Where Are We Now?: 2017

Wednesday, 13 December 2017

Snowmageddon out of here!

It was supposed to be a romantic weekend for two. My girlfriend and I visiting Amsterdam, a city I lived in and around for nine and a half years, and just before Christmas. A little sightseeing, some festive shopping, a couple of cosy dinners and then home to start another working week. And even though the weather forecast had talked of snow, being the out-in-the-Midday-sun Brits that we are, we didn’t see this as a reason to worry.

Even on the Sunday morning, as we trudged to breakfast pancakes through blizzard conditions like Captain Scott just popping out for a bit, we were confident that all would be fine later. No, really, this was just a dusting of snow, and that by the time we were meant to leave that afternoon, our modern plane, with its weather radar and automated flight systems, would soar up through the clouds.

It didn’t. As we were getting into the taxi to Schiphol Airport, a text message from British Airways said our flight had been cancelled. No suggestion of how we were now meant to travel, mind, just that it was off, and have a nice day. Tra-la-la. The missive provided a couple of numbers to call: the first didn’t work at all (BA’s Amsterdam call centre) and the second just offered details of a third number, in Newcastle, which of course everyone else was ringing, so you couldn’t get through. For the next 45 minutes I listened to a loop of soothing string music and suggestions of how I could get the best out of my weekend away. Marvellous.

At Schiphol we joined a queue that possibly led to a British Airways person to see whether we could get a new plane, or a hotel room, or a pot of gold or, frankly, anything. I decided to be bold and secured accommodation for the night at the Schiphol Sheraton (no point being inconvenienced for a night and uncomfortable). Eventually, a clearly already-weary BA employee rebooked us onto a new flight departing the next day, and that was all we could do about it. No other options, not even the train.

It was at this point that I begun to wonder where we actually were. This was Amsterdam, a city founded by intrepid international traders and now inhabited by one of the most vibrant, affluent, technology-savvy urban populations on Earth. And yet it was starting to feel like we were struck in the back of beyond in the midst of a crippling natural disaster. Little did we realise just what a crippling natural ”“disaster” we were stuck in for real.

That morning’s photogenic frosting had reduced the seven-runway Schiphol to just one and, worse, London City (where we were supposed to fly back to), Heathrow and other airports in the UK had been closed. Europe - or at least those parts of Europe unable to cope with snow - was grinding to a complete halt. Flights into and out of Schiphol, and again to and from the UK, were being progressively cancelled, leaving planes, crews and passengers in the wrong places at the wrong times. BA alone was said to have 50,000 passengers stranded around the world, which meant more than 300 aircraft were not moving.

The following morning we stoically camped in the Sheraton’s executive lounge, with the Schiphol and BA websites continuing to say our flight was on time, even when most others were being cancelled for a second day running. Ominously, it started snowing again, whiting out the planes we’d been reassuringly watching taxiing for most of the morning. But, thinking we still had a flight to catch we boldly left the comfort of free refreshment and went off to drop our bags at the terminal.

It was almost inevitable that our hubris would be shattered. In the 15-minute walk from bag drop, through an empty security inspection, to the lounge, our rebooked flight had been cancelled. And this time, no 24-hour delay. It would be a full two more days before BA would be able to get us out of Amsterdam. This was no longer a mere inconvenience: our two nights in Amsterdam had extended to five. Yes, there’d be compensation, hotel costs covered and a somewhat miserly £25 a day to keep us fed and watered. But we would now be delayed 72 hours to get home from a city only 230 miles away as the crow flies (were it able to get clearance to take off...).

Now, I know what you’re thinking: why, at this point, didn’t we drive or take the train? Well the first option was nixed by an absence of driving licences (plus the conditions would have been treacherous) and the second by train seats costing hundreds of Euros each disappearing before our very eyes.
By this stage we'd been reduced to the ‘you couldn’t make it up’ state of mental paralysis. We weren’t yet ready to cry and, oddly, not yet ready to lose it, either. Northern Europe had been caught by the weather, and Sunday afternoon’s chaos had snowballed - if I can use that word - with knock-on effects. BA's rebooking algorithms had made a huge assumption that it would be OK for us to turn a basic weekend into a five-day holiday, and that our employers and (in my girlfriend’s case) children wouldn’t have a problem with us being away for three nights longer than planned. But, of course, throughout there was no one to actually speak to, even if we wanted to complain as - guess what? - you couldn’t get through to anyone if you tried.

Luckily, got yet another hotel booked - our third of the trip (and, as it turned out, a rather nice one) - and headed off to the lengthy taxi queue where, as if trying to make a point, the weather conditions seemed to worsen further as we snaked slowly towards a ride back into Amsterdam.

So how does this story end? It is now Wednesday and we’re in the British Airways business lounge at Schiphol, checked in for a flight back to London this afternoon. The snow is clearing and it is drizzling, but the temperature has gone up and Schiphol has declared itself fully operational again. Life returns to normal.

Frankly, I’m amazed that both of us have remained sane throughout this experience. We've repeatedly reminded each other - and our Facebook friends - that there really is not a lot we can do other than sit it out. Our respective employers have also said the same, which has been wonderful of them (lucky that we have jobs with such flexibility). But, really.

Travel, as I'm prone to observe, seems to bring out the worst in people. But sometimes it brings out the worst in travel. Situations like ours are where people go mad and start lashing out. Twitter provides a somewhat healthy outlet for venting, as a search of the word “Schiphol” revealed. Inevitably, though, the poor employees staffing airport desks have taken the brunt of frustrations. To be honest, you can’t blame some complainants, as missed business meetings, college lectures, family gatherings and everyday normality is turned upside down by a transport infrastructure, that we normally use without blinking an eye, comes to a halt.

Those of us of a more rational composure will accept that snow is simply Mother Nature at work, even if mankind has done much to make severe weather “events” more severe. And we will accept that for all those hundreds of days in the year when planes take off and land like clockwork, once in a while it will all go Pete Tong, and there’s absolutely nothing you can do.

If there is one observation to offer, however, it is to British Airways: the blame for Sunday’s 'Snowmageddon' could hardly be placed at the airline’s feet (no - that must surely be shared between whoever didn’t order enough snowploughs and the weather forecasters who didn’t see such a huge dumping coming...), but there’s plenty BA must improve upon when these situations occur. It was only a few months before that an IT outtage left 75,000 of its passengers stranded throughout the world, and the once proud British flag-carrier’s reputation has taken a pounding ever since, by everything from shrinking seats and charging for food on short-haul flights, to its ageing aircraft fleet and making passengers with the cheapest tickets board those planes last.

BA’s low-cost rivals have their faults (Ryanair’s pilot shortage catastrophe might even make this week’s difficulties pale), but the absence of true customer service since Sunday seems to point to a threadbare organisation more concerned with short-term profit margins rather than long-term sustainability built on a quality product and the customer loyalty that deserves. And while BA’s chief executive Alex Cruz has promised a multi-billion pound investment in much needed new aircraft, as well as facilities like an improved business class and in-flight WiFi to help it catch up with its biggest competitors, this will do very little to repair the company’s reputation today. Because issues like paying for a sandwich are trivial when you can’t even get through to a helpline to get on a plane to begin with.

I’ve worked in corporate PR for many years and know that the first rule of crisis communication is to engage your stakeholders properly. If that means calling in every single employee on a Sunday to man the phones or hand out coffee and snacks at the airport, that’s what you’ve got to do. You can’t rely on automated text messages and bots rebooking people onto flights three days after they were due to depart as customer engagement if that customer isn’t being informed of the whys, hows, and whens. In a crisis you communicate and communicate often. Because if you don’t, an information vacuum develops leading to frustration and, in the case of travel - rarely the most placid of human conditions - palpable anger.

Lessons should have been learned from the May IT meltdown, when passengers complained about the lack of information as to what was going on, either collectively or in individual situations. A cursory text message may be a modern way of saying getting out information quickly, but if the follow-up process falls down, the engagement is pointless. Just as airports should have been better prepared for the snow, airlines should have been better prepared by putting staff on standby. Just two people on BA’s information desk at Schiphol on Sunday wasn’t enough (a problem replicated throughout the airport with other airlines), and although Schiphol employees were handing out bottled water and bars of chocolate on Monday, there was no such comfort on the day it all went wrong.

Perhaps, though, the worst lapse was in something that shouldn’t have cost a penny: an airline acknowledging that lives had been disrupted, that people wouldn’t be returning home to families or that business appointments would be ruined, that what should have been the simplest of excursions had been turned on its head.

Saturday, 11 November 2017

50, not out

“At the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month, the guns fell silent”. 11 minutes - and 49 years - later the silence was broken at 26 Groveland Way, New Malden. I had arrived. Now, 12 months shy of the centenary of the Armistice that ended the war supposed to end all wars, I’m 50. Which is, apparently, the new 40, though I wasn’t particularly comfortable with that number, to be honest.

Still, as optimists and age-deniers will cheerfully tell you, it is just a number, that age is merely relative. Despite (probably) being a middle-aged man since my mid-20s, I don’t actually feel all that old. And while I’m hardly in tip-top condition, I’d like to think my outlook is quite youthful. Still, though, 50 is 50. Half a century. My fiftieth spin around the sun. Bloody hell.

My memory is hazy, which isn’t a great portent for later years. I recently met a pal for a coffee and we both realised that, post-40 (he’s 56) we can’t any more hold conversations about music, films and telly without reaching for our iPhones to fill in gaps about names and trivia. Our brains, we concluded, are like computers with gradually disintegrating hard drives, retaining stuff you never expected to keep, and selectively losing vital pieces of information deep in the cracks, never to be brought up again.

What early memories I do have start to become doubts. My earliest recollection is one I can’t authenticate: I think I watched the moon landings on our black and white TV, but seeing as I would have been just 20 months old when Neil Armstrong made his giant leap, I doubt my noggin - even when it comes to telly consumption - is that good. Thanks to repetitive screenings of that, or Geoff Hurst’s winning World Cup goal in ’66, you start to think that, like Forrest Gump, you may have actually been there, or at least, witnessed it.

At least I can attest to have been alive when Armstrong jumped off the bottom rung of the Eagle's step ladder. And alive, just, when The Beatles were inventing rock music, when British and French ingenuity produced the never-bettered marvel that was Concorde; alive in 1970s Britain (which seemed to be mostly grey) and the start of colour television; alive during the rise of Margaret Thatcher, for which I have never forgiven British voters, and alive when the Cold War was at both its most intriguing and its most frightening; alive for Bowie, disco and punk, Reagan and Gorbachev, the Troubles and terror in the Middle East, recessions and economic booms, the mobile phone and the Internet, 9/11, Brexit and Trump (for, both, I will not forgive their respective voters, either).

In these 50 years I’ve been schooled and taken the path of employment, first in journalism, latterly in corporate PR. I have lived abroad, in the Netherlands, California and Paris. I have interviewed pop stars, film stars and TV stars, driven around Moscow with Jon Bon Jovi, witnessed the disaster of all live TV interviews with Ozzy Osborne in Red Square, hung out with Hulk Hogan and got to be there on the day Sky TV launched and changed the global - yes, global - media landscape forever.

These are, though, just snapshots, and I certainly won’t trouble you with the finer details of childhood holidays in Wales, teenage snogs or the other minutiae of these last 49 summers. Because, although I seem to be naturally disposed to nostalgia, and 50 years is a bloody long time, I should be looking forward, not back.

But indulge me one delve back in time: the day I was actually born - 11 November, 1967. The big news of that day in Britain was that investigators were trying find out what had made a British European Airways Comet airliner (the UK’s first home-grown passenger jet) explode over the Mediterranean; Bill Simpson of the radio soap opera Doctor Finlay’s Casebook had left his wife for Edward Fox’s ex; football league referees were threatening to boycott Millwall matches due to hooliganism; engineers at Leyland had developed the first jet-powered lorry, which would be on the road commercially by 1969; and a Lanarkshire toddler had swallowed her pet goldfish, but thanks to the administering of a glass of salted water, threw it up and returned it to its bowl. The big stories, as they appeared.

In the wider world, the Vietnam War was hotting up, notably on the propaganda side, with the office of General William Westmoreland, the US commander in Vietnam, claiming that US action had successfully reduced the number of communist forces (a CIA operative would, in 1975, admit that this was, in fact false, and that the enemy strength had been double that claimed. On November 11, 1967, three American PoWs - held captive for four years - were released by the Viet Cong.

On the day that my family was welcoming its third child, British television - the industry which provided my father with employment - was still a somewhat rarified affair, comprising of just three channels (including BBC2, which became in the previous July Europe’s first channel to broadcast regularly in colour). That Saturday afternoon, BBC1 offered Grandstand (including ‘Fight of the Week’ which, I presume, was boxing, a preview of the afternoon’s football fixtures, horse racing, “moto-cross”, rugby and the footy results. Over on ITV there was World Of Sport with Eammon Andrews presenting a mix of “international hockey”, “international table tennis”, more horse racing, and the-then jewel in ITV’s sporting canon, wrestling).

Early evening on BBC1 offered Dr. Who (opening episode of The Ice Warriors), Simon Dee’s Dee Time, Dixon Of Dock Green, the news read by Michael Aspel and The Val Doonican Show with guests Les Dawson and Wayne Newton. Next door on BBC2 that evening was a production of Wuthering Heights featuring Ian McShane as Heathcliff, followed by Dick Clement and Ian La Frenais’ sitcom Further Adventures Of Lucky Jim, starring John Le Mesurier. ITV’s Saturday evening line-up included Hughie Green’s talent show Opportunity Knocks!, Bob Monkouse’s legendary game show The Golden Shot, Man In A Suitcase - a detective series that I shamelessly borrowed the title from for my first regular magazine column, and after the news, The Des O’Connor Show. Quality.

That afternoon, and no doubt featured on Match Of The Day that night, Chelsea (then in their 1960s pomp and attracting the likes of Raquel Welch to Stamford Bridge) had beaten Sheffield Wednesday 3-0, with goals from John Hollins, Peter Osgood (‘The King of Stamford Bridge’) and John Boyle, in a side that also included Peter Bonetti, Eddie McCreadie, Marvin Hinton, Joe Kirkup, Ron ‘Chopper’ Harris, the mercurial Scottish winger Charlie Cooke, Tommy Baldwin and Joe Fascione, another Scot, albeit one with an Italian name (the first of many of Italian extraction to grace West London’s finest). I mention all of this for no other reason than I would become a Chelsea fan, and it’s pleasing to see that within a few hours of my arrival, they won a game. That may or may not have been an omen.

Just as Chelsea became one of my lifelong associations so, too, did music. On the day I popped out, the No.1 pop song in the UK was Baby, Now That I've Found You, the first single from the groundbreaking mixed-race British soul band, The Foundations, and which had benefitted from extensive airplay on the BBC’s new radio station, Radio 1, which had only been launched a couple of months before. Also in the Top 10 that week was the Bee Gees’ Massachusetts and the Troggs’ Love Is All Around, making its first assault on the ‘hit parade’ 27 years before Wet Wet Wet would make us suffer with their version.

Over in the albums section that weekend, Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band continued be on top (that it was the birth of both the concept album and progressive rock fills me with deep pleasure). The Jimi Hendrix Experience were a few places lower with Are You Experienced?, another debut album and the one which put Hendrix firmly on the map, Let’s, though, gloss over the fact that people were also buying the Sound Of Music and Dr. Zhivago soundtracks as well as - in a worrying forward echo of Ed Sheeran today - two from The Dubliners. Thankfully there was more interesting stuff going on in the chart’s lower reaches, with Scott Walker’s Scott, John Mayall’s Crusade and Otis Redding and Carla Thomas’ King And Queen. However, this one week’s charts don’t really do 1967 justice.

It was another year of music landmarks in what was already an extraordinary period of musical development, as early rock and roll started to evolve into pop and rock. 1967 saw the ‘Summer of Love’ and its peace, love and psychedelia, too, and both Sgt. Pepper and Magical Mystery Tour released that year, The Beatles seemed to be single-handedly transforming popular music, even laying the foundations for prog rock and concept-based albums. Elsewhere The Small Faces took a trip through Itchycoo Park, The Doors released their eponymous debut and Pink Floyd made their first appearance on record with The Piper At The Gates Of Dawn. Eric Clapton, Jack Bruce and Ginger Baker as Cream got heavy with Disraeli Gears, the Rolling Stones brought out Their Satanic Majesties Request, while The ‘Orrible ‘Oo released The Who Sell Out and The Velvet Underground (with Nico) gave us The Velvet Underground. Oh, and a certain David Bowie released his debut album, David Bowie, which largely sank without trace (though it does contain gems like Love You Till Tuesday and Silly Boy Blue).

Alright, so that’s the history lesson. Turning 50 means some reflection. I’m trying to avoid it. What’s done is done. Successes and failures, mistakes and misdemeanours, they’re all in the past. It’s time to face the future, but not without a thought of my age peers. Every year gives birth to people of note, but it’s always interesting to see who you’re keeping up with. Turning 50 with me this year are former deputy prime minister Nick Clegg, the Dutch prime minister Mark Rutte, Noel Gallagher, Paul Gascoigne, Matt LeBlanc, Pamela Anderson, Julia Roberts, Davina McCall, former Chelsea player 'Super' Dan Petrescu, the comedian Tim Vine, my rock star friend Steven Wilson, the Smashing Pumpkins' Billy Corgan, Letitia Dean - EastEnders' Sharon "Princess" Watts, the film director Judd Appatow, Will Ferrell, Jamie Foxx, Vin Diesel, Nicole Kidman and Sharleen Spiterri of Texas. Kurt Cobain and Philip Seymour Hoffman would have been 50. Given all of their achievements, I wonder how they’re facing up to 50?

As for me, I’m facing up to it “quite” well. Those around me will know why and because of whom. In fact my 50th birthday is a wonderful opportunity to draw a line under the previous half century, to forget the didn’t-happens and what-could-have-been and celebrate the what-happens-next, with family, friends and those closest to me. Bring it on, 50.

Thursday, 9 November 2017

Misty Mountain Hop: Father John Misty at the Eventim Apollo

It's a mark of my age that, on crossing Hammersmith Broadway, I could only think of the venue for this congregation for Father John Misty as the "Hammersmith Odeon". This is despite it having gone through numerous changes of sponsor over the last 30-odd years: Labatt's Apollo, Hammersmith Apollo, Carling Apollo, HMV Hammersmith Apollo and latterly the Eventim Apollo. But whomever's name sits above that distinctive, Grade-II listed art deco frontispiece, 'Hammy Odeon' will forever be one of London's most celebrated concert venues, thanks in part to being where Bruce Springsteen made his UK live debut in 1975, where Bowie ended the Ziggy Stardust tour two years before, and being venue of numerous live albums, most famously Motörhead's legendary No Sleep 'til Hammersmith.

It is, then, with this significant '70s rock heritage that in should roll Misty, the current incarnation of Josh Tillman, and the persona of a louche '70s rock star, plying wry, heartfelt folk-rock as if straight from West Hollywood's very own Troubadour. Tillman is blessed with all the accoutrements of the LA Canyon Cowboy, with great, long rock god hair, a magnificent beard, and a dry, cynical humour, all redolent of Billy Crudup’s Russell Hammond in Almost Famous. On top of this, he has a wonderful voice, melodic talent and stage presence to make Springsteen and indeed Jagger look like shrinking violets.

Now, re-read those musical reference points again: it’s no surprise that the Misty ‘character’ is, essentially, a distillation of all that made 1970s rock stardom what it was. That Tillman pirouettes and prances like Jagger, and assembled a huge stage band with the same attention to layered detail as Springsteen, feeds that brew. Throw in that voice - oh so similar to Elton John's in his 'classic' period (essentially, from Tumbleweed Connection and Madman Across The Water through to Captain Fantastic And The Brown Dirt Cowboy), and the strength of his deeply personal, cynical songwriting and you have a compelling live proposition.

And thus it proved to be. With three albums as Misty behind him, Tillman had 24 songs drawn from all three, opening up with the first four tracks in sequence from this year's brilliant Pure Comedy. Despite its title, it's an album of serious topics and thinking, taking broad, sweeping shots at the state of the world, from politics and religion to celebrity culture, subjects that Tillman has found outlets to comment on elsewhere, but in his stage delivery, actually fuel the intensity of it. Opening with Pure Comedy, and just Tillman and a piano, the song builds to the full might of what he, essentially, has on stage with him, a small orchestra, to play through Total Entertainment Forever, Things It Would Have Been Helpful To Know Before The Revolution and Ballad Of The Dying Man.

If his song titles are long, there is a paradox to it, since Tillman doesn't engage in a great deal of audience badinage (save for a few sharp retorts to noisy dickheads clearly experiencing alcohol for the first time, and one over-enthusiastic stage crasher removed by security - "I didn't know folk-rock could get you wild"). But that doesn't diminish his stage presence, with even the stage layout designed to create a wide aisle down which Misty could leap and twist and stretch when not at the microphone, like some crazed evangelical preacher (Tillman was raised in a strong, Pentecostal family on the outskirts of Washington DC), even falling his knees, James Brown-style, a couple of times. Together with a lot of strong backlighting and dry ice, very often Misty himself was, well, misty - obscured in silhouette. This may not have gone down well with the adoring female contingent in the audience, not that he would probably care that much, since the cult of celebrity is one of Tillman's many targets for barbs (along with music bloggers, so I'd better be careful...).

For all of Tillman's individual theatrics, this was a show somewhat devoid of it. A confetti burst after just the third song seemed oddly out of place - a finale stunt at best - and Tillman made a joke of it, though one would have thought that pyrotechnics would have been worked out at the time the stage show was being conceived. It was either an odd stunt, or an odd idea of when to bring levity to the show. On this basis, and Tillman's lyrics not withstanding, you could conclude that this was a excursion into muso humour. And while the show was [thankfully] light on rock and roll stuntery (save for Tillman tossing his guitar, somewhat riskily, to his guitar tech during a lively version of Nothing Good Ever Happens At The Goddamn Thirsty Crow) you couldn't help walking out having felt that you'd witnessed - or even experienced - a true spectacle. The Elton John/folk/rock/country reference points may provide a central guideline to what you expect from Father John Misty, but there is plenty of space for other things between the cracks and around the edges, such as the shuddering, pounding electronica-infused True Affection, as well as the singalong pop of I Love You, Honeybear, title track of Tillman's second Misty album.

From start to finish, via the ebb and flow of confessional lyric and solid country rock, this was a knowing presentation of an artist confident in his skin and confident of his own capabilities. Throughout, his voice remained magnificent, one of delightful purity. The former R. Dwight of Pinner might be one point of reference, but the tones of Jackson Browne or Niels Lofgren also come to mind.

As he reached the finale, with The Ideal Husband, it was impossible not to think that Tillman/Misty is well on his way to join the ranks of the other famed alumni of the Hammersmith 'Your Sponsor's Name Here' Odeon. If I had one reservation, it's that Tillman can come across as being somewhat aloof. But, then, isn't that how a proper rock star should be?

Monday, 6 November 2017

Back on dry land

So that was it, my first ever cruise. Seven days, three stops and over 2500 nautical miles travelled (or 3000 miles by very clever car). In maritime adventure terms, though, this was a mere Sunday afternoon drive. However, being my maiden voyage I had a limited idea of what a "voyage" would actually be like (my scope of knowledge being limited to cross-Channel school trips by car ferry, Sir Walter Raleigh's discovery of the potato, the Royal Navy travelling for several weeks to deal with the Argies in the South Atlantic, and Captain Kirk and the Enterprise and its five-year mission to boldly go where no toupee had gone before).

To some extent this spin around the Caribbean was not a lot more than an extended stay at a floating version of a Las Vegas 'resort' hotel, with the Oasis Of The Seas providing a dizzying enclosure containing 17 restaurants and 11 bars, four luxury brand boutiques, a running track, four swimming pools, six jacuzzis, an ice skating rink, yoga classes on the helipad, a casino, an open-air cinema which also doubles as a water show, and around 6,000 'guests' using 24 elevators (more of which later...).

The key difference, however, between Vegas and the Oasis is what you can do when the ship sails into a port. The choice of shore excursions is bewilderingly impressive, although the extensive options include plenty of premium-priced days out, some of which could set you back up to $145 each - heavy going if you're travelling as a family.

Plenty, though, are just happy to get off the boat for a bit to go shopping. Our final shore stop, Cozumel in Mexico, is a case in point. I say 'Mexico', but Cozumel is an island south of Cancún, and hardly representative of the whole country. There are long-distance excursions on offer, such as Jeep tours of Mayan ruins or dolphin encounters, but most of the disgorged passengers (including this one) seem content with heading straight for country star Jimmy Buffet's Margaritaville chain restaurant to chug a giant cocktail and a burger, or do a quick whip round the shopping centre for jewellery bargains (a similar concept to the cruise terminal shops in Falmouth).

Cozumel is also a hub for these giant cruise ships: it's hard not use superlatives like "majestic" when you see several of these beautiful, gleaming boats berthed together. On our stop I counted five of them, including our own and its sister, Liberty Of The Seas from Royal Caribbean, and three from the Carnival line. The cruise industry is so competitive that you can't help but looking across at another ship and making comparisons of which had the nicer sun deck or the better looking swimming pools. That's also when you realise that the ridiculous number of facilities touted in the marketing blurb is all about breeding cruise line loyalty and even the sort of attachment to individual ships that people have for hotels.

But back to the shore visits. As with Haiti and Jamaica, you’d be hard pressed to feel like you’d absorbed Mexico for the day, but on the other hand, a day of pure indulgence in the sunshine, with some booze and retail therapy thrown in for good measure, is what holidays should be about. At the end of the day that's precisely what this cruise has been for the 6,000 on board. Some have been perfectly content to spend all seven days on a lounger doing nothing more strenuous than watching clouds skud overhead. Others have been on the gangplank at the first opportunity, like D-Day commandos champing to get ashore to zipline/kitesurf/snorkel/insert_activity_here.

And if truth be told, the shore visits provide freedom from a form of claustrophobia. That might sound mad for a ship as big as Oasis, but even in an 18-deck, 1100 foot-long gargantuan like this one, 6,000 people can very soon get on top of each other. On Saturday, our final full day at sea, with the sun playing hide-and-seek as we cut between Cuba and the Florida Keys, a shopping frenzy broke out in the 'Royal Promenade' as a rank of jewellery stands turned it into a ship-borne Hatton Garden. Like duty free catalogues on planes, there is a suggested glamour about it all, but the close-up reality is less so, with the laid out ‘designer’ watches and handbags looking more Peckham Market than upmarket.

With this retail feeding frenzy came zoo conditions as people, desperate for a bargain, stepped over their own to get to the front of the queues. This, then, leads me to the less savoury aspect of this trip: manners. We Brits are said to be distinguished by our observance of good etiquette, so the absence of it on board comes as an abrupt shock. Such is the urgency with which people have to get to their next meal or to the handbag sale that Ps, Qs and a basic "excuse me" suddenly become abandoned. I'm sure these same people are perfectly civil at home, or when out at the supermarket, but somehow a pre-paid floating resort experience gives them a sense of entitlement.

Nowhere is this more so than in the lifts. I mentioned this in my post the other day, but as the week has worn on, elevator etiquette has disappeared altogether. The 24 lifts on the Oasis never seem to be working all at once, which means the fight for space is excruciating. At meal times or any other peak period of inter-deck travel the lack of common courtesy is almost comically bad. Royal Caribbean claims the average age of its cruise passengers is 48, but on evidence of these last few days, I'd say it's at least 78, and these 'seniors' are a sturdy bunch. What they lack in walking speed they make up for in sheer bloody-mindedness to get to the front for coffee, discounted leather goods, free pizza - you name it.

I could go on about the elderly and their lack of manners (or lack of bipedal speed), but I can hear a voice at the back of my head saying "that'll be you some day". As I approach 50 on Saturday I sincerely hope that I don't become that discourteous or even that desperate to eat before 6pm, but then that also raises the question of whether I'd take a cruise again. I'll defer that for now. Because I know - and you know - that whether you're on a cruise ship or at the Get Lucky Big Casino Resort & Hotel in Las Vegas, there will still be an octogenarian riot for the Early Bird Special Buffet and there will still be a traffic jam of mobility scooters queuing to get into the breakfast cafes. Likewise the hotels of Benidorm and Magaluf.

Again, as I stressed a few days ago, I don't wish to appear a holiday snob. I just prefer a more genteel meal experience, and being someone who uses public transport to get to work, I like a holiday where I don't have to let a lift go because it's overfull, and I'll take the next one. Or next but one...

Despite all this, as I settle into my final stop - an airport hotel in Orlando - I definitely feel more relaxed than when I arrived here, which surely is what a holiday should achieve. But where does this come from? How can the technicolour maelstrom that has been life aboard the Oasis Of The Seas be anything like relaxing? It's quite simple, and it covers two-thirds of this planet's surface. Sitting on my 'stateroom' balcony at various times over the last seven days, with nothing but ocean all around us, I have been rendered utterly placid. Normally on holiday I will spend most of it with headphones clamped to my head listening to music. I've just realised that I haven't touched my headphones since the flight over from London. The ocean has been all the soundtrack I've needed when I've needed escape from the hubbub onboard.

Living next to the Thames in Greenwich for the last year, I have come to appreciate the power of water, that commodity, essential to all life. When I need some meditation time, I will grab a coffee from Costa and just sit on the wall near my flat, watching the river go by. Over this last week, I've done the same, albeit with an entire ocean going past. And whether it's the sea air or the sense of perpetual motion, I have found peace and an almost zen-like calm. That, for those who've been asking, is my takeout from my inaugural cruise. It's not about the "dining experiences", or the amusement factor of an ice skating rink at sea on a ship touring the Caribbean. It's not even about the wonderful, entertaining company I've been fortunate to keep during this trip.

No, it's about the ocean. So here's my tip, if you're going to go on a cruise (and there's nothing that says you shouldn't), get a cabin with an exterior balcony.

Thursday, 2 November 2017

Jamaica, in

“Jamaica? No, she came of her own accord”. Sorry, had to get that out of the way. Yes, we have arrived in the aforementioned island, home to reggae, Bob Marley, Usain Bolt, implausible bobsleigh teams and a colonial history that, being European and, particularly, English, I have nothing to be proud of.

I say I’m "in" Jamaica (or is it on?), but if the truth be told I’ve ventured less than a quarter of a mile into the country (and half of that was walking off the boat and through a sort-of border post) and only as far as the Falmouth cruise terminal. This is, essentially, a prison exercise yard for cruise passengers, branded 'Red Stripe Beach', with rival ships from the Royal Caribbean and Disney lines offloading their human cargos to spend a day wandering around assorted local 'craft' and jewellery shops (i.e. tat), buying rum, drinking Red Stripe and chowing down on Jamaican pies (basically, Cornish pasties, and the fact it is in a town named after Cornwall's Falmouth is not lost, either).

For those feeling particularly adventurous, seven-hour, heavily-escorted bus excursions to Bob Marley's house or Montego Bay - presumably to also buy Marley-themed comedy Rasta wig combos, rum and packets of rum cake - are also on offer at the terminal. If I'd been feeling brave I would have hired a taxi to Goldeneye, Ian Fleming's estate (which he first occupied following a stint in British Naval Intelligence on the island and from which James Bond was inspired). But having spent much of my last holiday scampering after Bond filming locations in Sardinia, I chose a more sedate day in Jamaica, a decision helped by it being exceedingly warm and humid. So, no to Dr. No. As it was, when I ventured outside the cruise terminal's gates for no more than ten yards I was accosted by a gentlemen offering me "a smoke". I safely assumed it wasn’t going to be a Marlboro Light.

Today's brief land invasion did, however, serve a purpose that the cruise lines have noticed themselves, especially amongst younger passengers, that the cruise stopover agenda is a sort of tapas tasting plate of destinations. Our Haitian and Jamaican visits could hardly be described as immersive, new land experiences, but the warm waters of Haiti and the almost cartoon-like whirl around a tiny triangle of Jamaica provided some flavour of these Caribbean islands, if only a taste as expansive as being handed a sample of cheese in a supermarket. But as someone who has mostly holidayed in either the US or the Mediterranean, I’m suddenly awake to the idea of Barbados, St. Lucia, Antigua or any other of the recently storm-beaten paradise isles that live in this parish. All those idyllic beaches and swimming in bath-temperature seas, cocktail-infused nights and laid-back vibes. These are all, of course, horrendous cliches straight from the brochure, but having seen a little of it, it's not all that out of reach.

Tomorrow we reach Cozumel in Mexico, another purpose-built resort owned by the Royal Caribbean line, and much like Falmouth, a well controlled destination. There will be on offer bus tours to Mayan ruins, ATV adventures and opportunities (for a price) to swim with dolphins. Nothing at all that would bring one in contact with Mexico's worsening darker side. In fact, an enormous smorgasbord of activities which, should you be so inclined and have the funds at your disposal, can enable you to spend an entire day "in" Mexico. But, like visiting a zoo, there’s never any danger of being allowed on the other side of the reinforced glass. I must admit, though, as much as planned activities aren’t exactly my cup of tea, you can’t say you don't have the opportunity to see these countries in some part during the stopover. For some, they enable a sip of somewhere new. For others, it’s an excuse to spend the day dozing on the sun deck of this giant floating hotel, absorbing another paperback and occasionally trotting up to the bar for a cold one. Each to their own.

Wednesday, 1 November 2017

Island life

Yesterday morning the Oasis Of The Seas arrived in Haiti, and for this cruise newcomer it was a unique experience, waking up with an entire country hoving into view. Now, I know that anyone who has flown anywhere - including myself - will have experienced this novelty many times, but ideally from 38,000 feet. To see, for the first time, the trees, mountains and beaches of a ‘new’ country from the deck of a boat is something to savour.

It sounds corny - actually, it is corny - but you can’t help thinking what the early European explorers must have been like, casting first sight on the white sands of these islands (obviously, before claiming them in the name of the colonial power that sent them). Haiti, which shares an island with the Dominican Republic, is where Christopher Columbus is said to have landed in 1492, in his pre-GPS attempt to find Asia. "D'oh!" is, I believe, the appropriate comment. Columbus' 'discovery' was the 15th century equivalent of a truck driver misreading his satnav and getting wedged under a railway bridge. After running his ship aground near what is now the town of Limonade (Prop. R.White?), Columbus set about creating the first European settlement in the Americas - ‘La Navidad’, named after Christmas Day, the day they arrived. The rest, as they say, is history, from Columbus to Trump.

Somewhere in that timeline evolved the American cruise passenger, a creature with a recognisable descendency from the early settlers. Bold, fearless and fully prepared to consume all that lies in front of them. Just as those early pioneers felt no fear from a strange land with strange flora and fauna, the cruise passenger is unperturbed by a full elevator (a phrase I must use instead of "lift" as I am technically on American soil). There are 24 elevators on the Oasis serving its passenger decks and they are in constant use, shuttling the blessed 6,000 between decks, free food and sundry entertainments. Despite this, these elevators are rarely empty. Indeed, such is the demand, if there’s a gap - no matter how minuscule - people will cram in. Most notably this affront to good manners is at its worst amongst the more 'senior' passengers, who pile in like the front row of a rugby scrum, as if it was the last ride out of town and the buffet was about to close. This is often accompanied by a "Don’t mind me, dear", as a little old lady flattens you against the elevator's wall.

Even for a ship this size (for comparison, it is almost 200 feet longer than the Royal Navy's new 'super' aircraft carrier, HMS Queen Elizabeth), it can become claustrophobic. There are, simply, people everywhere, usually moving slowly in packs seeking sustenance. The platoons of mobility scooters alone create urban rush hour conditions (early morning traffic reports: "There are brake lights all the way up to the entrance to the Windjammer Marketplace...!"). The vast Windjammer restaurant spans the entire width of the ship's crown on Deck 16 and during breakfast it resembles the Florida alligator farm I visited two years ago - a lot of leathery looking creatures circling each other in the hunt for food and a coffee tank not on its last dregs. This swirl of humanity at 7am can be overwhelming, especially if your idea of holiday bliss is a Tuscan village, empty in the searing afternoon heat.

This is why the shore stops are very welcome. Arriving in Haiti was a welcome reminder that cruising is as much about arriving as travelling, and not just about lying on a topside sun lounger as vivid blue ocean gushes past. The opportunity to go ashore was too good to decline, especially with access to a cabana on a private beach. In my ever-expanding list of holiday preferences, I'm not naturally a beach person, but the novelty value of these 'off world' excursions is that you get some sand between your toes, take a swim in warm ocean and look across the bay to the boat you arrived on. Momentarily you feel like you've visited the island, even if you haven't, actually, gone any further than the boundaries of a private resort owned by the company that owns the boat itself.

Over the course of seven days, we will have visited three countries - Haiti, Jamaica and Mexico. This, in itself, is not so strange for someone who has many times driven from Amsterdam to London through the Netherlands, Belgium and France. But even though this isn't the grandest of voyages - there's only so far you can go in seven days at sea - it's not without its adventure. Much of this comes at a premium, with an eye-watering array of shore excursions offering everything from zip-lining and kayaking, to dolphin encounters. Given the prevailing demographic on board, the shopping trips and wine tasting trips are probably the more popular. Cynical as it's easy to be about all this activity, and the sensual overload that being on this boat is, you have to remind yourself that you are, essentially, on board a giant holiday camp. In 1950s Britain, it would have been a daily regimen of knobbly knees contests and questionable beauty pageants; here, it's prize-bearing Halloween parades (in which people really do go the distance to dress up), karaoke contests and an at-sea casino where hundreds of dollars appear to be gambled - and lost - with crazy abandon.

For me, it's been illuminating so far and a truly fascinating exercise in people watching, too. Every American stereotype is on board, all - it would appear - having an exceedingly good time. As I write we have just docked in Falmouth, Jamaica. Named after the Cornish port, of course, and - according to the weather forecast, likely to be as inclement as every childhood holiday I had in Cornwall. Bring it on.

Monday, 30 October 2017

Cruise Control

I’ll be honest, a Caribbean cruise had not really been on my ‘Things To Do Before You’re 50’ list. But on the basis of ‘why not?’ I said, “why not?”, and now find myself at the aft end of Deck 14 (or the "14th floor", as I like to call it) of a ship measuring almost a quarter of a mile long and towering 236ft above the water, amongst 6,000 other passengers and 12,000 plants and 56 living, breathing trees, watching the sea, the occasional tropical island and, hopefully, a few whales and dolphins float past.

With the approach of my 50th year on this planet, the opportunity to see a new part of it while travelling at a sedate 21 knots an hour seemed like a perfect convergence. Admittedly, though, the idea of being on a boat with more than 8,000 people, crew included, is not my normal idea of a holiday: I’m someone who gets people-phobic in a hotel with more than one lift, and I would not, normally, go to a resort offering all-you-can eat dining and a demographic that could realistically enable the staging of mobility scooter races around the half-mile running track on Deck 5, with a grid size not far off the 22 vehicles that start a Formula 1 Grand Prix.

This might sound snobbish, but I assure you it is not. I just - normally - prefer more holidays which don't require dressing up and in which I have the freedom to explore places in my own time or simply do nothing, without having to queue to sit down for dinner at a set time because of a system. So, to be at sea for seven days amongst a population similar in size to that of a small town is certainly out of my comfort zone. And to be on an itinerary whereby whole days elapse without the scenery changing much from, simply, blue ocean seems counter-intuitive. But that should be exactly what I’m doing, 13 days before I turn 50: a new experience, a new vista.

Cruising is, today, far from some Hemingway-esque exercise in rugged adventure it may have once been seen to be. Nor is it anything like Carry On Cruising or The Love Boat, my two sole reference points (carefully removing Titanic from that frame) - a never-ending programme of mass keep-fit sessions and deck quoits, with occasional bouts of projectile vomiting. Cruise ships today come with celeb-chef restaurants, sky-diving simulation machines, casinos and designer brand boutiques. Mine - Royal Caribbean’s vast Oasis Of The Seas - has an ice-skating rink, it's own English pub, a production of Cats, two rock-climbing walls, and more dining options than I actually know what to do with. Cruising is also no longer the preserve of the elderly (though the age group on this boat is definitely skewed somewhere considerably north of my own...). Indeed, the Florida-Caribbean Cruise Association claims that cruisers are getting younger, with Millennials and Generation X-age passengers choosing cruise holidays over land-based breaks. Indeed these two groups, according to the FCCA, like cruising as a means of ‘sampling’ destinations for later and longer trips.

That said, it's hard - yet - to get a full idea of who is on this boat, such is the enormity of its human cargo. Boarding was relatively - and reassuringly - quick, through the logistics must be astonishing: if you know how chaotic boarding a Boeing 747 can be, imagine more than ten times that number pitching up at Port Canaveral in Florida, in scenes resembling the Ellis Island sequence in The Godfather Part II. Credit, though, to Royal Caribbean: it all works.

Once on board it takes time for the newbie to get acclimatised. For a start, there’s the sheer scale of the boat. Oasis Of The Seas was, when launched in 2009, the largest cruise vessel in the world, and even with bigger ships coming into use, it still beggars belief. I could probably spend my entire week exploring it and still not cover everything. And that’s the point: these cruise ships are an exercise in over-consumption, and you pay the privilege for it.

The cruise industry is a big, $40 billion-per-year business. The major cruise lines will invest almost $5 billion this year alone in new ships and services, and their 23 million passengers will spend more than $3 billion at the various destinations the ships call into. The US accounts for roughly half those passengers, and with a predominantly American clientele on board this ship, it’s easy to see how. Not for nothing is the baseball cap the predominant headgear, and the capped-sleeve T-shirt very much in evidence. Cruising draws a loyal crowd: the average passenger on one of these big US-based ships will have taken more than five cruises as an adult prior to the current trip, and that’s certainly borne out by the people I’m travelling with on this seven-day voyage around the Caribbean, which will take me to Haiti, Jamaica and Mexico before returning to Florida. And that, in itself, is a statement I couldn’t imagine making before: a "voyage".

Ever since humankind first discovered that a felled tree could float, we've been exploring these oceans, crossing them, migrating via them, discovering new countries, subjugating their indigenous incumbents, trading with them, exploiting their resources and more. So I can hardly claim, at the end of October 2017, to be Columbus. But, after 24 hours on board and almost 24 hours at sea on the first leg of the trip, with nothing but endless ocean outside of my cabin, and hot-and-cold-running buffet seemingly available around the clock on the interior of this floating town, I’m starting to see the attraction.

Yes, you can indulge in a daily curriculum that includes Martini lessons, karaoke, jazz guitar instruction, “fun” activities around the pool and a machine dispensing Coca-Cola simply by holding up a cup with an embedded chip in it; or you can lie on a sun lounger surrounded by others exposing their equally pale, flabby flesh to the sky, just dozing to the rhythm of a ship at sea, occasionally dropping anchor to indulge in beach life and local craft stalls for a few hours before returning to the onboard buffet and casino. And despite the size of this ship, with its battalions of 'seniors' moving at a sluggish pace in search of food at 5pm, or the gaudiness and volume of the entertainment options, there is also a peace and calm to be found, that I'm enjoying from my balcony overlooking water of an almost unreal blue. The only sound being the gentle chug of engines and water washing against the hull. In fact, it really is most relaxing.

Tomorrow we stop spend a few hours in Haiti, a country I know principally for its natural disasters, its murderous father-and-son dictators ‘Papa Doc’ and ‘Baby Doc’ Duvalier, and being the back story of Steely Dan’s Haitian Divorce. I have a lot to learn. Welcome to the new order.

Monday, 16 October 2017

Robert Plant's Carry Fire

Pop quiz: can you name any frontmen - and notably, British frontmen - famed for being the focal points of legendary rock groups and who have now spent considerably more time on their own than they ever did in the bands with which they made their reputations?

Off the top of my head there is Paul McCartney (the you-know-whos). Peter Gabriel (Genesis), Bryan Ferry (Roxy Music) and, latterly, Morrisey (The Smiths). There are probably many more. Perhaps you can play this very entertaining game on your next dull car journey.

One further entry to this canon must be Robert Plant. His musical alma mater, Led Zeppelin, of course, only lasted 12 years before John Bonham's untimely death brought a sudden end to one of rock's most defining bands. Like Gabriel's eight years with Genesis or McCartney's 'paltry' decade with The Fabs, Plant's Zeppelin history has been both a blessing and the proverbial millstone. He can't avoid it, and on his last tour (which I got to experience in both Paris - at Le Bataclan, a matter of yards from the stage - and at the Montreux Jazz Festival) there was no shortage of Zeppelin material, albeit carefully selected and adapted to the eclectic sound of his diversely-influenced band, the Sensational Space Shifters. But the so-called Zeppelin reunion ten years ago at the O2 Arena (technically it was Plant, Jimmy Page and John-Paul Jones playing together at a benefit for Ahmet Ertegün) - while suitably respectful of the Zeppelin legend - unwittingly whetted appetites for a full revival. Page is said to be still up for it, Jones is apparently non-committal, while Plant...

'Indifferent' barely covers Plant's attitude towards returning to the band he joined in 1968 at the outset of a 12-year lifespan that, at times, resembled more of a military campaign than simply four men playing blues-inspired rock'n'roll (and, in the process, inventing heavy metal). Even last year's legal dispute, in which the LA band Spirit challenged the providence of Stairway To Heaven (claiming a close resemblance to their 1968 instrumental Taurus) brought Plant, Page and Jones together, briefly, without anything more coming from it.

Plant has always been somewhat diffident on the subject of a return to Zeppelin, and in a recent interview with Rolling Stone he maintained his distance: "Um, well, what was once a steady date becomes a cup of coffee. That's basically how it turned out, a cup of coffee from time to time. But nothing intimate," he replied to being asked whether the reunion was like old times. While Plant and his former cohorts could earn tens of millions from a Zeppelin revival, Plant's focus is clearly doing his own thing - enjoying life back home in England, on the Shropshire border with Wales, and pursuing his rock-meets-roots music.

Thus, Carry Fire - released on Friday - continues the eclecticism of 2014's Lullaby And...The Ceaseless Roar - "grooves and moves," he recently describe the album, albeit with a greater rooting in Plant's musical past, indeed to the blues and rock'n'roll of his teenage. There is a subtle mood of contemplation about it, as the recently-turned 69 Plant embraces age and, possibly, even his own mortality, as well as the world around him. Not that it is morbid or stark in nature and he is typically self depreciating about his encroaching years ("I play soccer every Wednesday at 7pm," he revealed to Rolling Stone. "I play till someone says, 'Go in goal – it looks like you're gonna die.' Then somebody brings the defibrillator quick.").

Plant's voice throughout Carry Fire is gentle, closer to a whisper, gently coating some songs rather than dragging them forward as he did with that banshee scream in his Zeppelin pomp. Ah, yes, that band again. Perhaps he doesn't do himself any favours by opening the album with The May Queen, though he maintains that it is somewhat coincidental that he should draw reference to that character bustling in the hedgerow of Stairway, even if the song is as steeped in Plant's romantic side as that song from Led Zeppelin IV.

Sonically, The May Queen sets the tone for the remaining 11 tracks, each drawing on reverb-drenched rockabilly, Appalachian folk, the strings and sounds of North Africa, as well as pastoral England. They mark a certain contentment with the form, one that has never settled into anything simple - even his bluegrass tie-up with Alison Krauss, Raising Sand found channels of exploration. There are obvious comparisons to be drawn to Peter Gabriel, especially with the richness of the Sensational Space Shifters' screeches and scratches, bleeps and blurps, many the result of guitarist/multi-instrumentalist Justin Adams, ex-Cast guitarist Liam 'Skin' Tyson, former Massive Attack and Portishead keyboard player John Baggott and the Gambian purveyor of all manner of exotic stringed instruments, Juldeh Camara, separating into their own recording unit to come up with parts of songs to reattach to Plant's core material.

The man who once screamed out "Valhalla!" on Immigrant Song returns to migration with New World..., taking a gentler view of human movement ("In songs we praise a happy landing, on yet another virgin shore") while Adams' guitars screech out a chugging rhythm like angle grinders. Plant expresses his dismay at the current occupant of the White House with Carving Up The World Again...A Wall And... while addressing man's desire for war with Bones Of Saints, both songs constraining any anger while the ensemble's rugged, reverb-shaped soundscapes do as much to express anger as any screaming vocals might have done.

Indeed, Plant's voice - at times an entire register lower than in his Zeppelin pomp - is more like a coating: on A Way With Words it is hushed almost to the point of a whisper, hauntingly drawn over a reluctant-sounding piano. It is in these textures that Plant now plays: even Bluebirds Over The Mountain, a duet with Chrissie Hynde and a cover of an old rockabilly number once done by both the Beach Boys and Ritchie Valens, is given a low-key, looped-up twist that sounds like Garbage doing a hoe-down.

The overall effect of Carry Fire is one of confident maturity. Plant knows he's an elder statesman, but has no need to exploit past glories. Instead he is flying his own kite, boldly, in the way this album's songs are arranged and delivered. It may, at times, sound like Eddie Cochran doing trip-hop, but it is - I wager - utterly unique. And utterly brilliant.

Saturday, 14 October 2017

A slice of reality: Squeeze's The Knowledge

For reasons I can't explain, and would probably require a pyschology professional to help understand, I've always been fascinated by celebrity associations with the environs I occupy. Discovering that John Martyn was born in a house less than half mile from the dwelling where I entered this world was like hitting a rich seam of gold. That Eric Clapton walked the very streets I did growing up, or that Jimmy Page and Jeff Beck haled from districts no more than a bus ride from my front door provided sparkle to an otherwise not particularly thrilling suburban existence.

So now I'm living in Greenwich, I'm discovering an iconic part of London famed not only for its maritime history, but for being the epicentre of one of the great earthquakes - even if one with somewhat erratic aftershocks - of British pop music. For it was around here that Chris Difford and Glenn Tilbrook found a kindred musical interest that would become Squeeze and endure - more often off than on - for the last 44 years. Difford's superb memoir, Some Fantastic Place: My Life In And Out Of Squeeze charts extensively the ebb and flow of his relationship with Tilbrook, as well as the intrinsic part south-east London (and Greenwich, in particular) has played in their lives, and still does.

These two elements - their relationship and their origins - is an underlying background to The Knowledge, the 16th studio album under the Squeeze name and as musically and lyrically rich as anything they've produced since their recorded debut in 1979. Like all musical partnerships, Difford and Tilbrook's has always been strongly fraternal, a classic case of they only do what they do best when it's been the two of them working together - the former's lyrical wit (recognisably of its geographic origin) whether spoken, written or sung, the latter's melodic ease. Of course, that fraternity has been frequently stretched, often as Difford - as his memoir reveals - has gone off on his own path, encountering demons in the way. But it's a brotherly fabric that even when stretched seemingly beyond shape, it has a welcome habit of retracting back to the state that serves the relationship best.

While their last outing, 2015's Cradle To The Grave (a musical accompaniment to Difford's Deptford schoolfriend Danny Baker's sitcom based on his first memoir) was a first flexing of the Difford/Tilbrook writing muscle in a while, The Knowledge feels like a fully-fledged adventure. And a grand adventure it is, too. Opening track Innocence In Paradise delivers a cinematic Western-theme, while still rooted in London's southern hemisphere, evoking both the social commentary of Up The Junction as well as that perennial pub singalong favourite Cool For Cats. Patchouli sets itself in Difford's Greenwich hometown, referencing Maryon Wilson Park in a nostalgic nod back to some of the tales his book's early chapters covers in entertaining depth. London is a recurring muse in Difford's lyrics, with Rough Ride giving a less than glowing appraisal of the struggles facing Londoners today ("this city we love") while married to a Steely Dan-like funk.

If we were honest, there are few pop acts who can do social conscience without sounding insincere or, simply, corny. Bruce Springsteen can succeed in covering the blue collar human condition whereas Phil Collins singing about homeless people just sounds false. It's all about how you go about it. Thus, A&E, with its gentle jazz-soul, shouldn't deliver anything even remotely cutting about the state of the NHS. But it does. "It wouldn't hurt to give them more," Tilbrook sings about public sector wages. It is, even with a serious message, simply a lovely song.

When Squeeze emerged at the beginning of the post-punk New Wave, they could easily have been categorised as novelty pub rock merchants. But this dismisses Difford and Tilbrook's mastery as songwriters of exquisite, if too often unrecognised class. Final Score is a perfect example - a beautifully crafted, beautifully performed slice of soul - replete with a piano solo former member Jools Holland would be proud of - that lulls you into its arms...until you realise that its about a young boy with aspirations to become a professional footballer being abused by a predatory coach. It's here that you realise that Difford is taking no prisoners with his writing, whether tackling topics as diverse as erectile dysfunction on Please Be Upstanding, record collectors on Albatross, or his relationship with Tilbrook on Two Forks.

One of my frustrations with Squeeze over the years is that they have, too often, only been judged by their hit singles. And while the greatest hits packages that aggregate these songs have, it would appear, kept them solvent during the lean years, the real strength to this band can only be fully experienced in their albums. The Knowledge is a welcome reminder of just why Difford and Tilbrook have been rightfully compared to pop's greatest writing partnerships - yes, a certain pair of Scousers included. Tilbrook has called it their "best-ever record", and he may not be wrong. It's certainly one of the most consistent, soup-to-nuts good albums in their history, one that feels like its been written and recorded with comfort and ease, particularly Difford and Tilbrook being comfortable and at-ease with each other, and rooted in reality - the pain and joy of it.