Amy

We’re back at our usual Parkrun this week at Forest Fields. L runs it, I get the bacon butties in.

The afternoon sees a spot of hedge cutting and then a drive over to Derby. L drops me at the Derby Beer Festival and joins me for a pre-race curry there. She has a race tomorrow, I don’t but I do have a Crufts Team qualifier.

Then she heads off to meet Daughter at the train station. She gives Daughter a lift over to her father’s, where she (and Son) have been summoned for his birthday party, a significant one we believe.

I loiter at the beer festival awaiting her return and have a few beers to pass the time. Sadly the festival is a shadow of its former self. With Derby’s Assembly Rooms shut, one feels more as a political statement that anything else, the festival now takes place beside it, in a tent on the Market Square itself. It is more like a refugee camp than a beer festival. Hopefully they will find it a new home for next year.

When L returns we head off to see ‘Amy’ at Quad.

‘Amy’ is a documentary about Amy Winehouse made by Asif Kapadia, the man who also made one about Ayrton Senna. To do so, he had the full cooperation of the Winehouse family and this, if nothing else, results in an amazing collection of archive footage. These clips, many clearly made only for personal viewing, are extremely revealing and at times uncomfortable to watch. Added to the footage are the recollections of many of the people who shaped her life and career.

Her father has openly disowned the film, after he saw the final cut, saying it wasn’t a good portrayal of his daughter. I would disagree totally, if anything it paints Amy Winehouse in too good a light.

It’s everyone else who gets butchered, her father included. For being a rotten influence on her from the start. From his infidelity during her youth to his conversion to dotting dad when she gains success and wealth. I can see why he didn’t like it.

Winehouse is no saint of course but it seems that hardly anybody is prepared to guide her away from bad influences. Those that try fail when they come up against the major influence that is Blake Fieldler, the inexplicable love of her life. It is his relationship with the insecure Winehouse which seems to be the deadly tipping point in this story.

This is a man who leaves his current girlfriend to be with Winehouse, then leaves Winehouse to go back to her. Then he switches women again when Winehouse gains success and wealth. Are you spotting a pattern here?

Unlike her father, this particular hanger-on led her into hard drugs. Then there’s the press, of course, who relentlessly pursued her.

The contrast between the Amy of the early years up to the time of her début album ‘Frank’ in 2003 and what comes afterwards, when she hit the big time with ‘Back to Black’ in 2006, is very pronounced. At that time, even I was enchanted by the attractive young talent but I quickly lost interest as her appearance (and life) became more bizarre and she disappeared under the weight of her tattoos. 

This film however restores my original admiration. It shows how incredibly talented she was and how she made music on her own terms but what comes over most is how clever and personal her songs were. Many of her songs were of a highly personal nature with lyrics sourced from her own, often unpleasant, experiences.

Watching the film is, at times, a macabre experience. The footage of her final, ill advised, concert in Serbia in 2011 is not easy to watch. Winehouse is too drunk to be on stage let alone to sing. When she died just a month later of alcohol poisoning, aged just 27, it had a sad certain inevitability about it.

 

Her dreadful but popular cover of The Zutons’ ‘Valerie’, unmentioned in the film itself, accompanies the end credits. Sadly this, rather than her own stunning compositions, is what she will be remember for by many.

 

Whether this film tells the real truth or not it has lifted Amy Winehouse up several levels in my eyes, which can be no bad thing.

Well recommended.

(Saturday 11^th July)

What Is The World Coming To?

L heads off to Parkrun at Rushcliffe but gets diverted by the tram works, which are everywhere at the moment. This means she misses the run but, looking on the bright side, gets an extended bike ride.

I’m at yet another dog show at Catton Hall. I’m there both days this weekend. It doesn’t start well; Doggo misses a jump and gets five faults. What is the world coming to? I don’t know what he was playing at; it was right in front of him.

MD on the other hand is very good at missing out what is right in front of him and he’s so bloody frustrating today that I come to the conclusion that there must be better ways of spending a weekend. Actually probably hundreds of better ways of spending a weekend. He totally lacks confidence and this isn’t just in agility but with everything really. 

I task him with doing pretty much three runs back to back late morning. I don’t know if this is a good strategy to beat the heat or not. Putting him back in the car between runs two and three doesn’t seem to cool him much but it does produce our best run of the day. Today two largely rubbish jumping runs are followed by a fairly decent agility one albeit with a pole down. It is however, far too hot for all of us, so I shouldn’t be too hard on him.

My Mum and Dad turn up to watch and are surprised to find us completely done and rosette-less by lunch time. We head home, in search of some shade.

In the evening, L and I head over to Derby Beer Festival which this year is held mostly in a marquee on the market square due to the closure of the main hall at the Assembly Rooms. It’s pretty grotty in the marquee though and most of the best beer seems to be inside in the foyer or the Darwin Suite, along with much cooler temperatures, so we loiter there.

Me

‘Unknown’ Porter 5.5%

Fullers London Porter 5.4%

Fullers London Porter 5.4%

Titanic Nautical Mild 4.8%

Bartrams Conrade Bill 6.9% (Stout)

Elvedon Ported Porter 4.4%

Muirhouse Stumblin About 5.2% (Ruby)

L

Leatherbritches Game Over 5.0% (Mild)

Muirhouse Stumblin About 5.2% (Ruby)

Muirhouse Hat Trick IPA 5.2%

Titanic Nine Tenths Below 5.9% (IPA)

Navigation Abus 5.5% (IPA)

Everards Old Original 5.0%

(Saturday 13^th July)

No Bad Place To Be

On the bus today, as it’s the Derby Beer Festival.

L comes over after work and together we try and make sense of their new system, whereby they have laid the beers out in alphabetical order by brewery but the guide to the beers is ordered by beer style. To say it’s a little confusing would be an understatement.

I drink by brewery and had no problem finding where each brewery's beers were being served but then looking them up in the guide for more information was a nightmare. I would have liked to have worked my way around the local breweries but it was too taxing on the brain.

It means that we gave up trying to discover anything new and stuck to whatever was nearest. This turns out to be the Fullers stand, which is no bad place to be. Not with London Porter and the first cask version of their bottled 1845 I’ve ever seen.

Apparently there was also a Mead Bar this year but we couldn’t find that either. We found the Owd Rodger though, which is always a pleasant treat, and that wasn't even on the menu.

We get an early-ish bus home to get back for the dogs and order a takeaway curry to soak everything up.

Me
Revolution Clash London 4.5%
Black Paw IPA 5.0%
Falstaff Johnny Cash 4.7%
Marston Owd Rodger 7.6%
Fullers 1845 6.3%
Fullers London Porter 5.4%
Havant Got a Clue 6.5%
Fullers London Porter 5.4%

L
Jennings Snecklifter 5.1%
Fullstow 1962 & All That 4.5%
Mr Grundy’s Lord Kitchener 5.5%
Marston Owd Rodger 7.6%
Fullers 1845 6.3%
Fullers 1845 6.3%
Marston Owd Rodger 7.6%

(Friday 13th July)