Dark Side of the Moon, Yeah Yeah Yeahs and a rector

BBC R4 reminded me this morning that it is now forty years since the release of Dark Side of the Moon by Pink Floyd. Obviously, I hear you say, but there is a slight possibility that there is someone somewhere who has never heard it. Unlikely I know but we cater to all types on this blog.

It was 1973, I was living in Cheltenham, and my pal Mike took me for a drive in his Jaguar XJ6, or was it an XJ12; he was showing off as he often did, and probably still does, in the nicest of ways of course, and he was playing this cassette tape which turned out to be Dark Side. It was before the days of surround sound but Mike seemed to have the world's finest music system installed in his car. He was a bit like that, a tech kind of guy. I was more impressed with his tape than his car, or maybe not, I don't really remember, but the music I've always remembered and still play, on CD of course, though I've also got the vinyl version and probably the tape that Mike undoubtedly copied for me. Happy days. One of the great albums, which will be played long after none of us are around and Lady Gaga is long forgotten.

Furthermore and incredible as it may seem it is now fifty years since the release of She Loves You by a little band called the Beatles, on Friday August 23, 1963, if memory serves. The greatest band of all time of course, I'm sure we can all agree. The boys wrote the song in Paul's home in Liverpool, his father suggesting they drop the yeah yeah yeahs as it was too crude and American, and just sing yes yes yes instead! The pillock.

I first heard this song in the most beautiful village in the world, Aird Tong, on the beautiful Island of Lewis, as I did most Beatles songs until 1966. I don't remember exactly what I was doing at the time or where it was that I first heard it. Maybe lying in bed listening to the radio or maybe someplace else. Maybe someone reading this can remind me. The songs remain fresh to this day and I still listen fondly to them. Happy memories indeed. Sadly I never got to see the band in concert, though I have seen just about everybody else from those days, Stones, Kinks, Animals, Bob (many times), Georgie Fame, Chuck Berry, Van Morrison, Geno Washington and the rest, but never the boys. A pity.

I've recently finished reading Leaving Alexandria by Richard Holloway, ex Episcopalian Bishop of Edinburgh, one of the few bishops I would give the time of day to. He gave up the bishopric because he no longer believes in all the stuff he spent his life preaching to the world. I enjoyed the book in parts but did not find it helpful in understanding what his position is/.was. He certainly did some strange things in his life, but his book is worth reading.

He tells about an old rector, called Albert Laurie, at Old Saint Paul's church in Edinburgh, where Holloway himself preached for many years. Laurie was a great social benefactor and did lots of good work amongst Edinburgh's poor in the early twentieth century. The streets of the Old Town had to be closed on the day of his funeral as so many of the city's poor came out to bid him farewell.

As he got older his sermons began to ramble somewhat. One of his regulars was Professor A.E. Taylor, prof of moral philosophy at Edinburgh University who used to sit at the back of the congregation and could be heard groaning audibly, "No, No, Stop, dear man, stop, please stop. Oh no no no!"

Any of you who have had the dubious pleasure of hearing a Free Church man preaching loudly and never endingly, will, I'm sure, understand exactly how the good professor felt.