Author Archives: Tony Ballantyne

As anyone who has seen it will attest, the Muppet’s Christmas Carol is the definitive version of the story. Dickens’s version, whilst competent, fails in a number of rather obvious areas. These include only having one Marley and glossing over the role played by Rizzo the Rat. Worst of all, he neglected to write a number of songs that sound good being sung by Kermit the Frog; Statler and Waldorf; and, hardest of all, Michael Caine.

I’ve watched the film every Christmas practically since it came out. However, when I heard that the Bridgewater Hall in Manchester was screening the film accompanied by a live orchestra I must admit I was confused.

Who’s idea was that, I wondered? Who looked out the movie score? Who put together the click track for the conductor to play along with? Who thought people would pay money to see something that airs for free on TV every December.

Whoever they were, they knew what they were doing. The hall was packed with families. When I say families, I should point out I saw about three actual youngsters there. Most of the children in the families present were now adults, my own two included.

Did the addition of live music add anything to the film? If I’m honest, I kept forgetting there was an orchestra present until someone made a mistake. The music was too loud, it tended to drown the speaking.

But that didn’t matter. Everyone knew the dialog. Not only that, they sang along quite happily.

So it was a great show, though not for the reason I was expecting. When I booked the tickets part of my motivation was to support an orchestra, not out of any idea that orchestras need protecting, but because I like orchestras and if no one goes then they’ll stop playing.

But this wasn’t about the orchestra. It wasn’t about the music. It was all about the feeling of community.

The Muppets Christmas Carol accompanied by a live orchestra. Surely this must be the cultural event of the year.

I suppose Brian Eno is best known for his contribution to music; and a lot of it is great music. I always think of him though for a particular piece of advice: Use your accidents. As a producer, Eno encouraged bands to moderate or even ignore their instinct to produce polished music, in favour of that with the vitality of accidental input.

How does this fit with writing?

When I was putting together the scenario for my new Conjuror Girl trilogy – a steampunk work set in an alternate late Victorian version of my home town of Shrewsbury – I thought everything would be steam, carriages and horse power. Then, reading one day a book about carbon-based fuel, I was struck by a reference to the fractionating column, used by chemists to separate different compounds existing in the same solution. Such a contraption I’d not seen since my school days. I looked up from the book, wondering if I could use the thing for Conjuror Girl, but I thought… nah. Too modern.

Then I reconsidered. The mental image persisted. Chemists did all sorts of things in the late nineteenth century, so was there really a reason to ignore this accidental image? I jotted the idea down, then was suddenly struck with another idea. The dark side of these novels comes in the form of the Reifiers, men with the ability to make real – reify – the contents of their minds. As it is put early on, they can make real their whims and fancies. But to do this they have to impose their minds upon the world, an act of deep selfishness. The consequence of Reification is a black fluid which, lore has it, is composed of pure selfishness; and even Reifiers dare not come into contact with this stuff.

Now I was getting to the kernel of the idea. What if this oily black liquid was composed of different fractions which could be separated in a fractionating column? What if there was a character who did this – a madcap scientist, a petit-Reifier in fact. Suddenly I had a whole new part of the plot, previously blank.

It’s accidents like this which make sub-creation such fun. I usually leave many of a novel’s details vague so that, when I’m writing in the white heat of composition, I can use my imagination for fuel.

And there was another accident which I took advantage of. When I was at school I did history before taking other O-levels, and the first thing we studied was the Danelaw. While talking about school teachers to a friend one day I suddenly remembered history lessons, and the naïve, poorly drawn map I did in my history book of the border between England and the Danelaw, which my teacher wrote poor next to in red pen. Thinking on this, I wondered if I could perpetuate that border and have part of Britain inhabited by Danes…

A final accident, then. When looking at a map of south-east England one time I noticed Sussex, Middlesex and Essex, and their origins in Saxon regions. There was also a Wessex of course. At once I asked myself: why no Nossex? Well, there were no north Saxons to leave such a name. I knew at once that I had to invent the region. So I did. My fictitious Shrewsbury is in Nossex.

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This is a green bag. A green bag of food waste.

The green bag contains things like potato peelings and leftover scraps: the sort of things that can’t go on the compost heap. The green bag normally lives in a container. When the bag is full, it’s taken out to the green bin. Here, someone has taken it from the container and left it on the kitchen counter.

This is very much the COP26 solution to the problem of keeping the house tidy. It has the appearance of doing something to help the housing environment, but it achieves nothing. It’s actually offloading the real problem (taking the green bag out to the green bin) onto someone else, all the while giving the culprit the chance to boast about their green bag credentials.

Who was it? Investigations are ongoing, but I’m pretty confident it will turn out to be the dog. The dog seems to be behind most of the crimes committed in our house, including drinking the last of the milk, not putting the butter back in the fridge and failing to turn on the dishwasher.

On Friday night I saw Genesis for what will probably be the last time. It was was an excellent, though flawed, gig. Excellent because of the warmth of the crowd, the good humour of the band and the body of work they played. Flawed because they are getting too old for performing. Much comment has been made in the media about how Phil Collins performs seated (as does Mike Rutherford for part of the performance). What’s not really been mentioned is how often Phil Collins is off key and out of time. If I’m to brutally honest, the other original band members weren’t at the top of their game either in terms of their playing.

But this isn’t a problem. Phil Collins still has great stage presence and charisma, he controls the audience with a wave of his hand. And there is is something rather magnificent about seeing him refusing to give up, walking onto stage using a stick. Unlike some other groups still touring, I don’t imagine that Genesis need the money. They were performing because they wanted to. 

I’ve written before about Second Rate Entertainment and how much I enjoy it. This was hardly a second rate entertainment. The light show was of typically high standard, a lot of time had clearly been spent on arranging and rehearsing. I’ve seen a number of older bands in the past few years using backing vocalists and musicians to support ageing singers and players. It’s usually done thoughtfully and honestly, the audience is under no illusions about what they’re hearing.

This was a gig aware of mortality. The song Fading Lights, the last song on Genesis’ last album together was used to introduce a medley of old hits.  The most poignant moment was in the middle of I Know What I Like. Many of us remember how Phil Collins would perform a lively dance with the tambourine. Now all he could do was rather wryly hit it on his head.

I  don’t know what non fans would make of the event. I saw a lot of history in this performance a certain  bravery and quiet resolution not to gentle into that dark night.  I was very moved.

And I knew that’s not just because of the gig.  I’ve been a Genesis fan since I was a teenager. That concert felt like an end bracket on part of my life, one reflected in the fact that I was taking my son to university the following day. The end of another era.  But another built on a solid body of work that I will certainly remember.

Genesis AO Arena Manchester 24/9/21