What Do Women Have Against Loud Music?

"Mind if I turn it down a tad, honey?"

What’s wrong with this picture? Last night I was ironing and listening to music when my 15-year-old daughter came into the room and said, “Dad, can you please turn it down? I’m trying to study.” For Christ's sake, girl, dump those books and get down to the golf course with a bottle of vodka in a brown paper bag, some cigarettes, and a boy to snog. Kids today, eh?

Or it could just have been her gender-dictated disposition to turn down music. Stick with me here. I’m not prone to making generalisations about the opposite sex, because the feminist peers my dad claims metaphorically castrated me during my formative years taught me otherwise. And believe me, I’m 100 per cent behind any female’s right to empowerment, a career, and even a driver’s licence. But experience has taught me that any time a woman walks into a room where music is playing, the first thing she’ll do is walk over to the amplifier and turn it down.

A chauvinist would say that it’s because a female can not bear any competition to the sound of her own voice. If I’m listening to music, then I might not be giving the female my full attention. I am appreciating the beauty of something besides the female.

Fortunately, I’m not a chauvinist, so I realise this is complete nonsense. Unfortunately, I

Records You Play Every Two Decades Or So

Not a bad record, every 20 years or so...

I like ironing clothes, preferably when the house is empty so that I can cogitate while playing records without people stomping past the turntable and making the needle jump. The other day I took out a Dave Kusworth & The Bounty Hunters LP, ‘Wives, Weddings and Roses,’ recorded in late 1987. I vaguely remembered most of it, but thought that I probably hadn’t played it for about 20 years. It’s not an outstanding release, but there are a handful tracks on it good enough to warrant another listen… some time. When? In another 20 years?

It’s a strange thought that I last played the LP when I was 25, and so logically I might next seek it out when I’m about 65. It really doesn’t seem that long ago since I was 25. Does that mean it won’t be that long until I’m 65? Being 65 is old, officially. Right now I am still listening to LPs that I bought when I was still considered to be ‘young’. But surely when I’m at retirement age, I shouldn’t be listening to songs with lyrics like, “She’s a constant companion to my thoughts/Though she tore things in two/Even slept with my best friend too/I don’t know why I still love you…”

I have a soft spot for Dave Kusworth for several reasons.