So box-fresh is that, that I can’t even give you a title for it - John Peel after playing Spring Yard on 8/11/92.
It seems splendidly appropriate to be posting a track called Spring Yard today. As I look outside my window, I can see one of those gorgeously blue sunny skies which showcase April at its best and which offer hope that the winter may finally be over. Being the UK, this can’t be taken as read. Earlier this week it was snowing here in Orpington. But nevertheless, it’s weather which seems to say, “Come outside and stay outside. Wash away the fog which has hung over you by staying inside and start making all those changes you promised you that you would make.” Essentially, a blooming springtime offers the distilled message to us all: “Freshen up.”
That usually means spring cleaning and more work as we get into jobs around the house or garden. I feel this keenly at the moment because my wife and I are due to move house soon, so we'll be tidying and refreshing two houses - the one we’re leaving and the one we’re moving to. Given that moving house was listed as one of the 5 most stressful experiences that a human being can go through*, it will be interesting to see how long any positive April vibes last for. But if we have C.J. Bolland as our soundtrack, we should make it through just fine.
Spring Yard is spring cleaning set to music. The opening pounding beat, sounds either like a fast heartbeat as one contemplates the scale of tasks set in front of you, or the relentless sound of a saw being used to make things or break things up. The tempo quickens as the work progresses, there are yelps of frustration and effort noises as things are pulled out of the corner of sheds and garages, either to be used or thrown out. Bolland layers his instrumentation simultaneously evoking both the energy expended during working and the relentless onslaught of jobs and things waiting to be done, demanding the attention.
Then at 3:25, there is a period of euphoria when the tasks appear to be complete and the projects have come to fruition and the house/garden/shed is finally looking as we always wanted it to. But Bolland knows the eternal truth, that things become tidy and clean for one reason only - to become messy and dirty again. And so the euphoric synths start to be overladen with beats and that effect you hear in dance records which sounds like a symphony of tightly wound rubber bands being played en masse (a digeridoo perhaps?) We end on a fade out with the euphoria replaced by the sound of new jobs to be done and the freshness overwhelmed by mundanity once again.
*The other four stressful things were listed as death of a spouse, divorce, Christmas Day and driving. This gave rise to Dave Allen’s immortal observation that the most stressful thing a person could do would be to drive your dead ex-spouse to have a look at a house you’re going to move into on Christmas Day.
Video courtesy of Underground Sounds M
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