101 Faces - 1

Having hit a brick wall writing about music, or anything else, I've come across quite a simple - actually, pretty well-worn - idea to fill up some space.

I get bored of myself on social media. I mainly put stuff to do with cricket, quizzing or crap jokes. I wondered if I can see myself as a person with a wide range of interests anymore. What was I "in to"? I realised that I can give a pretty good picture of myself by listing the people I have a special, or burgeoning, interest in.

I could probably fill up a monotonous list with rock guys and cricketers, and, sure, there'll be some rock guys and cricketers, but I hope I can do a little better than that. I wouldn't say my people are obscure - they're mainstream, or just a little off mainstream. I'm not quite at the "I'd have to say my hero is Ian "Beefy" Botham, because he was such a maverick" level of mundanity, but I won't kid myself I'm that far off it.

There are many, particularly in quizzing circles, who search out obscurities, fascinating unsung tales. I like a bit of that, and I love people whose minds work that way, but it's not really my thing. I'm arrogant enough to think the people I have heard of are, by 40, more likely to be great and fascinating than those I haven't. Most of these are people you may have heard of, definitely you should have heard of.

I'm not going to use the word icon in the title, but "iconic" is a word that may crop up. I've gone for "Faces" because I think nearly all these people have great faces. Most faces are great when you look at them long enough, but these are my kind of faces.

On that topic, I could have included "anti-icons" within this, people who we can't escape and inform our worldview by our opposition to them. We probably know who a lot of those are. But ...I have long been taught not to comment on people's personal appearance, and I stick to it pretty well in public. So, in these cases, I won't go beyond saying I like how these people look and they've got great faces.

To go the other way, to link people's malignance with what they look like (of course we all know what the likes of Farage look like) is a dangerous path to go down. Horrible people can look great. One of the worst tricks we humans play on ourselves is ascribing moral virtue to someone's appearance. Fuck honest faces.

But, ok, this lot will have great faces. Iconic faces. They're not all good people. Some of them are, or were, bad people. But I don't hate them. I either admire them or am intrigued by them (I'm not intrigued by Farage and his ilk, not one bit). I don't know how many there'll be - probably 101, knowing me.

It is, I found, hard writing little soundbites about why you like people, so they take a turn to the odd or minimalist at various places ...

Here are the first five:

ROBBIE ROBERTSON 

      At different times Robbie Robertson was the main sidekick for Bob Dylan and Martin Scorsese. I guess I can use him to avoid filling up spaces with my obvious ones- I don’t need to write about Dylan, Scorsese, De Niro, Ryan Giggs, David Gower, Paul Weller, now, do I? So they’re covered. I like them. 
He’s really vitriolically disliked by some who’ve studied The Band- they say he was a player and a swindler. But, I don’t know, he wrote those great songs, he played that guitar, and he was that fucking cool. It’s sad when great things sour, but that doesn’t take too much shine off Robertson for me.

MARTHA REEVES

Martha Reeves sang several of Motown’s greatest songs - the really, really good ones which are greater than the absolutely most famous ones. She sang with pure joy and an absence of trickery. She was then a Detroit councilwoman. This seems a great life.

LOUISE BOURGEOIS

I went to a big exhibition of Louise Bourgeois stuff in Stockholm – it was fabulous, very varied, funny and dark and memorable, not just massive spiders, and she looked supercool and lived to be 101. Excellent.

TOM STOPPARD

 A lot of events are enjoyable, but it’s rare that you get the feeling at a gig/comedy show/play – “this is exactly how I want this form to be”. I’ve had it at Wilco, at Stewart Lee, and I’ve had it more than once at Tom Stoppard plays, as he deals with Classics, Words, Philosophy, Politics, Cricket, Football, Love, Rock’n’Roll, Classical Music, Mythology, History, all while regularly throwing in brilliantly silly clever jokes. Obviously, great face, too.

ED MOSES

On a holiday to Devon in what must have been the summer of 1987, I remember my cousin Joseph telling me that Ed Moses was the fastest man in the world. No, I patiently explained, Moses is great, but Ben Johnson is the fastest man in the world. Ben Johnson, he calmly stated, is a ponce. He was right, I was wrong. Moses, and the story of how he got himself to be the best by being really clever, is fantastic. He's a beacon of greatness in the tawdry world of sport.