Inside Nokia Music

I’ve been making music and then playing it to varyingly attentive audiences for a few years now. During that time, I’ve been lucky enough to travel all over the world, playing on the same bills as some of my all-time heroes, and unlucky enough to play in Newport to a single drunk woman who fell over halfway through my set, then walked out.
All in all, being a musician has been a mixed bag so far. But one thing has always remained constant. Touring has always been fun.
Maybe it’s because I get to divest myself of all normal responsibilities for a couple of weeks. Or maybe it’s because I get to live like my childhood dreams managed to find their way through the grind of real life and actually come true. Whatever it is, touring has provided me with some of my most memorable musical moments.
I remember clearly the time I gave myself concussion onstage during my very first festival gig abroad, for example. I hit myself in the head with a brand new Fender Telecaster, then had to go to bed early and confused. That’s one to tell the grandkids.

I also once spent quite a bit of time searching for (and utterly failing to find) Bjork backstage at The Electric Picnic.
True story, that.
True, incredibly dull, story.

Then there was the time I nearly got shot in America.
Yeah, that’s right. Shot.
Probably.
Here’s what happened:
I was in Hollywood to do a live session on a radio station. Which I’m aware makes me sound both unexpectedly professional and like a massive, bragging tool. Well, I can’t help that. I’m trying to set the scene here, OK? I’m using all the storytelling skills at my (admittedly limited) disposal, so go with it.
Anyway, I was there for a few days, so I thought I’d take a look around Hollywood, and see what it has to offer. Turns out, it actually has surprisingly little to offer unless the infantile rantings of L. Ron Hubbard play an unhealthily large role in your life.
I was wandering back to my hotel room one evening when five or six police cars suddenly screeched to a stop just in front of me and a dozen or so policemen bundled out, all armed to the teeth.
Various weapons were brandished, including two honest-to-goodness shotguns, held by the smuggest-looking people I’ve ever seen outside of Lynx commercials.

Now. . .I’ve seen a lot of films in my time. I’m pretty sure that everytime this sort of thing happens in a film, at least one of the policemen (usually the chubbiest, friendliest, and unarmediest one) spends a bit of time ferrying the general public to safety whilst the others pump their shotguns, cock their hammers, and do a number of other things that sound suspiciously like euphemisms for being gay.
Not so in real life, apparently.
They all just lined up either side of the door that I was approaching. The door to Hollywood High School, as it happens.
I was already clearly in the line of fire if a crazed, coked-up schoolkid burst through the doors waving his father’s Uzi around with reckless, deadly abandon. And by now, I was pretty sure that was exactly what was going to happen at any second.
So, put yourself in my shoes for a second. You’re English, and as a result, you have had literally ZERO experience of guns so far in your life. Suddenly, you’re faced with about 10 of the bastard things. What would you do?
Here are your options:
1) Run like a shreiking, effeminate maniac. This incurs the scorn and ridicule of the gathered crowds who all seem to be calmly filming the stuff of your nightmares with mobile phones from across the street. On the plus side, you might not die.
2) Walk slowly and casually onwards like you see this sort of thing every day, thereby remaining cool in the eyes of the people you’ll never meet again, but possibly getting a bullet through a part of your body that really works better without any holes in it.

I tried, unsuccesfully, to combine the two. I casually, yet quickly, crouch-walked to safety like a petrified duck, thereby remaining a potential target for longer than necessary whilst simultaneously retaining not a shred of dignity.
Here’s what I learned that day. . .
Guns are terrifying, and can often lead to socially awkward situations in front of strangers.

Now, you may be wondering why I’ve just told you all this. Well, it’s because, in a week’s time, I’m going on tour in Germany and The Netherlands, and I’ll be sporadically blogging about it here, as well as on my myspace (www.myspace.com/cajita).
Hopefully, I’ll have some interesting tales to tell. Maybe I’ll actually get shot this time, and have a story that reaches some kind of conclusion, rather than just petering out uneventfully.

Who knows?