2008.06.27 0012hrs

So how is it that I find myself peering through the dirty midnight drizzle, up a darkened driveway in suburban Wimbledon ... at this hour? I ask myself.

It was a big day today, I mean yesterday.

I spent Tuesday afternoon up at John Henry's rehearsal rooms in N7 - Islington I think. Anyway it's one of the two really cheap pale blue ones on the Monopoly board, so you can imagine what its like up there. Rehearsals were with Mark Ronson and his crew, including Daniel Merriweather. We were working on a song that I'm going to sing next Wednesday in Paris. I have to say that at that point, i.e. the day before yesterday, I had a distinctly worried sensation in my gut. Not because it was sounding bad. No, on the contrary, it was sounding very good, with the potential, I'd say of becoming great, if we had a week's more rehearsal.

And that was the thing that was making my gut turn. Turn like the big single cylinder of the bike I rode over when the engine flooded, and it refused to fire up on being kicked over - maybe a big backfire, then nothing but a rumble and the whiff of unburnt gas. - Yes, the analogy's too good to let go just yet, especially when I think how many times I stalled the engine (in increasingly heavy traffic) on the hour long ride up to North London from peaceful Putney. Honestly, it should never have taken me that long - well, I must've spent a good 20 min. of that huffing 'n' sweating over the kickstart lever by the roadside.

So, you get the picture; I was feeling nervous because Mark has put together an hour of Duran Duran mega mix, complete with breakdowns, segues and - sweet Jesus - new bits! Whats more; we've got to stand on stage together in less than a week and perform it with smiles on our trousers - not frowns on our trousers - and definitely not brown trousers. Which was exactly what it was feeling like to me.

Yesterday however, was a totally different story.

We were working in Riverside studios Hammersmith in plenty of space; we got the songs together well; there started to appear larger and larger patches of blue in, our up to that point dark and cloudy sky. And at about 7pm last night the sun was not just peeking, but shining defiantly through (figuratively of course - this is England in June, and the Wimbledon Tennis Tournament is on).

Ah yes ... Wimbledon.

Here endeth the digression known (to myself) as Simon Le Blog part the third.

Incidentally, did this blog's first line remind anyone of the opening paragraph of "The Kite Runner"?