Tracks of Carole’s years: part 4

31 Dec 2021 Leave a comment

by Carole Gardiner in Uncategorized Tags: , , , , , , , ,

My seventh song selection is These are the days of our lives by Queen. As I’ve written about before in this blog, I am a massive Queen fan, I have been since I first saw them on Top of the Pops performing Bohemian Rhapsody in 1975. But I think I first fell in love with Freddie when I saw him on the Crazy Little Thing called Love video.

He was such a force of nature and one of the greatest entertainers that ever lived. He had the most amazing vocal range and stage presence, you only need to watch his Live Aid performance to confirm this. That is what makes the video for this song so upsetting, to see how frail and weak Freddie was while trying so hard to perform for the camera. According to his bandmates and close friends, Freddie was in a lot of pain on the day of shooting but was determined to put on his best performance.

My youngest son, Jake’s, birth was incredibly traumatic and after 30 years I can still remember every minute of it. I was in hospital for 2 weeks before and 2 weeks after he was born. On the day we were finally discharged from hospital the papers were full of the headline “Freddie has AIDS”. He very sadly died the next day.

This incredibly sad event will be forever linked with my overwhelming sense of relief that Jake and I survived and the joy of welcoming a new and healthy son against all the odds

These Are The Days Of Our Lives (Penampilan Terakhir Freddie Mercury di Depan Kamera) ~ QUEENINDO (The Indonesian Queen Fan Club)

Song number 8 is There’s a Kind of Hush by the Carpenters. In my humble opinion it’s one on the best songs by this very talented duo. Although they didn’t write it themselves, they have the most wonderful vocals and completely make it their own.

The saddest memory of this song is Karen’s appearance when she sang it on the video. She suffered from an eating disorder for a large proportion of her very short life. Tragically she died of heart failure, a complication of her long battle, at the age of 32.

Karen’s story resonates with me as I have been struggling with an eating disorder on and off since I was 16. It’s been a constant battle for many years and sometimes a coping mechanism in times of extreme stress. Severely limiting the amount I eat helped me regain the control I felt I lost. As a healthcare professional it doesn’t make any sense to, at times, starve my body of nutrition.

So at the grand old age of 54 I decided to address my issues with food and attempt to get my head straight. My first point of call was a nutritionist and those appointments were invaluable. I have a little way still to go but she has guided me in the right direction by essentially giving me “permission” and the strength to begin to eat more.

The Tracks of Carole’s years

02 Dec 2021 Leave a comment

by Carole Gardiner in Uncategorized Tags: , , , , , , , ,

Music is so emotive and conjures up many memories good and bad. I love listening to Ken Bruce on Radio 2 and his feature The tracks of my years. Each morning for 5 days a celebrity chooses 2 songs a day and talks about the reasons they chose those particular tunes and why they are important to them.

Now I know I’m not a celebrity or famous for just doing my job like the people Ken has on his show, and no one would be particularly interested in my choices on national radio. But it got me thinking what are the songs that represent my life and could I narrow it down to 10?

Well yes I could and I have created some posts as if I was joining the lovely Ken on his radio show, although without him asking me all the questions.

Day 1

The first song on my list is We are the champions by Queen. When I was in my teens I belonged to a Scout and Guide Marching band as a Ranger Guide then as a Venture Scout. Every year we entered quite a few band competitions throughout the summer months in South west England. This particular year we won our first ever competition, also with individual section wins and first place for turn out (which we always won thanks to our army of mums who sorted our uniforms). This win kicked off a very successful summer for us and we won all the competitions that year. On the evening of that competition win there was a disco in the church hall where we practiced each week. A parent must have gone on ahead to tell them at the hall that we had won, remember this was the early 80’s there were no mobile phones or social media! When we arrived at the church hall and started unloading our equipment we could hear this song being blasted out and everyone was singing to us. It really was an amazing moment.

My second song is Grease Lightening from the musical Grease. It’s fair to say my youngest son Jake struggled at school and probably hated every minute of it. There’s no need to explain why he struggled, it’s not the point of the post. Jake went to a small primary school that encouraged the children to be creative and express themselves especially in performing arts. His good friend Holly decided to have a go at putting on her own production; Songs from the shows. She held auditions for her cast, directed and produced the the whole thing. Jake auditioned for the role of Kenickie for the opening number and for other parts throughout the show. At the time I found this very surprising as up to that point he would usually only reluctantly take part in any performances at Christmas and leaver’s services etc.

On the night of the show I have to say I was stunned at his performance, he burst onto the stage and sang and danced his heart out, as did all the kids on this stage. The whole show was a fantastic success. I do believe that this was the start of Jake’s love for performing on stage. He continued to enjoy productions at school and he went on to achieve a BTEC National Diploma in Performing Arts. He has been a member of a community theatre group for many years, plays bass guitar and sings in a band.

(very grainy old photo of Jake strutting his stuff as Kenickie!)

Aren’t those the words?

27 Feb 2014 2 Comments

by Carole Gardiner in Uncategorized Tags: , , , , , ,

There was a small pocket of good weather on our journey to a spa day on Tuesday, so my friend Jane and I had the top down on her car and sang and the top of our voices in the sunshine. While we were murdering Take on me by Aha we discovered that neither of us had a clue what the lyrics of the 3rd verse were and just fudged our way through with our own made up words.

It got me thinking about how we sometimes get lyrics wrong, while being absolutely convinced that we are correct. Phoebe from Friends famously sang  “hold me close Tony Danza” instead of  “hold me close tiny dancer”  by Elton John. Another example I found online from Bon Jovi’s Living on a prayer, “it doesn’t make a difference if we’re naked or not”, which should be “it doesn’t make a different if we make it or not”.

Getting lyrics wrong is not a new thing for me, I was only 7 when Bohemian Rhapsody by Queen was first released. Nevertheless I felt confident that I knew every word and sang with conviction every time it came on the radio. My dad fell about laughing one day when he heard me get to the part  “spare him his life from this monstrosity”, I actually sang “sparing his life from his hot sausage tea”.

Sounded reasonable to me.

BR words Queen

My 15 minutes of fame

15 Aug 2012 2 Comments

by Carole Gardiner in Uncategorized Tags: , , , , , , , , , ,

After reading Jack Scott’s post on Perking the Pansies about his radio show appearance, it got me thinking about my very brief moment of stardom on the radio waves. My claim to fame is not nearly as exciting as Jack’s, but nevertheless it was good for me.

A few years ago our local radio station, known then as GWR, was doing a daily slot called ‘Four play’. Listeners were invited to contact the station with 4 songs; their favourite song at the time, their song they dance like their dad to, the song to turn up their speakers to and the song that makes them cry. The presenter would then do a quick interview about the reasons behind the choices and it was edited and played back in the show.

I listened to that show quite often and decided I should let Bristol know about my favourite tunes.

My favourite song at the time was Take That’s ‘Shine’, I liked the song because they had just reformed and I never really was a big fan of the band first time around, I felt it was much better than their old stuff.

My first choice for the song that made me dance like my dad was ‘Suspicious Minds’ by Elvis Presley because my dad was a huge Elvis fan and he actually won a prize once for dancing when he was in the RAF. But alas they didn’t have that one so I had to think of something else, my son suggested ‘Get down on it’ by Kool and the Gang as there is some ancient video evidence of his dad dancing to this somewhere.

The song to turn my speakers up to was ‘Summer of 69’ by Bryan Adams. I have been a fan of Bryan for many years and have seen him live in London, Birmingham, Cardiff and Bristol and I adore him…enough said!

I always cry when I hear ‘These are the days of our life’ by Queen. I am a massive, lifelong fan of Queen and I loved Freddie Mercury. Like many people I was upset when he died and the video for the song is just heartbreaking because of Freddie’s appearance. It was the last video he made before he died and he was just so thin and fragile, but still he managed to perform for the camera to thank the fans for all the support over his fantastic career.

He is truly a legend…

Long to reign over us

07 Jun 2012 Leave a comment

by Carole Gardiner in Uncategorized Tags: , , , , , , , ,

What a fabulous Jubilee we have had in our country. To celebrate 60 years of the reign of our wonderful queen, Great Britain came out to party on a massive scale proving why we are called ‘Great’.

I must admit I was a bit of a boring old fart and stayed in to watch it on TV. I was going to go down to Millennium Square in Bristol to watch the concert on Monday night on the big screen, but alas the lure of the sofa in the warm won me over. But I did make an effort on Friday evening with my brownie and rainbow guide units and had a jubilee tea party and I decorated the outside of my house with some flags and bunting.

I thought Her Majesty looked amazing all through the celebrations, so serene and beautiful even in the appalling rain on the barge on Sunday.

A few things puzzled me, however, about the concert; who invited Grace Jones to hula hoop and why Cheryl Cole was allowed to ruin Gary Barlow’s performance with her dreadful singing. But the song Andrew Lloyd Webber and Gary Barlow wrote for the occasion was fantastic and so moving, as was Prince Charles’s speech for his “mummy”. Overall the concert was great and the fireworks at the end were spectacular.

Sunday’s festivities were marred by the Duke of Edinburgh being taken ill, but the Queen looked  elegant and lovely again for the thanksgiving service in St. Paul’s Cathedral, but I felt she looked a bit lost without him at times.  The celebrations concluded with the Queen’s procession and the balcony appearance. No one does pomp and pageantry as well as us Brits and it was fabulous, union flags everywhere, horses and carriages, bands and cheering crowds. After the orderly surge of 1000’s of people down the Mall, the main members of the royal family appeared on the balcony and none of the annoying minor, hanger on members that no one wants to see. Although it was cloudy and raining the very impressive fly past took place.

The massive 3 cheers from the crowd and the singing of the National Anthem for the umpteenth time signalled the end of the balcony appearance and I think Britain should be proud of the way we celebrated over the 4 day holiday. I believe the Queen was genuinely moved by the response of her people on this very special occasion and achievement.