just for the moment..
I returned here after a quick look around the continent. I’m not done with it quite yet. I checked my mail to find three new children breathing our air and, sadly, one old dog not. I don’t know if it is the time of year, or the weather, or what it is, but I feel strangely disconnected from my usual life. I’m spending ‘quality’ time with my youngest, Violette, and the world has become one of simple pleasures, like going to the beach and teaching her how to crush beer cans on to her forehead.. Really, I shouldn’t even bother writing this as I am a million miles away from this in my heart… but.. surely that is the whole point of writing like this. So here’s my holiday snap. anyone care to guess where it is from?
robin guthrie : web log 
July 28, 2005 at 7:16 am
Is there soap beneath/next to the plaque?
July 28, 2005 at 12:31 pm
Is this some kind of memorial from Oradour-sur-glane?
July 28, 2005 at 7:39 pm
Hi Robin. My name is Mark. I’m a longtime fan of your work and do the occasional bit of music journalism and events promotion, though I am probably best known for being one of the creators of LiveJournal.com.
I didn’t know you had a blog until I ran into it while doing research for a post on “Mysterious Skin”. Expect a bit of traffic from my site and from my post at metafilter.com.
Also heard something interesting from a friend, that the the incidental music for the soundtrack won’t be released seperately. Is there additional material not on the soundtrack album? If so, it would be wonderful if there were a way for fans to get access to it.
Lastly, it looks like the film may be running afoul of Australian censors. See http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5744,15976133%255E16947,00.html .
July 29, 2005 at 11:42 am
Is it a memorial somewhere around the Somme? Could be a senory garden for alzheimer’s sufforers….? Bad Joke.. sorry…. bit too close to home that one! Nonetheless, I’m driving down to Paray le Monial in August with my daughter to visit distant famile, which I’m not looking foward to…. 400 miles from Calais…. not used to driving a right hand drive car in France and I have no air conditioning and No doubt Grace… my daughter will be irritable…
Got hold of a couple of albums you mentioned….M83 and Star of the Lid and Teflon Tel Aviv…. I already have loads of Jobim stuff so no need their. Big sound going on with M83!…. Anyway enjoy rest of vacation…. Cheers Harvey…
July 29, 2005 at 5:42 pm
I think Adam got it right….it’s a plaque to mark the horrors of Oradour-sur-Glane …what a nightmare it must have been in 1944….no wonder you had to go to the beach and teach Violette how to crush beer cans on her forehead…sounds like a chilling place to visit. Hopw the rest of the trip was more cheery…
July 29, 2005 at 8:26 pm
I bet you can find it on these sites?:
http://www.souviens-toi.org
http://plaques-commemoratives.org
Ah well….close but not sugar.
I’m in Canada anyway.
Cedric
July 30, 2005 at 11:42 am
Ahhh, Here I lie soothing my insomnia in Tennessee, USA listening to Treasure, my first Cocteau Twins album, first discovered two decades ago and often applied at the end of a frenetic lsd trip during the madness that was MY 80’s,…thanx again Robin…I saw you twice in Denver, The Paramount in 90 or 91 and the Ogden around 95 or 96 I believe…My best friend nearly swooned when a collection of sweat droplets flew from Elizabeth’s brow and burst apart upon his upstreatched fingers…good times…I’ll be back!
July 31, 2005 at 3:01 am
You should teach her how to smash a beer bottle on daddy’s head next.
July 31, 2005 at 3:10 am
Hello Robin,
would like to send you a cd of our band Deleyaman.
presently working on our next album in Normandy, France. all my best
July 31, 2005 at 11:57 pm
salut Robin,
You might be surprised to know that you have old fans in Creuse, which is one of the less populated department of France (something that could change in the future considering the increase of dutch and british citizens who strangely decide to live there, for the beautiful nature and the calm, perhaps, so, that’s a good choice… ); Creuse is next to Haute-Vienne, where you’d probably took this picture…
I’m not a musician (i’m more in visual arts) but I’ve always thought that the most beautifully strange, bizarre and risky things you’ve done were the four ep’s you’ve recorded with the cocteau twins from 1985 to 1986, from aikea guinea to love’s easy tears; personnaly, I’m still bewitched by this music… it had a kind of madness you don’t find easily (and often) in rock or popular music…
August 1, 2005 at 4:46 pm
Hi – I think it might be Oradour. I was there a couple of times last year. Devastating place. Seeing the burnt, bent frames of children’s bicycles is gut-wrenching.
Saw Cocteau Twins twice. Once in the Parr Hall, Warrington in 94 and again in Royal Albert Hall. Superb. So many great songs (‘Cherry-coloured Funk’ changed my life) I had to reference a few of them in my novels. 🙂
‘Imperial’ is a very interesting album too. Mesmerising…
August 2, 2005 at 4:28 am
What happened to the book we are sharing?
Tera
August 2, 2005 at 8:24 am
Robin, try to consider coming to Dublin for a gig someday. There’s about a million people I know who’d love to have you play here. My old man said he’d get rid of our 10 urchins for the night so you can have the small bedroom.
August 2, 2005 at 8:37 am
I completely agree with the person above. Dublin is a lovely city. Its much better than Belfast. And there are many great places to play.
We’d love to see you over here soon. We’re tired of New Order and the frigging Datsuns!
Matt, Dublin
August 2, 2005 at 4:36 pm
Yes, do come to Dublin, we’d love to see you play here and there’s plenty of great venues.
August 2, 2005 at 11:11 pm
Dublin indeed. It’s a wonderful little place. And if you come I promise to get you into see the Book of Kells for free.
August 2, 2005 at 11:58 pm
a dublin gig would be excellent indeed 😉 (please)
August 3, 2005 at 9:50 am
Dublin’s cool! We have bars and Guinness and lotsa stuff…but we’re missing one thing…YOU!!
Brian, Dublin
August 3, 2005 at 9:28 pm
thanks for sharing the moment, afterall, a moment is all we really have anyway isn’t it? 🙂
I enjoy your sharing and glad to hear you have had a great holiday. See you around the boards and here, of course!
**Star
September 23, 2005 at 3:48 am
Saw you perform in L.A. … the Coachella deal was cancelled for Cocteau. Seeing you play entirely made up for that disappointment.
Thank you so very, very much for following thru to your committment to ‘Club Violaine’. Won’t ever forget it……
L8TR………………..
October 27, 2005 at 2:56 am
Nice post. I’ll return. If you can’t pay for a thing, don’t buy it: http://www.bartleby.com/100/ , The best condition in life is , they go mad in herds
February 8, 2006 at 9:57 pm
I’m breading my first baby and I’m so involved in it that I can understand you. Though sometimes you have to relax and play those little games for yourself.