SPINNING COIN

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO: SPINNING COIN/BAS JAN/ROBERT SOTELO AT THE LEXINGTON, ISLINGTON – 18/3/20 – CANCELLED

There is only one packet of Lurpak left at Tesco, and the packaging is damaged. It feels apocalyptic. It feels, somehow, like a taste of the future. This is what the future’s going to be like, I think. 

  Wife thinks that life will never be the same again. 

On Sunday wife was deciding whether or not to take daughter to the cinema, as she had planned to. 

  “Yeah, you should do,” I said. “It’ll be fine. I’m definitely going to the gig on Wednesday.” 

  “It’ll be cancelled,” wife said. 

  “No, it won’t be,” I said. 

  “It will be,” wife said. 

  “It won’t. They’re on tour at the moment and all the other shows are on,” I said. 

  Wife was right. Of course wife was right. Wife is always right. 

  When I found out that this gig was cancelled – this was Monday – I immediately went to Bas Jan’s Bandcamp page and bought their latest record, Instant Nostalgia. I had been looking forward to seeing them this evening, and was planning to buy their record anyway. Then this morning I ordered the new Bobby Conn album, Recovery, from Norman Records. By lunchtime, I had also ordered Schland Is The Place For Me by Fehler Kuti, from ANOST.

  I don’t normally buy so many records. It’s because of the coronavirus. I am panic buying. I am stockpiling music.