AMAZING time last week. Thanks to Glastonwick stars East Town Pirates for organising a brilliant, packed gig at The Steamboat Tavern in Ipswich last Friday night. 

It started off with a blast of good old-fashioned ranting poetry from James Domestic — a fine thing in someone half my age — I did half an hour of new poems and stories, the Pirates plundered an hour of home-grown punk sea shanties, and then myself and my band Barnstormer 1649 finished things off with our early music punk. If you’ve got any kind of pirate or nautical-themed event in mind, and you like your punk rock, book ESP. You won’t be disappointed! 

And the following day was equally good in a completely different way. The Locks Inn Community Pub, more or less completely surrounded by water at the end of the River Waveney navigation canal near Bungay in Norfolk, is a truly magical, unique place. 

We arrived by the only single-track road, had an lovely gig fuelled by fine beer to an equally fine crowd and then went to our digs by boat, underneath a clear, starry sky looking at Venus and Mars. I have never lost sight of what an incredible privilege it is to earn my living doing this for the past 43 years and last Saturday was just perfect. Thank you so much to Graham and Nicky and everyone involved.

And then back to reality. How many different ways can I say the same thing? Here’s an early carol of despair. 

Away in the rubble
A brick for a bed
The little Lord Jesus
Laid down his sore head
The bombs from the night sky
Rained down where he lay
His mother was weeping
The rest passed away

The Romans, the exile,
the pogroms, the fear
The Bundists’ “stand fast now”
And Herzl’s “not here”
Sykes-Picot, the Nazis,
the Nakba, the wall
The little Lord Jesus
Despaired at them all.

And as for here — national politics is bollocks. All of it. Everywhere. 

The Tories have now managed to deselect by mistake the utterly clueless idiot most of them wanted to lead the party, leaving them the choice between two individuals whose only achievement is appearing even more batshit than Liz Truss, which takes some doing. It’s Fawlty Towers run by compulsive vivisectionists.

Labour are even more boring than Alan Durban’s 1981 Stoke City side, desperately trying to show off to the bullies from the banks and the right-wing press, which only increases the latter’s contempt for them, while slowly grinding the final vestiges of hope out of those of us who had any to begin with. 

Reform are a deranged surrealist golf club for Mosley tribute acts, the Lib Dems a constipated circus troupe and the Greens … are beige. And the varying bits of what passes for the “radical left” are as always absolutely determined to make sure the 10 per cent they don’t agree about with each other means that the 90 per cent they do agree about is irrelevant and so they loathe each other’s guts and “prefer the Tories, cos at least they're honest about it.” 

So this is England. But we could be in Gaza or Lebanon. 

Embrace your families. Cherish your friends. Surround yourselves with love, if you can, celebrate the countless good people out there (we’re the majority, never forget that!) and do the best you can to support those around you who need it. And have a LAUGH. 

This week I was in Northampton, and Leeds Thursday and Friday, tonight I’m at the indomitable Red Shed in Wakefield doing my Early Music Show with ace Edinburgh songwriter Calum Baird and tomorrow (1pm) the same show at the Town Festival in Halifax, a fine initiative set up by local indie venue Grayston Unity. Tomorrow’s the last day: check it out if you can!  All details as ever from my social media pages.

For further info please visit www.facebook.com/attilathestockbroker and/or attilathestockbroker.bandcamp.com/merch.