Band members sought

It's looking like 2017 will bring more gigging and recording opportunities for Keshco and Bleak House. We're seeking gentle friendly people who would like to help us bring our sounds to audiences. Could that be you? Or someone you know?

Currently, the members of Keshco and Bleak House are scattered all around:

Andy (mainly vocals, guitars, keyboards, other bits, recording) and Caroline (keyboards, clarinet, some vocals) are in London;
Luke (the mighty flute, guitars, keyboards, some vocals) is in Oxford and not often available;
Bob (the tower of drums, vocals, keyboards, other bits) is in Todmorden, Yorkshire, and not often available.

Gigs and recording are likely to be a combination of whoever is available, and could be anywhere around London, the UK, or abroad. We welcome potential new members worldwide.

If you're interested in being a part-time member of Keshco or Bleak House (or more!), try these questions:

• Firstly, do you like the music we play? We have a few main styles (psychedelic, folk, synthpop, outsider, prog, freakout, library).
• Secondly, do you really like the music we play? After going for this long, it should be obvious we're not aspiring to be accepted by the mainstream indie scene.
• Do you share our politics? (Left-wing/Green)
• It's very handy if you can play/try to play more than one instrument (not necessarily to a great standard). We are looking for any instruments to bolster the sound: bass, percussion, drums, lead guitar, woodwind, strings, brass, keyboards, harmony vocals, etc.
• Willingness to try a little improv when necessary, or to play defined parts (sheet music is possible if that helps), or make up new parts together, or a combination.
• We are hoping to meet calm people working towards a team effort, not highly-strung.
• We practice and record at home, so it won't be massively loud.
• Are you OK with the band not making much (if any) money? Most of our music is available for free or donation. We play small gigs. We will share any profits and I will try to ensure expenses are covered.

If you've answered in the affirmative to these, feel free to get in touch! http://keshco.co.uk/what-is-this-keshco/faq/ (contact form at bottom of page) or you can direct message us on Twitter or Facebook.

Political slot: Air quality

When I was growing up in the flatness of 1980s East Anglia, on foggy walks to hated school my dad would tell me of the air conditions he put up with living in London in the 1950s. Thick yellowy fog dense enough to reduce visibility to about arm's-length. In the Great Smog of 1952, 62 years ago today, at least 4,000 Londoners died. But those were the bad old days, pre-central heating, when most people had coal smoke pumping out of their chimneys, and those days were ended by the Clean Air acts - at least we thought so. Air pollution to my 1980s self meant industrial accidents, grim editions of First Tuesday featuring asbestos timebombs and iron lungs; something you could easily fathom. We were clean, we had a gas fire and nice warm radiators. Through the 1990s, the move to unleaded petrol and widespread adoption of catalytic converters gave the surface impression that we had improved things further; though near busy roads on still days there remained that persistent slight burning sensation in the eyes and the back of the throat.

The problem is, even though we can't see the pollution (well, not like the residents of Beijing can anyway), the air we breathe particularly in cities is nowhere near as clean as it should be - in busier London streets the pollution average is over twice the World Health Organisation's legal limits. Current estimates for yearly deaths attributable to nitrogen dioxide and particulate pollution are around 7,500 in London and 55,000 across the UK (with ozone possibly responsible for at least 5,000 further deaths per year). Yes, that's 7,500 deaths a year, or roughly 20 people a day in London whose deaths are down to air pollution. Bad old days? Did they ever stop, or did we just find a way of hiding the problem?

Pressure group Clean Air in London should be applauded for its tireless work dragging these facts into the public arena. It's only in recent months that newspapers have picked up on what is a major public health scandal of our time. It seems worse because it sounds a relatively easy thing to improve on - hang on, surely you've had clear figures for a while now, and you know it'll be a vote-winner to improve the air quality. So a fleet of new buses, hybrid technology, great, but what - they run on diesel? Isn't that responsible for far higher nitrogen dioxide and particle exhaust emissions than petrol? Who signed off on that?

You can monitor current street-by-street readings for air pollution, here: http://www.londonair.org.uk/LondonAir/Default.aspx