I hope that Ginger can overcome his demons...From gigs to depression and back again.

Monday night I went to the Craufurd Arms in Stony Stratford to see Ginger Wildheart touring his "Songs from the Tanglewood" album. This was a mellow, country flavoured album, not to my usual taste and I am not a country fan but the album does have some cracking songs on it and Ginger live, is always a joy to behold.
I'd not been to the Craufurd Arms before and my initial feeling was what a nice bunch of people. I flagged down a random person outside the venue who was kind enough to tell me where the nearest Chinese Takeaway was. Getting back to the venue, the person I had asked was Nathan, Front of House Engineer for the venue and a genuinely nice guy. He is a huge Wildhearts fan and was seriously chuffed to be hosting this gig and entertaining Ginger.
The venue is great, the pub part has a pool table and some "stained glass windows" with some proper rock n toll saints portrayed in them:

As a venue, they were really laid back and pretty chill about what they allowed. I asked if I could take my DSLR in and they said that it should be OK but be prepared that if there were any objections from the band, I would be asked to stop and it was a definite no to using a flash.

Prior to the gig, they had a big screen in the main pub to show the England vs Tunisia game. What a borefest, when a member of staff came round to tell everyone that Ginger would be on 15 mins earlier and I did ask if he could come on earlier than that so we could stop watching the goddawful match.

Anyway, I enjoyed the gig, it is always a pleasure to hear Ginger but he was not in a good place and I am pleased that he is honest with us about how he feels. He is a man with depression and he does the right thing and talks about it, it is all about changing the perception of mental illness, changing the way we don't talk about it or highlight it. Chris Cornell and Chester Bennington are 2 high profile cases where an awareness of mental health might have made a difference, or maybe not, but we'll never know. Ginger is open about his issues but there is still a severe lack of understanding, he tells us how he is feeling and the well intentioned response from the audience is a cheery "We love you Ginger", it is sincere and well meant but it sounds all wrong, if treating mental illness was as simple as telling someone they matter, we'd have cured it by now!
On one level, it would be easy to criticise Ginger for telling us his problems but the reason he has the support he has, is because he is honest, he wears his heart on his sleeve and the "Tanglewood" album is about mental health, so on some days he feels sh*t, I would rather he aired it than bottled it up. This got a bit more serious than anticipated but then I did leave the gig with a more serious head on, he finished the set telling us not be a c**t like him and if we have mental issues, to take the time off and talk with someone.

Anyway, it wasn't the best gig in terms of Ginger's standards, but it was still a great night. I enjoyed the set, it was great to see Jase Edwards from Wolfsbane on guitar (one of Britain's finest, I kid you not) and the songs always make me happy and then drag me down the next day as I start to feel like something is missing in my soul, ask my daughter, she feels that too after a Ginger/Wildhearts gig.

Here are some shots I took with my DSLR:

I hope that Ginger can overcome his demons, he deserves some respite and I hope that other people with these problems will talk to a professional, that is the only way to deal with the mind, speak with someone that understands the various conditions.
I have limited experience with depression, I know what it is and felt it once but it was more like plunged into depression and out again, rather than having depression (cutting out a few family members cured mine). It doesn't mean that I have any idea on how to speak with someone that has depression, I learned more about it last night than in the whole of my life and I have to say that it was jarring to witness but makes me all the more grateful that I don't have mental issues and also more helpless because it is something that I will encounter in my life, through personal experience or friends, and I will have no way of helping the situation.
I have had a couple of friends commit suicide but being younger by many years and in what feels like a different age, we put it down to life's tragedies and not mental illness. Could I have made a difference? I think on one of them I could have stopped it if I'd recognised the signs, I knew there was a problem and suicide did cross my mind but I put it down to a stupid thought. Unfortunately a mere few hours later it was real, but we all have those stories, even my eldest daughter has been through it a few times and I can't help but feel I am just now sitting in the sunlight blinking and wondering why all of a sudden I can see and why aren't we addressing these issues? How odd that a gig seems to have taken the blinkers off issues of mental health for me.

Despite how this all sounds, Ginger is a great live act, he has written and continues to write some great music and it is simply criminal that he isn't a huge star. He is definitely one of the hardest working people in music as this current tour adds extra dates everyday and it will overlap with the Wildheart shows over the next few months or so.See how schizophrenic this blog is? From gigs to depression and back again.

Here is some live footage from an instore performance: Daylight Hotel

And a video from an earlier album: If You Find Yourself In London Town