By The Landlord
Need to think of a title
Also, need to think of an opening line.
Something unusual and punchy
to confound the fuck out of the reader.
Perhaps by conjuring up a moustachioed walrus … (The Poetry of Philip Pyke 1965-2021)
Witty, pithy, warmly humorous, generous and gently mischievous, philipphilip99, or PP99 as he was also known, though to the rest of the world Philip Pyke, was a beloved regular at this establishment since the day it opened in early 2016, and prior to that was a regular commenter at the Guardian website. He would drop into this Bar almost daily, nominating songs and offering endlessly amusing and informed, friendly banter. He also wrote several playlist pieces for this site on a wide variety of topics.
But suddenly last year, in July, his visits ceased. After some time, with no response to emails, and and still hoping he might return, I managed to track down the tragic reason why he would never again grace these doors. In July 2021, he had a sudden diagnosis of myeloma amyloidosis, a rare form of blood cancer, and died just a month later, exactly a year ago today on 7 August 2021. So I’ve decided this is the day to remember and pay tribute to him.
Philip loved this website, commenting and nominating songs at Song Bar more than 5,400 times, the last of which, for the topic songs about stereotypes, was a Cocksure Lads song, Mr Man, one he succinctly described as “an affectionate Canadian parody of British Invasion bands”. It seems appropriate somehow, as his sharp sense of humour and sense of irony were characteristic of his many on-point, amusing contributions, and also, appropriately, among his favourite bands was another outfit from Canada, Barenaked Ladies.
But Philip also wrote several playlist pieces for us, often on topics that were a perfect vehicle for his pithy humour and excellent music taste, all of which can be viewed here. They included: bright songs about dark subjects, songs with notable key changes, songs about the colour white, songs about Hollywood, songs about the evening, songs from or about Italy, songs with a distinctly retro style, and cheekily, songs about underwear.
PP99: Philip Pyke
But two of my personal favourites, both his ideas, were songs about feeling or being fat – and – songs from or about Birmingham and the Black Country.
For the former, following as usual, all the song nominations from my initial weekly topic piece, he picked and wrote about his playlists with originality and wit, and in particular, a deliciously wicked, humorous pathos, choosing to present them in the style of a global online lonely hearts column, introduced by this sentence:
“Tired of Tinder? Bored with Bumble? Had it up to here with Grindr? Listen up, guys, Blubbbr is where it’s at! Check out this week’s top ten profiles …”
Always inventive, he used titles or lyrics from the songs in each each parody ad, such as these for numbers by, respectively, Howlin’ Wolf, and then Lee Pickett and The Screamers:
Built For Comfort, 59
3,833 miles away
Built for comfort not speed, but I got everything all good girls need.
YKWTD.
Fatty Patty, 17
5,341 miles away
Thirty-six! Thirty-six! Thirty-six! Wow! Round and firm and fully packed! Five-foot-two, I’m really stacked! Would you like to see me bop? The biggest gal at the hop!
FAF and looking for FWB.
Fat songs: Beryl Cook’s The Banjo Players
As he hailed from the West Midlands – born in Bloxwich, Walsall – his Birmingham and Black Country playlists were particularly Bostin’ belters – which he proudly decorated with handy, short, sharp “Brumfacts’ and “Blackfacts”, showing not only his sense of fun, but also broad and specific knowledge. For example, in connection with the Jon Wilks song I Can’t Find Brummagem, he tells us:
“Brummagem is a corruption of Bromwichham, an alternative name for Birmingham, and it persists locally despite appearing on no road signs or maps. In America, Brummagem is a word used to describe shoddy counterfeit goods, which were once said to be produced by Brummagem in large number, but this was a scurrilous rumour started by London sword makers trying to nobble the opposition.”
Slade budgie smugglers ….
But of course, Philip had a full life outside of Song Bar – he was a beloved husband, father, uncle and brother. He was also a keen guitarist and stylish, talented writer outside of the Bar too. He settled in Newport, Wales, but in his younger days studied English Literature at University in the 1980s, and 2015 he completed an MA I Creative Writing at the University of Cardiff.
He left behind a collection of great unpublished poems. Fortunately for the rest of us, his family posthumously put them together in a book, and used on the cover, one of his lovely illustrations. This volume, highly recommended, is available online as a paperback copy for only £4.99 and an eBook version for £1.99 from this link:
And all proceeds will go to First Story, a charity that encourages and supports young people from all backgrounds to write creatively for pleasure and for agency.
The poems, including one that inspired the meta-title of this tribute, with the first stanza quoted above, are filled with his characteristic wit, beautiful phrasing, humour and original perspective, on a whole variety of subjects, his upbringing and family, some of course very funny, and always unpredictable, while others are tender and moving. It even includes a poem by his niece, Sophia, about what it was like to have such a fun Uncle.
As mentioned above, Philip was a big fan of Barenaked Ladies and he would no doubt have been delighted, if a little bit amazed, to find that, courtesy of a family friend, one of his poems was read out by BL frontman Kevin Hearn at one of their gigs at Cambridge Corn Exchange on 21 March 2022. This is the short poem Kevin read out, one that reveals his warm mischief in a kitchen scene at home with his wife Sharanne:
Curse
The washing-up not done,
I find myself stirring
my cocoa with a knife
The wife, a superstitious type,
says, ‘Stir with a knife
and you stir up strife.’
So I say, ‘Stir with a spoon
and you stir up doom.’
And then she says. ‘Oh, you bastard.’
I thoroughly recommend anyone to buy this book of poems, as it’s not only endlessly entertaining but also the proceeds go to a great charitable cause.
So then, phillipphilip99, you are sorely missed, not only by wife Sharanne and sons, Harri and Nathaniel, to whom I give my best wishes and thanks, but also by all of us here at your favourite global, local, online musical drinking establishment.
So please feel free to add your own memories and appreciation of PP99 in the comments section below.
So then, let’s finish with the final stanza from that poem from the book that began this piece, showing Philip’s brilliantly droll, self-deprecatory wit:
Need to think of an ending,
using a rhyming couplet as a final flourish.
And though it may not be necessarily vital
really do need to work on that bastard title.
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