Friday, March 04, 2005
The importance of being David Sinclair
I am often asked "Are you David Sinclair?" And sometimes I have to reply "No." Or at least I have to confess that I am not the David Sinclair in question. If you are new to this blog, or unfamiliar with my website, or still otherwise confused, you can find my biographical details here.
So, David Sinclair. It's a splendid name and not one that I would change in a hurry. But it is also a surprisingly popular name. In fact, there are enough of them around to form a small masonic lodge. Who are these other David Sinclairs? There are several of them lurking in various corners of my world, but none who moves in quite such close proximity to me as the David Sinclair who is renowned for his photographs of jazz musicians. His name seems to be permanently on the door at Ronnie Scott's, which makes it a bit awkward on the odd occasions when I phone up asking to get myself on the guest list there. Our paths have crossed several times, and it seems likely that we are distantly related, since both our families come from the north of Scotland and we are quite close in age.
I once reviewed a concert by Andy Summers for The Times and David took the photograph which accompanied my piece. The by-line and the picture credit were thus both [separately] in the name of David Sinclair, which I thought was really rather cool, since most people who spotted this would surely have arrived at the conclusion that this Sinclair fellow must be even more talented than previously suspected. David gave me a lovely print of Andy Summers as a souvenir of that occasion, which I keep in my office. I still see David from time to time, most recently across a seriously crowded room at the launch of the new Vortex club in North London last month, when Acoustic Ladyland, featuring the sensational young jazz drummer Seb Rochford, played an utterly blinding set.
There is a completely different author and journalist called David Sinclair who is best known for his book The Pound, a "biography" of the UK currency, described by one reviewer as "a timely narrative of sterling's 1,000 years of history." This David Sinclair is, or was until recently, executive editor of the Financial Mail on Sunday. He also, rather incredibly, used to contribute to The Times. Not only that, but he occasionally turned his hand to writing about pop. This was before I started writing for the paper, and I was unaware of him until we were introduced at a media jolly-up somewhere in town. He suggested that I might like to insert an initial in my by-line. I haven't had the pleasure of speaking to him again. However, I did once receive a substantial payment for an article I obviously hadn't written. I eventually figured out that it should have gone to him. I wonder if he got it in the end.
However, the namesake I am most often confused with, or asked about, is David Sinclair the musician who used to play keyboards in the group Caravan. Convened in Canterbury in 1968, Caravan specialised in a whimsical brand of progressive rock played in awkward time signatures. A largely ego-free bunch of English eccentrics, including David's cousin Richard Sinclair on bass and vocals, they were fondly regarded by a particularly knowing sort of 1970s rock fan. But they were never as forceful as their more celebrated contemporaries Soft Machine, and despite a couple of brushes with the lower reaches of the charts with their albums Cunning Stunts (1975) and Blind Dog at St. Dunstan's (1976), they remained the archetypal underground/cult band.
Again, I am roughly the same age as this David Sinclair, but that is where the similarities end. I don't play keyboards, I have no connections with Canterbury. So far as I'm aware he has never written for The Times. We have never met or spoken. But perhaps the most crucial divergence in our histories is that he has become known - whether by choice or otherwise - as Dave Sinclair. So it is strange that he is the one I am most often confused with.
There are plenty of other David Sinclairs who can claim varying degrees of celebrity, including the flamenco guitarist living in Ontario, and the former pirate radio DJ, who was also working in Canada the last anyone heard of him. But as identity crises go, the situation could be worse. Imagine what it must be like to have been born with the name Fred West or Michael Jackson. None of my lot are mass murderers - so far as I know - or world famous superstars.... yet! ¶ 7:31 pm
So, David Sinclair. It's a splendid name and not one that I would change in a hurry. But it is also a surprisingly popular name. In fact, there are enough of them around to form a small masonic lodge. Who are these other David Sinclairs? There are several of them lurking in various corners of my world, but none who moves in quite such close proximity to me as the David Sinclair who is renowned for his photographs of jazz musicians. His name seems to be permanently on the door at Ronnie Scott's, which makes it a bit awkward on the odd occasions when I phone up asking to get myself on the guest list there. Our paths have crossed several times, and it seems likely that we are distantly related, since both our families come from the north of Scotland and we are quite close in age.
I once reviewed a concert by Andy Summers for The Times and David took the photograph which accompanied my piece. The by-line and the picture credit were thus both [separately] in the name of David Sinclair, which I thought was really rather cool, since most people who spotted this would surely have arrived at the conclusion that this Sinclair fellow must be even more talented than previously suspected. David gave me a lovely print of Andy Summers as a souvenir of that occasion, which I keep in my office. I still see David from time to time, most recently across a seriously crowded room at the launch of the new Vortex club in North London last month, when Acoustic Ladyland, featuring the sensational young jazz drummer Seb Rochford, played an utterly blinding set.
There is a completely different author and journalist called David Sinclair who is best known for his book The Pound, a "biography" of the UK currency, described by one reviewer as "a timely narrative of sterling's 1,000 years of history." This David Sinclair is, or was until recently, executive editor of the Financial Mail on Sunday. He also, rather incredibly, used to contribute to The Times. Not only that, but he occasionally turned his hand to writing about pop. This was before I started writing for the paper, and I was unaware of him until we were introduced at a media jolly-up somewhere in town. He suggested that I might like to insert an initial in my by-line. I haven't had the pleasure of speaking to him again. However, I did once receive a substantial payment for an article I obviously hadn't written. I eventually figured out that it should have gone to him. I wonder if he got it in the end.
However, the namesake I am most often confused with, or asked about, is David Sinclair the musician who used to play keyboards in the group Caravan. Convened in Canterbury in 1968, Caravan specialised in a whimsical brand of progressive rock played in awkward time signatures. A largely ego-free bunch of English eccentrics, including David's cousin Richard Sinclair on bass and vocals, they were fondly regarded by a particularly knowing sort of 1970s rock fan. But they were never as forceful as their more celebrated contemporaries Soft Machine, and despite a couple of brushes with the lower reaches of the charts with their albums Cunning Stunts (1975) and Blind Dog at St. Dunstan's (1976), they remained the archetypal underground/cult band.
Again, I am roughly the same age as this David Sinclair, but that is where the similarities end. I don't play keyboards, I have no connections with Canterbury. So far as I'm aware he has never written for The Times. We have never met or spoken. But perhaps the most crucial divergence in our histories is that he has become known - whether by choice or otherwise - as Dave Sinclair. So it is strange that he is the one I am most often confused with.
There are plenty of other David Sinclairs who can claim varying degrees of celebrity, including the flamenco guitarist living in Ontario, and the former pirate radio DJ, who was also working in Canada the last anyone heard of him. But as identity crises go, the situation could be worse. Imagine what it must be like to have been born with the name Fred West or Michael Jackson. None of my lot are mass murderers - so far as I know - or world famous superstars.... yet! ¶ 7:31 pm
