Even by Caught By The River’s eclectic standards, last night was a new one on us. Andrews of Arcadia put it perfectly when he pointed out that we were holding an event to celebrate the launch of a book shelf.

The fact is, that book shelf is a permanent physical manifestation of our shop in arguably the greatest record shop in the world – something we thought was worth celebrating. And we wanted to properly launch our recent collection, On Nature.

So, we got together, cracked a barrel of Sambrooks’ Wandle Ale (massive thanks to Duncan for that), had a chat on stage with John Andrews and Pete Donne from Rough Trade, heard a phenomenal reading from On Nature by the mighty Bill Drummond then took a short walk up the road for a Nature Disco at our favourite pub in London – Mason and Taylor – with Friend of the River Richard Norris on the decks. All that added up to a fantastic night and a hell of a sore head the morning after.

Our friend Emma Warren wrote a brilliant piece about it here and says it all better than I ever could. Emma will be hosting the next get together at Rough Trade on October 12th. It will be unmissable, we’ll give you full details in the next few days.

Robin. Pics by Neil Thomson

In case you missed it, we thought we’d remind you that we’re hosting two events in London this evening, one after the other just up the road, both free. The first is at the Rough Trade shop in the Truman Brewery and features us lot in conversation about On Nature with John Andrews and a reading from that book by Bill Drummond. That starts at 6.30pm.

At 8.30, we’re hosting a Nature Disco with special guest Richard Norris (Beyond The Wizard’s Sleeve/The Time and Space Machine) just at the top of Brick Lane at Mason and Taylor. Time Out wrote some very nice words about the Nature Disco last week – love the fact they listed us in the Rock, Metal and Alternative section (pretty much spot on I’d say). If you don’t know Mason and Taylor, it’s our favourite pub in London – perfect pints every time from the best selection in town.

Hope to see a few of you down there, mine’s a Camden Pale Ale.

Ps here’s a link to Jeff and Richard’s Nature Disco mix from earlier in the year.

A vintage tackle dealers story by Peter Carman.

Just another telephone call, “About your advertisement – I have some fishing tackle, unfortunately it won’t be used any more. Some of it is quite old.”

Let me explain. I am a collector, but like a lot of us, I sell a little, swap a little and attend countless tackle fairs. This is all because some years ago I came across an Allcock Aerialite in maroon Bakelite. I thought it was such a wonderful object that ever since then I can’t stop looking. After spending a fortune on rubbish I hope I have acquired a selective eye. Saying that, if someone wants to hoist the contents of their garden shed upon me so I can own a Wallis Wizard or a Zephyr centrepin, I tend to shrug my shoulders and take the lot.

I don’t get excited any more. Telephone calls are few and far between nowadays. Ebay and Auctions houses with specialist sporting sales have put the brakes on them. I usually just get the “mint” rod to look at – which never is – or a heap of bamboo, brass and rotten rod bags. I nearly forgot this one. Trying to reduce time spent with my wife in an out-of-town shopping centre. One of those places devoid of a shop of any interest. The phone call allowed me to abandon her with John Lewis and visit the voice behind it.

“There it is; everything in that pile”. Well without even opening or pulling at anything I could see a wooden Farlow’s racquet shaped Gye landing net with the sliding handle. Promising I thought. Using the “dealer” part of my head and not appearing too eager I opened a few boxes and carefully untied some fragile rod bags. I pushed aside the heavy Dunlop waders, keepnets, the obligatory gas mask bag and a Tilley lamp. I discovered a nice un-named brass multiplier winch, a couple of well-used Avon Royal centrepins, two wooden reels with just a single winding handle each, tackle boxes with plenty of cork and balsa floats, many homemade. A jumble of lures, baits, and a couple of whittled wooden plugs. I spied some phantom swallowtails and a couple of Geens Chase-me’s within the rusty tangle of traces and trebles, Mucilin tins, flies and sharpening stones. Later stuff included an early bite alarm, swimfeeders, boilie baiting needles, even modern hair rig stops. The rods were awful, broken and bent, short old fibreglass and some later cheap carbon carp, fly and float rods. There was an undamaged ABU Zoom baitcaster in its bag, about the best of the rod show, testament to quality, probably.

The guardian of the shed spoke again “I don’t know what it’s worth but we need one of these.” She guided me out into the daylight, pulled a folded cutting from her blue blazer, opened it carefully and pointed at a picture of a smiling woman in an easy chair. “A riser-recliner,” she said. I looked at the picture again. The woman portrayed was of an age and disposition that clearly didn’t need the appliance. An obvious strategy by the manufacturers to hoodwink people into believing they are older than they think.

Anyway, the price for the few bits I wanted was unsettled to date and uppermost in my mind, so I glanced at the price of the chair. Well, it was a bit cryptic, taking into account the “members reduction” and it was this month’s “star buy”. However, I was equating it with the tackle and agreed. In one way it was nice not to discuss values, but I am sure advantage fell on her side of the deal.

“You will take it all won’t you – only we have to clear the shed” – Oh no, I thought – this did include the gas mask bag, waders and Tilley lamp. The guardian of the shed had done her job well. I’m not sure I had. I fear my love of old tackle is greater than that of my wallet at times. I pocketed the brass multiplier, threw the rest in the car and headed back. Once inside the shopping centre I realised a shed isn’t such a bad place to be. I re-joined my wife who complained “not more stuff” adding on the way home “and it stinks too” I didn’t say anything, mentally agreed, but stayed silent for the sake of a quiet life.

My enthusiasm for the gear was not great and a week must have passed before I remembered the Geens baits and decided the chill easterly that blows straight into my garage had turned into a westerly and conditions made facing up to sorting the pile a little more bearable. I sorted it out and luckily there were a few more interesting baits in the jumble, but the centrepins didn’t look so good in my garage as in the shed, maybe some of the rods were salvageable – well enough for auction, anyway. I was undecided about the waders – the problem with them is that you don’t know until you’ve tried em’ – then it’s too late!! Auction as well I think, someone else can chance the wet feet.

I noticed some paperwork at the bottom of the pile and pulled it out. A handful of licences, permits or tabs. Why do they call them tabs? I only remember this because the approaching bailiff used to shout from the weir bridge when we were kids “Show me your tabs,” as we disappeared on our bicycles. Bathampton Anglers, Bristol Amalagamation, Wessex Water. I began to link the tackle I bought with the waters in the tabs. The Bristol Avon, Kennet and Avon canal, Hunstrete lake, once home of the record eel, Blagdon and Chew. All places I was familiar with. I unfolded the modern rod licence, not because of fishing interest, just plain nosiness really. Joseph Smith, Bristol road, old age concession. I now had a name to go with the tackle. My eyes glanced over the detail and then the date of birth. 1913. Jesus! I looked again and checked the date of issue – it was 2008. Now my grade 2 CSE maths (I was thrown out of O level due to lack of interest) tells me Joseph is 97 and was possibly fishing recently! If he retired at 65 in 1978 that’s 32 years pension, reduced licence fees and all that fishing from the bank now in the bank. Bloody well done.

Some questions answered. I admit to being puzzled by the range of tackle in the pile from a brass mulltipier to hair rig stops. I thought, perhaps wrongly, that is was from family members of different generations, but I doubt that now. I also realised the importance of the riser-recliner. I now felt a little guilty. In my quest for collectable bits and old reels I had overlooked the meaning of this stuff, I had even cursed myself for perhaps paying too much. I had never asked about the angler who had used it all and whittled those wooden plugs and fashioned the floats. I wished I had. I bet he was a great bloke to know. In fact I am sure of it. He was, after all, one of us. Perhaps old Izaak directed me to the shed. I would like to think so. Joseph, enjoy your chair, you deserve it. I hope you enjoy the time left to remember and relive the best of those fishing moments, misty mornings, hopes and dreams.

Remember there is more to old tackle than just twenty pound notes. I will.

Peter Carman at The Last Cast.

(all the photos above are by Nick Moore)
(this pic by Tom Sheehan)

It was a lot of fun and we plan on making it a regular event, open to all, after the Summer. Before that there’s Port Eliot to look forward to.

Winter Pike featuring Fred J Taylor and Richard Walker
Listen to it as a CBTR podcast or download free from our itunes page.

Review by John Andrews.

until the last surviving thames professional roger wyndham-barnes untied his punt at shiplake and took anglers downstream to his favourite weirpool, the best thing to have come out of the berkshire town of twyford was the fauna records label. the brainchild of ted fletcher, fauna’s most sought after release is this, ‘a year in fishing – volume 1′ winter pike’, a 33 rpm long playing lp, the record of a conversation carried on between two of the 20th centuries most influential anglers, dick walker and fred j. taylor. recorded on location using a lavalier condenser and mixed using an alice ad52 these committals essentially eavesdrop on a couple of day’s angling between two friends. in the grooves of this rare piece of vinyl you can smell the mud of the thames in winter, see the silouhette of dead reed beds beneath the surface and feel the gravity of the drop from the dam wall at tring. this is a world of d-i-y and homespun philosophy, a box car, backwoods manifesto for hinterland towns and villages that were swallowed up as London expanded. this is post war british folklore committed to a piece of plastic. a world confined in the 21st century to the archive of the car boot cardboard box and the attic sale. these are the conversations ted fletcher wanted the world to hear before they were drowned out by the drone of bait boats and the rancid whooping of robson green. an ordinary world populated by ordinary people, a lawnmower engineer from hitchin and a country boy. symbolized by a duffle coat in a garden shed, a booble hat by the fire in the quarry. listening to it you soon forget that the men captured here are giants of the post war angling world, published authors, recognised print journalists and occasional broadcasters, as their conversation is the conversation that we all have when we go fishing for pike be it with each other, with ourselves or just with the water. how many times have you said ‘he’s lively, fred’ or been prompted to mutter ‘good job i brought that big landing net, innit?’. this lp is a treasure. you might find it at wood lane car boot or in your local charity shop. looking for it will give your life some purpose. and before too long you’ll be saying to people on the bus ‘lean and mean, don’t he?’ with a straight face and a herring in your pocket. dressed in a duffle coat or a woolly bobble hat. in the meantime you can listen to it here courtesy of the archivist at caught by the river. brought to you by another man in another shed in another town in another century. this is winter as it should be lived. at 33 revolutions per minute. beautiful.

Further reading; excellent article on Walker in the media at the Angling Heritage website

Nick Small chanced upon this amazing photo on Flickr at the weekend. The drama of it blew us away so we got in touch with the guy and this is what he told us;

….All this happen last monday..We are fishermen first and we have great access to beautifull scotland ..I take friends out fishing nearly every week..we went to the north part of loch lomond near ardlui …we fished a small loch very unacessible from the road, it is separated but the river falloch. I make good use of a kayak to get to those remote places..the fish are pike…we allways have to break the ice…we use both methode of fishing, either the lure or dead bait, like small mackrell …scenery, weather changes,light big fish up to 24lb makes your day..the guy on the picture is myself ……..my friend took the picture, konrad his name is…….he is very strong and helps me out with all the gears………loch lomond is so unexplored, they are huge fish ..would be good to get a 30lb ..maybe this year with the kayak…be good jeff ..nicolas valentin

There are loads more great shots, fishing and otherwise, up on Nicolas and Konrad’s page HERE.

”In the early hours of the 13th of September last (4.45 a.m, to be exact), Richard Walker, of Hitchin, was in his tent beside Redmire Pool in the West Country”…..

B.B, on the day that Richard met Clarissa, from Country Fair magazine, December 1952. click HERE to see the story as it originally appeared.

Introduction by Jon Berry.

It is all but impossible to imagine carp fishing before Walker caught his 44-pounder from Redmire in September 1952. The small band of carp fishers in post-war England doubtless knew of Albert Buckley and of the mysterious Otto Overbeck, but big fish were scarce and those chasing them scarcer still. BB’s Confessions of a Carp Fisher hinted at an underworld of silent, patient men who fished long hours for little reward, but it was Dick who pulled remarkable and uncatchable creatures from the depths of mythology and in to the public consciousness.

With the benefit of his engineering and scientific background, a skill for designing appropriate tackle and an arrogant dismissal of dogma, Walker led his merry crew – Dick Kefford, Maurice Ingham, Pete Thomas and the rest of the Carp Catchers’ Club – to angling greatness. Old taboos were shattered by their catches from Mapperley, Dagenham and that small farm pond in Herefordshire, and the rod that had landed the record fish – Walker’s own Mark IV – became the most desirable 122” of bamboo in fishing history. It is still the best rod of its type, and with other Walker-inspired innovations such as bite alarms following soon after, generations of carp addicts were given a blueprint to follow.

The capture of Clarissa – or Ravioli as Dick preferred to call her – has been retold many times. Walker’s own account found a wide audience in his seminal Stillwater Angling, and reads factually, almost unemotionally. This was to be expected of Walker. He had set out to prove big carp could be caught, and having done so moved on to other challenges. Bernard Venables would later criticise him for his detachment, a perceived loss of the old spirit of angling, even ruthlessness. Walker’s biographer, the late Professor Barrie Rickards, saw it differently. Dick Walker loved fishing, and loved it even more when the fish were big. Once he had caught the one he was after, he simply began looking for a different monster. He did stop to smell the flowers along the way – but he chose not to write about them.

The article Jeff has unearthed offers the finest account I have read of Walker’s record carp. Like all the best journalism, it captures the essence of the moment – wide-eyed wonder, disbelief, and the dawning of a new age. Enjoy.

“B.B.,” President of the Carp Catchers’ Club, tells exclusively to “Country Fair” the story that every angler has been waiting for……

read the full story here tomorrow.

Charlie Bettinson. Golitha Falls, 28th Nov 1974. 24lbs 38”

Fast moving water crashes onto granite as its spume is thrown into the dull winter’s light, expressed by the gullies, cuts and crevices through which this relentless flow presses and thunders. December lies heavy at Golitha Falls on the Fowey River in East Cornwall. It’s one of the wild places of Bodmin Moor and holds a special significance for salmon anglers.

The Fowey is a spate river and back in the 1970s and 80s, given sufficient rain in the winter months, it would bring up the greybacks – the winter and early spring salmon whose size and strength far outweigh the width of this river. Fish of over thirty pounds were caught here then – in a river that’s between only twenty and thirty feet wide in most places. Tales of a forty pound salmon taken here long ago are not hard to verify. Sadly they have all but disappeared now and only a few are seen in the lower reaches where they quickly spawn and return to the sea.
“It’s not the hooking’em, it’s the getting them out that’s hard” – so say the men who know this place. Imagine then, that we are back there, forty years ago, at the roaring Golitha Falls, a wild secluded cathedral, full of mist and noise.
The fish are tenacious and tough. Seeing one of these greybacks is an education in game fishing. They look violent and strong with large powerful backs to give them extra speed . They are gnarled and scarred, broader and thicker than other fish, with a distinct hump back. Unlike the film star salmon that are found in the tender and civilized waters of the Tamar or Torridge in Devon, these are tough guys, commando fish, warriors with enormous strength and the ability to swim faster than a man can run. They can break twenty, thirty or even forty pound line with the flash of a tail and disappear without trace.
The banks here are treacherous, steep and slippery -one false move and you’re in. This is not angling for the faint hearted. Pastoral pleasures are far from this battlefield. No-one with a large social sweep would choose to be here. This is for the dedicated. The noise of the water is deafening and other than sign language, shouting into another’s ear is the only sure way to communicate. These anglers often go it alone though. The prize is too great to be shared. A wild fish weighing above twenty pounds and taken under these conditions, is a great prize and can enhance a man’s standing on the river. This is the Wild West and the men who fish here reflect that.
Golitha Falls is the major obstacle on the Fowey that salmon must overcome to reach the relative calm of the Draynes Valley and spawn in safety. On a “big” day it is impassable, so fish can be seen attempting to jump it only to be thrown back into the Falls Pool. Hooking one of these commandos is not so hard. Perseverance, patience and excellent eyesight will do the trick together with a spinning rod and 25lbs line. But after the hooking – that’s when the trouble starts. There is no room to manoeuvre. A winter fish will often go straight out of the back of the pool into the lower Bathing Pool. He may wait up there; he may keep rushing fifty, a hundred or even two hundred yards down river and hide up under some wild cover until you find him, if you still have him “on”. The worst obstacle of all is the nervy fumbling and clumsy loss of tenacity and confidence in the man who is trying to hang on and somehow land his prize.
Let’s imagine that after being hooked, a fish has gone back out of the Falls Pool and a hundred yards down river. He’s stopped under a large fallen tree that is impassable. The technique for overcoming this problem is to let the fish settle, then very gently, while the torrent is raging beneath your feet, find a suitable place to tie the line off to a branch, then cut it upstream of the knot, clamber around the fallen tree – rod in hand -and with a deep breath cut the line now downstream of the tree and for a moment have a wild powerful salmon on a piece of nylon held in your hand while you retie the two bits of line together with a double grinner knot and then gently wind in to put pressure on the fish again. The reel takes up the slack and -there he is – tugging madly at your rod-tip. You try to ascertain where he is now and how’s he’s placed for the next manoeuvre. Often you can’t see for overgrown trees or the steep banks winding away in a curve below you. You hang on.
The fish has decided to go beneath another fallen tree with scattered branches and into the back of a bramble strewn boulder ten feet wide. It’s the tie and cut procedure again. Settle, tie off, clamber around, cut the line with the fish on the end, and persuade your cold tired fingers to tie another double grinner in the fading half light and then – off once more.
This time though he’s desperate. After twenty minutes of scrambling he knows there’s definitely something up and he doesn’t like it at all. He takes off. Line flies off the reel faster now and you are forced to open the bale arm and hope for salvation somehow. The line runs out, just as you hoped it wouldn’t. The fish has more than enough strength, helped by the pull of a fast winter river, to shatter your line, reel and rod. This is now the last throw of the dice. You hurl the rod into the river after the fish as a javelin thrower might do and run. You run, you clamber, you slip, breaking your foothold and crashing your shin into unforgiving granite. Deal with that later you tell yourself.
A fellow fisherman has watched all this drama unfold and has arrived in the nick to assist. Another hundred yards further downstream he searches with you for the thrown rod. Can’t see it. He casts a spinner into the water and hooks a line. Your line! Backing up he drags the rod to the surface and you gratefully collect it. Line now goes back onto the spool. More than would be guessed at. In fact so much that either the fish is gone or he’s very close. You are in an easier place now, a wide pool with earth banks and no fallen trees. You wind and there he is. Twenty yards downstream- he surfaces and for all the world, looks a beaten fish. But not yet.
He’s fighting for his life and having swum two thousand miles from the Arctic Circle back to the place where he was born he’s not about to surrender his life without a final declaration of intent. He dives. He will not come up. You wind and lift – wind and lift. He will not be moved. It’s his last refuge and he’s put five feet of cold winter water between you and him.
Now comes the last act of this drama. You take off your coat, remove all valuables, car keys, spinners, angling licence and anything else that you feel you will need to get home, give the rod to your accomplice and slip gently into the water upstream of him. It’s a shade warmer than you would have predicted but deeper too-up to your armpits. You can see him now. Solid and dark, but he’s immovable on the bottom. Moving behind him you slowly sink a tailer – a kind of strong snare on a long handle- into position. If you miss him now with the tailer he could easily run again and being in the water, you would have no chance to control him, neither would anyone else – even from the bank. He would be lost. After all this, it’s unthinkable. You wait until he rises slightly and with all the concentration you have, in one confident movement, you slip the snare over his tail and wrench it upwards. The snare closes and he flaps, but to no avail. Unless something drastically stupid happens, he’s your fish now. It’s been forty-eight minutes since you hooked him and in that time he’s travelled four hundred and fifty yards downstream.
Handing the tailer’s end to your fellow angler on the bank, you clamber out. But with the added weight of water in your clothes you suddenly realise that you are shattered. A combination of mental and physical exhaustion overcomes your previously alert state and you sink to the ground in a wet heap. The giant silver prize is taken a safe distance from the flow and dispatched, assuming it is not a red spawning fish which must then be returned. The river needs a regular supply of eggs and milt.
Lifting him by the tail, the greyback weighs in at over twenty pounds and a gradual warming sensation grows into your tired, cold, wet body. You have the prize. You have outwitted nature -this time- and against many odds survived and taken a fantastic fish from this roaring river and now you can carry him home. The news will spread. No need to tell your friends on the river-they’ll know by night fall anyway. You collect up your belongings before starting the long damp trudge back to civilisation. But if you are wise you’ll find a silver coin and with a short silent prayer, toss it into the river with a numbed shaky hand. Silver out- silver in. That’s the way of it at Golitha.