Just like that odd-smelling great uncle you hoped wouldn’t appear for Christmas, Scher Drops is popping by unannounced to mark the festive season.
After we churned out a Substack every week for a couple of months, you may (or may not) have noticed another few months of radio silence. This wasn’t planned: I was away for a bit, then got Covid (so 2021), causing things to drop off somewhat. And then once I am out of a habit it always takes a jump-start to get me going again.
Turns out that jump-start is a roundup of the year. I started compiling a few things for my own benefit and thought, you know what, there simply aren’t enough end-of-year reviews out there. So here we are.
Going into 2024 I am planning to get Scher Drops out more regularly again - but perhaps a more realistic once a fortnight or so.
But for now, here are some highlights from my year, arranged as follows:
Have been playing
Have been reading
Have been sporting
Have been visiting
Have been playing
Fairly straightforward this: I’ve compiled my favourite songs released this year into one playlist. NB this is not my most played (you can check out my Spotify Wrapped if you must1) but the new songs from 2023 which I have enjoyed the most.
If you do want to have a listen, I’ve arranged the playlist into an order that makes broad thematic sense. Though feel free to whack on shuffle if you fancy random genres coming at you left, right, and centre.
I won’t regale you with details of all 19 songs - some of which long-term readers may recognise from previous Scher Drops playlists - but I will flag a few choice ones that I’ve particularly enjoyed.
We start the playlist hard and heavy with Ice Spice, whose beats can only be described as filthy. If you enjoy Princess Diana, the Bronx native’s debut EP Like…? is well worth checking out.
Skipping down a bit, we have Tenere Den - a genuinely unique collaboration between Tinariwen, of the nomadic Saharan Berber tribe, and Fats Kaplin, a bluegrass multi-instrumentalist who lives in Nashville. Not sure how it works but it really does.
Finally, if you listen to one song from the playlist, make it Jesus Going to Clean House, from Lee Tracy and Isaac Manning. The’re a singer and producer duo who have been releasing music since the late eighties but only recently have found an audience for their rough and ready, genre-straddling electronic sound. This song could easily be from 1989 or 2029. I’m obsessed with it.
Have been reading
My new year’s resolution for 2023 was to read 20 books. It was, like many of my well-intentioned but overly optimistic ideas, something of a stretch: I’ve completed 12 books, with another two half-finished and one abandoned.2
Not bad, but not great either. It does leave me space, however, to renew my resolution for 2024. And with a year’s more experience, hurting from coming up short but determined to put things right, I will be backing myself for a real tilt at the Premier League title reaching the big 20.
One thing that has been a success is the fact I’ve kept a record of what I’ve read.3 This has been helpful in curating options for what to read next (I am a Kindle-phile but miss the visual element of seeing a bookshelf/pile of unread books); balancing fiction and non-fiction (7-5 to fiction, since you ask); and compiling end-of-year lists for web-based newsletter platforms.
I’ll post my full 2023 reading list for posterity below but for what it’s worth, these were my two favourites of the year.
The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida by Shehan Karunatilaka [fiction]
Not an especially left-field choice given it won the Booker last year but Seven Moons is a stunning novel.
Set in 1980s Sri Lanka torn apart by civil war, it manages to straddle fantasy and brutal realism effortlessly as we follow our protagonist Maali Almeida’s investigation of his own death. Karunatilaka’s sheer ambition and vision is impressive enough (it was originally rejected by international publishers for being ‘too confusing’ for a western audience) but - like so many great books - it is the characters that keep you hooked.
At the risk of straying waaaaay into cliché territory, it made me laugh, it made me cry, and I couldn’t put it down. Highly recommended.
I also want to give honourable mentions to Maps of Our Spectacular Bodies by Maddie Mortimer, a heart-wrenching but also life-affirming debut from an incredibly talented twenty-something who writes with the wisdom of a septuagenarian; and to The Wandering Falcon by the late Jamil Ahmad, who was a septuagenarian when this was published in 2011 (also a debut). Drawing on his experience as a civil servant posted to the mountainous border between Pakistan and Afghanistan in the mid-twentieth century, Ahmad effortlessly captures that other-worldly tribal existence in a book that is somewhere between novel and short story collection.
Beyond the Wall by Katja Hoyer [non-fiction]
Also not a niche choice given it’s topped the best-seller charts all year but Beyond the Wall is a genuinely original (for Western history at least) look at East Germany under communism.
Eschewing received ‘communist country = bad’ wisdom, Hoyer blends a huge amount of first-hand evidence, personal accounts and data - as well as other historians’ views - to paint a vivid picture of life in the GDR for its 17-18m inhabitants.
As anyone who has had a pint with me recently will attest, it is full of very quotable stories and facts. Did you know, for example, that Vietnam’s coffee industry (they are the second largest producer of coffee in the world) was set up by the GDR in the late seventies as a long-term solution to volatile global coffee prices? And that the GDR finished first or second at every single Olympic games, winter and summer, from 1972 until the country’s collapse?4
But Beyond the Wall is far more than a series of factoids. The book makes compelling arguments around the influences and decisions that shaped the state, what this meant for your Mann und Frau on the Straße, and ultimately how it led to the country’s (almost accidental) demise. For example, the outlook of its early leaders - most notably Walter Ulbricht (first de facto head of the GDR) and Erich Mielke (head of the Stasi) - were forged during their time in Stalinist Russia, where a prerequisite of surviving the purges (which were especially barbaric for the tens of thousands of German communists who had fled to Russia to escape Hitler) was a willingness to comply with authorities and denounce colleagues. That in turn fed into East Germany’s swift descent into repression and a police state after its creation.
My one slight criticism of Hoyer’s work actually relates to the (relatively) little we hear of the Stasi: I was expecting a little more on the secret police, whose influence pervaded every aspect of GDR society. But the book does not shy away from the brutality of the regime, particularly when guarding its borders from citizens escaping, and ultimately I think Hoyer would argue the Stasi’s power is very well-trodden ground and further examination would not add to our understanding of the country.
All told, a fascinating book.
Also honourable mention to Mark Watson’s semi-autobiography Mortification: Eight Deaths and Life After Them, in which the stand-up comedian is incredibly candid about his failures in life and what he has learnt from them. Written in the tone of voice that watchers of his stand-up shows will instantly recognise, it is quite a tough read at points but funny on every page and ultimately with an uplifting message. And also a nod to Hitting Against the Spin by Nathan Leamon and Ben Jones: a book about cricket
data that is so insightful that anyone with a passing interest in sport will enjoy.
So for the record, my full list of books read in 2023:
Fiction
One of You - Bastian Scheinsteiger and Martin Suter
A novel rooted in reality, telling the story of footballer Bastian Schweinsteiger's life
Maps of our Spectacular Bodies - Maddie Mortimer
Moving novel about a mother's struggle with cancer
The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida - Shehan Karunatilaka
Brilliant, Booker-prize winning, genre-bending novel set in 1980s Sri Lanka
The Guest - Emma Cline
Lightweight summer reading about an escort's attempts to ingratiate/survive with the rich Long Island set
Ficciones - Jorge Luis Borges
Classic short stories collection
The Wandering Falcon - Jamil Ahmad
Haunting book set on the lawless Pakistan-Afghanistan border
The Bee Sting - Paul Murray
Sad, moving but amusing Irish family drama.
Non-fiction
Hitting Against the Spin - Nathan Leamon and Ben Jones
Data-driven exploration of how cricket works and what has shaped its development
Beyond the Wall - Katja Hoyer
Original, in-depth look at life in communist East Germany
Mortification: Eight Deaths and Life After Them - Mark Watson
A comedian's reflections on his (perceived) failures and what he has learnt from them
Monte Carlo or Bust - Joseph Buchdahl
How to use monte carlo simulations to improve sports betting analysis
The Pathless Path - Paul Millerd
Reimagining our approach to careers/life, based on the author's own experience of quitting the corporate world
Have been sporting
It has, for my money at least, been a pretty bumper sporting year. Here are my favourite events of 2023.
The Women’s World Cup (July-August)
Sarina Wiegman’s England side, already national heroes following their Euro 2022 victory on home soil, almost sealed immortality as they reached the World Cup final this year - only to come up just short as they lost 1-0 to Spain. If the Euros victory was the catalyst that made people seriously sit up and take notice of women’s football, this felt like the first tournament where the country could collectively express its new found passion, as only we know how: with the crosses of St. George flying all around us, gathered in pubs and front rooms, falling heart-wrenchingly short - together.
The Ashes (June-July)
A heroic comeback from 2-0 down, sufficient controversy to provoke a near diplomatic incident, and some of the most exciting test cricket you are ever likely to witness: but for rain at Old Trafford preventing a result in the fourth test, this was almost, almost, the greatest Ashes series of all time - certainly since 1936/37 when Australia became the first and only team to complete a 3-2 series win having lost the first two tests.
The Baz Ball effect.
World Athletics Championships (August)
There was a record-equalling haul of ten medals for Team GB at the World Champs in Budapest which, various off-track issues notwithstanding, has raised hopes of a big showing at next year’s Olympics in Paris.
There were lots of brilliant moments but we obviously have to mention our two gold medallists: Josh Kerr and Katrina Johnson-Thompson. Kerr’s gritty run in the 1500m to stun favourite Jakob Ingebrigtsen - a year after fellow Scotsman Jake Wightman did the same in the previous World Championships - was a thrilling, out-of-your-seat race; KJTs emotional win in the Heptathlon completed a remarkable personal journey that took one of our most likeable athletes from the brink of retirement to being crowned best in the world for a second time.
Matt Hudson-Smith’s agonising 400m silver felt for so long like it would be our third gold but he couldn’t quite hold onto his lead - hopefully fuel for the Paris fire. Likewise Keely Hodgkinson, who had to settle for second once again in the 800m, this time to Kenya’s Mary Moraa with long-time rival Athing Mu in third.
Away from Team GB, Jamaica’s hold over women’s short distance was loosened ever so slightly: the USA’s Sha'Carri Richardson set a PB and championship record to win the 100m and prevent a second consecutive Jamaica 1-2-3, but Shericka Jackson - who took silver in that race - went on to retain her 200m gold. America’s Noah Lyles - the self-styled saviour of sprinting - completed the men’s 100/200m double.
And finally, we witnessed the sort of redemptive narrative arc that only sport can provide, all within the same meet. The Netherlands’ Femke Bol, whose speciality is 400m hurdles, ran for her team in the mixed 4x400m relay on the opening day but, leading with just metres left, dramatically fell and cost her team not just a gold but any medal. It was brutal to watch. Bol, however, not only went on to win her first Worlds gold in the hurdles, she then ran a mind-blowing anchor leg in the women’s 4x400m to overtake GB and the USA and lead the Netherlands to victory on the final day of the championships. Now that’s a comeback.
The Ryder Cup (October)
A classic Hollywood cop movie trope sees two misanthropic individuals who prefer working alone made to operate as partners against their wishes. Over the course of the film they learn to recognise each other’s strengths and come to value working together as a team.
If I were USA captain Zach Johnson I’d have had my side watching everything from In the Heat of the Night to Men in Black before heading to Rome in an attempt to instil some of those lessons in my charges.
Going into the 2023 edition, the USA were a far stronger side on paper than Europe. But the Ryder Cup is a fascinating proposition precisely because you are asking sportsmen who spend their professional lives focusing on being world-class individuals to operate as part of a wider team.
Throw those individuals into the raucous, unashamedly partisan atmosphere of the Ryder Cup and funny things happen. The Europeans seem to embrace the sense of collective far more than their counterparts from across the Atlantic - almost paradoxically, given we are talking a disparate collection of nations versus a group of compatriots - while the Americans struggle to do more than pay lip service to the fact they are on the same side.
And so, on an extraordinary opening morning, Europe took all four match-ups to lead 4-0: the first time in the storied history of the event this has happened. Captain Luke Donald’s choice to open proceedings with the most collaborative format - foursomes - proved a telling masterstroke.
Rumours quickly spread of discord in the US camp, not helped by their failure to win any of the afternoon’s four balls. Although things eased a little the following day, where the eight points on offer were shared 4-4, we still witnessed some crazy golf - including the Scandinavian pairing of rookie Ludvig Åberg and Viktor Hovland beating world number one Scottie Scheffler and the hugely experienced Brooks Koepka 9&7 - the biggest victory in an 18-hole match in Ryder Cup history.
Team Europe ultimately recorded the most comfortable of victories, 16.5-11.5, to spark wild celebrations at the Marco Simone Golf and Country Club.
You can speculate as to how much our conceptions of team work and collective really influence these events. But, of the fourteen matches since 1995, Team USA have only won four - all on home soil. I suspect that does tell a story.
Queens Park Rangers 4-2 Stoke City (28th November)
(You didn’t think you’d escaped without an Rs reference, did you?!)
Queens Park Rangers have, by any reasonable measure, been an utterly dreadful football side for over a year. From the 22nd October 2022 to the 28th November 2023 they recorded one solitary home win. ONE. That’s a run of 23 games. They only managed to score more than one goal in five of 48 matches - they got through the same amount of managers in that time. And the ‘Super Hoops’ had only mustered four goals at home in total this season.
As a match-going fan of a small-ish club, you expect bad runs. It’s a feature of supporting your local team, not a bug. But even by the bonkers standards of QPR, this was something else. Yet when you are in the midst of it, it doesn’t feel - on the surface at least - quite so bad. There’s always the next game, and when that yields the same dreadful football, there’s the one after that. But the cumulative impact does wear you down, to the point that even the smattering of boos that greeted our inevitable defeats felt resigned and lacklustre.
Then Martí arrived. Spanish manager Martí Cifuentes, all designer clothes, sexy accent and highfalutin ideas about keeping possession, took over the hot seat from Gareth Ainsworth in late November. And when he - and we - secured our first home win since March with a late comeback against the ten men of Stoke City, it was the sort of transcendental experience they write about in the Bible. I, for one, had not appreciated just how despondent I had become, how starved of pleasure I was when doing something I have enjoyed from the age of four. Judging by the pandemonium and sheer release of emotion that had Loftus Road rocking to its foundations, I was not alone.
Sometimes you need to go to the very pinnacle of a sport to see the perfect expression of success. And sometimes you need to gather 15,000 misguided souls in a crumbling old stadium in Shepherd’s Bush on a cold, wet Tuesday against Stoke.
Have been visiting
In the summer I embraced my inner gap yah student and did a few weeks interrailing, mainly around Germany.
Departing from and returning to St Pancras station, I visited ten different destinations (Amsterdam; Düsseldorf; Heidelberg; Darmstadt; Berlin; Leipzig; Dresden; Munich; and the Black Forest).
I could write extensively about the joy of European train travel and on each destination (not least the Darmstadt vs. Norwich City friendly I attended), but for now I want to pitch Leipzig as your next city break of choice.
It is a city of significant historical and cultural heritage - whether as a key central European trading post, a cradle of the protests that brought down the GDR, or home to figures like Bach and Goethe (I ate one night in the inn where Goethe is supposed to have written Faust).
It is also easy on the eye: Leipzig escaped most of the destructive allied bombing that its near-neighbour Dresden suffered, thus retaining the sort of historical architecture rarely associated with the GDR. And even the post-war buildings often have significant character: I loved the opera house on Augustusplatz (previously Karl-Marx-Platz), built in the socialist classicism style. Which it turns out is a thing.
And with Berlin having increasingly priced out young creatives and entrepreneurs, many have turned to Leipzig as a cheaper and (let’s be frank) nicer alternative.
The end result of all of this is a city that boasts a young, growing population, plentiful bars and restaurants, great infrastructure, and an attractive visage, yet is still inexpensive by any reasonable western European standard. I had, for example, a properly lecker, head-sized döner kebab for €4.50.
There are also limited direct flights from the UK, which means it is saved from the worst excesses of mass (British) tourism. But is only an hour away from Berlin on the train so not especially difficult to get to.
If you like weekend breaks, I say get yourself there in 2024.
Fin
That, my friends, was 2023. Or at least a snippet of my 2023. And certainly enough of a snippet that we can leave it there.
I hope you enjoyed and perhaps found something to keep you busy while you’re trying to avoid in-laws/creepy uncles/your children over Christmas.
As alluded to in the opening, I intend to return with a bang - or at least a gentle pop - in 2024 with more regular editions for your reading pleasure.
But for now, I will wish you a peaceful and merry Christmas period. See you on the other side.
Yes, that is Wichita Lineman at #2
I gave up on London Fields - I enjoy his prose but try as I might, I just can’t get into Amis’ novels. This is the second crack I’ve had with no joy. Will try again in another decade.
It’s in a spreadsheet. I am deeply torn between being very happy with the practical value of this and wanting to laugh mercilessly at myself for being old and boring. A friend also recently pointed out the GoodReads app does this and more, far better than my spreadsheet can. Whatever. My spreadsheet doesn’t DESTROY AUTHORS’ LIVES does it??
Even allowing for widespread doping, that is an incredible achievement for a tiny population.