Adventures, thoughts and general ramblings of a complete imbecile

A Wankers Guide to Doing Nothing

2011-07-22T10:50:00.000-07:00

Summer has always been a typical one for me. A time to sit around and do fuck all for a long period of time, with brief intervals of shifts at work, nights out and festivals. However for the past 2 weeks I have had no offers for work and as a result have been resorted to lying flat on my back watching Sky sports news on what seems like a loop, as they report how nothing is happening in this summers transfer market. Now usually I have a great distaste for this, I get bored very easily and I can at times find myself wondering around the house, aimlessly, talking to myself or making poor attempts at the washing up or even just staring at a facebook page. In extreme cases it can lead to almost unrecoverable bout of demotivation and alcoholism, which are both demoralising and expensive. But these last weeks I think I have mastered the art of doing nothing and being practically unemployed, and here’s my guide….

First of all it’s very hard to justify having time off when you have no practical hobbies, especially in my case when my only valid activity is probably wanking. So to counteract this I have got myself into a routine which involves watching several episodes of a popular American TV series mixed in with a few hours of Xbox. For all of last week I nailed Boardwalk Empire- a nicely layered, prohibition period, drama starring Steve Buscemi in the lead role, and playing snippets of L.A Noire, which was then replaced this week by continuing on with the Wire and clocking up my world ranking on Fifa. I have found that the rotation of xbox and TV throughout the day keeps the mind refreshed and reduces boredom of either medium as well as giving you a sense of achievement by the end of the day, that have you have completed several goals, and as a result are more enlightened.

Now when your at home on your own for almost 10 hours a day, things can get a little lonely, you start to crave human interaction and when this gets mixed with boredom and one of man’s favourite pass times (watching porn) this can lead to the dreaded sexual frustration! Now being a life long single man that I am and have been, relying only on brief fly by night ‘no-strings’ relationships and drunken one off’s with strange, usually equally bored birds. I’ve never really had that luxury of having that person on speed dial who I can go and waste a day in bed with. Recently however I think I have overcome this, and the answer is in 2 things that are actually better then the company of women anyway-Music and books. Another routine, usually in the evenings, I will sit down with my book whilst either listening to the radio or a few of the artists on the lineup of the ATP gig that I’m going to this weekend. The mixture of in-depth book and new sounds can completely take your mind of that nagging feeling coming from your cock, like it is whinging about not being entertained by some new brass’ mouth. This again leads to a great sense of achievement and enlightenment, and can lead to facebook updates about new bands that you like and long threaded discussions on the book you’ve just clocked.

Some other practical and helpful ways of keeping your mind from turning on you are tasks as simple as cleaning the house or cooking a meal, even tasks as simple as the washing up or cooking a meal can keep the people that you are living with in the peace of mind that you are doing something constructive with your day. Also visiting other unemployed friends can also be a lovely pass time as it is comforting to be in the company of people in the same boat as you, also helping these other unemployed friends with task’s round their house. The other day I visited a couple of friends in Brixton, and even helped Josh paint his bedroom, which left me with the thought that this is how you do unemployed properly. Also if you haven’t already, sign on to every benefit you possibly can. Even if your quite sure they probably wont give it you, just try it’s free money at the end of the day. Also all the information you have to end up digging out to give to them is a good time killer in itself, and lying to your jobs advisor every couple of weeks gives you food for fantasy’s like being a world famous con man.

So that’s how I’ve been keeping myself occupied for the past fortnight or so, and I must say it’s actually been quite nice. The getting out of bed at 2 in the afternoon and not going back till 4 o’clock the next morning is one of them nostalgic routines that remind me of school holidays, and I’m finally getting round to doing stuff that I said I would do. Although I could go and have a full 5 day a week job at the restaurant that Jem works at…. This would be the sensible thing to do. But for now I am happy lying here doing fuck all thank you.

Glastonbury 2011

2011-07-07T06:06:00.000-07:00

I’ve been a lazy bastard recently! I have neglected the blog, granted a lot of that was due to university deadlines having to be met. But otherwise I just haven’t been bothered to write anything. I made an attempt at a Premier league review, but I’m going to postpone that until I can write a preview for the next season. And I was also going to write a blog on the history of my sexual exploits, but then thought that would be too much of a depressing and vulgar experience to put you all through. So I suppose I’ll try and drag out a Glastonbury based blog before all the facebook photo’s get overtaken by some other festival I end up going to in the not too near distant future and Iplayer take all the performances offline, which I find is a bit like taking the Christmas decorations down in January. But anyway, this year was one to remember!

After missioning around in London for hours we finally arrived in the Glastonbury car park for 4 o’clock Tuesday night (or Wednesday morning whatever you prefer) by 8 o’clock we were in, by 8:30 it was raining, by around 9ish we had the tents up. Wednesday’s are always a bit of a blur at Glastonbury, usually due to lack of sleep from the night before- in this case next to none. And the impending stress of getting in and setting up and getting settled etc. Weather did brighten up though and had a nice walk around the site with Rosa, pretty sure the weather was fine for the rest of the day. Got really drunk then met up with the Plumstead boys in the evening I think. The homebrew had been tested and I gave it a resounding thumbs up, later though people were telling me it gave them frequent visits to the long drops. I get absolutely blind drunk, blow a score on food and have a vague memory of wondering away from Northern Al at the stone circle and being guided back to the camp site by the other half and Heide. Apparently my Bob Dylan renditions, sung in the style of the man himself went down a treat.

Woke up on Thursday morning to the sound of rain, fell back asleep, woke up again and it was still raining, only this time even heavier then before. I can’t sleep so I watch The Other Half and Heide sleep for an unsettling amount of time. But can’t help be entertained by some of Josh’s hand and mouth movements whilst he slumbers. From what I can remember the weather turned out to be really nice, and the view of the festival from our campsite was absolutely beautiful. We spend most of the time sitting around the campsite pouring booze down our thirsty throats and contemplate actually leaving for a bit of food. Me and Sarah then split to have a look at Shangri-la and catch a cool Danish, Bulkan, Punk band called Tako Lako. A lovely start to the weekends proceedings. Evening had then settled and it was soon time for Bangface, the mud was thick and squelchy but not acting as a problem. But before any of this we head over to the stone circle dressed as robots for the robot invasion organized by Liam and Ian, it's an absolute resounding success, with about 50 robots at its peek, some of which had put an incredible amount of effort. There was even generations of families there, grandparents, kids and grandkids. A nice start to the evening. So night falls and I neck a pill then very shortly spew it back up again, unfortunately it was half digested and cant be salvaged from the bile, I then quickly lose the effects, but stay to watch a damn fine Teknoist set, then bugger off to go watch Hobo With a Shotgun at the cinema tent, and mange to catch up with Dave along the way. Came out of the film with a great sense of satisfaction as it were the bollocks. At this time I have settled into the festival and get that tranquil sense of comfort that I am at Glastonbury and everything is fine.

It’s Friday and the festival has officially started, the forecast says it’s due to piss it down. No fear though we all have waterproofs. First act of the weekend is Emmy the Great, who I have seen more times then other artist at that particular festival. I was dubious at first about putting a folk act on in a dance tent which already has a reputation for having dreadful sound, unfortunately my reservations are correct and the first half of her set is marred by absolutely shocking sound levels, she manages to salvage a fair set though, even though it’s her older stuff that is the best performed. Me and Heide split to Shangri-la to catch Molotov Jukebox, although I get the times wrong and we end up there an hour early-it’s raining by this point I might add. I am cheered up immensely by the site of 2 barely dressed birds dancing on their own in this one particular field to a pretty good Dub DJ, me and Heide grab a drink, then set off for a little wonder until Molotov come on. Have a glance at Bloc 9 and confirm how impressed I am by it- A to scale sized council estate block with a London Underground Tube sticking out the top of it. Molotov Jukebox open to 4 people, us 2 and the 2 birds who were already there. “Hello nearly nobody” says the gorgeous Natalia Tena. Before then proceeding with a spicy set which made us forget about the rain, and made passers by stop and have a boogie to.

Don’t remember much of the rest of the day, although we find out that Radiohead have been confirmed as the special guests for the Park stage, and myself, The other half, Heide, Kush & Ness all head over at an attempt to relive the magic set that the half of them did last year. Unfortunately this wasn’t to be, an overwhelming amount of people meant we stood at the back, loitering. We count our loses and head over to the Other Stage to await the mighty Primal Scream, but catch a bloody impressive Mumford and Sons set. I reflect back to 4 years ago watching them for free at the Macbeth, and remind everyone several times that I liked them before they were famous, the site of thousands of people dancing and dosey-doing in the mud and rain fils me with an unbelievable festival spirit, and I can’t help but sing and dance along to ‘The Cave’. I scoff half a bag of mushrooms and shove a pill up my arse. The 5 of us get a nice spot for Primal Scream. It starts raining heavily. Primal Scream blow us all away with a performance that included the masterpiece album Screamadelica followed by 3 classics. Primal Scream prove yet again that even after 25 years of racking out records, it’s experience they perform with live instead of age. Bobby Gillepsie also proves he is one of the best front men around and that the best Rock n Roll band of the festival are headlining the Other Stage instead of the Pyramid. Loaded and Come Together prove to be the best songs of the whole set.
I lose the others during a trip to the toilets, after standing around looking like a lost child for around 15 minutes, I munch off the rest of my evenings dose of liberty caps and make for the Strummervile stage alone.

On the way I catch a whiff of an exotic sound coming from the Greenpeace stage, it is ofcourse the lovely Molotov Jukebox again, with an almost entirely different set. I gain some sort of sexual gratification from Natalia thrusting with a accordion, then carry on my adventure in the pissing rain, cup of tea in hand. It is now that I get one of my most simple of magic moments. At the time I found the ridiculously long one way system was down to my perception of time and distance being totally bent. However I walk through the rain alone with my head up with a sense of complete content. My head is completely clear and my thoughts are positive and creative. It is by far the most peaceful I have ever felt within myself for a very long time and one of the very few times that I am pleased with my own company, I find the whole experience incredibly therapeutic and cant take the smile from my face as I continue with my Friday night. I arrive in Shangri-la and poke my head into Club DADA to see that the Correspondents are tearing the place apart as per usual. But I trot on over to the Strummervile campfire, where Beans on Toast is off his head and serenading us with festival classics. His 2 new tunes prove that his song writing skills are developing more as he gains age, and ends with a beautiful low tempo version of ‘This Side of The Fence’. It’s the only time I catch the most charismatic performer on the festival circuit. I poke my head into Bez’s Acid House, but can’t help but run in for a massive stomp. It’s by this point I notice that my moves are the best in the house, and end up spending an hour throwing shapes to some phat Acid House. Another quick whiskey and I head back for some much deserved rest, not before finding Tom ‘the nonse’ back at the Torquay campsite and grab a cup of tea before bed.

Saturday comes! The day when I chuck the rule book out and get as busted as I can physically muster. Usually with an abundance of Psychedelics and booze, this year is no acception. Myself, my 2 tent mates, as well as Sarah and Sam started with a lovely cider session, where we roamed the greenfields, making penises out of clay, generally acting like the beautiful drunken bastards that we are. A quick nip back to the tent to pick up supplies followed by a trip to the Dance village to see Dreadzone, the effects of the acid we necked a few hours ago is failing to show its face so I neck another pill and by this point and I’m very drunk. Sarah and me then leave an incredibly drunk Heide in the capable hands of The Other Half and make our way to see golden oldies Pentangle. It’s nice to finally see them, but the acoustic tent has this habit of being just a little bit too quiet sometimes. We grab a beer and stick around for Nick Lowe, who I have recently fell in love with. And for no use of a better word he is ‘nice’ to the full extent of the definition. Pure professional easy listening, delivered with warming charm. We leave after half an hour unfortunately to catch Mumford and Son’s do a set at the Strummerville. I get a call from Ian asking whether I saw Pulp do the special guest set at the Park, this pisses me off not because I missed Pulp, but made me wonder that if the organisers could book two acts like Radiohead and Pulp, why not just get them to headline? Instead of putting Coldplay and fucking Beyonce on top of the bill, and having 30,000 people re-enact the Hillsborough disaster on a tiny stage. But anyway along the way I compliment Sarah on her fast paced determination to get through a festival. Mumford are running late, we hit a few shots of tequila, bump into Bez, wait for a little longer but then split to catch Lee ‘Scratch’ Perry. We arrive at the Glade stage a little early, and they are playing dub step, but it takes us about a minute to remember that the Chemical Brothers are playing just meters away. We catch the last 20 minutes of a hench set that makes me dance myself into the mud. Then over to an incredibly impressive ‘Scratch’ Perry, where I discover that I am probably the best dancer on the whole farm, and that the whole of the Glade stage is full of the finest hardboddies that Glastonbury has to offer, so much so it nearly distracts me from the excellent set.

I head back to the tent to wake up Heide, and then the other half quickly joins us where we make an attempt to catch Shoplifting for Jesus at the Strummerville stage. Although the one way system had other ideas and we was herded like cattle around for over an hour, which led me to the conclusion that the festival may benefit from reducing it’s capacity, but it doesn’t matter though, im coming up on a pill and remind The other half and Heide how much I love them, and how lucky Hedie is to be sharing a tent with the two of us. We arrive at Shangri-la in full swing; Shy-FX & the Ragga Twins supplying the tunes, incredible lazers and visuals on the walls of the place, atmosphere in full Saturday night Glastonbury mode, couldn’t help but turn to Heide and announce how absolutely blown away I was by the whole effort put into the place. A reoccurring feeling that I get every year from that area and makes me remember why I pay 200 quid for the pleasure of going. The rest of the evening consists of us dicking around and soaking up the atmosphere, pop into the Acid House to see Larry Love on stage MC’ing, although listening to him shouting ‘ACCCIIIDDDDD’ over a Dub step tune is quite disturbing so we leave. I have my cool moment of the festival, when asked what I would like to drink ‘Lagar or Cider?’ my reply is ‘I’ll have a whiskey actually. Straight, no ice.’ To which a random bystander compliments me with a hearty ‘respect!’. I feel like I could go home happy. The evening ends as the sun rises, and I tell Josh that we would do our naked walk Sunday night, a decision that even at the time I knew would be fatal. We get to bed, suck a few balloons and have a cuddle before passing out.

Get woken up on the Sunday by the beating hot sun, so much so that my attire consists of just my satin shorts, but also means that it’s perfect weather for a bit of bare foot action, although i notice that my left ankle has swollen to almost twice the size of my right, although i feel no pain, i get the impression its going to hurt next week. I don’t have many plans for the day, get as drunk as humanly possible, see Paul Simon, and then catch the Streets later on. Not before a starter at the Glade for Cassette boy followed by The Correspondents. Cassette boy are their usual entertaining selves, then The Correspondents wow an absolutely rammed Glade stage, which leaves me to think that my predictions of them teetering on the edge of greatness may very well happen before the end of the summer. I stick a pair of shoes on and smack a robe over my already burning shoulders, get caught short at the campsite and end up using a piss bottle, only to find that my piss is the colour of a malt whiskey. 'I haven't drunk any water in nearly 48 hours' I think. I then make an attempt to get into the Leftfield tent but it’s too rammed, so we decide to stop by the Brothers tent to load up, then make our way over to Paul Simon, which is my first and only trip to the Pyramid stage all weekend. The set is a nice summers afternoon set, a lot of lying down nodding our heads, before having a bit of a dance to ‘You Can Call Me Al’ other then that a few recognisable Graceland tracks. Nothing that rivals previous ‘Legends slots’ such as Ray Davies and Tom Jones the year previous to that. I’m almost entirely out of cash and getting pretty burnt and agitated in the afternoon heat. I head back to the tent to wake Heide and The other half up but they aint having none of it. So I snort a line of K and wait for Rosa so we can go see the Streets. The sound isn’t amazing for them, but there is a nice mix of old and new material and Mike Skinners pulls off a good one man show. They don’t pull of a blinder by any sense of the imagination, and it’s easy to tell that their time as an act is coming to an end very soon. A sign of the times and nothing lasts forever.

I split from Rosa and head off to Croissant Neuf stage to catch the Sunday night headliner-Neville Staple. An incredible set from an incredible performer, 60 odd years old and still skanking around on stage pulling out all the hits. An ideal way to finish a damn fine festival, I catch up with Rosa, Ian, the Nonse and Pritchard. We stroll around the after hours areas until my knee can’t take it anymore. I pop a valium and head back to the camp site. I realize that I have missed the opportunity to walk around Glastonbury naked, but I wouldn’t say the festival has bee a failure by any sense of the imagination.

The next day we end up leaving with more booze then we came in and I get my hands on a lovely pair of Timberland boots. We go home.

Overall a festival for the archives, the rain and mud helped the atmosphere I thought- separated the lightweights from the ravers. The lineup was fantastic with minimal clashes, my comrades who I served with were their usual amazing selves and without sounding too much like a poof I enjoyed a sense of moderation to my festival, and for once the following week I didn't end up suffering from any mental breakdown like i usually do, but instead had to deal with physical aftermath of wading around in thick mud off my head, and walking around in the blazing sun in just a pair of satin shorts. But I have to say even though this one has made its way into my top 5, I am looking forward to the break next year, for financial, phsyical and tolernce reasons more then anything, But I know by June i'll be having withdrawals.

See you in 2013 I suppose.

2011-04-24T15:27:00.000-07:00

Last year I wrote a blog about the end of my teenage years, which to my surprise had people who I didn’t knew even read this thing come up to me and tell me that they enjoyed it. So leading up to my last big birthday before they get depressing (21) I thought I’d do a blog on some of my mates. To be quite honest 20 was a bit of a nothing age for me, but I have realized recently that it is a year to reflect and discover what kind of person I really am, and I say that with the least lamest intentions possible.

But anyway on assessing what type of person I am I have come to the conclusion that I am very much a bloke; My religion is football, I enjoy binge drinking, vote Labour, watch hardcore porn, my favorite authors are Nick Hornby and Brett Easton Ellis, my favorite actors are Paddy Consindine and Ray Winstone, favorite bands are Oasis, The Smiths and The Specials and my favorite songwriters are Morrissey and Neil Young, I have a flutter now and then and do enjoy the casual bit of drugs… If you put all that information into a search engine the first link will be ‘BLOKE’ which to be quite honest is a label I am quite happy with. I’m quite happy with the person that I’ve become, a few issues to deal with and several areas that need improving; I make excuses to buy booze, I pretty much give several bookmakers my money every weekend, I’m emotionally crippled and so very, very lazy, I’m knocking 21 and I’ve never had a proper bird, I’m far too angry for how easy I’ve got it and I really should take life a little more seriously then I already do. I could potentially be so much more then I am, but then again a lot of us have that issue init?

I have also recently conceded that the world is fucked and will end very soon. All the signs point to it, the planet is getting hotter, the world is getting over populated, and the oil is running out, economies are shrinking; the rainforest is failing at an alarming rate, there are bombs in the hands of idiots, and many different countries are plummeting into madness, also money is controlling absolutely everything. I have absolutely no faith for the future and I struggle to find any reason why I would possibly want to bring a child into this world to deal with the mess that my generation will eventually leave them to clean up, even if there is a world left at all.

But through my first 21 years on the planet I have been truly blessed with the discovery of some noticeably incredible people, 4 of which I would like to give a special shout out to. Now there are obviously several of my friends who don’t need mentioning in a blog to know how much I appreciate their patience with me; I live with one of them, I married another, he then ran off with another favorite person who was also my bridesmaids (which I found strangely pleasing), several down in Surrey who I don’t see as often as I like, a life long one who I really miss but I will let her dick around at university for now and I’m sure we will pick up from where we left off in a year or two, and then there’s that other guy who I met in a toilet, who gives me the feeling that know matter what happens we are going to be on this ride together for the whole way. There also the ones who stuck with me through them school years who I really don’t see as much as I should. Then there have been the inevitable friends that I have had to wave goodbye to, the ones from college that I spent many happy memories with, and the friends I have lost over things as petty as women and money, and to the rest who know who they are. And at the risk of sounding gay I would like to give a special shout out to four blokes who I have more of an admiration and respect for then simply a friendship with.

4 blokes with at least 10 years experience on me, and with this they have taught me a lot in their own particular way. I ‘spose I shall start with who I met first and that was of course Ian, who I met at the first Bangface weekender. He ploughed out of his room at 11 o’clock on a Saturday morning, said hello to everyone, then proceeded to make mojito’s for himself and everyone in the chalet for breakfast, there was around 8 of us in the chalet, so one for each person and 8 for himself. By the end of the weekend I had already given him the name ‘topshelf’ Ian. One of the main strengths I see in Ian is his attention to detail, precise organization and a constant touch of class. Take last years Glastonbury for example, on the lead up I was looking for a printers to print me a Bangface flag but none of them replied, Ian just whipped one up the night before, then when we got there I lost my wallet whilst walking around in the car park, I was awoken in the morning to Ian knocking on the car window waving my wallet in front of me, even on the way back he stayed awake in the car whilst I was nodding off at the wheel, got us to pull over and baught me a relentless and a sausage roll. This is just a short list of little acts of genius that make the geezer up. Even last year I was given the great honor of being invited to his wedding with his equally amazing wife Rosa, even then when I was supposed to head from the reception back to a hostel I was staying in, he chucked me the key to the spare room at the hotel they was staying in. He’s a true milkman of human kindness as well as a walking cocktail bar and at times evil genius.

The second in my list of outstanding contributors goes to a geezer who I always used to bump into at the toilets of the Electrowerkz, but then would get to know better through many after parties in Woodford, I am of course referring to the aptly named Big Scottish Dave. Purposely built for both partying and destruction, a chat in a pub with Dave is like having a conversation with a talking encyclopedia, anything from music to politics, activism, physics and history, Dave has enough knowledge of it to keep you drawn in for hours. However all this is eclipsed by the geezers casual acts of human decency. When me and Jem was moving house he took a day out to drive the van and help us get all of our stuff from each of our houses. The organizer of our Bangface chalet, supplier of booze and nos and never short of a laugh, he even cycled to and from Glastonbury from London. A journey I would never even dream of attempting. I’d imagine if I was ever to climb up a mountain Dave would probably carry me the last 10,000 feet and I’d probably end up doing it quicker. He tea bagged me once on my Birthday and the picture has become folklore. I retaliated at Glastonbury and pictures exist, but out of respect for the geezer the people who need to see have seen it, and I dont think it even exists anymore.... Unfortunatley

This then leads me onto the one and only James ‘Jean Simmons’ who I technically first met whilst in a K-hole in the casualty corner of the Electrowerkz but first properly met at around the same time I met Dave. Another machine built purposely for partying. The man who usually supplies the party treats and at times is also the most organized-disorganized person I know. You’re at a party and you need a particular lead or adapter for a lead, he’ll have it. You ever fancy a line, drop, bomb or smoke of something, he’ll sort you out. A well-spoken, artistic genius who has over the years introduced and recommended me endless amounts of books, music and films. I’ve ended up at many after parties with the geezer, and traveled the country attending many raves with him. He’s also been the director of many great trip movies I have had, and never fails at great hosting when we go on a pilgrimage down to his home in Portsmouth for a do. He’ll hate me for saying this, but James is a true English eccentric in every sense.

Finally there is Alan, the other half of another one of my favorite people (Dominick). I first met Alan at the Electrowerkz (appears to be a pattern emerging here) whilst thanks to Jean, I was grooving on one of the most mental trips I have ever experienced. At first I didn’t realise he was Dom’s fella and ended up being quite embarrassed of the bumbling incoherent mess I was. Alan has a bit of an Ian complex to him, they are quite similar in how constantly organized and quietly assertive they both are. Just like the 3 other blokes Alan enjoys his partying and never fails to generously supply the goods and I do often tease Alan on being such a classy bastard. A damn fine producer of music and bursting with general great ideas, I am actually quite chuffed Dom introduced me to such a gent and also like Ian, Alan has proved to me the rewards that come with hard work. All for of the blokes actually share similar traits. All genuinely modest in their talents, all incredibly selfless, all would go out of their way to complete a favor for someone, all 4 of them in their own rights are unsung genius’, and all 4 of them I hope to have some similarity to when I reach their stage in life. The four of them are examples of Gods different concept ideas, not necessarily meant for mass production but just examples of what the human race is capable of.

So there’s my tribute to 4 of the examples of my special select of people that I’ve been lucky enough to test the patience of. As for the rest of my mates… I’ve met quite a number of people in my 21 years in life, a lot of them are alright, most of them are dicks and I have had to trawl through a lot of shit to find the people I would consider a chosen family now. I sometimes even worry that I’m pushing my luck and often try to avoid having them question why they would possibly want to be associated with me just incase they end up buggering off. So despite my skepticism about the sinking ship that is the world I am pleased I’ve got a perfect crew to go down with. And I’m sure that when the apocalypse eventually comes, we will all be dancing in some field not giving a fuck about the impending doom that awaits us.
I do have plenty of goals to achieve now I have reached this stage in life. There are degrees to earn, careers to start, loves to discover, moments to get lost in, countries to travel to, instruments to master, languages to learn, friendships to form and a life to live. The best is yet to come really. But whatever happens I’m pretty sure it’s going to be one hell of a joy ride. So whether you’re with me all the way for it, or if our paths fork off somewhere along the way, enjoy yourself and if your buying mines a Guinness thanks.

An ode to a motor

2011-03-05T10:36:00.000-08:00

Today I sold the Pussy Wagon for scrap. A day that has been inevitable for the past few months, mainly down to the faltering engine, screaming fan belt, and clonky control which have made it a choir to drive. I remember when I first bought the beast, 400 quid off a geezer in Streatham with the money I got from a tax rebate. A little Citreon AX with an abnormally high bite point on the clutch, a flickery indicator and a reverse gear that just wouldn’t stick into place, needless to say I fell in love straight away.

Now a lot of people always ask “pfft, why is it called The Pussy Wagon?” this is mainly for 2 reasons, one of which can be traced back to its first road trip, a ride down to Brighton for the Regime at The Volks, I left the keys with Lewis and Emily whilst I went into the club, when the night had finished I was walking back to the car and saw the 2 of them shagging in the back seat. I stood there and watched for a bit, chuckled to myself, then went and disrupted them before I became aroused and the whole situation got weird. Then the second was my then good friend Anna and her girlfriend, whilst picking them up from Victoria station one night, (one of the many taxi jobs I did in that car) and whilst driving them back to Kings Cross the two of them started going at it on the back seat. There was no nudity or full on sex but it was close enough to confirm that the car certainly made the birds wet. Lewis has now been in a relationship with Emily for a couple of years now thanks to that night and I don’t talk to Anna anymore thanks to her bird being a bitch, but I wish them both the best. I myself never had sex on that back seat, but I did once bowl round Epsom Downs one summer afternoon whilst receiving oral sex, probably the most dangerous drive I ever did.

Many of my favorite memories in that car have been trips to festivals, one trip down to Camber Sands for the Bangface weekender I gave Nanja a lift who had traveled all the way from Holland, she said it was the best trip to a festival she’s had, and the motors best ever performance was when I drove Jem and Ian down to Glastonbury, busting down the A303 at no less then 90MPH the whole way and doing Hammersmith to Glastonbury in 2 and a half hours. The trip to Secret Garden Party was the only time the Wagon ever broke down on me. A hole in the pipe that connects the radiator to the water tank formed a whole and I had to get the AA out, a fee that I never paid and as a result has got me black listed from the AA. My most favorite journey in that car was also the longest one, that I also did on my own. A 4 and half hour trip to Torquay for Ian and Rosa’ wedding, A beautiful summers evening, ploughing down the 303 nearly crashing every 10 minutes because I was so distracted by the countryside, whilst listening to Dreadzone albums.

Apart from that minor annoyance of a break down, until recently the only other pain in the arse I was ever given whilst driving was a flat tire on the way back from Portsmouth one weekend. I could only pull over on a bend, which proved to be extremely dangerous, especially when 16 wheelers were having to dodge us. When the Motorway maintenance people showed up, they escorted us onto the hard shoulder, on my way there on the bend I pulled over into the outside lane and an oncoming Range Rover very nearly took me and the Wagon out, but fait had other ideas. The motorway maintenance people were dicks, but I wont give them the pleasure of being talked about.
I did have some lucky moments in that motor, one in particular was when me and Lauren went to the pub one night, then on the way back to hers pulled over on the downs to smoke a spliff, on the way back I did my usual speed of 40 but unfortunately an unmarked filth car was behind us and reminded me that the speed was 30. I was breathalysd and despite my 3 pints of Guinness and bottle of Becks just an hour earlier I was somehow under half the limit. Even on inspection of the car, which had empty nos canisters, roach ends and half empty booze bottles in (due to a trip to Glade the weekend before) I was still let off with just a warning.

They say you always remember your first car as your best one. I think they are right, despite the horrible performance, broken boot, horrible steering which made a 3 point turn feel like turning in a tank, knackered speakers that would peak horrible, a car radio that was increasingly getting worse by the day and scratches and dents all up the side, most of which caused by other cars on me. It never failed to start on them frozen mornings, and got everybody to every destination safely and soundly. The Wagons last road trip was a successful one to Bristol, but even then it was showing signs of wear as it drained the petrol at an alarming rate. From London to Brighton, Portsmouth, Bristol, Wales, Glastonbury, Reading, Torquay, Salisbury or Northampton, every journey I can remember being bliss. My next motor may be a better performer but it will never have the same character and will never have the privilege of the title of Pussy Wagon. I brought that car with 53,000 miles on the clock, I left it after just under 2 years of service with 68,000 on it.

R.I.P
The Pussy Wagon
1995-2011

Part 3: Festivals, Present day and Conclusion

2011-01-23T13:24:00.000-08:00

Shortly after my first Bangface, I was already looking forward to attending my first Glastonbury festival. Having already opened my eyes to excessive drug use, new music and social interaction over the past couple of months I was understandably very, very excited. For those of you who went to Glastonbury in 2007 you’ll know that from early Friday afternoon (when I arrived) all the way to Monday, it rained constantly turning the whole site into a quagmire. I didn’t so much mind this, I thought that it wouldn’t be a proper first Glastonbury if there wasn’t a bit of mud and treated the whole scenario as a baptism of fire. I remember the lineup that year being what mainly drew me in. One of the main memories I have of the weekend include waiting for ages for Arcade fire to start and strategically buying 2 pints of lagar to save having to leave the crowd to get another one ofcourse. However after slugging back the 2 pints and the band were just coming on, nature called and since I had just stood through one set of an act that was awful and had secured myself I really sweet spot, I decided that in the spirit of things I should just piss myself, and in doing so filled my boots and warmed my feet up quite nicely. After an absolutely awesome Arcade Fire set I decided to go on a Friday night stroll having a look at all the headliners since I couldn’t decide which one to choose from, I don’t think there will be many opportunities to see the Arctic Monkeys, Damian Marley and Bjork all in the space of a couple of hours of each other. Later on that night at a mates campsite I emptied my piss filled boots over his spot and said it was water… The following evening was qually as eye opening. I stood at the G-stage just to watch Bong-ra and ended up staying for Shitmat, Scotch Egg and Noisia all of which I hadn’t heard of before but was blown away by them all, I then ducked out to go see the Killers who I quite liked at the time. This was also the night however that I was to experiment with LSD for the first time, leaving me curious to venture further down the rabbit hole of the human consciousness. The following day I remember seeing Shirley Bassey, The Manic Street Preachers and The Who. The whole weekend was an eye opener, I’d fallen in love but didn’t realize how strong the love would be, and from that weekend on I was officially addicted to festivals.

Looking back on that first ever festival, I would of done it again completely differently. I focused too much on the music and getting wasted that I nearly missed the true sense of festivals. Over the next couple of years I was to learn the true description of a great festival. The following year I went to Glastonbury on my own, a strange experience which I’m glad I’ve done, I had some great memories and saw some amazing sets (Kings of Leon on the Friday, Elbow, Hot Chip and a truly memorable Massive Attack set on the Saturday) But the whole time whilst walking around and talking to people I couldn’t help thinking that although I was having a good time I really wanted my mates to be there with me to. But this was the weekend I discovered Beans On Toast, who is now one of my favorite artists.

Now its going to be a bit tricky to give all my festival highligts because I will literally be here all day, I suppose if I could give a brief run down I shall say that Glastonbury, although not without its flaws (size, price, dwindling music policy) is the best festival to go to in this country. It embodies everything festivals are to deliver. It transports you to another world for a week, a whole years worth of organization for just 5 days, the effort, the art, the unlimited options of things to do, the diversity of the music and sheer epicness of it all. Glastonbury has also been the setting for some of the best live sets I’ve ever seen; Blur, Bon Iver, Massive Attack, Christy Moore, The Who. And even for people who I wouldn’t usually go see play at all Tom Jones, Shirley Bassey, Rolf Harris, Bjork, Ray Davies.

To get anywhere close to something of the standard of Glastonbury you have to go to small or medium sized festivals for a similar vibe and organization. Secret Garden Party is nice, like the all the little parts of Glastonbury you spend most of your time seeing condensed into one site. A beautiful location, a truly friendly and divers crowd, and the music policy is quite quaint as well (a lot of gypsy-step, folk and traditional festival favorites to keep me entertained). Also despite the whole festival being a Bedales and Italia Conte student’s wet dream, it fails to be pretentious at all, I also had another highlight from Beans On Toast there, who performed 3 times one of which being one of the best live sets I’ve ever seen from someone. Then there’s Glade, which is always a lovely intimate affair. A pure mix of brilliant tunes, fun times with the chosen family and hefty hedonism, An offshoot from Glastonbury’s Glade stage, I’d consider it the Electronic equivalent to the mother of festivals itself. It’s had a few issues these recent years, but will be back this year just as good as ever I should imagine. Then of course there is a new lovely little festival discovered last year called Boomtown fair. A tiny little 3,000-person community, filled with a top dollar Ska, Punk and Reggae lineup including Nevile Staple and Toots and the Maytals. A short affair that only really kicks off on the Saturday, but lovely and intimate and only 60 quid! Then of course there is the ‘commercial’ festivals… I went to Reading to see Radiohead one year, I have always resented Reading, mainly from school days were it seemed that all the wankers in my year would all seem to go, and any other twat at a party or a night out seemed to be going. I always had this image of it being filled with students away from mummy and daddy for a weekend, celebrating their exam results… I was right. As soon as I walked through the gates onto the campsite someone kicked a bottle at me then laughed, other items chucked in my direction over that day included toothpaste, food and cups of what was probably piss, at a friends campsite I listened in disgust as the congregation bragged about how he spat in a girls hair who walked passed, and how later on that night they was all going to deliberately anti-social. I dropped a tab of acid which luckily wasn’t that strong otherwise I would of spent my entire time there pissed off and incredibly aggy. However despite being surrounded by fools there was 2 moments of beauty. I dropped my wallet with EVERYTHING in it, and a couple chased me up the path to give it back to me, and then when I lost my phone the geezer ran through the phone book trying to contact people so he could give it back. I rung the phone and met up with the geezer who said “be careful in future man the next person might not be so nice” Unfortunatley I had no beer and no spliff to give him so just gave him a cuddle and ‘nice one mate’, all this whilst the whole campsite was setting fire to each others tents and acting like animals, it showed that there is still some sign of decency even at the shit festivals. Radiohead were amazing and I got to meet Frank Turner which was nice. However having an arena and campsite area split, booze restrictions, average sound, a location which is literally just a field next to Reading town centre, horrible people and mainly horrible NME style music, makes Reading easily the worst festival I’ve ever been to. No diversity, no atmosphere, no effort. Melvin Benn is the Alan Shugar of festivals.

When ask why I love festivals so much I sometimes fail to project all the emotion behind my reasoning. For one it’s the sheer Englishness of it all… Camping out in the unpredictable, British elements, getting leathered in a field, listening to music is something that even our ancestors in medieval times can relate to. America can’t do it properly, and Europe lack the amount that we hold. But a more in-depth reason behind my love for them is that in this cold, loveless and unfair world we live in I find comfort and sanctuary in escaping to the great British countryside for a weekend, to sleep with the elements and live in small sectioned off communities with genuinely lovely people from all different backgrounds and countries, listening to amazing music, testing my bodies limits to how much alcohol my my liver can filter and how many drugs my brain will allow me to play with, in an environment where there aren’t really any boundaries or laws. I often get humor from people getting caught at the gates at festivals with enough drugs to put them away for 12 years, and escape with confiscation and a slap on the wrist. I can forget entirely about the real world and truly be myself in this little bubble protected by a 12-foot fence. There’s always that poignant moment on the Monday’s when I arrive back in London, seeing people talking on mobiles, people rushing to work and reading newspapers reporting on all the fucked up stuff that nobody really wants to talk or think about, and I say to myself “It shouldn’t be like this”. I’ll bring my kids up at festivals when the time comes to it. Teach them how to use the Diablo’s and the devil sticks, and show them the importance of community, music, art and human decency in society which are all vital lessons to learn in this unforgiving world we live in.

I suppose now I shall have to touch on the present day… the whole reason I started to attempt this mammoth entry was that I was so inspired by the return of Godspeed You! Black Emperor that I thought I’d reflect. However its been the past 12-18 months where I have truly used live music to its full effects. My knowledge of genres which I first discovered when I started to go to gigs I have built on and seen my heroes. In folk I have gone one to see Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy, , Frank Turner and Beans on Toast several times. I even consider Beans on Toast to be the most influential musicians of modern days. Acts which I assured myself I would see before I’d die of before they split up; The Pogues, Primal Scream, Leftfield, Alabama 3, Christy Moore, and of course Godspeed… All were exceptionally amazing gigs, also my regular attendance at such venues like the Jamm and the Hootenanny keep helping me discover amazing new bands such as The Correspondents, Molotov Jukebox, Ta mere and Lazy Habits. To the new rave nights which have gained more popularity since the demise of Bangface. Earblender giving us the Gabber, Breakcore and Happy Hardcore, Jungle Syndicate giving us the Jungle and ALAN giving us the atmosphere it once had. But also a special thanks to Heidie who shares my flair for live music, and gave me a new passion for searching for new bands… All cracking evenings spent in good company and without her I would still be that bloke standing in the corner on his own, because all of his mates were busy tonight and couldn’t come with him. Thanks for taking the time to hang out with me.

Now for the point… If there is actually a point, why do I spend most of my time and money on tickets to events of live music? Many of the reasons I think I’ve already explained, I suppose I should probably give a list of some of the best live acts I’ve seen… But it’s impossible, and doesn’t matter anyway, through all of the gigs I’ve been to and all the festivals I’ve attended even if the act playing has been awful I have still felt something. In real life I am a bit of an emotional cripple who doesn’t express his feelings to anyone, but there have been moments where I have cried in a huge group of people, felt the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end, or totally forgotten everything I was worried about, or felt a love for the people, even strangers around me so strong I just couldn’t help but give them a hug. It’s the moments like that when I actually feel quite happy to exist that makes it all worthwhile.

Part 2: Folk to Rave

2011-01-21T11:11:00.000-08:00

One night whilst lying in bed and living out the ritual of reading whatever book I was on at the time and listening to John Kennedy’s ‘Xposure’ show on XFM, a radio show which has had a profound effect on my listening and the gigs I have gone to. I’ll talk about that in the next paragraph, but I’ll carry on with the story for now… this particular evening on the live sessions was a London based lady of a bout 21 years at the time called Emmy the Great, and the first song she performed was a poignant yet beautiful tune called ‘Edward is Dedward’. I honestly think that this was the first time I’d properly listened to folk music and it sure weren’t the last. When I explored more into this London based music scene. Or “anti folk’ as it was properly, but not officially know. I never really liked the name because it had an elitist sentiment to it. Being that it wasn’t meant to be considered folk at all. But it had acoustic guitars and fiddles, and all the songs were stories so I can’t see how it couldn’t be considered folk.

Ah yea I’d like now to take a bit of time to give an over due thanks to the outspoken John Kennedy. Since I was discovering ‘alternative’ music post John Peel and pre Myspace (or atleast I wasn’t aware of finding music via this medium yet) John Kennedy was the music guru that was to help shape my music tastes. The Xposure show even to this present day is on Xfm at 10-2 on weekdays and like John Peel, or Mark Lamarr, John Kennedy will play anything of any genre he is given, providing it isn’t usually played during peek hours. It has been the catalyst for my music tastes and some of the artists and bands I heard for the first time include: Frank Turner, Bon Iver, Dan Le Sac Vs Scroobius Pip, Florence and the machine, Mumford and Sons, Noah and the Whale, Joanna Newsom Jeremy Warlmsley, Willy Mason, The Teenagers, Laura Marling and even bands that I wasn’t particularly fond of like Foals, The Maccabee’s and Crystal Castles, aswell as endless amounts of great punk, electronica and digital hardcore. His nights at the Barfly were a monthly thing for me, and he was a lovely bloke who always took time to have a chat.

That’s the ode done with now back to the gigs. After the revelation of hearing a new genre I took it upon myself to go out and see it live. Unfortunatley though, none of my friends really liked it that much and I had to go to most of the gigs on my own, (My mate B however joined me for a few gigs) There was a few crackers that stand out for me. One particular being Noah and The Whale’ single launch at The Enterprise in Camden, with Laura Marling and King Charles as support, now I don’t know if any of you have ever been to The Enterprise, but your bedroom is probably bigger, so it was bloody packed, it was also the gig that made me lose a lot of respect for Laura Marling. After the gig I went to do my usual courtesy of saying ‘nice one’ to the band, but instead of a thank you back, I got a dirty look, to which I replied ‘charming’ which was met with a ‘fuck off’ reply. Laura you make some pretty nice tunes, but you’re a total bitch. One thing I found funny about that gig is that almost exactly a year later, Noah and The Whale, re-released that single and held a free gig at the much larger Roundhouse across the road.

Now you may be wondering why I keep mentioning Emmy the Great but don’t explain why she is so amazing, so here are some reasons… I used to chat to her online through the medium of Myspace (remember that thing) just about what gigs she’s playing and general music stuff, and then when I first saw her live at the Ben and Jerries festival after her set she took the time to come and have a chat with me and stuff, the same with all her other gigs as well. Even after her debut album came out and she got all-famous and that, toured round the world a couple of times and was probably able to quit her day job, she still recognized me and took the time to have a proper chat. But it was an invite to her E.P launch at The Macbeth that was to seal her as a proclaimed Queen of folk. She managed to put together a superb lineup which included Noah and the Whale, Mumford and Sons, Lightspeed Champion, Stars of Sunday League, Florence and the Machine (when her act involved her and a man with a guitar) and Slow Club, aswell as herself of course, there was also cake and E.P handouts, all for free! I look back at that lineup and wonder what the price of it would be today as pretty much the majority of it have gone on to be superstars.

I thoroughly enjoyed my time knocking around at folk gigs. It was all so very traditional, getting pissed in intimate venues with all the names on the bill, sitting on the floor whilst watching people perform, friendly and genuinely interesting people, classy birds and some truly inspiring music. There were very few downsides to it; sometimes the venues were too small, and I found people talking through some of the lesser-known acts really rude. It’s a shame that I now have to pay about 30 quid if I want to see these acts again, however Emmy still remains modest and is currently running a pledge scheme to release her new album off, which involves fans being able to pay a bit of money to fund the new album in return for signed albums, postcards and opportunities to be in the new video, and even a living room gig. It don’t get much Indie then that. These days however I am one of them ‘I liked ‘em before they were famous’ wankers, which I think is down to a lot of the bands having their albums get the studio treatment and lose its original rustic feel… However I think I may also just be a wanker.

On June 12th 2007 I think it was, I went to the Electrowerkz on recommendation from a geezer named Tree, that I got talking to there a month earlier “You should come to the Bangface nights here, if you like this you’ll love them”. At the time I didn’t think much of it, I didn’t know it, but that night was to be the night that I fell in love with raving. The loud repetitive music, the endless smiling, welcoming faces in the crowd, the drugs, the individuality of the people, the fact that anyone had the chance to get up there and play tracks to a roaring crowd, the sheer fuck offness of it all. I finally found what I was looking for in a music community. I remember me and Lauren taking our first great pill at The Mass and as a typicial 17 year old pill honeymooner would do, went round hugging everybody telling them that we loved them. Although it wasn’t until the following April that I was to consecrate my marriage with rave culture and electronic music, when the two of us went to the Bangface Weekender….
As my 18th birthday approached I was given a couple of options by my parents over what they’d get me for it. One being that they’d front the money for me and 3 or 4 mates from college to go to Amsterdam for a weekend, or they’d front the money for me and a friend to go to the Bangface weekender, looking back on it I’m quite glad I chose the latter. I found us a chalet space off the Gladtalk forum, and on pure faith hope it would all go through without a hitch. One of the main memories I have of that festival was me and Lauren both coming up off whatever pills it was we had boshed, walking through the chalets taking in the atmosphere and Lauren turned to me and said “this could be the best weekend of our lives” as hokey and gay as it sounds it actually was, and when I get nostalgic about that weekend, I think back and wonder what type of person I’d be today if I hadn’t of gone to that festival. I owe a lot to the culture for shaping me as I am, before I discovered the environment of taking drugs like ecstasy and speed and socilising with people I’d never met before, I was a social cripple who lived the lifestyle of a typical Smiths fan. Stuck in my bedroom not talking to anyone, partaking in nothing social at all (apart from the laughs that me and my old school mates would have). Infact I thought about who my friends were the other day, and I have to say that over 90% of them I have met through either Bangface or other kinds of raves, one of which I’m currently living with, and many of them I couldn’t imagine what life would be like if I weren’t mates with ‘em. All of this I owe to a geezer named Tree. Although its Bangface which I owe my main thanks to, the mash pits, the stupid signs and inflatables, the social melting pot, the epic line ups, the mash pits and to being able to literaly be carried across the dance floor is what made Bangface the best live music experience I've ever had, yea these days it may be 'commercially diluted' and Hidden is a bit of a shit venue, and all your mates dont go any more but I'll still call them nights out the best nights of my life.

I suppose I should fill part of this in with the greatest rave I’ve ever been to (apart from the weekender) had to be the massive ‘sofa-tek’, ‘squatwars’, ‘skumtek’ whatever you like to call it party back in September time I think it was, around 3 years ago now. I remember leaving work on Saturday evening and fancied a rave, so called the Every1sound party line as I religiously did back then. And was greeted by the message of “Tonight is going to be a big one, we have 30 rigs, a huge building…. This one is not to be missed” so obviously after hearing this I gathered up what friends I could and we was on our way. Over an hour of traveling to Acton via bus (which was filled with party goers, a ritual I always enjoy about finding parties) and the building just happened to be the BBC props building, but we didn’t know this at the time. Through the labyrinth of sofa’s, washing machines, lawnmowers and beds, there was a rigs beyond every twist and turn playing tunes from DJ’s from all over the country. Ofcourse to celebrate the situation I ploughed myself with a ludicrous amount of stimulants and wondered around for seemingly ages. I remember one of the main rooms which was from memory about the size of 2 football pitches (but I was tripping) and it had the Every1Sound rig occupying it in all its glory, looked a bit like the Berlin wall. In this room was also a huge pile of books which Lewis commented on the time “was photography” on the pile of books was people passed out, couples embracing, wasted people flicking through them, a few people collecting them… And then it happened, one of the Liberator brothers was on the decks and was playing that Dawn Penn track that everybody knows, this created a momentum of people swaying and singing along, then a huge drop into a heavy techno drum loop sent everybody into a dance frenzy, also prior to this Lewis had just heroically skinned a 12 inch joint which we took to the dance floor, and shared with everybody… it was the rave equivalent of a religious experience. When we left that party I said to the door man “best one yet” to which his reply was “plenty more better to come mate” unfortunately he was wrong, and whilst walking away from what was the best rave I would ever attend, someone through a microwave out a window. Lovely.

As it goes raving has been my favorite pass time in my short life, the friends I’ve made, the places its sent me, the music and the lifestyle have all made me who I am today. They were and still are the best days of my life, I think I’ll stop when I finished, but I know there will be that time when the 808’s and 303’s wont be the friends they used to be and to be quite honest I wont mind.

Live Music and Me (Part 1)

2010-12-22T16:36:00.000-08:00

From Indie to Screamo
This blog is a lot later then planned, a refreshing coctail of being really busy with important things and not having access to the internet has cocked up the timing, I would also like to warn that this first part is a bit ropey and all memories aren’t 100% accurate.
Back at around about May earlier this year All Tomorrows parties announced that Godspeed You! Black Emperor were to reform and curate one of the tenth anniversary festivals, with a statement saying that they would also announce UK tour dates. Then on the week of Glastonbury, I got an email from a website which I put my email address on 7 years ago when I first heard their music with tour dates and ticket news, and forked out 60 quid for a couple in a heart beat. As this gig approaches I have realised this is the first band that I can remember splitting, then having to wait for them to reform to have a chance of catching them live. Which then made me think about my life through live music and my attitude, and love and devotion to music. Through the different social scenes it lead me, the venues I got drunk in and the people I met along the way. This will probably take a while so I’ve taken the liberty of knocking it into several parts. This is my best attempt at a memoir, from The Zutons to Godspeed…
For Christmas 2002 me and my friend Lauren both got tickets to see the Zutons at the Brixton academy for the 23rd of March. At the time my knowledge of music wasn’t vast, my favourite band was as it still is now Oasis and that’s about all I remember. I remember a few weeks before the gig avidly researching the Zutons music and enjoying most of it and when it came to the big day I was quite excited for my first gig. I remember my mum giving us a lift to the Brixton academy, I remember me and Lauren sitting down watching the supports before heading in when the band came on. It was with this set that I suppose I then fell in love with live music. The electric atmosphere, the people jumping around, I also think it was my first experience with people taking drugs around me. After this gig I was hooked. I went home and got on to buying tickets for my next gig, which was to be a band I was quite fond of at the time, who happened to be the Kaiser Chiefs. I bagged a couple of tickets for 20 quid and it was for the now late Astoria. Again I kept having my passion for live music enhanced. A more intimate venue, at the time I found the Kaiser Chiefs to be a very exciting new band. Which I suppose they were considering their now success, despite what my view of them now would be. I’d caught a bug by this point and every bit of pocket money I earned I would save up, and spend it on a ticket to see one of my favourite bands play live. It was also by this point that I had first heard The Libertines and The Strokes, and the whole idea of Indie Rock seemed really good. Solid guitar rifts and cool vocals seemed to me the most flawless kind of music that was around, but it wasn’t until July the following year that I would then attend a landmark gig, which was to be seeing my favourite band Oasis, play at the Southampton Rose Bowl on July the 6th. I remember it being even to this day, the most violent gig I’ve ever been to. Football terrace crowd in a live music atmosphere and the beer was 50p a pint (unfortunately at this age I had no interest in drinking) and considering that 80% of the crowd was male, you could expect that fights were breaking out absolutely everywhere, even to the point where during the gig Noel addressed the crowd by saying “any of you chaved up cunts want to fight, focking take it outside and do it”. There was also many incidents involving Liam slagging off Pete Doherty for Babyshambles not showing up to for their support act. A member of the crowd had an inflatable penis to which Liam shouted “Ah good to see that focking cunt Pete Doherty showed up” After this gig there wasn’t a lot left in the way of milestone events, a Babyshambles gig here and there, a Kasabian gig here, an exciting night out at the XFM Winterwonderland at the Brixton Academy until one Saturday afternoon I was sitting in my room playing a bit of Playstation, listening to my Saturday afternoons intake of radio which XFM used to supply so well, Ricky Gervais and Karl Pilkington, followed by Adam and Joe, followed by Justin Lee Collins (which is what I was listening to) when he played ‘I bet you look good on the dance floor’ by a young band called the Arctic Monkeys, I remember at the time thinking it was one of the best track I had ever heard and instantly became addicted to a bunch of young lads from Sheffield. They were the Oasis of my generation, I paid through the nose to see them on their first full UK tour, bloody good gig it was aswell,. But it was with this love of this band, which was to be the downfall and the start of my disillusion to the entire Indie Rock scene, I had a good opinion of it at first and to be fair I don’t exactly hate it now. The style was cool, the birds were tasty and the people who followed it were more or less really nice. But it was the lack of progression in the music and the plummeting quality of the new bands that diverted my interest. The Arctic Monkeys second album wasn’t that good and by this time I was well acquainted with The Smiths, Manic Street Preachers, The Stone Roses and Radiohead. Whilst the radio was ploughing out shit like Calvin Harris, The Kooks, The Fratelise, It was when a new sub genre called ‘Nu-Rave’ emerged that delivered the final nail in the coffin for my relationship with popular music and when the Klaxons won the Mercury music prize I finally turned my radio off and went looking for music through other means…
As a recap I’d say that by the age of 16 I would have listed my top 5 bands as Oasis, Radiohead, The Smiths, Pulp and The Manic Street Preachers. A long summer had finished and I had just started at college, where I was to become good friends with a geezer called Matt, it was with this geezer that I was to attend my first screamo/metal gig. It was at the Dome in Finsbury park, a small pub venue which didn’t I.D at the bar and had just one security guy. It was an interesting experience I can’t remember much of, however one thing that did keep my attention and that was the energy that the crowd possessed. I have always been a fan of using gigs to blow off steam and go mental and these gigs helped me do that. I was never particularly a fan of the music as such. It all sounded the same to me. Really fast guitar rift and vocals that literally sounded like someone growling, but I suppose that was the point. Anyway for about 8 months all I ever went to was metal and screamo gigs, mainly because that’s were all my mates went and it was always fun to get really pissed and punch a scene kid in the face. A few gigs stood out for me, Suicide Silence at the Underworld, Job for a Cowboy at the Mean Fiddler and many visits to The Peel and The Dome for the unsigned acts. There was however a few flaws with the whole scene, the people seemed very elitist. Their music tastes rarely excelled anything but metal, they were all so immature and if you had long hair, a tattoo and/or a huge plug in your ear you would probably get laid by the unattractive and mostly horrible women on offer. There was no love between the audience, always bitching, constant relationship problems and the respect pecking order came down to how many Myspace friends you had and how old you were… It was also the only music scene were I never met a fellow football fan. I quickly got bored of the whole scene even though at the time I had a lot of fun, the ‘2-step’ dance was one of my favriotes to do at gigs even though I never properly mastered it and being the only person who actually stood out at the gigs was a guilty pleasure. I remember one night in particular I was getting funny looks whilst wearing my huge parker, trackies, a pair of blue tinted sunglasses, swaggering around the Meanfiddler smoking cigs and pretending to be Liam Gallagher. I never shagged a scene girl, looking back on it though I’m not too bothered.
Whilst swinging my arms around, pissed out my head was all good fun I needed something more from live music then I was achieving with screamo, and then one night whilst lying in bed reading and listening to the Xposure show on XFM I listened to a live session with a lovely folk singer called Emmy the Great, I didn’t know it at the time but I was about to become a huge fan of the London Anti-folk scene and got a chance to rub shoulders with artists that are now topping the charts….

Glastonbury 40th Anniversary (or the reason I love my friends)

2010-07-02T16:42:00.000-07:00

It’s been 7 days now since Dinn, Dave, Sarah and I had just finished watching an overly satisfying Gorrilaz performance. A performance that consisted of such guests acts as Shaun Ryder, De La Soul, Mark E. Smith, Snoop Dogg, Mos Deff, Mick Jones, Paul Siminon and even Lou Rheed. Seeing this just hours after Thom Yorke and Jonny Greenwood surprisingly showing up for a secret was quite overwhelming. A night like this can only happen of course at the biggest and arguably best festival in the world that is Glastonbury. So I shall start from the beginning.
This year they let the car parks open on Tuesday night to ease congestion, a genius idea I thought and a genius idea executed, the Pussy Wagon made it in 2 and half hours and we was in the closest possible car park to the gate. Next was to execute my personal master plan, to make sure I get my first major festival friends (Bangface weekender I crew) and my chosen family of London (Bangface Hardcrew) to be camped up together to create my personal campsite of love. Which was achieved by late Wednesday afternoon. Right time to relax, get pissed, skin up and maybe have a walk, although by this time I realised which quite frequently seems to be with Glastonbury, was the following weather forecast. However this time fears of thunderstorms weren’t on the agenda, it was the fear of a sheer energy sapping heat wave. A sign of typical British behaviour from myself and probably a few of my fellow festival gowers. Never happy. The Wednesday however was a blur for me, I got in, got my mates camped up, shut my eyes for a bit then did a bit of visiting to some other mates. Thursday followed suit really except for getting so pissed that I was sick all over myself and passed out, but when I came to I realised that the long awaited Bangface Glastonbury takeover was about to come to life. I however got so munted that I had a “Where am I? Who am I? What am I doing moment?” and lost my phone as a result. Bangface I felt was a complete success and we concluded the evening with a visit to stone circle for sunrise and a mind expanding magic moment.
By Friday the temperature had risen and I wasn’t climatising anytime soon, Friday again is a blur and by this point I hadn’t stuck to my drug timetable well and everything I was pummiling myself with just didn’t seem to touch the sides, however I later concluded this might have been down to me generally having a really good time. I pretty much saw a Radiohead set then managed to find Dave, Sarah and Dinn to go see the Gorrilaz. We had a quality spot at the Pyramid stage, far right hand side, 50 yards from the bar, 15 yards from the toilet, view of the stage and plenty of room to dance. Like I said before the overwhelming scale of the guests was enough to make it a memorable set, but it was also very fitting to the theme of the 40th anniversary of the festival. World interludes followed by superstars of genres performing tracks. I’m not a fan of the Gorrilaz music, but they did very well. When they had finished performing I turned back to my 3 friends and said in the best way I could “If I looked up cunt in the dictionary all 3 of your faces would be there… But I couldn’t of asked to watch it with anyone else” Looking back on this it might of seemed harsh, but I did also have the genuine feeling that if I’d of watched that set with anyone else it would have been shit. Great Friday night… The following couple of hours then made me realise how lucky I was to have been stuck with the company I had. I put myself on man mission to drag my mates to a stage I’d never found in 4 years, and for a set that would be finished within an hour, I dragged them through every field on the west side of Worthy Farm, turning over to say “You are so lucky I don’t have any sharp objects otherwise I’d kill every single one of you” there was a part of me that meant this, but then I was overpowered by this emotion, this emotion I have chased for about 10 years, I think its called Love and considering their manor towards it I think that was exactly what stopped me from killing them all. I dragged them along for another until we found the stage and I pilled them and myself full of whiskey, popped into Bez’s Acid house then I lost ‘em all and headed back for some rest.
Saturday at Glastonbury for me has followed a ritual of dropping strong acid then going on an adventure of the green fields, healing fields, circus and cabaret and my personal favourite park stage. However this year I was quite horribly constipated and the heat was really starting to get to me. Instead of wondering around all trippy and happy taking in the magic of the place I sat at my campsite with a pack of wet wipes in hand insulting my best friends. Until night fall when my other plan of getting pissed up with Heide and seeing a god of music was to come to place… However it did have signs of a faultier when Heide did give the confession that she was going to see The Pet Shop Boys instead… This was never going to happen as my threats of murder earlier on in the weekend had settled in, but we did actually pull off my plan of finding a place that sold draught Guiness and getting pissed up for the man himself…. Christy Moore was brilliant, his soundman made him quiet for some reason, but the crowd and set list were pretty spot on. I don’t remember what happened that night but I think I enjoyed myself. My initial plan of pulling at Glastonbury had resorted to asking random girls to sit on my face, to which I had a reply of puzzlement or was just ignored.

By the Sunday I think I had finally acclimatized and was ready to actually do shit, unfortunately this is always too late, again Dinn, Dave, Sarah and I went to see Ray Davies perform the Sunday Legends slot which was very nice, that evening I saw Faithless, and Orbital. Orbital being a bit of a controversial one as I’d swarn to see Stevie Wonder on my “who will I have a chance of seeing again” Glastonbury Manifesto. But the atmosphere for Orbital was amazing, and seeing Dave in a moment of sheer awe and finally meeting Alan’s friends that he’d brung along each year, who were sound as fuck. That night I attempted to go see the Arcadia fire show and Shangri-la but was exhausted from a week of hedonism.

In conclusion this years festival was not the finest hour I had hoped for, the weather came into play as it usually does, I moaned a lot, threatened to kill my mates, missed pretty much everything I came to see, and broke my Glastonbury manifesto. But I have noticed with every year I’ve gone I’ve learnt something different….

2007=Festivals are the best things in the world
2008=You need friends at festivals
2009=Glastonbury is the best place to have the best week of your life
2010=I have the best friend I can possibly hope for…

Although this year I was mainly very aggy from the heat, and was probably a downer for the atmosphere, I have nothing but appricieation for the people that pulled me through it, and seeing them genuinely enjoy themselves was enough to keep me happy. I had actual intentions of killing every single one of them, but was stopped by the power of love. Which is that similar thing that stops you from killing a family member, but as the saying goes friends are the family you chose for yourself, and seeing my mate Jem having a laugh with Tom the nonse, or Julie getting wrecked with Dinn, or Sarah having conversation with Ian and Rosa, was magic enough for me. To have a week in the company of my two favourite sets of people and seeing them enjoy themselves was the only selfless thing I can take from the week. I can’t threaten to kill many people and them laugh in my face lets put it that way. So I’ll do a roll call and for those I’ve missed out it’s because I met you that weekend and my appreciation for you will be shown maybe after next years festival?

So… Alan, Dinn, Dave, Elliot, Fiona, Heide, Ian, Jem, Josh, Julie, Petch, Rosa, Sarah, Tom ‘The Nonse’… It was a privilege and a pleasure to serve under you all and if you’re ever in need of a kidney, lung, blood or even heart transplant, I will happily give it to any of you.

Until next year.

Why Alabama 3 are the best replacement

2010-05-26T05:05:00.000-07:00

Yesterday it was announced that U2 were to cancel their headlining Friday night slot from Glastonbury due to U2 lead singer and infamous hypocrite Bono having a bit of back trouble and needing surgery. This now leaves a slot open for one of the most covenant slots in all of music, a chance to headline the biggest, and most famous festival in the world. This following blog is my reasons for why in my opinion Alabama 3 should take the slot….

Now I know first of all Alabama 3 are already playing twice at this years festival and they are almost part of the furniture there after playing pretty much every other year and I know traditionally the festival headliners are top selling artists mainly of the rock genre, however I feel that since this year is the 40th anniversary of the festival, a festival from my own experience and from what I’ve been told is a festival rich in tradition, diversity, and high quality and due to these circumstances the organizers should try something new and celebrate these traditions with a band like Alabama 3 headlining the Friday.

When asked who Alabama 3 are and what they play, my usual response is “have you ever seen the Sopranos?” and if they have then the reply of “They do the theme music to it” and when they haven’t I usually get the question “What kind of music do they play?” which is when I’m given the opportunity to explain the concept of the best band in the country today…

Alabama 3’s obvious main influence lies within their southern American country and blues vocals, as well as adding acid house drum loops, rock n roll guitar rifts, politically and socially charged lyrics which usually involve communist, anti racist and drug based themes, as well as frequent references to old delta blues and country singers (Robert Johnson, Woodie Guthrie, Hank Williams etc) sometimes sung in the style of a rap by supporting vocalist and co writer D-Wayne Love.
Now you may be wondering how a band like this could of possibly spawned well the founders are; Larry Love (aka: Rob Spragg) who is the son of a Welsh Mormon minister and D-Wayne Love (aka: Jake Black) who is incredibly Scottish. The band aren’t from Alabama, they was formed in Brixton and there aren’t 3 of them there are between 8-11 when they perform live. Now it’s not just A3’s diverse music style and eccentric set up which I think makes them worthy of headlining Worthy Farm, it’s everything else they represent and for everything they stand for…

Now I often get asked by fellow fans of the band “Why aren’t they bigger then they actually are?” I think the answer to this lies within the bands ethics of making music and going about as a band. They are on an independent record label for starters, they have never played a venue bigger then a 2,000 capacity and even when they do it’s for no more then a reasonable 20 pound a ticket, one of my particular favorite traits of theirs is the fact that they let the producers of The Sopranos use their track ‘Woke Up This Morning’ for nothing! And to this day have absolutely no regret to what they did and never actually mention it unless asked, now I don’t know how much it would cost a television producer to play even one of the later, mundane U2 tracks like “Vertigo” or “City of Blinding Lights” But I’m pretty sure Bono and his men wouldn’t let it be played without a figure with at least 4 0’s on the end of it. Also when it comes to charity work Alabama 3 have trumped’s U2 yet again. Now I know U2 have given a lot of money to charity, if you don’t know this then you must be completely death or have ignored everything for the past 25 years. But despite what ever U2 does for charity it just proves them of further hypocrisy. The band hold duel passports to several different countries and as a result do not pay any tax to either of them since they don’t live in the country for long enough, they support helping climate change but are currently on a 14th month around the world tour, where they are probably all flying in their own private jets and also jetting around there 20 ton 360 stage, burning Christ knows how much electricity on one of their over produced 2 hour stage shows. Another thing I’d like to note on the recent tour was the irony behind the tours sponsors and one of the recent U2 tracks of their latest album. I don’t know the tracks name but the premise behind it is basically a dig at how are communications are being controlled by technology. THE TOUR WAS SPONSERED BY FUCKING BLACKBERRY!!!!. Ok I think I’ve vented enough anger about U2 so I can get back to promoting my campaign….Now the contrast between U2’s preaching, hypocritical charity campaigns and Alabama 3’s slight mention of a charity every gig and ask to donate to it at the end is a great one, also considering that all of U2 are on multi million pound contracts who could probably pay off the 3rd world debt if they all chipped in a bit and Alabama 3 make enough money off ticket sales, merchandise and their music to probably live without thinking of having to take up a day job. Like that passage in the bible where Jesus and his mates are hanging out in a temple and there is loads of rich people donating money to it, then a peasant woman comes up to the box and puts in like one coin and all of the rich people turn their noses up, I think Jesus then has a bit of a go at them which then leads to one of his mates asking him what the deal was, to which Jesus replies “those rich blokes have given just a fraction of what they can just to look good, even though they gave loads it don’t mean anything to them. Where as that bird is completely skint and has given all she has to the cause” It was words to that effect anyway. But anyway my point is Alabama 3 on the whole do more for charity.

I would like to start rolling things up now as I’ve noticed that I’m starting to ramble a bit and kind of getting away from my point, which is this in a few words….
Glastonbury festival is like I said earlier, a festival of great tradition, diversity and love. It also gives lots to charities and gives creative people platforms to express these on, The main one being the headlining slot. I feel that Alabama 3’s contribution to music and the world is worthy of that slot. The Guardian to this day states that they are the best live band in the world, and I probably wouldn’t fault that statement, not only do I feel that they are of the quality and have the back catalogue to headline, I also feel that a band that has been able to mix so many traditional forms of music from all over the world and turn them into songs refrencing old time artists as well as famous Brixton landmarks and streets, they have written one of the greatest drinking songs of all time (Old Purple Tin) a tribute to Tennants Super. ‘Mao Tse Tsung says’ which is mainly just a Jim Jones sample with D-wayne hitting a nice rap in the middle of it. The song isn’t much of a recorded track, but live it is followed by a left handed communist salute and is one of the bands landmark tracks…I could go on but I’ve got things to do….I just feel that a band as inspiring as Alabama 3 should have the privilege to headline this years festival instead of some shit like Coldplay.

Further watching….
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gpGgLyfDERI
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cAFU9cHZ1Xo
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=grPFfrLRBRI&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZHEjuZmVTi4
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1tmxVAEMxDI

A rushed look at this years Premier League

2010-05-14T10:03:00.000-07:00

The End of Season Review

The date is the 14th of May 2010 5 days after the rollercoaster of the Premier League jolted to a complete holt. A season, which has at times lacked in quality but has never been short of surprises, a season where mighty forces of the past have fallen, and where finally enquiries are being made about the corporate bastards using our football clubs as toys and business opportunities after the first ever Premiership club went into administration. As well as all that there was one of the tightest battles for fourth place I can ever remember, the title race kept
The first few months started off like any other, there were a few changes to some of the top sides, Chelsea had a new manager in but no real big signings were made in the summer, United has lost their wonder kid to Real Madrid for a record 80 million pounds, Arsenal again went in with the belief that they could go and win the league with a youth team and City splashed out more cash then any other premier league club with their new Arabic owners. The opening day did have one significant result in it that at the time spectators wouldn’t of predicted, Tottenham beat Livepool at White Heart Lane. As a Chelsea fan I always do find it amusing when Liverpool lose because having had to witness a Chelsea and Liverpool tie over 20 times in the past 5 years is no laughing matter. But yes would you believe it everybody’s favourtie whipping boys Tottenham managed to fight for and win the dog fight for 4th spot this season and change the face of the “Top Four”, they deserved it more then City and was more consistent then Villa (Although Villa were my favored team for the spot). There was always this constant horrible feeling that even though Liverpool were playing without any spirit or any skill and for the first time in their history dropped out in the group stages of Champions League, as well as going out in the 3rd round of the FA Cup to Reading, that despite all of this I could still picture how the last day of the season would play out, 3rd minute of stoppage time, it’s 1-1 and if Liverpool win they seal fourth after an unprecedented 10 wins on the trot, ball gets wipped out from a corner “ It comes to GEEEEEEEERRRRARRRRRRRRRRRDDDDDDDDDDDD” and Steven Gerrard, savour of Mersey side belts in a 30 yard volley in the last kick of the game…Typical Liverpool. But instead they finished 7th, one of their worst performances in the league for years. Benitez looks like he’s out of the job, and towards the end of the season all their star players were looking unbelievably depressed. It wouldn’t surprise me if one of the big 2 (Gerrard or Torres) were to leave in the summer.
The race for the title however was a bit of a different beast this season. Those of you who know me will know that I am a Chelsea supporter, always have, always going to be, but this season my love for them changed ever so slightly. The same way that your relationship is with a mate who you love dearly, but whenever you go out and get pissed he can’t help but start trouble. This was pretty much Chelsea’s attitude to games this season, whenever we would look like losing most of out star players would get aggy with the referee and we’d lose all faith in getting anything out of the game. This was shown when the Special One came back to the Bridge to tactically, mentally and physically out do us in every department. The loss came without shock really, Mourinho knows Chelsea inside out and he is the greatest manager in the world…we never stood a chance. But he had it played out so well. Shut Lampard out the way so we had to no playmaker, get on Drogba’s nerves so he loses his temper and probably gets sent off (Which he did) and hit us on a counter attack where we was consistently weak this season. A situation we was never in when the Special One was in charge of us. Despite the loss in Champions League I took many positives out of it. Both United and Arsenal were left back in it, this meant another 2 mid week games for top players to get injured in, or to just generally get jaded in. A lot of my non-Chelsea fans couldn’t understand this but as it goes I turned out to be right. Rooney was injured in the first leg of Uniteds tie against Bayern Munich, the Wednesday before we was set to play them, and Fabregras and Arshavin were injured for Arsenal in their fantastic game against Barcelona at the Emirates. Which did eventually lead to a dip in form for both of our rivals and for us to steam ahead. There were a few further hiccups but nothing major and more or less throughout the season played like a tank in Tiananmen Square, stopping only once or twice to minor teams. We got 6 out of 6 against the top 4, most goals scored by any club in a season ever, highest ever goal difference, topped off by an emphatic 8-0 win on the last day of the season. Which also included a Drogba hat-trick to give him the Golden boot for the season. The Premiership returns to Stamford Bridge.
It is the FA Cup final tomorrow and in true cup final fashion it is an underdog challenge. Botom side Portsmouth against League winners Chelsea, now despite my love for Chelsea and how I’d love us to pull off our first ever League and Cup double, I cant help but have this hope that Pompy do the impossible tomorrow, not just because I have a respect for the town of Portsmouth as it has been good to me over the years and is the home to some of my friends and is supported by my mentor. But because I feel that the fans deserve it more then any other. The way that that club has been allowed to be run into the ground by an owner who obviously didn’t have a clue has been absolutely sickening. A guestermat to the high courts and customs said that Portsmouth owed around 60 millions pounds in bills, it now turns out that they owe nearly 130 million and then the bills were released to the public. Ridiculous amounts owed to ridiculous people. 500 pounds owed to the milkman, 700 pounds owed to the local florist, 13,000 pounds owed to Chichester college, and I’d like to know what dealing they did with Qatar airways because they owe them 20 pence. This has been a harsh reminder that corporate bastards are being allowed quite happily to use our football clubs as toys without having any knowledge what so ever about running a football club, or having any respect for the fans that devote their lives to it. So tommorow at 3 o’clock when two 2 blue sides go out onto that pitch at Wembley I will have this slight support for the underdog. If we snatch an early goal, it’ll be a repeat of last week, but if Portsmouth play with the attitude that they have nothing to lose, then considering this is the oldest and greatest domestic cup competition in all of sport where anything can happen I turley believe that Pompy could do it.
Sorry this is brief and rather rushed I wanted to complete it before tommorows game and I’m currently getting ready to go to an Alabama 3 gig…here is a brief list of awards for the season
Player of the year – James Milner: Did he have a bad game for Villa? An absolutely certainty for Capello’s 11 in South Africa surely.
Best goal – Danny Rose: Spurs V Arsenal: your 19 years old, its your premier league debut and you score a 30 yard volley in a north London derby that you then go on to win for the first time since you was born. An absolute dream come true and a cracking goal.
Manager of the year: a toss between Harry Redknapp and Roy Hodgson: Premier League I’d give it to Harry for his achievement with Spurs, but nothing can be taken away from the spirit that Fuhlam have played with this season.

Signing of the season: Adam Johnson, Middlesborough – City: He might of come in January but young Adam Johnson has impressed amongst a team full of over payed pre madonna’s. good on him

A silver lining in a very black cloud

2010-05-11T18:14:00.000-07:00

Today was one of the darkest days in my living memory. Within hours not only has the countries fate been given over to David Cameron’s army of Tory’s thanks to the treacherous Liberal Democrats, but one of our finest sanctuary’s was forced to cancel due to rising cost’s forced by local money grabbing police. A stark reminder that our civil liberties have no sign of letting up when it comes to them being stripped from us without argument and that money is still the main evil preventing us from having a good time. Now I know next to fuck all about politics, so this isn’t going to be a politically based blog (I was only 7 when the Tories last had the ruling of the UK anyway) and I only ever went to 2 Glade’s so this isn’t going to be one on the history of my time there (Fantastic them 2 festivals were though). But there’s one thing would say I know a lot about and that is the history of music and film and its surrounding cultures, but again most of the stuff I’m going to document hasn’t come from my own personal experiences due to me being full of youth. But I feel that in my time I’ve been able to gather enough research from an addiction to IMDB and questions of curiosity when it comes to meeting people from that particular era as well as obsessing over music from that period. One of the main positives that can be taken from the new Tory government is a possible return to quality guitar music. Brit pop ended in allegedly ended in 1997, partly because of the New Labour government and something to do with Princess Diana generally putting a dampener on things as well, but from what I can see from 1979 to 1997 music, especially British music, was at its peek. Factory Records was a year in and starting to make some noise by 1979 and Thatchers call to power, Joy Division had released their first E.P and shit seemed like it was properly kicking off. Factory records then went on to sign many more influential bands and hold host to many at the notorious Hacienda. By the mid 80’s we had such class Indie music like The Smiths, The Stone Roses, The Fall, James, The Happy Mondays and so on, back when the term ‘Indie’ actually had proper meaning and the bands didn’t all sound the same. The Hacienda can also be credited with the rise of Acid house, ecstasy culture and the rise of raving. Hosting 808 State in 1989 and having reports of some people “crawling through the air vents just to see them” (according to Wikipedia), with this came the birth of free parties, which then led to ‘the law against rave’ also known as the “Criminal Justice and Public Disorder act 1994” which was bought in by John Majors Tory government mainly because of the infamous Castlemorten festival in 1992, where approximately 30,000 people descended on the tiny village for a week! The mighty rave was dealt its first major blow, not helped by the closing down of the Hacienda (although eye witness reports say the club had been truly dead for several years anyway). I’d like to at this point intervene the history lesson to note that the reason I give this period much praise is because of its lack of motivation for profit. Free parties lived up to their name, and got it’s meaning from “being free from the restrictions of legal club nights”, and Tony Wilson with Factory records famously made many calamities when it came to running a club night and a record company by spending more then they was taking. They released L.P’s that cost more to make then they was actually charging for, and literally rinsed all of New Orders profits from their biggest ever-selling Blue Monday single by putting it straight back into the Hacienda. Why? Because they loved music and felt this is how it should be, and from it we was given quality music from many quality bands. Now at this point you’re probably wondering what this has to do with Glade’s cancelation and a new Tory government, but I’ll be getting to that in a minute…. Anyway 1994 marked the first death of Rave (although I’m sure many still went on for a long time afterwards for arguments sake we’ll call the 1994 law the first death). 1994 also bought along a new band, again another Manchester based band 2 lads and a couple of mates who in 2 years went from the dole cue to performing to having the fastest selling debut album of the time and now one of the biggest selling British albums ever and to then performing to 250,000 people at Knebworth. The absolute Rock n Roll dream despite what anyone’s recent opinions of them are there is no doubting that Oasis were a revelation to Rock n Roll and proved that if you wanted to be the best at something all you had to do was rip off what you’ve heard before. There are many aspects to Brit Pop that I love; The Blur V Oasis war, the rise of Glastonbury, the peak of British Rock n Roll, Jarvis Cocker, I even like that an artist like Damien Hurst could be called a genius, literature such as American Psycho coming in from the states and Irvine Welsh writing his tales of decrepit Scotland and Film makers such as Danny Boyle making films like Shallow Grave and Trainspotting. A time when Britain seemed like it actually had some proper balls. Until of course like I mentioned earlier it all came to a bit of an abrupt end with the New Labour government, death of the peoples princess and the release of Oasis highly anticipated, and somewhat disappointing 3rd album, ‘Be Here Now’ from then on nothing happened. Music started to decline, a new Millennium was rung in and bands like Travis, The Darkness and Coldplay, even Robbie Williams was being praised for his excuse for music, Blur and Pulp put themselves on permanent hiatuses and everything else Brit Pop had was almost forgotten about, Glastonbury was then restricted by a massive fence, and television shows such as Pop Idol and then the X-Factor showed that mainstream music was just a tool for a bunch of gormless cunts to produce another production line fad of a performer, tricking the innocent public to come on and lose all their dignity or sell their soul on live television. This has been allowed to continue ever since, despite the brief rise of a new look of Indie music (which was very brief) and being saved by the reformation of a few bands from the old days. Popular music got so shit that I decided to abandon it and find new avenues in Folk and Electronic music with great results. Although the music was fairly bad we have now been given an amazing opportunity through the internet, an opportunity where any of us with a musical note and a lyric can produce a song and put it out to the world via the internet. Yea I know most of it’s shit but that’s not the point, musicians are back to promoting their music and giving it away for free and being more in touch with fans then they’ve ever been.
I think its now time I got to my point well here it is... I like to believe in omens and signs, and I find it more then coincidence that on this black of all days, a community’s legal festival has been stripped from it and the very government that tried to destroy it before is back, I find this more of a coincidence as music, just like the weather or may I be so bold to say the economy, change with every generation and I think a new Tory generation will be just what we need for our muscians, film makers, writers and artists to start giving a shit again and turn Britain back into the super power it once was. The previous Tory government might of stolen your milk, banned you from drinking on the terraces of a football stadium, forced you or a parent out of work due to privatization, and even tried to force a new pointless tax on you. But shit there wasn’t there some great music made under their reign? A Labour government was probably a bit easy on us, we got a minimum wage, tuition fee’s for higher education which could have been paid off by an easy little student loan, as well as a shit load of increased benefits and allowances which will probably now be cut. Now I'm not saying that the past 13 years will be known as the glory years of Britain. Don't get me wrong any government that goes to War illegally, bans the civil liberty of smoking and draws alliance with the dangerous, war mongering, bully Americans is not a good one in my view, but we are working class people and a change over from Red to Blue is against an unwritten social code, which is also why I think so many people voted for the Liberal Democrats this time round... So I ask that on this black of all days you try and have a little hope that beyond the inevitable lower standard of living, us working classes who enjoy our drink, cigarettes, music, films, drugs and parties can look forward to an increase of quality in the arts. It’s been a long time coming and it’s a new decade anyway so its bound to happen, lets use this time not to morn or moan, but to stand up against the new law of the land. I’ve already seen a Facebook group asking for support for a free Glade festival, and with the catalyst of the glorious Internet I’m almost certain that guitar music will return in this of all dark times. The Tories will moan, and living will probably only get worse, my main concern that the greatest institution left in this country, I am of course referring to the mighty BBC, will be allowed to be sold off to the evil Rupert Murdoch, that however is a blog I shall write if the situation arises, but fuck it lets go take in a film, get wasted and then listen to some tunes.
Thanks for reading; Sorry if my Wikipedia based research was all bull shit,
RIP Glade. 2004-2009
Lahm

Farewell teenage years

2010-05-05T17:19:00.000-07:00

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It is exactly 56 minutes until I turn 20 and leave behind me the first development years of my life. The best way to write about it would be to do it in the style of a decade review I suppose, try and recall what change me as a person, what had an impact, what I experienced, landmark moments and the people that were there throughout all of it. For some of you that have known me through these 10 years some of this will ring bells, to some of you I have known for a couple to 3 years this is a chance to get to find out what I was up to before I met you. For those of you with no interest in the gory details, I’ve put a lot of effort into doing my stats at the bottom of the page I don’t know how this is going to work, but if I get it done before 12 it will be the fastest entry I’ve ever written for anything in my entire 20 years on earth. I suppose I should start from the point when I first started to have a clue what was going on in the world and for many people of around my age this date would probably have to be September 11^th 2001. The last chance any of us will ever have to experience world peace, the start of fear and the beginning of a war which will last longer and probably be more pointless then the Trojan one. From now on no one was safe on a plane, anyone with a beard was a terrorist and your human rights were to be exploited for the interests of safety. I have tried to ignore this atmosphere for the past 9 years. Even when having to experience it happen just literally 3 miles up the road from me 5 years later. But this isn’t a blog about terrorism, more a blog of what I’ve noticed and learnt in the past 10 years. I grew up not knowing what its like not to have a mobile phone or not being connected to the Internet and I suppose I could argue that I've grown up in the fastest technological revolution in human history, also I’m yet to really understand the perils of a possible Tory government. I haven’t had a bad teenage life; but of course it has been plagued with the usual loneliness, self-consciousness, self-loathing and incredibly down periods where I stopped seeing the point and I’ve also discovered the evil of money and what it does to people. But despite the obvious harshness of adolescents, I’ve also learnt that within this world of morons and corporate bastards there is also so much more beauty if you look for it. I’ve experienced intense highs, explored unchartered mental territory and even discovered the joys of free love. But I have to say my favorite discovery is that no matter how hard life gets, how much them bastards grind you down, even when your own family starts to seem alien to you, you always have your friends, who are the family you choose yourself.

School Days

People always told me that your school years are the best years of your life…. That person was wrong. I went to a Jesuit run all boys school in Wimbledon, and it was filled with cunts. Prisons probably have better morals between the inmates. Grassing was not a crime, no one could be trusted, the banter was fun don’t get me wrong, but 90% of the people were arrogant, vicious and lacked a lot of human decency, Don’t get me wrong, I was never a victim of bullying as such but the enviroment of them classrooms was an absolute chore. I also hated that it seemed like it would never end, 5 days a week 9-3.30 for 11 years, learning stuff which a majority of which is useless and then years later realizing that the importance of these “GCSE’s” was all a complete fabrication. The idea that without them you would fail at life and never achieve your dreams was a lie and I felt like those 11 years of my life was taken from me unfairly. However it weren’t all doom and gloom, with the help of my mates Jul, B, G, Lloyd, Charlie, Stinky, Scott and maybe a few other acceptations of which I’m too tired to list at the moment I was able to survive them pointless years in that building. All of us had no interest in any of the work that was set and as a result pretty much all of us flunked our exams and kind of went our separate ways. Which is when things started to get fun….

Adolescents

Now I’m no expert on what its like to be a teenage girl, probably because I’ve never been one. But I am aware of hormones and all that emotional shit. But I honestly think that the years of 14-16 are by far the hardest years for the teenage boy. A Catholic all boys’ school isn’t the best environment to discover girls in. The teenage years I feel should the main years of sexual experiments, it’s a great practice patch. Find out how things work, how to put what where, how to react to certain reactions, and what to say when the whole ordeal is finished. Unfortunately though at this age if you ain’t got the development you ain’t got a bloody chance. I for one at the ages of 14-16 was shorter, quieter, and less adventurous and had less self as teem then a Guantanamo prisoner. I did however at the age of 15 manage to somehow lose my virginity to a girl called Emma Watson (unfortunately not the star of Harry Potter) I wont embarrass the girl with too many details of the filth we endeavored in. But it was the most awkward and seemingly pointless act I’ve ever had and I cant help but feel that the brief relationship I had with that girl has turned me into the unlucky sex crazed, buffoon that acts before you, but what I discovered from the experience and then further experiences is that sex should just be a bit of a laugh…because it is isn’t it? Love has got little to do with it when your that age because I don’t think your really capable of being truly in love with your first girlfriend or whatever so your just doing it for fun, in which case WHY DIDN’T I GET LAID MORE!?. The reason being is that the last I heard of that girl was that she was acting odd and had lost all contact with any friends that I knew of her. It was a time I’d rather forget and on that note I would like to start talking about the good shit….. The second significant date of my teenage years was the 23^rd of March 2004, the reason being this was my first live gig and the start of my love of music. I went to see The Zutons with my life long partner in crime Lauren. I have vague memories of the set list even, but considering this was in the wake of the Libertines split and the Indie world was still in a daze after The Strokes released “is this it?” I was soon to be a bit of an Indie boy. (At this stage I would like to point out that age 12 I would wear heavily baggy jeans, nirvana hoodies and bike chains). Now I don’t know whether it’s because I’m starting to get tired and I’ve already just completed a 1500 word essay but I’m far too jaded to discuss my journey through the love of music. But may I give thanks to Morrissey for saving my life again and again. Noel Gallagher for his fantastic Rock N Roll and to Thom Yorke for teaching me that rock music didn’t have to have guitars in it, Damien Rice for teaching me that your deepest feelings and stories could be told through songs… O and a little cheeky shout out to Nick Bracegirdle for teaching me that music could be made using computers. Since that date I have no clue how many gigs I’ve been to, or how many bands I’ve seen live but without music I’d probably be a dunce.

College

When I discovered that you could do a course at college that involved watching films, talking about them, and even making them, I thought it was far too good to be true. Until I met a man at NESCOT College who was going to then be a bit of a life mentor for me. When I failed my exams not a single soul had any hope in me, even my own mother had given up hope on my future, but I will always remember what Catlow said to me… “…O well, not the end of the world. Your young, a year is nothing, if anything its just another year of experience for you.” That mans belief in me gave me the first piece of real self-confidence I’ve ever had in myself. The good lord may never have blessed me with athletic ability, good looks, intelligence or even common sense at times. But Catlow made me believe that I could do anything I wanted if I really wanted. But my journey from the quiet boy at the back of the room was just beginning. My first year of college introduced me to two pivotal people in my life. The first was a young man called Matty, who by complete coincidence was friends with my life long partner in crime Lauren and through this my social life was born. I learnt the essential basics of how to drink, smoke and stay up late. The second was a young man who turned up late to his second day of college after skipping his first because he couldn’t be bothered to show up. This fellow is Jack Sparling or Del as I like to refer to him, he took me for my first drink (which I paid for) and was the first person I could properly have in-depth conversations about film with. He also taught me how to smoke and generally act in public although none of it ever set in. He told me once the only reason he went on the course was because whist visiting on a mates induction a girl smiled at him so he enrolled to see if he could find her… I dunno what kind of person I would of turned out to be if that girl didn’t smile at Del. My second course at college ( a 2 year national diploma media course) was by far the 2 best years of my life. A completely new introduction of people and a new appreciation of the pleasures of cannabis, I look back at those 2 years now with a sense of complete bliss. What other college could I get get top class teaching at, watch films all day, get stoned on a break, play football at lunch, watch another film, have a load of banter with some quality people and then get an education out of the end of it, of course I had my 3 main partners in crime there also. Lewis, Aaron and Josh. To this day I think they should of put us on the front of the college prospectus as a sign of the colleges multi-cultural vibes. Aaron chaved up to the eyeballs, Lewis with a 12 inch Mohawk and laced in punk gear, Josh pulling off a Chicago style coolness of a swagger and a Jackson 5 style afro and myself whatever the fuck I was. We would of looked brilliant on that front cover, if it weren’t for the spliff we al had in each of our hands anyway, But anyway… Aaron, Lewis, Josh, Chapman, yid, Steve, Luke, Freeman, Nick, Lizz, Sardine, Bud, Sam, Joe and all the rest. Cheers! Also as a result of that I can confirm that if you haven’t a GCSE or an A-level to your name, you can still get into a top university if you really, really, really try.

Drugs, Raves and Bangface!

During the hot summer of 2006 at a party in Cheam I bumped into a gorgeous South African girl called Kate. We got talking about football and music, exchanged numbers and the next week I went to her house to hang out. It was a large mansion like house in Wimbledon village with a massive garden and a converted garage which was a banging party room…It was in this room where I first experimented with hard drugs, an interest which was to turn into a bit of an interest of mine. I suddenly was hit with the realization that the reason take drugs was because they was fantastic...If only there was other environments where these chemicals would work well? Cue exactly one year later, sat in on a sofa in the notorious Electrowerkz club. I asked a geezer named Tree (that really was his name!) for a lighter and got chatting, he then recommend that I’d attend again but on a Bangface night. I headed his advice, and again me and my life long partner in crime attended and to this day I am Hardcrew. The amazement of this viciously loud and fast music being played in this cramped, sweaty, filthy club which stank to high heaven of ganja. Everybody with a smile on their face, everybody approachable to talk to…. Now as much as I’d like to go on about Bangface I really do think I should save that one for another time. As much as I’d love to let loose and tell tales of all the amazing people that I have met and all the amazing friends I have made thanks to a club night, I really am going to save it for another time and when I say another time, I mean a long time from now. Maybe when I’m bored of it all, or if I physically cant hack it anymore. But even on this of all blogs. A blog which I said I was going to reveal all…I honestly don’t have it in me to let loose that emotion on this my last time as a teenage boy.

What I’ve learnt

I am a Lazy bastard

The majority of the public are idiots.

It’s easier to be nice to people then to be horrible, and you always get a better reaction to a positive approach to things.

Money rules all!

(on seducing women) If you make the pussy laugh, you make the pussy wet!

Music is magic

Film is the greatest art form that I’ve experienced

Friendship is god’s greatest gift

Human deceny is our gift to God

I will always notice things getting worse but will never notice the benefits of life

Absolutely anything can be achieved if you want it to be

Festivals are a sanctuary for kindness, peace and love

Football harnesses a stronger passion then marriage and religion put together

Drugs were put on this earth to speed up and help the evolutionary process

A smile can go a long way

Having sex is just a laugh, making love is the important part

Personality is real beauty

Just be good and kind to each other because after all we are all we’ve got

Violence is a shit answer, wit takes real intelligence

Corporations will probably destroy society

Greed is the ultimate evil

Women are the devil

….Theres probably a lot more but as I mentioned earlier its been a long night and my mind is spent

Statistics

Days alive: 7304

Education: GCSE’s: 6 D’s, 3 E’s, 2 F’s A-Levels: None Diplomas: 2

Arrests: 1

Jobs: 5

Football Teams Supported: 1

Girls I’ve charmed: 11

Relationships: 0

Fallen in Love: 0

Festivals attended: 13

Cup Finals Attended: 4

Countries visited: 6

Bands seen live: 150 (approximatley)

What I do now?

Finish Uni and get a job out of it

Stop being lazy

Stop making excuses

Show some more respect to my parents

Save money

Find real actual love

Actually live out one of my passions

Travel

Shag more women

Run a marathon

Continue getting wasted but control it more

Have twice as much fun as I’ve already had

Final words and special thanks

To be honest with you I’m glad to see the back of the teenage years, I’ve seen all they’ve had to offer, I’ve learnt a lot, and I’m still learning which is exciting, I’ve met some of the finest people a young man can possibly hope to meet and I have a good idea of what I want to do with my life, sorry for lack of detail of certain events and life skills in this blog and it wasn’t as revealing as I’d hoped it be, I haven’t experienced that much bad stuff happen to me for it to be a thriller, I also hope you can respect I’ve just tried to sum up 10 years as quickly as possible. But if I could some it up in a sentence I suppose It would be something along the line of…I didn’t achieve everything I set out to do, and I made a lot of excuses, but I had a laugh and I regret nothing…but anyway a special thanks and respect to… (in no proper order)

Mam and Dad, Lauren Springer, G Brown, B and Jul Smith, Charlie O’Grady, Scott O’Conner, Kate Wessex, Jack Sparling, Matty Ashwood, Sam Fifield, Nairobi Affuko, Jay Sullivan, Craig Catlow, Alan Hardcastle, Lewis Grimwood, Mike Andrews, Axel Olson, Ian Gaughran, Lesley Remdond Josh Braithwait, Matt Chapman, Matt ‘The Yid’ Sharp, Matthew ‘freeman’ Carter, Luke Flight, Lizzie Millard, Stephen Hubbard, Sam Dowden, Neill, Leefus Fitzpatrick, Richard Unwin, Pete ‘razor’ Medlock, James Bangface, Sarah and Graeme King, Heidie Prag, James ‘Jean’ Simmons, Dominick Medler, Alan Mcleod, DAN, Dinn Warde, Mike Neufield, Dave Feneron, Jem ‘Gurner’, Hayley Morgan, Lee Hutcheon, The Regime Boys (Mic, Lloyd & Howard etc), Big Scottish Dave, Joe Amos, Holly Parker, Rosa Macey, Ian Hamilton, Tom ‘The Nonce’ Radford, Fiona Hamilton, Julie Pritchard, Adam Emberson, Ryan Mcfdagey, Duane Melius, Elliot Snook, Chris ‘Baldo’, Jenny Garton, Page Perrier, Annie, Charlotte and Callum Graham, Dylan, Josh Kerr, Laura Wood, Matty Treagold, Lloyd, Michelle, Jamie, Natasha, Nanja and too anybody who I’m too tired to remember. Cheers you made it all worth while

The reasons for my recent absence (pathetic excuse for problems)

2010-01-25T18:39:00.000-08:00

Hi. May I apologies firstly for my slack attempt at updating my blog. The reasons behind my recent laziness will be explained in the following through paragraphs, and I must warn you this is probably going to be a depressing one.

Shockingly the last time I wrote here I was still living in Morden, living up the summer and probably being slightly nervous about the next few months of my life, probably because I was moving out and starting university. Well here I am around 5 months in and I have found myself to be suffering from total de-motivation. Now I know that some of you will think that its just a fancy word for being lazy, but I’m a grand master in being lazy and I can tell you this is a whole lot more soul destroying. I find it’s probably the same difference between having the blues and being completely depressed. The worse case of this de-motivation came at around Christmas time, when I had 6 weeks off uni and all my housemates went home for the holidays. I completely isolated myself in the house, had no money to do anything, and wouldn’t move from my chair for about 14 hours until I would go to sleep. Now even a lazy person would use this time constructively, they would listen to new music, sit there and watch a shit load of films they hadn’t seen before or watch the whole series of The Soprano’s or something. I however sat there in my arm chair, blocking out the whole concept of Christmas, played a few games of Football Manager every day and had a routine of day time television, I would also drink myself stupid every day without fail so I could kill the boredom. The most horrible part of all this was that I knew I was doing nothing and I was unbelievably unhappy about it. Being so lethargic as to not even be bothered to listen to music was probably the lowest point of it all, but I battled through and made it into the New Year alive and well although slightly apprehensive about how things were going. I learnt a valuable thing about myself last Christmas. I’m not designed to be alone because my mind and me really don’t get on when we’re together; this is where I think the copious amounts of booze were helping.

Another issues I’ve had to face with my recent identity crisis are my sudden dip in confidence and self esteem. A year ago I’d walk into social situations with the excitement of meeting new people and making new friends, however a few weeks ago I couldn’t even ask a station supervisor when the next train to Victoria was, which unfortunately is just a small fact in a long list of recent quivering messes I’ve found myself in just lately, and what bothers me even more is that even though I’m aware all of this is going on I just lie in bed thinking about it and getting myself angry, which has also lead to another problem your faithful narrator has been having, which is confrontation. The past few months I have screamed at traffic wardens, spat in the direction of doormen, wrote unnecessarily aggressive letters to councils and nightclubs and just generally been a right arse to anyone who hasn’t shared my opinion on something. This entirely new concept of being angry hasn’t faired to well to my current situation because I’m not really used to making a fuss about anything, I’m also worried it could get me into a bit of trouble if I cant vent it better then I’m already trying to do.

This leads me on to another problem I’ve been having, which is my loss of passion for things I once loved loads. Music, like I mentioned before now has very little impact on me. Tracks I usually love now have no effect and whole idea of listening to anything new just seems like a choir. Film. Although until as recent as last (although with the help of my old friend Mary Jane) I had no interest in watching any films, I couldn’t bring myself to have the attention span to concentrate on anything at all, although this is facing a kind of revival recently and I’m seeing it as a silver lining to a massive black cloud. Then there’s my most favorite hobby… Getting wasted. Now the main answer I give when asked why I like to inebriate myself is simply that I feel that I’m quite good at it. I stay out of trouble, I can control myself quite well, I can handle a lot, rarely noticeable freak out, and can take care of myself pretty well, as well as enjoy myself immensely and be really social at the same time. But like everything else that I’m moaning about, this has become somewhat of a choir recently. Most noticeably for me was a recent adventure to Brighton. I was of course going for The Regime like I always do but had told my old friends B & G that I would meet them at the club. When I met them I was struggling to string a sentence together let alone make good conversation with my old mates, I stood almost lost in the corner of the club not talking to anyone and generally losing control of myself, this was when I realized that there had been previous stupid moments like this one. The squat party when I lost my wallet and keys, getting on wrong busses and trains home, getting myself lost in Enfield, and the bizarre anxiety attack I also had after one night. I’m hoping this passes as I miss the pleasures of letting off steam through the method of poisoning myself.

Now I’ve tried to think of a way of how to resolve this predicament I’ve found myself in. What can I put it down to? I blame the following…

The horrible weather – I’ve always hated winter ever since I was young. Short sunlight hours, grotty wet London settings, dead tree’s and plants, no wildlife, and freezing my bollocks off is a form of torture really.

The decline of Bangface – I loved Bangface because it meant that every second Friday of the month without fail I could go to a place were my favorite artists would be playing and the best people I know from all over the country would all gather to get messy and have an absolute right laugh in a grotty club called the Electrowerkz. Now I have to wait almost 2 and half months for one in a venue I’m not keen on, and an atmosphere that deters me a bit.

The realization that change is shit and more things are changing and getting shitter – I cant get a job because there isn’t any, everything is ridiculously expensive, popular music shows absolutely no sign of improving, Football is continuing its horrible downfall as a middle class and businessman’s sport, even my favorite band has split up. I can not note one single piece of change in my life that has effected me for the better in anyway what so ever… O and the fact that for the rest of my life; me, my friends and my family will all be addicted to money.

Now if your still reading your probably wondering what my solution is going to be or this? I haven’t quite decided yet to be honest with you. I’m actually waiting for the weather to get better so that I think straight again. I’m also trying to stay positive in a way and trying to imagine myself with real problems. I have probably angered some of you reading this with my petty excuse for problems. There has just been a major natural disaster in an undeveloped country and I’m moaning about how I’m too lazy to get off my arse and actually do something with myself.

Thanks for reading, and I hope that next time you come to read my ramblings it will be on a more positive note, but for those of you who actually enjoy reading this thing (And there must be a few because I don’t think I can get over 300 profile views for 6 posts accidently.) These are the reasons why I haven’t posted lately.

Nice one, take it easy

Football

2009-08-12T04:41:00.000-07:00

Now I know I’ve been a bit absent with my blog posting recently. To be honest the only reason I haven’t written one over the past few months is because I’ve been busy pretending I have better things to do. However its been an eventful summer so far, I’m moving out on the 12th of September, I attended my personal best Glastonbury yet, successfully broke into the Glade festival, paid off a huge fine that has been haunting me for almost a year, as well as general dicking about. But I’d thought I’d get back to writing today to touch on some issues that I feel I have to touch on, after being inspired to do so throughout the summer by certain events that I attended. So as another typical English summer ticks away we draw closer to one of mine, and probably over half the population of the country’s favourite time of year… The start of the new football league.
Now those of you who know me won’t be surprised to know that I love football. It is joint top of my passion’s list along with music and film. Like my other passions I love everything about it, I love playing it, watching it, talking deeply about it, studying it, using up general memory space remembering facts about it, but most of all just like my latter passions I love attending it. But unfortunately also like my other passions, there are elements I hate about it and that is the fact just like all other things pure, great and innocent that I love it has been destroyed by big corporations, advertising, investors and an influx of yuppie scumbags.
The first football match I went to was a Chelsea V Wimbledon match at Selhurst Park, a few years before Wimbledon became the victims of franchising in football and probably because of their careless owners, started a trend where the passion that owner once had for their club, could be bought off them with a series of figures with a pound sign in front of them…Anyway the score of the game finished 2-0 to Chelsea thanks to a stunning 25 yard free kick by Gianfranco Zola, and an early second half strike by Mark Hughes I think it was. But one thing that stands out for me was the atmosphere. The true working class of Britain coming together in their thousands to watch their football team, friends, families, people who had travelled for hours to get to the ground. The songs, the taunting of the opposing fans, the general protocol of different chants and when to stand up and sit down, and the delight of seeing tens of thousands of people burst into a supernova of joy when Chelsea scored twice, nothing to this day has matched it.
Although I missed the Chelsea of the 80’s when opposing fans would literally be scared the opposing Chelsea fans, and violence marred it a little bit (until ecstasy whipped it out in the late 80’s, another part of football history I regret missing) I’ve been told that going to football was made less enjoyable after the Hillsborough disaster, when terraces were banned and all league clubs had to have seating areas, I can imagine this is true, but nothing could beat them matches I went to in the 90’s. More recently though however after even Chelsea were eventually bought out by a big money investor, which in hindsight was the most amazing thing ever. 5 days from administration and a Russian billionaire saves us and ploughs money into the club until we win trophies. But with selling your soul in exchange for glory comes an even bigger fate. That thing that I loved, the pure element of football being the ultimate working class game, being able to go every other week to support my team was stopped, when football became a trend for the rich and yuppie. Because of Chelsea’s success and having the misfortune of being in the Kings road area of west London, yuppies come in their droves to watch football, because of this the price became unaffordable and I haven’t been to a game at the Bridge for over a year. The noise from stands has faded, standing throughout games is near enough banned, and swearing and chanting could face you with evection from the ground. These days having to pay over 3 times the original price for a seat, to sit next to a bunch of yuppie families talking amongst themselves, complaining when someone stands up and occasionally getting a tap on the shoulder saying “excuse me, could you mind the language…I have kids with me”. In ways I think it started with the original “Kick racism out of football” campaign, which don’t get me wrong was a good campaign but it did inflict the first rules for the terrace protocol and then acted as a catalyst for other rules. I think that football itself is the main reason for racial harmony in the working classes. It didn’t matter what colour you were, you supported the same team, the fact that your clubs top goal scorer was a black bloke, he was scoring for your team. Although racism was heavily featured in chants on the terraces, I’ve been told that this just simply faded out after societies views changed.
I appear to be digressing a bit…Anyway back in June I worked at Royal Ascot, which I soon found out was a big week long piss up for posh people and yuppies. Possibly their biggest in their calendar. They all dress up, blow loads of money on horses, frolic around and at the end of the day have a sing song of traditional English pop music and songs by the bandstand. Its quite possibly the greatest display of Englishness that I’ve seen, and in a way I really enjoyed it. But one thing I did notice was the amount of “lamb dressed as mutton”. Parties of Tarts and Geezers from Essex, Slags and Blokes from London and Whores and Bastards from up north also coming down to enjoy the party, luckily I was one of the very few people attending that was sober, but this helped me see that we the working class scum were doing to the rich what they had been doing to us, crashing their favriote sporting event. Although seeing people who are all peoples parents frolicking about pissed, committing acts of debauchery and acting like the kids they read about in the Daily Mail a little piece of me leapt for joy as I knew some of these upper people who invaded our terraces and implied new rules to our game, were now having their party crashed by a bunch of louts dressed up.

So as another Premiership season starts after a break of record breaking signings for amounts of money we can only dream of seeing, for players getting a wage that we will never make, playing a standard of football which seems to be losing its manly image, for a club whose owners probably can’t even speak English, I thank Sky Sports for giving me Jeff Stelling and Chris Kamara on a Saturday afternoon, John Motson in the evening and Andy Graye on a Sunday, so I can watch my football from the best seat in the house. I can swear, smoke, drink, stand up when I want, cheer as loud as I want, even scream brutal racial based obscenities to Didier Drogba when he wont get off the floor if I want, because I have admitted defeat to the other lot. Back in the 80’s Ken Bates the Chelsea chairman considered putting in a 12 foot high electric fence to separate away supporters from the Chelsea supporters, and to stop fans getting on the pitch. 20 odd years later Bruce Buck the Chelsea Chairman has introduced “family stands” and suggested that “those fans who wish to make noise please sit….” Although fans of smaller clubs will probably read this and wonder how it must be so shit to be a Chelsea fan when we break records and win trophies every year now, but to me the Club is buying these trophies for their clientele. It’s strange that about 14 years ago I was watching the now defunct Wimbledon play and now I’m thinking of abandoning my team (a sin which is absolutely unforgivable in every way) to support the new AFC Wimbledon of the Conference. Until then I’ll shut up and enjoy my teams’ success.

Venturing into the far right

2009-05-04T08:52:00.000-07:00

It’s a wet bank holiday in May so I can think of nothing better to do then to update my blog, surprisingly my last bit of doodling created a bit of success and everyone who I would chat too would usually start the conversation with “I read your blog by the way”. So it’s good to see that some people actually like to have a read of this thing.
I thought today I would talk about the time when I had a look to see what right wing politics was like. It was around about this time last year and I was now legally registered to vote, but of course who would I vote for? I weren’t going to vote for the Labour party, they banned smoking, went to war and bunged on loads taxes on the things I love the most. Didn’t quite fancy Conservative because I hate yuppies and bankers and the Liberal Democrats just seemed like a bit of a protest vote. But if I wanted to make a protest vote why not make a proper one, so at around April of last year I went to a BNP meeting at the local Chelsea supporters bar.
Now before I go on I will tell you about the story behind my interest into getting involved with the most evil people in the world ever. I live in Morden; the last town of south London, if you haven’t been there you’re not missing much. But about 4 or 5 years ago there was a bit of debate over what the local bottle factory should be turned into. It was agreed by the council at that time it was going to be turned into a multiplex cinema, filled with restraints, shops, a bowling alley, arcade and all that jazz. Wicked! Finally something to do around town and something to put Morden on the map, more jobs, more money being pumped in. But at the last minute someone changed their mind and it was then turned into the largest Mosque in all of London at the time, people were obviously quite concerned… Then the flyers started coming through the door. Being quite young at the time I didn’t really care for politics so I never really had much interest in what the BNP did or were I was however pummelled with information on how they was evil and had no right to be a political party, along with a few policies in the manifesto as to why this was. But like I said I didn’t care for politics at the time but I was starting to notice a lot about social identity, especially race. This was probably to do with going to a massive multi-cultured school. A 1200 pupil high school which was split to about 60% black, 30% white and the rest Asian, now I’m not one to care about the colour of someone’s skin as an important factor of their personality, but at school I didn’t have any black or Asian friends, neither did any of my friends, or anyone else I knew at that school, same with the Asian kids also. The playground would pretty much be segregated, us white kids would play football, why the others would play basketball. We would however have the odd black’s v white’s football match which would usually end in violence. This was my first experience with racial tension and I can’t say I really learnt much from it, but it did sort of give me an idea of what the BNP were trying to get at, although I didn’t know exactly what their goals were.
A few years passed, then there was a terrorist attack and more flyers came through the door, then my neighbour (an open member of the BNP) lent me a book by controversial American politician and “racial realist” David Duke called “My Awakening”. He told me that you couldn’t buy the book in England due to its content and that no matter how hard some parts may be to read, I must read it all. The fact that it was banned in the UK had already sold me, even though it was nearly a thousand pages long. I didn’t know who David Duke was nor had I even heard of what he done or what he represented, but despite what your view may be he wrote a damn good book. He explains in great detail about the differences in race, referencing over 200 different scientific experiments and studies, with an index of forward reading, he then explained all his political views of which some I quite agreed with, the main one being full racial equality which was basically no more forced integration, no more race laws, no more forced employments for minorities. This always seemed to make sense to me, surely people shouldn’t be forced to integrate and be told to get along they should just do it. Surely the only way to stop actual racism is to ignore the fact that we are different by the colour of our skins and accept that we are human beings, and surley its stupid that someone should be forced to employ someone from a minority just because the law states they should, people should be employed by their skill and not by their race.
Needless to say the first 250 pages of the book were incredibly interesting; the second part however was a bit long winded and hard. It was all basically anti Semitic studies about the holocaust and the Jewish influence on the western world, which has never really interested me anyway as its too much of an American subject, and as for the holocaust even if it is exaggerated, people still died and that’s all that matters really. The 3rd part of the book was a bit of a biography on how he rose to be a senator and all that American political Jazz, and how at one point he was the Grand Wizard of the Knights of the KKK, which was a bit of a modernisation of the old Klan. Still basically just as racist, but with less lynching’s, and he did eventually change the white robes to suits, but I digress.
I can’t explain every aspect of the book because it is bloody long and there is a lot in there, some of which I can’t really remember. But reading that book did open me up to another view, some of which made a lot of sense, some I didn’t agree with. But from then on I started to give the right a bit of a chance. The BNP however was a peaceful party, and I’ve always said whether you’re an Islamic extremist or a right wing politician you have the right to say whatever you like, which is why I couldn’t understand that when Abu Hamser was at large he was getting away with inciting actual killings on the streets of London and Nick Griffin was being arrest for a bit of a rant in a pub.
Over the months after reading the book, I was given more information on what the BNP did and some of their policies, which did again open me up to how the media perceive them. Many of their policies would be blown out of proportion, I remember the Sun reporting that the BNP believed that EVERYONE in Britain should have the right to own a gun, when really the actual policy was for people who had served in the army for over 25 years could have the right to own a gun. The main one is that the BNP would deport everyone who wasn’t white and British from the country. There isn’t actually anything like that written in the manifesto last time I checked, but even if it was surely that would expensive and impossible and of no benefit to anyone. There is however a policy that states only residents of the common wealth could immigrate to Britain and that the immigration gates should be closed.
Then one week last April I was invited to go to a meeting, so I went. The meeting as you can imagine was filled with predominately white, working class males, very similar clientele to what would usually occupy the pub on a match day. I don’t remember much of what was said in the meeting, but I must confess I did get a sense of racism in the crowd, but only from a minority of people, the rest of the people I spoke to were normal blokes that I probably usually talk to when the football was on, this media perception of the BNP being filled with skin head yobs looking to go on a bit of a paki bash was mostly bollocks. But I secretly already knew that. But it is the minority that did let it down for the majority and I left not being converted as a BNP member. I was still undecided on my political views, mainly due to one of their policies being that if you are not white you can not become a member of the party because you are not “indigenous” which is bollocks because I have black mates who are more British then myself. I also didn’t really like Nick Griffin; he’s not a great speaker and has a smug sense of greatness over everyone else that seemed to be there, and I got the impression that he seemed to be holding the party back from being an ideal nationalist socialist party, and his second in command Mark Collet has been proved a prick by both a junkie Russell Brand and a shit Channel 4 documentary which just made him look like a lost, gay, Nazi looking for someone to accept him in life. I am however very fond of British tradition and have no problem at all admitting to being a nationalist, and I think that even though at the moment the BNP is failing horribly at being a believable political party I do see this potential of it restoring those little things I love about Britain. Working classes taking refuge in pubs and free houses, old people smoking roll ups, the language of the market stool trader, football on a Saturday afternoon, greasy spoon café’s, binge drinking, secret love of art and culture, sex, drugs and on the dull lifestyle and all those other little pleasantries that I love about this country.
I have also had a few run ins with people from militant left wing organisations such as “searchlight” an organisation that attacks BNP meetings and in some cases their members as well. I have met some people from the organisation that actually take pride in the fact that they went to prison for attacking what could of well been a peaceful family man who just happened to be a member.
I can understand why people are so strongly against the party and I can understand why people would think it was racist and fascist and all that palaver but some of these people haven’t properly had a look in and met the people that follow it. There’s always going to be a minority that ruin it for everyone else but I think there is a racist shadow that follows the party and at the moment I wouldn’t vote for them, but with a bit of a makeover and a few policy changes I cant see any reason why they wouldn’t be seen as a proper working class party, but I think for now I’ll just stick to my guns and wait for a new party that hasn’t been invented yet that will tend to my needs without the risk of being battered by a bunch lefty fanatics.

Atheist's

2009-04-07T08:06:00.000-07:00

Recently I have noticed an incredible new support for a religion that I never really noticed had such fanatic supporters in the past, the irony of this new faith is that it isn’t a religion at all it’s atheism, or as I like to call it the belief in total coincidence.
Now I myself was born and raised a Catholic, and to this day I still openly admit a belief in a higher power. Recently when I have told people this I get what I like the call “the Atheist interrogation” which usually consists of the following “WHAT!” “WHY!” “HOW CAN YOU BE SO STUPID!” and “YOU DO REALISE HOW RIDICULOUSE THAT IS!?” This vicious, verbal assault of questions and insults is usually continued by a series of difficult questions on my faith, why I need it, what good it does and if it does any good why I need a religion to use that good. Now I may be a Catholic and a believer in God and yes I do know a little bit about the history of the religion and could probably do good on the trivial side of it, but I’m not cut out to answer complex questions on a subject that I have more important things to worry about then study deep into, It’s almost like approaching every black person you meet and expecting them to give reasons to why crime and poverty is so big in the black community. I don’t have typical Catholic views on homosexuality, but then again can you honestly tell me that there are no homophobic atheists, and I do believe in Evolution, however I see it as a miracle and not a genius theory, I do however think abortion is just code for murder and there was a bloke called Jesus and what he did actually happened.
Another thing I have started to notice is the amount of people I have noticed starting to read the Atheist Bible or “The God Delusion” which is written by the Atheist version of Jesus, Richard Dawkins. I haven’t read the book, I don’t know anything about Richard Dawkins, I have been peer pressured into reading the book by my militant friends but I never will, mainly because I have no interest in what he has to say, even if he did raise some full proof points as to why I should abandon my own, and my families beliefs and joins his own religion of the belief of no belief. It’s almost like an Arsenal fan taking me to one side and trying to deprogram me from becoming a Chelsea fan by forcing me to read a book on their history and points as to why there better then Chelsea. The fact that they have more silverware, a bigger support, better quality of youth players and long history of legendary strikers and victories doesn’t interest me in the slightest, I was born and raised a Chelsea fan and I will die with them too, just like I will with Catholicism.
What does annoy me about these militants is the irony behind some of their reasons to not believe. Some say its because of the way other religious people have shoved their beliefs down their throat, they tend to say this to me whilst giving me the interrogation and quoting their favourite Einstein passage. Other common arguments include the fact that without religion there would be no war… Now I don’t know if its just me but I cant think of a war with British involvement from the past 100 years that had anything to do with religion, from what I can gather both trips to Iraq have been about restoring Democracy and stealing Oil (Greed and Pride, one thing religion speaks out against) the Falkland conflict again was about taking back land and of course both World War’s which I think had very little to do with religion at all. Now there may be some religious connotations I haven’t quite caught on to but that’s what I can gather from where I’m standing.
Now as much as I respect peoples rights to believe whatever they like and I can understand why some people would choose not to believe for some good reasons, it’s the fact that Atheism itself has become a religion in the sense that these people actually take it upon themselves to go to any lengths to convince themselves there is no God. Surely not believing should be as easy as admitting it and not having to read a book about it or shouting at everyone who did believe in a higher power. I know there are people out there who just don’t believe, I know because some of my dearest friends are like that. They don’t necessarily believe in God and they don’t want to label themselves an Atheist, they just are indifferent to both causes, which is how I feel Atheism should be, a more carefree attitude towards life, knowing that no matter what you do you won’t be judged for it when you die and taking comfort in the new discoveries of science, not creating a new faith of non belief to try and convert everyone who doesn’t share what you think. The reason I don’t follow it is because I take comfort in thinking that all the beauty, and complex nature of the earth and the universe is so perfect that not one person could possible understand every element of it. The very fact that this is a reality is my very own reason for a belief in God. Not that everything we see and everything we do and everything that has happened is all because of a massive coincidence and that we are all living a massive lie. Fair do’s you may not feel the same way but don’t be such a dick about it.

Rugby hating

2009-03-05T17:31:00.001-08:00

Throughout my living memory I have always put people that I meet into categories of trust and personality. A bit like giving a certain type of people a mental Nazi style badge, but not as… horrible. My own personal worst enemies are what I like to call “Rugby types”. Now those of you know me will know that of all the sports I detest the most is rugby, not just because of the homoerotic “masculinity” that’s involved when playing it, nor the fact players have to stop every 30 seconds so they can stick their heads in-between each others arses and try and get the egg shaped ball. But the real reason behind my hatred of rugby is not just the fact that any sport the Welsh and Scottish can be good at isn’t a real sport, but it’s the type of people that follow it. Now I think you’re all aware of the types, mainly upper working to middle class white men, who scoff at football because of its “thuggish” and “cowardly” style of play, but when attending a game, will tell you to either sit down or stop swearing. The type of people who’ll quite happily call a member of the BNP a racist, but will cross the road when ever a group of black youths are walking towards them. The type of people who judge people on whether they’ve been to university or not, and who go travelling during their gap year without worrying about expense. The type of people who drink ale, and the type of people who think that a smoking ban is a good idea. They are the type of people that grass you up for drugs in a club, The type of people who don’t bother moving away from home because “mummy and daddy” pay for everything they want, and the type of people that will call you out for a fight then call the police once you’ve kicked their head in. Basically they are the real scum bags, the real downfall of Britain and the real people with noncey skeletons in their cupboards. I’ve narrowed down the start of this hatred to when I was at school. It was a Jesuit ran Catholic, all blokes’ school and its main sport was of course rugby. Now at this particular school if you weren’t particularly academic or didn’t care for school at all (me) you was fucked, and thrown into the classes with the rest of the scum of south London who didn’t care to learn. But if you was in the rugby team, that was your get out of jail free card and your ticket to success at life. This was also not helped by my incredible laziness towards playing sport and having a bunch of Welsh teacher’s as well. I also noticed that every lad in the rugby team was everyone that I hated the most, even though at school I hated pretty much everyone and it is the reason behind my racism and hatred in main stream humanity. I also hate the ship jumpers that all of a sudden became rugby fans when England won the rugby world cup. I remember where I was when that happened. I was on my couch watching Soccer AM which at the time was at its absolute prime. I was turning over during add breaks to see how England was getting on, obviously no matter what sport it is, as long as the Aussie’s lose it’s a good result. I remember I turned over during one break and Johnny Wilkinson kicked the “ball” through the 2 sticks and got the 2 or 3 points or whatever it is you get for kicking it over the H. I simply turned to my dad and said “England have won the world cup” he replied with “o really” then I turned it straight back again. The next day to my surprise it was on the front page of every newspaper and all my mates were talking about it. Now I’m not asking for the sport of rugby to be banished and for all it followers to be sent to camps and experimented on and gassed…although I would have no objection to it. Just for these people to be singled out for the imbeciles that they are, and for their stupid sport. Through my short journey through life I have learnt to avoid these people but also not tar everyone with the same brush, I have met some quality yuppies and posh people. Mainly at Glastonbury and through places where I’ve worked, but I’ve found recently that when faced with either a life of an upper class lifestyle of having everything I could possible want and be accepted by society…. or a lifestyle of scraping pennies together to go out, achieving great sense of achievements of getting extremely wasted, annoying suited people and causing general havoc then I’d rather the latter really.

2 good weekends and a horrible relapse.

2009-02-26T19:22:00.000-08:00

Hello again sorry for my absence and neglect but I’ve been busy doing nothing. Well that isn’t entirely true I’ve had a few adventures and attended one or two very cool parties, I also admit to a bit of relapse of my marathon vow but for good reason…or at least I like to keep telling myself that.
Anyways since I last spoke to you I’ve been up to quite a bit. I made a return to Bangface which was pretty cool. It was one of the first nights there in a while where I hadn’t seen most of the line up: Drumcorps, Hecate, Krome & Thyme, and my absolute favourite Bong-Ra, and may I just say what a lovely amount of sheer violence and madness there was. Mosh pits all night, careless people leaving there beers for me to finish off, I was even at one point on the stage having a dance, kissing Bong-Ra and doing a bit of crowd surfing. There was even a ketted out bird who I managed to pull. It was a Bangface to remember and since it was also Sarah’s birthday we was guaranteed an after party also. Which itself was not to disappoint. It was a bit like a handful of Bangface’s finest people having a bit of a party, and since Bangface is the place where super friendly people, who know how to party, go to have fun, it was guaranteed to be an absolute winner. I don’t think I stopped laughing the whole time I was there. I did however have a bit of a pro-plus binge and start to be a bit moody and restless but I did manage to get a couple of hours of shut eye. I did however have a bit of a relapse as there was liquid going around and it was free. At first I wasn’t having the best of times. I hadn’t slept properly and was being really anti-social, I attempted at some kip with Lauren but just ended up being entertained by Sarah’s fantastically, trippy bedroom. I then had the greatest visual of my life, the kind where I’d love to have some artistic talent so I could draw it later. Although describing it won’t give it any justice just try and imagine an old school style, bald clown, doing a handstand on a skull, resting apples on his feet and spitting fire into my face with a torch. I pissed myself laughing for a few minutes, then decided to go downstairs and have a bit of a chat with everyone there. Looking back on it I’m really glad I did, as I had a right ol’ laugh with everyone there. By Sunday morning I concluded that was probably one of my best weekends in a long while.
After that fantastic debauched weekend it was half term, and just like every single half term before that where I haven’t had a job, it was a complete waster of time and I got nothing done, except get stoned, play football manager, argue with a bank and watch porn. However it was the weekend again that was to prevail overall. I went to Hidden for Terradisco. A night where several squat party sound systems got together to play a lovely bit of jungle, techno, breakcore and drum and bass, there was also some pretentious “industrial noise” as well but I kept well clear of that. It was pretty good, the highlight of the night was basically Remarc who played a cracking jungle set filled with classics, the fact it was pumping out of the mighty Disjunkt soundsytem was an added bonus. I did the entire night completely sober for once, until that was Pete invited me back to his flat for a bit of an after party, included in the party was Rich and Lee. I think now is a good time to point out that of all the wreckhead’s I have met, Lee, Rich and Pete are probably all in the top five, if not the top 3. So as you can imagine this was going to be my ultimate test. I passed out briefly but I awoke to find that their dealer had turned up and they had just shoved some DXM (Cracker Jack) under my nose. I didn’t see the point of turning back after that so I continued to take whatever they gave me, except however for the Mandy they had going around. I did however get to a chance to smoke DMT. Which to those of you who don’t know, is an incredibly strong hallucinogenic. Imagine all the intensity of a 12 hour acid trip condensed into about 10-15 minutes of wacky, realistic visuals and intensely bright colours. I didn’t get much of a hit out of what was left from the pipe but it did make the picture of the LEGO man on Pete’s wall walk out of the canvas and have a stroll about the room, another notable feature was his bathroom, which was completely white except for what seemed to be an extremely red shower curtain, similar to that of the little girls coat in Schindler’s list.
Despite the 2 horrible relapses over that week, I feel that my marathon training seems to be going pretty well. It is however just over 2 weeks away now, but I do have one slight problem with my knee, over the past few weeks it has been giving me a bit of jip and has only got worse, I should really take it easy a bit but I don’t want to lose my fitness levels, hopefully ill run it out and ill be fine. I will be absolutely devastated if I was to get injured this far into the game.
This weekend has all the making to be a classic, Braindrop on Friday and a possible trip to Bristol on the Saturday for a Wrong Music event; however it could all fall through due the money which I’ve been waiting for a while now probably wont clear and I may have a bit of work at the Carling Cup final on the Sunday but with all my dallying could of lost that as well. Will I make it? Tune in next week to find out.
Whilst on the subject of the birthplace of Skins, most of my readers will know that I think the programme is shit and I haven’t watched the last few series, although just before I thought I should update this blog I watched the most recent episode and I have to say I’m a bit angry that no one informed me that there is a lesbian storyline involving 2 fit jailbait tarts, one is half of two jailbait twins. Even if it is just for the eye candy and possible a few lesbian sex scenes, that could be tossing material and not for the poor story lines, acting, characters and unrealistic situations I may very well be watching a few more from this series. Even Doogle from Father Ted is in it so it can’t be all bad.
Well I think that’s about it really. Like I said before have a read next week to see how my weekend goes, could be a classic, could be an absolute disaster.
Anyway goodbye, god bless and thanks for having a glance.

Day raving and the BAFTA's

2009-02-09T16:59:00.000-08:00

Hello again, thanks for those who may have read my last entry. I can understand that many of you may have found it to be tedious, drivel which it probably was, but then again I never said these were going to be exciting, although I hope in my next piece of thought on paper you get something out of it.
Last week was a mix of bollocks and good shit. The bollocks being snowed in for too long and just sitting down not doing anything, although I did read A Clockwork Orange (which by the way is bloody brilliant). I am now also temping as a nanny for a family in Kensington. I got the job by applying online, got an interview and now looking back on it must have been the only applicant they bothered to interview, because not only do I lack anything more then 3 months of experience in childcare, I also have a previous record for being a rascal. But the family are pretty safe and the kids aren’t little terrors, and I pretty much get to do what I do at home but get paid 8 pound an hour to do it, and there’s kids there to keep me entertained as well so it’s all good.
This weekend was pretty safe…On Friday me and Rosa attempted to go to the Rhythm Factory but we indulged in too much smoke and drink before hand and never got through the front door of the club, and in the end I ended up in their living room, making some lovely drunken conversation with Ian. The next day however we went to the Every1Sounds after party/day rave, which I have to say, was a cracking experience. Not only was it weird being all refreshed and sober for an every1sounds do, but also weird seeing all the familiar faces of parties in a club environment. The techno was thumping as usual, and although there was a bit of psy-trance going on, the tunes in general were all on top form. After finishing off a cracking Chris Liberator set, me and Rosa set off to pick up some more ammunition in the form of puff. The rest of my weekend was sat in their flat smoking spiffs and watching some shit TV with the odd little rant by either of us every now and then. It was all proper safe as usual and it was good to hang out with them lot again.
Now its time for a little boring rant of the week, on Sunday I watched the BAFTA awards, where as I expected Slumdog Millionaire took nearly everything, which is cool because it’s one of the best films I’ve seen in a while, and is directed by one of Britain’s most awesome directors, who I wish the very best of success at the up and coming Oscars. However the only shock of the night had to be Noel Clarke winning the rising star award, also in the running was Toby Kebbell (who both my vote and money was on).
Now those of you who know Noel Clarke will know that he wrote and starred in Kidulthood and directed, starred and wrote Adulthood. Both films are bloody awful depictions of youth life in London. Someone gets mugged every 5 minutes, the acting is as poor as a primary school nativity play, there is constant continuity and the film is filled with stereotyped characters, that you would move country to avoid if they were to actually exist. Toby Kebbell on the other hand started his career with a moving and very convincing role in one of the best British thrillers of our generation: Dead Man’s Shoes. He then went on to play Joy Divisions manager in Control and was the Rockstar in the latest Guy Ritchie film, Rock N’ Rolla. Which I haven’t seen yet. It was explained to me that no one would of heard for Kebbell and that’s why no one would vote for him, which is what made me feel the award which has made James Mcavoy a bit of a soon to be acting great, just a bit of a farse. Where as there was very little to gain from the Kidult and Adulthood films, all Noel Clarke can account for is a few appearances in Doctor Who and a full series of Auf Wiedersain Pet. Which I think you’d agree is a fairly average CV for any Actor/filmmaker. I do feel for Toby Kebbell because that award would of made people finally take notice of such a young and talented actor who has all the promise Euwan Mcregor had when he first went running down that street in Trainspotting. It feels like a great injustice for British cinema. However I did have to vote for Noel, because he came into our college once to give a talk and he said that if we voted for him he would come in again and let us hold his award, so I suppose every cloud does have a silver lining.

Not too much else I can think of at the moment that is bothering me, although next weekend looks to be a pretty one, so I will write down all gory details in this here blog. Be good to each other and God bless.

Writing Blog's, Snow and the Super Bowl

2009-02-03T16:31:00.000-08:00

I thought it was finally time to clog up web space with my terrible spelling and shocking grammar. Why? Probably because recently in my boredom I’ve wanted somewhere to jot down my ramblings, and thought in the hope that someone will take the time out to read them, and maybe get something out of them, then again maybe not, but it’s always good to write down your thoughts. Jimmi Hendrix had a similar problem. He used to write down tunes on pieces of paper, cig packets, napkins etc, and just collect them up. He just collected loads of unreleased lyrics and music around his house for many years…Then he died and his missus threw them all in the bin. I like to think that one day when I eventually die someone will read this blog just to get my thoughts, and then delete it so my mum won’t read it.

The other night whilst trying to deal with the excitement of the impending snow storm, I had a bit of trouble sleeping, so I thought I would have a gander at the Super Bowl, which was on BBC One. Now those of you who know me will know that I hate pretty much everything American, to point where it would probably be considered racism, but luckily Americans aren’t protected by the unwritten, social racism laws. So watching the Super Bowl was always bound to be an uncomfortable experience for me. I missed the opening ceremony but I was told by a friend it consisted of: jet’s flying over the stadium, a pop star singing the national anthem, fireworks going off like Chinese New Year, and 100,000 grown men and women crying. When I tuned in the “second quarter” had just started and I watched on with an open mind as I tried to understand the rules, but it was impossible as the game kept stopping every 2 minutes… I never worked out why, but I can imagine it was something to do with the ridiculous television advertising rights they have over there. By half time or “the end of the second quarter” as they called it things only got worse, Bruce Springsteen and The E Street band came out to sing a few tunes and more fireworks and over the top performers appeared. It was all too much by this point and I turned off and continued reading my book. But I couldn’t help thinking the difference between the two national sports of America and Great Britain, and how again we have succeeded in being better then that horrible place to the far left of us. Our national sport also called football is the most popular and well known, and supported sports in the entire world, where as America’s “football” is only played in their country alone, so why the world coverage, and over the top ceremony? Our equivalent of the Super Bowl would probably be the FA Cup. The oldest and most famous domestic knock out competition in the entire world, yet our ceremony consists of the players coming out at around 2:50 on a Saturday afternoon in May, being greeted by a member of the royal family, singing the national anthem, and then playing 90 minutes of the best sport in the world. When the match is finished the players walk up the steps where they are presented medals and the trophy, they then celebrate, sip champagne and all get pissed. No Bruce Springsteen, no Jet fighter planes flying over head, no constant delays to have a “message from our sponsor”. Its times when I have thought’s like that when I’m proud to be apart of quaint British culture, and it made me thankful once again that I had won the lottery of life and was born an Englishman.

In other news, this week we had the most snow I had ever seen in my life, so me and Chapman used it as the best opportunity to build a huge penis in the park. I always love how everyone shits themselves with excitement the moment the weather changes from the usual grey and dull to any other extreme. Whether it be 25 degree heat of an inch of snow, people go fucking mental, take days off work, rush over to the local park and their actions get national news coverage. What I did enjoy however was how it was like having a little holiday, I didn’t even bother contemplating going into college and just spent the past few days lounging around playing football manager and ploughing through a few more chapters of A Clockwork Orange.

Well that’s been my thoughts. Watch this space for more pointless rants and crazy adventures.

God Bless