Mozzy Pop

Ignorance

‘ As early as 1930 Schoenberg wrote “Radio is an enemy, a ruthless enemy marching irresistibly forward, and any resistance is hopeless”; it “force-feeds us music . . . regardless of whether we want to hear it, or whether we can grasp it,” with the result that music becomes just noise, a noise amongst other noises.
Radio was the tiny stream it all began with. Then came other technical means for reproducing, proliferating, amplifying sound, and the stream became an enormous river. If in the past people would listen to music out of love for music, nowadays it roars everywhere and all the time, “regardless whether we want to hear it,” it roars from loudspeakers, in cars, in restaurants, in elevators, in the streets, in waiting rooms, in gyms, in the earpieces of Walkmans, music rewritten, re-orchestrated, abridged, and stretched out, fragments of rock, of jazz, of opera, a flood of everything jumbled together so that we don’t know who composed it (music become noise is anonymous), so that we can’t tell beginning from end (music become noise has no form): sewage-water music in which music is dying.’

http://www.sendspace.com/file/brimid

It's amazing how tired Fish and Veg can make you!

Cards

Horse Cow

We went to Dunstall Park (Wolverhampton Racecoure) at the weekend. It was the grand opening of their new restaurant ‘Horizons’.

We arrived just in time for a free cocktail and a £10 free bet from Ladbrookes. Not being a betting man, and not ever having been to a horseracing event before, I wasn’t too bothered about placing a bet, as I’ll never win!

We got seated at our table, that’s Me, Lisa, Marie and Mark (Lisa’s sister and her fiancée), and my Mom with her fella Derek. We have a nice view of the track, and our first drink is free. We come to order. I have no starter, but Rib eye Steak in Ale on Rustic Potatoes for the main course, and Sticky Toffee Pudding with Hot Custard for desert, followed by Coffee. All Gratis. This should’ve cost £50!! I’d never pay more than £15 for a meal. I’m not a stinge, I’ve just got priorities.

And so Mom placed her bet, and alas, her horse came last. I complained that I’d rather have two five-pound bets, but I won’t win anyway so it doesn’t matter. I decide to bet on a horse named Succeed, as it’s the polar opposite to my expectations of the evening. After returning to the table, everyone is laughing at me. I’ve backed a non-runner. Off I trundle back to the betting table, and they give me £10 cash back!! Result, everyone has a voucher, I have hard cash!

I start to get into the spirit of things, and decided to place two £10 bets. One which inevitably loses, and another ‘Littledodayno’ that comes in first!! I win £27.50. Result.

So, to recap. Six people had a meal that was £50 a head, free entry which should’ve been £20 a head, six free drinks £18, £64 of free bets, and a £27.50 payout to me. Total £529.50. We paid £0, and I ended up nearly £30 up. Not bad for a Saturday out!

April 19th - Felt sorry for myself (contains 2 instances of the F word, one A word and a S! - read at caution!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Back in October 2006 we bought Kirsty tickets to see Scooby Doo live on stage at the Birmingham Hippodrome. The tickets we got meant that we had to do this on my birthday, which I didn’t mind.

Fast-forward to April 19th 2007, and we head off for Birmingham for a nice day out.
I decide en-route that we should do as our government often ask, and go by public transport, so we stop off at Blake Street Train Station. Not one single car park space. Off we drive again to Mere Green Train Station. Not one single car park space. Last attempt, Sutton Coldfield Train Station. One car park space. Hurrah!. The car park attendant watches as I reverse into the place, only to pull out to let Kirsty out of the car as there was a prickly bush obstructing her door. I pull back into the parking space, and car park attendant Dim McFuckwit (as I shall call him) decides at that moment to ask if I have a rail card. Nope, but I am going on the train to Birmingham, for which this is the car park for. “Then I’ll have to charge you”.
It seems you don’t have to pay at the other car parks, but at Sutton Coldfield you do. Unless you buy a season ticket. So they’re discriminating against rail users who don’t make more than one journey a week. I lost my temper, grumbled at him, and back in the car we went. Lisa tells me later that what I actually told him was “so much for helping the environment, you can stick you car park up your arse”. Not big or clever, but made me laugh later on when feeling slightly blue.

So, we had to drive into Birmingham. Once there could we park? Not initially. We found one car park that seemed to have spaces, but they were on floor 90980983, and getting out would’ve been a monstrous task at rush hour. Plus eight quid! We eventually found a niceish car park near Chinatown, with a very friendly attendant which went someway to restoring my faith in car-park attendants and helping to diminish the “Dim McFuckwit stick it up your arse” farrago.

We got into the City, and I wanted to buy a single “Under grey English skies” by The Social ‘exclusive to HMV and Fopp’ says the advert in HMV. What better place to look for this than in HMV, and Music Zone (now running as Fopp), in Birmingham. Britain’s Second City. Neither had it. HMV did have an album I want though, and as on their website it’s only £6, I thought I’ll pick it up as a Birthday treat. Badly Drawn Boy Passport Style ‘Born in the U.K.’. £22.

I’ll repeat that:£22. For a UK album. Scandalous. I love it when they moan that downloading is killing their stores. Good, I hope it’s a painful death, the kind that independent record stores died when HMV, Virgin et all killed them off. I applaud file-sharing sites for killing these daylight robbers dead. And when they lie on the floor gasping for their last breath, whimpering “buy the new Marilyn Manson album, it’s only a reasonable £18’, I shall laugh, and look for the logo below:

So, record shops (I use that term VERY lightly) out of the way, it was off to see Scooby Dooby Doo, which as you can guess was primarily for children. It was nice to see that the Birmingham Hippodrome noticed this, and put a barrier up at the front, so that the kids on the front row couldn’t see anything. But worry not, for they do booster seats. “We’ve got non I’m afraid”. Doh. They gave us two cushions instead, which were useless. Kirsty managed to find a comfy way of viewing the stage though, by basically standing on the chair. She didn’t have any problem with this and had a whale of a time. And Lisa and I enjoyed it too.


Then we had to drive home. Rush hour in Birmingham. Nightmare. Some idiot deciding to go right at a roundabout, from the left hand lane, nearly wiping our bonnet out. The usual retard idiots who cause accidents doing their usual thing. I moan a bit, but an hour later we get home. So, not a brilliant day, except for the bits with the family, and Scooby Doo.

Moral: Tony Blair, Gordon Brown, The Department for Transport, Sutton Train Station, HMV, Fopp = Rip Off Merchants.
But you knew that already, didn’t you?

C/x

For the love of God, no!, don't do it!!!

The Smiths may reunite for induction to the rock and roll hall of fame:

http://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/entertainment/music/rock_and_pop/s/1004/1004800_smiths_set_for_reunion.html

The Imminent return of the mighty 'Ned's Atomic Dustbin' - Stourbridge!

http://www.nedsatomicdustbin.com

Ned's Atomic Dustbin have been confirmed to play The Leftfield Stage atGlastonbury on Friday 22nd June this year!

In preparation for the bands return to the festival, 15 years after their first performance headlining the NME stage in 1992, we will be playing an intimate hometown Warm-Up show on Saturday 16th June at Stourbridge Rock Cafe.

Tickets priced £16.00 go on sale today (18th April) at Midland Box Office:0870 320 7000

Modest Mouse playing WOLVERHAMPTON as part of UK tour.

Modest Mouse will released their fifth album, and US #1,We Were Dead Before The Ship Even Sank on April 2nd 2007 through Columbia. It follows 2004's critically acclaimed Good News For People Who Love Bad News which has sold 1.6 million copies worldwide. Dashboard, the first single to be lifted from the album, will be released in May alongside a full UK tour.

Modest Mouse are Isaac Brock, Eric Judy, Jeremiah Green, Joe Plummer, Tom Peloso and Johnny Marr. The legendary guitarist joined the band in 2006, after Brock asked him to play on an album track. Marr and the band enjoyed the experience so much that he was subsequently appointed an official member of Modest Mouse.We Were Dead Before The Ship Even Sank was recorded with Dennis Herring at Sweet Tea Studios in Oxford, Mississippi. The band previewed a few tracks, including Dashboard and We've Got Everything, on their brief tour of the US and UK last November. We Were Dead is the follow up to the band’s 2004 album Good News For People Who Love Bad News which included the hit Float On, has sold over 1.5 million copies and earned the band two Grammy nominations.

Modest Mouse will be coming to the Wolverhampton Wulfrun Hall on Sunday May 27th. Tickets go on sale from 9.00am this Friday (20th April), and are available from Midland Box Office: 0870 320 7000 or online at http://www.wolvescivic.co.uk/

Homework

Today whilst on a journey to Lichfield, where we visited both the Cathedral, and the house of Charles Darwin's grandad Erasmus, me and Lisa chatted about how I maybe could work in as a first year school teacher. After weighing up the pros (background, education, cash), and the cons (more courses, children), we decided to give it some stronger thought.





Tonight I had to spend three hours helping Kirsty out with her homework. I was gung-ho, and thoroughly enjoyed myself. For about 2hrs. I started getting annoyed by backwards d's and b's by then, and I could clearly see that Kirsty was fed up.



I decided there and then that the school idea is a no-no. Upon further reflection though, maybe it isn't. Kirsty was doing two-weeks worth of homework in one sitting, so she is bound to get lax by the third hour, she's 6, and I'm bound to get ratty by the third hour.

All this and Kirsty had been questioning me about god, life, death, and everything else all day, before declaring very loudly in the car that the new CD I bought (from a charity shop), is... RUBBISH. Fun times!



Lisa agreed to Kirsty's CD declaration. It seems that 'The Brand New Heavies' aren't flavour of the week in my car. Yes, 'The Brand New Heavies'. We all have our crosses to bear, I just bear them publically!


http://www.myspace.com/thebrandnewheavies

Bye for now!

C/x

I'm fed up.

so here's a some pictures.

(Grandad, sister Lucy with boyfriend Dave and baby Evan. Uncle Richard peering into Bouncy Castle)

(some pic which made me laugh, from a NIN forum)

New Set Up

I've redesigned the back area of the dining room / office. I've got some new speakers that are so powerful, when you put Nine Inch Nails 'the great destroyer' on, it sounds like your walls are going to implode. Now all I have to do is get the kids out of the house more often!

C/x

This is Britain

Only in this country, can you have time off work to celebrate easter, and celebrate it by visiting such fantastic attractions as......

... a collection of VINTAGE air burners. A pleasure for all the family.

Versions. (Maulings).

This month, Mark Ronson 'drops' his latest 'bomb', Versions. Fourteen cover versions done in Mark Ronson's inimitable style, featuring guest vocalists aplenty. You may have heard the single, a fatboy slim style mauling of 'Stop me if you think you've heard this one before', by The Smiths. Add a soulful vocal, and a breakbeat, and voila a remix! And if you like you're music lazy, boy this bomb will be playing for weeks in your household. So, here we have, a lazy review for a lazy album:

God put a smile upon your face (featuring the Daptone Horns)

Breakbeats and horns. Lazy and tired.

Oh My God (featuring Lilly Allen)

Breakbeats and Lilly Allen. Lazy. Plus the god-awful Lilly Allen.

Stop Me (featuring Daniel Merriweather)

Lazy Mauling of The Smiths Classic, featuring breakbeats, horns, soulful vocals, and strings. Unfinished Sympathy it aint'.

Toxic (featuring ODB and Tiggers)

Breakbeats, Horns, and the sound of ODB rolling in his grave. Lazy.

Valerie (featuring Amy Winehouse)

Breakbeats and horns. Makes Amy Winehouse sound bad, which is no mean feat. Lazy.

Apply Some Pressure (featuring Paul Smith)

Breakbeats and horns. This time with strings, we all know strings = honest musicianship

Inversion

Filler. Features horns. Lazy!

Pretty Green (featuring Santo Gold)

BAD, Lazy, Jam cover. Schoolgirlesque vocals. I don't like the Jam, but I wouldn't inflict this on them. No Breakbeat!!! Horns? Check!

Just (featuring Phantom Planet)

Radiohead classic, featuring, guess.................... Breakbeats and Horns!! Lazy.

Amy (featuring Kenna)

Lazy. Breakbeats. Horns. This album is so bad.

The only one I know (featuring Robbie Williams)

Overrated Charlatans track, featuring Robbie Williams (and additionial breakbeats and horns). Robbie Williams. Jesus christ Robbie Williams, how like, cutting edge to take a mainstream artist and tag him onto such a subversive record as this. Did I say subversive? I mean LAZY!

Diversion

Filler again. Mainly breakbeat free, until the last third when they appear, along with the welcome appearance of horns, that bleeds into...

L.S.F (featuring Kasabian)

The horns and breakbeats are joined by self-styled 'Northerners' (from Leicester). The overrated Kasabian are joined by some breakbeats, and horns for a lazy rendition of their own piece of 'hot shit on a platter'.

Outversion

Lazy end of album filler, featuring horns, yet no breakbeat.

Sigh a relief, as the only place you'll hear this album is on a student disco dancefloor. I see the future of this album lining charity shop shelves in five years time, the way 'you've come a long way baby' by fatboy slim does now!

Gullivers Kingdom - Insanity in Matlock!

We decided to visit Gullivers Kingdom in Matlock, Bath. Matlock is a lovely town, a picturesque village at the foot of some fantastic hills. It’s home to ‘the heights of Abraham’ an expensive cable car from the bottom of the village to the top of a cliff, and back down. It’s also home to an impressive high street, that consists of: Chip shop – amusement arcade – pub – pub – old shop selling overpriced tat – pub – chip shop – amusement arcade – aquarium – pub – chip shop – Ice cream shop – chip shop – pub.

The above isn’t necessarily a bad thing as it makes you feel like you are at the seaside, albeit one without a beach, and in the middle of Derbyshire.
Like all seasides there are fairground rides, and these are housed in ‘Gulliver’s Kingdom’ a theme park specifically aimed at children. This is the most bizarre place, as because it’s designed for children, there are obviously going to be a lot of parents there, and where there are parents, there are buggies. So what better location for a theme park for children, than sloping down a very VERY steep mountain. Which was bad news for Lisa, becuase she has to push the pushchair due to my gammy arm (car crash, remember?).

The rides on offer are the standard fare for children, and both Elizabeth Kirsty loved it. For adults though, it’s a bit of a nightmare.

Highlight of the day was finding a ride housed in a castle courtyard with a sign outside warning of ‘a high-octane turbulent ride. Not for people of nervous dispositions, bad back, heart trouble, pregnancy blah blah’. At last, a ride for adults, I believe, and into the courtyard I go.

Once inside, I hit the queue. The queue lets in 17 people every 15 minutes. Luckily we’re near the front, and get to laugh at the major groaning going on behind us. Once we get into the ride, we enter a living room type thing, which will eventually show us some special effect laden tale that precedes the ride. Only the spotty teenager who operates the ride mumbles “d’ya wanna hear the talking or just get on with the ride” before opening the door to the high-octane ride, not giving us much of a choice.

The ride turns out to be a simulator, in front of a mini-sized cinema screen in an ornate 1970’s style auditorium. So we buckle up, and away on a magical voyage to commodore 64 style graphic renditions of the pyramids of Egypt. Up above us we see stars, wonderful stars. Well 3 quarters of the stars that work are wonderful. Well, wonderful for LED lights! What’s that, fire in the auditorium? Aargh! Oh no, relax it’s a not-so special effect. A light bulb that’s red, and a bit of wind blowing a red bit of cloth. And it’s over. The simulator seats grind to a halt, and everyone has a severe look of “what the f…” before bursting out in pitiful laughter. Honestly, this must be the best ride ever, because it’s so bad. Lisa missed out because she waited with Elizabeth, oh how she missed out.

Next up we went into the caves, to have a bash at gold-panning, for gold (obviously), minerals, and sharks teeth. Kirsty asks "why are there shark teeth underground?".

As we got to the bottom of the kingdom, you can get on a cable car to the top. Kirsty and me got on one, Lisa and Elizabeth on the next. I looked back at the two of them, baby on mom’s lap, all smiles. Wonderful.

I reach the peak; me and Kirsty jump off and wait for the other two. When they pull in, the man operating the machine let’s rip at Lisa “you’re breaking every rule in the book having the baby on you’re lap. You are banned from this ride” as if she was a naughty schoolgirl. Does he honestly think Lisa would have her on her lap if it were dangerous?? Plus, it was actually the operator at the foot of the ride who loaded the two onto the chairlift, thus it was him who was in the wrong for doing so. If there was anyone to tell off, it was his rule-waiving ill-information giving colleague. I put in a complaint at the end, saying it marred the afternoon. I bet it gets ignored.

Before we left, Kirsty decided to see a ‘show’ featuring Fatz the Gorilla, and Mitzy, whom I presume to be a bear. Me, Lisa, and Elizabeth decided to wait outside. As we waited, we watched child after child after child leave the auditorium looking bemused, so I popped my head round the door to see what was going on. There were no humans in costumes in this show, just very shoddy animatronics, and disco lights, some of which didn’t work. Again, Kirsty thought it was great!

So, to sum up: Matlock – Interesting but you wouldn’t want to live there, or visit for longer than one hour. Gulliver’s Kingdom – Insanely designed and tatty for the adults, but bliss for the kids with mostly FRIENDLY staff, with the exception of a couple of absolute idiots, and some dodgy animatronics.

Normal day out then!

Free the Dog!

http://www.petitiononline.com/dwayne/petition.html

Dog, Leland and Tim were taken into custody by U.S. Marshals early Thursday, September 14 in connection with charges stemming from their 2003 arrest of convicted serial rapist, Andrew Luster.Andrew Luster, the famed heir to the Max Factor cosmetics fortune, was convicted of drugging and raping three women over a four year span. During his trial in 2003, Luster fled the country to Mexico. In June 2003, Dog and his team tracked the fugitive Luster in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico, where he was living under an alias, and arrested him.As bounty hunting is illegal in Mexico, Dog, Tim and Leland were arrested by the Mexican authorities andLuster was handed over to the United States government by the Mexicans. He was subsequently found
guilty and is currently serving a 124 year prison sentence. Bounty hunting is illegal in Mexico, and Dog, Tim and Leland were arrested by the Mexican authorities. After being released on bail, Dog, his family and team, returned to Hawaii and to their lives as bounty hunters.

Dog, Leland and Tim were all released on bail on Friday, September 15th, 2006, as the judge concluded they are not flight risks. While out on bail, they will be required to remain in the state and wear electronic monitoring devices until they return to court for extradition hearings to face trial in Mexico. No date has been set for those hearings.

http://www.dogthebountyhunter.com/intro.php

Call me insane, but....

Everytime I see the Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, he reminds me of Mike D, of the Beastie Boys (with a beard though).

http://www.beastieboys.com/

China

banner above right

http://www.opensourceresistance.net/