Cult Fiction

Click pic to enlarge and read (pics are from phone-cam, so quality is variable)

http://www.amazon.com/Quitter-Harvey-Pekar/dp/140120399X

http://www.crumbproducts.com/

http://www.paulgravett.com/

The light at the end of the tunnel is a train... / UPDATE

We're just past the mid-week mark.

The story so far:

Inept doctor writes wrong info on my medical, causing insurers to not pay my make-up of wage, leaving me in financial dire-straits, but thankfully not musical dire-straits.

Somerfield don't tie up their heavy pallet trolleys, and a stray slopes down a hill into my car.

The story continues:

My wage slip has been lost. I can't find out if I get sick pay or a wage, which I need to in order to juggle bills.

Someone has shot our window, don't know why. It's not a rough estate, and we have no enemies.

Three days to go until this week ends. What next?

UPDATE...UPDATE...UPDATE...UPDATE...UPDATE...UPDATE

Between Kirsty and Elizabeth, milk has been poured all over my pc, inside my printer, and inside my camera usb port.

Next?

And they say the staff at McD's are a bit slow

Somerfields where I live, is on a slope. So some stupid, idiotic, comatose, brain-dead, moribund-in-thought, prick, decided that if you have a pallet trolley full of compost, on a hill, it'll be fine not to chain it up. I'm sitting in the car with Elizabeth, thankfully not getting her out of the car, when I hear a crash, and see the above. Scratches, but it could've been a lot worse.

That supermarket is beyond useless, which is a shame, as there are two members of staff there who are helpful and pleasant, and as ever, it is the moronic twod's ruining it for them

Gonzales - Royal Festival Hall

manchester 2002

Hot footed it down to 'Jarvis Cocker's Meltdown festival' at the Royal Festival Hall on the south bank of the Thames on Saturday, to see Chilly Gonzales (as you all know, my favorite artiste!). Gonzo was as fantastic as ever. Gonzo was backed up with Mocky on the drums, and between them they belted out some quality drum and piano action, before kicking in with some gonzo "hard touches". Hard touches, because he hasn't had any "Hits". Audience participation was partaken, whistling the choruses to said "hard touches" and humming a melody for Gonzo to jam along to. Rich, who came with me, was gobsmacked at A: How good on the piano he was, and B: How damn funny he can be. A great gig and a great day.

Press Gumpf follows:

Over the last 5 years, Gonzales has tranformed himself from Berlin-based underground entertainer to Paris-based pianist and producer.From a collaboration with Daft Punk to a piano concert for David Bowie's Meltdown Festival in London Royal Festival Hall, Gonzo straddles the underground and the overground. Having just finished arranging and playing all the instruments for Jane Birkin's comeback duo album “Rrendez Vous", Gonzales is now finishing prepartions for his album "Piano", an instrumental solo piano album to be released in the autumn on Universal Jazz's "No Format" series.His first album was Gonzales Uber Alles (Kitty Yo records), a melancholic trip hop classic voted in THE FACE's Top Ten albums of 2000, featuring the UK charting single "Lets Groove Again". 2002's "Presidential Suite"(Delabel/Labels) combined cabaret and hip hop, and gave us the summer radio single "Dans Tes Yeux" featuring French chanteuse Geusch Patti ("Etienne").
The 300 some odd live shows of Gonzales were half old-fashioned (showmanship pink suit, dance routines, lots of sweat) and half surreal piano recital, ending up somewhere between Andy Kaufman, Victor Borge and Richard Clayderman. Video artist Ninja Pleasure designed the PIANO VISION projection so audiences can see Gonzales' hands up close and larger than life on a screen. There have been Gonzales PIANO VISION shows at Berlin's Volksbuhne, Hamburg's Schauspielhaus, Paris' Salle Beaubourg at Centre Georges Pompidou, the aforementioned Royal Festival Hall, and in countries such as Russia, Australia and Gonzo's native Canada.Since 2003, Gonzales has been based in Paris, producing with Renaud Letang (Manu Chao's coproducer). His role is to arrange and play all the instruments, on albums by Jane Birkin, the Canadian singer Feist and Charles Aznavour - until Mr Aznavour fired the Gonzo-Letang team late in the game and started over...This gave Gonzales even more time to prepare "Solo Piano". 16 themes for left hand accompaniment and right hand melody; the influence of French piano style (Ravel, Satie) as filtered through Canadian folk and American jazz (Nina Simone, Keith Jarrett). Throughout the album, Gonzales' former job as silent film accompanist shines through.

And you will know her by the trail of mess.....

Scooby usually stands at a cool 5ft. He is about 2ft in width. He is fairly heavy, but he is no match for Elizabeth, post scooby-snack (cow and gate).

You can find a pest.........

..........in any conceivable place, when you visit our house.

Miles Hunt, Malc Treece, Vileevils, Pwei

click to enlarge and read

http://www.friendsofoscar.co.uk/

http://www.myspace.com/vileevils

http://www.pweination.org

pics courtesy kingsuperspecial

The Cribs - Wolverhampton Wulfrun Hall - June 7th 2007

Hi.

I went to see a young new-beat combo called The Cribs at Wolverhampton the other day, with my young friends Dan and Chris. I say young, 30 somethings. Didn’t want to give you the impression I hang around with ‘young’ men. Phew. Anyhow. On the way to the music hall, we stopped off at a friends house, Roy, to pick up some money that Roy owed Chris for a memory card. Discussion turned towards that Paris Hilton. It seems Chris doesn’t like her at all. Me neither. Back in my day a woman like that, and I use the term woman lightly, wouldn’t have found fame as them were pre-camcorder days. If she appeared onstage at a burlesque, or a soho strip joint club* she may have found small fame, but not the monolithic levels that you see nowadays.
Anyway, I digress…

We got to the music hall, and were greeted by some youths who were chanting and drunk. It was a far cry from when I saw Morton Feldman at Uttoxeter’s Barrenhall.
The band took to the stage and played a variety of numbers, jaunty, poppy, but quite loud.
They did a song about Bovine’s. That one was good. I don’t know if it’s my age though, but I was getting a bit bored by the end. Chris ensures me that the album is great, but maybe it was an off day. I didn’t sleep all night prior, due to my dodgy back. I hurt it in the infamous ‘tap’ war of 1975, when I got into a fistfight with Gareth Hunt’s manager ‘crispy’ chris joneston, over a parking space at the ‘eccleston tap dance specatacular tap-off’ competition.
So we left after the destructive finale of the gig. That baffled me. Why were they jumping into the audience.

The only thing that marred the night was when young Chris was asked to move away from the entrance to the ladies toilets by a security guard. He was about 1metre away having a glass of cola, not in anyone’s way, when this security guard came along and asked, “are you waiting to go to the ladies toilets?”. Because Chris wasn’t asked “Do you mind if we clear this area a bit please”, and instead was talked to in a somewhat snotty manner, this riled young Chris who had a wee row with the security guard, who claimed he ‘knew what women like’. He may know what his mother liked, as looking at him it’s the only woman he’s ever had real contact with. Anyway, I’ll let Chris fight his battles, Cribbins stepped back and enjoyed a pint of the black stuff. Gin.

Chris and Dan listened to Gogol Bordello on the way home, and I realized this must be the band their friend Roy mentioned when he said ‘the peg selling band’.

As for the act we saw tonight, I’d say they were okay for this generation, but the crazy world of Arthur brown they are not.

Goodnight.


*I say this hypothetically, I didn’t do strip joints, despite the reputation I gained on the set of ‘The world of Suzie Wong’

you're only a virgin once

click to enlarge

TV

Sick of channel 4 and the whole lunacy the media have created over the use of the ‘n’ word?
Me too. As ever. the media are carrying on like headless chickens, the way the housemates (or wailing banshees depending on how you see it) are behaving.
Aaaggh, is the term Banshee politically correct??
Aaaaaagh, let’s ban Siouxie Sioux, of Siouxie and the Banshees.
Aaaaaaaaagh, band her because Sioxie could bee construed as offensive to Red Indians.
Aaaaaaaaaagh, they’re not Red, does that mean that last comment is racist?
Aaaaaaaaaaaagh, ask channel 4.

They seem to know everything.

To regain sanity, feast your eyes on this:

http://www.ifilm.com/video/2795961

One difference between Elizabeth and I..........

I take ages to fall asleep, and once asleep, re-awake within no time at all. Elizabeth, can fall asleep in any manner of bizarre positions, and stay asleep for an age!

Health update - more scans

Today I was referred to a new physio, who did a 'prick test'. Turns out that I failed the prick test, thus I am no prick. I jest, It means there is loss of sensation in my right arm. Next up, nerve test. It seems that one of my nerves isn't as responsive as it should be. I have now been told to stop doing any of the phsyiotheraputic exercises they had previously given me, and i'm booked for an MRI scan.

They think the problem isn't my arm, but my neck, injured through the whiplash. They need an MRI scan so that they can tell for sure whether it is my arm or my neck, so that they can then work on it. I now have to wait eight weeks for the scan, and a further two weeks for the results, before seeing what actions to take to remedy the pain.

On top of all this, the Walsall manor want me to have more neck x-rays!

If they don't cure this, i'm going to die of MRSA the amount of hospitals i've now been in! Either that or Radiation overdose!

but first...

Forward Planning - Don't Look Back!

For next years holiday, I felt that instead of the usual Disneyland Paris/British holiday park route that I’ve inflicted on my family, I’ll take them to a European holiday camp. I’m not big into butlins and the like, in fact, I hate that kind of thing but Kirsty loves it and Elizabeth is at the age where she’ll find it mildly amusing. This is why I’ve been looking abroad, but not too far. Finally I found somewhere that sounded promising. Center Parcs.
I looked into taking the family into a UK Center Parcs last year, but the combined cost for four days in a wooden hut 60 miles from home was actually MORE EXPENSIVE that a break in New York City. So that was the last time I looked at a Center Parcs. Until I thought about Center Parcs Zandvoort.


Zandvoort is about half an hour away from Amsterdam. I was taken there once by one of my Dutch friends and his dad. We spent a great afternoon just walking around sand dunes and drinking coffee. I didn’t have kids then so I never thought of it as a family holiday option.
Surely, Center Parcs Zandvoort isn’t going to be more expensive than rip-off Britain?
Using my pidgin Dutch, I browsed the site to get a quote for a two-bed roomed chalet for a Monday-Friday stay in May 08. The cost? 349 Euros.

Not bad I though, so I went to book only to find my booking was not to be. You could only book if you lived in Holland. I thought about contacting Mark from Amsterdam, but I still feel guilty for being a bit of an idiot to him once, even though he accepted my apology over pizza and soup. It’s a long story, but to be quick, I was in a perma-drunken haze, lonely, and had been single for an AGE. Anyone female who showed me any interest at all I considered as ‘falling in love with me’. I was so out of touch it was embarrassing. Mark was a flat-mate of someone I that I was deluded enough (courtesy of booze and low self esteem) into thinking liked me. (Just think, I've been practically tee-total for four years now!)

Anyway, I digress……………….

At this point, I noticed a ‘booking from other countries’ link, so I suspiciously typed in the same requirements (imagine me with one eyebrow arched, and maybe wearing a fake beard), for the same chalet, for the same week. Result?
799 Euros.
DOUBLE the cost of booking from the Netherlands. Another example of rip-off Britain.

Shame on ‘family firm’ Center Parcs for taking advantage of Rip Off Britain. They can stick their wooden cabins up there Augustus Gloop Vessel (leave a comment if you understand that).

I eventually found a house to rent in Zandvoort, and have book marked it for May next year. And for a lot cheaper than the Dutch booking of Center Parcs. Add to that the fact that you can fly to Amsterdam from Coventry for around £40 return each, and at last Kirsty will get to go on a plane, something she’s been banging on about for quite a while, with the whole week for four of us coming in at just under £350.
Now I’ve got to get my manky arm up and running so I can get back to a bit of graft. Damn NHS Physiotherapists…………….

(Incidentally, Microsoft Word’s spell-check keeps trying to change the above sentence to ‘Manly’ arm. That programme knows me well!)

DJ Destruction

Stratford Upon Avon

We took off to Stratford upon Avon today. The last time I was in Stratford was for a press junket for the Phoenix festival, the year that Paul Weller, Iggy Pop, and the Beautiful South were playing (94?). My friend Hollie and I travelled on train from Birmingham, only to find out that on arrival I had to interview a press guy from National Express. Hall or Nothing’s PR tried to track down National Express guy, and waved me in the direction of the free bar. I’d never seen such a look of surprise on Hollie’s face! I’m sure she hadn’t seen one like that on mine either It took ages for the National Express guy to turn up, and when he did, I was somewhat unsurprisingly plastered. I remember barely being able to stand up, and asking him a genius-opening question. “So, you run coaches then, or trains?” That went down well. I can’t remember anything else but losing a baseball cap on the train home, and Hollie and I joining heads to sleep, only awaking up to dribbled-on shoulders.
This time in Stratford, the only dribbling was done by Elizabeth, 1. We found a parking place fairly easy. Not too expensive. When walking into the town we found the following place:




If only.

We wondered around town, a lovely picturesque town littered with the inevitable blights of modern capitalist living, McDonalds, HMV, and the like. In the park we watched a fire juggler thinking it would impress her. It didn’t. Seems she thinks the same of fire-jugglers as I, although I doubt she’s aware of the physical constraints of sticking a levellers album up one’s derriere.

We visited Shakespears birthplace, although didn’t go inside the house as I didn’t feel like paying £20 to be surrounded by Americans in an empty old house. Talking of Americans, Kirsty and me went into a tacky ghoul shop, as kirsty had seen the cauldron in the window. Lisa stayed outside admiring the statue of a jester and keeping Elizabeth’s pushchair out of the way of incense. When Kirsty and I emerged from the tat-emporium, Kirsty spotted a pigeon and stamped at it hard so that it flew away. It flew away all right! Straight into the faces of three American teenage girls eating on a bench. You’ve never seen so much panic in your life. Afterwards, when Lisa had stopped laughing, she informed me that the American girls were scared of the pigeons in case they were carrying bird-flu. Suddenly I was proud of Kirsty’s achievements in panicking gullible ill-informed American teenage girls.

I noticed that they were eating burgers, so obviously foot and mouth doesn't worry them.

After the laughter, we did a few shops, and I bumped into Sir Ian McKellen, Magneto out of X-men (for me), or the bloke out of Coronation St (for Lisa). I thought about asking for a pic, but he looked in a hurry, and I have a fear of coming across sycophantic, so instead of talking I just muttered “look it’s Magneto” to a bemused Lisa. It took me ten minutes to think of the acclaimed Shakespearean actors real name I’m afraid. I put this down to the sun, and a huge thirst.

And so, we had some drinks back at the park, and went home, crawling the entire way on a practically grid locked M42.
A good day overall.