“Back in black, I hit the sack,
I've been too long, I'm glad to be back
Yes I'm let loose from the noose,
That's kept me hangin' about.
I been livin’ like a star 'cause it's gettin' me high,
Forget the hearse, 'cause I never die
I got nine lives, cat's eyes
Abusing every one of them and running wild.”
AC/DC - Back In Black
Oh yes. The Summer of my Discontent is now finally over and made glorious. There’s a metric shitload of things I wanted to write about, but I seem to be perpetually under the gun at the moment and just running to catch up with myself, so that’s going to have to wait.
I’ve finally managed to get my Twitter page to feed into the blog properly, so scroll down the column on the right and you’ll have a more accurate idea of my daily movements and adventures.
As I wrestle with the remaining hours of this week, I am comforted to know that we’re heading into a three-day Bank Holiday weekend which ends with my 35th birthday. Every day that we can rouse ourselves from our slumber and breathe in and breathe out is a day worth celebrating, as we put one leg in front of the other and continue to navigate our way around this Big Bad Ball of Mud. That goes double for birthdays.
“They gotta catch me if they want me to hang
'Cause I'm back on the track and I'm beatin' the flack,
Nobody's gonna get me on another rap
So look at me now, I'm just a makin' my pay,
Don't try to push your luck, just get outta my way.”
Friday, August 24, 2007
Saturday, August 18, 2007
Mike Wieringo 1963 – 2007
Blogging still at a minimum, but I didn’t want this to pass without comment. Criminally underrated comic artist Mike Wieringo has died unexpectedly at the age of 44. Here are two of my favourite sketches by Ringo. First is a dashing re-imagining of Buck Rogers as part of a thread on Warren Ellis’ soon-to-be-defunct message board THE ENGINE:
Here is the other one. Ringo’s stint on Fantastic Four with Mark Waid is one of the most-beloved runs on the title, elevating it once again to its position as The World's Greatest Comic Magazine. Here is a tragically poignant picture of the FF waving goodbye to Ringo and his mighty, irreplaceable pencil:
Here is the other one. Ringo’s stint on Fantastic Four with Mark Waid is one of the most-beloved runs on the title, elevating it once again to its position as The World's Greatest Comic Magazine. Here is a tragically poignant picture of the FF waving goodbye to Ringo and his mighty, irreplaceable pencil:
Sunday, July 22, 2007
Urban Decay and the Vinyl Frontier
I’m still navigating the choppy waters of my personal life. I’m surrounded on all sides by ravenous sharks, and there is definitely blood in the water. Nevertheless, if I don’t do some writing, I’m going to go bug-fuck crazy. So here I am. Deal with it. Warning: This is going to be a bit rambling and shapeless. My thoughts tend to be skittish and unfocussed at the moment. And I’m rusty as hell with the ol’ word-slinging, so bear with me.
In the last few weeks, I’ve had a handful of reasons to be in the centre of London with time on my hands, so I’ve spent quite a bit of that time aimlessly wandering the streets, trying to hit some of my favourite areas. And I’m discovering that my favourite areas are gradually facing extinction.
About a year ago I wrote about the demise of Comic Showcase, but what I didn’t know at the time was that it was only the first salvo in the slow disintegration of parts of “my” London. London is many things to many people. No two people see this city in the same way. And that’s the way it should be. But it seems that progress or evolution or whatever- you-want-to-call-it has decided to call time on My London.
I suppose I first had an inkling a couple of weeks back. I went to a party thrown by a company I worked for many years ago – the company I was working at when this blog was born. You can check the archives to get a flavour of my hate-hate relationship with that place.
It was more of a wake than a party. After eight years in business, and having never turned a profit whilst ploughing millions into a misguided vanity project, they had decided to stop throwing cash onto the pyre. It was the end of the road. One of the deciding factors was the fact that the building where they were based was going to be demolished, and they couldn’t face another costly and ultimately fruitless office move. I was one of the key personnel involved in the previous office move. The reason then? That building was going to be demolished.
And I thought about my not-particularly happy working career. The jobs, the companies, the colleagues. Lots of places, lots of people. And it dawned on me that, with the exception of one company, they have all gone. They’ve either crashed and burned in failure, or they’ve cashed out in a smug burst of orgiastic glee, jerking off into rolled up £50 notes with a big “fuck you” grin on their faces.
Not only have the companies disappeared, their employees have scattered on the winds of opportunity, rolling up wherever the need for a paycheck takes them. And more often than not, even the buildings that housed those companies have been razed to the ground, to make way for plazas or mini-malls or who-the-fuck-knows.
Coincidentally, I also discovered the other day that my current company is on the verge of selling up. It appears that the directors have been casting around for buyers, and it looks like they might have found some. It’s only a matter of time. I discovered this through unofficial channels, so I’m not supposed to know this. I always seem to know things that I shouldn’t…
I went off on a bit of a tangent there. What I really wanted to write about was Berwick Street. The Fopp chain of record stores folded over a month ago, simultaneously doing away with my source of inexpensive music. It was always an excellent source of low-priced niche music. If supermarkets are increasingly catering to the Top 40 crowd, it fell to Fopp to cater to the rest of us, and they did it well. Their implosion had little to do with their day-to-day business, and more to do with a cash-flow problem brought on by acquisition and rapid expansion. They committed commercial suicide.
So, on Thursday afternoon, with time to kill and nothing to adequately slaughter it with, I decided to hit Berwick Street, Soho’s Mecca for the music shopper. Well, it used to be. Not anymore. It has changed. The stack-‘em-high, sell-‘em-cheap Mister CD had gone. Both branches of Reckless Records had gone. Selectadisc is long gone. The only remaining record store on Berwick Street is Sister Ray, and I wasn’t impressed. The prices aren’t that good. Neither is the stock range. I managed to snag a Latin jazz CD for £2.99, primarily for the Joe Bataan cover of the Theme From Shaft.
I remember the days when I could walk up and down Berwick Street all day (stopping occasionally for a burger or a beer), digging in dusty stacks of vinyl and finding piles of stuff that I wanted. I always had to put things back, because the stuff that I wanted exceeded what I could afford. Last week, it was a struggle to spend 3 quid. My friends and I would be tempting permanent spinal injury by hauling around bags weighed down with stacks of black discs engraved with the funkiest basslines and the baddest horn breaks. We were avid crate diggers, looking for elusive and unusual funk and jazz albums. And we never left empty-handed.
I know that shopping online is cheaper, but it’s purposeful. You want something, you find it at the best price and you get the fuck out. But you can’t browse in the same way. There’s nothing like holding something in your hands that you never knew existed. The death of the specialist shop is the death of pop culture archaeology, chipping away in the dust and the dim light to reveal a surprise.
Now, when I get on the train home from London, I don’t take any extra treats home with me. Not even memories.
In the last few weeks, I’ve had a handful of reasons to be in the centre of London with time on my hands, so I’ve spent quite a bit of that time aimlessly wandering the streets, trying to hit some of my favourite areas. And I’m discovering that my favourite areas are gradually facing extinction.
About a year ago I wrote about the demise of Comic Showcase, but what I didn’t know at the time was that it was only the first salvo in the slow disintegration of parts of “my” London. London is many things to many people. No two people see this city in the same way. And that’s the way it should be. But it seems that progress or evolution or whatever- you-want-to-call-it has decided to call time on My London.
I suppose I first had an inkling a couple of weeks back. I went to a party thrown by a company I worked for many years ago – the company I was working at when this blog was born. You can check the archives to get a flavour of my hate-hate relationship with that place.
It was more of a wake than a party. After eight years in business, and having never turned a profit whilst ploughing millions into a misguided vanity project, they had decided to stop throwing cash onto the pyre. It was the end of the road. One of the deciding factors was the fact that the building where they were based was going to be demolished, and they couldn’t face another costly and ultimately fruitless office move. I was one of the key personnel involved in the previous office move. The reason then? That building was going to be demolished.
And I thought about my not-particularly happy working career. The jobs, the companies, the colleagues. Lots of places, lots of people. And it dawned on me that, with the exception of one company, they have all gone. They’ve either crashed and burned in failure, or they’ve cashed out in a smug burst of orgiastic glee, jerking off into rolled up £50 notes with a big “fuck you” grin on their faces.
Not only have the companies disappeared, their employees have scattered on the winds of opportunity, rolling up wherever the need for a paycheck takes them. And more often than not, even the buildings that housed those companies have been razed to the ground, to make way for plazas or mini-malls or who-the-fuck-knows.
Coincidentally, I also discovered the other day that my current company is on the verge of selling up. It appears that the directors have been casting around for buyers, and it looks like they might have found some. It’s only a matter of time. I discovered this through unofficial channels, so I’m not supposed to know this. I always seem to know things that I shouldn’t…
I went off on a bit of a tangent there. What I really wanted to write about was Berwick Street. The Fopp chain of record stores folded over a month ago, simultaneously doing away with my source of inexpensive music. It was always an excellent source of low-priced niche music. If supermarkets are increasingly catering to the Top 40 crowd, it fell to Fopp to cater to the rest of us, and they did it well. Their implosion had little to do with their day-to-day business, and more to do with a cash-flow problem brought on by acquisition and rapid expansion. They committed commercial suicide.
So, on Thursday afternoon, with time to kill and nothing to adequately slaughter it with, I decided to hit Berwick Street, Soho’s Mecca for the music shopper. Well, it used to be. Not anymore. It has changed. The stack-‘em-high, sell-‘em-cheap Mister CD had gone. Both branches of Reckless Records had gone. Selectadisc is long gone. The only remaining record store on Berwick Street is Sister Ray, and I wasn’t impressed. The prices aren’t that good. Neither is the stock range. I managed to snag a Latin jazz CD for £2.99, primarily for the Joe Bataan cover of the Theme From Shaft.
I remember the days when I could walk up and down Berwick Street all day (stopping occasionally for a burger or a beer), digging in dusty stacks of vinyl and finding piles of stuff that I wanted. I always had to put things back, because the stuff that I wanted exceeded what I could afford. Last week, it was a struggle to spend 3 quid. My friends and I would be tempting permanent spinal injury by hauling around bags weighed down with stacks of black discs engraved with the funkiest basslines and the baddest horn breaks. We were avid crate diggers, looking for elusive and unusual funk and jazz albums. And we never left empty-handed.
I know that shopping online is cheaper, but it’s purposeful. You want something, you find it at the best price and you get the fuck out. But you can’t browse in the same way. There’s nothing like holding something in your hands that you never knew existed. The death of the specialist shop is the death of pop culture archaeology, chipping away in the dust and the dim light to reveal a surprise.
Now, when I get on the train home from London, I don’t take any extra treats home with me. Not even memories.
Thursday, July 05, 2007
Down And Out
I know that it has been quiet around here lately. Lots going on at the moment. Almost all of it apocalyptically bad. I don't really want to talk about it. At the moment, and for the forseeable future, this is me:
Normal nonsense will resume at some point. I don't know when. I wish I did. Over and out.
Normal nonsense will resume at some point. I don't know when. I wish I did. Over and out.
Thursday, June 21, 2007
Who Loves Ya, Baby?
Some things make life worth living. This music video is one of them. Telly Savalas singing (and I use that word loosely) If. If this doesn't fill you with joy, you are dead inside:
Thursday, June 07, 2007
Through The Looking Glass
It occurs to me that, after many years of indulging me and my inane chatter, some of you out there have no idea what I look like. Let me help you fill in some gaps.
An awful lot of people tell me I look like this:
Which is flattering. It happens less now than it used to, which may be attributed to my slowly advancing years. However, as time passes, I suspect that most people don’t actually mean that anymore. They mean this:
Bastards. Personally, I prefer this comparison:
Can you dig it? I knew that you could!
Occasionally, and this has happened more often than you would think, I have been compared to this:
This is usually followed by a brutal beating. And that ends today’s brief foray into Google Image Search Photofit Fun.
An awful lot of people tell me I look like this:
Which is flattering. It happens less now than it used to, which may be attributed to my slowly advancing years. However, as time passes, I suspect that most people don’t actually mean that anymore. They mean this:
Bastards. Personally, I prefer this comparison:
Can you dig it? I knew that you could!
Occasionally, and this has happened more often than you would think, I have been compared to this:
This is usually followed by a brutal beating. And that ends today’s brief foray into Google Image Search Photofit Fun.
Tuesday, June 05, 2007
No Subject Line Can Prepare You For The Horror
This is the new logo for the London 2012 Olympic Games. It cost £400,000.
Shit, isn’t it?
Looking directly at it gives me a piercing headache just behind my eyeballs. It looks like the aftermath of a Lisa Simpson chainsaw attack. It looks like someone’s granddad’s idea of cool. Because Granddad does so love that new hippity-hop sound.
Please feel free to add more insults and withering criticism in the comments section as you see fit, because ugly is in the eye of the beholder.
Friday, June 01, 2007
And The Tweet Goes On
Short Sharp Stabs Are GO!
George “drool-on-his-chin-and-the-devil-in-his-eyes” Bush is still the world’s most unbelievably Evil Bastard. Is no-one willing to challenge him for the crown of King of the Shits?
Be Kind, Rewind has the potential to be the finest piece of cinematic confectionary we can hope to consume in 2008.
As feared, I have become obsessed with Twitter. Have you seen me twittering yet? You should. It’s like this, only shorter. Less filling, but with the same great taste. And to all of my lovely friends out there who don’t like to go down on the blogosphere and get all messy with your hungry lips and roving tongue, now you have no excuse! Go forth and twitter! It will give me something else to read. And I can never have too many things to read.
And in the words of C.J. Cregg: "That's a full lid!"
George “drool-on-his-chin-and-the-devil-in-his-eyes” Bush is still the world’s most unbelievably Evil Bastard. Is no-one willing to challenge him for the crown of King of the Shits?
Be Kind, Rewind has the potential to be the finest piece of cinematic confectionary we can hope to consume in 2008.
As feared, I have become obsessed with Twitter. Have you seen me twittering yet? You should. It’s like this, only shorter. Less filling, but with the same great taste. And to all of my lovely friends out there who don’t like to go down on the blogosphere and get all messy with your hungry lips and roving tongue, now you have no excuse! Go forth and twitter! It will give me something else to read. And I can never have too many things to read.
And in the words of C.J. Cregg: "That's a full lid!"
Friday, May 25, 2007
Going Cheep
Dictionary definitions can sometimes make a point far more efficiently than I, and they use fewer words. Like this.
To Twitter:
to utter a succession of small, tremulous sounds, as a bird.
to talk lightly and rapidly, esp. of trivial matters; chatter.
to titter; giggle.
to tremble with excitement or the like; be in a flutter.
a state of tremulous excitement.
Yeah, that sounds about right.
I’m stupidly busy at work, my monitor is messy and crowded with open windows, and I’ve still managed to find a way to distract myself. Dammit.
I’ve started playing with Twitter, and now I have a Twitter page. There’s a shortcut on the right under The Others, but here’s a direct url to my page if you want to enjoy my Adventures in Microblogging.
This also means that I will be sending small twitters from my mobile phone at any time of the day or night. Oh dear.
I would put a flash badge in the right-hand sidebar so you can read my Twitters from here, but I tried that already, and it fucks up the blog template something horrible.
I’m hurtling towards the holiday weekend with open arms. It’s calling me. I can hear it…
To Twitter:
to utter a succession of small, tremulous sounds, as a bird.
to talk lightly and rapidly, esp. of trivial matters; chatter.
to titter; giggle.
to tremble with excitement or the like; be in a flutter.
a state of tremulous excitement.
Yeah, that sounds about right.
I’m stupidly busy at work, my monitor is messy and crowded with open windows, and I’ve still managed to find a way to distract myself. Dammit.
I’ve started playing with Twitter, and now I have a Twitter page. There’s a shortcut on the right under The Others, but here’s a direct url to my page if you want to enjoy my Adventures in Microblogging.
This also means that I will be sending small twitters from my mobile phone at any time of the day or night. Oh dear.
I would put a flash badge in the right-hand sidebar so you can read my Twitters from here, but I tried that already, and it fucks up the blog template something horrible.
I’m hurtling towards the holiday weekend with open arms. It’s calling me. I can hear it…
Friday, May 18, 2007
Wrap Party
So, here we are. This is the last day of my experiment in daily blogging. I did it. One post every working day for a month. Time for a post-mortem, methinks. What did I learn?
• I’m capable of doing it. I thought I would flake out after a couple of days, but I just kept powering through.
• Yes. I know that I cheated occasionally with memes or video clips. Fuck it.
• When I think that I can’t write, I am wrong.
• I am my own worst critic. When something is crap, I want it to be good. When something is good, I want it to be great. When something is great, I want it to be perfect.
• There is no perfect.
• I thought that doing this every day would siphon brainspace away from other writing projects. The reverse has been true. This turned into a warm-up before the main event. I’ve noodled around with short stories, untold ideas, and stray snippets for things that don’t exist yet. When you invite the Muse in, you can’t just kick her ass out when you’re done with her. Sometimes she settles in for the evening. She’s a demanding mistress.
• Now my writing muscles are nice and limber, I am ready to finally dive in and start chiselling away at my main project in earnest: the first draft of my screenplay Rotten Timing. Oh yes, It Is Time.
I guess I’ll be back here on a less stringent timetable next week at some point. Or I might be back tomorrow. That’s the thing with blogging. You never know when you might need the fingers to fly, the brain to spark or the words to pour. Excelsior!
• I’m capable of doing it. I thought I would flake out after a couple of days, but I just kept powering through.
• Yes. I know that I cheated occasionally with memes or video clips. Fuck it.
• When I think that I can’t write, I am wrong.
• I am my own worst critic. When something is crap, I want it to be good. When something is good, I want it to be great. When something is great, I want it to be perfect.
• There is no perfect.
• I thought that doing this every day would siphon brainspace away from other writing projects. The reverse has been true. This turned into a warm-up before the main event. I’ve noodled around with short stories, untold ideas, and stray snippets for things that don’t exist yet. When you invite the Muse in, you can’t just kick her ass out when you’re done with her. Sometimes she settles in for the evening. She’s a demanding mistress.
• Now my writing muscles are nice and limber, I am ready to finally dive in and start chiselling away at my main project in earnest: the first draft of my screenplay Rotten Timing. Oh yes, It Is Time.
I guess I’ll be back here on a less stringent timetable next week at some point. Or I might be back tomorrow. That’s the thing with blogging. You never know when you might need the fingers to fly, the brain to spark or the words to pour. Excelsior!
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