The Future of Rock and Roll (Part 2)
I wonder why I bother buying CDs sometimes - pay a visit to
myselecta (found via the mighty
Tomas Szbarro) for a whole slew of stuff to listen to.
Particularly
this slice of Morris-inspired lunacy.
See. You wouldn't find that down HMV, would you?
Word of the day
It's not often someone as old and jaded as me finds a new word for a sexual act. I did today though, while researching the unique restorative properties of the humble ginger root:
FiggingYou get a piece of ginger, peel it and... Oh, look it up yourself if you really want to know.
Great Train Journies of the World: Stourbridge Town to Stourbridge Junction
How to start?
Stourbridge - the legendry home of Ned's Atomic Dustbin, The Wonderstuff and Pop Will Eat Itself. Surely a Mecca for any self respecting music fan. Having sampled the delights of the town's myriad pound shops, estate agents and hair dressers it is finally time to return to civilisation.
Getting to the station is a hazardous experience requiring a choice of two disparate, but dangerous, routes. The aromatic passages of the mugger's paradise known as "the subway", or the 5-full chambered Russian Roulette of the overland traversing of the 3 lane motorway known as "the ring road". Whichever way you chose, you can be sure of an endorphin rush that no Class A could ever come close to.
Once safely on the other side (assuming you aren't on "the other side" by now!), one can attempt to locate the train station. The first obstacle is that paradise for disaffected youth, the bus station. Truly a pit of despond. Try not to be lured away by the dubious delights of the "coffee bar" (a garden shed selling lukewarm slurry and a fine selection of out of date chocolate bars). To arrive at the entrance to the train station one must first cross 8 bus lanes each of which is inhabited by a charabanc piloted by a psychotic Mr Magoo with the patience of a hungry hyena and the willingness to commit gross acts of barbarity worthy of a Nazi concentration camp doctor.
Assuming you have passed this stern test, you next have to locate the hallowed portal which will transport you to the mythical train station. And there it is, before you...a small gap between a brick wall and a white wooden fence. Hallelujah!
Passing the abandoned ticket office cum pill box you step out onto the bare concrete platform. There is only one direction of travel, which would indicate that Stourbridge is the centre of the known universe! To your left, an imposing brick wall of Berlin-esque proportions impedes progress, to your right the infinite sweep of the silver rails taking you to unknown pleasures (Smethwick).
As you wait for what seems to be a lifetime for your train out of this nirvana, you hear the colourful native chatter "'Ow's yow're oncle Bill, then?" "Ay yow erd? E woke oop jed laz Sundee" "E dain, did e?" "Ar, e did, otellyer. If e adn't ave died, e'dve been alive ter tell yer imself". Charming.
Finally the gleaming carriages of burnished rust wheezes majestically up to the platform. It is a single self propelled coach - frankly it could be the wreck of the Mary Rose and you'd still get on it. Boarding said conveyance the first thing that strikes you is the malodorous stench of McDonalds, stale urine and the subtle hint of ejaculate - maybe it's what they lubricate the bogies with. Not being a railway engineer, it is not for me to say.
Your next test is to find the least damp / sticky seat. The fake velour is notorious for being held on using nothing but the snot of a thousand unplanned brats. Actually, the stick factor does have a health and safety benefit as it acts as a very effective restraint in the case of derailment.
Finally your journey is underway, and as you pray that the driver has remembered to move off in the correct direction (it is not unknown for the train to end up going through the Black Country Wall (see above) rather than head off towards freedom....still at least the 'Centro snot-belt' really comes into its own at this point...) you can start to relax and look out through the perspex safety windows frosted by years of hallitosis, cigarette burns and genuine hand-carved graffiti at the truly breathtaking vista of a magnificent Victorian brick-lined cutting of Corinth Canal proportions. A true wonder of the mechanised age. Here and there a spindly, diseased tree grips to the brickwork like a one armed man above a pool of unfed piranhas. A metaphor for life in modern society, if ever I saw one.
Breaking through the cutting our eyes alight on a blasted copse of stunted, soot mottled trees. If they are the lungs of the planet, then poor Mother Nature has ventolin requirements which are not to be wheezed at.
After (death) rattling past this wretched woodland we look down upon the hallowed seat of learning that is Redhill School. Sapientia itself is surely entwined in its very fabric. Hark! A bell, and the little scholars fall over themselves to take the fresh air and immerse themselves in Ancient Danish studies (rape and pillage) - now part of the national curriculum since British Bulldog was banned.
The final part of our journey involves traversing a true monument to Britain's industrial golden age. A cast iron viaduct crosses the valley and allows birds eye views of the Seven Stars public house. This pub is truly the traveller's rest - possibly final resting place if anything is consumed on the premises.....
All too soon your destination of Stourbridge Junction hoves into view and as you decelerate into the magnificent architect unspoilt by paint in over 100 years, you can look back at the preceding 90 seconds of travel safe in the knowledge that you have embarked on one of
the great journeys known to man.
Retail Experience Review: IKEA
What the hell was I thinking?
This is probably a well-worn comedy cliche, but why do they build their stores right next to major traffic problems? More importantly, how the hell do they turn the insides of a rectangular tin shed into the sort of labyrinth Lord Bath would be proud to own? We must have walked past the same spot about eight times before we finally escaped through the children's section. Now I understand what Dante was getting at - I reckon this must be the
fourth circle although I'm willing to be corrected.
In summary: Never again.
The Future of Rock and Roll?
I was playing about with that Next Blog thing up there in the corner just now (yes, there's never a dull moment round here). Anyway, after about the fifth lot of cats or surfboarders I came across this offering from
The Tomas Szbarro Family, which appears to be a bit of a gem.
They've got their christmas single out already, which is maybe a little bit proactive for my tastes, but the gifts on offer more than make up for that slight indiscretion. As they suggest, I have added a link thing to this blog and
I suggest anyone who loves good music should pay their site a visit, listen to the tunes and do the same...
Great Railway Journeys of the World: Cardiff Queen Street to Cardiff Bay
Having tired of the shopping opportunities offered by the City Of Arcades, some travel is in order and where better to start than the conveniently-located Queen Street station – the gateway to the Valleys and also to the recently-modernised Cardiff Bay area. Having fed a pound coin into the ticket vending machine, we pass the barrier and make our way to platform three where the 11.29 is waiting to depart.
The first half of the journey describes a wide clockwise arc around some of the city centre's western landmarks: The whitewashed and angular Ibis Hotel, the red brick and metal of the Cardiff Indoor Arena, the dark blue reflective box-on-legs that is the Big Sleep Hotel (itself the former Gas Board headquarters). Here the train diverges from the path which would take us onto the main line and into Central Station, instead heading southwards over them on a curved flyover. A glance to the right offers a view of the Brains Brewery and some of the City's newer commercial buildings. Shortly we reach the bridge over Herbert Street and looking ahead and to the left we catch our first distant glimpse of the enormous copper dome of The Welsh National Opera House.
From here the track straightens, the four-wheeled carriage thudding into each joint in the rails as we hold a steady pace, albeit one noticeably slower than the cars running down the adjacent boulevard. Never mind, it means we can enjoy the sight of the nautical ornaments placed beside the tracks and the explosion of new apartment buildings to our left as well as the small terraced houses and large towers to the right, many of them in a state of some dereliction but hidden from the shame of their newer cousins by the very embankment we are running along.
Soon one's view to the of the left is obscured by a tall, bluish-green panelled fence, for it is here that the the long platform of Cardiff Bay station begins. Clearly designed for the future, it is several train-lengths before we come to a gentle halt at the buffer stops and disembark, some three minutes after we departed. From here it is a short walk to Roald Dahl Place and onward to the Bay area's many fine views and leisure attractions.
When I was young P.C. meant Police Constable
Now it forms the first part of the name of a shitty computer shop where they put £9.99 on the shelf edge but try and charge £19.99 at the checkout.
So I spent the money down the pub instead. Another satisfied customer.
Drink Review: Gin
Now here we have a real treat. I found this particular bottle in Sainsburys, where it was (perhaps not surprisingly) the cheapest Gin available. Notice that they couldn't even be bothered to put any Sainsburys branding on the label, instead opting for an austere design which Winston Smith would surely recognise (assuming he could remember anything after the lobotomy). Perhaps they're ashamed of it.
Despite not being the strongest or most pleasant tasting drink I've ever taken, this does have a number of properties that set it apart from other alcoholic beverages. First is a powerful narcotic quality that kept me awake and lucid for long enough to
write about turds at three in the morning. Second was an equally powerful narcotic effect that had me forget all about having done this until I noticed the blog post all about turds. Third is the brutal nausea it induced and from which I have only just recovered, a good 36 hours later.
In short: Well worth £6, I award it a full 10/10.
The postman sometimes rings once
The postman usually turns up around these parts at a suitably indolent quarter past eleven in the morning.
This morning, though, he had something that wouldn't fit through the door, so he turned up an hour and a half early, hence disturbing my sleep. I was having a good dream too - for some reason they were filming Top Gear in my garden and I was having a friendly chat with Jeremy Clarkson in my shed
*, lulling him into a false sense of security while I decided what to use as a weapon.
Worse still, back in real life I was in such a hurry to get the door (in case the fucker just puts a delivery slip through the door and wanders off) I managed to pull my trousers on the wrong way around. The long-haired prole is probably still laughing about it now.
Postman? Post
cunt, more like.
*Weird, because I don't have a shed. The mind works in mysterious ways.
Update
I apologise in advance to my faithful reader for the lack of detail in this post.
I was hoping to bring you the full, gory detail of my latest bowel movement – a written image of how, if one could imagine oneself in the bottom of the toilet pan staring upward (like some drowning insect or perverse spy camera) one would find oneself watching a pair of flabby, pockmarked buttocks parting just for long enough to reveal a distended sphincter, dilated as if to to form a laughing mouth, its joyous countenance rapidly contorting into that of a nauseated face, violently vomiting half a gallon of vile brownish-yellow foaming liquid, the consistency of over-watered boiling porridge, flecked with half-digested peppers and the remains of barely chewed mushrooms.
But sadly, I cannot. For I passed that yesterday.
Since then and despite a healthy intake of Thai Green Curry, my stools have been perfectly manageable, to the point of my actually enjoying passing them.
Again, my apologies.
DVD Review: The Wicker Man
Fucking hell! I'll have some of that!
Do RyanAir fly there?
Bang
Seems like fireworks season is upon us again - some cunts put on a display last night between midnight and half past. They'll be doing it right through into the new year now someone's made the first move.
Something needs to be done and ASBOs clearly aren't doing the job. No, what we need is a glut of dangerously faulty fireworks with a few mis-labelled cluster bombs thrown in for good measure.
They wouldn't do it again.
FUNEX?
RC: LO
RB: LO
RC: RUBC?
RB: SVRBC
RB: LO
Waitress: LO
RC: LO
Waitress: LO
RC: FUNEX?
RB: SVFX
RC: FUNEM?
RB: 9
RC: IFCDM
RB: VFN10EM
Waitress: A! VFM
RC: R!
RB: O?
Waitress: C-DM
RC: OK - MNX
RB: MNX
RC: FUNET?
RB: 1 T?
RC: 1 T
RB: OK - MNXT - MNXT41!
Waitress: VFN10EX
RC: UZUFX
RB: YFNUNEX?
Waitress: IFE10M!
RB: SILLYCOW
Travel Tip: Booking a Travelodge
Wherever possible, book a family room - it's bigger and it means a family can't have it.
Update
You also get three sachets of coffee. Six if you count the decaf type.
Book Review: The Men Who Stare at Goats by Jon Ronson
Reading this directly after finishing Closing Time, it was sometimes easy to forget this book was
not set in the same Crazy General infested world-gone-mad of the Heller's novel.
Nope, this is a journalistic effort, describing a world that is, well, infested with Crazy
Hippy Generals, willing to try just about anything to gain an edge, win wars and win hearts and minds: Wearing a beatific smile while carrying a lamb, walking through walls, remote viewing, Uri Geller... Truly the stuff of a million conspiracy websites (but with added citations).
Of course, dabbling in this kind of claptrap has to end in tears. So the story hurtles headlong into the all-to-familiar modern world of suicide cults, apparently suicidal scientists, novel new forms of torture and, sadly, a distinct lack of lambs cradled in soldiers' arms.
Ronson's Give-em-Enough-Rope style of exposition is always worth reading. So read this.
Now here we have a real treat. I found this particular bottle in Sainsburys, where it was (perhaps not surprisingly) the cheapest Gin available. Notice that they couldn't even be bothered to put any Sainsburys branding on the label, instead opting for an austere design which Winston Smith would surely recognise (assuming he could remember anything after the lobotomy). Perhaps they're ashamed of it.