alexsarll: (magneto)
So no, I didn't make the Tubewalk. But I did get new song 'Psychogeography' dedicated to me (well ok, Steve Brummell and me) at the shamefully underattended Swimmer One gig, so, um, in your face Iain Sinclair. Or something. Which reminds me, have I mentioned that Steppas' Delight is the perfect accompaniment to London - City of Disappearances? But yes, Swimmer One. One of the best bands in Britain. The best band in Scotland. Followed by...British Broken Class? Some order of those words, anyway. Whose bass you could feel through your feet. And then lots of dancing to indie and Bruce Springsteen but no, everyone was staying in watching another Eurovision fiasco instead. Even Sparks next door was sparse, apparently - though it was only Introducing Sparks.

Interview with Snoop Pearson, the actress who plays Snoop Pearson on The Wire. Which would already be pretty interesting, but for me the real jaw-dropper was that Jamie Hector aka Marlo is going to be in Heroes. Someone else is coming back too, it seems. This renews my interest in the third season somewhat, and after the second (though I've still not seen the finale) that was needed.
alexsarll: (savage)
Well, I know I'm hardly the first to say this but Eurovision 2007 - what an utter debacle. Even after the Eastern bloc vote nobbled Israel and Switzerland in the semifinal, there was still some great stuff on show last night. It was a scandal that The Ark were placed so lowly, obviously, and while Ireland's affair was dismal the line "archipelagic icicles" alone meant it shouldn't have been bottom. France, also, ended up far lower than their sheer camp pop fun-ness merited. But still, y'know - Ukraine and Russia, placed second or third, would both have been legitimate victors. Instead - Serbia. A lumpen woman singing a leaden song. Ghastly. And voted for by all Serbia's former victims! Surely this isn't how the whole local backscratching thing is supposed to work? And in any case, how come the political votes still manifest themselves if everywhere's now deciding it on a 'phone vote by the populace? I don't know anyone who votes for neighbouring countries out of a sense of regional loyalty - do you? Everyone I know just votes for whichever song or performance they like most. Which leaves us two options - either the rest of Europe is significantly more caught up in old tribalisms than us (and in a really confused way, at that) - or the 'phone votes are a sham. I did have my doubts after the year Tatu competed - when in spite of being the only act with a pre-existing British fanbase, we apparently had not enough people voting for them to award them any points, this being announced by the witch Lorraine Kelly who had previously expressed her disapproval of them - but I had taken that for an isolated atrocity. Now, I think we need investigations, tribunals, justice.
Also under the heading 'pop/WTF?' - Bubble Pop Electric. Not so much the music (mostly really good, if rather lacking in flow) as the venue, Studio 88. It could be a nice space if someone gave it a wipe down (Sticky! Also, dead giant bug swimming in the loo) but the staff...not serving any draught even though they had the pumps, in a spot of blatant profiteering. A bouncer who first did nothing and then actually wandered off as a big lairy bloke got confrontational with the guy on the door. Some of the most blatantly underage drinkers I think I've ever seen in London. I'd decided earlier that I was more in the mood for Pop! than goth, hence choosing this over B Movie that night, but the whole experience was far more existentially troubling than any of the men in black ever were.
Which itself reminds me, the final issue of Britpop 'music is magic' comic Phonogram didn't resonate for me quite as much as the earlier issues had. Not through any artistic fault by Gillen or McKelvie, I hasten to add, but because it was about letting go, moving on, coming to terms with one's past...and increasingly I'm not sure about such things. I think we were right as teenagers when we saw growing up as intrinsically a process of surrender and compromise. I think the best we ever manage is to extract some small concessions as we make a peace on the world's terms rather than our own. We all end up giving our 12 points to our own Serbias, and I don't know if it's worse when we do it through gritted teeth or with a Stockholm Syndrome smile.

Am off to Devon for a few days. That's got nothing to do with any of the above, though. Or at least I don't think so.
alexsarll: (bernard)
I've only ever been to the Stokey Rose & Crown at off-peak times before, but in spite of last night being Saturday and St Patrick's, it was pleasantly uncrowded, with said crowd containing no prats in hats, and one girl with the sort of cleavage that stops conversation. Which is what you want, really, isn't it?

Well now, isn't that interesting - "Pfizer set up a female sexual dysfunction unit a few years ago, comparing Viagra in women to a placebo, but the study had to be stopped because 85 per cent of the women responded to the placebo."
Also, mixing viagra with cocaine? Medically, a really good idea. No, seriously. I wonder if government-funded drug 'information' schemes will be sharing that information.

"Recent research by Mintel suggested more Britons drink alcohol than Germans or Spanish." We also got through the twentieth century without a fascist government. They're both outward traits of a certain British unruliness; that's who we are, and I rather like it.
(Which is not to say that I'll be cheering Scooch against The Ark, 'Vampires Are Alive' and 'Push The Button' come Eurovision; I'm patriotic, not insane)

When mention is made of Lady Antonia Fraser's family, it is generally of her husband, a passable actor who wrote some great screenplays for Joseph Losey back in the day, but who has regrettably insisted on plays and polemics outside that association. Only yesterday did I learn that she was related to a genuinely impressive talent: pioneering Irish fantasist Lord Dunsany was her great-uncle. So add that to poker and left-handed mouse use as things I've picked up this week.

December 2017

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