'huge, queer and tawdry' but 'much admired by the public'

Up to Kilburn for the first Vichy Government show since the US election. New songs abound, a particular highlight being the typically cheerful 'Siberia' - it may be their take on politics and society which first slaps you in the face with Vichy, but sometimes I think it's the ones which apply the same despair in the personal sphere which I love most. Andrew, ever encouraging, identifies it as 'Winter Forever Part 2'. This isn't entirely unfair, but nor is it any bad thing.
Beforehand, having spent a while reading in Kilburn's oddly congenial little park, I meet the troops at the Black Lion, which soon gets bonus points for giving us free samples of a new Smirnoff vodka - also what I initially take for shots in tubes, a bit like those Eerie Pub cocktails. Fortunately, before I can drink any I am informed that they are actually glowsticks. Everyone else has already gone the bracelet route, so I make mine into a glowing collar like I've been enlisted in the Nu-Rave Penal Battalion. I am already wearing my MAGNETO WAS RIGHT t-shirt* and red Converse; Johnny helpfully informs me that I "look like even more of a dick than usual".
On Saturday, the meet-up is held at the Highbury Corner Wetherspoon's, who have introduced something new and strange: alcoholic ginger beer. It is yummy and, if not quite Ginger And Free as would be appropriate pre-David Devant, it is at a promotional price. I approve. Wetherspoon's may have its flaws, but compared to meeting at the dismal Famous Cock it's the bloody Ritz. I do briefly set foot in the Cock later, to tell Aug not to have a swift pint because Devant are on in five. He suggests halves instead, I acquiesce. Except they don't have any Strongbow. For once, because I have no reason to remain in this shambles any longer, I am in a perfect position to do as I always wish in this circumstance - shout "Well why isn't there an upturned glass on the pump, then? Fvck's sake, it's not exactly complicated!", and exit.
Keith TOTP is on first, and as ever his UK Minor Indie Celebrity All-Star Backing Band has something new to offer. A sober member! A bassoon (an instrument I have always loved on account of its looking like a rocket launcher)! And a version of Devant's 'One Thing After Another' which really shouldn't have worked but was in fact astonishing.
Then Dream Themes, who cover TV themes, rather well. Although hearing a version of The A-Team theme in a club does give me major Spaced flashbacks.
Finally, David Devant, who I think I've seen live more than any other band, but who even when they're just playing the classics, thrill me every time. Lovely.

Yesterday I saw a butterfly die. It fluttered down on to a leaf, and as I moved over to take a closer look (I'd not seen one sat still in a while), it folded both wings over to one side. I blew, to wake it up, and instead it just fell off the leaf and lay still. I felt guilty about disturbing its final rest, so I feel the least I can do in recompense is memorialise it here.

Any song called 'Tesla's Future War' needs to be a great deal better than the extant example of the form.

*Selected for the Vichy show because it's probably the most confrontational garmen I own, though I always tend to forget that on this parallel it's not really all that controversial, because here Magneto is a fictional character. As I am walking to the station, musing on this, a guy comes the other way with the exact same problem: he's wearing the logo of the Sinestro Corps. We do our best not to acknowledge each other.