This has had me singing Superstition all day. And grinning at the sheer wonder of Mr Wonder. We all knew the man had musical chops, but his comic timing ain’t half bad…
Stevie Wonder Carpool Karaoke
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Chemical Party-Ah!
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Chemistry lessons at my school were as dull as ditchwater, or if you prefer, as humdrum as H2O. Why couldn’t we have been shown videos like this one? I like the music on this, too: it sounds like LCD Soundsystem crossed with The Fall, which is a musical mix that rocks my Petri dish. Apparently it’s by Von Südenfed (which sounds like a German decongestant brand)- a collaboration between Sir Mark E. Smith (always entertaining) and German electronic duo Mouse On Mars (me neither).
Mark Lanegan
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Venue:
The Cambridge Junction
Date: 03/09/2015
I could feel the bass notes pulsing through my plastic glass. There is something ‘A T-Rex is approaching and it’s making my drink ripple’ about Mark Lanegan’s voice on record – live it’s even more Jurassic Park. His tone is often referred to as ‘gravelly’ but that doesn’t begin to do it justice. You feel it in your eyeballs, in your belly, and in the toes of your boots; it’s an elemental noise. At 6’5” tall, with the hair of Jon Bon Jovi (non-poodle era) and the face of Tom Waits’ better-looking brother, he’s an imposing sight, although skinnier than I expected. And he doesn’t fuck about. On stage, straight into the The Gravedigger’s Song (first line, “With pirhana teeth, I’ve been dreaming of you…”) and we were off. There’s little between-song chat, just a man on a mission, like a preacher sermonising at the gates of Hell, launching haunting song after song, intensity levels set to 11 and rising. It was a perfectly-paced set, placing the brooding brilliance of Hit The City and One Way Street early on, with his excellent band notching up the guitars and synths and beats mid-set (Riot » Continue Reading.
PA Required For Lazy Arse Afterworder
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I am not a Premiership footballer. (The only team sport I participate in is Mixed Rounders down the Rugby Club on a Monday night, and this week only three of us turned up so we played a 1991 edition of Trivial Pursuit in the bar instead).
But if I was a professional kickpigsbladderer, I might – like Jermain Defoe – consider advertising for a Personal Assistant to do all those pesky little things I’d love to palm off to someone.
My job spec is in the comments. Feel free to add some more requirements. Or apply. The pay’s shite, mind.
11 AMAZING facts you may or may not have known about Glastonbury which will change your life FOREVER.
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1) Hot Chip look a little like an Off Broadway cast for One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest.
2) Lionel Richie is still backstage now (even if you’re reading this in three days time) looking in a mirror, hammily raising his eyebrows in surprise, and repeating: “What the HELL is going on?”. A line of security guards are behind him, continuing to do their choreographed arm movements to Dancin’ on The Ceiling. Cramp is setting in.
3) Alt-J. The symbol people in the crowd do with their hands – I know it’s supposed to be that keyboard triangle thingy. But it does look like a vagina, doesn’t it?
4) Rudimental (described perfectly by someone on Twitter as “the aftermath of an explosion in a Sports Direct factory”) did a particularly rousing version of Feel The Love. Scientists calculated this was approximately 150 times better because they sang it themselves rather that allow nasally quackerjack John Newman onto the stage to Donald Duck his way through it.
5) Brittany Howard from Alabama Shakes is quitting the band to form the Phil Cool Honorary Rubber Faced Drama School for actors in Sensitive Teeth » Continue Reading.
Rock ‘n’ Roll Estate Agenting
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A tip of the hat to whoever livened up their company’s Right Move Listings for this dilapidated bungalow in Cumbria (presumably after seeing a faded sign at the side of the track)…
Live At King Tuts
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I listened to the sophisticated sounds of the smartly-dressed string quartet as I sipped on my complimentary glass of red. (“You’re looking smashing tonight,” it said). I noticed the preponderance (no, chiffonderance?) of women wearing scarves. I sat there, in the audience of my local cinema, waiting for the National Theatre Live screening of Arthur Miller’s A View From The Bridge to begin, and all I could think was: “This is it, girl – you have now reached Peak Middle Class.”
But I hadn’t. Yet.
The screening, a Young Vic production starring the mercurial Mark Strong, was beset, at least in our cinema, by technical problems. Sound was cutting out intermittently, and, on top of that, the picture was breaking up, occasionally turning the smouldering Mr Strong into a heavily-pixelated Minecraft character. It was happening just often enough to puncture the tension but not quite enough to ruin it.
However, the general reaction was not one of anger or fury; it was reaction that took the evening up a notch from Peak Middle Class to a level I was hitherto unaware of. We were now in More Peak Than Peak Middle Class, because people were tutting. There were a » Continue Reading.
Legodeck
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I recently built Lord Business’s Evil Lair, with the aid of a functional 95-page instruction manual and a dysfunctional six-year-old boy. My achievement, however, pales into insignificance compared to this ‘Hayarobi’ person, who has designed and constructed a working turntable out of Lego. I’m concerned for his well-being, though – the article mentions that he’s a Korean ‘Brickinside member’, which sounds agonising.
http://i1280.photobucket.com/albums/a493/drakeygirl1/Lego_zpswyalwrc4.jpg
The funny bones of Olivia Colman and Sharon Horgan
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I listened to the latest episode of Radio 4’s Chain Reaction on the train down to that London for yesterday’s Afterword Mingle, and it was the most entertaining half hour of radio I’d heard in ages. This week Olivia Colman quizzed Sharon Horgan, and it was just perfect; the pair of them have funny bones, through and through. (If you’re not familiar with the programme format, it’s a ‘chat’ show where a celebrity chooses someone to interview. The following week, the interviewee returns to choose their own guest). Thoroughly recommended, although could cause embarrassment in a public place if, like me, you are prone to giggling.
The Well I Never! Endings Stories
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The ending of a film is so important. For every Some Like It Hot, there’s a Sunshine. For every The Usual Suspects, there’s a The Return Of The King. Or rather several, seemingly interminable The Return Of The Kings.
It’s obvious that outside pressures can influence the way a writer or director decides to end their masterpiece, particularly when studio money men are breathing down their neck. But I’ve had my ears opened to a couple of surprising stories about movie endings that I’d like to share.
The first concerns Gareth Edwards, the Godzilla director, who made his name writing, filming and directing the the ultra-low budget Monsters. He had a crew of six, and did the CGI gubins himself with off-the-shelf special effects software. Parts of it were filmed in Mexico, where near the end of shooting, Edwards was suffering with a bad back caused by lugging a heavy camera about. He was persuaded to get a massage, and relates the tale [taken from The Museum of Curiosity, Series 4, Episode 3, currently available on BBC iPlayer Radio]:
GARETH EDWARDS: “The woman laid me down, played this tranquil music and it was the first calm in the whole » Continue Reading.
Fitter Happier, Customer Miserabler
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There’s a man in my downstairs on his knees. (“Not for the first time!”, etc). He’s a carpet fitter, doing my bathroom flooring, and I’ve been treated to some appalling music. I was handing him a cuppa just as the whining dross of Bros (“When Will I Be Famous?”) echoed out, so I said: “They play some terrible old shite on the radio, don’t they?” just a split second before I saw his iPod dock.
I mean, each to his own, and everything, but Bros? By choice? This is the auditory danger you face by inviting workmen into your home when you work from home. Quite apart from the drilling and sawing and whistling. We had builders in a couple of years ago, and we ended up in a battle of the bands, with me cranking up the volume on my Atlantic Soul Legends box set, while Slow-Mo Glen turned the dial on his paint-splattered indestructible Makita radio to raise the burblings and chortlings of Chris Evans (introducing Scouting For Girls again) to health-and-safety-flaunting levels.
Anyone else been tortured by tradesmen’s tunes? Or are any of you lot chippies, plumbers or plasterers » Continue Reading.
Lizzard Of Ozz
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He’s got the cold-blooded reptilian, dorsal-crested, forest-dwelling, invertebrate-munching blues. The Mirror seems to have compared Aditya Permana’s photo of a little forest dragon lizard with Phil Lynot, I suspect for headline pun purposes. Yes, I know he doesn’t look much like Ozzy, either. It was that or Iggy Pop, OK?
http://i1280.photobucket.com/albums/a493/drakeygirl1/Lizard_zpss1rms28j.jpg
Bubbles
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I watched as my mate’s sister’s boyfriend put the vial up his nostril and sniffed. His head went red from the neck up. “Bloody hell,” I thought, “Vicks is strong in London!” We were on the tube, heading to a Dr Feelgood gig. I’d never seen anyone take poppers before. I was 16, and either a little too naive or a little too obsessed with cold remedies.
The Feelgoods were one of a handful of groups we saw over and over at The Town & Country Club (the other regulars being The Pogues, Stiff Little Fingers, and Voice Of The Beehive, which seemed like a perfect mix and match to us). It was a little time-bubble of gig-going, which left these bands forever linked in my head, along with the image of my giggling, cider-sloshed mates, and puce-faced Steve.
Later, there was an even bubblier era. In the early 90s, when I was a young reporter on a local newspaper, I went to loads of gigs at Northampton’s Roadmender, scarcely believing my luck at scoring free press tickets. The bubble bands from this time were Super Furry Animals, Chumbawamba, and The Blue Aeroplanes, and once, memorably, Radiohead. Listening to » Continue Reading.
