I did Sensible and Iggy In One day

Yesterday was quite a day of unexpected, no-holds-barred, unadulterated full-on rockmania in Romoworld. At lunchtime, I happened to bump into all time splendid musician and most recently political campaigner Mr Captain Sensible staging a small but perfectly formed demonstration in Soho Square. I shamefully introduced myself, had my photo taken and had rather a good chat about well, politics really - oh and the fact that no one had rehearsed much for the 30 year reunion Damned gig at the 100 Club in April. What a lovely charming man he was. Very nice to meet you Captain if you are reading (which you said you would!). Mail addresses have been exchanged.


After all that excitement I skipped off down to the Royal Festival Hall for the second time in three days to meet another fellow enthusiast. This time it was Iggy and The Stooges. Where do I start? From the second Iggy Pop explo-skipped onto the stage in a characteristically foul-mouthed and very loud lurch I tell you I saw God. In his trademark brown-bare, flay-scarred chest, jeans and non-descript boots his stomach looked twisted and pulsated with his every out breath. The affected movement was disturbingly like the stirrings of 'alien' before it ripped forth in the film of the same title. I wondered if his back hurt - he's formed a funny shape with all that long-term posturing. There were what looked like two car headlights either side of the drum podium. They flared unbearably bright and all I could think of was here we go, we are the passengers, this is the ride. By the second song Iggy had thrown himself into the stalls. By song four - No Fun - everyone from the stalls were free-forming, writhing and shouting onstage with little Iggy in the middle who was busy being stroked with sweaty furtive hands and being covered in utter adulation. Not bad for an OAP. But he's not. He is a carefree, androdgynous child who flutters and twists and turns in the most fuck you but come and get me kind of way. He makes Mick Jagger look like a Girl Guide. The performance was faultless. A little sprite that no one could quite catch and he knew it. I think by the next song he had simulated intercourse with both the stage and the amp. Later on - he shagged the drum kit in full-flow. After that episode a roadie who was dressed in an unusual red and white country and western shirt re-adjusted the stands in a very businesslike but quite jobsworth manner. Meanwhile Iggy hoicked up his jeans, poured another bottle of water over himself and howled like a tortured minibeast. Another younger roadie ran on earnestly for the ninth time to wipe the stage with a towel. Iggy skipped over the debris. The band were tight tight tight. Incredible. The sound was impeccable. 'I Feel Alright' was particularly outstanding - the syncopated rhythms tumbling over each other at different speeds punctuated with Iggy's grunts and further off-beat timing. Steve Mackay was introduced on saxophone - not everyone's cup of tea but worked brilliantly in an X-Ray Spex kind of way. As the gig went on, Iggy became more and more theatrical - lots of hyena howling and slight narrative forays into the dark side. His shadow gianormous on the side wall as he pranced across the headlights - big Iggy satyr shadow. He played on his demanding side shouting like a petulant child for the lights to go on. Our arms reached out to him. We all felt exposed. I guess that was the point. A bit like sex with the light on. In the latter part of the evening he shouted for 'a fucking beer'. It appeared stage right within 10 seconds. Awfully serious Country and Western shirt man again. Iggy downed it in all of 30 secs and then proceeded to smash it to bits on the mic stand. We all went wild. He is the consummate wild one. The disturbed child writhing and kicking indiscriminately at anything. Rolling around on the floor shouting, arched back, loving no one and doing exactly as he pleases. And then bam. Over. Lights up all gone. Iggy skipped off the way he came and the band just finished and left. The best way. Magical. I saw the light and it was Iggy and the Stooges. I will never be the same again.

Motorhead - In Bullet Points

• Motorhead at the Royal Festival Hall
• In bullet points
• Because that is the easiest way to do it with a hangover
• It was very VERY loud
• It felt a bit like Rock Goes To College
• We missed the first 30 mins due to forgetting that it was The Royal Festival Hall and not Hammersmith Odeon ie: bands come on sooner rather than later in posh places
• And we were talking too much in the pub beforehand
• Stu thought that Jarvis Cocker had his own range of sandwiches out
• I said – don’t worry – it’s just that he curated the festival – not the sandwiches!
• Oooh we laughed
• Istvanski did a monster sneeze and tried to wipe his hands on Stu’s jacket
• We finally got into the gig through a special door for latecomers
• We were 6 rows from the front of the stage
• It was GREAT
• I leapt up and down like a small child and pointed and laughed at lots of funny headbangers
• At first you couldn’t hear a word Lemmy was singing – it was just a blurry loud rasp
• Excellent
• Phil Campbell had a great line in guitars – especially the Minarik Inferno
• Micky Dee did a ridiculously over-pompous show off drum solo that went on a fraction too long
• When Lemmy and Campbelll came back on stage after the drum solo they were both smoking and looked very cool in a rock type way. It made me want to smoke immediately.
• Lemmy spat his fag out across the stage before he rasped the first verse of Motorhead. It just lay there smoking by an amp looking a bit health and safety
• Lemmy was wearing calf length uber-sturdy leather boots and the most exceptionally tight black stretch worn jeans
• The jeans served to highlight his really saggy bottom and squash it even further south and make his tummy look a bit bigger than it probably is in a voluminous black shirt which was characteristically undone to just above the navel and tucked into his straining waistband
• He had his trademark talisman around his neck
• He looked cool and very much legend of rock – which is what he is I suppose
• Thom turned to me and said as we marvelled at Lemmy’s tightness of jean “He’s so cool isn’t he? Would you shag him even though he’s all sweaty and old?
• “No” I replied as I scrawled "Lemmy - play Dirty Love for me I love you" on my ticket stub which I then tried to throw onto the stage
• Thom then said “What about Keith Richards? As he is now? Really old.
• “Yes” I said and we both laughed
• They played quite a lot of songs from the Orgasmatron album
• They played really well despite not being able to intermittently hear what Lemmy was actually singing
• After a slightly lame version (I’ve heard them do better) of Ace Of Spades for the encore they threw plectrums, a sweaty flannel and some drumsticks into the audience
• Lemmy left the guitars on and turned all the amps up to 11 (no doubt)
• Everyone was basking in the incredibly loud noise filling the entire auditorium
• Some were even still headbanging to it
• They seemed genuinely happy to see everyone at the RFH and went offstage smiling
• It was amazing despite the fact I still can't hear out of my left ear
• Then we all went straight back to the pub
• Where it went horribly downhill
• Somehow we entered a pub quiz and I was having to write the answers
• I seem to remember encountering difficulty after the third bucket of rose had passed my lips
• Everyone was very jolly and we all had such a great time
• The rose finally got the better of me and I had to go and be sick in the pub loo
• Euuuuuwwwwwww!
• I thought I felt much better after that but it seemed that I might not have been able to walk in a particularly straight line
• I was most chivalrously looked after by Messrs Istvanski and Howeser
• The train journey home was excruciatingly slow and sweaty
• Another fine gig with great company
• Mine’s a fizzy water next time

Photo: (that's me and Lemmy doing some after-show rose action backstage in case you were wondering)?

Faces Of Meth

This should be shown in every secondary school around the world. Shocking.

Learn To Spell Why Don't You?

For all those tossers clogging up my sitemeter searching for mans pennis photo's and man fingers pennis - looks like you need to go back to skool! B minus - get a life.

Ponderings

For some reason I was googling worst mullet ever in an idle three seconds today. Why I ask myself? I don't bloody know! the other side of my brain shouts. Then I stumbled across an Australian Top Ten of worst hairdo's of all time as conducted by Braun in a telephone survey for Australian broadsheet The Age. So - please relax and imagine if you can dearly beloved and departed Alan 'Fluff' Freeman at the controls and here goes for the Top Ten Worst Ever Hair-Don'ts. Not 'alf you beautiful lot!

Straight in at Number 10 - it's the Mohican - you haven't heard the last of them yet!

Next up at Number 9 - like a fish out of water - that's a mullet and a half mate - not alf!


Number 8 - can you hear it buzzing? It's the beehive!

Going downtown the chips are definately down at Number 7 - it's helmet head:

Straight in at Number 6 - it's New it's Romantic - It's New Romantic:

Halfway to paradise in a back-combed Bouffant - it's Number 5 - should be 666 - it's a fright alright!

Just teased in at Number 4 - it's the bad perm ladies...ahem...and gentlemen..

It's straight alright - in at number 3 - is he straight alright?


A shocking entry - certainly not straight at Number 2 - crimped mate - oh dear - don't try this at home kids:

Drum Roll

Trumpet Fan Fare

And certainly holding it's own at Number 1 for the 37th year running iiiiiit's The Pageboy!
Everyone wanted it, grown men lusted after it. A stunner at Number One. Goodnight. Stay tight. All right!

Versatile

Oh No!

I need some help. And I probably should mail 'halp' which I will do in due course - but - does anyone know why on earth when people mail me to the address in my profile that even though the mail gets to me it seems to be registered as someone/something else - namely marcie@store.com? Does this mean someone is using my mail id to buy stuff? Store.com is a shopping site. I'm really worried about this.

Blovelling

I went out for a lovely evening midweek with the collectively most clever and beautiful Miss Slaminsky and Miss Great She Elephant (in no particular order). On the second bottle of vino tinto we decided to start a participation novel - or blovel for want of a better word. All of the details are up on Great She's main blog and her very splendid Halp blog. We will probably set up a shared blog to do it and have already got around 12 participants. Basically, you can write 1000 words or a chapter - whatever you prefer and the starting theme is still being discussed. I will post again with link once it is up and running. We aim to get it published on Lulu first of all. Anyone interested drop me or GSE/Halp or Slaminsky a line.

I'm Just A Love Machine

Geoff and Betty are off on holiday to sunny blobby Cornwall so I thought I'd do a quick post especially for them - something to talk about on the journey - especially impossibly yellow tight shorts. This clip made me realise where I must have got inspiration for this from.

Yes! Paula Yates of course. Anyway - here she is looking rather fab in tight rock t-shirt and leather jeans reclining on an unmade bed (where else?) with Jools reminiscing about how impossibly fabulous Wham's version of 'Love Machine' actually was on the Tube in 1983. And I have to say - it is rather brilliant. Have a lovely holiday Betty and Geoff - I guess we'll all be here wittering away about the good old days when you are back. Don't go into any of those fancy tea-shops with tinternet connections and locally knitted potplants will you?

You say Roumania I say Romania!

Goodness - I am on a creative roll this morning. There has been a bit of cultural talk over at Dick and Istvanski's over the last few days about Romania. Here are a few of my pictures from my weekend visit to Bucharest in June 2004.

The wad of notes on the table was what I got out of the cashpoint when I typed in £20. The currency was buggered and had so many noughts after it even the Romanians had trouble keeping up with adding up stuff in shops etc. Put it this way - there wasn't enough room on a normal calculator to calculate the total of a few simple items.

View out of taxi window. It had Aer Conditionat and you had to get in quick as the taxi driver didn't want to upset the temperature balance and let any hot air in!

Main drag. I had to go to a 'mall' to find something to wear for an end of shoot party. When I got there there weren't any clothes shops - just lots of people sitting around eating icecream and a plethora of plastic shoe and meat and chemist shops.

Up the road from the mall - bottoms on the side of a building. I took the photo and then started humming Queen's 'Fat Bottomed Girls (make the rockin' world go round)' to myself. Then I hailed another Aer Condiionat.

Serial Killer Chicken downtown....bloody Coca Cola everywhere ('ahh - coka cole - symbol of free West as Mr Balowski (Alexei Sayle) once said so profoundly in the Young Ones)

View from the hotel room at dusk. Quite grey. There is a lot of grey in Bucharest. Nice parks though and great antique shops stuffed full of art deco gems.

Ceaucescu's monstrous palace/bunker on mega wobbly zoom. The third largest building in the world after the Pentagon. 4600 chandeliers, a thousand rooms and hallways, 300 ft reception hall, nuclear bunker, 12 million pieces of marble, hideous.

Resting - feet on coffee table.

Thank you - that was Romania from a Sat lunchtime to a Sunday night.

Corgi's Poodles and Kate Bush

It's amazing where a simple thought can lead you. I've just been over at Llewtrah's clogging up her comments box about the 'minced Corgi incident' which was featured on the news earlier this week. Which then led me to mention the 'poodle-pie eating incident' with Robert Morley in the very famous Hammer film 'Theatre of Blood'. I use to love Hammer Horror films as a child despite the fact I used to scare myself rigid by watching them in the dark and having to peep through my hands that were covering my face for most of the film. I guess we used to make our own 'themed' nights in those days........So off I trot to youtube in search of that infamous scene thinking I might put it up on here for everyone to laugh at. But instead I got side-tracked by Kate Bush's performance of Hammer Horror in 1979. I wonder who the man in the balaclava and dance tights was? Of course I would never slag off the Mighty Bush but this clip made me laugh almost as much as if I had found the clip of Robert Morley being forced to eat poodle pie. Enjoy it for all is datedness - late 70's picture feedback trails, dodgy interpretive dancing and Kate almost asphyxiating balaclava man with her mighty boosh of hair flicking.