I take pictures of people when they aren't looking and sometimes write about them - bullet notes in the back of my notebook like this:
Sitting next to a boy desperately coating himself in Allure Pour Homme as if his life depended on it. Mad US tourists with bottoms like wobbly half-filled water bags cramming in and shouting "one stop" to their party. Walk you fools!
Exasperated camp man in a bright green polo shirt has flumped next to me in a huff. I can see his tummy. His shirt doesn't fit which mirrors his manner in a funny but awkward way. He is reading the list of ingredients on a jar of marmalade.
Today is an odd day on the tube.
Anyway this is all by way of saying that my dedicated Tube Tales site now has a new home HERE.
Never before has food been quite so contentious and disgusting.
Ladies and Gentlemen - I give you - The Lasagnwich! The Lasagnwhat? You heard!
Suddenly there is temptation to start speaking like Peter Kay and walking around shouting and pointing in mock disbelief:
"Lasagnnnnwich"?
"Lasagne! In a sandwich?"
"A sandwich ? With lasagne in it"?
Yes - with a mighty dollop of mayonnaise slathered in between both sides presumably to help the starch slip down with yet more fatty imbued starch I guess. It could be worse - it could be deep-fried? Or god forbid in a tin like this poor unfortunate and rather flaccid looking whole albino chicken covered in what looks like obstetric scan gel?
I dread to think what else comes from Sweet Sue's Kitchen - but perhaps I'll save that for another post. In my forays I did come across a whole tinned cheddar which when grated looked like maggots on a platter. Apparently it goes down a storm in Australia due to the lack of fridges. Again, mind boggles.
Anyway, back to sandwich's. Imagine if you could get a sandwich in a can? Pardon the pun but you can! Well you were going to before the inventor took the $153 million investment money and spent it all on real estate, fast cars and horses for himself.
Actually I think he has done the world a favour - these won't be seeing the light of day now until the fraud case has been decided. Candwichman will be eating a different sort of sandwich from now on and in a different and rather ironically named new home - the can!
Goodness - it has been a long time. Seems that I have had a bit of a blogblock but am slowly overcoming it. Below is a bloody brilliant bit of complaining that my Dad has submitted to Jacky at the rather Kafa-esquely named Olympic Delivery Authority - Planning Decisions Team (what?):
In our time we have seen some vacuous bombast from Mr. Kapoor but this is literally astonishing in it's incoherence. The metallic surface/colour is that seen on pound shop flasks. It displays an utter lack of any indication of form/function/dynamic [see adjacent stadium & Thames basin light] and 'connecting' with the senses. The 'movement' of the whole - it's energy, is that of a coat-whirling lout drunk on cider at an Iron Maiden gig - circa 1980., or a Hammer Throw gone very, very, wrong.
Within the context of the site it looks as if a rogue scrap merchant has dumped this overnight, to despoil a site as would the worst of graffiti on a clean building. What is required is a clean simplicity that does reach for the stars - as does the 'Shard' . The very sight of the 'orbit' brings a shudder engendered by the worst of totalitarian monsters, the ethos of threat, oppression and thuggish dogma. Even the base entrance/platform is a dull hostile box - think 1950's army barracks. An accident that looks as if has already happened, or is delayed in time. It is vulgar to the point of insult.
It has no remarkable post-Olympic function such as a concert arena in the sky. Even though sheathed in it's lurid metallic lustre, being steel it will eat up maintainence funds when the east winds prevail October through April. I'm sorry, but we object and in the strongest terms possible. Thank you - JE.
I am off to see Iggy & The Stooges perform the whole of Raw Power as per the original 1973 line-up tonight. It will be strange not seeing Ron Asheton up there in his army jacket with his trademark stance of standing virtually still, dancing his elegant hands over the guitar strings and making an amazing sound like a cheesegrater being rubbed over the frets.
Even better the gig is at smelly old Hammersmith Apollo (nee Odeon) which has a bar that looks like it should be inhabited by extra's from Star Wars. I am so looking forward to this gig. But I am also trying very hard to resist the urge to dress like this:
or this:
I will probably end up going in something like this:
I took pictures of people while they weren't looking on the tube home last night.
Specimen 1: Aussie girls going home after working restaurant shift:
Specimen 2: Italian couple talking Italian. She had trout lips and very expensive leather gloves and they were fascinated with a passenger who had a doughnut in a clear carrier bag:
Specimen 3: A very glam long-legged woman reading a catalogue trying not to laugh:
Specimen 4: A man reading the koran. He was with mates who weren't into what he was doing. He was also with his much younger brother who should have been in bed!
There is a picture I didn't take out of respect (but wanted to) on the way into town. A painfully thin and obviously dying man sitting next to an also painfully thin man off his face on very strong drugs. The contrast was startling. Both men dying but at very different rates and brought together in a totally random formation in a city of millions. Who would have thought that they would have ended up sitting next to each other - both I am sure on very separate personal journeys. On the one hand a terminally ill man having probably one of his last night's out with his partner. He looked so thin and weak. His new thin shoulders swamped and awkward under his old, healthily-shouldered overcoat. I looked down and his shoes were very new and hardly worn. Brown and plain but filled with the most magnificently pink socks. A hint to a vibrance of the soul that still lurked as the remainder was being cruelly sucked away. I wanted to congratulate him on his choice of socks but he looked like he didn't want anyone to see him. I wanted to ask if I could take a picture of his shoes and socks as I knew this said so much about him but didn't out of respect. When he got up I could see why the shoes didn't look worn. Each step was very light and the foot placed with the least pressure possible. I could see the effort for him to walk was extraordinary and as he left the carriage I wondered how much it must of been for him to dress himself that evening. I could see his live determination as if it were fizzing. I imagine he won't be able to do that very soon. The man in the pink socks. I wish him well.
Hands up who had a gonk? Am I showing my age? What on earth possessed people to
(a) make these ? (b) buy them ? (c) collect them ?
I had a few - a turquoise fun fur one, a really ugly brown one that got bullied by the other gonks and my favourite one which was made of pale sugared-almond-pink rabbit fur. Actually it may have been baby kitten fur for all I know as it was handmade by my evil Nana. I had a nice 'Gran' and an evil 'Nana'. It was evil Nana that made me the gonks. I ended up getting quite bored of them and donated them to a really square girl who lived across the road from me called Rosemary. Rosemary had much older parents than mine and was really good. She never got into trouble and only ever wore skirts - and never dressed in anything unless it was static-inducing nylon.
She was always smiling despite the fact she never came out to play much or join in our mammoth riding up and down the street on our bikes sessions. I once invented a "Secret Spy Club" but didn't invite her to join because she was too boring and wouldn't bring biscuits to the meetings which was a proviso for joining. But quietly we were all a bit envious of Rosemary as she had a huuuge gonk collection and that was why we wanted to spy on her. The rumour went that she actually had a human size gonk amongst her 70-proud gonk collection but no one was ever allowed in to see them. Even after Rosemary had finally left home her mother said that she had kept her room as it was complete with full gonk collection. I am surprised she could get in it for all the gonks but there you go.
I always wondered what happened to Rosemary and her gonks.
Gil Scott-Heron Is Back! Update: free album preview.
Update: a little freebie from those lovely people at XL - you can preview the whole of the new album here:
>
I was beginning to worry that Gil Scott-Heron was never coming back after another spell in prison and an ongoing battle with serious illness. Here is a preview of the first release off the forthcoming album out Feb 08 2010. Apparently on tour in the UK April - if they let him in the country (Gil leave the drugs at home)! Let's hope he does and they do. I think this is great.
Enjoy.
And don't forget to watch, rate, share Rockmother Films' Rat Scabies Grailhunter Teaser here And if you love it that much you can become a fan here
Yes - we've been a bit busy over the last few months over here at Romo Towers digging the wondrous Mr Rat Scabies out of his West London habitat and sending him off on a mission which so far has taken him from Folkestone to France and back. The culmination of which is this three minute teaser film for what hopefully will eventually become a series. So without further ado I give you...Rat Scabies Grailhunter!
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New Year New Podcast New Brain New Seekers New New Now That's What I Call No.25!
Goodness gracious me - it's a New Year and a brand new podcast from The Rockmother. Yes I know - I almost fainted myself to be honest - mainly with the sheer effort of withstanding a 28 hour+ upload problem whilst preparing a New Years Eve meal and surviving an attack of pre-alzheimers to boot. There is a glaring error in this podcast - can you spot it? I'm off to order my trepanning kit because Father Christmas failed to bring me one this year - again.
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I have only ever seen Motorhead four times in my life - the first time was when I was 11 where my ears bled and I couldn't hear anything at school for the next week which was quite the best thing ever.At the gig me and my brothers turned to our Dad and shouted 'Daddeee, our ears really huuurt' We were told to stop moaning and put our fingers in our ears which we did for most of the show with a few goes of daring each other to take our fingers out at which point we would all scream and laugh because it felt like you were being hit by an express train of noise. Brilliant. Also especially brilliant was running around at the aftershow helping ourselves to everything while the adults got trashed.I then became a punk and decided I couldn't talk to or be seen with flare-wearing 'heavy metallers' - mainly pimplygeekboys with long dull mousy hair and cut off denim jackets with Journey and Motorhead patches sewn onto the back. Secretly I loved Ace of Spades which to me has always been more punk than metal but that's another story.
The other three gigs were much later in life and most recently the other week at timewarp Hammersmith Odeon. I mean the Apollo of course although it hasn't changed at all and is still the same old smelly, sticky, beery, dark Odeon. As I queued at the bar I could see a man and his no more than 10 or 11yr old son standing next to me. Thoughts of blimey I wonder what they are going to order? Two JD and Coke? ran through my mind. Surely not. Suddenly the Dad piped up: "Two vanilla icecreams please". I love that. A great mix of traditional theatre interval snack coupled with unbelievably loud and proper rock and roll. What more could an 11 year old want?
Next I went in search of the Ladies. I didn't really need a wee - I just wanted to eavesdrop on possibly amusing fan talk. There was a woman queuing who was dressed in a big mega shiny polyester basque and was apparently following every UK show on the current tour. Staggering. She was moaning about how she had been in Southend earlier in the week, had to go up to Wolverhampton the next day and was really pissed off The Damned were on as support as it meant she might miss her last train home to Ipswich. Now that is a dedicated fan. Then she spent at least 12 mins trying to stop her 'blimming flyaway hair'. Jesus christ woman - we are at a gig - a Motorhead gig - it's dark, and sweaty, and loud - fuck the flyaway hair that would be long gone by the middle 8 of Bomber!
I missed Girlschool who were on before The Damned - mainly due to eavesdropping as above. I could hear the chugga chugga of their only hit I know which is the one they originally performed with Motorhead "Please Don't Touch". Top tune. Perhaps that is their only hit but I'm sure not. I did get very organised and make sure that I didn't miss The Damned who were on great form. It is the only time I have heard Dave Vanian sing brilliantly. Really. He was incredible. Monty Oxymoron was leaping about like an excited demented Magnus Pyke from the underworld and La Sensible was tight tight tight. All in all quite neat neat neat despite the naff gimmick of the Captain being pretend-pulled off stage for trying to sing Happy Talk as an encore.
Next the atmosphere shifted and suddenly it felt like iron filings were filling the air with their heavy metallic tension. Lots of big boom boom on the bass drum and wheeling large hangings into place. Premature cheering. Flashing green lights - that sort of thing. Suddenly a big cheeeer-rraaargghhh roar.
I saw the top of Lemmy's big stetson hat floating across the stage - at that point I had the tallest man with the fattest neck suddenly come and stand in front of me. Not great when you are 5'3". He moved (after I shouted "for fuck's sake" a little too loudly).
Lemmy's wonderfully raspy opening salvo was exactly this:Hello. We are Motorhead and we play Rock and Fucking Roll.
(Vintage Top of Pops with Filthy Phil Taylor chewing gurning-gum madly)
And so they fugging do - brillliant vibrant rock and roll. Bomber, Rock With Your Cock Out, Metropolis, No Class, (Teach You How To) Sing the Blues were big highlights. I don't wholly get the whole proper metal thing really - Motorhead are more punk to me. I don't get the devil's hand point thing and I don't get the slightly overlong drum solo's impressive as they are. Leaping about yes - headbanging no - I just don't get it. The diehard fans love it and Motorhead love them back which is great. But what I do get is the noise (and the louder the better), the proper bluesy rock'n'roll chords and arrangements and the life of the rock and roller all gloriously breathed in and out night after night after night by a 64 year old man in tight black jeans and big boots who sure knows how to live. Impressive. Fun. Perfect.
you can see all, buy and find out more at Koestler Trust exhibition at the Royal Festival Hallhere - at weekends female offender curators of the exhibition take guided tours - brilliant scheme
and fairground art..
I love the silky airbrushed pseudo-realistic style of fairground art - makes it all the more exciting when you are there if they have the big colourful hordings everywhere. And I love the way they use celebrity to add to the smoke and mirrors effect of the fairground. Great people-watching too I always find.
Wolftank Systems. Stuffer. Thonegger. We are in an industrial area.
Italy passes by at night to the sound of The Watt From Pedro Show and WWM podcasts. Inspiring. Lost in other worlds transported by people talking about tv, stuff, music, tours and people. Love it.
Stars are out, the mountains are clear. People are kind.
Hot face, lots of wood. Listening to bass. Thump on the snow. Bag doesn't fit in, everyone in ski lift ignoring the smell of puke and blaming it on the cheese that someone is taking up the mountain. I don't think so.
The police won't let us pass and I get spooked going for a wee behind a derelict mountain house. I am sure I am being watched.
Lost in the time zone, floating on the road.
Trans Europe Express.
(Written on a drive from one location to another at night whilst filming in Italy).
