BEYOND THE IMPLODE 3 - BRITISH AIRWAYS 0

Fellow hitch-hikers on the autobahn of life - let's get the important screeve out of the way first - am I the only person who thinks it might, just might, be considered a portent of catastrophe 'n' doom to have a whale kick the bucket in your capital city? Imagine, for a second, that our most venerated city columnists actually did something useful and documented London life ((instead of trying to score sex through schadenfreude)), and bequeathed a wond'rous stack of archives to future generations. '21/01/06. A WHALE EXPIRED ON THE APPROACH TO SHADWELL. AND IN EAST LONDON, A COAT WAS ARRESTED.' See, it's not difficult. Ain't exactly Thomas Pynchon, you dig?

"Oh BTi", the Kraftwerk fans implore, "what is more hip, owning Computer World or the German-language Computerwelt?" "Ja, mein krankenhaus ist kaputt!" I spit back. Clearly, owning Lee Perry's Disco Devil is much wiser than giving a toss either way, but try telling them that....

Anyway, it's come to my attention that some bloggers have been LIBELLING me, besmirching my good name, calling me "completely fucking nuts" or accusing me of pretending to be a "violent punk". What utter bilge. Mine is the ultimate sanity, and my commitment to the proliferation of good manners - even if forced at gunpoint - is notorious. Just to prove that it's the rest of the world that needs a spell in detox (I've kicked fags again, btw), here's one of the most ludicrous email press releases I've ever witnessed - I swear this isn't made up

Okay we're obsessed with MP3s. It seems that everyone has one hanging around their neck or training for the marathon with them glued to their ears. We know that they could make us deaf but we still love 'em.

Yes, we do seem to bleat on about security, but hey that's the business we're in! So we've put together a lovely article on the risks of MP3s - to wake up all those naïve managers who innocently believe that their staff are just using them to download and listen to music.

We're here to tell them that there's a dark and murky side to MP3s, for example they can store the entire contents of their office on them! And what happens when the MD who has saved the draft annual report or confidential details of all his customers accidentally forgets his prized MP3 on the tube on the way home?

Cripes - it could just get picked up by a competitor, opportunist or heavens above a journalist who has being dying for an opportunity to expose a company like this - at last!!!

Somebody actually sent out an email with the term 'Cripes', warning bosses that the entire contents of their offices could be circulating around a coven of iPods. This is incredible, in fact, if you're one of the many BTi readers without a steady job, and are only just waking up now, crack open a can of lager and sit back and congratulate yourself - this is what you're 'missing out on' by not seeking gainful employment in the Big City.

RIP Electric Dreams, it seems - ironic in a way, given the death of the whale, famed source of income for the harpoon-wielding hard drinkers of Sandefjord.

It was another Monday morning at the Music and Video Exchange! Jez Snide was pricing up a pile of CDs. On each pricing card, he wrote a derisory comment about the artist involved, marvelling at his own wit.

A woman approached the counter, clutching a copy of the first Layabouts album. Snide rolled his eyes, sneered contemptuously, and snapped the record sleeve out of her hand. The Layabouts were so over, what was this stupid cow on? Just because the group's singer had been arrested for drug offences, this dame obviously thought the group was cool - even though they hit their real peak in November 2004. He shuffled out into the backroom, sat down on a footstool, and plugged in his laptop, to compose a piece on Skream for his dubstep blog.

He was so engrossed in this epistle that he failed to hear Barry Pickles creeping up behind him...'til it was too late!

"HA HA!" Pickles roared, booting the base of the footstool, sending Snide crashing to the floor, and his laptop spinning under a record rack. Pickles was well known as a racist, sexist, homophobic, bullying moron, though he'd managed to convince the branch manager, Sheena Moorgate, that this was due to him being an unreconstructed prole, and thus totally acceptable, save in the eyes of boring, university-educated middle class liberals. And nobody wanted to identify with THEM!

"Bastard!" Snide cried.
"Oi, guess what, I fucked this bird and her mum last night, they were both gagging for my cock", Pickles belched.
"You're an animal", Snide spat back.
"Excuse me!" called the woman at the counter.
"Oh...piss off!" Snide shouted back, his face still red with the humiliation of being shoved off his perch by the cretinous Pickles. "I saw the Layabouts in 2003 before Johnny Morphine sold out, you've missed the boat, you fat old sow!"
"Well, fuck you too!" the woman called back.
"I spunked all over their fannies and all" Pickles yelled.

Snide stormed out of the backdoor, and lit up a fag. Everyone knew that Sheena Moorgate had a brain tumour, and her role as branch manager would soon be up for grabs. Jez fancied himself in this managerial position. And when he got there,by Christ, there'd be no Barry fucking Pickles to aggravate him!!

****************

Sheena Moorgate sat with Jim Scowl in the Portobello Star. The pub had, until recently, been a hangout for The Layabouts and their hangers-on, but it was small and cosy, and the beer was cheap. Scowl wasn't particularly interested in Moorgate or her incessant whining about the pressures of her job. But being taken out for a pint by the boss was a preferable alternative to having to breathe the same air as those pricks Jez Snide and Barry Pickles. Scowl was also pleased that he'd been asked out, as it was well known that Moorgate was scheduled to have serious surgery in a month's time....and there was nothing he wanted more than to become new branch manager in her absence!
"I mean, this stupid little workman, he keeps waking me up at 9.30am with his drilling", Moorgate moaned, lighting up her 48th fag of the day.

Suddenly....Barry Pickles and Jez Snide entered the pub!! Scowl clenched his fist in anger. The Star was his pub. HIS! His sanctuary of refuge when he wanted a quiet pint away from the store. He should never have brought Moorgate here. And now, these two wankers had found it as well!

"Alright, poofs" Pickles saluted. "What's that gay German shit you're drinking? I'm having a London Pride...white pride!!"

"Oh, Barry", Moorgate muttered.

"What?" Barry retorted. "I can't help it if I grew up surrounded by racial tension. This is what you academics don't understand, the plight of white working class youth!"

"I'm not an academic" Moorgate mithered. "I came to this job straight from a Business Studies A-level"

"I'm off", Scowl announced, draining his pint and stomping out.

"Probably off down the toilets, to fuck a bloke!" Pickles tittered, winking at Snide, who was glaring venomously at a youth in a Layabouts T-shirt. Pickles didn't like Snide. All he cared about was Moorgate popping her clogs. It would be the ideal opportunity for him to convert the MVE into an imitation of the long-defunct Brick Lane skinhead record and clothing shop, Last Resort....an opportunity Pickles was determined not to miss!!

***********

Gustav Carrion was in charge of the Avant Garde and Experimental records section, in the upstairs part of the store. Carrion despised the world. Most people were pathetic drones, going about their sad, humdrum, media-saturated lives, clueless as to the genius of Robert Ashley and Anima. The 53-year old lit up a roll-up, and settled back to the strains of some prime Gordon Mumma, recorded back in the 1960s.

His ponytail suddenly stood to attention as he noted a stunning, Mediterranean-looking goth chick with blue hair, flipping through the 'FLUXUS' rack!! His eyes bulged as his heartbeat sped up to an Amen break. Immediately, he envisaged himself and her, a companion for life, a nubile soulmate who actually knew about La Monte Young, and who he'd get to have loads of sex with! It'd be them against the world....and then, when Sheena Moorgate died and he was appointed branch manager, he'd fire the other losers and reign supreme over an experimental musica emporium, with this gorgeous avant garde angel in tow! She would understand...FINALLY, FOR ONCE IN HIS LIFE, A GIRL WHO'D UNDERSTAND!!

Clearing his throat, Carrion nervously approached her. "Superb..." he whispered. "You know, a number of those records are from my own personal collection, they're far too rare for mass public consumption!"

"Oh.." the girl said. "I think I've got the wrong rack. I'm looking for Flux Of Pink Indians, you got any mate?"

Carrion responded as if he'd been slapped in the kisser. "P...Punk WHORE!" he screamed. The chick managed to squeeze past him and leg it to the door, as he lunged at her, sending him tripping into empty space, and knocking down a hanging display of Whitehouse LPs, priced at a modest £200 apiece, which clattered around his ears.

******************
"Skrewdriver were the best rock band ever!" Barry was telling the barmaid. He was now the only drinker in the Star, save for a smartly dressed city boy, reading The Independent. The barmaid yawned and stuck 'Eastenders' on the TV. With only 90p left in his pocket, there wasn't much for Pickles to do, except go back to his Bow flat for some wrist action.He decided instead to go back to the store to steal some records. As he left the pub, the suit folded up his paper, and followed the bonehead outside into the frosty winter night!

As Pickles was letting himself back into the store, the gent suddenly leapt from the shadows, forcing the skin to the ground and knocking him out cold. Dragging Barry's unconscious body beneath the 'ROCK / POP' racks (which Snide had earlier scribbled 'MAINSTREAM SHIT' over), the suit then snuck upstairs. Avant garde records were worth a fortune - there was easily about £10,000 worth of vinyl up there, which he'd easily punt to mugs on eBay.

However...nothing prepared him for the sight he witnessed as he entered the top room and flicked on the light! Gustav Carrion was prostrated on the floor, his trousers round his knees, a line of Girls Aloud dolls laid out before him. Emitting a volley of guttural sobs, Carrion was masturbating frantically and smashing each of the dolls with a clawhammer!

"Jesus!" cried the suit. Carrion panicked, trying to scramble to his feet, but smashed the top of his head off the sharp steel border of one of the record racks, killing him instantly. The suit raced downstairs, accidentally tripped over one of Barry Pickles' protruding ankles, and hurtled through the front window of the shop, rolling across the pavement. A passing car screeched to a halt to avoid him, though as the driver lost control, the vehicle ploughed into Jez Snide, who'd been cycling, inebriated, across the street at the time.

******

"So, my own staff were stealing from me. Cunts!!" Sheena Moorgate snarled, as she surveyed the wreckage in the store. Jim Scowl had obviously left the pub early to disguise himself as a city gent, and was as guilty as Barry Pickles of attempting to defraud the hand that fed him! With Snide and Carrion both dead, it looked like there was nobody to assume the reins.

"Oh ho" laughed two cops as they bundled Pickles and Scowl into the back of a van, "You'll have plenty of time to play the hard nut in Brixton! You'll get 5 years for this, you thieving little scrotes!"

"Mother!" Pickles wailed as the van door slammed on him.

Suddenly, Sheena let out a piercing scream, and fell to the floor, gripping her head. After a few convulsions and jerks, she was dead.

"Blimey", said one of the cops, "Didn't even give me time to radio for an ambulance! Oh well. Guess they'll turn this place into a teak furniture store now"


READERS - BUYING CDs AND RECORDS ONLINE IS KILLING YOUR LOCAL RECORD STORES. ALL OVER LONDON ALONE, STORES ARE CLOSING DOWN, UNABLE TO COPE WITH EXORBITANT RENTS AND A LACK OF CUSTOM. GLADDY WAX, DADDY KOOL, RECKLESS - - WHO'LL BE NEXT? PERHAPS THE STORE ON YOUR STREET, THE ONE YOU NEVER FREQUENT BECAUSE YOU'RE TOO BUSY BUYING THINGS OFF AMAZON AND WALLOWING IN YOUR OWN LAZINESS?? IF YOU GENUINELY CARE ABOUT MUSIC, BUY IT FROM LOCAL STORES AND SUPPORT THE SCENE THAT SUPPORTS YOU.

Have you ever been to an evangelical Christian shindig? It's quite an experience. There's old blokes in jumpers, gurgling phrases like "SLAMIDAMISMANGMANGMANGMANG" into microphones. There's half-blind, warty, bumfluff-sporting youths, strumming improv pieces on acoustic geetar and looking slightly dazed by it all ; there's grannies and housewives, fainting and hitting the deck, overcome by the intoxicating nature of the ritual babbling in tongues ; oh, and foxy girls in extremely tight mini-skirts and too much make-up.

"Why so the latter?" you may demand. Well, it's a good question, and one of the many questions I've spent years pondering, alongside such enigmas as, "Why do I keep thinking Hitler's dog was called 'Goldi' instead of 'Blondi'?" AND "Why haven't government inspectors raided the kitchen in Jamie Oliver's restaurant and presented the public with a full breakdown of the REAL nutritional 'value' of the fare he's dishing up to his punters?" (BTW - parents - feeding your kids pre-packaged junk is NOT going to make them under-achievers ; why, as a child, I devoured tin after tin of alphabet spaghetti, and by rolling the toxic salt and tomato puree'-soaked letters between my lips, greedily sucking these arcane pasta texts like a vampire felching a bullet wound on Candi Staton's inner thigh, I attained knowledge and came to truly appreciate the mysteries of the English language, learning the meanings of great words like 'ISTHMUS' and 'BESMIRCH' by the age of eight. As for Oliver - "THAINBURYTH NEW POTHATHOTH!!!"?? - I rest my case)

But yes, why do evangelical gatherings draw these girls? There's 3 possible answers. Firstly, is that they dress in this way so as to attract random blokes off the street. This practice was most commonly utilised by the Children of God (AKA The Family) in 1970s America, and was referred to as "flirty fishing". Basically, it was a simple trade-off ; pull a bloke off the street, promising him umpteen bouts of debauchery, bring him back to meet the group, and then convert him and get him to join the sect. Jesus doesn't mind a bit of smut if it catches Him a live one.

Alternatively, they may simply have been testing the resolve of the male members of the group. Even St Marcello, the holy man of Bergamo Alta, was tempted away from an 122-day fast by the Devil, who offered him a teenage Egyptian concubine who could piss pure wine, if only he'd relent and take a nibble on some foccacia bread. For this lapse in discipline, the monk was chased out of Italy and relocated to Scotland, where he made a killing by exploiting his bride's streams of pee, which he sold by the bottle under the brand name 'Buckfast' (he literally bucked his fast right off). He was later canonised as the Patron Saint of Pelvic Well-being .

But no, Explanation 3's the most plausible - these girls were there to meet some well hung Christian boys. And seeing as I was there purely to meet some Christian girls, having grown bored of punkettes in Conflict T-shirts, we all went home empty-handed, save for the haunting memory of 40 people clapping their hands and singing a raucous ditty called "LORD, YOU PUT A TONGUE IN MY MOUTH". Give me the crypto-fascist Catholics any day - I know they're responsible for blighting millions of lives, but at least they use incense...

Ah, but a better question - and indeed, the point of this whole fucking post. You are me. Your parents are Irish. You were born and reared in England. England are in the World Cup. Who do you support?

Well, I'm proud to announce that BTi is now officially the Blog sponsor of PARAGUAY, the greatest national team ever. I've always loved Paraguay ; they represent the unacceptable face of South American football, the true punk rock rebels battling on, regardless of the fact that the rest of the world would rather smugly champion Brazil as its 'second team', while lambasting Paraguay for the minor affront of kicking seven shades out of anyone who tries to take the ball off them.

Ah yes, Brazil and the 'beautiful game' ; as beautiful as lying back and toking up to an 18-minute Santana guitar solo. Face it, all you self-satisfied prudes who'll be posing in your ugly yellow shirts on the Portobello Road this summer, should England exit the tournament early on (though let's all sincerely pray that Brazil are dumped out of the first round) - you just want the 'certainty' of backing a supposedly 'legendary' team. A team that nobody dares to slag off, because they're so nice and 'cool'! And most of you hypocrites then have the audacity to slag off Man U's fanbase for being glory-hunters and not actually coming from Manchester!

Right, sod all you 'samba fascists' ((C) Mark K-Punk, 2005) - I'm putting my money where my mouth is, and have just entered the final ballot for (relatively cheap) World Cup tickets, including the Paraguay vs Trinidad game. I'm already getting my 'PARAGUAY YIDS' banner ready in preparation. I've also put in for Argentina vs Serbia, as the thought of another mighty but despised South American team taking on a load of fascist skinheads is way too tempting to miss! ((Sorry, England - I like Argentina too, but that's mostly because Ricky Villa and Ossie Ardiles used to play for Tottenham. And cos it reminds me of the time my sisters used to wind up the neighbours by singing "ONE! TWO! THREE! FOUR! / ARGENTINA WIN THE WAR!", after next door hung up a Union Flag in the window))

Oh, and I've also gone for Angola vs Iran - let's hope nuclear war doesn't break out first. Never mind the statistics, tactics, and reasonable post-match analyses - get out to Germany and back yourself a proper team. Why, Paraguay are so utterly underground, you can't even get their team shirts in the UK. Prior to the 1998 and 2002 World Cups I actually resorted to ringing up the Paraguayan Embassy in London, to find out how I could get one, and ended up severely bugging some poor guy called Alberto, who sadly couldn't understand what I was on about. I'll let you know in a month or so if Alberto still works there, but in the meantime, if any representatives of Asociacion Paraguaya de Futbol fancy sending me a free shirt, please get in touch.