Monday, April 28, 2008

CLASH OF THE MORONS

My attitude to the revolution's always been very simple: when it all kicks off and Westminster's reduced to a smouldering ruin, give me a shout, I'll be down the pub. It's just all the waiting around and theorising that turns me off. I want to see Parliament Square ablaze, like some demented Bosch triptych - forgive me if I take a raincheck on the meetings about who's sorting out the sandwiches for the barricades. The way I see it, if you arrange some work with a removals firm, it's your responsibility to wrap up the crockery and secure all your Italian new wave rarities in a sturdy packing crate. Don't blame the man with the van if your priceless Dennis the Menace mug gets smashed in transit because you couldn't be bothered to wrap it up properly in a moth-eaten Jesus & Mary Chain T-shirt. Do you understand where I'm coming from? You've read Trotsky, Marx and Zizek, I haven't, so YOU work out how it all leads up to a molotov-fuelled prole riot, sweeping gleefully down the Mall in a carnival of communist devastation - and, once you're ready to go, give me a buzz on the mobile.

I've got a vested interest in smashing the state and aborting the system: I'm still pissed off over being forced to cough up my TV license fee last year. As a result, I've been spending hours watching BBC programmes, just to ensure I get my money's worth. I've become au fait with utter tripe like Falcon Beach and Newsnight Review, not to mention John Craven's Countryfile. But worst of all's been some junk called Last Man Standing, which had me screaming infernal obscenities at the idiot box like God himself wouldn't believe.

Basically, for anyone who hasn't seen it, here's the 'concept': six Western ponces get to fly around developing countries, where they compete against local indigenous tribes in various tests of endurance. The ponces are drawn from the UK (( a 'spiritually attuned' hippie plonker, a Brummie kickboxer and some Oxbridge toff) and the US (( an amiable but thick muscleman, a BMX racer with a mental age of 4 and some Alaskan personality void)). The Corporation could have sent these jokers down the Red Cow in Peckham at closing time to assess how fucking 'tough' they are, and squandered my money on something semi-interesting instead - but, oh no - as if these tribes hadn't suffered enough under decadent Western capitalist exploitation, they now had to accommodate this bunch of preening dickwits as well.

Still, there seemed plenty of scope for serious injury and bloodshed, so I gave it a go. Christ, what a disappointment. One of their first 'challenges' was to take part in a ZULU STICK FIGHTING competition - which, the presenter droned, can easily result in fatalities. The camera then honed in on a black bloke lying in the grass with his head split open, gushing torrents of claret into the yellowing grass. Great, I couldn't wait for the Zulu experts to batter these turds into the witchdoctor's hut! "WHITE MAN, PERISH!" I roared at the screen every time one of the nobheads popped up, churning out sub-Apprentice gush, like "I don't believe in losing - I'm here to win", "I'm gonna kick his ass..I'm at my peak, so I just need to stay mentally focused now..." and"I'm doing this to make my family proud" (what a cunt!). The thought of the toff having his skull fractured under an almighty blow from a swooshing Zulu stick made me so excited I had to dash into the kitchen, to crack open a bottle of Guinness and a packet of smokey bacon.

Ah no, twas not to be - the ponces all got away with nothing more serious than a few cuts and bruises. The only conclusions I could draw from this utter travesty were:

a) Zulu warriors are powder puffs

OR

b) It was inevitable that, despite the Boy's Own bravado on offer, this fucking shambles of a show was never going to put the 'competitors' in serious danger. No headhunter or Mongolian wrestler's REALLY going to whack the living earwax out of some Western thrill-seekers who've greased a few police, military and government palms in order to get an armed escort into these remote areas ((that's how illegal miners and loggers operate, by the way, when they trespass on endangered tribes' land, raze their resources and leave toxic garbage strewn everywhere)).

Anyway - the only episode I found remotely joyous was the one on TROBRIAND CRICKET, which pisses all over the conventional game, involving some riotous voodoo dance routines. An hour-long documentary about this sport would have been good, but rather than fill us in with any detailed info on the rituals and their history, the programme makers simply sullied my TV screen with endless pop-ups of the whinging prats banging on about how exhausted they were! "I'm finding it hard...I'm just relying on my concentration and will power now.." the hippie wretch blurted, while what I howled by way of reply is too sick to relate to you on a Monday, dear browser - even by this blog's usual gutter-level standards. Surprise surprise, none of 'our' competitors got a lethal googly in the nads. In fact, by this point in the series, the only injuries I'd picked up on were a couple of blisters, a sore neck, a bruised rib and some heatstroke. Talk about swindling the license fee payer.

But - naively, I suppose you could call it - I held out a smidgeon of hope for some major calamity to befall at least one of the cretins before the dismal series ground to a halt. Perhaps on the last episode, where they went 'canoe racing', the hippie pillock would be torn to pieces by a discerning alligator, or suffer the agonising humiliation of having a candiru fish wriggle up his Jap's eye and munch upwards 'til it hit prostate gland. He fell in the water umpteen times, but pulled through the challenge unscathed. Shedding hot tears of frustration, I booted the TV set repeatedly until the picture went all funny and suddenly switched itself over to ITV.

And what has the casual viewer of Last Man Standing actually learnt? Indigenous tribes dress funny, eat weird things and have nothing better to do than bear children and devise wacky sports for mutilating one another. Still, you can't say the BBC's not consistent. Meanwhile, gold miners in Brazil are exposing Amazonian locals to TB and smallpox, polluting their dwellings and sexually assaulting women and children in the Yanomami tribe along the way...maybe the Beeb can find a couple of rugby-digging postgrads to head over and challenge them to a spot of front crawl...

Oh, and what was up with that fucking White series? I didn't hear a note of Skrewdriver once.

Monday, April 07, 2008

NO WAVE - LUTON 1980 STYLE!

This one's dedicated to Neil at TRANSPONTINE and all other former/current Luton punks - hopefully this'll make up for any unfairly negative things I've gushed about the place. Great live rendition of "November Car Crash" by Lutonian ratbags THE FRICTION, which is up there with "Warm Leatherette" and "Holland Tunnel Dive" for post-punk odes to dying horrendously in a steaming hot bath of blood and petrol. Think I prefer the first half of the video, with its black and white drawings - though you could always shoot a new version, driving slowly around Hockwell Ring and Leagrave - or you could just listen to it and not look at the monitor. Ah, do what you like, this isn't fucking 'Hitler blog'. Lower East Side? Brian Eno? Pah, who needs ya?


WORLD OF SPORT 2




So, THAT'S the new Wembley stadium then? I went along on Saturday to check out West Brom vs Portsmouth in the FA Cup semi-final. I didn't pay, which was just as well, cos the only drinks available were plastic bottles of Carlsberg piss ((a generous £3.50 each)). For the suckers who hadn't eaten before the match, there was some modestly priced fare ((cheeseburger and chips=£7.99, fish and chips= £8.99)). The whole stadium feels like an airport, with just as many pointless security men bimbling around, the worst being the porkers in blue jackets with RESPONSE UNIT stamped on the backs.

Alcohol is forbidden during the match, and the Response Unit are the bods who ensure nobody returns to their seats with their warm Carlsberg hidden in a cardboard Coca Cola beaker. Smoking is also forbidden anywhere in the stadium but, after the match, me and a couple of people managed to sneak into the rows at Block 244 and took photos of each other lighting up against the Wembley backdrop for posterity, minutes before the Response Unit came hobbling towards us. Maybe they were scared we'd set fire to all the concrete.

Oh yeah, the game. Well, it was crap, to be honest. I wanted West Brom to win, only cos I think Portsmouth's Play up Pompey...Pompey play up! chant is feeble, and I've probably met more cool Southampton fans in my time. West Brom, of course, go for "Poing" by Rotterdam Termination Source, though the best chants were on their way into the ground, when a load of Baggies fans surrounded a speaker playing the perennial rocksteady classic Liquidator, yelling "FUCK OFF PORTSMOUTH....WEST BROM!" over the swirling organ loop in the 'chorus' bit. Anyway, I've made enough enemies online in 4 years of this blogging schtick, so let's just say I was 'neutral'. The game was dull, the weather was cold, New Wembley sucks. Bring back the upper tier toilets that were basically a trough nailed into a brickwork shed...

Sporting event of the weekend, though, has to be the Olympic Flame being snatched away from Konnie Huq. I really detest this vacuous cow - just check out the slow-motion news footage of her face, as the protester makes a grab for the torch. See what I mean? No emotional response. The rictus grin remains, her eyes like buttons in a stuffed bear's head. You could shoot a couple of orphans in front of her, and you'd be lucky if she gave an "Oh, my" and jerked her neck slightly, before resuming her ghoulish 1,000-yard stare and flashing the kind of pseudo-smile they force students to adopt for college brochures, to show that life's all sexy and funky on the Ancient History and Social Anthropology course. To hell with her and all Olympics celebrations! Still, nice to see the filth get some exercise.

By the way, if any of you bet on Hedgehunter...ha ha, tough shit. What you SHOULD have done was put your hand in your pocket, and invested heavily in my 'Occult Horse Racing System' - the initiates to which are now chortling their way to the bank, after I successfully identified Comply or Die as the winning nag. I dunno, sometimes I wonder if people think I make this stuff up for a cheap snigger...

Tuesday, April 01, 2008

OFFICIAL - RIOTING IS GOOD FOR YOU!



IF you’re feeling depressed, under the weather or poorly, you might want to skip the Omega 3 capsules and Thai head massage, and instead head for the April 6th London (UK) demo against the carrying of the Olympic Flame - with a cache of bottles and bricks.

That’s the staggering claim made by Dr Morton Cairnway, a healthcare specialist based in London (Canada). "Rioting is a perfectly legitimate form of self-therapy and, unlike most of these so-called ’treatments’ on the market, it’s completely free," Cairnway comments.

The doctor continues: "Rioters run around a lot, which can only be a good thing - they get to burn calories while they’re burning cars, as well as boosting their serotonin levels. From a psychological point of view, it’s also a great opportunity to interact with others. We’re social beasts, ultimately. Let’s face it, everyone wants to look good and have nice things, so looting shops is an excellent means of increasing self-confidence and satisfaction - and also involves beneficial cardiovascular exercise."

"YOU’VE GOT TRUNCHEONS, DIE BY THE BRICK"

Dr Cairnway has previously studied the effects of rioting on UK-based patients, and believes that the results speak for themselves. "I surveyed 20 people, ranging from teenagers to 50-year olds, who participated in the anti-Criminal Justice Act riot in Hyde Park in 1994," the physician reveals.

"A week after the event, I noted massive improvements in their concentration levels, feelings of self-esteem and their abilities to cope with stress. They genuinely seemed more contented and, when quizzed on the topic, all admitted that they’d very much like to partake in more riots in the future.

"HARRY ROBERTS IS OUR FRIEND"

Cairnway also believes that rioting may lead to increased libido and fertility. However, he has been slammed by Metropolitan Police commissioner Sir Ian Blair, who described the doctor’s findings as "highly irresponsible" and "an incitement to thuggery and mindless violence."

The Canuck quack counters: "Sure, I have my critics, but I believe they’re full of shit. I’ve seen the positive health benefits of rioting on numerous occasions, and no mealy-mouthed argument from some overpaid department of health minister will convince me otherwise. Perhaps rioting should be added to the roster of Olympic sports.

"Ian Blair probably thinks it’s ’responsible’ to run around shooting Irishmen when they come out of the pub or Brazilians who use the tube. He doesn’t like rioting because the police seem so bad at it these days - it’s a defeatist attitude, which probably sums up his poor state of mental health."

(Reuters)

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