ISSUE 25 - march 2007
“There is no comfort. Our lives dismay us. We have dreams of leaving and it is the same for everyone I know.”
David Hare
For some of us, it's an endurance test, this 'living' business - something to SUFFER through rather than enjoy. But we’re not STUPID, so we’ll take our pleasures where we can find them, thank you very much. Life ISN’T a constant love marathon, it ISN’T about the soft focus pull of a Maria Carey video. THIS is what life’s about! This is the zine for boozers, losers and substance abusers - those people who REFUSE to join the de-clawed fake smilers of the rehab generation. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have a hangover to arrange. This issue written by Mark Ritchie and Gary Simmons. www.oocities.org/sniperglue is THE place to be online, sweetie-chops. Back issues of this zine are also available… you fuckin’ BET!
VULTURES, SORROW
coffee
quiet
the suddenness
of sadness
women walking
down the street
dressed in shame
there is no escape
only routine
birth
school
work
death
booze and then
the grave
we'll live and die
in these towns
in these shrouds
bathed in shades
of blue
and fading
like light
like hope
our bones
picked clean
in nature
nothing goes
to waste
THE POET AT WORK
The poet stares at
the page with great intent,
furrowing his brow and
running his left hand
over his closely cropped hair.
Occasionally, he will take
a sip from his pint glass
and glance around the bar
for a moment,
before returning to work.
What is he writing?
What marvellous words
of wisdom does he have to impart?
None of the other drinkers
seem to notice,
too busy with their chatter
and their 24-hour Sky Sports news.
But the poet is beyond
all of those cheap distractions,
furrowing his brow,
staring at the page
with great intent.
What a prick, I think,
as I watch from across the room,
doing exactly the same thing myself.
OFF THE RADAR
how come people have
this overwhelming desire
to inflict themselves
on one another?
to telephone,
to write,
to go round and visit?
ego-junkies, stalkers,
twisted souls rampaging
through other people’s lives.
i just don't get it.
me?
i'd rather be nowhere.
off the radar,
off the map.
i'd rather be a shadow
than a mole blinking at the daylight.
SNOWING IN THE SOUTH EAST
It's snowing in the South East,
the newsreader informs the nation
with all the solemnity
such terrible news demands.
Schools are closed,
power-lines are down
and people are stranded
in their vehicles.
As I drink my coffee,
I wonder what happens in Canada
or what happened HERE
back in the ‘60s and ‘70s
(and all the decades before THAT)
when we used to get REAL snow.
I think of the murders and shootings
that happen every day -
in Barnsley, Belfast, Bangor and Bo'Ness -
that go unreported as they are not deemed
'newsworthy' by the Biased Broadcasting Corporation.
It's snowing in the South East
and the rest of the country is LAUGHING
as it savours a rare chance
to stick it to those smug cunts
who take so much pleasure and delight,
the rest of the time,
in sticking it to US.
POSP15
he sat in the square
and he puked up all over
his brand new boots
and he looked up at the stars
and he said,
'fuck you, stars',
and he laughed and he laughed
before going home to die
SHROVE TUESDAY
Not yet 5pm
and you've nearly
finished your
second bottle of wine -
this is on top of
the Guinness and whiskey
from earlier.
Drooling on yourself,
you speak about the futility
of life and how
humanity is damned.
People at the table
drift away
as your eyes become
hopeless and terrified.
You spit on the carpet
but no-one seems to notice.
You are immune from harm,
invisible to all radar,
condemned to live forever
in a world you call 'Hell'.
Many times you nearly
smash the stem of your glass
as you return it to the table
too roughly, with clumsy abandon.
I pat you on the back
and say goodbye.
‘Don't go’, you say,
but I tell you that I must
and I leave you sitting there,
drooling, mumbling,
incoherent and inconsolable,
my friend in the flames,
my marvellous obsession,
my love.
13.7 BILLION YEARS OF HELL
Selected Dispatches from an Unwilling Player of Gods’ Little Game
By Gary Simmons
Dear Mark…
When I got back home I couldn’t park the car coz ‘they’ were cutting down a sick tree outside our house. Cunts. I do not LIKE ‘work men’. They think they’re sooo FUCKIN’ important, so FUCKIN’ INDISPENSABLE! Don’t they fuckin’ realise that it is US, underground JOURNOS and WRITERS and POETS and OMP ENTHUSIASTS and LOLITA COMPLEXED GODS, that hold the equilibrium of the universe in place?!?! FUCK dark matter and dark energy, I demand humanity sink to its collective knobbly knees before us! Pray, beg, worship, adore and BURN!!! BURN!!! Feel the power, the thrust, all three main engines running at 104%, solid rocket booster ignition and… LIFT OFF… tower clear… roll program… 20 seconds, thrust looks good… 28 seconds, roll manoeuvre completed… So, now the diseased tree is gone and the view is altogether more delightful. I photographed the cunts from my window, just in case a branch hit the car or something. Also, I like to keep a record of events, etc. They are the first PHOTOS I’ve taken since 15th December 2004! I loaded the film into my camera when I was on the beach with M at Joss Bay on the 2nd of August of that year! It’s a loif-time ago!! My Casio says ‘Mistaken shot! 5.4.2005’. Dunno what THAT was, a month before my eviction. I’m GLAD I’m obsessive about keeping these records!
Saw most of that ‘Meaning of Life’ programme… Why couldn’t they ask some fuckin’ SCIENTISTS? These celebs of light-and-oh-so-genteel-entertainment just make stupid jokes. I could do THAT myself! It’s a mystery and no-one fuckin’ knows, full STOP. Maybe, for us, it’s unknowable. I can’t do prime-fuckin’-numbers so what chance has bear got to learn the cosmic answers? None whatsoever, it seems. Do you see the ghost of the monkey? The ghost of the dog? The rat? The bird? The spider? The ant? The flea? The microscopic parasite that lives on the fleas’ BUM? The ghost of the Venus flytrap? Oh, watch out!! The ghost of the Tyrannosaurus Rex is going ‘Woooo, woooo’ outside my door!! What a load of fucking boo-lacks! ‘Human’ ghosts would be naked anyway… unless astral-fuckin’-clobber becomes the latest fad, my puckered and pencil pleated ASSHOLE!! My fisted DICKIE-EYE! My unstoppable ERECTION meets an impenetrable VAGINA… then what would happen? Would the prick and the cunt ANNIHILATE each other? Or would they pass THROUGH each other, both unperturbed and with no harm done?? Do you have any BELIEF or JUDGEMENT on these matters????
Hmmm… Funny I can be a BIT ‘manly’, what with gardening, DIY and shit. I see it more as a cross between art and a space shuttle mission. Thug builders can FUCK OFF, along with ‘Nazi punks’. Ah… Also, I see it in a similar context to the Japanese tea ceremony. It’s not just the END result, it’s the process of GETTING to that point. Thug builders get to the point… the point of charging you ultra-rip-off prices for being CUNTS!! That’s ONE reason why I was brought up to do it my fuckin’ SELF! I was spat at by ‘decorators’ in a white-FUCK-van 20 years ago, as I crossed the road to Snaresbrook station on my way to the Marquee club. ME! Dressed in the height of late 80’s HM fashion! I want revenge. I wanna KILL them, BURN them, destroy their CHILDREN and dismantle their failed-whore WIVES! That’s why I don’t care much about the Islamic terrorist threat… My enemy’s enemy is my friend. My ‘own kind’, the white British, have treated me like SHIT. Why should I care if a load of Bin Laden fans wanna do what I MYSELF would do if I had the means and/or the bottle?! Hail Al-Qaeda! No WONDER people fly planes into buildings… I think I’LL drive dad’s Dihatsu into fucking BARCLAYS! Watch me KILL! They stole £25 from me without warning for going over my £100 O/D limit and I’ve been a fuckin’ ‘customer’ since 1979! The KUHNTZZ!!
…Love, Gary xxx
GEROGARY’S “OUR FOUNDERING VENUS, McCLAREN’S FINAL SALUTATION AND THE DEATH OF COLUMBIA” PLAY-LIST
PUBLIC IMAGE LTD – PROFILE AT THE OLYMPIC AUDITORIUM, L.A. 4.5.80. Bootleg cassette.
PUBLIC IMAGE LTD – THE FLOWERS OF ROMANCE. LP. (absolutely OUTSTANDING third studio album from Lydon, Levene and, this time, Atkins, closing the PIL-box lid on Mr Rotten’s innovative trilogy of BONA FIDE experimental-post-punk full length releases… before Johnny started “going over to the other side” in earnest and became “happy to have, not to have-not”. Well, who can fuckin’ BLAME him? Virgin. 1981)
PUBLIC IMAGE LTD – HAMMERSMITH PALAIS 22.11.83. Bootleg cassette (bought in Scam-Den on New Years Day, 1984, after having kipped round illustrator Graham Humphrey’s gaff. He’s the artist who painted the “Nightmare on Elm Street” and “Evil Dead” film posters! I was at the above PIL gig the day after my 24th birthday. Johnny took a cursory glance down at me, as if to say; This is one of the tossers here tonight who “COULDN’T ATTACK A FUCKING CRISP BAG!” He was right)
QUIREBOYS – A BIT OF WHAT YOU FANCY. Cassette (used to see ‘em at the Marquee club in Wardour Street for £2 when they were the Queer Boys – name change for politically correct marketing purposes, no doubt. ALRIGHT THERE, NIGEL?! Some Japanese BINT told me you don’t like the taste of your own cock’s shaft-to-mouth contamination too much? Deary me, how very hetero us Sex-Party-going rock’n’rollers are. Parlophone. 1990)
BLACKMORE’S RAINBOW – RAINBOW RISING. Cassette (sweet little slip-of-an-angel-dick me, aged a green 16 in 1976, asked the local record shop guys for “something heavy”. After much deliberation, I eventually purchased this “thermonuclear heavy” – for 1976 anyway – out and out HM CLASSIC! It WELL-pisses over their latter, utterly contemptible and suffocatingly claustrophobic, “Since You’ve Been Gone” pop-rock shee…YITE! GOTT IN HIMMEL!! Polydor. 1976)
RAMLEH - MAY 31 196/82. Cassette (Broken Flag. 1982)
RAMLEH - LIVE 1983. Cassette (includes their set from “the legendary Equinox event” of 21st June 1983. I WAS THERE… but not for long, coz I had fuckin’ WORK the next morning. Ha! How times have changed. Saw Ramleh though, the Gary Mundy w/ Jerome Clegg-on-synth incarnation. Gary wore a beige shirt and smashed a glass bottle on the ground, right in front of a group of floor-sitters, which can be clearly heard on this “unique document”. Well, it means a lot to ME! Fuck off and leave me alone. Broken Flag. 1996)
RAMLEH – ELITE GYMNASTICS. Cassette (WHAT… no “Twins” CD? I’m misogynistically fucking GUTTED! No SERIOUSLY! Broken Flag. 1996)
RAMLEH – BOING. LP (this is “SPLENDID!” Aural milk chocolate, if ever I heard some. Majora. 1996?)
RAMONES – 1982 N.Y. Bootleg cassette (note from Juntaro Yamanouchi, “This bootleg cassette is the bad DUBBING TAPE. Very high speed + dropout (??) – dubbing by bootlegger. BUT! This is the best gig of my RAMONES’ bootleg gig, tapes, LP’s!!!” And if THAT doesn’t excite you, there’s always a Bukkake film to watch round at Summer’s place. And Summer’s JUST around the corner…
MUSIC
TOM WAITS – THE EARLY YEARS VOLUME ONE (MANIFESTO)
For some reason, I overlooked this collection of early Waits recordings (from 1971) when I was madly buying up everything I could find with his name on it. Was only reminded of its existence while staying at my cousin’s place in sunny Musselburgh at the tale end of January when her partner played it to me, saying it was one of his favourites. It’s in a similar vein to debut-Waits-LP ‘Closing Time’ and in fact features four different versions of songs from that record. This is more traditional singer-songwriter fair than later-period Waits and there are even traces of Loudon Wainwright III and Bruce Springsteen at times. A lot of the songs are rendered solo on acoustic guitar or piano and, as well as great, tear-inducing versions of ‘Virginia Ave’ and ‘Midnight Lullabye’ (sic), there are unavailable-elsewhere-gems like ‘Goin’ Down Slow’, ‘Poncho’s Lament’ and ‘When You Ain’t Got Nobody’. And how’s about ‘I’m Your Late Night Evening Prostitute’ and ‘Looks Like I’m Up Shit Creek Again’ for titles?!
RICHMOND FONTAINE – THIRTEEN CITIES (DECOR/EL CORTEZ)
I’m writing this dressed in my ultra-sexy brown and yellow Richmond Fontaine T-shirt, on my PC with its Richmond Fontaine wallpaper. Yes, you could say I like this band quite a bit, so imagine my ECSTACY when I found a copy of their new CD (their seventh album proper) in Avalanche Records several days before its official release! That shop just doesn’t give a fuck and I LOVE them for it! Every writer has his pet themes and Richmond Fontaine’s Willy Vlautin seems obsessed with chronicling the lives of drifting loners and mixed-up losers (as he sings in the hauntingly gorgeous ‘The Kid from Belmont Street’, ‘I’ve been there too’). His characters are usually running, trying to find escape in motels, bars and gambling dens. Two great examples are the magnificent ‘$87 and a Guilty Conscience That Gets Worse the Longer I Go’ and ‘I Fell into Painting House in Phoenix, Arizona’ (those titles ALONE convey more than a lot of bands manage in entire SONGS). ‘Westward Ho’ basically just lists the names of a load of motels before concluding that ‘a motel ain’t much of a home, but I found out years ago that a house ain’t either’, which might sound a bit bleak if it weren’t for the lovely tune and the fact that Vlautin sounds like he’s IN LOVE with these places. Elsewhere, his lyrics read like perfectly condensed short stories and, on a beautiful track called ‘The Disappearance of Ray Norton’, Vlautin dispenses with singing altogether and merely speaks the words over a spectral backdrop of dusty accordion and clarinet. There are also windswept pedal steels, haunting harmonicas, barroom pianos and melancholy trumpets adding colour and shade to these songs, courtesy of guest stars like Giant Sand’s Howe Gelbe and a couple of folk from Calexico as well as the Fontaine boys and their regular cast of supporting players. ‘St Ides, Parked Cars and Other People’s Homes’ seems like a nod to the late, great Elliott Smith, who had a song called ‘St Ides Heaven’ which told of ‘walking out between parked cars’ while drinking the cheap malt liquor of the title (AND Smith used to live in the same town as Richmond Fontaine AND sometimes even used the same recording studio). ‘Capsized’ would be the hit single if this band HAD singles, OR hits, come to that, and ‘Lost in This World’ ends the album with a bruised-but-not-broken piano lament where the narrator’s ‘skin is too thin… I fucked up again, I barely know who I am.’ The only way this album could be any better would be if it were to include the live favourite ‘West is Falling’, the omission of which is a complete mystery.
CENTRO-MATIC – ALL THE FALSEST HEARTS CAN TRY / LOVE YOU JUST THE SAME (MUNICH)
THE WALKABOUTS – DEVIL’S ROAD (VIRGIN)
Got up at 8.15-ish and had an egg/salad roll and a scone. Walked into my town. There were a couple of guys in the street dressed as those 118 twats from the TV ads who were doing Valentine's Day messages for passing idiots. I also saw a brass band on Sauchiehall Street who were playing 'I Just Called to Say I Love You'. WAS going to have a coffee in the Henglers but it's being done up and won't re-open till Friday, so I went to the Counting House instead. Got a latté and nicked some toast on jam someone had left on a table. Got TWO free biccies too, instead of the usual ONE. When I left, I saw Alan from GOMA coming out of RGs and we said hi, then I spent a shocking £26 in HMV as they had these two hard-to-find Centro-Matic CDs. The guy who served me said 'this one's AWESOME' (holding up ‘Love You Just the Same’ and he was RIGHT! The other one is good too, but not AS ‘awesome’) and we had a short chat about them. Had I seen them at King Tuts last year? Did I have any South San Gabriel stuff? etc. After that, I decided to splash out even MORE by having my lunch in the Scotia Bar which I hadn’t done since 2002! It was so bright and sunny outside that I was blinded for a moment when I walked into the dark bar. Had macaroni, chips and salad and a soda water and lime. Was glad I sat in what passes for the 'lounge' as some guy in the bar was drunk and was asked to leave. Finished writing Andrew's letter and went and posted it and also had a look in Mono-Rail (saw a DVD about the history of riot grrrl which looks grrreat!) Saw famous lawyer-cunt donald findley walking with some be-suited bitch. He's defending the guy who's accused of murdering that Polish student whose body was found in a church the other month. He ONLY seems to defend TOTAL CUNTS. Then I went to Avalanche, where I spent £3.99 on a Walkabouts CD which includes the AMAZING ‘The Light Will Stay On’, that I’ve had on a CD single for YEARS but THIS has a LONGER version on it AND some other lovely songs. Stopped in Virgin for a little rest then went to Bunker and got myself a £1.20 Magners over ice. There were quite a lot of fanciable souls in. Had a loving look at my new CDs. After that, I had a sitting-by-the-window pint in the Sir John Moore, watching all the fat and ugly retards outside getting their nicotine fix. They spend all their hard-earned dosh on designer gear and expensive hair-dos and flash perfume/aftershave then they go and light up and end up stinking like tramps. IDIOTS. Went to the Horseshoe after that and had a pint, sitting in the same place where I sat yesterday with James. Started writing a story as some hetero-couple sat nearby in stony silence. Looked like a RIGHT old fucking HOOT being in THAT relationship! I also 'read' a copy of the Sun someone had left lying about. Then I went to Failté and had a pint of cider, which I had to wait ages for as the barrel was being changed. Then I walked a bit to the beautiful Bon Accord and ordered a cider and some guy at the bar told me to have a taste of HIS, which was really strong shit. 'Real cider', he said. I went and sat down at a table and, I don't think it could have possibly been the tiny SIP I'd had of that guy's cider, but I started feeling ill and sick. Still managed to finish my pint, though. Walked back, stopping at Sainsbury's on Woodlands Road for some cup-a-soups and a pot noodle. When I got in, just before 8pm, I went straight to bed, I felt so bad. Listened to music on headphones and drank a little water. Slept after a while.
DANIEL JOHNSTON AND JAD FAIR – IT’S SPOOKY (JAGJAGUWAR)
Got up at 7.55am. Felt better and had a pot noodle, a coffee and a nutri-grain bar. Taped a couple of albums for someone and watched the news then 'The Wright Stuff'. Left the flat at about 10.50. Put a letter into number 17 which had been lying in our hall for, probably, ages. then I walked to Byres Road and went into Oran Mor for a piss then got a 'What's on TV' from the post office then went to Zen Arcade to get that CD copied again but Ronnie had ran out of blank discs. He was all apologetic and said he'd get some in tomorrow. Had a browse in oxfam music and a couple of Japanese girls were taking photos and shit, conforming to a national stereotype. I picked up a copy of this CD by Daniel Johnston and Jad Fair for £3.99. I’ve had it on vinyl for years but the CD has lots of extra tracks on it, many of which are quite brilliant. As I walked into town, some Christian woman tried to lure me into a church with the promise of free coffee but I told her I had to go to WORK! That's the 2nd time that's happened to me. I must look like a wayward soul. Got a £1 egg-mayo sandwich and walked into town then continued walking to the South Side. Found 20p lying outside some garage. Looked in all the charity shops on Victoria Road then bought 2 veggie sausage rolls from Bradfords Bakers then I walked to Shawlands and looked in the charity shops THERE. Got a text from Joe saying he was too ill to meet me so I went into Sir John's at 1.40pm and got myself a solo Guinness. Only stayed for half an hour as no one I knew was in. Well, John M's brother was in but John doesn't speak to him and neither do I. Walked back into town and had another Guinness upstairs in the Crystal Palace. Read the metro then walked back West along the waterfront as the sun was disappearing. Went into Oran Mor again for a piss AGAIN and got chips for my dinner. Was back at about 5.40pm. The two finalists on 'Weakest Link' were possibly the thickest people I've ever seen on a quiz show in my LIFE. Spent the evening reading my TV mag and playing some of the CDs I'd bought over the past couple of days. Went out just before 8pm to get crisps and a chocolate milkshake and also took a couple of bags of empty bottles and shit to the nearby recycling bins which cleared up some space on my floor, if nothing else. Watched 'Party Animals' and 'Never Mind the Buzzcocks' (Noel from 'The Mighty Boosh' was really funny but Donny from Towers of London was an utter TOSSER) then some doc about erotomania and obsessive stalker types which was SCARY. Went to bed after that, at about midnight.
THE FRAY – HOW TO SAVE A LIFE (SONY)
THE ENEMY – IT’S NOT OK (STIFF)
It’s very rare that I see/hear anything GOOD on the shite Freeview music channels but these two singles were happy exceptions. I didn’t buy the Fray one, ‘cos the anthemic chorus is repeated SO many times during the course of the song that hearing it once a week is QUITE enough, but that’s not to say it isn’t good. The singer looks like he should be in Fugazi, though, instead of piano-pounding and sensitive-song-singing. Also, there are tonnes of people crying and shit in the video, so you can tell that this lot are gunning to be the new REM or something. The Enemy single I DID buy (putting another £1.99 into Richard Branson’s already overstuffed purse in the process) and for my dosh I got a nice sticker (the SECOND sticker I got in the space of a week – the other being a Majestic Twelve one which came in the post along with a lovely FREE T-shirt from them. I’m not going to start reviewing T-SHIRTS, though, so go to www.themajestictwelve.com if you want to check out the band whose T-shirt I’m wearing RIGHT NOW!), a nice black and white Commie sleeve and Jam-esque working-class RAGE with great lyrics about being ‘washed away by the minimum wage’ and folk in suits being ‘just the same as me and you’ and how ‘it’s not OK to be a slave’. It’s really rather good, you know.
BITCH MAGNET – UMBER / STAR BOOTY (COMMUNION)
This CD called out to me from the £3.99 racks at Avalanche so I bought it, even though I’d had ‘Umber’ on tape for YEARS. Bitch Magnet were one of those bands that were a little too early for grunge and more-or-less originated what later became known as emo-core. Some songs stray into Steve Albini territory, especially on the ‘Star Booty’ EP (which he produced), - specifically what he was doing with Rapeman and Shellac - while others wouldn’t sound out of place on a Codeine record. It’s mostly harsher sounding than Seam, the band Bitch Magnet would evolve into, but the occasional moments of reflection are nicely contrasted by this approach.
TARNATION – GENTLE CREATURES (4AD)
I’ve been buying a lot of CDs by country-tinged female singers lately (in fact, I’ve been buying a lot of CDs in GENERAL lately. I think it’s become somewhat of an addiction. Yeah, ANOTHER one!) This was yet another £3.99 find in Avalanche and it’s shocking to see that it came out in 1995, ‘cos I remember it getting bigged-up in the press just like it was yesterday. Anyway, it’s taken me a while to get round to owning a Tarnation release, despite the band’s main member Paula Frazer once having recorded a song with Mark Eitzel (probably my Favourite Songwriter Of All Time). This album sounds like Patsy Cline, Gram Parsons and Hank Williams having a party in a haunted house. It’s full of lonely ballads, some of which are lo-fi enough to pass for field recordings from the 1930s. With pedal-steel guitars, sobbing fiddles and titles like ‘Game of Broken Hearts’ all present and correct, it’s country-tinged alright, and Frazer’s yearning vocals float over the top just perfectly. An achingly lovely record of which I want more, more, MORE!
GIGS
THE HOLD STEADY – CATHOUSE, GLASGOW, 14TH FEBRUARY 2007
Got up at 8am. Had a coffee and the cold remains of last night’s pizza. Got things in the post from Simon and Andrew. Sorted through some old plastic bags to take to be recycled. Some workmen started erecting scaffolding out the back of the building but luckily it doesn’t really effect me much, unless I’m in the bathroom. Went out into the sunshine and posted something in Byres Road PO then looked at the crap NME in Somerfield, then I had a leisurely walk to Maryhill and killed some time in the ultra-depressing shopping centre. Got rid of all those plastic bags then went to sign-on. At least I ‘got’ the nice fat lady who I somehow managed to chat to like I was a NORMAL person. She printed out some jobs for me to apply for. Oh yeah. Was back in the flat at 12.30 and treated myself to a Valentine’s Day wank. Er, another one. After that, I walked into town through Kelvingrove Park, where I saw that prick from Del Amitri jogging. Killed some time in Waterstones in Sauchiehall Street reading a Bukowski short story called ‘The Unaccommodating Universe’ then went to the Old Printworks for a £1.50 pint of Velvet ale. They always seem to be playing the Libertines in there. Went second-hand CD-browsing in Mono-Rail and did some aimless wandering then had a pint of Abbot ale upstairs in the Crystal Palace, sitting on a comfy sofa. Then I went to the Edward Wylie and got a burger and chips for dinner, plus a pint of Deuchars. Saw a dwarf in a business suit pass by, which was odd. And some young-and-in-love couple were practically fucking each other over by the window, which of course fascinated and repulsed me both at once. I left. Went to the Horseshoe and got a pint of lager. James was in, so I sat with him. He got me another pint even though I’d asked him not to. As it turned out, I began feeling ill after finishing the first pint. I don’t know if it’s ‘cos I switched from ale to lager or if it was the food or WHAT but I had to go to the toilet and puke. Gave James some of the second pint but most of it went untouched. We left and went our separate ways. I killed some time in Borders, reading this new punk book ‘Babylon’s Burning’ and listening to the ‘Open Season’ soundtrack which they had playing. It’s mainly new Paul Westerberg tracks and they all sounded REALLY good. They also played ‘The Holy Bible’ by the Manics. I left, got to the Cathouse just after 8pm and caught the last two or three songs by one of the support bands. They were Scottish (at least the singer was) but, confusingly, had a name with ‘New York’ in it. Fucking Yankophiles! I got some water from the bar but my stomach still felt dodgy so I only had a few sips. Got down the front for what I THOUGHT would be the Hold Steady’s set but soon realised there was ANOTHER support band on before them. They were the Checks from New Zealand and they were OK. A bit Strokes-esque and the singer wore a single leather glove. Oh my! The place was pretty packed when the Hold Steady eventually took the stage. I was close to the front but not TOO close and I got a good view of the band’s two main focal points – singer/occasional guitarist Craig Finn (who resembled a weird cross between George from ‘Seinfeld’ and Jello Biafra as he bounded around the stage like an excited puppy) and keyboardist Franz Nicolay (a Kevin Rowland/Ian McShane lookalike in a dapper suit who swigged from a wine bottle between songs and who was constantly dancing and singing along when he wasn’t playing). I’ve never seen a band SMILE so much! They looked genuinely THRILLED to be doing their thing, as Finn took snaps of the crowd and encouraged the crowd to clap along (which a lot of people did. I wish I hadn’t felt so ill and sober, otherwise I MAY have joined in). The set-list mainly comprised songs from their last two LPs and the songs from their latest, ‘Boys and Girls in America’, got such rapturous receptions from the, mainly older, ‘Uncut’/‘Mojo’ reading crowd that I wondered why they hadn’t been booked into a larger venue. Only a couple of songs from their debut album were played but they WERE probably the best two (‘The Swish’ and ‘Killer Parties’, an extended version of which was played last and sounded VERY Husker Du-ish). The enthusiasm coming from the band was infectious (Finn and the bassist actually high-fived each other at one point!) and didn’t let up once during the one and a half hour plus set and it really did feel like everyone was having a good time, despite the usual smart-arse Glasgow heckling between songs (some wag called out TWICE for ‘Hot for Teacher’. Ho!) I went away happy, anyway, and at least I’d saved some money by not buying beer. Also, this was the first gig I’d been to in ages where I came away DRY. This time, it was the BAND who were chucking beer about, not the CROWD! Worthless parasites like Madonna and the newly reformed Police (average ticket price $200) obviously only want RICH cunts at their gigs. Well FUUUCCCKK THOSE useless, spunkless cunts ‘cos THIS show was a nifty £7.50. Got the subway back, bought some milkshake and Pot Noodles from the Co-op and was in the flat at 11.25. Put some music on my headphones and drifted off to sleep, but woke at about 3.20am when I heard James knocking on John’s door, asking him in for a drink (!), an invitation he declined. But then, ten minutes later, he’d changed his mind and the non-stop alkie party resumed. I had a Pot Noodle and went back to sleep.
RICHMOND FONTAINE – ABC2, GLASGOW, 22ND FEBRUARY 2007
Got up at about 8.35am. Made a coffee and a plop noodle, still feeling a little drunk from last night. Lay around doing sod all for a while then walked into town in the light, but unending, rain. Had a £1.20 Magners with ice in (Hitler’s) Bunker which was beginning to fill up with suited and booted office cunts. The dullest of the dull. Was told by a waitress that I may have to move ‘if we get busy’ just ‘cos I had the AUDACITY to sit in a booth. If I’d been buying any of their over-priced grub, I’m sure it’d be an entirely different story! After my drink, though, I was OUT of there. Went to Waterstones and read some laugh-a-minute semi-incestuous stuff by Mishima then a couple of Bukowski stories. ‘The beautiful people are useless and everybody else is dull’ was my fave Buk line. Went to the Counting House and bumped into John M, who was sitting on one of their comfy sofas. I ended up staying HOURS and having five pints of Guinness. We chatted about nothing, really, but it was most enjoyable. He told me some AWFUL ‘dirty’ jokes but the ones I told HIM, he considered SHOCKING! He left at about 7pm-ish, to watch some silly football game. I got some cash from an ATM in Sainsbury’s then bought some fritters from the Kings Café. The foreign guy serving had obviously just started working there so I used this to my advantage, to get about TWICE the amount of fritters for my £1.20. Ate them sitting on some steps across from the Kings Theatre. Had a Guinness in the Griffin, where Samuel rang me. He was in the Horseshoe and was going to see The Killers later. I went to the ABC after 8pm and bought yet another Guinness. Had a look at the Richmond Fontaine merch stall and splashed out a tenner on a TASTEFUL T-shirt. Asked Willy why they’d left ‘West is Falling’ off the new album and he said ‘We took a vote. It was either that or ‘Capsized’ and that one won’. I told him ‘Capsized’ was a great song too. The support band were finishing up as I made my way down the front. Alan L came and said hello, as did his mate, who I was supposed to contact about my mono copy of ‘Sgt Pepper’ after I got him back on the train from ANOTHER RF gig, in Edinburgh, nearly two years ago! Alan was fiddling with his mini-disc, to record the show, which started off very low-key, with ‘A Ghost I Became’. They did a lot from the new album and some choice oldies. Their pedal-steel player was along for the ride this time around and his presence really added an extra dimension to the, already magical, songs (especially on the amazing instrumental ‘Twyla’). He played trumpet on some numbers too. I just love this band SO much that EVERY time I see them, I think it’s the BEST time. I walked back and was in at 11pm, stinking of Rock. Drank some Lambrini and listened to Ice-T and NWA on headphones, laughing my head off. Went to bed at about 12.40am.
BOOK
RICHARD YATES – DISTURBING THE PEACE (METHUEN)
I’d been waiting a while to read this, Richard Yates’ semi-autobiographical (as the majority of his work WAS) story of a man’s struggles with nervous breakdowns and alcoholism and, after years languishing in out-of-print obscurity, it was finally granted a reprint in January 2007. It’s a more terrifying tale than even Charles Jackson’s ‘The Lost Weekend’, possibly because Yates’ biography ‘A Tragic Honesty’ (as reviewed in HY! issue 15) makes it clear that the author really DID spend periods of his life in loony bins as horrifying as the one described so vividly here. The fact that the main character leads a pretty normal life (holding down a good job, having extra-marital affairs and generally being a bit of a cunt, really) makes his descents into madness even more terrifyingly true-to-life.
DVD
GG ALLIN AND THE MURDER JUNKIES – TERROR IN AMERICA (MVD)
Probably wouldn’t have noticed this if Grant hadn’t been with me as I don’t usually have much cause to look in the ‘Punk’ section of Avalanche, or ANY shop, really. More fool me, I suppose. This contains three live gigs from 1993, two of which I already had on VHS bootlegs but it’s SO much nicer to have them on shiny DVD disky. The ‘come-back’ show from New Jersey (GG had just got out of prison) contains not one but TWO encores, surely a one-off occurrence in GG’s world of hastily aborted gigs. The ‘extra bullshit’ tacked onto the end deserves some more sober-ish attention, as I was pissed-as-fuck when I watched it, so I don’t actually REMEMBER much about it. There are clips of ‘GG hanging out at the family pool’, though, which I DO remember as being WAY fucking weird for so MANY reasons. When you consider that he was always being followed around by cameramen with posh lights, etc, it makes you wonder from what kind of background he sprung. Not that it MATTERS, to be honest. GG was one of the world’s greatest ever entertainers. Take THAT and shove it up your pampered, rehab-obsessed arse, Robbie Williams!
STRANGERS IN THE NIGHT
I got on the bus just before midnight. Most of the other passengers were asleep. I found a seat near the back and got comfortable, putting a Frank Sinatra tape into my walkman and letting myself drift with the music. I’d burned all my bridges back home, walked out of my factory job and been dumped by my girlfriend for drinking too much. I didn’t blame her. I often wished I could dump MYSELF. Anyway, I’d decided that the best solution was to get away for a while.
About an hour into the journey, a woman who looked to be in her early fifties got onboard and sat right next to me, even though there were plenty of other seats free. I tried to pretend I was asleep but, even with my walkman on and Frank singing ‘Deep in a Dream’ in my ears, she persisted in striking up a conversation.
“Where you going, then?”
“London,” I said, turning Frank down a notch or two.
“Me too. Visiting my son. And you?”
“What?”
“Are you visiting anybody?”
“Yeah, I’ve got an uncle in Dulwich and I thought I’d go and see him for a few days.”
“Dulwich? That’s nice. My son lives in Hackney. It’s a bit of a dump, he tells me, but beggars can’t be choosers.”
“True.”
The bus slowed down as we passed an overturned lorry whose driver was talking to a bored looking policeman. His cargo – thousands of packs of toilet rolls – was spilled all across one lane of the motorway.
“Look at that,” the woman next to me said. “You could wipe your arse for YEARS with that little lot.”
I laughed and then she pulled out a shiny silver hip-flask from the inside pocket of her coat and took a swig.
“Care for a nip of whiskey?” she asked.
“Okay,” I said, bringing out a near identical flask from my sports bag. “Care for a nip of vodka?”
We both laughed.
“You really shouldn’t mix the two, you know. Never mix, never worry.”
“Aw, sod it,” I said. “There’s worse things in life than hangovers. At least they remind you you’re ALIVE.”
“That’s an interesting theory. I think Frank Sinatra said something about that once.”
And I quoted the line to her – “I feel sorry for anyone who doesn’t drink because, when they wake up in the morning, that’s as good as they’re going to feel all day.”
“That’s it! You like Sinatra, do you?”
I took my headphones off and placed them on her head as ‘Last Night When We Were Young’ played.
“Ah, that’s just the ticket,” she said after a while. “It’s not often you meet a young guy like yourself with decent taste in music. My son’s into all that punk rock stuff.”
“I like a bit of that as well. It’s just not the best thing to listen to in the middle of the night. My name’s Tony, by the way.”
“Nice to meet you, Tony. I’m Helen.”
After a few more swigs from our hip-flasks and a long conversation about the merits of Sinatra’s Capitol recordings versus his Reprise ones, we pulled into a service station and the bus driver announced that we were taking a thirty minute “comfort break.”
“I don’t expect there’s a pub in this place,” I said as we walked into the brightly-lit café, but when I looked round at Helen I could tell that she’d been crying.
“Hey, what’s wrong?” I asked.
“Oh, nothing. I’m just being silly. Could you get me a coffee? Here, I’ll give you some money”
She reached for her purse but I said that I would take care of it. Once I’d got our drinks from a vending machine, we sat down at a table adorned with an overflowing metal ashtray, a bottle of tomato sauce and some tatty plastic flowers. Helen reached into her bag and took out a small bottle of prescription pills.
“For my nerves,” she said, swallowing a couple along with her coffee.
“You couldn’t spare one, could you?” I asked. “I’m all out of booze.”
“Okay, then. Seeing as it’s you.”
A few of our fellow passengers were scattered around the café, drinking from plastic cups and eating sandwiches and packets of crisps. I noticed the bus driver standing outside in the car park chatting to another man and smoking a cigarette.
“I’m not really going to visit my son,” Helen said.
“What do you mean?”
“The truth is, I haven’t even seen him in years. We had a falling out and he just left one night. I get the odd postcard but never with an address. The last I heard he was getting married.”
“That’s terrible. I don’t understand how anyone could do something like that.”
“Oh, I don’t really blame him. I wasn’t the best mother in the world and his father buggered off years ago.”
“Don’t you have any other family?”
“I had a daughter but she died. Don’t have any other family now. I’m the only one left. That’s why I really shouldn’t be drinking. It makes me do stupid things. Like tonight, I got it into my head that I could go to London and find Raymond again. That’s my son. Isn’t that daft? I mean, I don’t even know if he’s still living there, and London’s a big place.”
“I thought you mentioned Hackney?”
“The last postcard I got from him mentioned he was living there, but who knows if that was even true? I just don’t know what to do.”
Pretty soon, we were back on the bus. I let Helen have the window seat. She seemed to have calmed down since her pills had kicked in and said she was going to have “a little snooze”, so I put my headphones back on and listened to my Sinatra tape until I eventually fell asleep too.
The sun had just come up when we pulled into Victoria Coach Station. I had been awake for only a few minutes but Helen was still fast asleep on the seat next to me, her head leaning against the window. I gathered my things together and was about to wake her but she looked so peaceful that I decided against it. Instead, I took the tape from out of my walkman, scribbled my uncle’s phone number on it and slipped it into her coat pocket. Then I walked out into the blazing sunlight.