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I've started up a new clubbing venture with Morgan and Sandy, a tiny Canadian with perfect hair. It's called Come Out 2Nite, named after the most perfect pop single by the most perfect pop band.
It's at the Betsey Trotwood, which is in Farringdon. Our first night is on Saturday 24th October, which will also be Morgan's 22nd birthday. To celebrate this, we're all playing sets from our birth years, 1977, 1979 and, errr, 1987.
My set will therefore involve The Only Ones, Sparks, The Cure, Squeeze and the B52s.
Come along if you can! Let me know if you can make it and I'll put you on our £2 guestlist. And please spread the word with past London Loves veterans, if you know where they live, in real life or on the internet.
Hello all,
I'm back from America, where I spent my time playing Mario Kart, drinking whiskey, and hiding from tornadoes in Indian Restaurants.
But enough of that - who wants to come to London Loves? It's a one-off, a reunion, a memory, a reminder, a celebration, a resolution. It's the clubbing equivalent of Murakami's what I talk about when I talk about running. If people come, we'll do another. I'm totally up for it - all being well, I'm moving back to central London in June, so will again be able to turn part of my easily distracted attention to the crazy world of club promotion.
It takes place on Saturday 23rd May at the Torriano Pub on Torriano Avenue, which is a lazy 10 minutes walk from Kentish Town tube. Here's a map for you. Entry is free, but space is tight - or, as an estate agent would say, cosy. Therefore, we need to know FOR CERTAIN if you're able to come. No facebook maybe babies. If you can make it, let us know, and we'll put you on our (free) guestlist. If you can't, let us know asap, so we have a decent idea of numbers.
It's an early one - 7-12 - so we hope to get people dancing early, and everyone will be able to get the last tube. This, I think, is a good thing, as people are old and they seem to like the last tube. The last tube has taken on a mythical status, suggesting warmth, safety, and not spending three hours on the night bus.
This means we'd expect you to get down early. Start drinking from seven, and start drinking by nine. That's the plan. Amazingly, there's a jumble sale at the pub in the afternoon - so you could even come in mid-afternoon and see if you can still remember your name by the time by 9. Then when If by The Bluetones comes on, you won't even care if you can't.
As the vast majority of you know, I'm getting married soon, so this London Loves forms part of my hopefully legion non-stag do style celebrations.
Email me if you can make it, and I'll put you on the list.
Forward to anyone who might be interested (any 20sixers who aren't on here?) - we lost our London Loves mailing list in a tragic internet forest fire.
Hope all is well.
J x
Martin works in Mark's and Spencers
Sharon stocks up cash dispensers
Mary married a man who hears
Voices in his head
Your mate Brian knocks down buildings
Sean and Sally had six children
I'm ensconced in academia
And you, you're still in bed
But do you remember when we'd go to town
Meet our friends and hang around
And talk about what we'd like to be?
We slowly went our separate ways
Meeting up on holidays
To talk about the way it used to be
Our headmaster's back in prison
Peter plays for the first division
No-one's heard from Fred
Sexy Sadie's put on weight
Michael's working in Kuwait
Billy Jones is dead
And do you remember when we'd go to town
Meet our friends and hang around
And talk about what we'd like to be?
We slowly went our separate ways
Meeting up on holidays
To talk about the way it used to be
You said that you'd be famous and drive a flashy car
I thought that I would be the first man on Mars
But you couldn't pay your insurance and had to sell your guitar
And I'm stuck in the Midlands
I guess I didn't get too far
No I didn't get too far
No I didn't get too far
But do you remember when we'd go to town
Meet our friends and hang around
And talk about what we'd like to be?
We slowly went our separate ways
Meeting up on holidays
To talk about the way it used to be
---
By MJ Hibbett. His new album is ace, by the way.
I met a traveller from an antique land
Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. Near them on the sand,
Half sunk, a shatter'd visage lies, whose frown
And wrinkled lip and sneer of cold command
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamp'd on these lifeless things,
The hand that mock'd them and the heart that fed.
And on the pedestal these words appear:
"My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!"
Nothing beside remains: round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare,
The lone and level sands stretch far away
---
Saw Watchmen. It was alright.
The top of this blog lies - it's been lying for some time. I don't live in New Malden any more, haven't done so for a while now. This could go some way to explaining the lack of posts: how can I claim to be the foremost authority on all things New Malden related when I don't even have the decency to live there? Sure, I was chased out by angry townsfolk armed with pitchforks; I could at least have the decency to sneak back when they're asleep, and bed down on a hammock made from bin bags in the middle of Beverley Park.
But those days are over.
My news is that I'm half-way to moving to Bethnal Green / Whitechapel way, which is no-where near the New Malden / Surbiton / Kingston axis, at all. I'm not sure how I'm going to cope; no longer will I be able to cycle down the river, or go swimming in Hampton Open Air Pool, or (under heavy disguise, of course) sneak back to New Malden to eat at one of it's fine Korean restaurants. Coupled with the new job I've just started, and various personal gubbins, it really does feel like the end of an era.
Now, from next month I'm going to be living alone and I'm probably going to go mad. So I decided that - as I finally have a job with vaguely civilised working hours, which means I have free time - it may be time for me to waste that time by starting a new blog. Unlike you guys, I'm not really able to write a personal blog about normal day to day life, which a lot of you do rather brilliantly, because my mind is wired in a manner that means I need to write about a certain theme. Before the theme was New Malden - but I can't write about that anymore, for the reasons outlined above.
So I had a new idea. I've always been fascinated by the local, about sense of place, and how people have little places near them that transform a collection of samey streets into a hometown, a crappy suburb into a warm blanket of reassurance. I note, with increasing incoherent anger, that every single bit of London worth writing about is turning into wanker flats for wankers, surrounded by a few chain restaurants and cafes for chain people with chain brains.
Oriental City in Collindale - gone. New Picaddilly Cafe - gone. Walthamstow Dogs track will be no more come August.
So far, so miserable. So what I find people who live in different bits of the city and get them to take me for a thoroughly LOCAL night out. For example, if it were New Malden, I'd expect to be taken to a lovely little noodle house, then eccentric pub Woodies, but it could be anything - cafe, knitting club, ukulele bar, cock fighting pit. As long as it's local, and as long as it's not a chain, and as long as it's not a place where wankers congregate. I think these rules are fairly clear.
What do you think? I raised this idea, initially, with foxinthesnow, and she suggested that the idea was basically so I can have lots of free nights out. Nothing could be further from the truth, and this is an outrageous slur against my character. I'm happy to pay my own way, and would expect nowt but your company, and directions to the nearest tube/bus/piggyback home.
So how about it. Can you show me a good time in your local area? Who will start the magical ball rolling? Come one, come all. If this was to work, I'd like for it to start of by being all about being taken out by bloggers, then see where it goes from there. You never know - if it's successful, maybe readers may start sending out invitations of their own.
Of course, one of them might lure me out with the promise an excellent local curry and end up locking me in their basement, but that's a risk I'm willing to take.
Oh, and its name? "A Night Out In..."
Guitar man - the David Gray meets James Blunt dickhead who lives in the upstairs flat - played his latest creations this morning. He didn’t start until 10am for a change, but with my late shifts that was far too early. Now I can’t see properly, and it is to be a long day as a consequence.
The moment the first chord was strummed I was awake and unhappy. I dragged myself out of bed, aware that sleep was over, and opened the curtains. It's an absolutely glorious day. I opened my window, then sat up on my window sill to look up at the upstairs flat. Unfortunately the window was closed, so shouting at him wasn’t going to be effective. I will write him a strongly worded letter.
But at least it’s a nice day, and I enjoyed the walk down to the station. My train was full of normal people excited about the gorgeous weather so filled with the inexplicably desire to spend a day on Oxford Street. I was surrounded by Daily Mail readers, all scrutinising articles about how current London Mayor Ken Livingston enjoys secret exotic banquets of the Queen’s swans and halal haribo with terrorists and, worse, asylum seekers, or whatever their latest non-story is.
Then I noticed that on the local Kingston paper I was reading was an advert for Ken’s campaign. It consists of two squares, representing the two plausible choices. And next to the squares read:
DON’T VOTE FOR A JOKE
VOTE FOR LONDON
Then at the bottom: “DON’T RISK
LONDON. VOTE KEN”.
Obviously the majority of political advertising in the past 50 years has been variations on the ‘TIME FOR A CHANGE’ vs. ‘DON’T LET THE OTHER PARTY RUIN EVERYTHING’ messages, but I thought this was a pretty effective one. So I thought I’d do a little experiment – on the tube, I sat holding that page of the paper out, hiding my face, ostensibly for the purpose of reading the story on the other side. Which was about swans, funnily enough.
I watched people’s reactions from the reflection in the glass to the left of me. Most of them looked at it and either looked amused or ashamed, but didn’t say anything. But then a couple got on at Piccadilly Circus, didn’t have much to say to each other, so eventually the conversation turned to the paper I was increasingly obviously holding up for political purposes. The guy was about twenty, and was wearing a red rugby shirt.
“I’m gonna vote Boris”, he said. My heart sank in an unsurprised fashion. Rugby fan in 'votes Tory' shocker.
“Why are you going to vote for a joke?”, replied his girlfriend. The tone of her voice indicated not that she had balanced up the various pros and cons of the candidates and had come to the measured conclusion that Johnson is lacking in actual policy, but that she hadn’t really heard of either of them and just wanted to mock her boyfriend.
“Cos Ken’s crap”, he said. Then he went on to explain in a paternal and patronising tone why Boris was the right candidate. It was a collection of half-remembered and mangled election soundbites, but basically what it came down to was: Boris is going to bring the Routemasters back.
Basically, we’re doomed.
Waist deep in the Thames on a Sunday morning
She kissed all her friends goodbye and she rowed away
Rain came down on Kingston, we stood silent
She will reach the sea in a couple of days
Will you keep the picture safe?
We will keep the picture safe.
I went climbing mountains high above the city
Looking at the river stretched out like a map below
All her friends were scattered to the corners
Nobody understood why she had to go
I will get my story straight:
We will keep the picture safe.
On the evening news a mother drowned her baby
As I sat there, I knew who to blame
Halfway down Embankment hope was fading
Truth is nothing will ever be the same
I will never see her again
We couldn't keep the picture safe.
Face down in the Thames on a Thursday morning
Watch the picture float away.
"It's a rich tapestry"
"I'm living the dream"
"It's all thanks to my Aryan immune system"
"At least you're not universally hated like me"
"It's merely a facade, hiding the face of hell. Or maybe the face of Bo"
"I'm oblivious anyway"
"At least he's not a vegan"
It is estimated that 62 billion emails are sent every single day. Of these, 40 billion of them are advertising fabulous penis pumping opportunities. Ten billion are about pyramid schemes, which never turn out to be about building pyramids; this is a shame, because we need some new pyramids. The old ones are looking a bit knackered.
Of the twelve billion remaining emails, some of them are even worth reading. Here's a selection of some of the bits of communication that have found their way into my various gaping e-orifices over the course of today.
Enjoy.
---
From Geoff to me:
"I got an incomprehensible message from your new friend last night. Something about 'cock to the bop, tennis to the top'? I don't understand although I suspect I probably don't want to."
Me to Lisa:
"The good news, anyway, is that Emo Dan is actually going to write a fanzine all about being Emo Dan. I've no idea whether he wants Geoff and I to help him, but we'll make sure he actually does it. It's quite sweet - you've got him wrapped around your little finger, you do. You have everyone in Nottingham wrapped around your little finger, come to think of it. I hope you plan to use this power for good, not evil."
Lisa to me:
"I'm really excited about the Emo Dan fanzine. I think it's going to be great and everything I ever dreamed about. I have checked my finger and there isn't anyone even perched on it, let alone wrapped around it, so I think perhaps you are mistaken. Are you telling me that Emo Dan loves me? I hope you are. Oh, to be loved by Emo Dan.
TastySam wants to destroy Emo Dan. Poor Emo Dan."
On learning this, Geoff to me:
"Oh dear, what have you done? It's like watching the cream of Nottingham bowlie society curdle before my eyes. Lisa will leave Sam for Emo Dan and will accidentally kill herself cutting her arm to try and impress him. Sam will descend into a deepening drink fueled depression and he and JamieC will be jailed when they are found trying to assassinate Emo Dan by smuggling a crude home made bomb into Rock City under their cardigans. The rest will then slowly dissipate into the ether leaving Emo Dan standing astride Nottingham like a colossus cackling evilly as his army of fat, pasty faced, miserable teenagers sweep all before them and London, Manchester and Sheffield are left as the last bastions of indie."
Unrelatedly, Gina to me:
"I worked in recruitment for a while, it was certainly eye opening. My favourite was a girl who applied to be sales manager of some big chain store, it was like 50k or something. Her experience was that she worked in New Look at the weekends. Oh, and some of the CVs were hilarious too: were my favourite CV was a man who put in his interests bit :- 'I have a large collection of Toby Jugs, one of which is worth over forty pounds'"
Geoff on his landlord:
"I was on the receiving end of a spectacular all encompassing rant from Steve last night which ranged from the planning system to the free market economy as a provider of cheap shoes and hats to council employees on their lunch break and segued effortlessly into the non reaction of Muscovites to seeing cockroaches in a shop. You wouldn't think there was enough room in all the barely comprehensible self righteous indignation to shoe horn in a denunciation of socialism but he managed it somehow.
Sadly the only thing which really surprised me was he managed to go on for ten minutes working himself into a real lather without saying anything racist. He's slipping in his old age."
Paul (via Byron) to King Nathan 'hey I know guys why don't we meet at that pub right next to my house?' Williams:
"Nathan,
Think'st thou there is no tyranny but that Of blood and chains? The despotism of vice-- The weakness and the wickedness of luxury-- The negligence--the apathy--the evils Of sensual sloth--produces ten thousand tyrants, Whose delegated cruelty surpasses The worst acts of one energetic master, However harsh and hard in his own bearing."
And finally, from ebay:
"You are currently the high bidder for the following eBay item: GIRAFFE DESIGN SKIPPING ROPE"
