Category Archives: Miscellania

Andrij – our man pulling pints in the Gay Traitor, wants to bend your ear ……………………………..and his Gran really was Alice Cooper y’know All this talking is only bravado.. The 1980s were to music what George bush is to middle … Continue reading →

y iBook has been superseded umpteen times since it emerged from its box, and 3) What do I need a posh walkman for anyway? It would have been handy during my globe trotting days but now, I dont use a walkman!

So when my brother Ste got me a 40GB iPod for my 40th birthday I was chuft to bits but still thought it an extravagance I didnt need..how wrong I wasIts now my constant companion in the car on shuffle mode where you never know whats going to come on next, but you know youll like it.

The weird thing is, it has somehow tuned into my neural network in Borg-like fashion. The first time it happened I was driving along in my CBGBs T-shirt when on comes Blondie Pretty Baby. Ah thinks I wouldnt it have been great to be at CBGBs in the late 70s. The fantastic bands that grew in that environment, The Ramones, Talking Heads on comes Cities by Talking Heads..spooky!

I was driving to Sheffield & just as I got off the Motorway an entered the city limits Hard Times by the Human League came on followed by Cabaret Voltaires Nag Nag NagHmmmmm

My other half has thought this notion ridiculous until…we were driving form my mums in Swinton near Manchester, to my mates in Chorlton, chatting about our impending wedding when My Bride to Be by Winston Samuels comes on (Id never heard it before – its from one of those Trojan 3 disc box sets that I loaded up and hadnt got round to hearing) but odder than that, we then drive past Old Trafford and Manchester United Calypso by Edrich Connor* comes on!!!! Sideways glances to each other with raises eyebrows.

I remember talking to a friend Matt who lectures in philosophy about million to one occurrences

How many millions of people are there in the world?

About 5 billion?

Well million to one events should be happening to 5 million people all the time

Which kind of takes the mystery out of life

Bob the Chiropodist

*For the record, Im a Man City fan but I still love this track. My folks are from Salford and were Roman Catholics and so should, by rights, be United fans. My Dad + Grandad (Jim) used to take my older brothers Ste and later Dave when they were old enough to the football on a Saturday (after they finished work at 12). Somewhere in the mists of time, United put up their prices and Grandad decided we would support City instead (thanks Jim!). By the time I started going we were a true blue family and I hate that more than United is still a family saying. Being a City fan was great in the 70s, not bad in the 80s, a joke in the 90s and thanks to Keegan and Psycho, becoming respectable again in the naughties. As the games become obsessed by money Ive become less and less interested it (even Blackburn could win the championship with enough cash). I hate to say it, but I even like to see Man U do well, except on Derby day of course Continue reading →

y and what with the inevitable spills of orange juice or stray marmitey fingers on it at some point, youd be mad to splash out on a fancy system for the kitchen. Jammy Smears is my favourite Ivor Cutler LP but I dont want them on my Denon amp or my beechwood Mission speakers!

Which brings me to an article I read in the Guardian recently about special power supply cables for your hifi to make it sound better. The article suggests its a nonsensical idea and I must agree that I could never get to grips with this one, even in the days when I was single and relatively loaded, when I would look seriously into all aspects of hifi before buying.

Quality speaker cable has always been a must – my present ones are from a hifi buff colleague who claims theyre platinum and from a fighter aircraft (cheers Andy). Speaker and hifi stands that have spikes on the bottom to isolate vibrations that improves sound I could understand and invested in (although the parquet flooring now means we are a spikeless home).

But power cables..I remember seeing David Baddiel talking about how hed bought into the idea (I think it was on Room 101) and has subsequently felt foolish.

When I was 13 I got a mono portable Radio/Tape recorder. It meant I could tape Peel shows in the evening after Id gone to bed (only 45 minutes worth as the technology for recording both sides of a C90 was way out of reach). It was my pride and joy and I still posses some of those tapes I made on it. I remember taking it along to a birthday party in the local church so the kids could play pass the parcel. I turned it up full blast thinking it would fill the place & all you could hear was a distorted wail. Lesson if you have a big room, you need a big sound system, unless youre Jonathan Richman who Ive seen perform to big venues with the tiniest of amps and even then sing most of his songs off mike.

Unfortunately Ive never lived anywhere big enough thats warranted a huge stereo but that hasnt stopped me from spending cash on hifi that would fill it if needed! My first proper system was thanks to my cousin Johnny. He was about to get married to Trish and realising that this may be his last opportunity, he sold me his excellent Rotel amp + Wharfedale speakers and bought an even better ones.

That was around 1986-87 and I had recently moved to London village to start my first ever job, working for Bloomsbury Health Authority. Tottenham Court Road was in my patch and with the spare cash I had (ie that not spent on gigs and booze) I trawled the hifi shops to put together a top quality system. A Revolver turntable (£250.00 a beautiful thing) A Yamaha double tape deck (£150.00 – you could record both sides of both tapes one after another.amazing) and a Sony receiver (£80.00 – cos it was cheap in the sales).

When CDs came in a few years later, I was determined not to buy into them, until I borrowed my cousin Diggers one time when he was in Jamaica on holiday and then I just HAD to have one myself bought an ex demo Onkyo that was in the sales for only £250.00.

This system was my pride and joy until I moved to Leeds in 1995. I was burgled (well I was living in Harehills) and the whole lot went, along with most of my (rather large collection of) CDs. The insurance people did me proud & I took my money to Richer sounds and got another great system, this time with a Digital Audio Converter (DAC) that makes your CD player sound better honest!…but it never really felt like mine anymore, and they no longer made Revolver turntables.

When that got burgled too (I no longer live in Harehills) the insurance company replaced everything with of like quality and I had no say in the matter*. Its the system I have today and whilst at first I thought the sound was too clinical, it does the job.

Elderly neighbours and small siblings means I rarely let the system rip these days (do your kids tell you to turn the music down too?) so having clean electricity into the system to make the sound that much better doesnt really enter the equation.

Bob the Chiropodist

*They replaced the DAC with a DAT (Digital Audio Tape recorder) which I still have, unused. If anyone wants to buy one..

PS hours after writing this I opened an email from Dr Peacock whos just got a sonos system. Continue reading →

I know that the first thing that crossed your minds when you saw the headline was Chris Moyles in a casket but what I am writing about today is about the demise of the radio dj in general. Since the … Continue reading →

o u x s i e S u e .

T h i s t o o k m e b a c k i n t i m e t o m e e t i n g the l a d s i n
t h e b o o z e r o n t h e i r r e t u r n f r o m L o n d o n .

W h a t w a s i t l i k e t h e n?
B r i l l i a n t , r i g h t a t t h e f r o n t 
W h a t d i d t h e y p l a y?
B l a h y B l a h y B l a h y H o o .
B e t y o u w o r e t h o s e d a f t f u c k i n g g l o v e s 
T o o F u c k i n g r i g h t y o u c h e c k y b a s t a r d 

W h y d i d n t I g o? W h a t s t h i s g o t t o d o with a b o o k
r e v i e w? W e l l i f y o u r i n t e r e s t ed r e a d o n

T h e b l a c k h a n d e d g l o v e b e l o n g s t o m y m a t e .
H i s 1 5 m i n u t e s o f f a m e , w e l l 1 5 s e c o n d s o f f a m e
o n t h e v i d e o o f t h e B a n s h e e s a t t h e R o y a l A l b e r t
H a l l , a b u i l d i n g n a m e d b y Q u e e n V i c t o r i a a f t e r
h e r d e a d h u s b a n d, u n a w a r e t h a t a f u t u r e Q u e e n
o f P u n k w o u l d o n e d a y p l a y t h e r e w i t h h e r B a n s h e e s .

T h e r e a s o n w h y I d i d n t g o d o w n t o w a t c h t h e B a n s h e e s a t t h e A l b e r t H a l l , ( s o r r y R o y a l A l b e r t H a l l ) w a s t h a t,
u n l i k e m y m a t e s, I h a d f a l l e n s l i g h t l y o u t o f l ove w i t h
t h e m . O t h e r l i f e c o n c e r n s t a k i n g o v e r (H o w D a r e I) .

T h i s b o o k i s s e t i n t h e f o r m of a d i a r y, a l l n i c e l y
c h r o n o l o g i c a l a n d n e a t . I t g i v e s i n s i g h t t o t h e
f u l l h i s t o r y u p t o t h e t i m e o f p u b l i c a t i o n ; t h e r o w s ,
the c h a n g e s a n d the r e a s o n s why.

T h e s t o r y o f a g i r l w i t h s h o r t d y e d h a i r who grew int o a g i r l w i t h a b i g h a i r s t y l e t h a t t h o u s a n d s o f y o u n g p u n k e t t es
c o p i e d b r i n g i n g t h e r e o w n s l i g h t c h a n g e t o
t h e m s e l v e s. A s t y l e f r o m B r o m l e y t o C e n t r a l L o n d o n
t o I s r a e l t o J a p a n a n d B a t m a n .

S o m e w i l l n o d o u b t t h i n k t h a t t h e r e l e ase o f t h e
b r i l l i a n t p o p s i n g l e H o n g Ko n g G a r d e n w a s a s e l l o u t .
W h a t a m i s e r a b le f u c k i n g l i f e t h e s e p e o p l e m u s t h a v e
h a d .

I f y o u r e l i k e m e , t h e n y o ull r e a d u p t o w h e n y o u m o v e d o n (in my case a b o u t 1 9 8 3) r e f l e c t i n g i n a s h a r e d e x p e r i e n c e
o f l i f e a n d a b a n d t h a t m a t t e r e d . D a r k , m y s t i c a l a n d a
f e w m o r e p o p p y t y p e s o n g s .

There are c o n t r i b u t i o n s f r o m S i o u x , S t e v e S e v e r i n ,
B u d g i e , M c G e o c h , K e n n y M o r r i s a n d o t h e r s . B i t s o f h o m e b a c k g r o u n d t o s e t t h e s t o r y . A v e r y a m u s i n g s t o r y o f
t h e m m e e t i n g u p a f t e r t h e i n f a m o u s s p lit*. W h a t t h e y
d i d t o g e t s i g n e d . T h e G r u n d y i n t e r v i e w (y o u d i r t y
f u c k e r ).

W h y w e r e t h e B a n s h e e s i g n o r e d b y t h e g r e a t B r i t i sh
P u b l i c ? A g i r l a n d b a n d w i t h a t t i t u d e a n d u n b e n d i n g
s e l f b e l i e f m o s t d e f i n i t e l y h e l p e d .

T h a n k s f o r t h e m e m o r i e s , a t t i t u d e (a n d
t h e 1 0 2 D a l m a t i a ns p h o t o g r a p h) .

B i l l y S t u t t g a r t
*Siouxsie + Budgie went to the Lakes on holiday. At breakfast there was only one other couple in the dining room.guess who….. Continue reading →