Wednesday 26 August 2009

Passion is a fashion



I couldn't resist posting up this brilliant photo of 'The Clash'. I was reminded of how much I loved it when it appeared in a film I watched recently. Discussions on 'School of Rock'/Jack Black I shall leave for another day but in the meantime enjoy the energy and perfect aesthetic captured in this image of a truly great band.

There's a far more famous Pennie Smith photo of Paul Simonon smashing his bass guitar, voted 'Q' magazine's best Rock 'N' Roll photo of all time, but what I particularly love in this image are his snarling lips and angular stance. With Mick Jones (on the right) caught mid 'windmill' arm, you get a real sense of the urgency with which the band played live.

I would have loved to have seen 'The Clash' in their pomp but with that an impossibility I'll have to settle for this footage of them performing 'Clampdown' which for me sums up how a band should perform on stage: posturing, gyrating and looking fundamentally cool!

Friday 21 August 2009

I might be wrong


First, some self-flagellation - I sometimes get things wrong. I know, I know it's a shock that I could admit such a thing (an admission that would probably send Laura into labour).

Also, I can be a bit of an anally retentive, holier than thou, music snob. This however, I won't apologise for. I may be erroneously accused of 'going all NME' but my stoicism in this particular field is unequivocally necessary.

It's kept me from falling into the trap of liking U2 for a start. A petty crime you might think but in my world an act of the most diabolic heresy. Recently however, I've had to perform a smart u-turn when postulating the merits of one particular band - 'The Cribs'.

Despite already being 2 albums into their career, it wasn't until their 2007 release of 'Men's Needs, Women's Needs, Whatever' that they appeared on my personal radar.

For a long time I considered them a poor man's 'Libertines', lacking in the poetic romanticism of 'the likely lads' and in interviews, more dour than a Mick McCarthy post-match soundbite.

I'd heard the singles of course, 'I'm A Realist' in particular (the song that's perhaps still my least favoured on the album), and to be brutally honest, I'd been less than impressed.

I suppose my change of heart manifested itself, not in anything musical that passed my ear (as is so often the case when considering a bands worth), but in the news that legendary 'Smiths' guitarist Johnny Marr had joined their ranks for the new album.

If musical influences were so fused as to make this possible, perhaps 'The Cribs' were due a reassessment. They were, and now I find myself in thrall to their arresting guitar hooks and disaffected lyrics, so much so that I'm in considerable anticipation of 4th album 'Ignore The Ignorant' released next week.

I could be a little concerned, maybe even embarrassed, that I was guilty of such an oversight (I did tell you I was anal about these things) but I suppose I'd much rather be late to the party - as long as it's the right party. At least in sticking to my guns, even if I occasionally might be wrong, I avoid being another member of 'Our Bovine Public'.

Monday 17 August 2009

Commencing countdown

4 weeks to go until the due date and we're told things could happen any time from the end of this week!

As we approach D-Day, I actually feel quite calm, serene in fact which, paradoxically, makes me feel a little nervous. I was expecting to be a bag of nerves and the fact that I'm not, makes me worry the eventual arrival could be a bigger shock to the system than even I expect.

In truth, much like in the build up to our wedding day, once you've organised everything and are merely waiting for the action to unfold, there's not actually much you can do to effect the outcome of things anyway.

I was much more stressed when, at the beginning of the pregnancy, it felt like there was a never ending list of things that needed to be bought, mended, cleared out, readied etc. trailing off into the distance. Now it's hard to remember the time when having a baby wasn't always just the way things were.

I'm not going to lie to anyone though, when I occasionally say to myself "You'll be a father in a month's time", I still get a brief swelling of panic that rises from the pit of my stomach and usually leaves unsociably out of my backside.

It soon passes though (literally) and I realise there's a very real possibility of my becoming one of those parents who go on and on and on and on about their darling little bundle of joy ad nauseum - something I'll be trying very hard to avoid especially as the vast majority of my friends are sans sproglet.

Having said that though, what amazes me is the excitement with which the news was greeted by friends who have been a fantastic calming influence.

When worrying about how my every action could influence my kid, it was a friend who wisely suggested that they will inevitably be the first to see faults in their parents character and usually do everything to avoid replicating those faults in their own personality.

From the personalised 'Mini McRae' cards to all the offers of babysitting, it's reassuring to know that friends will be there too, not just doing a runner at the first whiff of a soiled nappy.

It's enough to make me start feeling confident about this parenting lark again...that's a worry.

Tuesday 11 August 2009

'Football' focus


Another new football season has already begun and it feels like a huge release.

Not just because I've missed the regular fix of domestic football, especially in the absence of a proper international competition (the Confederations Cup doesn't count), but because I grow tired of all the speculative transfer rumours, news of clubs financial turmoil and the general nonsense of an annual silly season that erupts over the summer months.

My own club Chelsea is as much to blame as any. Drogba, so insistent that his time at the Blues was over, has performed a more dramatic about face than Jodie Marsh's make up and John Terry, the so-called 'Mr Chelsea', has treated all the fans like complete morons (the fact that most Chelsea fans are morons is no excuse), claiming his silence on any potential transfer to Man City was because he, "wanted to find the right words to say." Quite simply - bollocks!

Despite this though, I'm not going to fall into the trap of bemoaning the loss of football's soul (although I accept that it may well have slipped down the back of the sofa with the small change some time ago), nor will I claim that football was so much better in the good old days.

There may have been more club loyalty, you may have seen the players down the local boozer and your salary may have only been a couple of zero's less than your idols but when you cut through all the hoi poloi, the thrill of seeing Gerrard driving into the opposition box or the joy of watching Arshavin skinning a couple of defenders before burying a shot into the far corner, still makes you tingle with the same excitement as ever.

So here's my plea for the new season. As the drama unfolds, resist the temptation to talk endlessly of terrible refereeing decisions or how you was robbed by a diving centre forward cheating his way to a penalty award. We love to debate these things and of course they add spice but ultimately we can't control them and even though it's a cliche, these decisions generally do even themselves out over the course of 38 games.

Instead, wax lyrical over a sublime piece of silky skill, gesticulate wildly when describing a real rasper unleashed from the edge of the box or swear liberally in appreciation of a point blank reaction save.

Above all, let the words of 'Big' Ron Atkinson ring sagely in your ears.... "I never comment on referees and I'm not changing the habit of a lifetime for that prat!"

Sunday 2 August 2009

Film Review - Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince


****
Most film franchises have blown themselves out by now but 6 films in, the tale of Harry Potter goes from strength to strength.

I'd argue (probably to the disgust of most fans) this film is an improvement on the book which was perhaps a little flabby in places.

It's true that some of the intricacies of the story get lost in the constricts of a 2hr film such as the mystery surrounding the identity of the Half Blood Prince himself and indeed the battle in the grounds of Hogwarts which is practically non-existent here. However the film manages to cover everything else without feeling bloated nor lacking in circumspect - a considerable achievement

Many film goers will be disappointed of course. There's no showdown between Harry and Voldemort, in fact the Dark Lord is never to be seen, yet the sense of pending doom bubbles under sinisterly from the moment Dumbledore appears with his blackened, wizened hand.

In fact this film, if it focuses on any single character, could be really about Professor Snape, Rowling's most complex character, whose allegiance and intention is still so clouded in mystery. See him first colluding with Death Eaters only then to appear Dumbledore's greatest ally.

The film culminates in a wonderful sequence where Harry has to fight his instincts and trust in Dumbledore and Snape only to watch on as he and Dumbledore are betrayed. This climatic scene is played with such great ambivalence that it is surely the best sequence of any of the films to date.

That the film still manages to make you laugh, indulging in the teenage love triangles of Hogwarts young students and Jim Broadbent's hapless and guilt-ridden Professor Slughorn, is to be saluted. It is incredible that as the emotions of the lead characters become that much more complex, the actors, so young when first selected to play the roles, have managed to mature in their skill and not only their years.

Perhaps none more so than Tom Felton as Draco Malfoy, burdened all term by the terrible act he has been given responsibility to commit. As the others flit through their love lives, Draco is seen brooding in the shadows clearly preparing himself for the event.

His relationship with Snape is almost as intriguing as Harry's and at the films climax we are still unsure of whether Snape's 'unbreakable vow' to protect him is one of genuine concern or of simple necessity. Either way the intrigue is limitless.

Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince could well be the pinnacle of the series. From here on in there's a certain inevitability to events. The beauty of this installment is in Harry's personal plight and how trust, authority and duplicity can have an effect on every young man who thinks he knows where he stands in the world.

If not the best Harry Potter film so far, it's certainly in the top 1.

Saturday 1 August 2009

Summer holidays and 'The Swines'

Having recently been away for a few days in Dorset and having the rest of the week off to spend with family, I've had a much needed break from the routine sparking lie-ins, meals out and a general devil may care attitude to expenditure.

This has been liberating but now I find myself worrying a) that I haven't got enough cash to get me through the rest of the month b) that my return to work will divulge a plethora of disasters occurring in my absence and c) that I haven't had enough time to catch up with the usual string of 'witticisms' on twitter over the last few days. I must be mad!

***

Swine-Flu. I wonder if there would be so much hysteria if the word 'flu' was prefixed with something less threatening than 'Swine' ("Ooh the little swine's gone and pinched me knickers off the wash line"). Perhaps if this strain of the virus had originated in rabbits rather than pigs and was given the name 'Bunny-flu', everyone would be quite happy to be infected and we'd all think nothing worse of it than if we'd picked up a slight sniffle in the rain on a damp Tuesday. After all, bird-flu, a far more dangerous disease to humans, seemed timid in comparison.

Imagine the furore if some equally tame illness was found to come from spiders! Arachno-flu. Now there's a phrase to conjure with!