Monthly Archive for October, 2007

must be the season of the witch;

Published on October 31, 2007 in a little more personal and film. 1 Comment Tags: hallowe'en, the x-files.

Hurrah! I’d been wanting an excuse to use this photo!

I think I only ever went round the doors the once on Hallowe’en, but it was a pretty lucrative evening. I guess, in those more innocent days before Asda’s cash-in offers in the six weeks leading up to a once-pagan holiday, the neighbours hadn’t really prepared for a schoolkid invasion, and so instead of monkey nuts and mini Mars Bars they gave us money for a wee song and dance.

We used to get guisers round at my mum’s. Every year they got less and less imaginative, mumbling Christmas Cracker-style jokes and holding out their chubby hands for treats. In the end they didn’t even bother with party pieces, the lazy wee shites. For that reason, I will as usual be making sure I’m out for most of the evening, and ignoring the door when I get home.

Oh, okay then. If you want some Hallowe’en spirit, here are some silly costume ideas inspired by Bob Dylan lyrics.

I was offline last night with a migraine, but I’m very surprised that the person who emailed me this little nugget (clue: he was on the sofa next to me most of the night) didn’t think it worth mentioning offline. But I refuse to believe that X-Files 2 will start filming in December – until I see some pictures from the set at least, or some corroboration from somewhere that isn’t a blog! But rest assured, when I know about it you all will because I won’t be able to keep the squee down.

[The following bloggers wil also look like fools if this turns out to be yet another false hope: Crazy Days and Nights, Always Gay. Always, Comic By Comic (hello: twentysomething geek), Obsessed With Film, SciFi Scanner (somebody didn't watch anything past Mulder's abduction), Busy Bee Blogger and Cinematical.]

YET ANOTHER EDIT WHICH WILL PISS OFF THOSE WHO DON’T KNOW HOW MUCH THIS MEANS TO ME: “multiple sources… independently confirmed…” This looks much more promising.

people as places as people;

Published on October 30, 2007 in books & literature and film. 13 Comments Tags: control, elizabeth wurtzel, enchanted, joy division, once, ratatouille.

We never actually made it to the end of our planned Saturday movie marathon, Jay and I. We got as far our seats in the auditorium for Stardust, but had decided against chancing our fortunes to the night bus by the time the house lights went down.

It’s not as if we hadn’t had enough entertainment anyway. Pixar’s latest, Ratatouille, was as fun and as clever as the studio’s previous efforts, and totally got me in the mood to try its signature dish. And Enchanted, for which we saw the trailer, will be a must-see for my sister and I around Christmastime.

As you can imagine Control, loosely based on a memoir by Ian Curtis of Joy Division’s widow, was a very different experience, but so beautifully shot as to steer away from depressing. The black and white, widescreen presentation and skilful shooting made every frame look as if you could have screengrabbed it and sold it as an art print. From that perspective, it was one of the most striking movies I have seen this year.

I don’t really like Joy Division’s music and have no emotional connection to the band’s iconic frontman so approached the film not expecting to be moved in the way many of my friends were. I was right, but not for the reasons I anticipated. On the surface, there isn’t much to Control: no set pieces, no quotable dialogue, and a story told in such a way that it’s pretty difficult to establish much of a connection with its characters. But that’s part of its genius, and part of what returns the product of hard work and talent.

Control wasn’t, and was never meant to be, a novel. I think that there’s a temptation in biopics to recreate the protagonists in the director’s image; to give them redeeming characteristics or the sort of resolution that they never had in life, or to predict their motives. Anton Corbijn didn’t attempt to do that. He didn’t try to paint Curtis as a messiah or a tortured genius, he didn’t attempt to explain away his infidelity; god, at times the actor barely spoke above a mumble. It was a film that was evocative as it was mundane: it was the scenes of Curtis in his “day job”, as a bright, personable young man working at the local employment exchange, that most made me think “what a waste”.

Once, for which we were joined by Steff, Stoo and Steff’s friend Richard was another film with a muscial connection: it starred Glen Hansard of Irish band The Frames (and directed by their ex-bassist, John Carney) as a busker who meets and becomes involved with an immigrant flower seller. As I read more about the film I become more entranced by it: there was something very charming about it, even if much of the music which provided a central focus for the film went on a little too long. And it ended the only way it could have, even if the musicians (who were never really actors) went on to fall in love in real life.

PS Elizabeth Wurtzel is 40 and finishing law school. Doesn’t it make you feel old? And (maybe, sneakily) a little proud that you managed it at half her age? Okay, plus or minus a few book deals…

we try to change the city noise;

Published on October 29, 2007 in a little more personal, art & culture and modern life is rubbish. 0 Comments Tags: glasgow, new york, pacific quay, public transport, steven wells, the scotsman.

WE GOT OUT JUST IN TIME, I sometimes think: out of a New York City that was turning whiter than white, richer than rich, where you’d find a Ralph Lauren showroom on the corner where the best greengrocer used to be, where the New York Times Book Review holds proper parties in what once was the raunchy end of the meat-packing district, and struggling artists, having opened up the roughest zones to agreeable loft apartments, are no longer welcome.

This piece, ostensibly a book review, gripped me on Saturday morning til the bath water turned cold (hi Scotsman, fancy working up a site you can view on a mobile browser with the minimum of trouble?). This is my favourite sort of writing: the kind that comes from nowhere, that’s hidden away in the back pages in the guise of something else.

I think Julie and I got on the wrong bus yesterday – we seemed to take the long way round, a guided tour in a rickety old number 47 that reeked a little of piss around some of the southside’s less salubrious housing estates. Although everything’s slowly changing here – the old buildings are being pulled down and the tenements giving way to bespoke penthouse apartments. You know you’re not in Kansas anymore when the petrol station forecourt store is an M&S Simply Food.

My favourite part of the city is Pacific Quay at night; the new BBC Scotland headquarters glowing like a plate-glass monolith against a backdrop of show apartments and boutique hotels, just a stones throw from Govan. A few months ago a taxi driver told me that prices for flats in the area surrounding the development, which includes my own flat, are starting to creep up at the expense of us locals. I’m not a Daily Mail reader and I’m not looking to buy, but I wonder where the rest of us are supposed to go.

I don’t think you can kill a city though, not through buildings and commerce, and I’m not so naive as to think that the New York I inhabit in my dreams is anything more than a bohemian myth. There’s spirit under the surface if you know where to look; you can give the artists full-time jobs and council tax mandates but you can’t kill the desire to create in the driven. As for me, I wish I could be functional on four hours’ sleep a night – but I’ll get there.

Michael Pye says that Edinburgh could so easily be truly avant-garde; I’d say our own Glasgow is a better candidate but perhaps that’s because I was never in Edinburgh long enough to uncover its best-kept secrets. I thought that when I moved to the city my life would turn into an episode of Friends with a better soundtrack. It hasn’t happened quite yet, but as long as I’m watching telly all night it’s hardly going to.

PS I was madly in love with Steven Wells about ten years ago, when he wrote for the NME and I read it. Today, he has written this for the Guardian. It may be the best thing you read all day. Apart from the Speaking Clock’s comment on my last post (srsly).

no fear of falling;

Published on October 28, 2007 in a little more personal and current affairs. 1 Comment Tags: 365days, daylight savings time, silverburn, speaking clock, tspam.

Day 97

Because there’s always an excuse for a photo of me in a silly hat I have no intention of buying.

The clocks went back today.* At least, I think they did. The wonders of modern technology are such that both my mobile phone and my laptop – the two devices I most regularly rely on to give me some indication of the passing of time – adjust themselves automatically for Daylight Savings Time. I woke up so disorientated that I had to check the Speaking Clock for some crumb of comfort.

The Speaking Clock is a wonderfully British institution, still voiced in the same BBC English I remember from childhood. If this was America, it’d be sponsored by McDonalds by now. With adverts for Chrysler or something in between the pips.

I used to be terrified of it when I was a little girl.

I’m not sure why, but since I used to be terrified of car washes too I think attempting to rationalise my fears is a job for somebody with much more free time than I.

Julie and I visited Silverburn, Glasgow’s shiny new shopping centre, this afternoon. It wasn’t quite finished, half the tenants are yet to move in and access from the bus station is an absolute joke. You have to wonder why they didn’t hold off until everything was ready. Still, no matter – there’s a giant Tesco just behind the centre, so when we were bored we wandered over there in search of spices and baking supplies.

The magazine is (just about) done. I might even post content this week! Can you handle it?!

*How 21st Century, excuse-for-everything-culture is that article?! I’m going to phone in sick for the next three days now: it’s okay, a scientist said I could.

i won’t wear your shoes//i won’t clip your wings;

Published on October 22, 2007 in a little more personal, current affairs and music. 8 Comments Tags: live reviews, ryan adams, the twilight sad.

I just lost out on this rare Ryan Adams record on eBay because I promised myself I wouldn’t go over thirty quid for it. If this is what being sensible feels like… well, you don’t want to know the PILES OF TAT I will buy tomorrow in an attempt to anaesthetise the empty feeling in my chest.

Piles of tat… and Fourteen Autumns and Fifteen Winters by the Twilight Sad because, because, it’s so rare that something hits this cynic between the eyes and blows her away these days and that’s something that has to be encouraged.

Last night at the Barrowlands – Idlewild’s greatest hits tour – my little world was turned upside down. Fi and I arrived somewhere in the middle of first support Baillie and the Fault‘s set, and I immediately made some quip about how much McFly had grown since the last time I saw anything of them. Once I actually listened though, I’d maybe compare them to Biffy Clyro. That sounds as if I was taking the piss – but despite the lead singer’s shite patter the band were really solid, the right combination of heavy and melodic that gets through to me, and with a song with “Gemma” in the title that begs further investigation.

But it got me thinking about how lazy so much music writing is (and I include myself here): we cut corners and play safe with our band comparisons and Myspace links. Were the trails of rock journalism blazed with such cliches? Would Lester Bangs, were he still alive, be comparing the latest buzz band to lyk the Arctic Monkeys… on drugs??! Thank God then, for the Twilight Sad: I’m conscious of the fact that from the moment the lead singer strained for the microphone, eyes closed and twisting out the first part of “Cold Days From The Birdhouse” in gorgeous Glasgow brogue over a delicate, minimal backing I was rooted to the spot, eyes and ears wide and my mouth slightly open.

And then the song exploded, and my world exploded, and something in my heart beat hard and fierce and it was all I could do to keep myself upright. And on stage it was tick tick tick and loud, and grinding, and at the same time gorgeously melodic, and the tinnitus in my ears took until 1am to fade, and it was all so unexpected because the band’s recordings have never really moved me but sometimes, like the old line goes, you have to be there.

Our city has found a worthy successor to the Aereogramme whose memory the singer invoked; and there you go – I’m doing it again.

PS I love this. I totally saw it coming. Haven’t I been calling the site yaTUBE! for ages now?

just click yr heels, don’t touch that dial;

Published on October 21, 2007 in music. 8 Comments Tags: ian hunter, jesse malin, live reviews.

My Jesse Malin gig “experiences” just get stranger and stranger. I broke myself-imposed magazine-related house arrest last night to catch him supporting Ian Hunter (was in Mott The Hoople, they had that one song, you know, my mum knows it…) at Glasgow’s Old Fruitmarket, fully intending to be tucked up in bed with a mug of hot chocolate, ready to face Sunday’s travails, by 10 o’clock. As it turned out, I ended up working the merch stand and getting home for 1am. But I still got my hot chocolate.

It was my first time at the Fruitmarket, one of the city’s most beautiful – and certainly one of its most interesting – venues. Now part of the City Halls, this atmospheric space provided us with plenty of inspiration as we hawked copies of Glitter In The Gutter to the punters – much of the original signage from days of yore, when the Merchants’ City was the home of commerce and not trendy wine bars, has been retained and the hall is lit by chains of coloured lights.

Jesse (with a new band line-up, including Brian Viglione of Dresden Dolls – shirt off by two songs in, hair wild by three) filled the often-difficult support slot ably, and I’m not just saying that as the fangirl down the front who was dancing like a loon. Support bands, not playing to their crowd, generally find themselves having to just get up there and batter through the hits or the most accessable numbers in their repertoire. Jesse managed two tracks before he started rambling about his penis and how much he hates the Myspace gig culture.

And he’s my hero precisely because he came out into the crowd in his usual style for a cover of Neil Young’s “Helpless”, and had a room full of people with no clue who he was sitting on the floor singing along.

“The best bit about being stuck at a gig you’re not all that interested in,” said Trish – for it was she, on official merch stand duty, who wouldn’t let me leave – “is that you can peoplewatch.” I have to confess that Jo and I had speculated earlier we would likely be the youngest people in the venue, and had giggled at the procession of punters expressing dismay that the gig would be mostly unreserved standing with only limited seats (“we’ll huftae carry you out Dave, hur hur”) but there was so much fun in that room last night; shameless, unironic dancing in waistcoats and cowboy hats – and that was just the women. Indeed, it was us wee young things on the stall who were slumping as Ian Hunter played what felt like the same pleasant, MOR track for an hour and a half – until Jesse joined him for a rendition of “Roll Away The Stone” at any rate.

As for our sales drive, well, it was pretty successful and I got a hug and a kiss from wee Jesse out of it as well as a free CD (and he hopes we enjoy The National, Jo). I can only hope that, when I’m forty, I’m half as cool and half as willing to buy a CD by an unknown support act as last night’s lot.

now it’s spy vs. spy;

Published on October 17, 2007 in aff the telly, fitba and music. 8 Comments Tags: horoscopes, last.fm, ryan adams, scotland, spooks.

Spooks is back! And, although I’d seen the “coming soon” teaser trailers, I didn’t even know it was on last night until it was brought to my attention by a TV-less Jo. She has requested I don’t go on about it too much.

Still, how long is a piece of string, eh?

This season, the rumours are that rather than save the world (or at least the world that exists in central London) from a different baddie each week, our heroes will be grappling with one ongoing story arc. What does this mean for you, the viewer? Well, on the evidence of last night: gratuitous flashing of Rupert’s backside (my eyes, my eyes!) then a bomb on a train in Iran and a deadly virus, spread through London by a coughing defected zomg!TERRORIZT, who answers the question what would George Clooney look like had he found himself typecast after Syriana and ate his way through all of teh pies as a consolation?

And it’s big, bonkers and utterly brilliant. There’s a regular on-screen UK Infection Count, and perhaps if phone-ins weren’t the devil du jour on British television at the moment it would have been kept on screen like an interactive, Children in Need style counter. You could have text-voted: who would you like to see cark it? The name’s Bond, Rupert Bond, that’s Rupert like the bear or Zaf, who couldn’t look more skinny white boy if he tried despite being hired solely so that they’d have a cast member to send undercover in the Middle East.

I honestly don’t know what I preferred: the Spooks of yore with its abortion doctors and anti-vivisectionists and characters you actually gave a shit about, or the current tight, glossy thriller that’s all about Rupert Penry-Jones’ one-man campaign to be the next Bond. Still, with Hermione Norris also on board to move the show away from ensemble drama to star vehicle, it means less time spent with Jo’s ridiculous new haircut. She looks like she’s auditioning for the role of Santa’s little helper in Debenhams over Christmas.

(“Not so,” said Kaite, ably taking on the mantle of Spooks text-buddy with the bezzer on night shift, “they can at least act.”)

My horoscope says my notorious rubbish attention span will be worse than usual today, and I should reward myself with a chocolate bar for half an hour’s labour. Quite frankly though, what Scot isn’t counting down the hours until 6 o’clock, and yet not, all at the same time?

PS I have to say I’m loving that the last.fm plugin now picks up what you’ve been listening to away from your computer when you sync with iTunes. I reckon it means the site now gives a much better indication of what I’ve been listening to over a given week, rather than throwing up top artist anomalies that have come up twice on shuffle.

Although I don’t half look like an Adams-obsessed sad case.

she was alright but she can’t come out tonight;

Published on October 15, 2007 in aff the telly and music. 7 Comments Tags: arcade fire, bruce springsteen, dave, evening standard, friends, the hype machine.

Deadly Skunk Floods London

Originally uploaded by LinkMachineGo

STEVIE: Evening Standard board: Deadly skunk floods London. It’s like a really bad B movie, I wonder if they would need to be undead?
LIS: And just imagine the SMELL? Begs to be a comic strip though. First stop: Evening Standard offices. Chews through the AP wire. News blackout. Panic. Too far?
STEVIE: Should kill all the reporters I think. Or maybe the flood meant they take down the Thames barrier, destroying Parliament. Actually most of UK would be happy.

My brother called me earlier. He’s discovered a Freeview channel that shows what appears to be wall to wall Top Gear, Whose Line Is It Anyway? and Have I Got News For You repeats. I may never leave the house again. What was that about the magazine?

Yes. Yes, it’s really a TV channel called Dave.

Music blog aggregator The Hype Machine is getting ready to relaunch… as soon as they get 10,000 people accessing the site at once. As of twelve minutes past nine this evening, the total stands at 3422. Go on. You’ve got tabbed browsing. Can’t you leave the window open, and tell all your friends?

OMG. Stereogum has been updated since this morning: videos of Bruce Springsteen/Arcade Fire collaboration here!!!

picking up the slack;

Published on October 14, 2007 in aff the telly, current affairs, fitba and photography. 0 Comments Tags: 365days, alex salmond, bob dylan, kelvin mckenzie, scotland, snp, top gear, tspam.

It’s That Time again, which means my internet presence is about to be curtailed severely for the next couple of weeks. So I don’t really have a considered response to Kelvin MacKenzie’s comment that: “Scots enjoy spending [money], they don’t enjoy creating it which is the opposite of down in the south.”

I’ll give you my gut response though, which was: “Cock.”

I attempted to come up with something a little more considered, that took into account that while our beloved First Minister, Baroni von Greenback, continues to wage his one-man campaign to paint Scotland as a nation of whingers with a full sausage supper, nevermind a bag of chips, on their shoulders the least we can expect is for some London-based media wanker desperate for some headlines in order to supplement that CHEEK HE HAS TO TALK considering he makes a fortune doing ABSOLUTELY FUCK ALL to pass painfully obvious provocative comment.

But really, I think I should just stick with: “Cock”, and revel in another glorious weekend for this nation of wastrels.

James May is currently comparing a Ferrari to Sainsburys Taste the Difference cheese. I love this show.

And now it’s Bob Dylan night on BBC4, perfect to distract me from the batch of cookies I’ve got baking in the oven.

PHOTO: Day 82.