Sinister: long winded post that says nothing very intersting at all

[duke of harringay]

Current listening = the Delgados new record. No opinions forthcoming at this
time. Not like me really, is it? No opinions I mean
 not the listening to
the Delgados.

My apologies to anyone dismembered by my barbs about sharing opinions on
non-public-yet records. In the spirit of the times then, I made some notes
on some things not-yet-public. Seasoned readers will want to press ‘delete’
right now.

The Visitors ‘Miss’ album is a collection of little known pop, I’m sorry,
Pop gems that stab at the very heart of What It Is To Be Sixteen. That’s
Sixteen, clumsy and shy probably
 or at least sixteen, angry and drunk.
Perhaps both. Some songs are penned and warbled by some self-proclaimed fat,
ignorant drunk. Top quality
 Not due for anyone to be hearing until at least
June I expect.

Who mentioned the Smiths and the Go-Betweens recently and suggested that
they merely scratched at the nether regions of the ‘charts’? Pah. The
Go-Betweens never so much as sniffed the charts, not even when Beggars
Banquet tried silly marketing ploys like traffic light shaped packages or
some such nonsense. Double pah. It just goes to show how stupid people can
be
 (for not buying the Go-Betweens records I mean, not for suggesting that
they sniffed the charts
 because obviously that’s a question of
interpretation and maybe Streets Of Your Town reached 41 or something
) And
The Smiths? Well, hell, The Smiths were regularly ‘top, top twenty’ (to be
sung as in the Undertones tune
) tunesters, and didn’t ‘Panic’ go top five
or something ridiculous? It’s all so long ago and I know my mind is dulled
by too much work and wine, as well as many other things. I dug out my old
Smiths singles the other week and made up a tape for an ex-pupil who told me
he saw them on MTV and remembered me saying how good they were and he was
surprised I was right
 hmmm. The Smiths on MTV, how strange that would have
sounded back in 1984 when we swore they were the very epitome of anti-chart
pop. These were the days when the Razorcuts would write ‘Top 40’s not where
it’s at anymore’ on their sleeves and we would jump up and down and say
‘yessum, it is indeed so.’ For it was.

I used to think that Belle & Sebastian were godlike in their rejection of
all things rock and roll, that they were treading very strange avenues
indeed with their refusals and perusals and odd meanderings. Then they
seemed to grow up and become dull. Which is just my opinion. I feel kind of
disappointed. Actually I feel very disappointed, but that’s the prerogative
of artists, just as it is the prerogative of other artists to do what the
hell they like and not have to explain it all away to anyone like me.
Especially if what they do seems to be a bit dreary and weak willed. Someone
recently called me a bitter pill, which I thought was pretty spot on. Honey,
my students call me worse than that all the time
 it’s true I must be
picking up bad habits from them.

I was talking about things that weren’t released yet, wasn’t I? (Hey Aimee!
Tell your English teacher to stick it up his bum. My students do this all
the time
 and I don’t even tell them they are great. In fact the exact
opposite. The tears I’ve had from being honest
 ‘this is crap’ is always a
good one for that. It’s the new brutality
 ) well when the new Aislers Set
album is released in a couple of months time you must all promise me that
you will head out to the stores and buy it. That’s if you can find it
 I
seem to have endless difficulties in finding ANYthing I want in the local
stores. I want, and I mean I WANT the Stars record but has anyone even heard
of it? No siree. I am driven to ordering it through CDNOW in the USA, who
have it as an import
 so I am getting an exported import. Or something. That
’s if their back ordering service even works at all. Meantime anyone who can
furnish more details (like record label?) much appreciated. Endless praises
be to MP3s. And they do a storming cover of This Charming Man. Which is
enough Smiths for one post by FAR.

Ailsers Set
 yes, yes, and thrice YES. There’s a song by Wyatt that goes on
about being drunk on the streets of Chicago for fourteen days on end and I
tell you, it SENDS me every time. And another of Amy’s that says something
about heading up to the New York border that is just sublime. Honest, I had
a minidisk of the Aislers Set album, and one of the B&S album when I was on
the plane to New York last week and do you know what? The B&S one didn’t get
a look in. But I’m not telling you why not. Oh no.

There’s a book that comes out next month and it’s called ‘Powder’ and the
NME says ‘Read it’. Of course you know by now to never trust the NME (unless
you don’t, in which case you are fifteen and that’s understandable
 give it
time) but really
 this book should be avoided at all costs. It is written by
the bloke who used to be the manager for the Farm. Hands up who remembers
THEM? No sniggering at the back. I mean it
 I wrote this book when I was 16.
No really, I did. Some of it anyway. Ask my friends
 oh wait, I didn’t have
any. Which is why I wrote the book. Hmmmm. All of this says much more about
the lack of quality in ‘Powder’ than it does about any quantity of it my
writing when I was 16. I mean, look at it now. How much better can it have
gotten? Answers to be kept to yourselves
 especially Peter Miller, who I
just mentioned because I know he loves to see his name in print. And hey,
Miller, the fat ignorant drunk and I were arguing about which of us it was
you were taking the piss out of in your recent Papercuts outing? I insist it
was him because there’s no way I’d have said such things about Hip Hop. I am
too ignorant


And on that unarguable point, I shall withdraw, perchance to dream of seeing
the Magnetic Fields in July
 what a super start to our summer hols!

Still keeping some kind of strange faith


The Duke

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