Sinister: my love is bigger than your love (sing it!)

[Mark Hester]

hello,
blimey, Peter Miller!


Well, I suppose I'm a quasi-fan rather than a true fan, for getting the new
single on Tuesday rather than Monday.  Oh dear, Avalanches, why did you bother? 
I think that their versh of I'm a Cuckoo is definitely going to supersede Beyond
the Sunrise in the B&S track most often skipped stakes, if it really counts as a
B&S track.  Fortunately, Stop Look and Listen and Travellin' Light more than
make up for this blip by being fantastic - the country twang of the first part
of SL&L is a demonstration of the band's increasing versatility and the guitar
solo at the end is astounding and unexpected.  The comparisons with sixties and
seventies acts seem to coming apace into my inbox.  Sorry, David Moore, I have
never heard any Gram Parsons, although I prolly should have.

The video's good as well - I'm always impressed by the way the cover stars from
the records appear in the vids as well - it's a nice touch.  Also, I like the
way the dog emerges from the bed to coincide with the line about trouble rearing
its ugly head - although I can't help feeling sorry for the poor mutt :).


I find it quite easy to regard the I'm a Cuckoo video as a sequel to the Dog on
Wheels video.  After all, both feature Stuart going round Glasgow and
interacting in various ways with the people he sees, but Dog on wheels sees him
very much as part of a band just starting out (putting up posters in the college
and so forth) whereas in I'm a Cuckoo he is more self-assured as someone in an
established band might be expected to be.  If he had bumped into the two girls
whilst jogging at the Dog on Wheels stage of the band's career he may well of
received a scowl and some abuse, but as he does so in 2004, the girls can go
home and tell their housemates that they had been bumped into by Stuart Murdoch
and getting crumpled course-notes was a small price to pay!  In fact, it's
possible that one girl mouths "wow, that's Stuart Murdoch!" to her friend after
Stuart goes on his way.....I don't know, I can't lipread people in real life,
let alone on a screen.

Talking of people on screen, I found myself being videoed at the end of last
week.  That sounds quite pervy put like that, but it was all very innocuous.  I
was on a one and a half day course learning how to carry out people's
performance appraisals and we had to do these videoed role plays.  My character
was a manager who had a member of staff who was SO popular that she had an
entourage of people gathered round her desk chatting loudly at all hours of the
day and I'd had a Very Important Visitor who'd complained about the noise!  I
watched the video in my parents' living room on Saturday and they commented
"ooh, you don't seem like *you* in it at all!  You're so professional!"  To
which I immediately thought - what, you expected me to halting and slapdash??? 
I suppose any complimentary comment can be regarded negatively if you think too
hard about it.  The funny thing about the whole process was that the course
tutor assured us all the way through that "only WE would see the video" as if
there was a suspicion in some quarters that he was going to make multiple copies
and flog them down market, innit.

Has anyone reported back from My Bloody Valentine Tigermilking?  It was great as
ever, I went there via Stoke Newington to call in on Ruth from corduroysmoke who
wanted to go but couldn't as she was working.  Fortunately she was working in a
PUB so I was able to be barfly for an hour and a bit while we discussed all
manner of things including Franz Ferdinand and the Will Self book I'm reading at
the moment, punctuated by inevitable breaks for her to serve the other
customers.  Then on to the betsey where I met Dafyd, Jim Purpletrousers, Paul H
and of course Mr Santabarbarbarbarbara-ann, who was wearing his B&S & t-shirt
under a shirt, which he unbuttoned Clark Kent stylee, tho he didn't play the
final track on Lifes Rich Pageant to emphasise the point.  Tigermilking this
time confounded us all by being Upstairs Downstairs, although there was no sign
of Lord Richard Bellamy.  We were treated to some Primals from Stefano's tall
friend whose name I can't remember, lots of stuff I didn't know but which
sounded good anyway, FF's Take Me Out (twice!  I hadn't heard the version on the
album before, only the radio edit, although I'd just bought it I hadn't had the
opportunity to listen, so asked what's this before it became obvious exactly
what it was) and of course the track in the title.  Bridget the Midget sounds so
different these days.

well, it's How does It Feel tomorrow, Penelope Tree in a couple of weeks (I'm
excited about this as I've never been before) and of course in between there's
my trip to BELGIUM!  (waves to Olivier and Aton, oh and Annie...where art thou?)

byeeee,
Mark.

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