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Sunday 1st August

The One and Only Billy Shears

Have you ever started doing something because you thought it was a good idea and you had a bit of spare time to do it in? And then realised that the reason you hadn't done it before was that it was a gigantic pain in the ass? Keeping my PC infection-free is like that. Of course, I'm using the dreaded Windows98 OS and IE as my default browser, so I deserve everything I get, right? Probably. But I still find myself amazed at the ease with which my system can be compromised without my knowledge. In between shaking my fist and cursing Microsoft loudly, I often think that if any of the companies I've worked for had released software that was as buggy and insecure as Microsoft's, they'd have gone out of business a long while ago. (And then I remember the component program whose Delete button erased all the records in the database rather than just the selected one.....) And what prompted this latest bout of despairing? I finally got round to installing some spyware detection software - Spybot Search and Destroy to be accurate. Having basked secure in the knowledge that the detection script at doxdesk hadn't detected any parasites, I didn't think I needed it, but you can never be too certain, can you? So having detected and removed 86 instances of Spyware, I'm now a litle less complacent.

My ex-workmate, Jack, had a bit of a muse about his preferred browser, Firefox, a couple of weeks ago and how he'd tidied up his page's HTML to make it comply with W3C standards. Good on ya, mate. I ought to do the same. (This page currently is currently compliant (Yippee!), but I can't guarantee the rest of the site is.) I really ought to because, as a technical author, I ought to be as rigorous about my personal standards as my professional ones (only in a writing sense, of course, but yeah, maybe I ought to have a shower on the days I'm not working too...). However, as long as 90 per cent of the world are using IE, I can get away with sloppy coding because IE still displays it "correctly". (Hey, perhaps they think like that at Microsoft, too...) That's really no excuse but that's going to be the way it is for now. If you do view this page using anything other than IE, I'd be grateful if you could let me know if it looks terrible. Of course, if you're not using IE, you might not be able to see this text or the layout feck-ups might have sent you fleeing screaming before you got this far...

And talking of crappy software - my PC came pre-loaded with a version of Nero. Now despite uninstalling and re-loading the software and fiddling with various settings, I've never had any success burning music CDs with it. In fact, I've not had much joy with it at all, as it keeps failing at various times with a variety of non-specific error messages. I finally gave up a fortnight ago, after spending nearly all day trying to burn a CD without success, and decided that the constant reference to a SCSI/IDE problem meant that it must be a hardware problem. WRONG! As I found out yesterday, having spent £70 on a replacement external CD-Writer, it was the bloody software. Again! Having installed the accompanying CD-burning software I got perfect results first time using my own internal CD-Writer. Arse! So, does anyone want an Iomega CD-Writer, USB 2.0 (and 1.1 compatible), boxed with all the leads and everything, never used, for say 50 quids?

Changing tack, here was another entry for my own, unofficial, "Disappointing URL of The Year" competition - http://www.britishblondesociety.co.uk/calendar/. It sadly doesn't appear to be there any more (or at least wasn't when I last checked it). The British Blonde is a breed of cow, if you really must know.

Fans of good music may be disappointed to learn that William Shatner has a new album due out in October, apparently. Fans of bad music, like me, will be delighted. And fans of bad music who can't wait will be even more delighted to know that they can download The Kirkster with Joe Jackson covering Pulp's 'Common People' and many other treats from here - Shatner - Has Been. Subscribers to b3ta.com will have seen this already, but I don't care - everyone in the world ought to hear this. Maybe not more than once though.

As it's the end of the month, it must be time for the lastfriday review, surely? Yep. I'd been looking forward to this night for a while as it was going to be the first chance I had to catch up with the phenomenal No Names Mentioned. Imagine my disappointment then when I find that a) they're not playing and b) they seem to have fizzled out in a wave of apathy. What a waste. Come on guys, get your thumbs out of your asses and get back to doing what you do best. Don't make me come down there to sort you out.... That said, there was still a decent enough line-up. First up were Disarm side project Superc*nt 5000. What a racket. Certainly not as focussed or as brutal as Disarm can be but then I guess that's the point. The sound of a band having fun. Following that were A Future Regret. I thought they made a promising start with the first two numbers sounding very Placebo because the guitars weren't loud enough in the verses, but then they turned their guitars up and went a bit rawk, which was not my cup of tea. I started to notice the rougher edges. Still, they provided comedy moment of the evening when the lead singer's guitar-twirling move went badly wrong and his guitar hit the floor instead. That said, if I'd been able to play like that when I was that age I might have carried on being in bands instead of retreating to the safety of my bedroom. (No one ever says you're crap if you don't play live...) Third up were Faith In Chaos. I'd heard good things about them and they didn't disappoint. Proving that you don't need a lot of chord changes, a dozen riffs per song or even to play at a million miles an hour to be effective, they delivered a powerful set. It helps, of course, if you have a front man who can deliver, despite the band's rather static on-stage demeanour. They also won the Best Cover Version no-prize by banging out a hilarious 'You're the One That I Want' from Grease. I laughed out loud. Closing proceedings were Series 7. They were full-on hardcore from the word go. They won points from me for their use of samples and having a laptop (an Apple of some sort, tech fans) on stage to launch them from, but they lost points by distracting me by having the singer's trousers on the verge of falling down almost from the start and making me wonder if I could persuade their bass player to be Kim Deal to my Frank Black in a Pixies tribute band - I'd only need a Joey Santiago and a David Lovering then.... Anyway, they were loud, good and the set was surprisingly short. But then, it was very hot and no one had heard them before, so the short, sharp shock was the best approach. Dead, dead good. The only downside of the night was that the attendance seemed to be down on the usual numbers but then with No Names Mentioned not appearing, the summer holidays and 6ft Midgets playing elsewhere that night it was perhaps only to be expected. Still, I managed to catch the last bus home so that was a result in itself!

Limping a little further back into the past, last Wednesday (28th July) I took my nephews to the Nantwich Show - the annual gathering of the farming folk of Nantwich and South Cheshire, based around a long-established Cheese Festival. My sister, Liz, or her husband would normally take the kids but Liz has knackered her knee and can't walk very far, and the estranged husband was working, so I volunteered. First stop was the falconry display which involved too much talking and not enough demonstration to be satsifying. Plus, the pictures I took didn't come out too well. Then there was time for a wander round the site, a ride up to 12m in an industrial platform-thing (great views but a little too wobbly for my liking) and then off to the main arena to see The Kangaroo Kid performing stunts on his quad bikes. I saw him at Truckfest a couple of years back and he was a bit disappointing then but this time he delivered the goods. Using a radio mic he kept up a constant stream of banter whilst performing some impressive stunts. The jumps were the best - just clearing the roof of a tractor, then turning it front on to the ramp and clearing both it and a car parked lengthwise on the other side. The kids certainly enjoyed it. After he'd finished we went to take a look at the International Cheeses. Incongruously, in the midst of the displays of the finest cheeses from round the world there was a table dedicated to processed cheese. Yep, the sort of plastic stuff that isn't really cheese at all. Don't believe me? Lookee here! Anyway, once the kids had got tired of looking at cheese (after about 30 seconds, to be honest, but I made them walk all the way round the exhibition) we headed home via the toy stall. Needless to say, that was where they showed the most interest, but then they are kids. "From birth to five you're learning, from five to ten you're playing, by the time you're fifteen you're never wrong, you turn around and it's all gone. Your Childhood.". On passing the Young Farmer's Club marquee I momentarily thought that I ought to see if there was anyone I knew in there but then I remembered that anyone I might remember would now be in the Middle-aged Farmers' Club....

This sharp reminder of the passing of time did cause me to recall that, as far as life-changing events go, it's now twenty years since I was diagnosed with cancer. Testicular cancer, if you really want to know. These days it's entirely curable if caught early enough and the recovery rates are very good. Back then, the recovery rates weren't so good and I left it far too long before confiding in the doctor. I can't recall the date exactly, but I remember the "Great Quake of '84" happened whilst I was in hospital and that was on Thursday 19th July, according to the statistics. So I would have been on the operating table on Monday 16th or Tuesday 17th. To a large extent it doesn't matter - I was ill a long time before that - but if we're counting, that's a rough date for the first official diagnosis. Perhaps next year, when it's twenty years since the end of my treatment, I might share some stuff about it, but I don't feel like doing it now.

Right, that's the public navel-gazing out of the way. My good friend Richard and I having been having a regular correspondence about the classic British horror films that BBC1 have been showing late on Friday night/Saturday mornings. For most people the words "British horror" probably conjure up images of the more dreadful Hammer movies, so I'd imagine people have been giving them a miss (especially when they note that the star is, say, Patrick Mower - the poor man's Gareth Hunt) but there have been some surprising gems on display - Satan's Slave, Psychomania, Theatre of Blood, to name but three. Anyway, if you really want to know what the film is like don't go by the two line review in the paper, look it up at The British Horror Film site - a scarily complete archive of every British horror movie ever made. I can't recommend this site enough - it's the IMDB of British Horror.

I had a couple of other things I was going to mention, but to be honest, I think that's enough for you to be going on with. So that's yer lot for this update. Next update, sometime, somewhere in summertime.

Go on, stick your oar in:

Sunday 18th July

I am old enough to be your postman

It is I, Leclaire. Back with yet another in the series of sporadic updates as my house-hunting efforts come to naught and so I'm dependent on being in sunny Coni to update the old site. Actually, I'm sure that if I made a bit more of an effort I could find a way of updating more regularly, but this sporadic stuff suits me at the moment.

Well, there's only really been three major events in my life in the last three weeks - the family gathering two weeks ago, the Move Festival in Manchester last weekend and the opening of Spider-Man 2 this. So which do I start with? Hhmmm, tricky. I'll start with Move, I think

The Move Festival at the Old Trafford Cricket Ground in Manchester isn't really a festival in the true sense of the word - there's no overnight camping, no hippies, no mud, no holes in the ground masquerading as toilets - but more a series of one-dayers at the same venue. To give the place a feel of a festival the beer was overpriced piss (Carling and no other) and there was a wide range of takeaway cuisines to attempt to get food poisoning from. Anyway, let's go through the days one at a time....

1. Thursday 8th - the day I saw the least of, having chosen to work instead of taking the afternoon off. Having got a lift into Manchester, I checked into my hotel (The Princess on Portland), had a shower, got changed and headed off. I arrived just in time to catch the last few bars of Jimmy Cliff's set, which was a bit frustrating as I'd wanted to see him. It also meant that I'd missed The Stranglers (not that bothered about them since Hugh Cornwell left) and Ozomatli, who I'd never heard of. No loss. Sadly it did mean I had to put up with Ocean Colour Scene who were as tedious as I expected. Or at least they would have been if I hadn't retired, disgusted, to the bar after only a couple of their songs. They still sounded tedious from out there though. The clock ticks round to 8.45 and it's time for one last wee and then back into the arena to take up position for the headliners Madness. Unsurprised to find I'm not the only shaven-headed, middle-aged, fat bloke in the arena. Madness are brilliant from the opening blasts of 'One Step Beyond' right through to the closing chords of 'Madness', which rounds off the second encore. Obviously enjoying themselves, Suggs is joking with the audience, the band are all grinning throughout and everyone is dancing. Even me. They play all the hits, except 'Cardiac Arrest', 'Michael Caine' and 'Ghost Train', throw in old song 'The Fear' and even the recent hits 'Lovestruck' and 'Johnny the Horse' are rapturously received. They encore with 'The Israelites' and 'Night Boat to Cairo' and then come back out to do'Bed And Breakfast Man' and 'Madness', sending us all home happy. And, quick check of watch, it's only just after 10.30pm. It still takes an hour to filter through the Metrolink station and get back in to Manchester city centre. I crash out, tired but happy.
2. Friday 9th - A long lie-in and a decent breakfast followed by a soak in the bath and I'm ready for a morning wandering the shopping emporia of Manchester. Lunching in a Wetherspoon's up the road from the hotel, I take the opportunity to ring the boss and point out that I'm in the pub having a leisurely lunch and some decent beer. She's not impressed. After lunch and a bit more window shopping, I freshen up and head off to Old Trafford once more. I arrive in time to have missed Longview and, unbeknownst to me at the time, The Cranes. So first band of the day for me was Keane. Live, they're not much different from on the record, although the disadvantage of the big screens did mean that you could really see what strange looking people they are. Still, they put on a decent enough show, played the hits, "rocked out" with 'Bend And Break' and kept people reasonably entertained. Unlike Elbow, who despite the goodwill of large parts of the crowd, played a set of such unrelenting, plodding, ordinaryness that I was driven back into the arms of my good friend, the bar. Mind you, that was a very good place to watch all the goth girls go by.... I made my way back into the arena for the night's headliners, The Cure. Now I'm no short bloke, so imagine my delight in finding myself stood behind a man who must have been 6' 5" at least. I edged my way round him to stand at his side. Now anyone under 6 foot tall stood behind us couldn't see. Ah well. Anyway, The Cure packed in a fantastic mix of old and new stuff and sounded great and looked as if they were enjoying it. This was (so far) their only scheduled date in England, and the first time they'd played in Manchester in years, so I think Robert Smith was somewhat surprised by the reaction they got. Sadly, due to the festival restrictions they only played for about an hour and three-quarters (a more "normal" set might weigh in at two and a half hours or more, apparently) but it was a great hour and three-quarters. The only complaint I heard was that they didn't play 'Friday I'm In Love', what with it being Friday and all, but I was more than happy. I didn't even mind the crush on the Metro back into town.
3. Saturday 10th - A hectic morning as I had to check out of one hotel, get the train to Nantwich to drop off one set of clothes and pick up another and then get back to Manchester, check into another hotel, (The Palace) and get out to Old Trafford for 4pm. I didn't quite make it. I arived at Old Trafford in time to catch end of The Stands tedious rock/pop offerings. I'd missed 22-20s but according to the stoned bloke just inside the arena, I hadn't missed anything special. Saturday was the worst, weather-wise, which was probably because I didn't take my coat that day. There was a brief shower whilst former James frontman Tim Booth was on. But I didn't really mind that because, in the middle of a fantastic version of 'Sometimes' (slowed down, with spoken verses) I sudenly found my eyes were leaking. It's a good song anyway, but this version made it sound so tender, so wistful and so heartfelt that I couldn't help it. Soft git. Anyway, this was the only James song in a set culled from his solo album, which I'm now very tempted to buy. After Timmy, Goldfrapp had a good go at warming up the audience, but even the gorgeous Alison herself was wearing a coat for most of their set. I'm still not convinced that Goldfrapp's success doesn't have as much to do with her penchant for strange, sexy outfits as it does with their Giorgio Moroder-style '80s electro-funk. That said, I'd give a pound to see her abuse a Theremin in that manner again. Ooh, saucy! Next up, the band that a large number had come specially to see - Pixies. Little more than an hour from Black Francis and friends, largely culled from the first two albums and with virtually no between-song banter with the crowd. Absolutely fantastic. Apparently, it was raining while they were on, but I don't think anyone noticed. There's been some sniping about Kim Deal having put on weight, but she still looks hot to me. On the other hand, Francis is getting up to my proportions these days. All I need to do is shave my beard off and find some other talented lookey-likeys and I'm sure there's a fortune to be made as a Pixies tribute band.... Not sure who's idea it was to make The Stereophonics the headliners, but it must have made sense to someone. It certainly didn't make any sense to the couple of thousand of us who legged it rather than have to suffer the tedious Welsh tossers. Sadly, due to congestion at the Metro station I had to listen to the first couple of numbers before I could escape. At least I didn't have to look at them. I didn't realise how wet I was until the euphoria of seeing the Pixies had worn off back at the hotel. Slept well, a happy man.
4. Sunday 11th - Decided to skip the hotel breakfast at an additional £15.50(!) and lazed in the bath for an hour or so before heading over the road to the local Spar to pick up some nosh. Wandered round Manchester centre for a couple of hours before heading back to hotel to chill out in front of the British Grand Prix. Nodded off about five seconds after Schumacher, M, took the lead. Headed off to Move early, determined not to miss a single act on the last day. James Maker formerly of Raymonde kicked things off with a largely unremarkable set. His guitarist has a disturbingly close resemblance to former England 'keeper David Seaman. Very off-putting. At about the same time Mr Maker was on, The Beta Band were doing an acoustic set in the VH2 tent. I managed to catch the end of it. Sounded very good. Back on the main stage The Ordinary Boys were doing their best to kick-start a Jam revival. The biggest cheers in their set were for '(Little) Bubble' and The Specials cover 'Little Bitch'. It seems to me that when they stop being angry young men and concentrate on knocking out a tune they can be very good indeed. And the guitarist ought to refrain from spitting on stage - most unattractive. I wouldn't recommend getting their album on the strength of this performance, however '(Little) Bubble' is on the b-side of their current single, which is worth getting for that alone. (Or just download it from the Internet or something). Next up, the Beta Band, already warmed up from their acoustic show and apparently determined to push the sound system to it's limits with didgeridoos, dogs barking and all other sorts of musical weirdness. They surprised me - I'd kind of written them off after their first couple of EPs - but I think their music was perfectly suited to the early-Sunday-evening, chilling out vibe that was going on. Following them was the more visceral, in-your-face glam-rock of the New York Dolls. Seminal band of the 70s they may have been, but the two remaining original members - David Johanssen and Sylvain Sylvain - were both looking ravaged by time. Much like some of the audience stood next to me, who spent half their time calling for 'Trash' and the other half skinning up. There was a cryptic reference to bassist, and Mormon, Arthur 'Killer' Kane not being present because he was singing in church, but he'd pulled out from this gig at the last minute as he wasn't feeling too well. Sadly, no one, not even he, knew how unwell he was and he died of leukaemia two days later. RIP. Moving swiftly on to cheerier things - Morrissey. Headlining the fest and playing his second gig in Manchester in as many months, he was in a playful mood. Warming us up with a selection of his favourite tunes (Pony, Jobriath, Nancy Sinatra, etc) he strolled onto the stage with the words "Good evening Weatherfield. I am a local boy made... bad." The back curtains opened to reveal MORRISSEY spelled out in red bulbs a la Elvis in the Comeback Special. He then launched into 'Don't Make Fun Of Daddy's Voice' which was the only song I hadn't heard before. Then there was 'Shakespeare's Sister' and then, oh damn it, here's the setlist:
   Don't Make Fun Of Daddy's Voice
   Shakespeare's Sister
   First Of The Gang To Die
   How Can Anybody Possibly Know How I Feel?
   Let Me Kiss You
   I Know It's Gonna Happen Someday
   The Headmaster Ritual
   I Have Forgiven Jesus
   All The Lazy Dykes
   Such A Little Thing Makes Such A Big Difference
   There Is A Light That Never Goes Out
   Subway Train (into) Everyday Is Like Sunday
   The World Is Full Of Crashing Bores
   No One Can Hold A Candle To You (A Raymonde cover)
   Rubber Ring
   I'm Not Sorry
   encore: Irish Blood, English Heart

   In between the songs he was enlightening us with a few "history lessons" about his time in this part of Manchester. He used to work near the cricket ground and where the B&Q is was the Rockhard Club where The New York Dolls were due to play in 1972 until the untimely death of drummer Billy Murcia caused them to cancel. He reserved most of his vitriol for his old school, slating both it and the teachers, especially the headmaster, before launching into 'Headmaster Ritual'. Between songs he was throwing sweets into the crowd and generally having a good time. Three times he changed his shirt and every time it ended up thrown into the crowd. In short, he was brilliant. The only downsides to the performance were the lack of encores (due to the curfew) and the fact that every time I looked at Boz Boorer, I kept thinking of Roger Whittaker (fortunately he didn't do any whistling). I accused Morrissey of having waning powers in an earlier post; on the strength of this, I take that all back. Fantastic. I want to see him again. Now.

On Friday and Saturday night there was footage from the Move festival shown on ITV. I taped it, in the vain hope that I might see myself on film, or see something interesting that I'd missed. But I was unlucky on both counts. Mostly I found myself being irritated by Mike Maclean, who fronted the programmes, and frustrated by the fact there weren't more bands on (No James Maker, no Cranes, no Ozomatli, for example). I think you might be able to spot me in the crowd for both Tim Booth and The Ordinary Boys because I was near the front and I'm definitely somewhere in the middle of the heaving masses for The Pixies, Madness, The Cure and Morrissey, but so are hundreds of other people. One interesting thing I did glean from the programmes was that The Cure chose to play on Friday with Keane and Elbow, which shows how astute they are - get two boring bands on ahead of you and by the time you come on, people will cheer anything remotely lively... And in case you're wondering The Ordinary Boys single is called 'Talk Talk Talk' not 'Take take Take' as it was credited.

Anyway, as if seeing Morrissey wasn't enough excitement for one month, yesterday I went to see Spider-Man 2. I only managed to fit in three viewings (one of which was free, too) before time and tiredness forced me to give in and return home. The first time through, at 9am, I was blown away. I was back in full-on soft git mode. The fight scenes are fantastic, in fact all the CGI is great. Alfred Molina makes a great Doc Ock. Kirsten Dunst is truly beautiful and you get to see her nipples through her dress again. Tobey Maguire and Rosemary Harris are on top form, and even Uncle Ben puts in a surprise appearance, as does someone else, but I can't tell you who without spoiling the end. There's some nice cameos too - John Landis, Bruce Campbell, Ted Raimi. There's plenty there to feed a third instalment even allowing for the fact that only a true comics buff like me would know that old one-arm, Doctor Connors is destined to become The Lizard at some point in the future.... I have to admit that I was still thinking this is the best movie I have seen in ages, and better than the first, on the third viewing when I started noticing one or two incosistencies in the film. Still, there's nothing that should spoil your enjoyment. Get out and see it now. Now. Go on. Go!

What? You're still here? Well, there's just time to tell you that I did take some pictures at the Move fest, but I've left my camera back in Nantwich so I can't upload any at the moment. And if you want to download some Morrissey stuff, there's a bunch of on this site, just follow the morriseysolo link at the bottom of the page. (I've downloaded a load of stuff that I'll be burning to CD for a friend).

And that's about it. There's no news from the family gathering that I want to share here - not because it's "too personal" but just because it's dull. What else? Oh yeah, I got my credit card limit increased by a whopping two grand this month. Which was a bit of a surprise as the last time my credit limit was raised was about 4 years ago when they put it up by a mere £300. You'll be pleased to know that so far I've resisted the temptation to blow the money on a Spiderman outfit or, indeed, anything at all. I suspect I'll need to call on that facility when I finally find somewhere to live. Er, there's probably some other stuff but I'll be damned if I can think of it now. I'm off to my mate John's next weekend for a bit of a drink-cum-barbie to celebrate his birthday and then I'll be back the weekend after for the lastfriday gig. I'm quite looking forward to that one, I can tell you. Cheers!

Go on, stick your oar in:

Saturday 26th June

Too Much Effort

Here it is, another of them sporadic bulletins from the fatfakir. I know how much you guys have been missing me, so I thought I'd take the chance offered by an unscheduled return to Conisbrough to spew some more random shite on to the Interweb.

First up is a 'shout', as I believe the kidz say, to Burnz, who's representing 6ft Midgets and e-mailed me to say how much he enjoyed the site. He must have enjoyed it - he spent 8 hours trawling through it. I didn't know there was that much toss on here to wade through. So, "Big Up" to you Mr Burnz and I hope the gig went well last night.

Sticking with a musical theme, I've been out wasting my money on CD's again. (Yeah, I know I should be downloading them from the Internet, but they frown on that sort of thing at work - so no more crack whore mp3s for me till I get Broadband at home.) I've actually mostly been wasting my money on music mags with free CD's attached - MetalHammer and Terrorizer mainly - but when you get the chance to visit a cut-price store you have to make the most of it. So, recently I've bought the following:

• Ramones - End of the Century/Pleasant Dreams/Too Tough to Die. All recently re-mastered and re-issued with "bonus" tracks. End of the Century is the Phil Spector-produced opus that was about as commercial as they got. Pleasant Dreams features live favourite 'The KKK Took my Baby Away' and Too Tough to Die was the tenth anniversary album. They're all pretty good although probably not regarded as classic Ramones by the purists. Anyway, with the news that Johhny Ramone is seriously ill, I thought I'd better get in quick before they hike the price up again. I had the great fortune to see the Ramones live in '85 and they blew me away. Absolutely fantastic - virtually their entire back catalogue in little over an hour and a half and then three encores and they were still finished in time for me to get the last train home.
• Stiff Little Fingers - All The Best. Pretty splendid compilation of stuff from Belfast's finest punksters. All the tracks you'd want are here - Suspect Device, Alternative Ulster, Straw Dogs, At the Edge - and a couple of things you can live without - Running Bear, White Christmas. I've also seen them live, and I could have sworn it was in '84 or 85, but checking their website suggests that it must have been in late '82. Ah, how the memory plays tricks. At least the CD confirms my memory of them being very good though.
• Elbow - Asleep in the Back. I'll confess I've only had the chance to listen to this at work, where etiquette prevents me from whacking the volume up to my preferred listening level, but I found this a bit dull, to be honest. Perhaps I've missed out on some of the subtleties, and perhaps I expected a bit more from my passing acquaintance with their version of 'Independent Woman' but at the moment I'm at a loss as to why Elbow are doing so well and the similar, but superior, I Am Kloot seem to be disregarded.
• Keane - Hopes and Fears. The "credibility out of the window" purchase. Alright, they're ugly and they're just Coldplay without the guitars, but Everybody's Changing is an excellent piece of pop and besides, you can't find cheap Ben Folds Five CDs anywhere these days. So there.

Anyway, whilst I was in said cut-price store (the name of which escapes me, but it's near the KFC in the middle of Birmingham) I also went a bit crazy in the DVD department. Cheap DVD's you can't beat 'em, even if, like me, you don't actually own a DVD player. So I had to buy the following:

• Donnie Darko - I've already got this on video, but obviously for less than a fiver it's worth getting on DVD too. Excellent, even if the ending is more than a little sad.
• The Goodies....At Last - I've not seen this anywhere else for much under twenty of your English pounds, so at a smidgeon under a tenner I couldn't resist. Eight classic Goodies episodes, including 'Kitten Kong', 'Kung Fu Kapers' and 'The Goodies and the Beanstalk'. I haven't actually gotten round to watching this yet so they may turn out to be much worse than I remember, but my sister's seen Kitten Kong and said it was hilarious, so I've got high hopes.
• The Night of the Living Dead - the original George Romero zombie classic for only £2.97. Yep, two pounds and ninety-seven of your Earth pence. Bargain.
• Class of Nuke 'Em High - Troma classic. Right up there with Surf Nazis Must Die, Rabid Grannies From Hell, Chopper Chicks in Zombie Town and Toxic Avenger. Pure trash. Available for a similarly irresistible £2.97. Hell, why not?
• Hulmerist - Morrissey
- A collection of early solo promos that I haven't seen knocking around for ages so I had to have it. A wiser purchase, I'm told by an expert, than the other Mozza DVDs knocking around at the moment. Sadly, seeing the old stuff again just serves to illustrate how much his powers have waned in recent years. Oh well, we'll always have this to look back on.
• Er, and that's it. I wish I'd picked up the Toxic Avenger DVDs now and I was a fool not to get the Fngerbobs one - the entire series for less than two quid - but, to be honest, I could have blown an entire month's wages in there and still come out wanting to buy more.

Finally, some words of advice for the crisp aficianados out there. If you're tempted by Walkers new "Mediterranean" range, don't. The Greek Kebab flavour taste like a meaty, minty ashtray (and believe me, I know what that tastes like!), the Feta Cheese flavour taste like a cheesy ashtray, and the Tomato and Basil flavour taste like a tomato-ey ashtray. Horrible. Horrible. Horrible. And they seem to have changed the flavour of their Cheese & Onion crisps again. Does anybody out there have any recommendations for decent crisps?

Oh yeah. Look out, Clodhopper are coming. Watch this space.

Go on, stick your oar in:

Tuesday 1st June

Pinch, punch, first of the month

Flippin' heck, it's June already! Where does the time go? One minute you're lazing around on the dole and the next you've spent nearly three months working in a new job. How did that happen?

To finish May off, I went to lastfriday er, last Friday. Like (apparently) most of the crowd I went to see Disarm, who seem to be getting better and better to me, although I must admit I had my beer ears on by the time they came on. They were ably supported supported by Taylor Shop Dummys who weren't really my cup of tea, but charmed me by finishing their set with a song called 'Cupboard of Doom', and A Destructive Issue from Leeds, who showed why they're getting a bit of attention at the moment. Disarm seemed to be on top form as usual. Once they'd finished though, large numbers of people left, which must have been a bit disheartening for bill-toppers GU Medicine and is something I always find a bit puzzling. I know the last bus from Mekki leaves quite early and that some of them youngsters need their beauty sleep, but why not see at least something of the last band before you go? It's not like it costs any more money... Anyway, I can't tell you if GU Medicine were actually any good or not because I'm afraid I was very, very drunk and spent most of their set spouting shite to anybody who'd listen. So, apologies if I was rude to anyone and I won't be around again till July, so you'll have to wait till then to whack me one....

My sharper-eyed readers may have noticed that the hyperlink to Snuff's site, which used to be on the left there, now leads to a holding page, which is a bit of a disappointment. I'm hoping this just means that they're re-doing their webpage and have not split up, again. Anyway, I've had a dig around for alternative sites but haven't been able to find anything up-to-date or relevant. So I've removed the link pending the return of their website or the appearance of a viable alternative. If you're hanging out for Snuff-related information you can check out their page on the Fat Wreck website or just do your own Google search. In the meantime why not check out the new links to lastfriday or No Names Mentioned instead?

Go on, stick your oar in: