this week was marked like a hot brand on the skin by our part in the casey and ewan (hereby to be known as raymo) directed video for CATE LE BON. it was the hottest week of the year so far, the sort of weather people leapt into wearing nothing but shorts and people in offices complained about the lack of air conditioning. our working environment was the llofft theatre space above the chapter cafe bar with blacked out windows and at least 4 500 watt hallogen bulb lights at any given time. with no fan. if this was a professional production everyone would have sued! but it was casey and ewan, top creative minds of our time and we gave our time freely and happily, because its far more fun than anything else we do normally. poor cate, she gave birth to an egg, attacked by tree people, raped by a monster and her head pulled off and then lynched by an angry mob. a friend of mine came upstairs to help at one point and said i looked completely calm and at home. i was, i love all this stuff, its what i imagined myself doing when i was a kid. things being what they were and the little twists i took to veer off this path i've ended up doing something different but its always nice being back in that atmosphere where saying things like "i think we should move her eyeball to the right a little more" seem completely normal. we did our normal work and then dashed upstairs to help out till about 11pm from monday and friday and usually got a pint in at the end of the evening. a bloody brilliant way to spend a working week.
other things i did that week that was exciting was attend lots of CHAPTER meetings. this may sound dull to some but it was to discuss moving back to the other side of the building and all that entails: very exciting indeed! our visual arts director, hannah firth, gave us a presentation on the interior design she, angela giddens and marc rees had co-designed (old school) and we saw the finalised signage (neon neon!) and we talked about all that needed to be done. as soon as we move back we have arts festivals WONDERCULTURE and MAY YOU LIVE IN INTERESTING TIMES and then hot on their heels is SWN festival and EXPERIMENTICA. the capacity is going to be huge, a real leap from what we have now (currently at about 200 we will have capacity for 660 in the new concourse) so its important we do a lot of planning. it was revealed that we will also have far more commissioned spaces for art and the idea of what it is going to be like just made my stomach bubble with joy.
on the friday we said goodbye to the raymo team to attend the JOY COLLECTIVE benefit gig in aid of the hospice that looked after jonny's dad when he was dying. it was an opportunity to go to TJ'S and see FUTURE OF THE LEFT and jonny's new band SCIENCE BASTARD. it was very odd going into tjs again. i worked out that i hadn't been there since 1997 when we shot the catatonia video mulder and scully in the xmas break from uni. that is 12 years ago. frightening. it hadn't changed much, apart from the wall to the quiet room moving a bit and the toilets relocated, it had the same feel. i was flashbacking all over the place. NINJA NINJA were on first, they were ok. deans and steen did not like them but i thought they were all right, they seemed to need a bit more practice. SCIENCE BASTARD were full of energy and good fun but the night truly belonged to FUTURE OF THE LEFT, they really are so good live. kelson stage dived at one point and was playing his bass whilst being held up by the crowd. it was a strange contrast that the last time i'd been in there kevin allen, the director of the catatonia video staged a stage dive with cerys that took many attempts to muster into looking like the real thing.
on the sunday we had a film day, since i was ushering for the ken loach season. we saw LOOKING FOR ERIC followed by KES. it was interesting to see how much and how little his style had changed over the years. everyone's seen (and been traumatised by) kes, its up there with WATERSHIP DOWN with one of those films you saw when you were a kid that made you cry your eyes out and this wasn't even accompanied by art garfunkel crooning comfort over the credits. it was odd to look back at the 70s in a very real way, without some bouncy voiceover telling you how great spacehoppers were. some people in the older part of my generation than me had taken their tween children to watch it and it suddenly made me feel very old. i remember things looking like that, i remember that life, if a little distantly and dreamlike, but to them it must seem like how things were in victorian times. it is such a true picture of how brutal things were, the children were as wild as the animals, loach seemed to be portraying human society as a lie of civilisation. it may be my age, but it feels like everything is mapped out that children are never allowed outside on their own to play, their every moment is monitored, closing in on their imagination. LOOKING FOR ERIC was in contrast to that, quite a feelgood movie. it begins with postman eric having a panic attack. his life is at a turning point, his partner has left him and his first wife, lily is back in contact through their grandchild and the remembering of how he screwed up the first time has him reeling. added to this he has two very lazy, abusive, drug taking teenage stepsons that somehow he has ended up solely responsible for. seeking guidance in his life he takes some of the eldest's weed and tries to calm down, in the process hallucinating eric cantona. cantona gives mysterious gallic advice but as most good counsellors tend to do, he lets eric the postman work things out for himself. it was a delightful film, about being and becoming a man, from the teenage sons' maturation and veering away from false idols and how if working class men became better at expressing themselves and learning to deal with their responsibilities. it was also a relief that it was not as depressing as some loach films can be.
to get completely over the hot week we went to the BAD MOVIE CLUB to see lindsey lohan in I KNOW WHO KILLED ME. nicko warned us it was bad. she even said it was worse than THE SWARM. "pah!" i declared, "nothing is worse than the swarm". i was wrong. at least the swarm made some sort of internal sense. it was stoopid but didn't make you go "whaaa?". the plot is such: lindsey lohan is an ordinary middle class virginal teen called aubrey and in her town is a serial killer who lobs off bits of teens then leaves them for dead. one day she goes missing. we see lots of horrific footage of her limbs being frozen off, hacked into by bits of fancy sculptured blue glass and then she is found at the side of the road. when she awakes she tells the doctors and her family she is not aubrey but dakota, her twin. the only way to see this movie is in the company of the bad movie club. i was laughing my socks off. nicko and joe's gaffawing at some of the terrible terrible lines and gaping plot holes made it all worth it. the plot barely made sense and the twist at the end just made you go "no way!". a brilliant way to end the week.
Showing posts with label future of the left. Show all posts
Showing posts with label future of the left. Show all posts
28 Jun 2009
25 Jun 2009
the big unsleep
this week has been hot. hot and bright. i've been waking up at about 5am wide awake then falling asleep just before i have to get up. very annoying. monday passed by quite nicely, played with the cat after work then fell asleep in the garden and almost missed the FUTURE OF THE LEFT live instore performance in SPILLERS. i felt a bit groggy when i got there and found it packed full of people and airless. i found steen who was stood just behind matt and jonny (from JOY COLLECTIVE) and charlotte and jamie were next to me, a good placing. i tried to fend off fainting by waving my photomarathon topic card for the next half hour or so. they did 6 songs i think and it was very good. i especially liked the song "mark foley was right" cos he tends to be. i'm warming to future of the left. i thought they were great the first time i saw them (i think it was their first gig too) but never seemed to be in the mood for them since, which sounds like a complete diss but i always seemed to be doing something else when they were playing. it was good to see them here to remind myself that they are actually really good. apparently my friend james is moving into a house with falkous and matt, which will be the most cynical house of disgruntled males in cardiff, i can't wait to visit!
afterwards we went and had some tea in CHAPTER and went to see SYNECDOCHE, NY, the new charlie kaufman film. i was incredibly excited about this, dismissing the cries i've vaguely heard from the press about it being indulgent. ha! he's allowed to be indulgent, he's a genius, thought i. i was wrong. it was a mess. i started off enjoying it, gleefully noting that everyone in the cast list at the beginning was amazing (dianne wiest! catherine keener! jennifer jason leigh! phillip seymore hoffman!) and halfway through was longing for it to end. its the story of a writer in an unhappy marriage who starts writing a great masterwork on his life and that is all you can describe it as really. it is a valiant effort, in a way, he's trying to redefine film language, it is as massive an opus as the play the character is writing, trying to understand himself by getting it all played out in front of him, his personal life seems out of control so he tries to take control over it by reimaginging it on stage. a good effort but it didn't work for me. it felt like unfunny woody allen and just became a big sprawl of characters and went on a bit long. i understood where he was trying to get to but i felt like he needed a filter of some kind, someone to tell him where to stop. by the umpteenth time someone new was becoming his wife / daughter / assistant i just thought it would never end. a shame, but a grand shame which is the most interesting so not a waste of time.
wednesday i met some friends lou and rich from AMBERCOUCH for an exciting business meeting, we're thinking of starting a website. i came up with an idea a couple of years ago and asked how much it is to get a website and dismissed the idea for being ridiculously expensive but now they say it may be done! wow! we're doing research on it now, a sort of cardiff version of BUY OLYMPIA, one of my all time favourite websites. finding out if we can get grants, my time won't really be wasted but lou and rich's is a bit more precious since they'll be doing the actual work.
after that i went to usher for O'HORTEN, a norweigan film about a lonely train driver who has just retired and has to find something to do with his life. it was a wonderful, beautiful film. it could have been really depressing and sad, about the uselessness of retired life but instead it gives horten the chance to forge relationships with people and live for the first time in his life. the scenery when he was driving his train around the mountains and snowscapes was breathtaking and made me determined to try and do the train journey around europe steen and i have been talking about.
i zipped off to PULSE to buy some much needed toms of maine deodorant, soap pods for the laundry, kingfisher toothpaste and all those useful hippie things i am about to run out of and saw the lovely marc roberts and rob kennedy and morgan hall in there, a proper chapter away from chapter! then zipped back to chapter to see THE BIG SLEEP. i missed the raymond chandler talk last week but was determined to see this one, a big favourite. it was amazing to see it on a big screen. i'd forgotten the script was written by william faulkner till he came up on screen in the credits and its evident in some of the scenes, the first one with the general and marlowe, any with bogey and bacall... it crackles. the villains seem genuinely sleazy, the grime reaching all the way up to the upper class in hollywood. wonderful.
thursday i was entirely lazy. i caught up on some sleep by having a proper lay in and did lots of laundry (still trying to get through stuff from when the cat had fleas last week) and stayed in my dressing gown till about 3pm. at 6pm i got picked up by rob to be taken with will to bristol to THE CUBE cinema where we were going to watch "introduction to japanese sex films". we got some food first in CAFE KINO, a co-operative place which was basically exactly what sort of business i want to run when i grow up. it had all these little touches, all very much home-made and BOOK CROSSING posters (leave a book, post in a book crossing pamphlet and then it can be tracked every time someone new reads and then leaves it). the food we had in there was amazing, i had a spicy bean burger with amazing thick cut chips and steen had falafel. we dashed over to the cube, worried we'd be late but they're so laid back there it didn't start for another half an hour. i love it in the cube, we keep saying we'll have to go more often, if it wasn't for the shite cardiff-bristol train service i think we'd go every week. everyone (staff and customers) were sat outside having an impromptu bbq and chatting and drinking, very relaxed then we went in and was introduced to the film by a nice man called jasper sharp who has written a book about PINKU EIGA, the japanese sex film industry. the perimetres are quite tight: its 1 hour, budget of £20,000, at least 1 sex scene every 20 minutes and no pubes or real genital parts but apart from that you can do anything. the first film we saw was A LONELY COW WEEPS AT DAWN, a rather sweet film about a farmer whose son has died and lives with his widowed daughter in law. he has gone a bit senile and gets up every morning to milk his favourite cow who has died so she pretends to be the cow. they love each other but feel they can't express their love and its really quite romantic. the second was SEXY BATTLE GIRLS, an altogether less sweet, more funny film about a schoolgirl whose father has installed a device in her vagina to exact revenge upon the man who stole her mother away from them. neither film was particuarly sexy, too much tit grabbing and the second film had a bit of tying up women to torture stuff in it which i found a bit uncomfortable to watch but it was more benny hill than anything else, just silly. afterwards we had a chat with jasper about how films like SHORTBUS are banned and yet art films can get away with loads of sex and how the cube got the most e-mails for showing these films than anything else recently. many famous political japanese directors got their starts on the pinku eigas as they could explore all kinds of themes without them needing to be commercial.
saturday morning i was ushering for the SCREEN SCHOOL showing DICK TRACY. i was a little disappointed with the selection and i presume the children were too, from the way they dashed out of the cinema like it was on fire once i'd said they could leave. i'd not seen it before, my family didn't really go to the cinema when i was a kid so i'd not got around to seeing it before. it was too much of an ego led production and very dated. it was like warren beatty saying "look who my mates are, i can get dustin hoffman and al pacino in loads of prosthetic make up!" the acting was baaaad and the cartoon style looked terrible compared to comic book adaptations like SIN CITY. the only high spot were the madonna songs. i played the I'M BREATHLESS album over and over and over so had expectations that there would be songs all the way through and i knew all the words, but no, it didn't even show off the songs by madonna, which in those days was a big deal. madonna was predictably terrible, its funny how you forget how bad she is. she is really really bad. this film was hardly even enjoyable and it made me curious to see what they're going to be saying in their feedback session next week, can't wait for that. "sir, this is shit, can we see more buster keaton?" maybe? i only hope.
afterwards we went and had some tea in CHAPTER and went to see SYNECDOCHE, NY, the new charlie kaufman film. i was incredibly excited about this, dismissing the cries i've vaguely heard from the press about it being indulgent. ha! he's allowed to be indulgent, he's a genius, thought i. i was wrong. it was a mess. i started off enjoying it, gleefully noting that everyone in the cast list at the beginning was amazing (dianne wiest! catherine keener! jennifer jason leigh! phillip seymore hoffman!) and halfway through was longing for it to end. its the story of a writer in an unhappy marriage who starts writing a great masterwork on his life and that is all you can describe it as really. it is a valiant effort, in a way, he's trying to redefine film language, it is as massive an opus as the play the character is writing, trying to understand himself by getting it all played out in front of him, his personal life seems out of control so he tries to take control over it by reimaginging it on stage. a good effort but it didn't work for me. it felt like unfunny woody allen and just became a big sprawl of characters and went on a bit long. i understood where he was trying to get to but i felt like he needed a filter of some kind, someone to tell him where to stop. by the umpteenth time someone new was becoming his wife / daughter / assistant i just thought it would never end. a shame, but a grand shame which is the most interesting so not a waste of time.
wednesday i met some friends lou and rich from AMBERCOUCH for an exciting business meeting, we're thinking of starting a website. i came up with an idea a couple of years ago and asked how much it is to get a website and dismissed the idea for being ridiculously expensive but now they say it may be done! wow! we're doing research on it now, a sort of cardiff version of BUY OLYMPIA, one of my all time favourite websites. finding out if we can get grants, my time won't really be wasted but lou and rich's is a bit more precious since they'll be doing the actual work.
after that i went to usher for O'HORTEN, a norweigan film about a lonely train driver who has just retired and has to find something to do with his life. it was a wonderful, beautiful film. it could have been really depressing and sad, about the uselessness of retired life but instead it gives horten the chance to forge relationships with people and live for the first time in his life. the scenery when he was driving his train around the mountains and snowscapes was breathtaking and made me determined to try and do the train journey around europe steen and i have been talking about.
i zipped off to PULSE to buy some much needed toms of maine deodorant, soap pods for the laundry, kingfisher toothpaste and all those useful hippie things i am about to run out of and saw the lovely marc roberts and rob kennedy and morgan hall in there, a proper chapter away from chapter! then zipped back to chapter to see THE BIG SLEEP. i missed the raymond chandler talk last week but was determined to see this one, a big favourite. it was amazing to see it on a big screen. i'd forgotten the script was written by william faulkner till he came up on screen in the credits and its evident in some of the scenes, the first one with the general and marlowe, any with bogey and bacall... it crackles. the villains seem genuinely sleazy, the grime reaching all the way up to the upper class in hollywood. wonderful.
thursday i was entirely lazy. i caught up on some sleep by having a proper lay in and did lots of laundry (still trying to get through stuff from when the cat had fleas last week) and stayed in my dressing gown till about 3pm. at 6pm i got picked up by rob to be taken with will to bristol to THE CUBE cinema where we were going to watch "introduction to japanese sex films". we got some food first in CAFE KINO, a co-operative place which was basically exactly what sort of business i want to run when i grow up. it had all these little touches, all very much home-made and BOOK CROSSING posters (leave a book, post in a book crossing pamphlet and then it can be tracked every time someone new reads and then leaves it). the food we had in there was amazing, i had a spicy bean burger with amazing thick cut chips and steen had falafel. we dashed over to the cube, worried we'd be late but they're so laid back there it didn't start for another half an hour. i love it in the cube, we keep saying we'll have to go more often, if it wasn't for the shite cardiff-bristol train service i think we'd go every week. everyone (staff and customers) were sat outside having an impromptu bbq and chatting and drinking, very relaxed then we went in and was introduced to the film by a nice man called jasper sharp who has written a book about PINKU EIGA, the japanese sex film industry. the perimetres are quite tight: its 1 hour, budget of £20,000, at least 1 sex scene every 20 minutes and no pubes or real genital parts but apart from that you can do anything. the first film we saw was A LONELY COW WEEPS AT DAWN, a rather sweet film about a farmer whose son has died and lives with his widowed daughter in law. he has gone a bit senile and gets up every morning to milk his favourite cow who has died so she pretends to be the cow. they love each other but feel they can't express their love and its really quite romantic. the second was SEXY BATTLE GIRLS, an altogether less sweet, more funny film about a schoolgirl whose father has installed a device in her vagina to exact revenge upon the man who stole her mother away from them. neither film was particuarly sexy, too much tit grabbing and the second film had a bit of tying up women to torture stuff in it which i found a bit uncomfortable to watch but it was more benny hill than anything else, just silly. afterwards we had a chat with jasper about how films like SHORTBUS are banned and yet art films can get away with loads of sex and how the cube got the most e-mails for showing these films than anything else recently. many famous political japanese directors got their starts on the pinku eigas as they could explore all kinds of themes without them needing to be commercial.
saturday morning i was ushering for the SCREEN SCHOOL showing DICK TRACY. i was a little disappointed with the selection and i presume the children were too, from the way they dashed out of the cinema like it was on fire once i'd said they could leave. i'd not seen it before, my family didn't really go to the cinema when i was a kid so i'd not got around to seeing it before. it was too much of an ego led production and very dated. it was like warren beatty saying "look who my mates are, i can get dustin hoffman and al pacino in loads of prosthetic make up!" the acting was baaaad and the cartoon style looked terrible compared to comic book adaptations like SIN CITY. the only high spot were the madonna songs. i played the I'M BREATHLESS album over and over and over so had expectations that there would be songs all the way through and i knew all the words, but no, it didn't even show off the songs by madonna, which in those days was a big deal. madonna was predictably terrible, its funny how you forget how bad she is. she is really really bad. this film was hardly even enjoyable and it made me curious to see what they're going to be saying in their feedback session next week, can't wait for that. "sir, this is shit, can we see more buster keaton?" maybe? i only hope.
20 Feb 2009
there was a delay in writing of this edition. the delay being the temporary loss of my diary. i learnt some valuable lessons this week. lesson #1: i realised how completely dependant i am upon my diary. lesson #2 i have no hard drive keeping info like this in my brain. it is stored in the diary. lesson #3 i will endeavour never to take my diary out of my bag whilst rooting around for my purse / make up bag again to run the risk of losing this again.
the loss of my diary caused a massive confusion and meltdown in my brain. can you work this shift? I DUNNO! can you come to my gig? I DUNNO! do you want to go for a cup of tea and a catch up? I DUNNO! you get the picture. very distressing. after a couple of days of phoning the two shops in town i'd been to and found them NOT in possession of my diary like i'd hoped and searching the house in vain i started to look around for another diary (or more specifically filofax, for i like to shove bits of paper and write notes for myself and find this the most satisfying bit of kit). i could not find anything that came up to scratch. they didn't make my style of filofax any more, since i've had it for about 5 years and fake filofaxes were either too boring or too big. ooh how vexing. i met my mate richard for a drink and we exhausted the subject of computerised watches, phone organisers, palmpilots, little diaries you get from smiths and both agreed there is nothing as useful as a brand named filofax. all i need is a massive suit and a flat in town and you may call me a yuppie. anyway, eventually it turned up, courtesy of CINEWORLD. i have been going to cineworld for the last 9 years. i have in this time donated £10 every month to their cause (not very worthy, i'll give you) with my cineworld card and left a few objects there before (umbrellas, gloves, keys) and got them all back. however, they do not have a direct line number, you cannot talk to a real person i cineworld and it took me a week to find time to get back over there, i'd asked staff who did not know a number for me to call in but said someone would call me back. i spoke to a nice security man called steve who called me back ON THE CINEWORLD LINE. i now have something they don't: their 02920 contact number. now diary is restored to my lap i can now look back on the week safe in the knowledge that there is a little bit of paper that contains my memories.
the beginning of the week was taken up with helping our friends casey and ewan with their shoot for the video for FUTURE OF THE LEFT's new single. i have no idea what it is called, or how it sounds cos i turned up after work which was well after the band were having their final shots and everyone had got sick of hearing the song in question. the lead singer has had a nice new haircut and a local groupie was trying to pull him on the shoot. that is all i can tell you about any gossip, its not very exciting, is it? what was exciting was spending time with old mates (casey, ewan, ed, carl, iain and leah) and some new ones (ryan, llyr, amy, rob, willy) and POLO THE DONKEY. yes. a donkey. in a pub. we got shouted at by some mad locals in the VULCAN PUB an unfancy place opposite the very fancy atrium in the city centre and watched a donkey shit on the floor and had to stare at some things. i think my friend percy the dead bird got utilised in a shot and we had to wear clothes that made us look like we were in the 1930s. steen even had to eat crisps with his thumb. it was lots and lots of fun. i hereby officially declare that i will help those boys out any old time they need (ewan and casey, not future of the left).
a quiet couple of days then ensued where we didn't really want to be outside in the cold rain any more and we rented out VENUS from the library. venus is a film staring peter o'toole as an old actor who is best mates with leslie phillips and falls in love with leslie phillips' great neice who comes to stay with him. when she arrives she is a bit vicki pollard and leslie phillips is disgusted with her but peter o'toole, the old devil, fancies his chances and takes her out to a bar. it is a strange story, unsurprisingly written by hanif kureshi. it had great reviews when it came out but i was a bit sceptical. i was in the cinema for THE MOTHER and hated it. hated it hated it hated it. i also thought INTIMACY was a pile of middle aged fantasy wank. however, i loved MY BEAUTIFUL LAUNDRETTE when i saw it on channel 4 in the early 90s and taped every episode of BUDDHA OF SUBURBIA so have a prickly relationship with kureshi, i don't know if he's going to make me slap him or hug him. VENUS is a wonderful film. the performances are sparkling, they are having so much fun and its so meaty and sad. you have a real sense of them being real people with real histories, they are completely believable.
thursday was diary loss day, but i didn't know that at the time. i merely got paid and decided to go to town to get some supplies and go to the cinema. i went to see REVOLUTIONARY ROAD, the sam mendes film with leonardo di caprio and kate winslet. having seen THE READER the week before i was worried it would be a bit too much winslet for one month. but not true. i thought this was truly one of the best films i've seen. winslet and di caprio played a couple in the 1950s who were struggling with weighing up the comforts of suburbia with the emptiness they felt in this life when they felt they were destined for something else. these characters really penetrated me and i could not stop thinking about them for days. i felt like it was something we still have to make decisions about. i quit my job and dropped out of that comfort of 9-5 office work over a year ago and its been bloody hard but i am so much happier knowing that i'm finally being true to myself. i was thinking about them for days. the film will be in CHAPTER in march and i will be going to see it, probably about 3 more times.
saturday was LOVE DAY. neither me nor steen really believe in the falsity of valentines day. i got him a present but not because it was valentines day, just cos there were some cameras for sale in the CHAPTER shop and it was a good excuse. i made it clear that it was NOT A VALENTINES PRESENT. instead we planned to make a nice tea, get drunk and go dancing. only two thirds of this plan came to fruition. we both got back from work about 6pm-ish and the plan was to make a main course (spinach and soft cheese omlette - steen) and a dessert (chocolate cake - vaughan). both took the same amount of time to bake (30 mins) so the cake could cool whilst we were eating then we could decorate. well, that was the plan. the cake in the end took over an hour (why? i cannot say) so by the time it was finally ready we were VERY DRUNK on cava and red wine. rather than leave it to cool we decided to ice it straight away. the icing was to be melted chocolate mix then writing icing. we spilt half the melted chocolate over the floor when the bowl flew off the cooker. we put the rest on the cake. i'd forgotten to bulk it up with icing sugar so it just melted into the still-very-warm cake. by this point we were just convulsed with giggles so got the writing icing and drew a big yellow cock on the cake. nothing says valentines day like a big yellow cock, right? we force fed each other cake and more wine. we realised it was 10.30pm, we were covered in chocolate like kids and very drunk and not going to make it to twisted. happy love day.
the loss of my diary caused a massive confusion and meltdown in my brain. can you work this shift? I DUNNO! can you come to my gig? I DUNNO! do you want to go for a cup of tea and a catch up? I DUNNO! you get the picture. very distressing. after a couple of days of phoning the two shops in town i'd been to and found them NOT in possession of my diary like i'd hoped and searching the house in vain i started to look around for another diary (or more specifically filofax, for i like to shove bits of paper and write notes for myself and find this the most satisfying bit of kit). i could not find anything that came up to scratch. they didn't make my style of filofax any more, since i've had it for about 5 years and fake filofaxes were either too boring or too big. ooh how vexing. i met my mate richard for a drink and we exhausted the subject of computerised watches, phone organisers, palmpilots, little diaries you get from smiths and both agreed there is nothing as useful as a brand named filofax. all i need is a massive suit and a flat in town and you may call me a yuppie. anyway, eventually it turned up, courtesy of CINEWORLD. i have been going to cineworld for the last 9 years. i have in this time donated £10 every month to their cause (not very worthy, i'll give you) with my cineworld card and left a few objects there before (umbrellas, gloves, keys) and got them all back. however, they do not have a direct line number, you cannot talk to a real person i cineworld and it took me a week to find time to get back over there, i'd asked staff who did not know a number for me to call in but said someone would call me back. i spoke to a nice security man called steve who called me back ON THE CINEWORLD LINE. i now have something they don't: their 02920 contact number. now diary is restored to my lap i can now look back on the week safe in the knowledge that there is a little bit of paper that contains my memories.
the beginning of the week was taken up with helping our friends casey and ewan with their shoot for the video for FUTURE OF THE LEFT's new single. i have no idea what it is called, or how it sounds cos i turned up after work which was well after the band were having their final shots and everyone had got sick of hearing the song in question. the lead singer has had a nice new haircut and a local groupie was trying to pull him on the shoot. that is all i can tell you about any gossip, its not very exciting, is it? what was exciting was spending time with old mates (casey, ewan, ed, carl, iain and leah) and some new ones (ryan, llyr, amy, rob, willy) and POLO THE DONKEY. yes. a donkey. in a pub. we got shouted at by some mad locals in the VULCAN PUB an unfancy place opposite the very fancy atrium in the city centre and watched a donkey shit on the floor and had to stare at some things. i think my friend percy the dead bird got utilised in a shot and we had to wear clothes that made us look like we were in the 1930s. steen even had to eat crisps with his thumb. it was lots and lots of fun. i hereby officially declare that i will help those boys out any old time they need (ewan and casey, not future of the left).
a quiet couple of days then ensued where we didn't really want to be outside in the cold rain any more and we rented out VENUS from the library. venus is a film staring peter o'toole as an old actor who is best mates with leslie phillips and falls in love with leslie phillips' great neice who comes to stay with him. when she arrives she is a bit vicki pollard and leslie phillips is disgusted with her but peter o'toole, the old devil, fancies his chances and takes her out to a bar. it is a strange story, unsurprisingly written by hanif kureshi. it had great reviews when it came out but i was a bit sceptical. i was in the cinema for THE MOTHER and hated it. hated it hated it hated it. i also thought INTIMACY was a pile of middle aged fantasy wank. however, i loved MY BEAUTIFUL LAUNDRETTE when i saw it on channel 4 in the early 90s and taped every episode of BUDDHA OF SUBURBIA so have a prickly relationship with kureshi, i don't know if he's going to make me slap him or hug him. VENUS is a wonderful film. the performances are sparkling, they are having so much fun and its so meaty and sad. you have a real sense of them being real people with real histories, they are completely believable.
thursday was diary loss day, but i didn't know that at the time. i merely got paid and decided to go to town to get some supplies and go to the cinema. i went to see REVOLUTIONARY ROAD, the sam mendes film with leonardo di caprio and kate winslet. having seen THE READER the week before i was worried it would be a bit too much winslet for one month. but not true. i thought this was truly one of the best films i've seen. winslet and di caprio played a couple in the 1950s who were struggling with weighing up the comforts of suburbia with the emptiness they felt in this life when they felt they were destined for something else. these characters really penetrated me and i could not stop thinking about them for days. i felt like it was something we still have to make decisions about. i quit my job and dropped out of that comfort of 9-5 office work over a year ago and its been bloody hard but i am so much happier knowing that i'm finally being true to myself. i was thinking about them for days. the film will be in CHAPTER in march and i will be going to see it, probably about 3 more times.
saturday was LOVE DAY. neither me nor steen really believe in the falsity of valentines day. i got him a present but not because it was valentines day, just cos there were some cameras for sale in the CHAPTER shop and it was a good excuse. i made it clear that it was NOT A VALENTINES PRESENT. instead we planned to make a nice tea, get drunk and go dancing. only two thirds of this plan came to fruition. we both got back from work about 6pm-ish and the plan was to make a main course (spinach and soft cheese omlette - steen) and a dessert (chocolate cake - vaughan). both took the same amount of time to bake (30 mins) so the cake could cool whilst we were eating then we could decorate. well, that was the plan. the cake in the end took over an hour (why? i cannot say) so by the time it was finally ready we were VERY DRUNK on cava and red wine. rather than leave it to cool we decided to ice it straight away. the icing was to be melted chocolate mix then writing icing. we spilt half the melted chocolate over the floor when the bowl flew off the cooker. we put the rest on the cake. i'd forgotten to bulk it up with icing sugar so it just melted into the still-very-warm cake. by this point we were just convulsed with giggles so got the writing icing and drew a big yellow cock on the cake. nothing says valentines day like a big yellow cock, right? we force fed each other cake and more wine. we realised it was 10.30pm, we were covered in chocolate like kids and very drunk and not going to make it to twisted. happy love day.
8 Feb 2009
lord have mercy
this week i actually managed to see some gigs! sunday i didn't make it to zonderhoof, which i was annoyed at myself about but instead steen and i watched HAROLD AND MAUDE, my favourite ever ever film. steen had not seen it so i was curious to know what he would say. when cathryn, alison and i were in university we used to test potential playthings out by making them watch THE LAST UNICORN and TWIN PEAKS: FIRE WALK WITH ME, as these were our "friday night after going out" films. if they stayed the distance and watched them they passed. this is a pretty hefty sized task as one is a cartoon and not necessarily a late night movie and the other is a very disturbing look inside the heart of darkness. HAROLD AND MAUDE is one of those films for me. if someone doesn't like this film i won't necessarily give up on them but a bit of me will die inside, not to be too overdramatic about it. it is very special to me. i heavily identify with maude (apart from the petty theft) and hope that i stay pure enough to be like her as i get older. i didn't see this till i was about 20, jamie and erin showed it to me astounded i'd not seen it. everything about it is perfect: the cat stevens soundtrack, the oddly lingering shots, the casting (i think harold looks like steven black by the way, and told him so every week when i used to go to barfly, i don't think he ever really understood)... its just great. steen loved it. phew! i wouldn't have dumped him if he didn't but i'm very relieved. someone once made me harold and maude coasters, it remains one of the best presents i've ever received. anyway, enough of my fandom.
monday we went to see BRAKES and GINDRINKER. unusually for a forecast gig it was in tommy's bar. it was great. i hadn't been to a gig for ages and i bloody love gindrinker and had heard good things of brakes. dc was on top form, i worship at his lace ups. graf climbing things and playing the guitar on the lighting rig was a shot of genius. there were people who hadn't seen gindrinker before and they were full of bemused grins. job well done. brakes came on and had a little guy who looked a bit like my friend john in barcelona wearing a silver spacesuit which glittered in the light carrying a pineapple. the songs went from brilliant twiddly freak out to 5 second long rants "cheney cheney cheney cheney... don't be such a dick!". again, excellent stage banter. if only all band nights were unpretentious, clever and amusing like this. i danced around a lot and tried to avoid the blinding stage light that was in my eyes and tried not to jump on john rostron who was skulking behind me with a camera taking pictures. ahh, love those forecast boys. they do good things and are nice people. i am so glad they're back. last year when forecast folded for a bit i was gutted, i spent that month looking around cardiff for good gigs like an orphaned animal. luckily cardiff has so many good promoters (loose, peppermint patti, skelley etc) that i was easily entertained but it did leave a hole. hooray for forecast!
we were also forecast for snow (boodoom tshk) and it was magic walking in the snow back from tommy's bar on monday night. less magic was the fact that the rest of britain had dramatic, dangerous weather,whereas we only had a sprinkling. it was just a bit crap in cardiff, not scary or record breaking, just a bit shit. that was irritating.
but now for a fulsome hip hip hooray for liz of the loves, the school and more importantly LOOSE fame. liz does not get the recognition she deserves for all her hard work. i have loose gigs in my diary up to may and all of them look good. she has brought some amazing things to cardiff (daniel johnson ferfucksake!), always has a loose record stall (very important for picking things up you might have missed or not had money for on the gig night), always has sweets (tangfastic!) and is a bloody nice lady. her pardner ryan also had on a very good dirty mac. this week she was putting on EMMY THE GREAT. first up is YOUNG HUSBANDS who are made up of some of emmy's backing band. i liked them. no-one else i was with them did. they reminded me of TEENAGE FANCLUB and that band who were popular a few years ago but then sunk without a trace THE THRILLS (i once saw the lead singer all alone in my local cinema, which is entirely irrelevant but on my mind that night). they need stronger melodies but i thought it was a good start, they were doing things i rather liked. EX LOVERS were on next and one of their singers had my friend david's tongue on the floor. he liked her a lot. he was fascinated by her tattoo. boys are always agog by pretty innocent looking types with tattoos. she was indeed very pretty and had a sadness about her eyes and mouth that made her beguiling. the songs were quite good too, sad and pretty and beguiling like their singer. then we chatted with some friends for a bit and suddenly struck by the million people who were upstairs in clwb. it was a sell out and full of young uns. i was chatting to my friend ash later who said she thought it was "something to do with the internet". it made us feel quite old. emmy the great was also quite young, as the songs made you aware. i didn't know much about her music (she was at the first swn i think but i didn't catch her) but it seems like a first love break up album. some songs sound like plath-inspired 6th form poetry but not necessarily in a bad way, they reminded me of being that age and having unfulfilled crushes and relationships which neither of us were ready for. i was really tired by the end of the gig but soothed by the atmosphere, everything was hushed for her solid, clear vocals. her voice was refreshing, like a cascade of water, i'll be interested to see how her voice develops and what she does next.
wednesday was a lovely, domestic day. i had to sweep up everything in benny's main bedroom and put it in his little room for we have our friend jon staying with us whilst ben's in essex. i hate essex for its overpowering sway upon our lovely benny. we miss him loads and taking the stuff out of his room was sad. there was a picture of ben with his nephew maximillion* (*not his real name) and i put it in the sewing room so i can pretend ben is still around. then i made a veg soup and mixed fruit crumble, which was darned tasty, if i do say so myself. that evening we went over to our friends anne and helen's to see if crumble cures a poorly foot. we had cups of tea and amused ourselves with gossip and had a bloody lovely time.
thursday we both had off again and decided to go charity shopping to get some gear for the video that we're helping our friend out with this week. the theme is "1930s sunday best" and i instantly found a white button up dress that i think'll do and steen found a great jacket (that made him look a bit like graham coxon when he adopted the correct stance) on cowbridge road east. i didn't have enough money to go mad with shopping but i also bought myself some boots for £3 which feel like slippers and are amazingly a million times more comfortable than the pair i bought for £35 in the janurary sales. i set myself a goal to try not to buy new clothes to try and cause less waste, only stuff from charity shops and so far its working, i got some great things. after a much needed hot chocolate (i was being very grumpy due to the cold) we headed for JACOBS MARKET. i love antiqueing. i have always collected stuff from charity shops and antiques places as a treat. when i was a kid i used to collect old photographs so would ask in every shop i found myself in. you do see some tat but there is also great great treasure. i found a record player i desperately want but can't afford as well as some random niknaks that i really don't need but think i can give them a home, like stray animals. in the end steen bought two badges, a seahorse and one that says "jesus loved me" with a bible number quote. Loved? in the past tense? intriuging. maybe this bit in the bible is when jesus found mary magdalene in bed with one of his mates.
friday and saturday i was working in CHAPTER and lord lummy, it was busy. this makes me everso everso happy. we have survived through the redevelopment and business seems to be eerily picking up despite record bankrupcies and national debt. i am very excited about the reopening this summer and gives working there a real fizz. in the box office we had 3 sell outs yesterday, which i think might be unprecedented. friday was the 2nd birthday of the DRONES comedy club, which is ran by a lovely bunch who i am always happy to see. due to the nature of my working life i never get to go to the drones apart from topping up the money in the till or something boring like that but from what i can see its a really good night and we even had complaints cos that was a sell out too! afterwards i had a nice chat with all the lovely cardiff comedy lot and their mates and stuck around to have a half with my colleagues. a good night. on saturday we went to a full cinema to see FROST / NIXON in the evening, eschewing a good line up at clwb but i was pretty tired and anticipating a busy week helping out our friend in the evenings. richard nixon has always been my favourite president to study. as a man and his place in history he is absolutely fascinating. when i was doing my degree i would just gobble up anything related to nixon and his rise and fall. the man is like richard III or lear! so flawed and insecure, so disgustingly pitiful. he was so full of self hatred and hatred of other people and tried desperately to fight against his nature, he wanted to be good and civic minded but was destroyed by his own internal battles. i think oliver stone's best film is NIXON, it begins with a storm at night in the white house and nixon pulling kissinger down to pray with him, sweaty and shaking, kissinger looks visibly afraid. obviously that was fiction, as was this movie, but the man was a frightening character. the way he spoke to people and the things he did to solidify his power was astonishing. this film was good, it did have ron howard touches (obligatory appearance by clint howard, overly-dramatic close ups, slow pace until the denouement) but wasn't cheesy like a lot of his films can be. one aspect of the film that i expect was intentional was the parallels between nixon's presidency and that of dubya. here was a man who brought the country to its knees, destroyed faith in democracy and committed atrocious war crimes. ring a bell? the big difference here is that nixon was a smart man. flawed and unattractively vicious but fiercely intelligent. he was haunted for the rest of his days about what he had done to the country, his quaker guilt not giving him peace for a second, which seemed only fitting. bush is now playing golf and going for his runs in the morning with the sweet smell of two terms behind him, unbothered by his actions. i suppose that is why obama's election was so important and his speech needed to be a stinging attack on bush, we needed it to carry on and believe in america once again. heavens knows if obama will succeed but at least america has come good in bringing some intelligence and strength back into the office rather than a frat boy idiot. what was it bush said to sum up his 8 years? "hey, we had fun!" a fucking disgrace. this is the week my wife lost her job at the architecture firm and the world is worried about its future. 8 years of inertia in environmental matters and making the rich richer. we will a close up of bush in a tv interview realising the implication of his actions and coming to terms with a damned eternity, people are too media savvy to be caught out like this nowadays and i'm not sure he even has the emotional and mental capacity to weigh up all that he has done.
well, thats a sad note to end on. today i'm looking forward to some lovely food from the market and helping our friend casey make his video, which is sure to be fun and will distract me from these dark days.
till next week, dear diary!
monday we went to see BRAKES and GINDRINKER. unusually for a forecast gig it was in tommy's bar. it was great. i hadn't been to a gig for ages and i bloody love gindrinker and had heard good things of brakes. dc was on top form, i worship at his lace ups. graf climbing things and playing the guitar on the lighting rig was a shot of genius. there were people who hadn't seen gindrinker before and they were full of bemused grins. job well done. brakes came on and had a little guy who looked a bit like my friend john in barcelona wearing a silver spacesuit which glittered in the light carrying a pineapple. the songs went from brilliant twiddly freak out to 5 second long rants "cheney cheney cheney cheney... don't be such a dick!". again, excellent stage banter. if only all band nights were unpretentious, clever and amusing like this. i danced around a lot and tried to avoid the blinding stage light that was in my eyes and tried not to jump on john rostron who was skulking behind me with a camera taking pictures. ahh, love those forecast boys. they do good things and are nice people. i am so glad they're back. last year when forecast folded for a bit i was gutted, i spent that month looking around cardiff for good gigs like an orphaned animal. luckily cardiff has so many good promoters (loose, peppermint patti, skelley etc) that i was easily entertained but it did leave a hole. hooray for forecast!
we were also forecast for snow (boodoom tshk) and it was magic walking in the snow back from tommy's bar on monday night. less magic was the fact that the rest of britain had dramatic, dangerous weather,whereas we only had a sprinkling. it was just a bit crap in cardiff, not scary or record breaking, just a bit shit. that was irritating.
but now for a fulsome hip hip hooray for liz of the loves, the school and more importantly LOOSE fame. liz does not get the recognition she deserves for all her hard work. i have loose gigs in my diary up to may and all of them look good. she has brought some amazing things to cardiff (daniel johnson ferfucksake!), always has a loose record stall (very important for picking things up you might have missed or not had money for on the gig night), always has sweets (tangfastic!) and is a bloody nice lady. her pardner ryan also had on a very good dirty mac. this week she was putting on EMMY THE GREAT. first up is YOUNG HUSBANDS who are made up of some of emmy's backing band. i liked them. no-one else i was with them did. they reminded me of TEENAGE FANCLUB and that band who were popular a few years ago but then sunk without a trace THE THRILLS (i once saw the lead singer all alone in my local cinema, which is entirely irrelevant but on my mind that night). they need stronger melodies but i thought it was a good start, they were doing things i rather liked. EX LOVERS were on next and one of their singers had my friend david's tongue on the floor. he liked her a lot. he was fascinated by her tattoo. boys are always agog by pretty innocent looking types with tattoos. she was indeed very pretty and had a sadness about her eyes and mouth that made her beguiling. the songs were quite good too, sad and pretty and beguiling like their singer. then we chatted with some friends for a bit and suddenly struck by the million people who were upstairs in clwb. it was a sell out and full of young uns. i was chatting to my friend ash later who said she thought it was "something to do with the internet". it made us feel quite old. emmy the great was also quite young, as the songs made you aware. i didn't know much about her music (she was at the first swn i think but i didn't catch her) but it seems like a first love break up album. some songs sound like plath-inspired 6th form poetry but not necessarily in a bad way, they reminded me of being that age and having unfulfilled crushes and relationships which neither of us were ready for. i was really tired by the end of the gig but soothed by the atmosphere, everything was hushed for her solid, clear vocals. her voice was refreshing, like a cascade of water, i'll be interested to see how her voice develops and what she does next.
wednesday was a lovely, domestic day. i had to sweep up everything in benny's main bedroom and put it in his little room for we have our friend jon staying with us whilst ben's in essex. i hate essex for its overpowering sway upon our lovely benny. we miss him loads and taking the stuff out of his room was sad. there was a picture of ben with his nephew maximillion* (*not his real name) and i put it in the sewing room so i can pretend ben is still around. then i made a veg soup and mixed fruit crumble, which was darned tasty, if i do say so myself. that evening we went over to our friends anne and helen's to see if crumble cures a poorly foot. we had cups of tea and amused ourselves with gossip and had a bloody lovely time.
thursday we both had off again and decided to go charity shopping to get some gear for the video that we're helping our friend out with this week. the theme is "1930s sunday best" and i instantly found a white button up dress that i think'll do and steen found a great jacket (that made him look a bit like graham coxon when he adopted the correct stance) on cowbridge road east. i didn't have enough money to go mad with shopping but i also bought myself some boots for £3 which feel like slippers and are amazingly a million times more comfortable than the pair i bought for £35 in the janurary sales. i set myself a goal to try not to buy new clothes to try and cause less waste, only stuff from charity shops and so far its working, i got some great things. after a much needed hot chocolate (i was being very grumpy due to the cold) we headed for JACOBS MARKET. i love antiqueing. i have always collected stuff from charity shops and antiques places as a treat. when i was a kid i used to collect old photographs so would ask in every shop i found myself in. you do see some tat but there is also great great treasure. i found a record player i desperately want but can't afford as well as some random niknaks that i really don't need but think i can give them a home, like stray animals. in the end steen bought two badges, a seahorse and one that says "jesus loved me" with a bible number quote. Loved? in the past tense? intriuging. maybe this bit in the bible is when jesus found mary magdalene in bed with one of his mates.
friday and saturday i was working in CHAPTER and lord lummy, it was busy. this makes me everso everso happy. we have survived through the redevelopment and business seems to be eerily picking up despite record bankrupcies and national debt. i am very excited about the reopening this summer and gives working there a real fizz. in the box office we had 3 sell outs yesterday, which i think might be unprecedented. friday was the 2nd birthday of the DRONES comedy club, which is ran by a lovely bunch who i am always happy to see. due to the nature of my working life i never get to go to the drones apart from topping up the money in the till or something boring like that but from what i can see its a really good night and we even had complaints cos that was a sell out too! afterwards i had a nice chat with all the lovely cardiff comedy lot and their mates and stuck around to have a half with my colleagues. a good night. on saturday we went to a full cinema to see FROST / NIXON in the evening, eschewing a good line up at clwb but i was pretty tired and anticipating a busy week helping out our friend in the evenings. richard nixon has always been my favourite president to study. as a man and his place in history he is absolutely fascinating. when i was doing my degree i would just gobble up anything related to nixon and his rise and fall. the man is like richard III or lear! so flawed and insecure, so disgustingly pitiful. he was so full of self hatred and hatred of other people and tried desperately to fight against his nature, he wanted to be good and civic minded but was destroyed by his own internal battles. i think oliver stone's best film is NIXON, it begins with a storm at night in the white house and nixon pulling kissinger down to pray with him, sweaty and shaking, kissinger looks visibly afraid. obviously that was fiction, as was this movie, but the man was a frightening character. the way he spoke to people and the things he did to solidify his power was astonishing. this film was good, it did have ron howard touches (obligatory appearance by clint howard, overly-dramatic close ups, slow pace until the denouement) but wasn't cheesy like a lot of his films can be. one aspect of the film that i expect was intentional was the parallels between nixon's presidency and that of dubya. here was a man who brought the country to its knees, destroyed faith in democracy and committed atrocious war crimes. ring a bell? the big difference here is that nixon was a smart man. flawed and unattractively vicious but fiercely intelligent. he was haunted for the rest of his days about what he had done to the country, his quaker guilt not giving him peace for a second, which seemed only fitting. bush is now playing golf and going for his runs in the morning with the sweet smell of two terms behind him, unbothered by his actions. i suppose that is why obama's election was so important and his speech needed to be a stinging attack on bush, we needed it to carry on and believe in america once again. heavens knows if obama will succeed but at least america has come good in bringing some intelligence and strength back into the office rather than a frat boy idiot. what was it bush said to sum up his 8 years? "hey, we had fun!" a fucking disgrace. this is the week my wife lost her job at the architecture firm and the world is worried about its future. 8 years of inertia in environmental matters and making the rich richer. we will a close up of bush in a tv interview realising the implication of his actions and coming to terms with a damned eternity, people are too media savvy to be caught out like this nowadays and i'm not sure he even has the emotional and mental capacity to weigh up all that he has done.
well, thats a sad note to end on. today i'm looking forward to some lovely food from the market and helping our friend casey make his video, which is sure to be fun and will distract me from these dark days.
till next week, dear diary!
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