ISSUE 32
OCTOBER 2007
�The only solution: another revolution. Everywhere.� Cathal Coughlan
When we die, do we go to Heaven, Hell or into a void of nothingness? Is your life meaningful like Mother Teresa's, or pointlessly destructive like Fred West's? What is the best way to insulate an attic in a semi-detached property? NONE of these questions will be answered in this issue of HY! Our long-awaited "new direction" starts HERE. You can go to JAIL for having "subversive" opinions, you know. So thank FUCK HY! is now a kitten-stroking, government-worshipping, easy-listening kinda zine. REST EASY, nothing in these pages will trouble your over-worked brain. It'll
be almost like you're ALREADY DEAD! This issue conceived, written and performed by Mark J. Ritchie and Gary B. Simmons. wWw.geOcItIeS.CoM/HIrOShImaYEaH
THE ENEMY
I grew up around people like you.
Loud and brash,
all surface, no substance.
Your songs of hatred
would ring in my ears
from the back of the school bus
where you�d congregate
(safety in numbers, as usual)
while some of us would sit alone,
gazes fixed on the scenery rushing past
as if it were the only thing between us
and a beating.
Which it often was.
I was luckier than some.
Perhaps my stillness scared you,
perhaps not,
but I was subjected to mostly verbal assaults
which I found easy enough to brush off.
�Sticks and stones�� and all that shit.
Yes, I grew up around people like you.
Sport worshippers, enemies of intellect,
so proud of being just like everyone else,
your life an endless quest to �fit in�
with the dull hordes of teachers,
parents, big brothers, bosses�
Killing time until your job-for-life kicked in
with all of its safe, stale comforts.
So forgive me if I�m not impressed
by your designer clothes
and neatly polished shoes,
by your mortgage plans and holidays abroad.
Forgive me if I�m not impressed
by the smug, sturdy children
trailing behind you,
condemned to be dragged forever down
by your legacy of self-satisfied misery.
SAUCHIEHALL STREET, 11TH SEPTEMBER 2007
Soup Du Jour,
Mojama,
Cream of Tomato.
Such an assault on the senses,
these words.
Cheap Guinness,
candle flicker,
the perfect stance
of a sexually desirable human.
Sun going down on smiles,
buildings,
corpses.
Bands playing in bars to no one
except the silent shadows
and peeling paint.
Smokers and drinkers
and liars and lovers,
tired of trying,
praying to the passing lights,
holding hope in their hands,
shaped like dirty pennies.
ROOM
Who ARE you without your lover
pressed tightly against your legs?
Who ARE you without this vulgar display
of cheap middle-aged lust?
Who ARE you without his half-swallowed drink
dribbling down your chin,
down your designer clothes,
seeping into the secret crevices
of your pathetic failure?
I�ll TELL you who you are:
You�re a lost LAMB,
a frightened CHILD who�s lost sight of daddy at the funfair,
you�re a little wooden boat adrift on a violent sea,
land nowhere to be seen.
Get a fucking ROOM.
THE SWARM
Anonymously, you swarm
around the fluorescent money-guzzling gods,
sharply dressed with eyes that stab out sickness,
failure, weakness,
heartless like mobile phones, silk ties,
pension schemes,
heartless like insurance policies,
salary appraisals, expense accounts.
When your gaze falls upon us,
we scramble to bask in its warmth,
helpless in our neurotic decay,
lost like abandoned puppies
sniffing at lampposts,
waiting for a kindly voice,
a scrap of food,
waiting for the tight pull of a master�s leash
we have come to equate with love.
RULES
I was working in a call centre, 1-9pm,
and we were required to wear �business dress� at all times
(shirt, tie, all that),
even though we did not deal with customers face-to-face.
The part-timers would come in at 5.
It was a hot summer so they would be dressed in T-shirts, shorts and sandals,
as if they�d just come from the park or the beach
(which some of them obviously HAD).
It seemed ludicrous that the rest of us had to sit there until clocking-off time,
sweating away in our �business dress� when everyone else
looked like they were at a pool party.
But, whenever we mentioned this to the boss, she would say
�It�s company policy, I�m afraid. Rules are rules.�
It�s no wonder most of us hated that place and couldn�t wait to leave.
The job was stressful and stupid.
Some of us burst into tears, some got angry
and some just quietly slipped away.
I left after 6 months and started looking for a place
where I could exist on my OWN terms,
without being governed by pointless rules.
I haven�t found it yet
but I�ll let you know when I do, okay?
ON THE OUTSKIRTS OF A DREAM
On the outskirts of a dream
there is hot coffee
steaming away on a table,
people passing by like ghosts
too tired to make themselves live,
bright lights of freedom burning forever
while the clatter of teapots
fence in the joy of escaping
a moment that's built to destroy
all that it sets out to protect.
13.7 BILLION YEARS OF HELL
Selected Dispatches from an Unwilling Player of God�s Little Game
By Gary Simmons
10.37pm - What the FUCK is going on? The News 24 �ribbon� says that a computer destined for the ISS was deliberately sabotaged by an engineer by having its wires cut!! It was discovered before being loaded into Endeavour. This �engineer� must be publicly TORTURED, HUMILIATED and slowly HUNG!! �Believe me baby, I ain�t bluffing!� Whitehouse.
11.17pm - OK, I�ve got it! This isn�t the same place I left when I got over my depression. Lots of things here don�t add up. Maybe I DID kill myself in the Archway flat? Maybe I�m in some sort of a coma and, by feeding me stupid stories of DRUNK astronauts and shit, THAT�S the only way �they� (my doctors, anyway) can communicate with me. So, OK, I got the �message�. How do I reply?? I�m just absolutely TERRIFIED that I�ll wake up in Archway with the monster spider electric box on the wall!!!! And now� M calls. It�s all PLANNED to affect/test me!!
8.27am - Spoke to M last night and drove HER mad this time with MY craziness. Told her about God. He teases me. He pokes me. He prods me. He waves well-oiled young MUFF before my boat race like donkey and carrot.
*
Did you SEE Metallica on Live-Earth-Aid-Red-Nose-Save-The-Children? I didn�t. Fuck THEM and their fast cars and big houses and jets and shit. What kinda �green� shit is THAT?! Makes you wanna pollute and wreck the bloody planet even MORE. You can�t beat nature anyway. She will ALWAYS win. Fuck it ALL!!
*
Regarding school reunions : Uzi or Kalaschnikov? Coz I�d wanna BLOW �EM A-WAY!! Gas cylinders and cannisters of petrol in dad�s Daihatsu, baby!! I ain�t joking, I wanna KILL some of them. Mark my words. Trying to recapture something that I fuckin� HATED anyway! Look at school-mate Keith! Look at school-mate Mark! Tie �em up!! Take the pictures!!!! Record the SCREAMS!!!! Of 47 year-old Keith and Mark! Another victim�s DEATH!! King GARY, the VICTOR!!!! (With thanks to Whitehouse, natch.)
GEROGARY�S PLAY-LIST TO MAKE YOU CUM IN 2 MINUTES
V/A-DRY LUNGS IV. LP (I originally bought this for the Gerogerigegege track entitled �I Wanna Be Your Pantie� (misspelt as �Partie�!) The album has gorgeous high quality sleeve art and contains a veritable cornucopia of outstanding industrial/avant-garde pieces by the likes of Controlled Bleeding, H�l�ne Sage, Un Drame Musical Instantane, Printed At Bismarck�s Death, Robert Rich and more. Subterranean. 1991?)
V/A-FOXTROT. Dbl 10� (Released in order to help offset the costs of John Balance�s treatment for alcoholism, the lovely white vinyl contains tracks donated by Nurse With Wound, Peter Christopherson, a classic by Coil, Current 93 and The Inflatable Sideshow. �Bacchus hath drowned more men than Neptune�, angel-dicked Editor please take note. Graal. 1998)
V/A-F�R ILSE KOCH. LP (Purchased on 5th June 1982 at an aborted Whitehouse �live aktion� in London, this MAGNIFICENT and PIONEERING album boasts tracks by Aleister Crowley, Charles Manson, Heinrich Himmler, Whitehouse, Nurse With Wound, Come, Leibstandarte SS MB, Imperial Japan, er� etcetera! Freaked-out, hopelessly addicted and disturbed?? I WAS! This is the absolute MOTHER of all compilations with a sleeve to prostitute your children for. Come Organisation. 1982)
V/A-GANGSTA-FUCKIN�-RAP. Home taped cassette (Done for me by Mark Ritchie and featuring artists such as Ice-T, Jello Biafra, N.W.A, Body Count, Mitchell Brothers� this is �as funny as a brick in a ned�s face� � � Mark Ritchie. 2007)
V/A-HOISTING THE BLACK FLAG. LP (Surrealists choice! Lemon Kittens, Nurse With Wound, Mental Aardvarks, David Cross, Whitehouse, plus superb Steven Stapleton artwork� oh MY! United Dairies. 1980)
V/A-IMPULSE 3. Cassette (Came with good ol� Mark Crumby�s Impulse#3 zine and contains tracks by Konstruktivists, Cathedral, Voltoid and more. Impulse. 1992)
V/A-IMPULSE 7. Cassette (As above but with Bodychoke�s �Whore�, Mlehst, Tea Kulture and so on. Impulse. 1994)
V/A-IMPULSE 8. Cassette (As above-above but with Splintered, Days Of The Moon, Konstruktivists and so forth. Impulse. 1996)
V/A-INCREDIBLY STRANGE METAL VOL 1. Home taped cassette (Done for me by seduced-to-the-internet ex-correspondent Jase Village-Bums, this isn�t all THAT �strange� really� maybe coz I�m a jaded old cunt? No idea as to label or date but Jasey-poo made a nice Xmas Mr. Blobby insert for it, the fuckin� WEIRDO!! I bet it�s a sexual thing. 2002-ish)
V/A-IN FRACTURED SILENCE. LP (H�l�ne Sage, Nurse With Wound, Sema, Un Drame Musical Instantane. United Dairies. 1980)
So, did YOU obtain a discharge? I did.
MUSIC (QUITE A LOT OF WHICH WAS MADE BY CATHAL COUGHLAN)
MICRODISNEY � THE PEEL SESSIONS (STRANGE FRUIT)
39 MINUTES/GALE FORCE WIND (VIRGIN)
I was sent the following few items on CD-R by my Cathal Coughlan �dealer�, who got me HOOKED on his brilliant music, to tide me over until I can track down the originals. The �Peel Sessions� album is quite wonderful, comprising tracks dating back to the early days of Microdisney�s journey from obscurity and back again as well as more stripped-down versions of later songs like �Town to Town� (which I, wrongly, described as being �one of those let�s-run-away-from-it-all kind of songs� a couple of issues back. It�s actually about NUCLEAR WAR!) Any record that starts off with the lyric �I drink gin like a 1960s wino� has GOT to be a classic and John Peel sessions seemed to bring out the best in lots of bands (especially in the case of The Smiths, who recorded some of their finest early material for his show). �Dreaming Drains� advises the listener to �savour this moment when your heart is broken� over a sparkling melody and cheapo drum machine thump while �Everybody is Dead� contains possibly the most menacing - and, yet at the same time, hilarious - declaration of love I�ve ever heard in a song, with Cathal screaming the line �I LOVE YOU� over and over, like some demented, desperate mantra. Elsewhere, songs like �A Friend With a Big Mouth� and �Genius� meld catchy tunes with lyrics that are literate, angry and often bafflingly obscure (especially in the case of �Teddy Dogs� - which namechecks James Dean and Lillian Gish for no discernable reason - and �Horse Overboard�, which includes the line �my wife is a horse�). �Genius� is so bouncy, it could almost be a HOUSEMARTINS song if it weren�t for the fact that the chorus contains such jolly lines as �the things you feel are just a joke so BURN! BURN! BURN!" Similarly, �464� combines moments of loveliness with crazed, screamed verses while �Bullwhip Road� and �Begging Bowl� are just completely OUTSTANDING. The final Microdisney album �proper�, 1988�s �39 Minutes�, also contains great songs but some are slightly marred by SERIOUSLY dated and naff 1980s production techniques. The funky synths, saxophones and over-emoting backing singers certainly don�t do songs like �Send Herman Home� and �United Colours� any favours. You have to wonder if the band�s bosses at Virgin were forcing them into such a commercial sound, especially when you hear the B-side of the (terrific) �Gale Force Wind� single. It�s two very different versions of the same song, �I Can�t Say No�. The first sounds like something you�d hear on a crappy �comedy� record with lead vocals credited to someone called Betty Lou Dupree, while the music is like a pastiche of a number from �Grease�. The second version starts with Cathal asking �What song would our record company like us to do?� before launching into what sounds like an improvisation about �dogs in their high heels� over a backing track of Eastern European folk music. Truly bizarre. Thankfully, most of the songs on �39 Minutes� escape from the production disaster and even the ones that DON�T sound good after repeated listens, their brilliance somehow managing to shine through the glossy sheen. So, all 10 tracks are winners then, and these include the fab �Singer�s Hampstead Home� (a scathing attack on the shallow hypocrisy of rich pop stars, as relevant today as it EVER was), the gorgeous, country-tinged �Soul Boy�, storming �Back to the Old Town� and addictive �Herr Direktor�, with its insistence that �mainstream life is a pauper�s grave, full of lepers who think they�re saved� and closing assertion that �it�s all over! Hitler won the war! British Hollywood! Leni Riefenstahl! Whooo!� And, as I delve more into the history of Microdisney (the internet has its uses BESIDES porn, you know), it becomes clear that theirs was a very singular vision and that they weren�t quite �indie� enough to fit in with the indie bands and yet too �weird� to ever really make it big in the mainstream. TRUE outsiders, then, like a lot of my OTHER very favourite people: Mark Eitzel, Charles Bukowski, Bill Hicks, etc.
TOWNES VAN ZANDT � LIVE AT THE OLD QUARTER, HOUSTON, TEXAS (CHARLY)
Got up around 9.25am and had a Pot Noodle for breakfast. Watched the remainder of �Wright Stuff� then walked into town via the harbour, stopping off for a browse Oxfam Music and at my USUAL takeaway place near the Goat for a coffee. When I got to town, I bought this excellent live CD for �4 from Fopp. A BARGAIN for a DOUBLE CD of complete and utter GENIUS. Got some more stuff for my mum�s birthday from Boots and the Body Shop. Got a baguette from Greggs and ate it in the rain, walking around the Merchant City. Saw my BITCH ex-boss Sandy smoking like a COMMON SLUT while I was on my way to have a pint in the Counting House. It was so busy in there, I had to stand up, but at least I had a table to lean on and read my Metro. Joe M rang, out of the blue. He was on his lunch-break. He�s been working for BT for nearly 5 years, he said. Went to Borders, very briefly, then had a pint of Velvet in the Auctioneers. John and Alan from the art gallery sat nearby and we said hello. Some Eastern European beggar chick came in with her little coffee cup. There�s been a sudden EXPLOSION of these women, who all look good enough to earn LOADS of cash as HOOKERS! Strange. Posted a zine in the St Vincent Street post office then went to O�Henry�s for a cider. As I was reading the booklet of my new CD, I saw a dwarf ride past on a bicycle, which he then parked outside the Horseshoe, so he could go inside. I went there myself, a little later on. The dwarf was sitting at the bar, eating some grub and chatting to some guy. I sat a little further down the bar and had a pint of Velvet. Went to Failte next for a cider and a read of the Evening Times. Then I walked along to the Society Room but spied James sitting with someone (Dennis, perhaps. I couldn�t tell) so I turned around before he saw me (I�d already seen him earlier in the week). Went to the Brunswick instead, where the price had leaped from �1.50 per pint to �2. The barmaid acted like I should have KNOWN this, even though I�d been in the PREVIOUS night and it was only �1.50 THEN! Went to Nico�s next and had a Guinness, standing at the bar. This guy started talking to me about his pit bull terriers and other FASCINATING things. He seemed a little �Care in the Community�, perhaps. Went to the Captain�s Rest next, for another cider and a read of some Tory rag someone had left lying about. It made me wanna PUKE. The PAPER, not the booze. Got six cans of McEwan�s Export and some Bombay mix and was back in the flat at 9.15pm. Drank 3� cans, watched my Bukowski DVD documentary and played Microdisney. All was quiet in the flat, amazingly enough.
THE FATIMA MANSIONS � AGAINST NATURE/BLUES FOR CEAUCESCU/BERTIE�S BROCHURES (KITCHENWARE)
More CD-Rs of Cathal Coughlan goodies. His Fatima Mansions were a pretty schizophrenic lot, way more extreme than Microdisney, so these releases are a rather mixed bag. 1989s �Against Nature� kicks off in fine style with the excellent �Only Losers Take the Bus�, a video of which I still have on VHS from the long-forgotten indie-rock show �Snub TV� (you can now watch it on YouTube, of course), Cathal - his arms tied up with rope - and the band miming the song in an old church. There are also great, mid-paced angsty pop-rockers (�You Won�t Get Me Home� and �The Day I Lost Everything�, which contains a spoken-word intro namechecking both Jimmy Tarbuck and Santa Claus) and moody, mournful ballads (�Wilderness on Time�, �Bishop of Babel� and the gorgeous �Big Madness�). Then, stylistically out on their own, we have �13th Century Boy� (a song that takes the cheesy disco sound of Stock, Aitken and Waterman - whom Cathal once called "the Leni Riefenstahls of Britain's Era of Enterprise" - and subverts it with lyrics like �I�ve learned to love the void� I�m a new Dark Ages boy!�) and the punky �Valley of the Dead Cars� which backs up my view that Cathal Coughlan is kind of like an Irish Jello Biafra. He even LOOKS a bit like him! 1990�s �Blues for Ceausescu� single boasts a devastating six-minute title track that storms out of the gate with lines like �You can no longer depend on the land in which you were born� You can no longer depend on the existence of silence in your mind when you close your eyes� Go to England, baby raper, false economist�. Wow! Needless to say, it�s fucking GREAT! There�s also a darkly funny B-side called �On Suicide Bridge� where a bridge-jumper longs to escape the �frigid sunshine� and �humiliations of Crouch End�. As well as a fantastic title track, 1991�s �Bertie's Brochures� also includes the EXQUISITE songs �Behind the Moon�, �Smiling� and �Long About Now� along with a bizarre, hilarious �reworking� of REM�s �Shiny Happy People� that simply HAS to be heard to be believed! �The Great Valerio�, a Richard and Linda Thompson cover, is quite wonderful too. Then there�s �Mario Vargas Yoni�, probably the most eloquent attack on Maggie Thatcher I�ve EVER heard delivered in song. Go to your posh laptop, download it and hear for YOURSELF!
TINDERSTICKS � TROUBLE EVERY DAY (BEGGARS BANQUET)
Got up at 8.30am. On TV, they were discussing the MILLION QUID people gave to that appeal for the missing girl (the one who�s been all over the news �cos her parents are middle-class and white, unlike all the OTHER kids who go missing and no one gives a SHIT about). Some old woman rang up and said she�d donated something, even though she�s living on a pension and the girl�s parents are DOCTORS! INSANE! The world is INSANE! Had to get out, so I went and had a posh dump in Oran Mor, looked at the NME in Somerfield and in some shops on Byres Road. Went to Tesco in Maryhill and bought a microwave meal then went to sign on just before noon. Then I went BACK to Tesco for a can of Coke. I used a self-service checkout for the first time EVER and felt like a RIGHT clever fucker (even though I�ve seen all SORTS of MORONS using them ALL the time). Went back to the flat and ate/drank/lay around for a while. Saw James emerging from his room. He looked like he�d just woken up and was obviously under some heavy sedation (which is why it�s been so quiet lately, I expect). I went out again and embarked on a tour of lots of West End charity shops. Bought some Koka noodles plus some soup and reduced samosas from the big Morrisons in Anniesland. Got this Tindersticks soundtrack CD for �1 in a charity shop there. They also had a Swans one (but it was one of their NOISY releases) and Throbbing Gristle�s �Greatest Hits�. Went to the Esquire House for an Abbot ale, which turned into FOUR Abbot ales. At 6.45pm, I bought a BIG bottle of Lambrini from Somerfield (still in Anniesland) and walked about, drinking it. Spent some time by Bingham�s Pond, watching the swans and ducks. Walked down my old street, Crown Road North. Got back to the flat at 8.30pm. Gary�s letter had arrived. The post must�ve come REALLY late. I imagine a large percentage of the population were spending their evening watching the Scotland-France game. Ha! I read and wrote and played my Tindersticks CD which was as peaceful as the flat, AMAZINGLY. I moved onto cider once I�d finished my wine. Went to bed after midnight but heard John and James having their first alky party in a while (that I�ve NOTICED, anyway) at about 4.30am! I KNEW it was too good to be true�
THE FATIMA MANSIONS � EVIL MAN/1000% (KITCHENWARE)
Yet MORE Cathal! Here are a couple of singles taken from the Mansions� genius-sprinkled 1992 �Valhalla Avenue� album (reviewed in the last issue). The extra tracks on �Evil Man� are mainly bonkers remixes which don�t turn me on very much and which Cathal himself has been less-than-complimentary about. But there�s ALSO a fabulous human-beings-are-shit song called �Hive� (�All drones everywhere arise from mildewed states of unconsciousness and go to celebrate their condition in the abandoned village greens�) and a rather bizarre version of Leonard Cohen�s wank fantasy �Paper Thin Hotel� (from his Phil Spector produced 1977 album �Death of a Ladies Man�). �1000%� contains some WELL tasty live tracks where we get to hear stage patter like �You might think (this song is) distasteful but it�s about England, where I�ve lived for a long fuckin� time and where I feel like I have nothing whatsoever to gain from the mainstream of most people�s fuckin� lives, so I reserve the right to say this whenever I feel like it� (in the intro to the anti-police/anti-bailiff �Angel�s Delight�) and �I want to KILL a motherfucker�. This guy obviously has an ATTITUDE PROBLEM! No WONDER he�s not a household name like the WONDERFULLY TALENTED Simon Cowell and Sharon Osbourne, eh?!
CERAMIC HOBS
To celebrate the release of their wonderful new CD, �Al Al Who� (out now on Pumf Records. www.pumf.net. BUY it, BITCH!), I sent Ceramic Hobs some questions that I stole from The Local Mag (�quite possibly the best magazine in Essex�). Simon Morris sent back some answers. Here they are�
DO YOU HAVE AN OPINION ON SIZE 0 MODELS?
I prefer more meat, although it�s always nice to see someone younger and more attractive than yourself self-destruct. ?
WHERE IS THE MOST UNUSUAL PLACE YOU HAVE SPOTTED A MODEL?
At a Mad Pride gig � Gini S., who worked as a model and was in cheesy metal videos, ended up doing work as a video-maker for Mad Pride�.
WHAT MUSIC ARE YOU LISTENING TO AT THE MOMENT?
Old beast gets tired � everlasting return to Ithaca � teenage revisited x 1000 � The Fall, Butthole Surfers etc. Xeroxing degrades the image.
DO YOU HAVE ANY ROCK-STAR FRIENDS?
Most people I know live like decadent rock stars especially all the young bands in Blackpool � Constant Source of Disappointment, The Dropout Wives, Higher Council Of Mars, Seaton Bombs, Intravenous In Furs et al� Mongoloid Porn Inferno�
OUTSIDE MUSIC, HOW DO YOU RELAX?
I enjoy researching hidden information and using this in lyrics/texts/cover art � I NEVER fully relax, it is ALL work � Current fields of interest: Kock + Group 13 / �les ballets roses� + Dutroux / E. Gyde campaign / �Project White Flash� etc.
HAVE YOU GOT ANYTHING YOU�D LIKE TO SAY TO THE PEOPLE OF ESSEX?
Obviously I feel bad for anyone picked on, the anti-Essex stuff seems to be the typical British class prejudice. I am interested in Manningtree, Harwich and Dovercourt in Essex. Prettyinplump/
Burton-Moore was from Essex.
ANY FAVOURITE MEMORIES FROM YOUR CAREER SO FAR?
Hitler�s last photograph showed him pinning Iron Crosses to the chests of 14 year old H.Y. boys who were due to defend Berlin street by street in 1945.
HAVE YOU ALWAYS WANTED TO BE IN A FAMOUS BAND?
Reading between the lines in Alan Clark�s diaries, what can we learn? What do the cryptic comments about a �sideways elevator� made at his Privy Council initiation mean?
WHAT DO THE AMERICAN AUDIENCE MAKE OF LILY ALLEN AND AMY WINEHOUSE?
Not as bad as Kate FUCKING Nash but what is.
IS THERE A CERTAIN FOOD THAT YOU CAN�T RESIST?
I eat it all�. slugs, the lot.
WITH YOUR POPULARITY, IS IT DIFFICULT TO BE A PRIVATE EVERYDAY PERSON?
Sometimes I panic badly at being recognised by people I�ve never spoken to� I would like a scramble suit � l� �Scanner Darkly� and I�m not even famous, just lived in the same small town too long.
FAVOURITE SECRET HANGOUT?
The World Wildlife Fund�s �Club 1001� and the Regina Louf Blackmail Experience. The connections are electric tonight. I�m in the other room now.
BEST SATURDAY NIGHT OUT?
Doing debut Berlin show, August �06 at Die Alte Buchbindere. Or Funkadelic live, same summer.
WHAT�S THE CRAZIEST THING YOU�VE EVER SEEN IN THE AREA?
A mental patient too far.
BUSKERS
I was in a pub where some old man was trying to engage me in a conversation about horse racing. I told him that I wasn�t interested but he kept on talking anyway, about races he�d been to and how he could always pick a winner. Lucy had been downstairs in the toilets for almost ten minutes. I was getting bored and restless, so asked the man to buy me a pint but he just continued talking about racing as if he hadn�t heard me. I got up from my stool and moved to the opposite end of the bar.
�Snakebite, please�.
The barmaid with the pink mohican poured the drink and took my money. It was the exact amount. Then Lucy appeared.
�Where�s mine?�
�You took so long, I thought you�d fallen in,� I said and went to sit down in a dimly lit booth. Lucy got herself a drink and joined me. It was three o�clock on a Sunday afternoon and we�d planned a trip to the cinema but had taken so long deciding what to see that we�d already drank three or four pints. This happened most weeks. I yawned and watched the barmaid adjust her bra strap.
�Do you think the buskers will be coming in later?� Lucy asked.
�If you mean Paul, I�m sure he�ll be here.�
Lucy had taken a fancy to this handsome-scruffy busker who wore a brown leather jacket and played Beatles songs on a battered old acoustic guitar. He busked near the pub and would usually show up at night with a few of his friends, to drink their day�s earnings. I knew that was one of the main reasons we always drank in the same pub. It was a shabby sort of place, a hangout for students and general outcasts, which suited us fine. Also, it was cheap. Paul treated the place like a second home and was probably there more than his REAL home, wherever THAT was. We didn�t really know him very well but Lucy would always end up speaking to him after she�d had a few drinks. A lot of people assumed that Lucy and me were an �item� but she made it very clear to Paul that we were just friends.
We killed the next couple of hours drinking and listening to the jukebox, until the buskers came falling through the door, laughing and panting as if they�d been running all the way up the street. They trooped up to the bar and ordered drinks and snacks but Paul wasn�t with them. Lucy looked so downcast that I tried to give her a comforting smile, only she wasn�t looking at me. Her eyes were fixed expectantly on the door.
We�d worked our way through eight or nine snakebites by the time Paul eventually arrived, his guitar slung over his shoulder. When she saw him, Lucy ran up, screaming, and threw her arms around his neck. Even from a distance, I could tell he was embarrassed. I would have been too if I�d been sober. They both walked over to the bar where they ordered drinks and lit up cigarettes. Lucy claimed she didn�t smoke, although that always changed after a few pints. They stood at the bar for so long that I got lonely and started thinking too much. Thinking about what I was doing with my life, about how long it had been since I�d left college, how long it would be before my dole money got stopped� There were so many things to worry about, so many things to drag you back to cold, hard reality. I was so absorbed in my own depressive thoughts that I barely noticed when, after a while, Lucy came back to our booth and sat down, all smiles.
�Sorry about that,� she said.
�Have you got a date, then?�
�I�m working on it. He�s a bit mysterious. Won�t tell me where he lives. Just said he dosses down on mate�s floors. He�s from some wee island off the West Coast.�
�It sounds like he told you quite a bit. Doesn�t sound THAT mysterious to me.�
�Don�t you think he looks like Jesus?�
�Jesus? Well, it hadn�t really crossed my mind... Didn�t Jesus have a beard?�
�Well, APART from the beard.�
�He wears a leather jacket, Lucy. I don�t remember anything in the Bible about Jesus running about looking like some grotty biker.�
�I just meant in GENERAL, he looks a bit like Jesus, that�s all.�
�Oh YEAH,� I said sarcastically.
At this point, there was a sudden lull in our conversation.
*
�He�s got a kid.�
Lucy was telling me all the juicy gossip about Paul. I was lying in bed, hungover, and she was on her lunch-break. She�d just got a job nearby, temping in some office.
�He had to get away from Mull. That�s where he�s from, did I tell you? But he still goes back sometimes to see the kid. Isn�t that sweet?�
I felt terrible.
�Let�s go out and get some coffee,� I said.
I didn�t have to get dressed because I was still wearing the same clothes from the night before. I�d been to a nightclub and had been physically thrown out for drunken behaviour. My jeans were torn at the knees and my legs covered in dried blood. Lucy was shocked when I pulled back the duvet and so was I. I�d forgotten about the club, the irate bouncers and the empty pint glasses I�d been tossing around the dance-floor like ping-pong balls.
�What happened to YOU?�
�Don�t you remember?� I asked. �You were THERE!�
�I remember you asking me to buy you a drink and, when I got back from the bar, you�d gone.�
�Oh yeah. Sorry about that. Let�s go.�
We walked down the road to a greasy spoon caf� and Lucy bought me breakfast, even though it was lunchtime. We sat on two stools by the window and I watched a middle-aged man in a trilby hat who was playing guitar in a doorway across the street, as Lucy told me about her new job and how WONDERFUL Paul was. I noticed that a lot of people walking by were gawping at me, which made me feel like some sort of animal on display in a zoo. Then I realised they were looking at my torn jeans and bloody legs. I smiled, took a sip of hot coffee and wondered what the rest of the day had in store for us all.