You asked if I remembered that time you caught salmonella from the eggwhite in those homemade Chicken McNuggets that Polly brought to my Election Results Watching Party in '04
I am pretty sure none of that ever happened so I don't say anything, and continue poking random butons on the broken toy keyboard my older brother got me for my birthday last week, until I happen upon a particularly abrasive series of "notes".
"It sounds like your ex-girlfriend's band" I laugh. "It wasn't a band" you snap "It was a perfomance project" I stick my tounge as far into my left cheek as it'll go and stare you straight in the eyes.
You correct yourself: "Not that I care anymore..." A long pause. "Anyway, I'm bored. What are we doing this evening?" I pass on the information that Michael has invited us to his fictional cocktail party.
"... So it's not a real party?" I explain that all the cocktails sered will be taken from fictional sources. Resultingly some of them are incredibly dangerous and, more importantly, digusting. "Much like some of the people drinking them" you add.
***
Dangeroulsy drunk on the Inverse Terrorism they'd shared, They stumbled home through the snow and had satisfactory-if-slightly-dull sex on the sofa in front of CNN.
"The economy's still fucked then" Cath said. "Did you REALLYget salmonella?" Jeff asked. "Yes. I forgot that you didn't know me then." she replied. "I did. We'd been friends for two years at that point." "Well..."
[End. God knows, just some nonsense. TOMORROW's will be good. Her ex-girlfriend is the girl from The Young Poet Meets a Fan, obvs. (Lookitme, building a universe) Oh, the Terrorism is my favourite fictional cocktail and comes from Pictures for Sad Children. The Inverse Terrorism then is a drop of tequila in a pint of Bailey's. It does not need pointing out that a Fictional-Cocktails party would be a TERRIBLE idea. Written whilst watching Persepolis. Not edited.]
[I am so, so sorry. There's rhyming in this one. No idea what came over, hope it won't happen again]
My favourite TV show ends and I soon come to feel like I've lost a best friend. I miss the overly long intro, that awful music at the end; All the annoying little things on which I had come to depend -
And look I know that my very own supporting cast Is devastatingly attractive and constantly entertaining, but when I'm all the way out in my hometown and it's dark and it's raining (Like some Danish movie's end) I can't help but frown and wish I lived closer to them. So I think this, and then: That feeling once again - Like I've lost a best friend, But this time only for the length of the long weekend.
[End. Written whilst listening to: Yet more Okkervil River. Plus Ones and On Tour with Zykos. Edited whilst listening to: I Need Some Sleep by Eels. I'm home from university for the holidays and am rather missing both the usual ensemble cast of the Miles at Uni Show and the other supporting cast that I try to see when home but who mostly live in a big city a tiny bit too far away. Ho hum. Reading Jonathan Coe's book about BS Johnson, eating chocolate pie pudding from M&S and listening to the new Dirty Projectors' single way too much - These are all good ways to spend days at home with the family.]
You ask how I knew your boyfriend would turn out to be a bastard. It's very simple, He once said to me: "All suffering is optional All unhappiness is voluntary."
Which is bullshit Which is idiotic Which is moronic -
You and I know there's always 3 or more good reasons To lay under our beds screaming At the sheer horror of being alive. There's always 3 or more good reasons to cry And if you're happy all the time...
"Then something's seriously wrong with you?" I'd say so. I mean, Don't start sleeping with nihilists But remember that there's a spectrum and sitting right at one end or the other is all wrong.
Also, It wouldn't hurt to ask about criminal records.
[End. Well, you're only 18 once. Written whilst listening to: Lost Coastlines by Okkervil River. Not edited]
We thank god (just in case) for shorts, as your skirt fights with the wind. (Second dress, you said) And the weather's not great but it's good enough for us and we always have spent the better part of the day indoors (so long since you've seen a human being that you've developed your own way of eating, you said) Then you beat me repeatedly at Mario Kart (Except for steering and aiming, you're amazing, you said) I hum "Same as it ever was, same as it ever was" Safe in the knowledge That some things will always be good.
"You're going to write today's poem about this, aren't you?" you said.
[End. Written 5 minutes before midnight whilst watching the Wire (DEADLINE PANIC), but influenced inevitably by the fact that I listened to Okkervil River's "Calling and Not Calling My Ex" at least five times in the last day or so. "God (just in case)" is quoted from "You'll Need Those Fingers For Crossing" by Los Campesinos! (from my favourite record ever). "Same as it ever was" is the best five-word-pop-lyric ever, from "Once in a Lifetime" by Talking Heads. Thanks to my good friend Hannah for giving all my material by hanging out with me this afternoon]
All these goddamn poets and songwriters And screenwriters and rappers and bloggers Keep beating to me to every single punch. Everything I have to say has been written by twenty men and women who wield and weld words better than I ever could.
[In one caffeine powered burst, I stand up (ill advised) and shout: And even if I had, who would listen? You’ve got your goddamn acoustic guitar and think that gives you instant credibility. But me? Just one white kid shouting words against the walls? Not so much, no, no one wants to listen to that. Well, hell, I went and GOT a backing band, so I will break into your headspace someday soon then you'll fucking swoon when I tell you to and you will hate and hurt and heal over and thank me for it]
/And breathe/Eyesclosedeyesopen +++++ What follows is a list of things can instantly turn a(ny) day around:
Or at the very least, seriously improve a mood - Pizza. Long talks with good friends. Short arguments with bad friends which you clearly win (and others witness). Loved songs (loud ones played quietly, quiet ones played painfully loud).Lists. Unexpected e-mails or invitations from long lost much missed companions and comrades. Good poems. Dancing. Warm weather (with intermittent breezes). Sugar. Noise. You. Did I mention the pizza? Trust me about the pizza. \Andbreathe\Eyesclosedeyesopen +++++
We wake late (Having been up until godknowshwhathour Working on songs about poems and poems about songs) And, after dislodging the dust from our eyes, We just lay there for a long, long time. We digest the crumbling remains of dreams But we will rise, given time And then do great things - So stand back and shut up. Open a window, let in some sun, Fetch us some water and gather your friends.
And they do. Then -
Someone raises a placard saying “FUCK LIFE, LET’S ART!” The girl to my left pulls a face. “Isn’t it all the same thing?” The boy to my right leans in front of me. I move my head forward. He leans behind me. I move my head back. He leans in front of me. “It depends on how you live, surely?” “And more importantly” I add “what your art is like” The crowd knows the answer to this one and answer in unison: “IT’S PRETTY GOOD” I grin. There is hope yet.
Back in the hometown for a religious holiday of no signifigance I lapse back into a teenage fantasy where I can play guitar And begin to wonder what songs I would have performed at my first ever show with the express aim of pissing off my least favourite ex-girlfriend. The sun sets on a patch of grass splattered with dog shit and I wonder where she is...
ii.
It turns out that where she is is getting Chinese food at the same place I am ten minutes later. (And still dresses exactly as she used to, which I find a little unsettling) These small towns are minefield; All the people you went to secondary school with who you now never want to see again (which is all of them, obviously) are primed for conversastions you never want to have are loaded with information you wish you could forget are waiting in the long grass which you have to cross to get home/to get to the bus stop/to get food.
I sprint home and (not at all thinking of your skinny current boyfriend) eat a mountain of rice and chicken to ensure I feel bad all over.
Dear sweet jesus I hope somebody paves over this county.
(Soon I will be back in a big glowing city With girls who've only ever been needlessly cruel to other boys (Not me, because I'm Just A Friend who they Love Like A Brother) And easy access to A) Alcohol and B) 4am milkshake.)
There's no question of broken hearts here - (failing bodies, maybe) That part of me long ago moved on and made a decision;
I will no longer mask my contempt for you: Let the hatred stand naked Let me live with it awhile and learn to see it's good points. If nothing else, it's (a little) inspirational.
[End. Bloody hell. Bad evening. This one got a bit ranty, huh? I'll try to be less of an Angsty Teen Poet tomorrow. Written whilst listening to: Casiotone for the Painfully Alone. Not edited, which shows rather doesn't it?]
If it were shared the unending opressive warmth (even with windows open) the blinding white hot sunlight (even with eyes shut) the gravity that stops me lifting my legs (even with hours of effort) the impossibly heavy duvet that I cannot shift...
If it were shared, the sum of this could be a damn good sunday.
As is though: It's hell.
[End. Written and Edited whilst listening to Superchunk]
I say I don't believe in it but the drinking games undeniably build up a certain momentum after midnight, when all you know is that you don't want to know who you are anymore (not that you want to lose your identity to be clear, you just want to forget certain parts - forget that you are timid and quiet and afraid of sex. You want to (just for the night) forget about that and accidentally fill the space with something confident)
We wake up on spare matressess, alone. As always. Staring at white ceilings with microscopic black holes all over - this is the night sky in reverse, which makes sense because right now your head feels like it's just been turned the right way around for the first time in twelve hours.
Lessons learned: I will always catch up with myself. I can throw my arms around anyone but whiskey never made me something holy and gin never made me someone lustable. (Maybe someone laughable) I love and I love and I love and all I ever get is drunk -
I laugh quietly to nobody in particular (the girls on the stairs?) and say "Well, you can't grope a memory"
I'm sorry but I'm not sad. Turn down the bright lights and we can try again; I am learning (slowly) to feel good, I think it's a wortwhile study.
So, cue the strings - I will swoon at the streams of moonlight that punch through the window and dance in your kitchen (barefoot, of course, because some cliches ... well, they work, don't they?) And be happy and fuzzy and floaty and light and...
Maybe I should save this for another night. The point is: You may think I'm a serial miserablist But I do alright, so - Give me a hug and another shot And I will be well on my way to enjoying this.
I do not regret my straight-edge years But I am glad they are over.
[End Another poem about girls and drinking. The "something holy" line is a reference to the incredible song "Patriot's Heart" by American Music Club. "You can't grope a memory" is an obvious nod to "You can't put your arm around a memory". The rest is all me (though I worry I may have subconciously stolen the "all I ever get is drunk" bit?). Written whilst listening to: The National (Ada, Gospel, Karen and All the Wine) Edited whilst listening to: Explosions in the Sky (The Rescue EP), Death Cab for Cutie (their cover of Superchunk's Kicked In)]
Dear teenage girls: Leave yr boyfriends. Just because he's nice to you doesn't mean he's nice; You should have heard what he was saying last night -
I was lying on my back in the dark Listening to the popular consensus conversation outside Drinking and getting as comfortable as a carpet allows - Then he stumbles in, falls down and says... " " some things that really don't need repeating, then he laughs into the black. I shift so I don't have to face him.
So the girl - Blonde Blue eyes (enough shadow to cloak a small town in darkness for long enough that people start to ask questions) she says she took my advice leaves a casette tape on my desk
(so I walk home wondering if I still own a working tape player. Turns out I do, it was one I had as a small child all big red, white, yellow buttons, chunky plastic seemed... inapropriate...)
I hit play, and her words slide out the speakers they sound like they're trying to stay as close to the ground as possible And what she says is: "I took your advice, after he came into the bedroom and said: If you don't love me by sunrise I will make you pregnant. I still don't know if he was joking But I knew it was time to leave"
Next time I saw her she was fronting some post-post-punk post-rock post-feminist post-irony musical perfomance project, reciting those same words whilst three girls in orange bikinis spat white noise out of their broken guitars through broken guitar amps.
I didn't really "get it" as a piece. One tall guy stood next to me sighed (mistaking my curiosity for wonder) and said "She only dates girls now you know" And I suddenly feel bad... "I said some stupid things to her I just... I just wanted her to take me seriously." And I feel worse abo... "Bitch" And I don't feel so bad about what we did when she came back to ask if I enjoyed the tape.
[End I wrote some of this, then realise it should OBVIOUSLY be a poem by my Young Poet charachter (star of Teenage Poetry Blues Remix and Twenty Something Poetry Blues Edit, so far). I imagine the girl visits him after seeing him at an open mic event and mistaking him for a sensitive soul, or at least an artsy type. Dear fictional girls - Always remember, the Young Poet is (above all things) a total bastard. I mean, I am a bit for writing him I suppose... Written whilst listening to: Parenthetical Girls. Edited whilst listening to: Imperial Teen.]
I love The Wire (really as good as everyone says) but have developed an unfortunate habit of making and eating one sandwhich per episode. The BBC are showing one every night.
You can understand my concerns then. TV is killing me.
If my body gets much worse then being me will become a job nobody wants and if (and understand, you only took it because you absolutely had to goddamnit you needed the money) you do take it, you quit as soon as you fucking can and it's not just that all your friends have heard the stories of how awful it was, it's that you've reached the point now where anyone in the same building as you just needs to reffer vaguely to the line of work and everyone will look at you laugh
and you laugh too, but only because you sat down one day and let yourself breathe in the memory, let your lungs somehow suck all the suffering all the unrelenting horror out of those two/four/six weeks (eighteen years) and return the thought to your lips, now in third person so now you can smile at how vile the whole affair was
just so long as you don't think about it when you're alone when it's dark when you're trying to sleep.
[End. Written whilst watching: The Wire Edited whilst listening to: Yo La Tengo (specifically Last Days of Disco and Let's Save Tony Orlando's House)]
We float above our beds Alone, held up by sheets of sound And the white noise does cause goosebumps but only at the very best of times Mostly we just lay there Glad we're not touching the ground Thankful for the force we feel beneath us (but cannot understand) And always always wishing we could share the feeling Wishing we could fly (hands touching)
Eventually, the stars come out, So we rememember where we are. We turn out the lights And in the total black that follows the curtain's fall Our legs hang off the edges of our beds.
There could be nothing there. If we slipped off we could just
drop.
But we never do.
[End. Written whilst listening to: Wilco. Edited whilst listening to: Phoenix. Pretty sure there are at least two references to lyrics of songs I like in this one. This will be a recurring theme. I like to think there's a fine line between intertextuality and plagiarism.]
Me. Hello, the blog is back. At least temporarily. Sorry for being gone so long.
1. It's the Easter Holidays, after this I have Exams and then we're done with the education business til September. Assuming I pass and am allowed to progress to the next year. I'm... I'm less confident about this than I should be.
2. Currently listening to a lot of: Afghan Whigs, this, Destroyer, Kenickie, Ra Ra Riot and (as ever) Los Campesinos!. (And right now as I write this post: Outkast)
3. Just finished reading Tom Perrota's The Abstinence Teacher. Have just begun reading Tom Perrota's Election. Appear to have lost my DVD of the film of Tom Perrota's Election. [Might review Abstinence Teacher later/soon]
Includes me saying silly things like: "She is cutting out hearts and taking names for embiterred ex-girlfriends everywhere, except, not everywhere because these songs are defiantly, definitely HERS and if you happen to empathise then so be it"
It starts with a simple plan - Meet friends who are back in the city for the winter holidays, go out, get drunk, go home.
It starts with a song that leaps out of a consistently great album and sits in my head for ever and ever.
It starts with a comic book about dancing.
It ends with a minor epiphany, another road-to-Damascus moment, life imitating art imitating life and me being ridiculously happy.
Ready? Go.
My friends are a varied bunch, with very different tastes in music and wildly different degrees of interest in the stuff. So it is that when we are drinking and talking in a student pub in Leicester, me and Adam leave the conversations we are having to high-five when Sound of Silver by LCD Soundsystem plays and then two minutes later both fume at somebody highjacking the juke box and putting on Queen or the Red Hot Chilli Peppers or something like that. Something with guitars that a teenage boy could like without having to think about it or defend it.
We break apart and head to various bars and after a short period in the great-when-it's-empty-shit-when-it's-busy Time (wherein too many shouting bald men and too much bad house music stop me from even attempting to get to the bar and buy one of their genuinely brilliant cocktail milkshakes) we arrive at Mosh, one of Leicester's very few Alternative nightclubs. Metal in the basement, emo on the ground floor, indie upstairs. Which is kind of perfect isn't it?
Firstly I have one of those odd moments where you meet someone in person for the first time that you've previously known mainly online. (In this case we have in fact crossed paths before but not really and we didn't really know each other then and now we do so). Secondly I have one of those odd moments where you are surprised by the appearance of a very close friend you haven't seen in too damn long. Thirdly I have one of those really, really odd moments where someone buys me a drink. C'est bizzare.
All of which puts me in a pretty good mood which is instantly killed when we head up into the indie room and, well...
Indie is a terrible word and if it does mean something to the kids in here, it means boyrock. There are at least two songs by Pete Doherty in some guise played. There's Killers and Kings of Leon. It's grim.
There's a glimmer of hope when a Long Blonde's song is played but it's one of my least favourite songs of theirs and the dancefloor thins out for it and I'm not drunk enough and anyway I'm not planning on dancing because I only have once before ever (You know I really WILL write up the story of Sunday at End of the Road. I'll do it soon. Promise) and I don't think I'm anywhere near drunk enough for such a thing.
So me and my trustworthy partner in indie adventuring, Ashish, find ourselves a corner and sit and talk to friends whenever they appear. You, probably more than I, know how it is with a group of friends and an establishment like this - they go to talk to people you don't know, they go to dance to records you don't like, everyone disappears occasionally to buy drinks.
Just as I'm despairing (full dancefloor for "Sex on Fire" which is one of the worst things ever), something fairly wonderful happens: The DJ plays Broken Heartbeats Sound Like Breakbeats from Hold On Now, Youngster by Los Campesinos!
Me and Ashish shout along but it's not one of my favourites (don't get me wrong, Los Campesinos! are a band I love more than almost any other band in existence but I definitely love We Are Beautiful We Are Doomed more than HON,Y) and I imagine it'd be a bit akward to dance to.
Now.
1) A week or two ago, the first issue of Phonogram: The Singles Club was published. This is the second Phonogram mini series written by Kieron Gillen and drawn by Jamie McKelvie. In the world of Phonogram, music is magic [because music IS magic]. The first series was concerned with Britpop and memory and the Manics and Blur and the Auteurs and stuff like that which I understood. The first issue of The Singles Club is largely about dancing. The music is mostly stuff I know and like (The Pipettes, The Long Blondes, CSS, Blondie) but dancing... I've never understood. And even the one time I have done it was to a live band and was possibly the last time they'd ever do what they were doing and there was a lot of proper fans there and it was Different. Pull Shapes (the book) is concerned with dancing in a club, with people, y'know. Properly. Kieron Gillen once wrote something along the lines of "I don't get people who don't get dancing" (I've Googled but can't find it on his blog so maybe it was in an e-mail, I don't know) to which I said "I don't get people who don't get people who don't get dancing". Anyway. I've been thinking about Pull Shapes (the book) a lot and listening to Pull Shapes (the song) a lot and all of this praying on my mind at the time but I think I won't say any more about it for fear of spoiling the thing. Go and buy it if you can, there's a reprint due this week or so.
2) Salt, Pepa and Spinderella by Johnny Foreigner is possibly my favourite single song of the year.
It's incredible. I hadn't heard it before playing the album, Waited Up Til It Was Light, so I was listening to it in full for the first time and very much enjoying all of it. Every song had at least one memorable bit that refused to move from my memory and it rocked and was fun and great. Hennings Favourite was ending (with a lovely big guitar bit) and this bass line emerges and creeps across stereo channels and keyboard drums bite down on my ears as Alexei's vocals enter and then it turns out to be a duet with Kelly and it's the most melodic thing on the album so far and it sounds incredible and I can't really tell what it's about (I have this problem with JoFo, I always ADORE lots of lines from songs but in many cases I can't tell you what the whole song is about. This shouldn't be a problem, obviously) but it FEELS like an infidelity anthem.
And just when I don't think I could love it any more, Alexei does some spoken word and then it ALL. GOES. MENTAL. LOUDER. BIGGER. INDESTRUCTIBLE.
So. 1+2=
3)
The slow bit at the end of Broken Heartbeats Sound Like Breakbeats fades out and me and Ashish look up as we hear a very distinctive bass guitar sound and then we look at each other. I can't even recall what words are exchanged but something along the lines of: Him: "Is that JoFo?" Me: "HELL. YES." Him: "That's remarkable" Me: "DANCEFLOOR"
And there I go. It's mostly empty, a few of the "I will dance to anything!" warriors doing their best and then me and Ashish shuffling awkwardly and singing along and then...
I don't know. What I remember is singing louder, closing my eyes, moving faster, knowing that The Loud Bit is coming and then it hits and then ERUPTING and for some reason everything seeming white and then it ends and something I don't care about fades up and I stumble to the bar exhausted and grinning and feeling amazing.
And from that moment on, I am immune. No shitty boyrock, no overheard misogyny, not even being dragged into the METAAAHL basement for 3 minutes can dull my mood. Important lessons learned I: It doesn't MATTER that I can't dance, I can flail with an energy that'd make many a skinny-jeaned I-don't-dance-cause-it-might-mess-up-my-hair type of indieboy decidedly embarrassed. I need to do this more often.
So I do! Later my very good friend Hannah enters the room just as the DJ drops Paris by Friendly Fires which is pretty much perfect because they are the only band I think Hannah has introduced me to that I've ended up loving rather than the other way around. It's a great record, all manner of Rapture-esque funky and sexy (but decidedly platonic and therefore cute). And then just as we think we've made it away safely, my favourite MGMT song (well. Almost. It's the standard version of Kids rather than the AMAZING Soulwax remix but waddayagonnado?) so more flailing.
Lessons Learned II: Indie clubs SHOULD be small and horrible and ARE largely rubbish (I mean The Average Indie Club here, the likes of Offbeat are another plain of existence entirely) but perhaps worth it if we can get two or three songs I really love over the course of one night.
Lessons Learned III: Don't ever question Kieron Gillen? Except, actually, do, it's more fun that way. But, uh...
Anyway. That was a true story about a thing that happened on Friday night. I'm pretty much still feeling good about it. Please do buy the JoFo album if you haven't already, yeah? Yeah.
What have you done this weekend, readers? What was the first record that you danced to in public? What minor epiphanies and road-to-Damascus moments have you had recently? etc. etc.
