"I make proper trifle with proper custard, not out of a packet"

Warning: This is a rare post about which contains stuff about, ugh, 'feelings'. Those of a nervous disposition should look away now.

Been thinking about my parents a lot over the last few days. Not only because I've spent some time in the place where my mum's ashes were scattered - it's a lovely place and I would have gone anyway, while there I saw an infamous figure/cretin in British life walking along the beach - but also because I noticed in a bookshop a film tie-in edition of Nigel Slater's rather excellent book, Toast. I don't normally go in for Top 10 Favourite whatever, but if I did one on books that would definitely be in there. It's a book about how Slater's formative years were shaped by the food he ate. Coming from a family of gluttons* I found loads of common ground with him in it. Apart from the fact that his mother was a terrible cook (it's called toast because the one abiding memory he has of her is scraping burnt toast) mine was absolutely fantastic. I think one thing people do when a family member dies is to talk about whoever it is whose gone and talk over the good times and good things. Most of our reminiscences came from the food Mum prepared. The thought that we'd never taste her macaroni cheese (pretty mundane but her macaroni cheese was gorgeous, great 'comfort food'), chocolate fudge cake, fruit scones, Yorkshire puddings, shortcrust pastry, ginger parkin, steak and kidney pie or trifle again made us shiver (well, just me on the trifle front as those two divvies don't like it). There was also the disasters but funny disasters, like when Dad, who didn't get a sophisticated palate until later in life, insisted that he'd only eat spaghetti bolognese with veg. Plates of spag bog with a healthy serving of boiled savoy cabbage on the side was duly delivered to the table. She'd also sneak carrot into lasagne and had this fetish for putting sultanas in curries. Years later, when I'd discovered curry houses, I pointed out to her that I'd never eaten in an Indian restaurant that served savoury sultanas, she laughed and told me that that's how she was taught to make curry...by an English chef.
You'd also never see her weigh anything - unless she was cooking for a competition, where strict rules applied - her skill was immense. I wish I could 'knock up a few scones' if someone gave us short notice that they were visiting or cook something delish for an ill or needy friend. Memories are all I have, like Slater.

On a slightly different subject, came back to find the great Danny Baker has fucking cancer. I say 'fucking cancer' because that's what I call it after hearing Wilko Johnson call it that on an interview recently when talking about his deceased wife. Cancer's a murderer which takes good people before their time; like Mum, three grandparents, an aunt, an uncle and several family friends. I wish Danny well and nothing but best wishes. If you can spare a few pence for a cancer charity, please do.

*There's a great photo of Mum's twin brothers at a Christmas party in the fifties. Though facing the camera neither of them are looking at it, but follow their eyeline and they only have eyes for an enormous trifle on the table.

We're from totally different backgrounds

Five Centres made a point yesterday about the new background to the blog. One of the main criticisms of Blogger is the lack of variety of templates; they seem to have addressed this problem just recently.

I picked this book theme because I suppose I thought it'd make me look more intelligent. Don't be fooled. I've just finished One Day by David Nicholls (which I enjoyed immensely, even though I originally though it was chick-lit. And I ended up falling in love with the main female character, which I also did with Nick Hornby's last), and I'm currently on the Chris Evans book.

I know I should be reading Proust, EM Forster, Steinbeck, Graham Greene and all that, but I enjoy a bit of crap. Who doesn't secretly enjoy a Big Mac every once in a while?

I'd go as far as to say that the publisher with the most books on my shelves isn't Penguin but Ebury Press, publisher of memoirs and travel guides by 'my sort of people'. Hey-ho, Dostoyevsky's going to have to wait. Why read about some bloke being locked up for murder when you can read about Richard Herring facing up to his fortieth birthday? I'm planning on reaching forty, not murdering someone.

Thanks for nothing

I quite clearly never learn with books written by comedians, do I? I asked for the Jack Dee autobiography for Christmas, and actually got it. Another disappointment. I like Dee, and, as a, ugh, 'student of comedy', thought it would be all about his way in to the world of stand-up with his life story thrown in.
Oh no it isn't. What you get is this trend these days for stretching autobiographies out over more than one volume. Now I could understand it if it was by, say, David Attenborough; someone whose lead a full and varied life. Not for a moderately successful comedian and sitcom writer/actor.
So to pad the book out you get Dee's opinion on everything from football (he doesn't like it), to people who claim not to watch television (he doesn't like them), to people who use Facebook and Twitter (he doesn't like them).
Am I being old-fashioned, or is it wrong of me to expect an autobiography to follow a pattern as laid down by The Godfathers on their excellent single of the late 80s, ie birth, school, work, death? I know the death bit's pretty difficult as he's not dead and would find that bit hard to write anyway, what with not being dead and everything. But there's very little of his formative years, apart form being sent to boarding school (he didn't like it) and a load of stuff about working as a waiter/chef/restaurant manager (he didn't like it).
The parts where he tries stand-up on open spots at The Comedy Store, decides on his miserable persona and being contacted by his future manager, Addison Cresswell, are dashed off in the last thirty pages as though he realised he was approaching his word limit and he had to hurry things along.
If he wants a true guide as to how to do multiple autobiographical volumes then I suggest he reads Vic Reeves's Me Moir. It's a straight autobiography that's thoroughly entertaining and leaves the reader at the point he gets on the train to London in the late 70s. It also contains one of the funniest stories about attending prog rock concerts I've ever read. It's a pity he never got round to writing volume two...

So Dee's book's a wasted opportunity from the man who came up with this, one of my favourite stand-up routines ever. Made even better by the fact that I used to work for a company called Mojo, and I've eaten more Mojos than you can shake a stick at in my time.

Ask me about the Mitfords

I've had a bit off a Mitford's weekend. First off, on Friday night, I went to see Andrew Collins and Richard Herring record one of their podcasts. I don't normally download their podcasts but thought I'd go along and support the Lincoln Comedy Festival and it was only a tenner to get in for over two hours of live entertainment. I enjoyed it, even Mr Collins's attempt at stand-up in the first part of the show. I tell you what bugs me though; people who get up to the bog in the middle of a set. It was even more noticeable on Friday night as they were recording it and someone's echoing footsteps must be clearly audible on the podcast. I haven't downloaded it, I heard it live, three rows from the front. It was a lovely venue for comedy though, the seats were actually quite comfy.

The Mitford connection is that Collins was sporting a t-shirt which read "Ask me about the Mitford sisters." Apparently he's an authority on the Nazi-loving, uppercrust siblings.

The second bit of my Mitford weekend came yesterday afternoon when I thought I'd pop along, as part of my ongoing quest to culturally enrich myself, to the annual Sotheby's sculpture selling exhibition at Chatsworth House. It'd slipped my mind but the youngest of the Mitford's, Deborah (or 'Debo' as she's known to her friends), is the Dowager Duchess of Devonshire, whose family seat is Chatsworth. Their are two large gift shops at Chatsworth, both groaning under the weight of books about the Mitfords. They don't hide their light under a bushel.

I love a stately home gift shop. They always think they're above selling gonks and pencil sharpeners with the name of the home on the side. For a start not only were there books about the Mitfords, but there were books by a Mitford. That's right, Debo has her own books of letters and essays published. I flicked through the latest one and not only did it have an introduction by Alan Bennett ("Aah yes, I've spent many happy hours stroking Debo's pussy by a roaring fire in the private apartments at Chatsworth" or some such nonsense) but there was also advice, I kid you not, on the correct way to wear a tiara. My stifled guffaws must have been noticeable to the staff.

Another book which diverted my attention was DeBrett's Guide for the Modern Gentleman, of course I could have written the bloody thing, but it was worth standing in the shop and flicking through for fifteen minutes, if only for the advice on how to handle a lady (I was heartened to find three of my favourite albums in their Top Ten Heavy Metal Albums).

I believe bits of the TV adaptation of Pride and Prejudice were filmed at Chatsworth, and, as you'd expect, there's tons of Pride and Prej stuff, including stacks of copies of the book. What I couldn't quite understand though is why, next to Pride and Prej, there were also stacks of copies of Stuart Maconie's Pies and Prejudice. Do you think one of their buyers got the wrong end of the stick?

Anyway, what I loved the most were the tables given over the The Duke's, The Duchess's and Lady Burlington's own choices of gift. They've got stuff on with a little note by whichever member of the family's picked it, like this for a kiddies' book "My grandchildren love me to read them this amusing book whenever they come to stay" or this for a book called Posh Crosswords "The hours on the train journey between London and Derbyshire just fly by with this handy book of puzzles". What had me scratching my head the most though was a huge stack of those clocks which sings a different birdsong on the hour, they're the sort of naff things you only normally see on those terrible Innovations catalogues. The 12th Duke's note? "This clock never fails to amuse me, on the hour, every hour." As Basil Fawlty once said "Only the true upper class would have tat like that."

Get it right or I kick your head in

Well, here we are again. What have I been up to? like you're interested. For starters I've booked two holidays. One of them is a get-away-from-it-all affair to the north of Scotland in a small place overlooking the Moray Firth. Apparently you can watch dolphins from the garden. I hope they don't get too close, there's a word in The Meaning of Liff for the point when animals stop being picturesque. I don't get on very well with animals and have never seen the fascination of wanting to swim with dolphins. Mind you, I don't see the fascination of wanting to swim. As Billy Connolly says "Man spent thousands of years evolving to get out of the water, and the first thing he wants to do is run back in". We don't belong in there, there are things in there that want to hurt you.

Anyway, I'm going up there to just switch my phone off and chill out, away from solicitors, bank managers, pension companies, fawning funeral directors, the DWP etc etc. Having said that though, I get on quite well with our solicitor, she's a laugh. I knew I'd gone a bit far the other day though when I launched into an anecdote about The Great Soprendo before realising she didn't have a clue who I was on about. The penny dropped when I was reduced to saying "You know, The Great Soprendo off of Crackajack...piff paff puff......he was married to Victoria Wood...used to do Dictionary Corner on Countdown...Geoffrey Somebody...no?...oh." Obviously she'd spent her formative years poring over legal texts while I watched telly. Never mind, it's her loss.

I've also been thinking about buying a new car, thanks to Lord Mandy of Mandelson's scrappage scheme. I hate buying cars though and I'm desperately trying to put it off. It's the salesmen, I went with an ex-girlfriend to look for one for her once and the salesman kept addressing me. I had to tell him it wasn't me buying the car. He also kept saying 'superb' at the end of every sentence, like a complete wanker. The last one I bought the salesman said "I can see, sir, you look like the kind of man who loves his gadgets." How could he tell that? And he was wrong anyway. I'm still putting it off though, and knowing my luck, when I do brave the showroom it'll be the day after all the scrappage money's run out. Bah!

I've been reading The Northern Clemency by Philip Hensher. It's a sprawling book that spans two decades in the lives of two middle-class Sheffield families. I love that kind of thing. (See my love for Stan Barstow's Vic Brown trilogy, Jonathan Coe's Rotters' books and Our Friends in the North for more details) It's a 700+ page monster but it's one of those books I don't want to end. He takes ages getting the detail right, which some would probably find infuriating, but it's the detail I love. Also not much happens, but it's very involving. So involving, in fact, that I had a day off work yesterday and took it to the pub yesterday afternoon. I never take books to pubs, and never go to pubs on my own, but I did yesterday. I read about eighty pages while getting slowly half-cut on pear cider and sitting at an outside table which I think was meant for smokers, but fuck 'em. Have you tried pear cider? It's a great summer drink, very sweet, but it slips down as easily as pop.

I went to see Telstar - The Joe Meek Story at the cinema last week. What a disappointment that was. It didn't know whether it wanted to be a knockabout comedy or a serious drama about mental health issues. I have a passing knowledge, and general interest in Meek, but the film told me very little I didn't know already, apart form the fact that his session guitarist of choice was Ritchie Blackmore. It also concentrated too much on his relationship with a complete turd of a man called Heinz, who Meek fell in love with and spent loads on trying to get a string of hits out of him. It all went pear-shaped, as you'd probably guessed. I was frustrated that it didn't tell you how a tone deaf man who couldn't play an instrument became a producer of such note. I reckon they made it with the interest of the average cinema punter in mind and didn't want to get bogged down in all that detail. It would have made a better TV drama, like those BBC4 films about real people. Especially as I was at a weekend showing with only six other people. That was after I'd picked myself up off the floor at how much the cinema wanted to charge for a) premium seats (Which turned out to be Mastermind chairs at the back with a small table, worth £14 of anyone's money. Not. I'd want a mid-film blowjob by a Polynesian handmaiden thrown in for £14) and b)the price of popcorn, surely the world's most inexpensive food product somehow made on par with caviar.

I'll leave you with this. How hateful is that? It's like those annoying tear-off calendars at work which each have a bit of cod philosophy at the bottom of each page. The filmed report on that page is worth watching just for the sound of the train driver's monotone voice spraffing off a a bit of Immanuel Kant, and saying "The passengers love it." Really? Oh, and it's also worth watching because I've taken a fancy to the woman at 50 seconds.

April fool

Well, not much to report here. You'll have to get used to more sporadic blog posts as I don't enjoy all the internet access that I used to, and an immediate family member is going through a pretty major health scare at the minute.

Anyroad, have you seen - the incorrectly-titled - Chris Moyles' Quiz Night? If you haven't, then don't. A bigger dog's breakfast of an 'entertainment' show I've yet to see. I've nothing against ugly people on the telly, but I am against ugly cretins on the telly.
What I have been enjoying on the telly though are I've Never Seen Star Wars (and in Fawlty Towers and Dark Side of the Moon, Rory McGrath picked two things I'm a bit of an expert on), Genius (even though I've never previously had much time for Dave Gorman). I've also been watching - the incorrectly-titled - Monty Halls' Great Escape. If you've not seen it, and I don't think any of you will have done, it's about a rather enthusiastic bloke who chucks in his life for six months and goes to live in a crofter's bothy on the west coast of Scotland. Very idyllic. I reckon I could manage that, I don't mind my own company and as long as I had my iPod and stack of decent books I'd be in my element. Besides, the local village, Applecross, seems to have a ready supply of buxom, red-cheeked women who were all clamouring for his attention. I found that he was rather in love with his dog though, which was a worry.

I've finished Stuart Maconie's new book. For a travel book it left me oddly not wanting to visit many of the places in it. I suppose that's because I come from a smallish town in 'Middle England' and that's, er, what it's about. When you come from somewhere like this you tend to reach out either for the anonymity of the urban sprawl or, being British, for the taste of fish and chips on the seafront. He bigged-up Bath and Leamington Spa, two places I've been to myself and enjoyed immensely. He's cock on about Grantham though. I worked there for four years, and it's a really strange place (about a half mile down the same road as Thatcher's birthplace sits on, which was his reason for going). It's as though someone built a town in the middle of a bypass.
He goes to Cambridge, which is somewhere I've never been and always wanted to go to. I love Pink Floyd and want to go and immerse myself in the fabled Grantchester Meadows. There's a lovely Floyd promo film for the song Scarecrow, which features Syd Barrett and co frolicking on the Meadows. The colours are gorgeous. I might do that over the Easter break, go to Cambridge, it's not much more than an hour's drive from here.

I've also been dabbling in Spotify. I wanted to listen to a new album by a band called The Decemberists, and Spotify gave me it right there and then (I can highly recommend the album, by the way, if concept albums about infanticide and burying the bodies in enchanted woods is your thang). The other day I fancied listening to Deep Purple's Fireball, instead of rummaging around looking for the CD I just pulled up Spotify and set Fireball playing. Will it spell the end for purchased music? Not in my world, I like the feeling of ownership.

I watched Quantum of Solace on DVD last week, someone lent me it. Oh dear. I have to say I thought it was terrible. I couldn't really follow what was going on. It just seemed to be a load of action sequences stitched together with the faintest whiff of a story. There were no laughs, no Q, no Miss Moneypenny, no gadgets. The only light relief came with Gemma Arterton's character Strawberry Fields. That's right, they're naming Bond girls after Beatles' landmarks. What next? Penny Lane? Abi Rhode? And why can Bond seemingly control any vehicle? He was a master in a speedboat, a car, a commandeered motorcycle and a WWII DC3 aircraft.

As I was a Twitter denier, I've gone over to the dark side and joined. I knew it was a mistake the minute I did it and tried to delete my account. It wouldn't let me, "Twitter is stressed at this moment and can't perform that function." I've tried deleting it since and it won't let me. So I'm stuck with it. Why do they treat you like an imbecile? "Twitter is stressed", no it isn't, it's a website, it doesn't get 'stressed'. It's like those smoothie bottles that say stuff like "We've packed thirteen pieces of fruit in here because of all the yummy goodness, and we like to make sure you get your five-a-day because mummy can't be there all the time to make sure you do". I'm not a child.
So if anyone fancies following my mundane life on Twitter, then you can go and find me.

Just a quick thing about the Radcliffe and Maconie show on the 6th of April. Andy Partridge is on it and, if his previous appearances on Radcliffe shows are anything to go by, he makes for very entertaining listening.

Anyway, must go, but here's what I've been listening to just lately:

I love late 60s Rolling Stones, it's a goldmine, Sympathy for the Devil, Gimme Shelter, Jumpin' Jack Flash, this one's my favourite though.



Love this new single. Everyone says they here Kate Bush and Goldfrapp in this, weirdly, I hear All About Eve.




This has had a few plays on R & M. It should have been Britain's entry for this year's Eurovision, unfortunately, he's Norwegian, or summat.



Oasis don't pull any trees up musically. But I love this, they can still release a decent rock single every now and again.



Also listening to something called Kardomah Cafe by a band called The Cherry Boys, which was on the radio the other day. There's no You Tube clip for that though.

Can't think of a punning or witty title for this

I've just been listening to this week's Word magazine podcast while doing my ironing (there's a slice of my rock 'n' roll lifestyle for you, right there), they were talking about Mick Jones, of The Clash, and his collection of late 20th Century popular culture that's just gone on display. You can gawp at it here.
Do we really need all of that stuff? At first I thought it'd be fantastic, but surely the whole weight of it would gradually drag you down. I occasionally have purges of my 'stuff' whenever a charity bag comes round. Only the cream of the crop make it through the cut.
I always fancy that one day I may find myself interviewed for some weighty programme where they'll want to interview me in front of a bookcase. I don't know about you but I always look at the books on those kind of interviews. Politicians appear in front of heavyweight biogs about Clement Atlee or Anthony Eden while boring old duffers will plonk themselves in front of a book by Max Hastings or about the siege of Leningrad. Do you think those books have actually been read? I know if it was me I'd put the books I was most proud of reading in the eyeline of the camera. A bit of DH Lawrence here, some Dickens there, Hardy over there, a bit of Orwell to mix the whole thing up. The last thing I want is for someone to look at me on telly and say "Hmm, he reads too much James May, Tim Moore and David Nobbs. And just look at all those Viz annuals and Commando comic compendiums."
Which I suppose also throws up the question of whether you sort your records out for public display. I don't give a toss anymore, let people see my Moby and Yes albums nestling alongside Holst's Planets and OK Computer.

While I'm on, I no fan whatsoever of either Tony Christie or Richard Hawley, but it has to be said that their new collaborative single, Every Word She Said is a rollicking pop number. I can't find a link to it, but listen out for it.

Still...

...on a Luke Haines' tip. Here's a good article about the man from possibly the world's dullest newspaper, if you needed any more convincing to buy it that is.
I should be on commision...

An English Booker T and the MGs

I'm currently reading a book I love so much that I don't want it to end. I'm now on page 169 of 243, and I know that at some point this week I'm going to finish it. It's called Bad Vibes by leader of Britpop's forgotten ones The Auteurs' Luke Haines. I don't know why I call them 'forgotten ones', I only know two Auteurs songs, and a further three songs that have been touched by the hand of Luke Haines in various guises*. The thing is, I treat him a bit like XTC, I love everything I've heard that he's been involved in but have never got round to really delving in to the catalogue. Which is funny because Haines looks a bit like Andy Partridge (another man who should write a book, he's very entertaining. I once heard him call Richard Branson 'Pol Pot with a beard').

It's his biography dealing with the period of his life from 1992-1997, "Britpop's" "glory" years. What I love about the book is the way it's written in an as-it-happens style, rather like last year's excellent, and entirely fictional Kill Your Friends (another book on my highly recommended list, and it's about the same time period too). I thought I was a misanthrope, Haines really does take the misanthropic cake. It's fair to say that during the period the book deals with he pretty much hates nearly everything, including: the term 'Britpop', Brett Anderson, Damon Albarn, Camden, the Gallaghers, the drummer from Pulp, northern Britain, The Verve, Belgium, The The's Matt Johnson, Simon Day aka Tommy Cockles, Manic Street Preachers, Metallica's Kirk Hammett, music journalists, Justine Frischmann, Three Lions, the NME. And that's just off the top of my head. And certain characters in the story are only known by Haines's own nicknames, so The Auteurs' cellist is simply known as The Cellist, and their American tour manager becomes known as The Chocolate Teapot due to his vocational shortcomings.

And you can't argue with writing like this which has made me roar with laughter:

"I think I may be turning into a cunt"

"Now it's fair to say that The Verve have got a bit of a cob on"

"The [Oasis] song in question is 'Whatever'. It sounds like the fucking Rutles. It is cack."

"Radiohead were - and this is pre the band's hand-wringing-conspiracy-theorising-meta-peacenik phase - rapidly turning into that most heinous of creatures: a heavy rock outfit, fright-wig and all. One wrong turn and it would have been into the valley of the Tygers of Pan Tang for good"

"Radiohead then, this lot were certainly being prodded with the Britpop tickling stick"

In my head that last sentence manifests itself with Ken Dodd wearing a Union Jack suit - and possibly a bass drum on his chest with the word 'Britpop' written in Goodies/Spangles/Magpie-style typeface - poking Radiohead's uber-miserabalist Thom Yorke with a red, white and blue tickling stick. Discomknockerating indeed.

Anyway, read it, you won't be disappointed.

*The songs I know by Haines:

The Auteurs - Lenny Valentino

The Auteurs - Light Aircraft on Fire

Black Box Recorder - Facts of Life

Luke Haines - Off My Rocker at the Art School Bop

There's also another song of his, the lyrics inspired by the book The Damned United, called Leeds United. It was released as a single but I can't find it on You Tube, I know it exists 'cos it's on my iPod.

Don't Cry For Me: One Boy's Dream of Not Getting a Daily Thrashing

I'm looking for something new to read. If I don't finish Andrew Marr's History of Modern Britain by Christmas then I'm going to shoot myself. While perusing Amazon, I came across the list for the best-selling 'tragic true life stories'. I know I'm not the first person to comment on this, but who buys these things in such huge numbers? And look at the titles - some probably have more words than the actual book itself contains. Here's my favourite: Cry Silent Tears: The Heartbreaking Survival Story of a Small Mute Boy Who Overcame Unbearable Suffering and Found His Voice Again. Jesus, you'd need to take a deep breath when ordering that at WH Smith. And I just bet someone has that on their Christmas list.

So I've come up with a title for my own, entirely fictional, tragic childhood story: Little Dickie: The Boy Who Was Locked in a Wardrobe For the First Ten Years of His Life Before Being Encouraged to Run Along the Central Reservation of the A1(M) With Scissors In Just His Nylon Y-Fronts.

Anyway, I've been thinking of getting this, but apparently it's very thick and I'll get arm ache reading such a big book in bed.

I know I'm a bit late here, but the fellow who made this contributed to my relatively happy childhood, unlike the mute boy who found his voice. A great storyteller, and who doesn't love a great storyteller?