Anyone reading this fancy seeing Gothika this evening? I feel the need for shitty horror movies…

(Actually, that’s not true – there’s a weird number of good films, on telly tonight, but I think we’ve got all the ones I might watch on DVD anyway, and I fancy going to the cinema.)

I’ve gone about him at length before. I know I have. But that’s not going to stop me doing it again, as I’ve just discovered that he’s got a new album due out next month, and he’s going to be touring the South of England this summer either side of playing Glastonbury, and will apparently be playing somewhere in London on June 23rd. He’s also got a couple of Brighton dates. I will be attempting to drag as many people as possible to see him, because he’s utterly fucking brilliant, and deserves to be better known in the UK. You’ve all been warned.

So, in order to put everyone in the right mood:

Go here and listen to: “The Graveyard”, “Drinking Song” and “Train Tracks”.

Go here and listen to: “Devil Be Good”, “Dance While The Sky Crashes Down” and “Last Song”.

Go here and listen to: “Halloween” and “Music That Tears Itself Apart”.

And even if what you hear on recording doesn’t grab you, come and see him anyway, because it’s in the live show that his performance really shines. There’s a review of the sort of antics he gets up to at a live show in his home town here.

We now return you to your regularly scheduled nonsense. Expect remainders of all this nearer the time.

In theory, I have a working server in my flat – web, mail, shared filespace, etc. In practice, either my upstream bandwidth or my router is for shit, and I can only get a webpage off the fucking thing one time in ten, and the pages it serves crawl back at no speed at all. Everything thing else should currently be locked off, so I’m not too worried about that, but I’d like to get the damn thing serving web pages properly. I’m going to play with the router settings a bit when I get home, but I am not optimistic. Anyone got any suggestions?

On the bright side, my latest bottle of whisky arrived the other day, just after I finished off some entirely acceptable Mortlach 15. This one’s a society bottling rejoicing in the name of “Horse’s Nosebag”, a 13 year-old Glenrothes that is possibly the sweetest whisky I’ve ever had. The society tasting notes read: “This sample from a fresh sherry butt is burnished orange gold. The first impression on the nose is of a biscuit barrel, rich tea and digestives, but also dark toffee and Demerara, like a horse’s nosebag with molasses in the mix. Water evokes the impression of struck matches. The taste is rich, intense and long lasting with flavours ranging from zabaglione to distressed fan belts and the little tasty burnt bits from the Sunday roast.”

Which is, y’know, a load of old toss. There’s no fanbelt in there, and I couldn’t pick zabaglione out of a line up. But they’re right about the toffee in the smell, and it’s a lovely, large, warm dram.

For those of you that want to keep up with Antony Johnston’s latest news either because you like his comics, or just because you feel the urge to kerep track of where he’s hiding these days, you may want to add mostlyblack to your friends list, it being the syndicated feed from his blog.

So, after getting marks for a wrong answer in zoo_music_girl‘s quiz, I was filled with an urge to listen to “Come In And Burn” by the Rollins Band. (I can hear meetpaulblack endorsing that from here). In the process, I found an album I’d given up as lost the other day, just in time to cancel the order for a replacement that I’d made on Amazon.

Now, like many people, I file my CDs by association, rather than alphabetically or anything sensible like that. It’s not quite the scary “autobiographical” scheme a la High Fidelity, but just artists that in some nebulous way remind be of one another, more favoured artists being more accessible than ones I almost never play. Tom Waits is next to Nick Cave and Diamanda Galas, for instance. The Paradise Motel is filed near The Cocteau Twins. But here’s a bit of filing that, a year after the fact (and I know for a fact I haven’t listened to either album since I filed them when I moved in) I’m at a complete loss to explain.

Someone, please, explain to me what I was thinking when I stuck the Rollins Band in next to The Fairport Convention…

Is a top class chap. One of the reason’s he a top class chap is that he puts his time and effort where his mouth is, and gets involved in protests. And today he brought this little lot to my attention:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/wales/3561015.stm

http://bristol.indymedia.org/newswire/display/14130/index.php

http://www.warband.org/cgi-bin/yabb/YaBB.pl?board=news;action=display;num=1080044129

Now, I personally am not terribly bothered about this specific protest beyond my general abstract “cutting down trees is often quite bad”. But what does fuck me off is this: There is a court order against these protestors. That’s fair enough, even if I’d perhaps rather there wasn’t. But the order is under appeal, as is their right.

And today, while the legal situation remains unresolved, they have been evicted. Now, I am not a lawyer, and off the top of my head, the only lawyer on my friends list is a Scottish lawyer, but y’know, if anyone can advise me as to whether or not it’s legal for the construction company to go ahead, I’d be interested. Because, as Ali pointed out to me and a few others, if it is, it makes the whole appeals process a bit fucking toothless, because all that a construction company needs to do is budget for any fines they might recieve, and go ahead anyway while the order is under appeal.

And y’know, I’d like to believe that the law of the land has some teeth, especially when it might help my mates out a bit…

I start every holiday like this: I intend to do many exiciting things in London, and write them all up, and make everyone jealous of the fun I’m having, because what’s the point of a holiday, if other people don’t know how much fun you’re having? And invariably, I do nothing terribly exciting, and don’t bother.

But still, I am, once again, going to try. And in fairness, if I do do anything exiciting, this should throw it into sharp relief, because this is dull:

Got home last night, to find I had the house to myself, which was a bit of a surprise. Went to the gym, then came home and watched the last episode of Sex in the City, just to make sure it was really over. I have a mild dislike of that show (and most of it’s ilk) but it’s entertaining enough in a “shout irritatedly at the telly” kind of way. And since I had the place to myself, I did exactly that, because I really didn’t like the fucking ending. Complete predicatabilty from start to finish is not the way to end on high note. It was exactly what I expected, as well as being pretty piss-poor, so there was quite a lot of shouting at the telly. (I may have been drinking, too.)

Then I got up this morning and broke my whisky glass. Not the best start to the day. So I went out for breakfast with Warren Zevon and Bill Hicks for company, which cheered me up. Later, I am going out to have coffee, and then [REMINDER] on to John’s/my/anyone else who happens to be chronologically appropriate’s birthday drinks. (Locked post prior to this one has the details.) I may also buy a new whisky glass.

In a hair under two weeks, I turn 27 (on March 25th to be exact). And while I’m sure that some of you wish to shower me with tokens of your esteem, I appreciate that some of you just plain don’t love me enough to buy me the nice things I deserve. And while I am hurt and rejected by this, I’m prepared to offer you all a way to make it up to me. Because I know you feel bad about it. I know you do. [1]

This coming Saturday, the 20th of March, I and several of my friends with birthdays around now, will be celebrating our increasing wisdom at The Court on Tottenham Court Road. [streetmap]

Because half of my friends are on a budget, and the other half are deeply committed alcoholics, the bar is apparently both cheap and open late. I’m planning on getting there about six-ish, and if you can read this post, you’re invited to my birthday party, even if an accident of geography would prevent you from attending.

That’s this coming Saturday, at The Court on Tottenham Court Road. Be there, or at least have fun doing whatever it is you’re doing elsewhere.

[1] And, y’know, even if you don’t, come along anyway, because I’d love to see you.

I read Antony Johnston’s new graphic novel, Spooked on the bus to work today. I am amused by the number of people on my friends list, (or known to many them – it’s a good chunk of the old u.p.g crowd) that the book is dedicated to. Also amused to see Sexbat quoted in the book itself…

The book is very good, by the way.

“For why are you a happy man Alasdair?” I hear you cry!

Firstly: please shout less loudly.

But secondly, the reason I am a happy man is that my bottle of 1984 arrived. I was not expecting that, since I’d been given to understand it wasn’t yet available (but would be within weeks). So I figured I’d pre-order a bottle, and it’d get here some time next month. But no, it has arrived a mere two days after I ordered it. This is, as they say a re-fucking-sult.

So, because it is Wednesday, and on Wednesday’s I torture myself with exercise I am first going to go the gym, and then I am going to come back and pour myself a large dram.

Bloody gym.