Thursday, 31 January 2013
TAKE A DRINK...NAW..GAN OAN, TAKE A DRINK...NAW.. AWW GAN ON YER ONLY SMOKIN' IT. FERRERO ROCKER.
Anyone stuck to their January diet? If you have and you're about to lag on the old drinking front...have wee goosey gander at this colonial musTARD.
What's he doing with the flat alcohol? Is he drinking it after he's smoked it? Is that why he seems a bit 14-year-old's-first-sip-of-booze-I'm-soooodrunk towards the end?
I've not really done any research on the interent yet but i'm not convinced this is working. He should have done some before and after tests and not put any edits in. That said his crack is probably so bad YOU'D have to go and smoke an exhaust pipe to get through it. Jeeze you've obviously got fingers, you look it up and or try it and get in touch to prove it works, I've got nothing to prove and nobody that i care about cares if i have a gut. We've drank booze as a species for so long for a reason, to make people like this guy more bareable or to have an excuse when we've broke a part of him, mental or physical. CHEERS!
WALTER'S PASTA AIN'T WELTER WEIGHT
Jueves 20 Diciembre
Hacienda Malinche, Tlaxcala
I´ve barely seen Javier today and Mariana not at all, so most contact has been with Li & Chang, Carolina, Marianita (eldest daughter, 15 anos), and the dogs & chickens. Work-wise, cleaned all the oil off the window and sorted timber & crockery out of the hacienda´s store, plus a roll of white substance Chang thinks could contain asbestos. I fucking hope not.
Li & Chang have been a godsend food wise. I hope I get to make them some decent pasta before parting ways - the best I can do as yet is the washing-up, in lieu of not having access to ingredients. The hacienda feels completely detached from modern commerce, with no internet or TV to be found. How hard is it gonna be to get pesto in Mexico? The isolation´s affecting my travel plans too - looks like I won´t make Chichen Itza until late Enero with Jay & Kel, so I may have to greet The End Of The World™ from the top of La Malinche instead, and spend Navidad in the hacienda. I´m in danger of getting comfortable here, so I need to further some of my shit tomorrow.
It´s been fun exploring the hacienda grounds, and putting work into making rooms functional. It´s like unearthing a sense of purpose buried in the present, according to a template laid out centuries ago. Having said that, I had a shave this evening on the roof of the semi-derelict church. I´m a little surprised God didn´t kick me off the roof of his house for applying critical thinking in the waning light. I guess he was away on business?
MEALS 4 MEN due
Nice Edition. Bruschetta veggie burger with rocket, garlic and extra virgin olive oil, sliced tomatoes, halloumi cheese on a toasted bun and an ice cold Tennants Lager Beer.
MMM K WEST'S WANK WAREHOUSE ~ YAN
D for Delinquent's Mother Earth, K West, likes the art of self massage... read on...
Everyone knows that being a musician gets you into all the cool parties and easy underwear, but natural talent wets the gusset like nothing else. I used to think that the harmonica was what Bob Dylan used to torture, or what convicts used to sing mournful songs about their past and how they shouldn't of done did what they did. Now I think the harmonica is SEXY. Very few people called Dave are sexy, but this Dave is. I mean, I'd rather take to my bed a beatboxing harmonica bad ass than a cardigan twee pop lover who doesn't/never learnt how to fuck.
Wet Knicker rating: 4/5
Everyone knows that being a musician gets you into all the cool parties and easy underwear, but natural talent wets the gusset like nothing else. I used to think that the harmonica was what Bob Dylan used to torture, or what convicts used to sing mournful songs about their past and how they shouldn't of done did what they did. Now I think the harmonica is SEXY. Very few people called Dave are sexy, but this Dave is. I mean, I'd rather take to my bed a beatboxing harmonica bad ass than a cardigan twee pop lover who doesn't/never learnt how to fuck.
Wet Knicker rating: 4/5
Sunday, 27 January 2013
Thursday, 24 January 2013
I RECOGNISE THAT! OH HEY, AND THAT, AND THAT X EVERYTHING X FOREVER
This is colourful stuff. I recently read a good quote from @OverlyManly - "Colours? You mean those things Gays & Women like?" Which one are you, ya big gay girl?
BEN FROST
BEN FROST
MEALZ 4 MEN uno
D For Delinquent regular Loverman is quite the upcoming Chef. Look out for his cook book, Meals 4 Men 2 F Women, out in time Xmas 2013!
Eurozone Austerity Edition: Pimento stuffed Olives & a Pint can of Tennants Lager Beer.
Wednesday, 23 January 2013
HERE'S AN UPDATE! CLASSIC MISTAKE MADE!
Miercoles 19 Diciembre
Hacienda Malinche, Tlaxcala
“The riot of flowers is incessant”
Start on a high note to cheer myself up. Left the Mexico City hotel to find last night’s empty, smelly, messy streets now reborn as a full-chat mid-morning market. It’s all on display and all swarming over itself and me, cooking smells, street-corner hollering, every imaginable form of knock-off tat, mopeds nipping between the crowds, plenty of police. Best sight was the guy wheeling his trolley heaped 7-feet-plus with bulky cardboard boxes, with his perrito sat observing on top. Got a little lost but got some croissants (3 times the size of their UK cousins) and a clem for M$1. Found a quiet plaza on a side street to eat them shirtless in the roasting sun, on a bench beside an old church. The doors look thick, and the frame’s clearly high enough to ride a horse through. I put the day’s plans together…
1. get un-lost and back to the Zocalo
2. buy a local SIM card
3. contact Mariana and Javier via internet cafe
4. Get to bus station and ticket to Huamantla
…and including getting eggs on toast with side salad & lemonade, took until 6pm. Would love to do Mexico City again, but without the backpack. One strangely fitting musical moment, hearing the Verve’s Bittersweet Symphony blaring out of a passing car stereo.
“It’s not an adventure until something goes wrong”
After seeing the motorway turn-off sign saying Huamantla, I got off the bus two towns too soon, which had Javier roaming Huamantla and Tlaxcala searching for me, all the while giving them updates on which part of Huamantla I believed I was in. Felt like a right useless shit for not checking with the bus driver when I got off it so eagerly. Still, they’re a friendly and welcoming couple, and even reaching Casa Malinche in the dark, it’s something special. An elegant bed & breakfast hewn from the same base material as Sergio Leone movies, crowned by an ornate belltower, in dusty scrubland. The dormant volcano la Malinche broods in the distance.
http://www.casamalinche.com/
Plenty of adorable animals to be introduced to this morning. 1 gato (Che), 2 perros, 2 perritos, and the most entertaining sight: over a dozen chickens, all far smaller and friendlier than the ones I know. They chirp instead of cluck too. Best part of today was having Emiliano (7) and Carolina (5) balance 7 of them on my outstretched arms and head, at least while not chucking them at me, each other, the other pollos or anything going. There’s also 2 other wwoofers in the room next to mine, Li and Chang, a young couple from Taiwan. Dead nice folk, helped me loads in feeding around the meat, and a welcome contrast to locals. I talk with them in English, but moderate it to keep it in the present tense for their benefit.
Spent over half the day on my first job, fitting a pneumatic arm to one hacienda door. Arduous work, and I doubt the end result will work for long, given how flimsy the door frame is, but I fire on with it because Mariana’s sure it needs done and I don´t want to kick up a fuss about my first job here. Still, after two sulks and much careful screwing, it seems to be working and I fit it to the point of easing pressure in the mechanism so the top of the arm won’t rip off the door frame. And then the arm’s pneumatic valve bursts, pissing stinky oil over the door frame, window and floor every time it’s moved. I fought back tears long enough to remove the top half of the arm, explained it to Mariana (who was understanding about it), made a cup of tea and retired, to write my way out of feeling like a right useless shit once again.
Good day tomorrow please! More chickens!
STOOPIDGES MORE LIKE. FERRERO ROCKER.
Sometimes poor 'creative' divvies get in a little paddy and realise everything's been done before and all they can do is sellotape two previously done things together to make a 'new' thing...other times they just get over it have some fun and play covers! Here's a fairly decent Iggy & The Stooges Complilation album:
SNOWDONIA - WHAT WOULD THIS RECORD HAVE SOUNDED LIKE IF JOHN CALE HAD HAD SOME SETBACK & CINZIA LA FAUCI & ALBERTO SCOTTI HAD TAKEN HIS PLACE?
SNOWDONIA - WHAT WOULD THIS RECORD HAVE SOUNDED LIKE IF JOHN CALE HAD HAD SOME SETBACK & CINZIA LA FAUCI & ALBERTO SCOTTI HAD TAKEN HIS PLACE?
Saturday, 19 January 2013
WALTER'S A MAN, A LEGEND & SOMEWHERE ELSE IN THE WORLD.
Martes 18 Diciembre
Habitacion 103, Hotel Tuxpan, Mexico City
Landed in Mexico City at 9:30pm, coming in low enough to the roads to see the faces on the street-side billboards on final approach. Funkadelic still reverberating in my ears, walking along the airport strip and
(as I’m typing this, a possum has snuck in through the hostel window and is hiding behind the computer desk)
buy a lush cup of chai from the airport cafe, chuffed with myself to have understood when she asked if I wanted it caliente or freo. Immediately make the mental note to get another cup of this shit when I’m due to fly out, whilst sorting my bags out. There’s a recommended hostel in the rough guide, so I get a Metro ticket and work it like a boss, reaching the Zocalo and a subsiding street party with dry ski slope, street vendors and Mexicans of all ages milling about. The hostel only takes advance bookings, but I get talking to Sergio outside the cathedral - a Chicano traveller with mixed native American / Maya blood - and after some amiable wandering, he helps me find a hotel. Must be a slow night for the sex trade, got a ground floor cut-and-shut room with mirrors above and facing the bed! M$140. Sergio crashed out on the floor and split early the next morning - he said he’s gonna hit Puebla, then Chiapas and the MesoAmerican ciudads next, so I hope to catch up with him around there. Decent guy. Switched-on and exactly the right person for me to have met at the time.
Just read in the rough guide that the Zocalo (meaning plinth) was built on the heart of Tenochtitlan, and masonry for the original church that preceded the cathedral was sourced from the Aztec temple of Hurtzilopotchtli.
(the possum has left the building)
Last night the smell of the streets and sewers reminded me of the insect house roach smell - not pretty, but honest and I like that. Plants grow out of the upper building walls, and with the buildings generally reaching no higher than four storeys, the whole city feels close to the ground. I remember dusk, take-off from Houston was epic, flat horizon, glaring deep colour in the last of the day, and so many lights on the flat Texas floor. Makes me think that America retains some grandeur, and the promise of a road movie waiting to be lived in the expanses between sizzling bulbs.
Saturday, 12 January 2013
ST NICOLAS CAVE. FERRERO ROCKER
As usual I'm late on realising things are uber cool so here we go, ten years too late...NICK CAVE:
This last one, anyone else well embarrased for him? Hardest thing to do EVER, stand infront of a mic in an empty room and perform like you would full of booze with the rest of the band behind you. Credit where credit is due, he nails it. All like what, 20 year old of him or whatever. Here's some funny and cool stuff Krent Able does with the Cave:
K R E N T * A B L E
So aye, better late than never, he's a dude, wouldn't like to get on the wrong side of him mind.
K R E N T * A B L E
So aye, better late than never, he's a dude, wouldn't like to get on the wrong side of him mind.
THEY HAVEN'T...THEY HAVE! FREDERICK NICHE.
D for Delinquent homeboys Black Jash have been eager/generous enough to upload some brand new recordings on thier soundcloud:
B L A C K * J A S H ~ NEW TUNES!
They may not be playing ANYWHERE live for the forseeable, due to lack of demand, but they've still got their heads down and bums up, recording crap nobody wants to hear! Hats off to the Jash! Keep doing what you're doing boys, eventually the masses will come round. As NWA said 'Fuck crossing over to them, let them cross over to us'. And they will...at some point...might not be today, might not be tomorrow or ever...but hey as long as you're happy.
B L A C K * J A S H ~ NEW TUNES!
They may not be playing ANYWHERE live for the forseeable, due to lack of demand, but they've still got their heads down and bums up, recording crap nobody wants to hear! Hats off to the Jash! Keep doing what you're doing boys, eventually the masses will come round. As NWA said 'Fuck crossing over to them, let them cross over to us'. And they will...at some point...might not be today, might not be tomorrow or ever...but hey as long as you're happy.
ARE WE THERE YET? THE WORLD IS BOWIE MAD.
I've been watching lots of Lost lately. This seems like a good idea to me:
MARS ONE
MARS ONE
IS THIS WHAT THOSE THOUSANDS OF MEDIA STUDIES GRADUATES DO WITH THEIR DEGREES? FERRERO ROCKER.
So pottering around on youtube and subscribing to pages i know i'll regret in a week's time. Came accross this lot:
THE DIAL
In particular their 'Not Punk Sessions' Here's my pick of the best:
Forest Gump always wanted a brother. I know folk with brothers and they don't seem any more functional as adults. Still, would be nice to be these pair, a down scaled Osmands with considerably less talent. Fair play though, they're doing something. From this video alone i can pretty much put money on the fact that me and the drummer would not get on...but hey, the pressure of a camera AND that girl slumped in her chair...who knows, most likely not a fair representation of his personality.
Hi oh! Somebody's seen some footage of John Lydon when he was in the Sex Pistols! Big shout out for playing thier style of music on metal style guitars. So aye these guys, in a band and that, well done.
So it seems each town has a group of Media Studies graduates filming the bands the go and see live on nice cameras a la Be Nice To Your Kids:
B N T Y K
Here's the best of those guys's stuff:
Good for them. Everyone's getting thier itch scratched. More please.
THE DIAL
In particular their 'Not Punk Sessions' Here's my pick of the best:
So it seems each town has a group of Media Studies graduates filming the bands the go and see live on nice cameras a la Be Nice To Your Kids:
B N T Y K
Here's the best of those guys's stuff:
THE AMAZING SNAKEHEADS By ROGER FROM THE CRYPT.
Third wheel. Been there manys a time. Not out of choice. This is ONE of the main problems i have with this lot. I'm actually a big fan of this three pieces. But these guys...They're a drum & bass band with some sort of addict dragging them down rape alley. If they'd somehow secured Jack White or Bryan Ferry this would be something a real reviewer would write about. But no. Drum & Bass have stuck with this guy...And he sings from his throat. Credit where credit's due, he doesn't play a lot of his throat/guitar over his foot up friends. Sad thing is these two rythmn radicals think he makes it. For THEIR comitment to a friend THEE Amazing Snakeheads get a high 4/5.
THE AMAZING SNAKEHEADS
THE AMAZING SNAKEHEADS
Chelsea Wolfe by ROGER FROM THE CRYPT.
Jeezalou! Attention seeking goth girl? Is that possible?..Course it is, what am i saying? That's the point in them isn't it? What is it with pronounciation? I can sing AND you can understand what i'm saying, just like my Dad told me to. Are they too feared to say what they want? Don't they understand that 99% of idiots listening to them will never have the balls to do anything more than giggle into a microphone or is the content of thier lyrics THAT embarrasing? Is this black haired bumhead alergic to major/happy chords & notes? Why the pale face Mme Frankenstein? She's less whiny than the average goff & i imagine we'd have a whirlwind romance after a night of blood drinking in the grave yard so...Chelsea Wolfe gets a 5/5
Take A Worm For A Walk Week R.I.P. by ROGER FROM THE CRYPT.
Ha! Krate Kid. Wasn't it great!? Imagine you were an able minded, well read, educated cinema fan when it first came out. Like these guys will never be. Singers are hard to get right...If you can't find a good one...settle for a vocal alcoholic. As the river, so the town T.A.W.F.A.W.W. get a lovely 5/5
Chud R.I.P. by ROGER FROM THE CRYPT.
I'm in a band, just like everybody else, but thank Christ I'm not in this one! They're docile Americans on the crest of some wave that i can neither be fucked nor arsed with. And news just in, they've just split up. Thank Christ! From what I've found on YouTube & Vimeo they seem to have been quite fashion. To their detriment. I would like them if they were wearing fleeces & baggy jeans but sadly no. It's check shirts all round. For shame. These wankers use effect peddles & a more than competent drumming to vomit out left field riff rock. Hold up. Here's the hook. It's quite obvious that these guys...smoke weed! Not only are they mad crazy laugh riot el dude stone heads, I think they drink alcohol & energy drinks at the same time! I think the singer injected a few joints before he recorded the vocals because he's alllike crazy & shouty. I don't know what he's saying, probably something about the munchies. Anyway, things to see & hate, things to do & hate. Imma give Chud 4/5.
Crushed Beaks and Palma Violets - Retro style and Retro Sound by JACKSON BOLLOCK.
So since the music press have finished their end of year retrospectives it's now time to look ahead and deicide who could be 'the sound' of 2013?
Previous industry tips have sometimes succeeded, blowing people out of the water before going on to super-stardom. Some impress in glimpses, maybe having a wonderful first album before taking one musical direction change too far or not progressing far enough. I have many bands which I love(d) who have fallen into one of those categories the most recent being The Vaccines (poor 2nd album.. makes me sad..it really does). But enough of my tearful reminiscent, the future is here!!! Or rather, the past has returned, repackaged in shiny new boxes in the shape of two bands tipped to make a big splash in 2013.
First up is Crushed Breaks, never heard of them? Why not read this, it's from a proper music journalist:
High praise indeed, you can find the songs "Breakdown", "Grim", "Close Up's" and "Sun Dog's" on the ol' YouTube and it's a mixed bag in my opinion:
Where some of the songs have a haunted and soulful quality to them, it sounds too much like a Cold Water Kids style band who went to an English public school and first experienced heartbreak when the families prize gun dog was shot by the eccentric Uncle on mid-summer's evening. When they cut loose (like the final part of "Breakdown" and last year's single "Grim") it has that sound that all the shit indie bands you watched at your local boozer wish they had. Tuneful yet aggressive, with only the fairground organ in the background enabling the songs to stay this side of chirpy.
But is it really anything we haven't heard before? Is it pushing the boundaries far enough? Well for this self-important, avant-garde, Guardian reading ponce....no...not quite. They have been touring and getting notoriety since 2011, but expect a push this year and maybe a new EP.
Moving on to the second band, now you most certainly have heard of Palma Violets... You have? Good.. cos their album '180' is set for a February release and will be bummed the fuck out of by Radio 1 and the NME. Since I stopped reading that shower of shit (when they started featuring Will.i.am and just generally being Smash Hits for indie girls and boys.. When was that?? Oh about 5 years ago..NME rant over) I was surprised to read that Palma Violets song "Best of Friends" had been voted as NME's song of 2012. The BBC put them on their 'sound of 2013' list blah blah fucking blah.
So, ahem, onto the music... I am just going to concentrate on perhaps their two most prominent songs, the aforementioned 'Best of Friends' and new(er) song 'Last of the Summer Wine' and no, that song isn't sampling of old people chasing baths down hills or whatever the fuck used to happen on that show.
'Best Friends' is prob where they first gained the Libertines comparisons as it sounds JUST LIKE THEM. Which isn't holding up Mr Barrett and the well known drug hoover to be original musical genuineness 'cause they weren't. The Who or The Buzzcocks songs played through a drunk guitar does not a modern classic make.
I know lot's of people enjoyed 'Best of Friends' so I gave it a couple of listens, it was dull and had a shouty chorus which I am sure sounds good live but at home just hurt my ears. Hardly ground breaking, maybe a bit fun to shout when your drunk but that's about it.
They'll be big in 2013...and hopefully the album will show they have more depth than the pissy (sorry, shallow) end of the local swimming pool. The End.
Previous industry tips have sometimes succeeded, blowing people out of the water before going on to super-stardom. Some impress in glimpses, maybe having a wonderful first album before taking one musical direction change too far or not progressing far enough. I have many bands which I love(d) who have fallen into one of those categories the most recent being The Vaccines (poor 2nd album.. makes me sad..it really does). But enough of my tearful reminiscent, the future is here!!! Or rather, the past has returned, repackaged in shiny new boxes in the shape of two bands tipped to make a big splash in 2013.
First up is Crushed Breaks, never heard of them? Why not read this, it's from a proper music journalist:
'The London duo appear to have nailed a way of creating an all-consuming mass of noise, rhythm and melody which somehow belies their stripped back set up. With a sizeable clutch of winning, gristly pop songs...Crushed Beaks are ones you should most definitely be watching.''
Jon Hillcock, Clash Magazine
Where some of the songs have a haunted and soulful quality to them, it sounds too much like a Cold Water Kids style band who went to an English public school and first experienced heartbreak when the families prize gun dog was shot by the eccentric Uncle on mid-summer's evening. When they cut loose (like the final part of "Breakdown" and last year's single "Grim") it has that sound that all the shit indie bands you watched at your local boozer wish they had. Tuneful yet aggressive, with only the fairground organ in the background enabling the songs to stay this side of chirpy.
But is it really anything we haven't heard before? Is it pushing the boundaries far enough? Well for this self-important, avant-garde, Guardian reading ponce....no...not quite. They have been touring and getting notoriety since 2011, but expect a push this year and maybe a new EP.
Moving on to the second band, now you most certainly have heard of Palma Violets... You have? Good.. cos their album '180' is set for a February release and will be bummed the fuck out of by Radio 1 and the NME. Since I stopped reading that shower of shit (when they started featuring Will.i.am and just generally being Smash Hits for indie girls and boys.. When was that?? Oh about 5 years ago..NME rant over) I was surprised to read that Palma Violets song "Best of Friends" had been voted as NME's song of 2012. The BBC put them on their 'sound of 2013' list blah blah fucking blah.
So, ahem, onto the music... I am just going to concentrate on perhaps their two most prominent songs, the aforementioned 'Best of Friends' and new(er) song 'Last of the Summer Wine' and no, that song isn't sampling of old people chasing baths down hills or whatever the fuck used to happen on that show.
'Best Friends' is prob where they first gained the Libertines comparisons as it sounds JUST LIKE THEM. Which isn't holding up Mr Barrett and the well known drug hoover to be original musical genuineness 'cause they weren't. The Who or The Buzzcocks songs played through a drunk guitar does not a modern classic make.
I know lot's of people enjoyed 'Best of Friends' so I gave it a couple of listens, it was dull and had a shouty chorus which I am sure sounds good live but at home just hurt my ears. Hardly ground breaking, maybe a bit fun to shout when your drunk but that's about it.
Next 'Last of the Summer Wine'..... and it's title is very apt, it's slow, a bit painful and ultimately worthless... just how I imagine my elderly years will be. At least I'll be deaf then so I won't have to listen to bands like Palmo Violets... re-packaged, UK, paint by numbers rock music.
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