Severe Jam Damage

‘I hold your last breath in my hand…’

The music wavers, cuts out and then begins again. The machine tries to catch up with itself, spinning magnetic tape in a frenzy. Finally the fight ends. Machine and tape surrender. The cassette snaps, the machine grinds to a halt.

‘Dammit’

Suzy pulls herself from her pit, leans a silver clad hand across and pulls the ribbons of tape from her broken stereo. She’d had that tape for years. Never bothered to get it on CD, hell, had never SEEN it on CD anywhere. It was a bootleg. Suzy had listened to it so many times she knew every note, every breath, every hiss and crackle.

She slammed her hand on the stereo, angry and pissed off. Inside something went clunk and it made a slight noise, like a sigh or whisper.

The tape was in shreds, it had snapped in a couple of different places, and the stereo -ornery thing that it was- had twisted the free strands into tangles and knots.

Suzy shrieked and threw herself back onto the bed, pulling a pillow over her face and shouting. Anything to block out the silence.

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Inspired by Abandoned by Flickr user Dark Tranquility. Not sure who else is in this week but check out the usual suspects: The Gurrier, Chris, Linus, Tadmack, LittleGoat and Aquafortis.

Myself and Miz D ended up in the Mez last Wednesday night. I had met her after work and given the fact that both of us work in companies and have roles that require formal dress we were both still in our work gear. (ie, skirts and blouses.) At the door I was stopped and the gorilla asked to look in my bag.
‘What is it you’re looking for?’ I asked.
‘Bottles’ says he, ‘Have you got any?’
‘Eh, no’ I replied.
Now this is a first for me. I’ve been stopped before of course, for years I couldn’t get into places without ID, and there has always been the issue of doormen stopping to see just how drunk you are. But I’ve never been asked for a bag search for ‘bottles’. Not unless I was going into gigs and then it was mainly in Canada where they frisked you as well.

So what kind of place searches ladies handbags for ‘bottles’? What kind of place expects people to be sneaking in their own drink?

Is it the kind of place that overcharges for drink? The kind of place that short changes the customers perhaps?
(I ordered a bottle of Heineken and a gin and tonic and was charged 11 quid, but the barman only handed me back change of 6 from a 20.)

The Mezz, not going on my list of cool hangout spots in Dublin.

Picked this up on Saturday, but I’m not going to bore you with a review of it as Jim Carroll did a much better job over on The Ticket.

I almost lived with Jim once, years ago. I was looking for a new place to live and so was he. A mutual friend put us in touch. We had a few discussions about getting a place big enough that would be able to house both of our music collections and libraries but Jim found a place soon after and I met Mrs H and moved into Smithfield.

Anyway go read it, in addition to upping the band, he has a good (or bad) take on the state of the Irish music scene that is worth reading.

On Friday myself, Priscilla, the Barfly and The Philosopher went to see ‘Children of Men’ in the Savoy. It was very quiet for a Friday night, and we noticed as we waited for the patrons of the early show to leave that many of them looked rather glum.
‘Looks like a winner’ I remarked.
‘Yeah, guessing it’s not a good date movie’ said Priscilla through a mouthful of popcorn. My popcorn. I was starving and had no food after leaving work, so the popcorn was my dinner, but that didn’t stop the other three from helping themselves. By the time we got into our seats my bucket of popcorn was almost empty.

Caution: There may be spoilers ahead.

The movie begins with a bang, literally. The world is in turmoil, there are no childen and many of the countries of the world have fallen to chaos and barbarism. Only Britain stands firm with any level of civilisation. But even that is rocked when the death of Baby Diego, the youngest man on the planet is announced. In a clear satire of the death of Princess Di, Clive Owens character ‘Theo’ walks numbly through a London frozen in grief. On his way to work one morning a coffee shop he has just passed is bombed, a woman exits from the wreckage screaming, carrying her own arm. Theo just looks at her and walks on. On arrival at work, he immediately heads to his boss’ office and requests the day off as he has ‘been more affected by Baby Diego’s death’ than he thought.

So begins a tale of a future dystopic England where immigrants (ie. Non-English) are rounded up and shipped off to an Abu Ghraib-like detention centre, where Homeland Security watches everything and everyone and the government hand out a suicide drug called ‘Quietus’ (‘Quiet Us’) to every adult for use when they can’t cope anymore.

Enter ‘Kee’ a young foul-mouthed angry ‘Fugee who needs to get to the coast. Kee has a secret.

She’s pregnant.

The first pregnant woman in 18 years. It is never explained why the human race cannot have children anymore. The characters in the film don’t know themselves. Early on a hippified Michael Caine (‘Jasper’) explains to Theo that no-one knows why women can’t concieve. Which I find interesting as it vaguely puts the blame on women for the whole thing. We are told that there was a flu pandemic around about 2008 that killed a lot of children and then somewhere around 2009 women began to miscarry at an alarming rate.

Clive Owen plays a man going through the motions in a world with no future, Julianne Moore (Julian) is his ex-wife, now a wanted terrorist and leader of the FISH. (It’s never explained what FISH stands for – or at least if it was I missed it over the noise of crunching popcorn.)

There are a number of shocking moments in the movie and the violence is dark and gritty. I would imagine the body count gives any Schwarzenegger movie a run for it’s money. Mixed in with this are a few rare moments of humour. A fight between Theo and Julian on the top deck of an empty bus results in Theo’s parting shot ‘Oh, that’s right,just walk away as you always do’ Julian looks at him, vaguely puzzled from the top of the stairs ‘This is our stop.’

The director has an eye for the subtle and absurd. (Watch for the Pink Floyd pig floating over the Battersea Power station) The first sight of the Bexhill internment camp recalls those now-infamous images of the detainees in Abu Ghraib. Definitely not a date movie. There is one point where things take a decidedly sentimental turn, however it doesn’t last long and the atmosphere is broken with the explosion of one well aimed bomb. Afterwards the boys said they could have done without that bit, but I think that was just boy-talk as they immediately segued into talk of body parts.

The cinematography is stark and involves a lot of hand-held work, following Theo and Julian as they race through the countryside. In one shot a bomb results in the camera lens getting splashed in someone’s blood, the camera never moves from Theo’s side and the blood remains on the lens.

A thumbs up from me, and a general grunt of assent from the boys. (‘It’d be better without the sentimental shit’) A British film, with a Mexican director that makes a nice change from the normal Hollywood schlock of ‘one man with great teeth saving the world.’

‘In sickness and in health.’

Those were the vows she took. Spoken a million times before in a thousand different languages by doe-eyed young women and men. She hadn’t taken it seriously then. Just more words in a ceremony that was growing old and stale.

‘In Sickness…’

‘Does this count?’ She wondered. ‘How ill must I be?’

He’d left her with squalling babies, dirty laundry in a steam filled kitchen on a rainy day. More words, this time a different kind of ceremony.

‘It’s not you, it’s me.’
‘I want us to stay friends’

Walking out he hadn’t looked back. Hadn’t kissed the kids goodbye.

‘Sickness…’

The voices echoed round the chamber. Echoed round her mind. The doctors said she had a good chance of recovery. Better than average they said. But the lies shot like arrows from their eyes and their tools continued to tunnel through her flesh.

The kids were grown now. Moved away and making their own ceremonies, speaking their own words. They weren’t the only ones. She too, had her own ceremonies. Sacraments and rites unshared.

‘Sick’

The damp cloth on her head, wrapped round her eyes, felt briefly cool. It didn’t help. Nothing would.
‘A placebo effect’ said the medics. She didn’t care. These small things she did, this faith. It would not see her through. No matter.

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Inspired by we can rebuild you by Flckr user Lauren.rabbit. Hmm, don’t know what that’s about or where it came from. Check out the usual suspects: The Gurrier, Chris, Linus, Tadmack, LittleGoat and Aquafortis.

It’s a funny thing when you start a new job. Well perhaps not ‘funny haha’, or, come to think of it ‘funny strange’ either. It’s a normal thing I guess that when someone new starts in a job the co-workers spend much of the first week trying to figure out what you’ve done previous, where you’ve come from and HOW OLD YOU ARE.

The last couple of weeks I have been dodging as many of these personal type questions as possible. Not because I’m some sort of privacy freak - although I can sometimes tend towards that – but rather because being asked personal questions when sitting at a table of about eight people makes me feel very uncomfortable. It’s the shyness thing see. Having a whole pile of eyes staring at me waiting for an answer to what would in a one on one situation be a perfectly natural question makes me feel ill at ease. I stutter, turn red, and speak into my hair.

So at the moment the current bunch of workmates don’t know anything more than the fact that I work in ‘X’ company and I’m in this office for ‘Y’ project. Occasionally they make reference to my accent (which appears to have returned in all it’s drawling glory.) I can see them analysing my answers and trying to figure out just how old I am. I am supposed to be managing a section of this project y’see and I get the feeling they all think I am much younger than they are. (Goat’s blood and yak milk baths = eternal youth)

So anyway I get the whole, ‘whats the new girl like?’ vibe that’s going round. I just don’t necessarily want to be put in the position of answering questions in front of a lot of people. Invariably there is one loud-mouth who picks up on something you may mention and then won’t shut up about it, ever. You could meet this person on the street twenty years from now and they would still remember that one tiny little thing you said.

Whether it’s new schools or new workplace I’ve been the ‘new girl’ so many times. It’s not that I’m ignorant (although some would say that) or that I’m a bitch (and a lot would say that) its quite simply that I hate the sound of my own voice talking about myself (unless I’m drunk in which case I am the most fabulous person you will EVER meet and you should get down on your knees and be thankful I let you into my inner circle of friends.)

For the moment though, let’s take it slow ok? Nothing personal like.

The plan was to meet in the Harbourmaster in the IFSC. On a Thursday night. I can hear you laughing already. I was the first there and it took me twenty minutes to order a heineken. Twenty minutes of standing at the bar and trying to catch ANY of the six staff working there. They were so intent on getting the orders out for the people eating food that they ignored the people in the bar. The harbourmaster is a bit of a shithole. And not what I think of as those good types of shitholes. The old man style pubs like keogh’s or neary’s where you can go and have a nice pint and where the barstaff can handle serving more than one person at a time. Harbourmaster is full of officious suits and ten grand specials who bray like donkeys instead of laughing and drink pints of Stella cos they can pretend to be Marlon Brando when ordering. I hate places like that.

The Barfly and Priscilla eventually showed up, neither of them bothered to even try their luck at the bar and we headed directly across to the Speigeltent. For some reason I always thought that ‘Speigel’ meant ‘Play’ but I think I’m getting my German mixed up. Anyway apparently the tent is so called because of the mirrors that line the wall. They had a bar which was open and serving bottles of German beer. I can’t remember what it was called but it was one of those half litre bottles so I looked QUIITE classy sitting there with my massive bottle of beer while around me ladies in feathers and satin sat sipping glasses of red wine. They were also serving Hoegaarden in those huge glasses, Mrs B said there were a few people at the bar who ordered rounds of these and then had to ferry back and forth as they couldn’t get their hands around three at a time.

It was all very Moulin Rouge. Girls with painted faces, feathered fans, cinched waists and stiletto heels, and boys in berets sprinkled through those of us in the audience who hadn’t dressed up. On stage ‘Heidi Hoopla from Sweden’ through herself through hoops literally as she rolled around the stage keeping hula hoops spinning round various parts of her body. A girl whose name I cannot remember did a fan dance. The Compere ‘Dusty Limits’ sang us a filthy version of the Phantoms ‘Music of the Night’ and then something went horribly wrong. No one is quite sure what happened but it was quite obvious there were problems backstage as the compere was stretching out his time on stage while waiting for the next act. ‘The Extraordinnaires’ (sp) came out and did some old style motown music. They were pretty good and got the audience going, up dancing and singing. Dusty Limits introduced the Usherettes who traipsed up on stage in corsets and suspenders at which point Priscilla grinned and said ‘That’s grand, women in underwear, I’m a happy man now.’ After that there were Can-Can dancers and ‘Lord XP’ the only male burlesque in the show. Of course I was at the bar so missed his act, although Mrs. B assures me he tore off his trousers to reveal well, not much of anything at all. As it was the Club’s 3rd birthday the show ended Miss Lily White who was covered in balloons and popped her way across the stage.

It was a good show, something different, funny and entertaining. However while the Spiegleltent was a unique venue I’d like to see them somewhere that they didn’t have to cut the show short. The Orb were playing at 10 o’clock so in addition to whatever had happened backstage you got the feeling that the show had been truncated to fit into just an hour and a half (with a fifteen minute intermission.)

Tassel Club are back in Dublin in December at the Sugar Club, if you are after something different I’d recommend it.

*Photo from www.thetasselclub.com

Each day he stood there, looking, trying to see it. Nothing emerged from the canvas. A vast blankness confronted him, mocked him. His tools lay unused. Tubes of paint, like overfed caterpillars sat on a small table, the seal round their cap unbroken. Beside them, a pile of brushes their sable tips as fine and glossy as the day he had bought them.

Still the canvas remained empty.

In his mind he could see Her. The soft curve of her cheek, the tiny wrinkles around her eyes. He had tried to capture it, but every time he stepped into this room he could go no further. His vision was becoming dimmer, each day a small part of her flaked away, soon he would be left with nothing. No memory of her face, no painting in his mind.

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Inspired by untitled bu Flckr user Tangent. That’s it. That’s all I got. Nano is going to be painful this year. If you want to see what other more talented folks might have gotten out of this you can check out the usual suspects: The Gurrier, Tea and Cakes, Chris, Linus, Tadmack, LittleGoat and Aquafortis.

Lisa Gerrard and Patrick Cassidy

I’ve been listening to this on and off over the weekend. Lisa Gerrard - the female half of Dead Can Dance and composer of the soundtracks to Gladiator (with Hans Zimmer) and ‘The Insider’ (with Pieter Bourke) – has teamed up this time with Irish composer Patrick Cassidy to bring us ‘Immortal Memory’. Similar in theme to her previous work, this has the added bonus of hearing Gerrard actually singing words. Granted those words are sung in Old Irish and Aramaic but still, they are (almost) recognisable words. Then again if you are buying a Lisa Gerrard album you aren’t really there for the lyrics rather, the Voice. Which still manages to astound and surprise. At times you could be mistaken for thinking that no human could make that sound, it must be an oboe or a cello. For instance I had to listen to the second track ‘Maranatha’ (Aramaic for ‘Come Lord’) three times before I realised that she is actually chanting deep underneath and has overlaid this with another lament – the second melody sung in her signature ‘melismatic’ style. ‘Amergin’s Invocation’ builds on ‘Maranatha’ and listening to it one can easily imagine the Milesians marching to war with the Tuatha De Danann.

This is quite a specialised album and it’s not going to be up everyone’s street. Me, I’d buy an album of Lisa Gerrard singing the phone book. Given the lack of recognisable lyrics on her previous albums I quite possibly already have. But this is good listening for those nights when it is 4 in the morning and you can’t sleep. Put it on the stereo on low, close your eyes and get lost in the heart of it.

For those who don’t know - or haven’t figured it out from the waffling I do on this blog – I tend to keep a notebook with me all of the time. This is why I can be seen scribbling nonsensical rubbish while waiting in the pub, on the bus, sitting in the park, etc. (Of course it gets cleaned up and ordered before I post it here… yeah.)

At the moment I’m on the last few pages of a small black A6 size notebook. I look through it and it’s full of snippets of thoughts, opening lines, overheard conversations and tail-ends of dreams that I can vaguely remember. Some of those snippets will become entries here, some may form the basis for a short story or three and others won’t inspire anything at all.

My little notebook is the perfect size to throw in my handbag. It’s as the same length as a biro which means I can clip my pen inside without worrying about it leaking all over my bag, wallet or hands – the notebook will soak up all the drips (I always manage to lose the lids.) But as I mentioned I’m on the last few pages of my current one, which means that I’ll soon be using my new notebook. The Gin Lady and the Gurrier picked it up somewhere in Sweden (or maybe Norway) for me and it’s got a pretty funky cover and this cool marker that has a couple of magnets inside and clips on whatever page I’ve finished up on. The notebook has lots of lovely clean pages. I have a bit of a thing about stationery, I can spend hours wandering around looking for the perfect pen, or the perfect notebook. I’m not as bad as C-Bear though who has a positive fetish about such things, but I do have the ability to while away some time in the basement of Easons.

Ok, I realise the marker is probably of more use as a bookmark, but for the moment it’ll do for use in my fab new notebook.