six videos

heya

so yes, indeed, i have watched another 6 videos (discs), look you see. actually have more than a few that i very much wish to watch soon, but figured rather than doing yet another "mega" post it would be best, if not preferable, to throw assorted musings about them thus far at the internet. and why not.

no, of course i don't particularly feel like my views on films, or anything, are "oooh, listen to me, i know my stuff" in terms of value. we are, however, all here now, so might as well make the best of it. indeed, as you shall note from the below picture, there was (considerably) more Russell Crowe than i had realistically (ever) intended to watch. 

how, overall, were the six (6) films? just realised that's a fairly pointless question to have posed, as they are somewhat different (if not wildly so) in style. none of them was particularly "oh wow, this is quite class", one was "erm" and just the further one (1) was complete sh!t. but, well, moving on. that is moving on but with an obligatory ** POSSIBLE SPOILERS AHEAD ** warning. 

i actually can't recall the provenance of my copy of the video (disc) of The Nice Guys, which is indeed a film people have been urging me to watch for several years now. likely i got it down the market as part of the "3 for £2" selection, although i really rather suspect it was off of a charity shop, where it might or may well have been 3 (or 4) for £1. does it matter? 

quite likely the "best" of the ones i have watched of late, which is something of an ominous sign. i mean i could see why so many people thought it was good (great, in fact) and i kind of did enjoy it. there was, however, the distraction of this being very much a Shane Black film, and one which was extremely similar to another Shane Black film, the (vastly) superior Kiss Kiss Bang Bang. as good as Russell Crowe and Ryan Gosling are they are not Val Kilmer and Robert Downey jnr good, at least not so far as they were in that one from, i think, 2005. 

the "similar but different" plot and characters meant i often lost focus, to tell the truth. it isn't always bad to rehash something that worked, but if you are going to do that then you have to be really, really careful not to let the audience for the new one think of just how much better the original spin on it all was. on the one side it was, for an example, a bit "oh" when one clocked that Joaquin Phoenix's oscar winning turn in Joker was effectively him rehashing the character he played in You Were Never Really Here from a year or so before, but then Joker was a vastly superior film. i really rather suspect (or think) Nice Guys started off as an idea for a (much wished for) sequel to Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, or at least as another film Shane Black could make with Val and Robert. so then yes, i get why for a decade or so people have been saying they should have made a sequel to this one too. 

for some reason i think i have actually watched Vault Of Horror within the last ten (10) years, give or take, as some of it was vaguely familiar. yet much of it was not. possibly because i can remember seeing the exact trailer for Cannibal Holocaust that is on this disc and being as surprised (again) that so much of what made the film infamous (and an easy thing for the censors to ban) was on display. provenance is my preferred video (disc) market stall, i believe i paid £2 for it.

anyway, as for this film itself, it is one of those "anthology" things which was peculiarly popular for horror stuff in the 70s. suppose it kind of  has been revived, what with the V/H/S films doing pretty much the same job. this one follows the generic pattern of several similar anthology horror films from the 70s, which is a group of apparent strangers are by chance drawn together and share some macabre story. 

each of the stories (i think five in total) are quite punchy short, being some ten to fifteen minutes in length. as in they were clearly an interesting story but not, alas, of enough substance or interest to turn into either a full tilt film or a 30 to 45 minute tv episode. not that, from what i recall, something like Tales Of The Unexpected was on the go when this one was made. 

but is it any good? kind of. easily the best of the stories is the one what has Curt Jurgens in it as a magician seeking out new (exotic) tricks. probably the main draw is that it has Tom Baker not being Dr Who in it, and his section is a reasonably decent spin on The Portrait Of Dorian Gray or what it was called by him what was dead clever with words. no, i have no idea what "extra" is on the disc, for it brags that it is "complete and uncut". i did not see anything (certainly no nudies) which struck me as something the censors would get in a fettle about. anyway, it holds interest whilst watching, but isn't a film anyone is going to argue as being a great or all time classic. 

it's close on a quarter of a century (!) that Master And Commander The Far Side Of The World has existed as a thing. at no point whatsoever in all that time have i had the slightest interest in seeing it. then a colleague (actually a good friend) exhausted quite some time explaining how good it was. not long after that i saw it on offer in a charity shop for all of 25p, so went yeah, why not. 

plot wise it's a fairly interesting thing, for despite the huge, massive scope of the move the story itself is quite small and basic. a hopelessly outsized and outgunned British ship has to take on a bigger, more better armed French one. think the last space battle off of Star Trek II The Wrath Of Khan spread out over 2 (or so) hours. 

technically the film is flawless. as one might (reasonably) expect from Peter Weir this is cinematography and pacing perfection. the same, too, is true of a superb cast, with Paul Bettany in particular being superb. yes, "the Crowe" is quite good too. it's just got that odd thing going on where it's not exactly great or enthralling, yet somehow retains interest to keep watching. everything about it feels like one of them films they frequently repeat on television and when you switch it on you find yourself stuck watching it, even though you are telling yourself no. 

you all saw the spoiler warning, yeah? for me it (more or less) fell apart with the first bit of the ending. and do not read the rest of this paragraph if you haven't seen it yet intend to. i am not sure which was the least plausible to accept - that they just happened to have all the paint and signwriters on board required to "disguise" the ship, or that the French (even by their standards) would not recognise the ship that they had recently put all them cannonball holes in. that said, though, the "twist" in the second part of the ending was brilliant, and perhaps it is that end note why people left it thinking it was a really decent film. a review i read after said that the film was "basically showing someone (Crowe) who was very good at his job", which is spot on. but also a bit like going and seeing The Empire Strikes Back and being blown away by how excellent a business administrator Lobot was. 

unlikely that i have watched The Beastmaster since, in a surprising move, Dad took me and Richard to see it in, what, 1983 or 1984 or around then. surprising or unexpected, as Dad really never has been keen on the cinema, and neither i nor my brother can recall ever expressing a wish to see this one. oh well, off we went, and whereas i could not for the life of me remember much about the film, i of course have come to hold fond memories of time with father and brother. 

certainly i do not remember the really, really excellent bits from this version, the "director's cut". what we got taken to see at the cinema (probably the Odeon) was an edited "PG" family friendly version of it. this one has two scenes of nudies, with one of them being full tilt too, if you don't blink, and some slightly more graphic violence on the go. of particular interest in the nudies scenes was the very agreeable topless scene of Tanya Roberts, who(m) went on to be in A View To A Kill. quite poor (and mean) of the film distributor and the BBFC to have colluded and denied us such a magical moment in cinema for a few years, if not decades. no, i wasn't all excited (or as excited) as that "yes yes yes this is excellent, brilliant, class, woo hoo" moment with Deborah Shelton out of Body Double (and, i think, Dallas) when i for some reason watched Circuitry Man II, but still. 

not a very good film, if we are honest. mostly (or for the most part) it's a rip-off (or "homage") to the eternally excellent Conan The Barbarian, with a quite similar but toned down plot idea. Rip Torn turns up in it as a kind of quasi-sh!t version of Jame Earl Jones, and a very ripped (muscular) Marc Singer, who(m) would go on to be class in V, is the titular Beastmaster. which means he can control a hawk or similar bird, a tiger painted to look like a panther and a couple of ferrets. whilst it was very pleasant to have this on the tele one Sunday afternoon as summer gave way to autumn i really don't think this is one i shall watch again. nor, for that matter, will i go looking for the sequels. or sequel if they only did the one for it.  

teenage me (moi) would be very pleased to know that fifty something me is still watching Schwarzenegger films on an, all things being relative, about frequent basis. however, teenage me might be somewhat disappointed that, outside of the eternal excellence of Commando, i am not inclined to think they are the greatest things to ever be things. 

much like Terminator 2 (see above link) there's been all sorts on that "internet" thing saying how "brilliant" (etc) True Lies was or is, all in celebration of some random number anniversary of it. could only half remember it, had picked up a copy down the market (pretty sure as one of 3 for £2) some time ago and decided to give it a go again. 

actually what prompted me to watch it again was when i found out, by chance that i had a "rare" yet now obsolete copy of the film. this "first pressing" of it, with "widescreen" in the red banner at the top, features the uncut version of it and not the one what the BBFC ordered edits to before it was certified for release. as far as i am aware the new blu ray / "uhd" video (disc) is entirely uncut too, but still, something of a nice novelty factor to having this. from what i can work out the "cut" bits were (and again you have had a spoiler warning) when Arnie bashes the heads of two (2) dogs together to stop them shredding him, and then when he absolutely (totes) knacks someone in a bathroom. 

it's not really a case of "they could not make this film now" as it very much is one of "how they hell did they get away with this at the time, and why was it praised". some will accuse me of being "woke", whatever that is, here, but this comedy is really disturbing, along the lines of Revenge Of The Nerds looking back and going "no, hang on". you get told in this film, for instance, that Art Malik is obviously the bad guy as he strikes a woman, but Arnold Schwarzenegger is obviously the good guy since he only uses an entire secret government facility to psychologically torture his wife and then makes her go do a striptease for a stranger. mindful of it being, what 1994 or thereabouts, the world was short of "traditional" villains, but i am not sure making angry Muslim terrorists look like a bunch of bumbling idiots was all that good an idea with regards to international relations. 

didn't really expect to reference A View To A Kill twice (or two times) in this post, but also True Lies features some "sloppy" work. as in, like with Sir Roger's stunt double in his last outing, you are clearly and painfully aware that you are spending a disproportionate amount of time watching Arnie's stunt double instead of actual Arnie. 

like with Terminator 2 (see the link for Commando) i simply don't "get" the idea that True Lies somehow had mind-blowing, brilliant, "best ever" (at least at the time) action sequences. to give them (the makers and/or distributors) their own comparison, well, it was announced that True Lies was "the American answer to James Bond, only better". other than "the American James Bond" probably being more correctly seen as Jack Ryan, as good as the scenes in True Lies were they were nowhere near as good as the set pieces in Goldeneye, which was the first James Bond, you must remember, to have that right proper nancy boy play the part. 

yet there was some good (great) moments rewatchings this. i had avoided watching again because i for some reason thought the bits with Bill Paxton were awful and drawn out. not at all, he is comedy gold in it, an absolutely brilliant performance. same is true of Tom Arnold as the (somewhat) unlikely partner of Arnie. not sure what happened to him, probably some scandal. as for Jamie Lee Curtis, well, as superb as ever, but very dubious if not questionable character. 

here, with the final video (disc) of this post, is a really important lesson for any film maker types who(m) for some reason are reading this. unless you are damned (as in f*****g) certain that you have just made a film that would have made Kubrick, Scorsese and Spielberg say "wow, now we can see where we went wrong with our lesser films", do not give your film a title that provides an easy stick to beat you with. if you are going to call a film Suck, then, best you make sure it does not suck. they did not make sure of this. 

when i picked this one up at the market (£2) i was almost certain it would be rubbish. however, i asked Spiros about it, since he is a significant Alice Cooper fan (he is in it), and he said it's probably not as bad as you might think. so i watched it, and yeah, it really was as bad as i expected. 

plot wise and it's something or other about a quite bad rock band getting the gimmick of becoming vampires. it really, really does not get any better than that at all. not even by accident. oddly, they could have had one redeeming scene, for that tw@t Moby is in it, playing some obnoxious type of character. had they given him a gruesome, on screen death that would have been rather satisfactory viewing, but no they kill him off screen. not like the awful Collision Course, then, which was awful but also excellent just for that bit when Jay Leno gets his f*****g face smashed in. 

the plot is flimsy, the main cast is awful, most of the cameos by rock stars are just them standing around in a self-knowing way, no nudies i could recall, the jokes aren't funny, the limited violence and gestures of gore are dull, there's no scary bits and certainly nothing to cause a fright or squirm. pretty much avoid this one at all costs, except for the slight curiosity of Malcolm McDowell playing what could be considered a "good guy" rather than the usual villain or anti-hero. for those interested, here you go, a link to the bits of Collision Course with Jay Leno getting twatted one. 

 

as ever, absolutely no idea (at all) if any of this is of use, or interest, to anyone on the other side of the screen, but thanks all the same for reading. undoubtedly some staunch defenders of it will take to disagreement with me on True Lies, but such discourse is always polite and constructive on the internet. 

be excellent to each other!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

unexpected statue

hello there

every year for the last few years i have, i think, managed to get at least one (1) post on here concerning a football (or if you will soccer, look you see) related statue. it would seem, alas, that this year no such thing shall happen. no more do i travel all that extensively for verk concerns. likely i could if i wished, but my rather well documented medical exploits have me of a mind to remain close to home. just in case, as it were, or as you would. or might. 

merrily, though, my travels took me more or less directly to a statue of significance. no, it is not a football related one as such (or per se), but still, quite an interesting one. 

gone done my best in the above to use this (relatively) new "8 bit" camera thing to give it a newspaper feel, for as i recall this is where the person in the statue first appeared. should you have no idea as to who(m), exactly, that is, well, i am not too surprised as it is doubtful he is all that well known across the present generation. that, then, is newspaper cartoon (and briefly TV show) character Andy Capp. 

someone somewhere will have written a much more better history (or what have you) of the Andy Capp character than i could offer. i would encourage you to look it up if interested, but in brief he was a kind of "stereotype" northerner, as in unemployed, frequently in the pub, for a while constantly smoking and as keen on betting on horses as he was fighting. very. he was of (or from) Hartlepool, as was his creator, the late Reg Smythe. 

indeed i was, for verk concerns (that i would rather not discuss), in Hartlepool. rather likely that Andy Capp is the second most famous thing from the place, for it is rather tough to top the story of how the residents of this coastal town once put on trial and hung a monkey on suspicion of it being a French spy. easy mistake to make. not sure how, exactly. well known Andy Capp is around the rest of the world. likely his "fame" spread via various "ex-pats" communities. 

my understanding was that it, Andy Capp, was always "controversial", as it not so much personified various ideas (or stereotypes) of us "northerners" (proper ones, not that gentrified Manchester lot) as it did define them for some. oh, undoubtedly them southern shandy drinking softies laughed heartedly at how we peasants must be. changes were made to the character over the years - at some point the cigarette which perpetually hung from his mouth vanished, the "light hearted" takes on domestic abuse, perpetrated by both Andy and his wife Flo, were removed, as was his fighting. for whatever reason alcohol has always been seen as a perfectly fine thing, so the pint pot remains always. rather likely these changes would, in this day and age, be called that "woke" thing (whatever it actually is), but the alterations were made long before that word got thrown about so freely. 

from what i recall they had a go (or attempt) at making a TV series of the character, starring no less than James Bolam in the lead role. he was the one in The Likely Lads which was not Rodney Bewes. i don't rightly remember much of it, except that it was not particularly good. stretching a 1 - 4 panel newspaper comic strip into a tv show would strike me as a challenge. 

apologies if these pictures have not been the best (the ones i use here seldom are). it's just that the statue, as you can vaguely make out in the first picture, is right near some people's homes. really felt a bit awkward and intrusive taking the ones i did. 

well, if you are ever in the Headlands area of Hartlepool (which they brand on all signs as "Historic Headlands", presumably so as not to confuse it with the "Future Headlands"), you could do a lot worse than take a stroll to see it for yourself. 

be excellent to each other!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

no code

erm, who isn't and who isn't, apparently

so, for purely altruistic reasons from the goodness of their hearts Oasis are once more allowing some fans to give them a little bit of money in exchange for hearing a few familiar songs. well, let us be fair, they are permitting many fans to give them f***loads of money for such, look you see. no, i didn't get tickets for this one either, so if you want to assume all of this is a whine, that's fine. otherwise, a peek behind the curtain at what might have been, plus other stuff. 

being really, really fair and "some" lessons appear to have been learned from ticket sales from the first reunified Oasis tour. at the very least (and this is two sides of the same coin) certain "PR" or image lessons sank in. making it so that only if you were (cough, cough) randomly selected to get a code could you get a chance of buying the tickets. well, last time it was widely known that certain people (and a lot of them appeared to be connected to Manchester City Football Club) got codes that "guaranteed" a ticket or as many tickets as they wished. i believe the same was applicable this time around, too, but such codes got given to "people in the industry". at the least, then, people were not spending an entirety of a day hopelessly hoping the ticket website would accept they were a real person. 

first stage of trying to get tickets for the imminent (2027) tour, then, was to register to get a random code. no problem. you had to use an email address which was linked to an active (as in used) ticketmaster account, which (also) was no problem. oh, they also asked you what album the band released in 1995. easy enough. 

now that i think of it my email address was probably (or likely) blacklisted or otherwise blocked by Oasis. this won't be off of any abuse i sent them, but rather due to how my ticketmaster account will show that i have (very much) indeed previously bought tickets for the Manic Street Preachers and Suede. rather (in)famously, in response to the initial reformation, Simon Price wrote this article, which mostly is a textbook example of what uncontrolled being full of yourself can lead to. in his rather scathing, scornful words of pure unadulterated hatred in the belief of being the omnipotent bastion of truth and correct thinking, all he really did was give the band a lovely tagline ("the most damaging pop-cultural force in recent British history") to use. inexplicably, yet understandably, Liam somehow manage to interpret how much Mr Price fawns over the Manics as him being in the Manics, and fired off several abusive comments about them in response. oh well. 

at once i was the paradox (or what have you) of not in the slightest bothered about not getting a code whilst also tremendously disappointed. let me try and explain, but yes, i get it, should all of this sound, if not read, like a whine (or "sour grapes"), no worries. zero, for the reasons in the post on the first reformed tour and beyond, appeals about seeing them again. by the admission of the band themselves it's not all that much of a performance they give, and they strive to just deliver live renditions of songs as they were done in the studio. let's not upset ourselves by discussing the make up of a certain section of the crowd. 

yet i wanted to do nothing more than purchase, at the great (and real) threat of putting myself into some financial difficulties, three (3) tickets. why such a specific and precisely odd number? nothing more explicit nor simple sounding than i thought it might be an instance for me to have a day out with my brother and sister once more. which would be the first instance of such in many years, and could well have proven to be the last, but boy what an epic last that would be. for reasons i am not going to go into, oddly (if not perversely) getting the Oasis tickets would have, by some distance, been the easiest part of this entire idea. oh well. 

in regards of those who got tickets, well, ace, nice one, hope it's all as excellent as the first tour all sounded like it was. for the "PR" side, it was good to see all that "dynamic pricing" sh!t, where people felt pressured into paying x3 or x4 more for the tickets because "reasons", was gone. although it was, it seems, replaced with a "similar but different" thing (i did not say scam) in that the more modest priced tickets were not available, but ludicrously expensive ones (including hotels, travel, etc) were. go figure. 

quite enjoying reading the (and i am grateful to a dear friend for this term) mental gymnastics some are currently doing to be at peace with the ticket prices they have paid. one in particular, as it happens. someone has taken the time, trouble and (disturbed) imagination to say that "when you think about it" the price is decent as Richard Ashcroft is (yet again) the support, and he himself "would be at least £70 to see". no, no he would not. he is on the support bill out of a misguided sense of loyalty (early on Oasis were support for The Verve) for PR reasons, in reality he is there as he is cheap and there is no threat at all of him upstaging the main act. as for seeing him being "worth" £70, i think not. from memory there were all of three (3) decent Verve songs, the most famous of which was the one the Stones had done all the music for. his solo career is niche, with "selective" appeal. risking further blacklisting, i got tickets for the Manics and Suede joint tour, and then for Holly Johnson supported by ABC and Heaven 17, for a little south of £70 each. there is a sense of perspective (perhaps too much f*****g perspective) for the claim of what seeing Richard Ashcroft is worth. 

some might say (see what i did there) i could (or should) reach out to Liam or Noel, explaining how i would very much like to be together with my brother and sister just one more time, and that for whatever (see what i did there) reason Oasis is the only thing likely to make that possible. nah, no. there is a clue in the name of my blog as to my feelings on fate, etc. besides, likely there are going to be tens of thousands of (vaguely) similar stories to mine of people wanting to be there. perhaps some of them had fate decree it was to be, and all the best to them. also, if we are honest, their "really caring" for the fans is on a lip service level, as in it goes as far as PR needs it to. they are a great band with songs that have become anthems, but never forget they are also a business. 

righty-ho, that will do. sorry if this has (indeed) sounded like "sour grapes" or whatever, that really was not the intention. don't realistically see how they could have come up with a "fairer" way of selling the tickets or doing more dates, although that does not defend the nice workaround they found for not being able to do dynamic pricing. rock and roll, one and all. 

be excellent to each other!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

by the sea

now then

were it so that i was asked (and no, my social circle is not of such a radius that i get much in the way of conversation) if i believed i would visit Scarborough at all this year then the answer would likely have been not really, not really, no. however, as it turns out, that's now twice i have gone done been there, all in or around a six (6) week stretch, look you see. 

most recently, as (undoubtedly) both regular readers and those with a taste for quality music will know, it was off there to once again see Holly Johnson do his stuff. well (ahem) musical stuff, and the support was boss. not so much on the latter for his live dates (announced thus far) in 2027, mind, since a certain Tony Hadley is on the support bill. anyway, getting back on some semblance of point, it was so that, at rather short (but not disagreeable) notice that verk decided i should go there one Friday. 

quite a lovely day too, considering it happened to be the first Friday of October. well, weather wise it was all splendid, verk was somewhat difficult (challenging), but i suppose i am not there just for my rather dashing good looks. bright sunny day, perfectly comfortable temperature and a most welcome breeze off of the mysteries of the sea. often, in our (collective) haste to be all miserable and depressed, we overlook the positives of all this global warming and (or) climate change business. a lovely day at one of the more prestigious Yorkshire coastal locales is very much one of them. 

a big plus for Scarborough is that they (the residents) actually want people to visit. some nearby places, and i didn't (specifically) state Whitby but still, get all @r$ey, not wanting tourist filth yet wishing for their money. one example of how Scarborough is more welcoming in absolutely loads of parking and not much in the way of really excessive charges for it. bit of a shame it is not better served by more direct rail links, but hey, welcome to England, the land where the train people do not really want you to use the trains. 

indeed that is a (reasonably) rare "proper" picture above, as in no "app" mode. no, i suppose it isn't what one would call "postcard perfect" or suitable for framing (commercial or otherwise), but still, not too bad. although maybe the people on the beach might wish to frame it. or show it off. 

to the right in the above picture is the Grand Hotel, one of the more celebrated sights in Scarborough and one linked to a (most peculiar) curious myth. no, nothing to do with Sir Jimmy. my brother loves it when i send images of being in Scarborough, as he cites the story of how Hitler intended to turn the place into the "capital of Europe". this isn't entirely accurate, as the myth (or urban legend) is that Hitler simply wished to make the Grand Hotel his "base". at the time it was the largest hotel in Europe. undoubtedly the magnificent architecture of it appealed to him. further elaboration of this was that the Luftwaffe were told they would be executed if the bombed it, so fond of the building was Hitler. no evidence has ever come to light that suggests any truth resides in this one, but it has just about the right level of randomness to be plausible. what a lovely idea it is, though, that France was occupied merely as a stepping stone to making Scarborough the epicentre of Europe, or whatever Europe would have been called under his rule. 

yes of course there is some video (above) and indeed it is in VHS mode. actually, i elected (or opted) to do something close to intelligent. this video kind of replicates the classical "scenic shot" everyone and anyone with a video camera in the late 80s and most of the 90s tried to do. except i did not think to use the zoom function, sorry. doubtful that the video is of any particular use or holds much interest, but as you are here now, go on, press play if you have not already done so.

generally the local residents are on the whole rather friendly and welcoming. this is not like certain other places on the Yorkshire coast (no i didn't specifically say Whitby, but still). for an example, on this visit a bloke just stopped and had a random conversation with me. he appeared full of remorse about having spent two days in Blackpool. yes, going from one seaside resort to another for a bit is interesting, although of course this one meant going from east to west. i asked, since that would be the usual reason for such a short sojourn to Blackpool, if it was for a stag night. he replied no, informing me that it was a "drunken decision" and (very much) a mistake he would not make again. 

cost of the magnificent fish and chips (with scraps) you see above? just north of £12, which isn't bad as such for what i got, but more than i would usually spend on dinner (or "lunch", if posh). likely cheaper, or if you insist "fewer", than certain other places on the Yorkshire coast. to be honest it was just ever so slightly south of 4pm that i had finished verk stuff, had not eaten, decided (or elected) that a late dinner was wise before a 90 - 120 minute drive back to lodgings in this era of exile. so my choice was made on the first place i saw with no queue, and of course when i saw the price it did (indeed) occur to me why no queue was present at this one fish and chip shop. still, it was amazing, man. probably not the sort of thing i should be eating with my various medical exploits, but it is done now. 

readers of a sensitive nature, which is to (very much) say those that simply don't like me and certainly have no wish to see images of moi, may well do well to depart now, for the next (and final) image is indeed of an obligatory selfie nature. like, you know, it is my blog, and i get people not wanting to see me, but surely some (even if just one or two) do. 

did indeed get a bit windy during the later stages of the day, hence my (usually concept free anyway, to be fair) hair going a bit stray. i do indeed keep considering doing "something" with my hair, but ultimately i am (just) too lazy to do that, and besides however it goes feels rock and roll, which is all that i am particularly interested in. 

likelihood of me heading to Scarborough again soon? probably "high", in particular (or if only) for further verk reasons. doubtful such shall ever take me to that there London (innit) ever again, but one never knows which path comes next. or something like that. 

be excellent to each other!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

pennies

hello there

alas just one of "them" posts, look you see. bit of a whine, or moan and groan. not for the first time and, if we are (entirely) honest, not for the last it is of course all about the wonders of our inefficient, unreliable public transport system here in England land, or possibly all of the UK. except that there London (innit), for those times when the greedy staff there are not on strike for an extra few hundred thousand (each) for working on what is effectively an entirely automated system. 

recently, then, i (and many other passengers) had to put up with a delay in service. great. such things have gotten to the point where you feel compelled to be grateful that it is at least running, so frequent are the outright cancellations. for me (moi) the most recent incident was pretty much a minor inconvenience, not all that much of a problem. other passengers, however, were going to miss connecting trains, buses and, in one case, flights. 

calling trains "public transport" is, these days, somewhat misleading. of all the "privatisation" things what they have gone done, and not all are bad (for a start energy companies are competitive, subject to regulation and gone are the days of ruthless disconnections), the only one more stupid that the trains was, of course, water. the companies what run the trains soon clocked that they could charge a fortune for the tickets, cancel services at will and claim massive subsidies from the government (our taxes) as they somehow cannot "cover costs". not helping is that a different company, the comically named "Network Rail", own/run the tracks on which trains run. they simply have no interest at all in proper maintenance and would prefer it if trains did not actually run on their tracks. 

so is it a case of "eat sh!t and f*** you" from all of the train people involved with regards to us? not quite. yet it is the case that the utter contempt and lack of interest in customers (beyond their money) is illustrated in the "compensation" one gets for these delays. behold, if you will, the stunning amount i am entitled to for the most recent incident. 

i am not getting a calculator out but i believe (or think) that's not even 10% of the ticket price. to state the obvious, nor does that really cover the inconvenience of it all. and no, mine was not a major issue, but as highlighted earlier it very much was an issue for other passengers. 

putting this compensation claim on a "fast track" is something that presumably sounded witty to them. however, the reality is that is a false description. granted (true), the compensation process "has" got faster, as in putting in the claim has been "simplified" to the extent of "only" taking about 15 minutes. before it took somewhere over half an hour, required a whole load of information and needed you to log in and out. yes, you could speculate that they make it deliberately cumbersome so people just get bored or otherwise fed up (f****d off, even) and simply don't bother. 

fast track for the actual payment of the "compensation" (all of 50p) isn't a thing either. they do advise it can take "up to ten days" to process the claim, and when found correct as in you are due it then it can well be the same amount of time waiting for it to arrive in your account. presumably we should be grateful that they pay it back via your payment method and do not issue a cheque. hopefully none of the tw@ts involved in this process are reading this, or they will see that last sentence, consider it a brilliant idea and go with it. 

to make some sort of (vague) point with this whine, then. issuing "compensation" is all well and good, but the value is nowhere near meaningful enough to teach them to stop being incompetent, is it? say only half of us bother to file the claim and get back that limited amount and, well, how exactly does that seem like "punishment" for the rail company? that's a really insignificant amount of the overpriced ticket they have to pay over. 

eligibility for what they call "compensation" commences if the delay exceeds a very Andy Warhol fifteen (15) minutes. as you can see, the percentage (%) of ticket is small, and likely of negligible difference to either the train people and fat lot of good to the people (us simple passengers) wildly inconvenienced by it all. were it so that compensation, on the random 15 minute mark, started at 150% of the ticket price and increased dramatically with 5 (five) minute intervals then it would be a decent gesture of compensation and would teach the rail companies not so much to be efficient as it would just to do the f*****g job they get paid (very) well to do. 

undoubtedly our glorious, excellent new leader (he likes The Smiths so he must be good, apparently) will have this on his agenda. right now, of course, he seems busy with the most pressing concern in modern society, which i gather is allowing football fans to drink alcohol in stadiums. let us hope that getting public transport into some sort of serviceable state is next. 

be excellent to each other!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

random bowie - the shel talmy recordings

howdy pop pickers

indeed i was hesitant, if not quite reluctant, to include this in my set of "random bowie" posts. this most recent of releases, The Shel Talmy Recordings, doesn't claim to be an "album", look you see, instead being as direct (or honest) enough to say it is very much a bunch of recordings taped together as a bit of a compilation. some of these have surface before, a few have not. besides, there is a (quite) strong likelihood this might be the last time we get a significant amount of "previously unreleased" Bowie material all at once. i dare say his taste for the subversive would be amused at a "final (mostly) new" release would feature his first ever recordings. 

but, one may ask, are these recordings the first ones he ever gone done? probably, likely but no one is all that sure, really. one (you and i) have to remember that the unreleased until now ones were mostly all forgotten about. for the sake of simplicity, or an easier life, perhaps we should just say yes, the first recordings what he ever gone done are held in (on) this tape (disc). 

and is it any good? does this release offer anything of remote quality, or interest beyond it being David Bowie (and a few others of note) on it, or is it simply a bit of a "cash grab", dangerously if not perilously close to scraping the bottom of a barrel? yes, no and maybe are all (oddly) not unreasonable answers to both extremes, which places a fair review in the middle. 

who(m), exactly, is Shel Talmy? must confess i had not heard of him, so did a bit of research. whereas no, not quite a legendary figure as some producers of the 60s, a very decent track record (sorry for the play on words) with some musicians, notably The Who and The Kinks. also took a bit of a flyer, or if you will a calculated risk on a young David "Davie" Jones, who he felt might be quirky enough to produce a few hits but accepted probably not. so he signed him up, encouraged him to write songs and brought in musicians to play on some records. as has widely been reported, one of them just so happens to be (i think on 4 songs) a certain Jimmy Page, who(m) started off as a very much in demand session musician. beyond that, was interested to see Nicky Hopkins appears too. for the more casual fan it may well be so that the name doesn't immediately trigger a memory, but i promise you that you have heard either his organ (so to speak) or piano playing on some of the greatest rock songs ever. 

this will sound terribly (and incorrectly) like i am damning with feint praise but the booklet, with extensive liner notes, is the treasure here. it tells the story of Shel, who was not, say, George Martin or, for better or worse, Phil Spector, but all the same was an integral component of that legendary era in the 60s when pop music well and truly became a thing. for anyone interested in rock history, or all of the mythology, it is fascinating stuff. 

music, though? well, said booklet makes (abundantly) clear not to play it with any expectations whatsoever. no "lost classics" exist here, but there is also nothing "bad" and certainly not a song one could suggest is an "embarrassment" for either (as we came to know him) Bowie or the musicians that feature. you get decent mid-60s sounding pop and proper rhythm and blues (not the horrendous style which appropriated the the term in the 90s) for the most part. good, but not what one would realistically deem "great", and certainly nothing likely to challenge The Beatles, The Kinks, Gerry & The Pacemakers, etc, etc as being the toppermost of the poppermost. 

 

once upon a time you could walk into shops and they would have tapes (actual) and then discs called things like "the best of the sixties". a more better (accurate) title was invariably "the best of the sixties songs that are either cheap to licence or free to use". invariably they comprised of "one hit wonders" or artists none but a few ever recalled. again it feels like i am unfairly slating this record, but being completely honest would be to say that any of the songs here would not feel "out of place" on such a set. 

do we (at the least) get the distinctive David Bowie vocal on the songs? partially. impossible for me to say but i suspect that if you played it for someone without telling them it was Bowie they would be able to work it out. although there answer would possibly be "sounds like Bowie mimicking Roger Daltrey", or Eric Burdon, or even (not then but still) Sir Mick. entirely likely that this was what he was doing, really, since they were the popular vocalists of the day (well, outside of The Beatles). certainly the evidence here is his ability to hold a note and be a strong vocalist, but you have to temper that with the fact it was a 17 year old lad, famously with a lack of ego or self belief. were anyone foolish enough to let moi into a recording studio when i was 17 then i dare say i would have tried, in my own head if not actually, to sound like who(m)ever was popular. major difference is that Bowie (Jones) does a really good job of pulling off a vocal which could be marketed along the lines of "if you like The Who or The Animals you will love this guy".

stand out, or outstanding songs? closest to such will be the ones you are (possibly) familiar with, for they are the songs that he re-recorded for Toy, be it in the never released intended version or the ho hum variation that eventually got released. to that end the first track, You've Got A Habit Of Leaving, stands out somewhat. of the four (4) tracks featuring Mr Page (two songs with two different vocal takes) easily the best is the rather decent I Pity The Fool, with Take My Tip being resoundingly ok.

for the week (or so) that i have actually had it the tape (disc) has not been replaced by another on the stereo. not sure if this is due to it being peculiarly compelling, or if i am resigned to knowing that in  week or so there is little, if any, chance of me playing it again. once more that is not quite the damnation of it that it feels like it sounds, more a reality. 

how has the rest of the world taken to this set (or if you like compilation)? reasonably well. it got up to number seventeen (17) in the UK album chart. quite the lovely touch, since that was his age when most if not all of these were recorded. 

were it so that someone said "oh yes, you can clearly tell his genius is present already in these early songs" they would be hard pressed to elaborate (or clarify). by the same margin, if one were to lambast this, saying it was rubbish (or just plain sh!t), then likely they are being far too harsh or exacting, or otherwise went into listening with far too many exalted expectations. ultimately it is a record way closer to pleasant curiosity than it is patchy cash in, which is fair enough. 

should for some reason you wish to read just a fraction more of the (vast) acres of waffle i have managed to gone done on Bowie over the years, this link to a "bootleg best" has a link to all of the random bowie editions (i think). 

be excellent to each other!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

notebook and toothpaste

g'day

unexpectedly, then, i bookend this not particularly significant month with posts of vague relation to the wonders of koalas. well, not vague, look you see, as for most of it there has been a perfectly clear, or if you will direct, connection. if you are a more random than regular reader here is the link to the start, indeed commencement, of this month. 

yes, with the overt fair dinkum Australian link it is so that some would (perhaps) suggest i have gone right ahead and "boomeranged" the subject for the month. this is if you accept the notion that a boomerang is indeed meant to come back to you, once thrown proper. no, alas, it is not. a boomerang is a hunting weapon, and so whilst it is incredibly efficient to return, a returned boomerang has failed and you have to try once more to get some food. 

moving on as best i can, then, and this month of nothing much of anything being so saw me purchase yet further things of koala. as i said earlier. 

do i purchase (or procure) absolutely everything i see what has a koala on it? no, i do not believe so. there was that instance, for instance, when i saw (observed) in a shop a teddy bear styled as a koala. whereas it was very clearly of a high, discerning quality, i was not prepared to pay(from memory) somewhere around £140 (not a typo) for it. on the other end of the scale as recently as today i saw another form of koala toy for £3 on the nose. this item i declined. 

on the same note no, i do not believe i have ever (knowingly) gone out to specifically purchase an item which one could say was of koala. it really is as dull, or mediocre, as every now and then i shall see an item or thing which has what one could call essentially a koala link, and my money is handed over in exchange for it. which does indeed lead to a number of unnecessary, impulsive and arbitrary acquisitions. 

like, for instance, an off blue-grey (very pleasing to the touch) furry covered 80 page notebook. 

when i saw this, in an Aldi i believe, i did indeed think to myself (or possibly said it aloud) oh wow that is rather cute, but took as a given it would be too expensive to indulge as an impulse item. no, as it turns out, for on seeking guidance from the relevant price tag it turned out that the item cost all of £1.79. 

indeed i am (quite) aware that the world as we kind of know it is on the verge of collapse, that society is going to break down, etc. maybe it would have been wiser to retain the penny south of a Bullseye friendly £1.80, but then if society breaks in a quite specific way then money shall be of little consequence and less ("fewer") value. it might be easier to trade a notebook rather than coins for essentials like cigarettes (sorry), sex or even, at a push, food. besides, the soft feel of the cover is really, really smooth and quite comforting. 

shall i, on the off chance of society not collapsing, use it as intended, which would be as a book to write notes in? doubt it. long since has been the time i aspired to be some sort of "writer", bar doing this blog what you are reading (thank you). just don't see what i would "note", to be honest. all the same, a lovely item to have, one that i shall probably forget about and one day (which may not be as soon as some hope) it will be the problem of someone else when it comes to disposing of all that i have picked up on my travels through life. 

for the toothpaste element of this, well, i did and did not (really) need any more of the stuff. however i happened to be in a shop and saw they had eucalyptus toothpaste. so of course i elected to purchase it, presuming that if it were good enough for koalas (eucalyptus and not toothpaste as such) then it would certainly do for moi. 

how is it? actually quite decent. oddly it is a pinker shade of pink (or thereabouts) in colour, and is quite overtly more of the menthol suggested (stated) on the box. not essentially spearmint, alas, but all the same a subtle "mint" like experience, presumably tempered by the fragmented presence of the wonderful thing what is eucalyptus. mindful of such being dependent on what you eat, or put in your mouth (so to speak), during a day, this does seem to leave one with decent feeling teeth all day. 

exactly why has someone decided that eucalyptus should be used to clean teeth? a good question, as it turns out. being curious i elected to do a google thing, and it might not be that koalas have brilliant teeth as a consequence of their eucalyptus based diet. far from it, sadly (and alas). if "the internet" is to be believed then koalas do have strong, robust teeth so as to consume the eucalyptus, but in turn the eucalyptus damages the teeth, leading to them being unable to eat. oh dear. 

right, well, i would remain (pretty) confident that any random (or practical) purchases made will for whatever reason get documented here. 

be fair dinkum to each other!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

blu two

greetings

of late it feels somewhat this month (september 2026, look you see) has become a bit heavy on posts concerning films (or related) and (merrily quality) vibes. well, i suppose i can only write of what i have gone done, or what comes to mind. and little ("fewer") else comes to mind. 

so, as the title gives you every suggestion of being, i have recently watched two (2) of them fancy types of video called blu ray. unusually one of them i did not watch alone, but we shall get there. don't get all too excited. indeed i have watched a few "regular" fancy videos (dvd discs), but yeah, i shall go ahead and let them pile up a bit more before (inevitably) posting of them here. 

for now, then, 2 (two) what i watched, with both (as in all two) of them being 2026 releases. one of them also being one what i had not seen before, although i was very familiar with the story. 

go on then, since this has inadvertently taken the format (or what have you) of how i would usually do books (so to speak), a "spoiler free" overview. indeed Project Hail Mary is excellent, and a truly inspired adaptation of a novel i loved. that said, perhaps out of necessity, it is a bit long. meanwhile it was not all that long ago i saw Supergirl at the cinema. very enjoyable, no masterpiece true, but nowhere near as bad as some comments and (or) reviews have indicated. 

with the above (relatively) fresh in mind, then, on to each film. so yes, one of them "spoiler warning" things is likely best to put here, although i shall do all that i can to skip such. although for the first i suppose, realistically, for the film they simply could not keep the "twist" secret. 

regular readers (or people who click here before going on) will be aware of just how much i loved the novel of Project Hail Mary. it was breathtakingly brilliant, and if i ever get to read a novel which so enthralled, entertained, kept my attention and felt so beautiful that will be a tremendous day. anyway, when it got released at the cinema i declined going to see it. not out of any fears of it being a poor adaptation, i simply couldn't see me being comfortable sat there for three (3) or so hours. it struck me as wiser to wait for the video (disc) to come out. 

indeed they have done a spectacular job of adapting it. for fellow fans of the novel who(m) have not seen this adaptation yet there are two what i would call "key" (or big) moments dropped, but they do not cause any harm or, in terms of telling the story, miss anything "major". as big as one of the two were. 

my concerns of going to the cinema were, it turns out, well founded. although at no stage does it ever get (particularly) boring as such, it does have a sense of being overtly long. whereas the novel was one i flew through, eager to experience the whole story rather than savour it, the pace is well slower on screen. peculiar, if not strange, as the reverse is usually true. the only other instance i can think of where the film was a slower ("fewer") pace than the source novel is The Da Vinci Code. whatever flaws or what have you the book has it was an exhilarating pacy read, where the film was overtly dull. 

quite peculiar that this film got released in that odd "window" (or at the time) when it is unlikely to be recalled when the relevant "award" season comes along. delighted to say that Project Hail Mary is brilliantly made, and Ryan Gosling deserves all the praise, accolades or other such positive things one would care to throw his way. 

doesn't feel like all that long ago when i went and saw Supergirl in the cinema. well, eventually did, after some sort of mishap with electricity. being fortunate enough to go and see it on the weekend it opened meant that i went without being influenced with all the noise, etc, berating the film. noise coming from people who possibly had not actually seen it. well, i walked out of the cinema (after the movie had finished!) feeling thoroughly entertained. the eldest of my (known) children also saw it at the cinema and enjoyed it. alas the youngest of my (known) children didn't get chance to go and see it on the big screen, hence me watching the fancy video of it with him. 

little value exists in trying to discuss whatever those chronically online have said in a negative way of the film. also that's not my fight, and no (real) need for me to take the punches. rather, then, it would be considerably more better for me to just say why i enjoyed it. mostly it was a decently paced, reasonably well timed self contained story, despite being part of yet another "expanded universe" thing. good story, funny in a lot of places and thrilling in others. i didn't have any immediate issue with any of the cast, the writing or much else beyond. 

one "criticism" (or what have you) i have - or still have, for it is likely in my original post - is the "end battle" thing. for some reason the pacing of it feels a little off and, watching again, some of the effects, or cgi or what you call it, are noticeably poor. a bit where Supergirl is flying into something or other, possibly a crashed spaceship or maybe a building, manages to look like effects have not progressed from the days of the Christopher Reeve Superman films; if anything have got worse. 

very likely (and a bit sadly) right to say one Supergirl film will be enough, though. as much as i enjoyed this, more would be pushing it. she is just not an a-grade "main character", really. this is no bad thing. look at the two poor to mediocre Hulk films that got made, yet the character is brilliant in ensemble films or ones where there is a different protagonist. going on how good (so far) this Lanterns tv show has been, and how obviously sh!t it would have been as a film, maybe they might have been wiser going that way with this. but, all the same, seen twice, enjoyed twice. 

well, that's that. just my musings, really. in the present day (2026) i would imagine all who(m) wish to see either (or both) have done so, and have no need for my suggestions at the best of times. one never knows though, years from now when both films are forgotten (it happens) someone may stumble on this, determine that one (or both) sound quite class, and seek to watch them on whatever format is the one to use in that time. or not. 

be excellent to each other!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

act iii by kasabian

howdy pop pickers

no, i didn't really anticipate the Mike D tape (disc) being dislodged from my stereo in all that much of a hurry, for it is quite class. but such has happened, look you see. somehow - and i get that i shall be getting accused of not being a "proper fan", etc but just trying to be honest - Kasabian have gone against what i had expected and delivered a rather smart album in the form of act iii. 

whilst i was (vaguely) aware they had a new album on the way i was all "meh" or "sigh" about it. for some reason i had gotten it into my head that i wasn't all that keen on the last two (2) releases they had gone done. no, this is not me in "camp Tom", for the reasons for his departure were as understandable as they were reasonable. however, looking at my reviews of the last couple (click here and follow the links back if you are interested) suggests that i enjoyed them at the time. neither has been played since, mind. 

so sure (or certain) was i that i hadn't particularly cared for the previous offering off of Kasabian meant that i did not rush to "pre-order" it. now that i think, perhaps (and this i shall assign to being a senior moment) i got confused with the banal, bland, anonymous record off of someone called Blossoms that i randomly got at the same time. anyway, in the face of "social media" pressure (or reminders) via adverts i clicked on to order it. being honest again and i was delighted to find some "special exclusive live artwork cover" version of it which was about half the price of the "standard" disc. thank you very much, that will do. 

it turned up in the post what i thought was a few days early. this, however, turned out to be a few days after the previously much treasured "day of release" date, thanks for that Royal Mail. for some reason i had it in mind the release date was 11th September, which would be a Kasabian thing, yet no, it was as point of fact released earlier (4th). oh. well, after noting the cover said that this was all "inspired (or based) on true events" and with interest seeing neither the front or back cover mentioned that it was Kasabian, i put it on. 

honest response to the first song "proper" (after an intro thing) was that it reaffirmed my idea that i didn't really like the last one. i get why they didn't recruit a new vocalist to replace Tom, for Sergio felt it would be better for him to just do it, but then the first song, Soulmate, features him doing that "shout rap" thing. it sounds awful. nonetheless i carried on, going with the idea that at worst it was another album which is just north of 30 minutes (half an hour) from them. 

yes i have ended up with the "proper" tape (disc) of the album too. for some reason they are doing a couple of gigs on the same day at a venue reasonably close to moi. having not seen them live it seemed like as good an opportunity as any. the gigs are being labelled as an "album launch", just three (3) months after the release of it. i am assuming they are "warm up" shows ahead of some major (large) venues they are playing a few days after, and expecting to hear just all of act iii in (mostly) full, with maybe a Fire or Club Foot thrown in for fan service. the ticket i got did say it included the album, but i had taken it as a given it would be issued at the gig rather than posted to me. 

good job that i did leave it play, for the remainder of the record is less "shout rap", more frenetic, energetic, gloriously "this sounds awesome" rock. as in (you know) what made Kasabian such a class band. lyrically i am at a loss as to what the "true events" all are, except (conveniently) the tale can merrily be told with basic, simple and predictable rhyming couplets, but so what. 

favourite tracks? not sure i could select just one, but mostly i have been quite taken by Hippie Sunshine and Hyper/Rising, with Superpowers along the way. pretty much all of them after Soulmate, i think, elect not to have "shout rap" on them, so they work just fine. 

essentially (or effectively) this is just a really good rock album. the kind they would have you believe no one makes any more, since the charts tend to get dominated either by solo artists or this hideous (awful) trend of solo artists with someone else on a "featuring" credit. delighted to see that i am very much not alone in supporting the band and their quest (if not crusade) to make sure awesome rock and roll gets the correct level of attention. 

sure, it did that very modern thing of immediately falling out of the top one hundred (!!) album chart the next week. which pretty much means that everyone who wanted to own it (or just hear it) did so within the first few days of its release. 

oddly i have (somehow) become a "proper fan" of this album. well i assume so, since i went right ahead and bought a third (3rd) copy. during the first week of release they had a clear and obvious push to get the number one spot. to this end they offered a "special edition" download version for (just) south of £5, with the added bonus of posting you a "personalised" signed card. 

anyway, that will do. little point (if any) exists in me writing something here that takes longer to read than one would need to spend hearing the whole album (entire). once again, then, it is quite class, with some truly epic rock odyssey adventures in the music. 

be excellent to each other!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!