RIP Christopher Lee

As someone who avidly watched the seemingly endless battles between Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing in the Hammer 'Dracula' films, I was truly saddened to hear of the death of Mr Lee.
To me he represents the passing of an old line of gentlemanly actors, and I only hope that he is reunited with his old screen nemesis.
In my mind, he will always be Dracula, as I felt he embodied the character so well.

I remember feeling conflicted when he played Scaramanga in the Bond film The Man With The Golden Gun , as he was (in my mind at least), typecast as Dracula.
Of course he also achieved cult recognition as Lord Summerisle in the original Wicker Man film, and widespread recognition latterly in The Lord Of The Rings - infact he was the only cast member who had actually met Tolkien.
He also dabbled in Death Metal, I kid you not.


His acting career spanned hundreds of films.
His first Hammer role was in 'The Curse of Frankenstein', followed by 'The Mummy' , but to me it was with  'Dracula, Prince of Darkness' that he cast an inspirational figure - well, as inspirational as an immortal bloodsucker could be.
He reprised the Dracula role five times.
Peter Cushing as Van Helsing was often his foil, and between them we had the age old battle of good and evil.
He and Peter Cushing, were, in real life, great friends, although the only film in which they were allies was 'Horror Express'.

Will they walk and talk together in the Summerland of yore ?

Will they finally resolve the age old struggle between light and dark ?

I just want to say a heartfelt farewell to a true titan of the silver screen.

Business Unusual

Hello everyone both of you,
 You may have read my rant recently where I got on one (as they say) with regard to spammers and bots misappropriating my magical words and thereby bringing a premature end to my blogging in the free world  (which was almost a joke, for those who recall the song by Neil Young...)
Speaking of which, what happened to music ?
I mean - I'm old and out of the loop - at 50 something, I should perhaps be grateful for pastoral symphonies and suchlike, to ease the pain of life in a harsh, unforgiving world.
For those of you protesting that 50 - something is not old ; when I was eternally 21 , anything over thirty was old, so I am technically a listed building.
All the hoary cliches of my punky mis-spent youth are now true.
I am that old fart that I shouldn't trust.
Though I'm not a 'hippy'...
but Peace anyway.
I am only grateful that age is less of a cliché than it once was.
Besides, I was reared on the musical dabblings of John Peel, and he was timeless

But the music, man.
What happened ?
Since 'home taping is killing music', it's been going downhill

Actually, it was a number of things, including the internet...

I've always been wary of the charts (payola man, breadheads and cocaine)
But the situation has spiralled downwards -
The birth of CDs, the death of tapes,
The advent of Mpegs , torrents and Spotify .
The death of vinyl - now making a comeback, hurrah - but boo as I will have to re-invest in turntables .

When I was younger, living through the shock of the new
and grooving to Punky - Reggie music
my mainstream was The Clash, The Sex Pistols, The Stranglers and The Jam.
With a side order of The Damned , Wire, The Gang Of Four, The Mekons , XTC , etcetera.
Later flavours included The Swell Maps, The Normal, Patrik Fitzgerald, early Ultravox.
Stateside we had Devo with their buttoned - up version of Satisfaction
Novelty nonsense The Dickies .
Guilty Pleasures were The Vibrators and The Tubes.
It's already getting messy, and I haven't mentioned so many ...
For melodic, old school moments, Mr David Bowie.
For more challenging old school, proto-punks The Velvet Underground.
Back in the U.K., The Soft Boys.
Oh, and Queen, now and again - though I never quite got their angle ...
As my personal musical tastes expanded, I discovered the joys of reggae, psychedelia, blues, mod and metal.
I had mind expanding moments with Captain Beefheart and Mr Barrett...and I was a sucker for coloured vinyl and gimmicks from John Cooper Clarke to Dr Feelgood.

Not to Scale

It was an incredible world with a wealth of stuff.
I always assumed that as I matured  got older, I might gain a new found respect for 'Prog Rock' embodied by Yes, Hawkwind,' The Floyd ', and suchlike (in fairness I never warmed to Jon Andersons voice, or much of the endless self indulgent guitar- noodling of 'The Floyd ' and co, but c'est la vie...).
I also grooved on the Stones, The Who, The Beatles, The Kinks, The Small Faces, etc
These groups were endemic and are mostly timeless - but what happened to music ?

Punk became 'New Wave' with a slightly wider remit and real grassroots d.i.y and more influences - even the dressing- up box as Adam And The Ants morphed into pirates followed by the likes of Siouxsie and the Banshees, Spandau Ballet, Ultravox and Visage leading to the New Romantics and the rise of Goth, which was led by The Mission, Fields of the Nephilim, Sisters of Mercy, All About Eve , Bauhaus and The Cure.
As the Eighties became the Nineties, dance music mashed and mangled choice moments from years gone by - eventually creating loved up baggy - swagger.
I never quite got the angle of people like the Happy Mondays, who seemed more of a gang than a band. Plenty of fashion and attitude, but not so hot on the ditties, in my opinion- but they were part of the burgeoning u.k.dance 'scene' in the early Nineties, which felt like more of a protest, with endless illegal raves organised in secret, and 'cat and mouse' games with the authorities...one of the beauties of this rebellion was the sense of unity, and the fact that you could be happy drinking water all night long...
The 'House' scene diverged, with Euro-House, Acid-House, Hard-House and probably Wendy House.
Trance - Dance, Ambient, Junglist, Drum and Bass, Grime and so on, as movements splintered and labels gradually morphed.
Millenial awakenings led to the decline of the drug-addled payola -  ridden muzak biz, where glad-handing and cheeky lines of marching powder fuelled an increasingly deluded industry full of inflated egos and precious little talent...
...so here we are, painfully aware that perhaps there really is nothing more to explore - I think it was Paul Weller who once said that by the year 2000, all possible chord combinations would have been used: and he's the Modfather, so he should know-
But then he also gave us 'The Cappucino Kid', so maybe not -
- so here in our post millenial hangover, are we condemned to re-hash everything that went before ?
Don't get me wrong - I've used and abused sampler technology too - but I say use what's gone before by all means, but add something new.
Give it a twist.

...and that seems to be the problem.
There's no twist anywhere
Apathy has descended upon us...
There's an overwhelming sense of - to quote Bohemian Rhapsody:  nothing really matters anymore.

Discuss...

Glyphs And Griffins

The other day I was reading an article which demonised the prime minister , when I thought about how every age seemed to depict its worries / demons in images which would make sense in the wider cultural context - visions of flying dragons or images in clouds with ominous portents (or just Jesus in a slice of toast).
Of course in days of old (or so I'm told), we had the seers, shamen and wise women who made much of signs and symbols, often scrying tea-leaves or animal entrails or just smoke.
So, as we come forward through the dark ages into the light of science and rationalisation, how do we see our cultural fears and demons ?

No longer do we have eyewitness accounts of fish and frogs raining from the sky...
Another sign in the heavens was the sighting of comets, whose fiery splendour presaged war, pestilence, earthquakes...

...but we are no longer seeing things in the sky...

Alleged U.F.O. 1952

In the post-WWII era UFOs became a thing, particularly in the Cold War era U.S.A., where their alleged alien crews (as depicted in film ) were ciphers for the ever - present communist threat .
However true or not the reports of aliens and crash-landings were, they gave a modern form to ancient fears.

In the U.K., we have frequent reports of exotic animals in the wild , such as pumas and ominous phantoms like 'black shuck' in urban places.
Unusual creatures are often sighted.
Sometimes they are just throw-backs, remnants of a simpler time when strange creatures roamed the world...
 ...we had a surge of Loch Ness Monster reports which went global in the 1930s with the publication of a (later disproved) photograph .

The 'surgeons photograph' 1934

There were also tales and sightings of the Yeti / Sasquatch which came to the fore in the nineteen-seventies.
It is perhaps relevant, however that the most popular sasquatch film ( Patterson / Gimlin ) was probably of a guy in a suit.

Alleged Sasquatch 1967

Again, the truth of the reports is not as important as the reports themselves.

Later in the last century, the emergence of crop circle spirals on an annual basis seemed to indicate a growth in Earth- consciousness ( whatever that is ) , or messages from extraterrestrials.
This, however, falls into the dangerous realms of tin - foil helmet  territory.

But then why should it ?
Are we just so sophisticated that we are instantly dismissive of signs and symbols ?

'Hidden in plain sight' is a latter day saying.

Perhaps with increasing literacy (don't forget, centuries ago , only monks could read or write ), the use of symbols to convey messages gradually fell into decline.
 Perhaps , alongside the 'old wives tales' or superstitions, they became embarassing relics of a primitive past.


Saying this, we still have symbols in everyday life , although they are for practical purposes.


We are now in an age of almost entirely visual cues, given the global reach of products which often have to rise above the inconvenience of language -

Symbols are increasingly everywhere, giving us the immediacy of understanding that we crave

But they are almost purely practical, existing in an instructional sense.
So how do we see our demons now - and who or what are they ?

One of the most obvious and recognizable demons of the last century...

image by Noma Bar

Our modern demons seem to increasingly lurk in our peripheral vision.
Shadows that we rarely encounter personally.

Faceless immigrants, masked terrorists, anonymous hackers in cyberspace.
But there are other, perhaps less visible but no less real, demons.
And these beasties are often created by us !

Global Recession.
Climate Change.
Mass Extinction.
War.


We're overdue a switcheroo on the magnetic poles, too.*
So that could be fun...

What I'm saying is, the signs are all around us

Are we seeing the signs around us?


Oh...and I mentioned griffins in the title of this rant.

Sorry, I fibbed.

They don't exist.

* current scientific thinking says we're more than 500, 000 years overdue for a reversal of poles.

If The Future Is Now, Where Are The Robots ?

When I was younger I dreamed of a time when I could roam around the moon in a buggy.
I'm sure I read somewhere (probably in  Look and Learn) that by the year 2010, robots would dominate the workplace, and automation would allow humans greater freedom and 'leisure' time.
Quality time, free from drudgery.
Hurrah, I thought.
The world will be such a great place when I grow up.

So...no flying cars either...

People, they lied.
THEY LIED.
Whoever they are (cue footage from Invasion of the Bodysnatchers).


Or perhaps they didn't lie, but are quietly making it happen, just very slowly...
Of course, the whole idea implies that there is cohesive global structure in place regarding work / life balance.
Which is a palpable nonsense.
Unless we really are the subjects of a New World Order ruling elite, who are probably alien lizards (cue footage from Invasion etc...)
So let's not go there...

Robotic Vacuum of the future (available now)

My point is that whilst we now have industrial mechanisation (certainly widespread in the automotive industry), where are the humans enjoying all those leisure pursuits instead of being engaged in dull, repetitive labour, hmm?
Are they writing blogs like this ?
Or watching endless videos of cats ?
Or logging into social media sites to see what everyone else is doing ?
Or having a life instead of writing blogs like this ?
You get my drift...


SPOILER ALERT: look at the diagram on the next link, or the following paragraph will be meaningless (more so than usual,anyway)...

Apparently the best countries for work / life balance  are Denmark,  Spain and the Netherlands, with Belgium and  Norway as close runners...
Unfortunately, I live in the U.K. which is number 23 on the list : all those other countries (often demonised in our tabloids) are ahead of us... the U.S.A . is even lower at 29 , with  Australia lurking down there, grafting away, and as for Japan :
Have a day off, guys !
Shocking stuff then.
Now don't forget this is a work/ life balance thing, so on the one hand you could say the hard working economies are in better shape than the others, but are they ?
Purely in terms of GDP, it seems to be the case - but then surely a better quality of life is an intangible variable which cannot be measured ?

Who are the OECD anyway ?
By the way, if you clicked that link, you got a scary looking energy statistic.

The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development is based in France, has 2500 employees and has existed since 1961.
I got that from their home page.
They must have poor PA, because who ever heard of them ?
They certainly don't crop up in everyday conversation:
Did you see that awful statistic from the OECD ?
I know, terrible, isn't it.
Shouldn't be allowed
No, but then they are a neutral organisation who only exist to impart advice to businesses and governments based on ...
(Sounds of disgruntlement continue as our everyman stereotypes wander offstage)

My point is that regardless of work / life balance , we are sadly low on the domestic robotic front , unless you happen to own a Roomba™ , in which case, bully for you and all that, but I say where is all the leisure time we were promised ? 

Of Monks And Mindfulness

It's a strange world we inhabit now, where we can be so attuned to our inner selves.
Yet we're also in denial.
Science and the quest for factual evidence leaves many people disenfranchised and quite distant from their roots, both geographically and spiritually.
The other day, a friend posted a Guardian piece about a monk known as the 'happiest man in the world '.
The article talked of no possessions and being mindful and in the 'now' and all that populist stuff.
I read that the monk had created an app to teach meditation.
Despite my inner cynic, I found myself  thinking yes, here is a remedy for 21st Century anxiety and the relentless pace of modern life.
I clicked on the link, and was dismayed to find that the app was only for Apple phones (and ipad, natch ).
So much for global consciousness, I thought, my inner cynic rushing gleefully to the fore.

To me, this embodies the whole dilemma.
Spiritual longing married to material limitations.
Coupled with an over-riding sense that the spiritual is somehow wrong.

I cannot be a part of awakening consciousness as there is no empirical evidence for any such state 
Besides,  I don't subscribe to all things Apple.

Disenfranchised by my own thoughts based on an encounter with an online article.
In other words defeated by Maya, the veil of illusion .

Now, before I get deep and meaningless again, let me say this:

I am not a 'hater'- this is new-speak .

However,
I am cynical
I am bitter
I am twisted.

I put it down to my pragmatic, stoic Scots heritage, mixed with an everlasting horror at the excesses of the human race.
Possibly why I need to learn to meditate...
Because I'm also eternally hopeful.

Like supporters of the Scotland football team.
Or the England team...
...or any team you love who lose regularly but you always have hope.

I'm doing it again.
Losing focus.
'Switchbait' I think is what they call it
Switchbait is what is happening in my brain.
Neurons bored of a train of thought.
Looking for a shiny, new toy.

So yes, meditation would be good to learn.
But then I found myself meditating whilst ironing this morning.
That counts doesn't it ?
Hang on whilst I consult my guru...
Oh, I haven't got one.
It must be me.
Phew, glad that's sorted then.
Except, that makes me a Humanist.
And I hate labels...

Check Your Privilege At The Door

I was going to write a third and final piece about the long - running Richard Prince saga (to get up to speed please go back to my earlier blog, Bitch-Fest ) , but decided that it had devolved into the usual self-centred spectacle , with Doe Deere, The Suicide Girls, and others all claiming a piece of the media exposure, so I thought, why bother being part of that ?
The Suicide Girls angle is interesting because - do they intend to sell their original images with the amendments made by Mr Prince, thereby breaching the copyright of his intellectual property ?
Or will they just sell their original instagram photos, thereby breaching Instagrams rights ?
Which brought me to thinking the Big Question - Why ?

Suicide Girls join in the media feeding frenzy

WHY

This moment of existential self doubt was added to by then stumbling across a piece in my news feed regarding a separate issue (I include a link here) which is very dry, and the author debates the question of academics writing for free and asks whether they are, in fact, scabs:

'My use of the word “scab” is often met with a range of responses from irritation to blind fury.  Academics in particular, the sort who wax on about neoliberalism and its exploitation of labour, turn apoplectic as they insist that they’re not scabs but performing vital services by “choosing” to write for free.'

'But what is neoliberalism if not the rationalisation of capitalist exploitation under the rubric of “choice”? ' 

'what is neoliberalism', indeed.
The use of the word 'scabs' is highly emotive, given its previous use to describe those who cross picket lines in defiance of strike action and solidarity amongst workers.
For this reason it's a way of creating a sense of unity in a common cause.
It's also quite divisive in that it implies that anyone not following the authors reasoning is one of 'them', i.e. the 'enemy'.
The tone of the whole piece annoyed me, appealing to my sense of righteous indignation, and is indicative , in my opinion, of many of todays online problems.
It's a worthy read , as an example of the pretentious high-brow gibberish that gets bandied around.

Professor Brian Cox (yes. he of astronomy and previously D;Ream fame) said that part of the problem is the slew of self - published opinion pieces which could be mistaken for factual pieces.
This is almost tantamount to saying that the internet should be left to those who know best, thanks.
The next question is who knows best ?
Could it possibly be no-one, really ?

Let me take a deep breath, and stand back a little from the edge of this existential abyss.

1977 Primitive Blog...

As a disillusioned youth , I was inspired by the D.I.Y. ethos enshrined in punk / new wave, where many would attend gigs and scrawl reviews on paper which would then be xeroxed, stapled and sold for pennies  at gigs, or in record shops (remember those?).
The idea was that this was a form of empowerment, making a mark and taking control of a piece of media, rather than being told who to like and what bands to follow by 'the man' and his running - dog lackeys with their nepotistic promotion of mediocrity.
The downside of this of course, was that it was driven by a desire to stand out from a sea of faceless people, and fanzines were usually released without fanfare or a marketing budget: therefore making no money, or even losing money was considered par for the course, and a small price to pay for editorial freedom.

So here we are in the online world of the internet with its great levelling technology, where everyone can use the tools available to reach out and communicate for fun or learning or profit, or just to escape the humdrum workaday world - yet even here we encounter reactionaries masquerading as our superiors.

What I object to is the elitist agenda pushed by self-righteous types who flaunt their privilege by attempting to tell everyone else what not to do; i.e. unpaid writing !

What is missing here is the 'freedom of choice' option.

Don't get me wrong - I'd love to be paid for my rambling words.
What I'm saying is it happens regardless.
I feel compelled to write / create.
It's in the blood.
Therapy, if you like.

Looking back over this piece, I realise it's a bit divisive in the old 'us and them' way, and I apologise, but terms of reference are hard to come by these days without offending some poor flower...



Please note that the opinions expressed in this blog are purely my own, and in no way are they sponsored or solicited by paying causes.

Fuck 'em.

If a Rip - Off Rips Off a Rip - Off, is it a Rip - Off, or a valid Statement ?

Bricks are not works of art. Bricks are Bricks. You can build walls with them or chuck them through jeweller's windows, but you cannot stack them two deep and call it sculpture.
Keith Waterhouse, Daily Mirror, 19 Feb 1976.

Controversy in 1976...

The debate on the worthiness of the art of Mr Richard Prince continues, gathering media momentum, much like a snowball rolling down a hill.
The debate is polarising opinion, with many feeling that whilst he is indeed re-appropriating (without requesting permission ) the art of others, he is doing just enough transformative stuff to claim 'fair use'.

Andy Warhol controversy in 1962...

Some are pointing out the similarities with the Warhol soup cans , whilst others are bemoaning the misappropriation of Intellectual Properties (the original photographic images on Instagram.)
Meanwhile, images are being sold for around $ 90,000 and Mr Prince is no doubt weeping at his appalling lack of originality all the way to the bank.

It has been pointed out that on a purely technical basis, the reprinting of such images on a large scale would require some serious technical ability (think of the pixellation !).
Is it a post modern comment on the state of the Art world itself ?
If so, then technically Gagossian Galleries are to blame for first mounting the exhibition, having deemed it worthy of attention .
Then the issue falls to the first person who decided that $ 90,000 was a worthy price for an 'original'.

The issue is further clouded by the modern desire for visual affirmation - the online seflie thing that says hey, world, I'm here! 
I'm sure that many of those whose Instagram pics have been appropriated are not too upset - after all, the images were made public on social media, so another way to look at it is to question the strange invocation of privacy laws in such a global public location.

Pic by Doe Deere...controversial, too

My personal feelings are that it is further evidence of the commodification of Art, in which artificially inflated prices are achieved by media controversy - the very value of the art is directly proportional to the shock horror outrage , which is usually expressed in emotive tabloid terms- 'Children are dying of hunger, but some tosser just paid silly money for a Xerox of a Polaroid !'*


From the exhibitions of bricks in the Tate, to Tracey Emins unmade bed, the level of media hysteria seems to influence the perceived monetary value of the work.
I've put the word 'perceived' in italics because it really is about perception as opposed to nuts and bolts reality (ie cost of the materials used, time taken by the artist,etc.)

The artist Carl Andre whose piece 'Equivalent VIII' caused the British tabloids to explode with indignation way back in 1976 (see the opening quote), later denounced Conceptualism as 'humbug'.

STOP PRESS : in news just in , no less than the 'Suicide girls' are joining in, moving from victim status to 'Yes, please' - they are selling their own prints for $90,  as opposed to $90,000...so the whole thing seems to be descending into a post - modern free for all...can't beat 'em ?
Join 'em !

 I have spent more than enough time on the (non) - issue, but I hope you've enjoyed the pieces...

Equivalent VIII  pic from D. Telegraph

* Obviously both Xerox and Polaroid are brand names, so I should have said:
 '...a photocopy of an instant photograph'...