Quantum Leap Year

We’re not really sure what happened. This week the Lollards went back in time to 2007 allegedly trying to rescue Tanya. Tanya herself called FT Towers yesterday asking for an explanation. I didn’t have one and then something strange happened last night…

While I was tackling a technical glitch on our servers that was failing to admit the existence of the 29th of February, I got an alarming call from Tanya — but she was suddenly cut off by what sounded like someone attacking her. I haven’t heard back from her yet. We will keep you posted

Update
There is something happening in our archive feature (below). Freaky Trigger has never had any posts from 1981 before. Could it be that Tanya Headon has come unstuck in time??

Later update
We’ll be keeping an eye on Tanya’s I Hate 1981 diary for new posts

Sorry about the technical problems we’re having

I have no idea what might be causing it. My current theory is that a bit of the Apache server has gone mental (perhaps mod_rewrite) but it could be something in our Wordpress setup too.

For now, I have reverted FT to a primitive form of URL which seems to be less problematic.

Popular is on http://freakytrigger.co.uk/?cat=2 for example.

immediate update
OH GOOD GRIEF. not even that seems to work properly (the ?cat= thing). But you can at least click on individual posts reliably. please?

update 2
I’ve reverted to the proper URLs. it really does feel like apache (it’s not rewrite, something weirder). i’ve found that refreshing eventually forces the right page to appear (sometimes 1 refresh, sometimes several tries) so something is going wrong either between supplying the URL to PHP, or in sending the correct request back. god knows.

if this does turn out to be wordpress oddness i will feel right foolish.

update 3
LOOKS LIKE WE’RE BACK IN ACTION! There may be badness cached around the internets, but fresh requests are coming out ok right now (12:40pm)

Admin: listen up, all comment crew

I was hoping that the lovely Akismet filter (200,000 spam caught and rising) would be updated to have an option to never mark logged-in user’s comments as spam. No such luck, so i’ve had a go myself. I tried posting blatant spam logged in and it worked ok, and it failed when logged out as a double-check, so the signs are good. (And it continues to trap all the usual spam.)

It’s risky stuff fiddling with such a good spam filter and v difficult to test and troubleshoot – so let me know about any problems you find here. And if your comments are being ignored please use the Freakytrigger e-mail link (bottom of the sidebar there) to let us know.

My worry is that the spambots will work out how to automatically make an account. (Then I might have to add a captcha to that process *wince*)

Another great FT milestone: 100,000 spam

About the same time we passed 5000 comments*, so 20 out of 21 comments are spam**. Nice. Many many thanks to akismet.com and the “Worst Offenders” plugin.

Free fun FT fact: we are now mobile phone friendly (looks like this)

(*RIP the comments lost in the great haloscan massacre)

(**The real proportion is even worse because the 100,000 is comments since we went WP in, er July??, and comments have been accumulating on Popular for some time prior to that, using Blogger comments)

FT Archive Resurrection – C90 Go!

C90 Go! – a series of seven long essays about mixtapes sent through time or space.

(Thanks to Tim Hopko for his archival striving here)

THE SQUARE TABLE – What Is The Square Table?

It’s a rotating panel of Interweb pop pundits - they get sent an MP3 by me (that is, Tom) about once every three days and they comment on each one, giving it a mark out of ten. The collated comments and overall mark then appear on NYLPM.

Does The Membership Change?
After 12 MP3s have been voted on a ’round’ of the Square Table is over and there’s a reshuffle - some people from the waiting list come onto the panel, some people from the panel go back on the waiting list. The four most popular files each ’round’ go through to the Square Table Live Showdown at Club Freaky Trigger, which happens once every three rounds (i.e. about three times a year).

How Do I Join?
You email us at freakytrigger at gmail dot com. The only requirements are i) not minding seeing your comments up on the site and ii) having an email account that can cope with regular 5MB file sends.

alext
FAVOURITE POP SONG OF THE 00s the one that’s playing now
[*]I LIKE POP TO…perve, pretend, pout, pose, preen, ponce, posture, pastiche, parody, problematise, perform, profess and play.
[*]I DON’T LIKE POP TO… pander, prescribe, predict or prefer.

Anthony Easton
my favourite song of the 00s is hit me baby one more time
[*]i like pop to astonish me, make me hard, make me want to fall in love, make me want to fall out of love, make me shake my money maker, make me roll down the windows and sing along in the middle of summer.
[*]i dont like pop to bore me or to really make me think.

Bushra
FAVOURITE POP SONG OF THE 00s: ask me in 2010
[*]I LIKE POP TO…scare the goth kids away every time it’s played in[*]Claire’s Accessories.
[*]I DON’T LIKE POP TO…wear green nail varnish.

Cis
FAVOURITE POP SONG OF THE 00s: ‘nsync, ‘gone’
[*]I LIKE POP TO… bounce, blast, make you dance and sing under your[*]breath in embarrassing public.[*]
I DON’T LIKE POP TO… take itself too seriously, whinge, think it’s indie.

Daniel Reifferscheid
I Like Pop To: Grab every piece of hook and mentalism that it can gets its hands on, without feeling bloated. Also if it’s sung by aging philosophers then that’s a plus too.
I Don’t Like Pop To: sound like “Frankenstein” by The Edgar Winter Group. Guys, I know it’s tempting, but NO.

David Raposa
FAVOURITE POP SONG OF THE 00s: “Bootylicious” - Destiny’s Child OR “Back To School” - Deftones
[*]I LIKE POP TO…make me breakfast
[*]I DON’T LIKE POP TO…burn my toast

Derek Walmsley
FAVOURITE POP SONG OF THE 00s- Sean Paul- Get Busy
[*]I LIKE POP TO- seduce with the promise of alternative, parallel lives
[*]I DON’T LIKE POP TO- be uncritically British.

Diego Valladolid
FAVOURITE POP SONG OF THE 00s “Libertine (Radio Edit)” by Kate Ryan
[*]I LIKE POP TO… introduce gross amounts of distortion to the speaker,[*]eventually destroying it.
[*]I DON’T LIKE POP TO… be reproduced as accurately to the source as possible.

Forksclovetofu
Fave Pops song of 00’s: B.O.B.? Toxic? Gossip People? Country[*]Grammar? I’m torn.
[*]ILIKEPOPTO: surprise me, popularize unlikely dark corners, blow up[*]th’ joint, shake up the status quo, remix/chop/screw, move my ass,[*]embarrass the hipsters and ruffle the squares, explore new niches.
[*]IDON”TLIKEPOPTO: make everybody go “not that song AGAIN”, get TOO[*]clever, recycle beat/concept/cliche X for the nth time, involve[*]Puffy, inspire drunken beatings, be sung offkey loudly on the subway[*]by people other than me and a select group of hangers[*]on/roustabouts/hallucinations.

George Kelly
Favorite pop song of ’00s: Daft Punk’s “Harder Better Faster Stronger”
[*]I like pop to: forget to remember to forget, and to fail interestingly[*]at its experiments.
[*]I don’t like pop to: forget how to pander to the Big, the Dumb, the Obvious.

Martin Skidmore
FAVOURITE POP SONG OF THE 00s um, probably Crazy In Love
[*]I LIKE POP TO… bounce
[*]I DON’T LIKE POP TO… whine

Jel
FAVOURITE POP SONG OF THE 00s: * Avril Lavigne - Complicated * Christina Milian - Dip It Low * Evanescence - Bring Me To Life * Busted - Crashed the Wedding * Girls Aloud - Sound of the Underground * Kelly Osborne - Shut Up * Sum 41 - Fat Lip
[*]I LIKE POP TO… Be hummable
[*]I DON’T LIKE POP TO… be anything other than pop

Michael Daddino
FAVOURITE POP SONG OF THE 00s: Does Archigram’s “Carnaval” count? If not, then “A Stroke of Genius.”
[*]I LIKE POP TO…: Involve matching suits, implicit consumerist critique, and songs about crippling anxiety.
[*][*]I DON’T LIKE POP TO…: Hey, I like Godard just as much as anybody, but I don’t like it when pop draws too much attention to the artifice involved. This isn’t a demand for realism so much as a demand the illusion that pop offers to be relatively seamless. When it’s not seamless - when I have to think about the overdone application of autotune or the star’s fucked-up “real life” - it’s a distraction that makes the pleasures of engaged listening impossible.

Pete
FAVOURITE POP SONG OF THE 00s Bring Me To Life - Evenessence
[*]I LIKE POP TO…Shake my arse
[*]I DON’T LIKE POP TO… Wipe my arse

Sarah C
FAVOURITE POP SONG OF THE 00S: Bladdy hell this is hard. I cant think of anything. It’s Monday. I’ll get back to you.
[*]I LIKE POP TO…: snap and crackle
[*]I DON’T LIKE POP TO…: go soggy and or possibly encompass SNOW PATROL. SNOW PATROL! Did you see them on BBC3 last night? I mean, it’s not peonic TV and I only saw it cos I was round a posh mates house, and he made us watch it, I dunno, but he said Snow Patrol were better than the Strokes and I was like: here’s me: WA?! and then he said yeah but no but yeah but no but yeah they’re RUBBISH, aren’t they?

Steve M
FAVOURITE POP SONG OF THE 00s: Freelance Hellraiser ‘A Stroke Of Genie-us’
[*]I LIKE POP TO…: grab my hand and say ‘come with me’ (’Digital Love’) or ‘look at it this way’ (’Overload’) or ‘let me tell you a story’ (’Don’t You Want Me’) and leave no doubt it was the right choice
I DON’T LIKE POP TO…: lack ambition or belief, or indeed a good hook.

Stevie Nixed
FAVOURITE POP SONG OF THE 00s Ushah’s “Yeah” I have supah dupah short memory[*]span
[*]I LIKE POP TO… Kidnap my hips
[*]I DON’T LIKE POP TO… Unhook the left frontal lobes

William B Swygart
FAVOURITE POP SONG OF THE 00s The Delgados - Witness
[*]I LIKE POP TO… move me like it means it.
[*]I DON’T LIKE POP TO… ‘push the buttons’. Also, sneering.

Glastonbury Review 2003

Tom Ewing’s Bit

THE RAPTURE
Almost everybody else I was with hated the Rapture. I loved them. I know the songs on the much-leaked album quite well, but that wasn’t why. The thing was, by Sunday afternoon I was sick of Glastonbury, I just didn’t know it. I was sick of the sunshine, the good feelings, the optimism, the chirpy cynicism of those cunting Q handouts, the remorselessly chugging music – I may even have been sick of indie girls in bikini tops. The Rapture, a band who have released no actual records in Britain and whose most famous song was known to maybe one-thousandth of the Festival, were put on the second-biggest stage at six in the evening. Did they win the crowd over? Did they bollocks – they played the spikiest, trebliest, scrappiest set of the whole weekend. Camp falsetto, ear-basting guitars, baking-soda disco rhythms – it was fucking horrible and I adored every second. Finally Bez came on to reward us and remind the Rapture about ‘fun’. They played ‘House Of Jealous Lovers’ and we freaky-danced like the good little masochists we were.

THE DARKNESS
My theory: much great pop music eventually turns out to be ridiculous, and more ridiculous music turns out to be great. Adam Ant’s axiom: ridicule is nothing to be scared of. If you love ridiculous music, as The Darkness might but probably wouldn’t tell you, make it more so. They gaze into the powdered face of schlock-metal and do not blink. Justin Hawkins has flames on his belly and a nice line in the splits. He also has two or three thunderously fine tunes – just as well, otherwise The Darkness would be pastiche, a metal Barron Knights, not the weekend’s most winning band.

CANDLE-POWERED BOATS
The apex of hippie craftsmanship.

JOHN CALE
Cale headlined to a half-empty new bands tent on the Saturday night, most of his crowd I’d guess lured away by Radiohead. I’d take one of Cale’s frozen-over ballads over any Radiohead song (even the very good ones!), and sorry to sound like a snob but Music For A New Society templates the Thom Yorke stance and pushes it into places that I suspect are just too stark for a five-piece band to go. It’s such a powerful record that I don’t even like it, but I certainly respect it, and respect is what carried me through most of John Cale’s set. New songs, made with synths and laptops and old session rockers by the sound of it – away from the man’s aura I suspect that they were rubbish, and there was much relief among the Dads when ‘Venus In Furs’ started up. Highlight for me was a gleeful ‘Paris 1919′ – directly afterwards Cale, with a horrid glint in his eye, played a gut-churning V/Vm style glitch-grind racket. After two disgusting minutes he started singing and we realized this was a version of ‘Fear’. The man next to me had been shouting for it all night.

2 MANY DJS
The not-so-secret of 2 Many DJs is out: their set, give or take a Benny Benassi, is an indie disco. We twigged this when they played ‘She Sells Sanctuary’ – the looks of delighted recognition among Steve, me, Alan et al were I fear a piteous sight. ‘Cannonball’ we knew about from the album of course (their set had a dispiriting ‘hits’/'new stuff’ dynamic to it, its only flaw really), but when they started on ‘Fool’s Gold’ we could only laugh. ‘They’re just taking the piss now,’ said Steve. Next stop Kennedy.

THE LONDON LLOYD WEBBER ORCHESTRA
If by any chance you’re reading this, and you were camping by the new bands tent this year, and on the Sunday night your Moby-induced chill was disturbed by a bunch of fuckwits playing Performance: The Greatest Hits Of Andrew Lloyd Webber on the world’s cheapest cassette recorder, and singing along, and holding the player above their heads, and trying to do a comedy falsetto to ‘Memories’, and then putting on some dancehall which sampled ‘Eye Of The Tiger’…we’re very sorry, very sorry indeed.

Andrew Farrell’s Bit

I probably said half a dozen times over the weekend that festival bands are to bands what airline movies are to movies (or internet downloads to singles): if it looks like it might be a good idea, there’s no reason not to try it. You’re hanging around anyway, right?

So people go to stuff, and wander into to stuff, and experience things they hadn’t intended to (cause that’s the point, maaaan). So there’s probably no reason to imagine that everyone at the Vice Party on friday night (in what used to be the Rizla Tent) was there to listen to Erol Alkan, or the Audio Bullys or because it was a great time last year, or even because it was open after midnight. It might’ve been some or more or less of these, but they were there to dance.

And Erol slapped on the chart hits, and at some point a serious bassline was heard, and whooping started. Everyone liked the hell out of this, whatever it was, and it was going to start. And it was White Stripes’s Seven Nation Army, and everyone went on loving it. And singing. And dancing. And dancing.

And then it was Saturday Night, and 2manyDJs, and the continued search for that moment again. And they play Seven Nation Army to an equally loud reception, and then a few minutes later, the guitars play a song I’ve known for ten years, and me and my friends are rocking out to The Cult’s She Sells Sanctuary, and so’s everyone. DJ Swamp had the slot before and was rubbish, playing a trick-heavy set that included murdering Smells Like Teen Spirit. As luck would have it, 2manyDJs are packing Lithium, and they show how to do it.

And then it was Tuesday back in Dublin, and I’m dropping by a computer game store on the way into work, and they’re playing a bootleg of Bootylicious over Smells Like Teen Spirit, which I’ve heard before, and thought it was pretty clever, and I realise that it isn’t just clever, it’s great. I used to love one, and now I love the other as well, and I’m not alone. Both the songs have ascended to the same heaven, and they’re still not the same song. It’s girls versus boys and both sides win.

(Ironically, Erol’s proper set in the Dance Tent was pretty much identical to the Vice one)

Steve Hewitt’s Bit

RECOLLECTIONS OF THURSDAY CANCELLED DUE TO PERRY
Friday, and, before the rain, The Darkness. Now, I was quite pro The Darkness before this and it was my enthusiasm that got several people off their behinds and over to the pyramid at the unreasonable time of half past ten. And it was so worth it. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a band win over an audience quite so spectacularly. Where to start? Costume changes, Justin playing guitar behind his head, that cover of street spirit? Don’t give me that blah, blah, they must be ironic and knowing bollocks, this is PROPER ROCK with screechy high-pitched vocals and everything, but more importantly, an ability to write damn good pop tunes and share the fantastic time you are having with the audience. To use a phrase not often heard since the Gay Dad debacle, The Darkness are The Best New Band In Britain.

Saturday, and after wandering back from the cabaret tent via dancing to The Smiths outside the herbal high tent and the tastiest chips ever (well that’s what they tasted like at the time, I was possibly not entirely sober), I walked past the dance tent, silent and deserted, the ground inside strewn with thousands of empty beer cups and water bottles. Four pure white scans roved over detritus, making their patterns for their own amusement seemingly. I stood and watched for a couple of minutes until the lighting guy moved onto his next pre-set for the following day.

Sunday afternoon, and after feeling a bit tired and low in the morning, I met up with the gang once more in time for the Sugababes. Looking around at the sunburnt smiling mob I felt yet another (non-chemically enhanced, I assure you) rush of love for this four days of madness. Oh and the Sugababes were alright too, but it’s not really about the music.

Then to top it off I spotted the ace of trumps in indie t-shirt bingo (if that’s not too mixed a metaphor), a Sultans Of Ping FC WHERE’S ME JUMPER t-shirt. The girl wearing it seemed somewhat bemused when I told her she’d won, pity we didn’t have an actual prize to give her…

Freaky Trigger Pop Music Focus Group 8

Introduction & Nos. 20-16

Welcome to the Eighth Freaky Trigger pop music Focus Group.

What’s all this then? We took twenty recent hit singles and got a focus group to rate them each out of ten and comment on them. You were allowed to play a joker on one of your scores, which would make whatever you played it on count double. To bulk up the statistics a bit we also played all 20 records at a Freaky Trigger club night and handed out a ballot for people to fill in. We also sent the ballot to a few people who couldn’t make the group itself, mostly from outside the UK.

How does it work? Each record has an average score out of 10, and also a controversy score – the higher the score, the more it split our panel. The result is a TOTALLY SCIENTIFIC determination of which pop is Best.

What happened to the Seventh Focus Group?? Um….er…we used to run the Focus Group every six months, with 35-40 records and a lot more participants. These took a lot longer to do and by the time they appeared they were often a bit out of date. Finally the seventh focus group never actually saw publication – I still have a huge Word file full of edited comments and will do something with it soon, so your commentary has not been wasted!

Why wasn’t I invited? We’re trying to keep the numbers of participants down, so I just grabbed some names from my address book and sent it out to them. Get in touch if you want to be included in the next group.

Who are these people? See the Top 5 page for a list of commentators. Thanks to everyone else who filled in a form at the club night, and thanks also to Alan Trewartha whose handwriting defeated me at the editing stage – sorry Alan!

20. MADONNA - “American Life” Score: 2.57 / Controversy: 2.54

Squirly squirky squirly squirky squirly squirky squirly squirky. Ptunt ptunt ptunt ptunt. Fffffffff. Nnn-nn-n-nn. Uh-uhhhuh-uhhu. Strum-strum-strumstru-ahh-ahh-ahheh. Ghhhhhh-eah ghh-ghh-eah-eah. Stopstartstopstartstopstartstopstart stompstompstompstomp untuntuntunt sqee-ee-ee-ee-ee blat fft ink shhshhshhshh vrhhhhhhhhh ykykyk bleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee.

She’s being a bit of a ponderous grown-up which is entirely her prerogative. This is really really ace, and I quite like the rap, so there. 8 (AL)

Raps as well as Brett Anderson. Good squidgy noises. Dreadful lyrics. 7 (SH)

The funniest song in the Focus Group – ever. Like watching a particularly nasty car crash. That more cars keep crashing into. When she raps a plane crashes into the whole sorry mess. 5 (PB)

The most disappointing of the selections, what was innovative has become old, what was fresh has become narrow. The only way she can hook up with Missy is a gap ad and everyone but her knows the producers that she should work with. For the first time since the 80s I no longer care what she produces. (The odd thing is that the sung vocals, stripped of their annoying production seems technically strong) 4 (AE)

I live in Archway / I buy things off eBay / I clean my own kitchen / But here I am bitching. 2 (MH)

**JOKER** This used to be my playground. **JOKER** 2 (JB)

A poor entry to her canon, entirely sunk by lyrics written for an O-Level English Empathy essay. 1 (MA)

That rap! Oh that rap! I quite like her Gap advert song, coz it’s like her old stuff. 1 (JL)

She should know better. 0 (AC)

Maybe this isn’t really totally unlistenable. It’s semi-OK until the rap…but the rap is so excruciatingly awkward it leaves me convinced that her once-peerless gift for saying exactly the right thing at exactly the right time has completely evaporated. She bares her soul and renounces the masks that made her both a star and a critical object of wonderment, and reveals herself to be obsessed with personal authenticity, somewhat insulated from the “real world,” and given to keeping people as pets — in other words, a dismally ordinary celebrity, something Madonna never before was, and never was supposed to be.

Five years from now, drag queens will not be doing routines to this. 0.0 (MD)

19. ROOM 5 feat OLIVER CHEATHAM - “Make Luv” Score: 2.58 / Controversy: 2.14

Does what it sez, convinces you to do what it sez. Extra credit for deployment of cricketchirp guitars (I stand defenseless before thee). 8 (JB)

All bow down before the advertising industry. Or bend over. 4 (MA)

I wore Tom’s Lynx in Barcelona and no women danced around me. 2 (IS)

A night out in Cleethorpes. 1 (TH)

This is a cunt’s trick. “I like to party / Everybody does.” Right! So stop spoiling our parties! Room 5 has just taken over from Room 101. 0 (PB)

Offends most parts of me. 0 (AC)

Much though I love them Daft Punk are to blame for this. Fucking awful. 0 (TE)

18. COLDPLAY - “Clocks” Score: 2.74 / Controversy: 2.21

smart enough to let the hook be song, savvy enough to have his voice break on the word ‘home’, fast enough to skip past Radiohead directly to U2. 7 (JB)

Cocks more like. Better when he does not sing. 5 (SC)

I’m sure my boss would like this. This is just them recording their piano exercises. Rock on Grade Three! 4 – oh, and cocks more like. (MA)

Usual sludge. Nice piano. Also cocks more like. 3 (SH)

Tick tock, please stop. 3 (JL)

Cocks more like. The Moped version is much better. Strangely the song has made me acutely aware of the clocks in the room. Not their worst. 2 (PB)

The weepy and melodramatic nonsense a housewife hears in the record store while birthday shopping for an ungrateful son. She buys the album, thinks for the first time she was 17 she is cool. She isn’t. 2 (AE)

Cocks more like. More relentless than Benny B. Shut up you self-satisfied heir to a caravan fortune tosspot. 0 (TH)

17. FAST FOOD ROCKERS - “Fast Food Song” Score: 3.79 / Controversy: 3.39

Yeah! Yeah! Yeah! And it’s clever – ‘eat to the beat’. 10 (IS)

Eat to the beat! Best concept ever! A 10 for sure if it mentions Dallas Chicken. Ley change! Oh sod it. 10 (SC)

Cheap novelty, making the food is sex metaphor for the umpteenth time, so why
have I been humming it for an hour? 6 (AE)

It’s catchy, it sort of reminds me of Steps first single, when you thought they were just going to be a karaoke novelty act. FFR will be number one by Christmas, just give them an Abba or Bee Gee’s song to cover. Along with the Cheeky Girls watch them dominate the Tweeny market. 6 (JL)

How angry must the marketing director of Burger King be? Harmless playground fun and bonus points for planned obsolescence band name. Exactly as good as Electric Six. 6 (TE)

Pop is all about this: doomed romantic adolescents lay their souls bare. Passion and excitement and love. 4 (TH)

Never really convinces you of its desire
for or love of fast food (or “fast food”) the way David Trout’s “Fast Food
Song” did, and to pull off something like this requires you gotta mean it, man. 4 (JB)

Far too much verse! I had no idea! Needs a Scooter remix. 3 (SH)

Amiable chooon that would be much improved by being about ANYTHING apart from fast food and/or getting it on. Sparks would have done this so much better, and probably have. 3 (AL)

The first song played entirely on a polyphonic mobile phone. Fast Food Rockers promote healthy eating – and unhealthy listening. A song to get obese to. If you like this you are fast food rockists. 2 (PB)

Why is she singing in an American accent? This is how Steps started. 0 (MH)

My childhood set to a pounding beat. This is not good. Unrealistic portrayal of service in fast food places. 0 (AC)

16. PINK - “Feel Good Time” Score: 4.20 / Controversy: 2.75

When did Pink become my dealer for catchy sing along pop? When did she figure out when to make the perfect chorus? This must have come like a golden shower from Heaven, because something so perfect could not have contained itself in the studio. 10 (AE)

Beck wrote this ; it would be better if he sang it. 7 (MH)

Pink is the single worst artist currently working in any field of the arts anywhere in the world. I quite like this one. 4 (TH)

Destiny’s Child were assertive, sassy go-getting – attitude fired through hooks and beats to inspire admiration, ambition and respect. What on earth possessed somebody to replace them with Pink? 3 (MA)

She doesn’t sound like she would know any kind of good time. Her wretched vocals spoil what is quite good fun, hooky backing. Pink – stink more like. 3 (PB)

For god’s sake Pink stop trying to sound hard! The American Robbie. 2 (TE)

John Otway At Glastonbury – Beyond The Fringe

John Otway plays every year at Glastonbury in the Cabaret tent, but no one ever goes to see him. He had a novelty hit single called ‘Cor Baby That’s Really Free’ in the late ’70s and has reputedly been living off that in a rather sad manner ever since. This makes him a somewhat unappealing prospect.

However, in the interests of science I decided this year that John Otway must be seen. So on a sunny Saturday afternoon I joined those taking shelter inside and caught most of his act. It turned out that he was surprisingly entertaining. The music is not so good, but he has a very engaging stage manner and for someone who has enjoyed so little success he is very good at working the audience.

His act is essentially a comedic one, albeit based around musical performance. He was accompanied by another guy on guitar, who looked like an escapee from A.R.E. Weapons, but he played guitar himself on most tracks, and used on a variety of gimmicks to keep us amused. One of these was his trick of folding a coathanger so that it became a hands-free microphone holder. More striking was when he wheeled on a theremin and strapped some kind of beatbox onto himself, so that he was able to dance and make music simultanaeously. Truly this man is a genius. He also had a great comedy roadie who had to keep running onstage to re-connect mikes and stuff, especially when Otway was using the coathanger microphone. The roadie was so funny to watch that I am still wondering whether he was part of the act and his interventions scripted.

The actual music was less important. I’m not sure if I caught the Hit, and a lot of the tunes performed were covers - e.g. ‘Delilah’ and ‘Two Little Boys’. Apparently the former of these was released as a single in the relatively recent past, and charted (albeit peaking at number 192), so Otway is now entitled to release a greatest hitS compilation. I always find ‘Two Little Boys’ strangely affecting - I mean, I know it is a mawkishly sentimental song for small children, but a lot of its themes touch my heart. When listening to it I always imagine some poor fuck on a battlefield somewhere waiting to die beside his dead horse, and then he is saved by his childhood friend. Hurrah. Also, the whole thing of sticking close to your childhood friends (something none of us ever do) is a great source of regret and guilty nostalgia.

Otway finished with ‘Cheryl’ - wasn’t this the song he released after ‘Cor Baby’, the track that no one bought, thereby dooming him to a career as a figure of fun rather than a proper musical artist? I found myself thinking that it is actually quite a good tune. Perhaps in an alternate universe John Otway is primarily famous as a songwriter and not as that surprisingly funny guy who always plays the Cabaret Tent at Glastonbury.

The Dirty Vicar

WHAT’S A GIRL LIKE ME DOING AT A RINK LIKE THIS? – The Other Skate Nation

I often ask myself that too. Especially on “Adult nite” (Thursday),
which is like a singles bar — except that there’s no booze allowed and they play too much Motley Crue and everyone’s on quads (old-skool rollerskates, not designer drugs).

You’ll run into a wide variety of people at a roller-skating rink - literally! That’s probably why these rinks are still popular with the swingers who first came here in the 70s, when most USA rinks were built. Interestingly, most people who come here nowdays still look and act like it’s the 70s, especially the teens - who wouldn’t have been around for it the first time obviously, but who have somehow channelled that vibe : cheap glamour, endless flirtation, silliness, bellbottoms…

Rink skating is not so much “skating” as it is “avoiding”: when you skate indoors, you need to be a bit paranoid. There are fifty other people on the rink with you, and three fourths of them have never skated before (so they don’t know how to stop or steer). The other fourth are such good skaters that they’re bored with going round and round, so would rather go unexpectedly sideways — usually when you’re trying to pass them from behind. Ouch! But it’s a rare moment when a good skater actually loses balance. Most can twist themselves out of nearly any hazard.

And that’s the sad part. Seems that the better skater you are, the less interaction you’ll have with other skaters: you’ll be skating too fast for conversations; you’ll intimidate beginners just by donning your custom gear - and you’ll rarely fall down (providing fewer opportunities for someone who fancies you to help you back to your feet again — one of skating’s sweetest, most genuine gestures).

Oh, and about that falling down thing: you will do it at least once, no matter how good of a skater you are - so it’s best to dress for it. You won’t see the pros in low-rise pants ever. Low-rise is the height of fashion now, but if you fall in them, they will fall from you. (Trust me, you don’t want your thong displayed so prominently when there’s this many digital cameras milling about!)

Different subsets come to the rink on different days: on weeknights before dinner, it’s kiddie birthday parties and elementary school fundraisers, so I hear Destiny’s Child and Blink 182 a lot. Young kids only seem to like (or request) about different five bands. After that, we’re all at the mercy of those crusty party standards like “Chicken Dance”, “Macarena” and “The Hokey Cokey” … (sigh).

Kids are somewhat snobbish and cruel at these times — they bring their two hundred dollar inlines from home, and spend more time teasing (anyone wearing helmets, pads or quads) then they actually spend skating. Boys skate alone and aggressively, but girls huddle together like geese, making it impossible for someone who’s a faster skater to skate between them. Every so often, one girl whispers something, and then they all burst into giggles or excited screams. I’m wise to them now: I know they’ve got the hots for the referee who looks like Mike Hutchence. When I skate by, I often overhear them daring each other to do something “bad” to get his attention — maybe even get him to whistle at them, or lecture them personally by the side of the rink.

Late in the evening on weeknights, after the kids have gone home, the crowd thins down to just a dozen hard-core skaters — most of them in their thirties and forties, almost all of them on customized quads (except for the fifty-year-old who leaps about on his in-lines like a ballerina). These “regulars” like to skate backwards, sideways, concentrating on their form and footwork — always staring at each other, seldom speaking, always trying to figure out someone else’s moves. If you go out onto the rink late night like this, you’ll be scrutinized, too. Not only for your moves, but also for your shoes. Rented skates tell them you haven’t been “serious” for long — but if your form’s ok, then they might mumble a little praise when they see you in the food court next time. This crowd prefers time-tested tunes — familiar songs with slow, sturdy beats, tunes that they did routines to when they entered contests, tunes that they are now requesting over and over so that they can teach their moves to others.

Do not go late night if you don’t want to hear “You Dropped A Bomb On Me” or “Billie Jean” at least twice.

“Adult Nite” attracts some of these good skaters too, but often has a more desperate vibe. People show up in Hooters and Spanky’s t-shirts, comparing their tattoos and piercings while ranting about their disfunctional ex-spouse(s). Then the Deadheads wink at the Surfers who wink back, and they all leave at once for the parking lot. When they come back, they’re smiling and their clothes reek of pot. Adult nite music is heavy metal — with the occasional Soft Cell song thrown in by a desperate DJ. Heavy metal generally isn’t good to skate to — it’s too fast — but AC/DC is the one exception.

Saturday night is when the gang-bangers come out to skate. They usually hog the floor, even though they’re rarely good skaters. Once on the floor, they do a lot of pushing (both kinds) — usually only at each other, but with large enough gestures that those skating nearby sometimes get caught in a ricochet. Music then is mostly gangsta-rap (as difficult to skate to as metal is), but sometimes the dj slips a diva into the mix, and that’s when everyone else who was complaining to him about the rap stuff lightens up and goes back to the floor.

Then later that night, teen-agers pile in from the amusement park nearby, dragging their cliques behind them. That’s the worst time to skate — too much shoving and smooching — you’ll get elbowed in the ribs or face. That’s usually the time when I give my skates back to the ref behind the desk and call it a night …

To be honest, skating rinks are pretty funky places — and sometimes scary too — but I’d rather go there than to a proper gym. The music’s quirkier, crowd watching’s more fun, and since there’s so many distractions, it just doesn’t dawn on you how hard you’ve worked-out –

– until the next day.
When you up with sore muscles.
In yesterday’s clothes.
On the downstairs couch.

Stripey, October 2002