I Am Not The Beatles

 

Click above for big pictures, click below to play me…

” And this song is considered a perfect gem,
And as to the meaning, it’s what you please. “
 

C.S. Calverley - Ballad

If - like me - the prospect of a good Boing is the kind of thing likely to get you more than just a little excited, then you’re going to love this record. For here is a song with you for the long haul, one which realises that although an accomplished Boingking may be enough to gain your initial attention - only by following such a thing up with some seriously intelligent pillowtalk can any hope of a long term relationship be established.

Thus for every hardworking Boing which is expertly tossed off in your general direction, a roughly equal number of similarly industrious Pings, Booms and Tschaks quickly make themselves known to alchemise any embarrassingly premature overexcitement into the gold of an intellectualised discourse.

This is a brave tactic certainly but also very successful as although, just like any marriage, the Boings do eventually stop, this slowly turns a song which may appear to be an empty soulless void into something rather more interesting - a process not unlike when a new colleague starts work in the office who you find a bit vacant and bland… only to discover two years later that you now inexplicably fancy the pants off them.

For Kraftwerk’s Booms, unlike Will Smith’s much more blokey Boom!s, are not here to do anything as mundane as shake the room but instead exist to help you deconstruct the medium of pop music itself and thus create a veritable Love Tschak : a little old place where we can get together and make sweet Musique… Non Stop.

Brilliant.

Aren’t Kraftwerk More Than Just A Little Bit Famous ?

They certainly are and the story of this track is utterly fascinating - as a song called Technopop, which allegedly contained bits of this one, was originally recorded in 1981 for an album of the same name.

That album was never released however as one member of Kraftwerk had become rather oddly obsessed with the mechanics of bicycles at the time and, whilst riding one and presumably ruminating upon the exciting sound the gear change made rather than actually looking where he was bloody well going, he then rather sadly nearly killed himself upon it - putting the entire Technopop project on hold whilst he recovered from his injuries.

And it was during his recovery time that some exciting new digital technologies coincidentally came to the commercial fore and - not wanting their futuristic band to suddenly be consigned to a part of the past - Kraftwerk thus ditched the entire album they had just recorded and recreated it all again in the digital environment instead :

http://www.kraftwerkfaq.com/recordings.html#technopop

As such Musique Non Stop is a place where the band changed, and was therefore mildly controversial in Kraftwerk circles at the time, as it is a song that stands at the crossroads between two worlds - originally created in the analogue world like all their previous music had been, but now recreated and existing in the digital world like all of their (and just about everybody else’s) music from now on surely would.

In an irony some oh so futuristic Kraftwerk fans didn’t seem to spot however, alot of them were a bit scared of change - with them being downright suspicious of digitalness generally and therefore this record specifically - with the upshot being that not many people bought this pariah of a record even if it is now considered, for very good reason, to be a bit of a classic.

Want to hear the album which was renamed Electric Cafe ? The first three tracks are minimilistic magnificence personified… and terrifyingly prescient of the music that was about to occur :

http://tinyurl.com/cfjvgg

A Digital Universe In An Analogue World

” If I could write the beauty of your eyes
And in fresh numbers number all your graces
The age to come would say, This poet lies;
Such heavenly touches ne’er touched earthly faces.’ “
 

William Shakespeare - Sonnet 17

And the importance of the crossroads where this song stands cannot be underestimated.

After all, man’s ability to manipulate his own environment is what makes him inherently human and is one thing which separates us from being purely animal. In the past however our manipulation had always been within the analogue environment - ie on The Earth, constructing things like stone circles and cathedrals to make our mark upon the land and mould it to our cultural expectations.

The digital domain though is of course entirely different - as here Man has seemingly done the impossible and created what is essentially a totally new universe within the world itself which We are the God of.  This new digital universe, unlike our analogue one, can have no actual meaning as part of it’s make up however as it is constructed purely out of binary numbers (or, to put it another way, any human beauty of any human eyes when placed into it is digitally turned into fresh numbers) :

http://openlearn.open.ac.uk/mod/resource/view.php?id=187488

“…a piece of music has meaning for us… but when we take these things across the boundary, they are stripped of their meaning. They just become numbers, their human associations lost. If their meaning is to be regained, they must be transported back from the digital to the human world.”

As such meaning must thus be plastered onto whatever objects we put in the digital domain and are now transporting back. But the problem with plastering meaning onto objects rather than just having feelings about them is that you end up objectifying them ie your feelings about them become exaggerated - something that Lara Croft can more than attest to.

In Kraftwerk’s case the transporting back process is just a question of performing the songs they put there, and they thus gain whatever exaggerated meaning we perceive about them at the time. In other words, although “such heavenly touches ne’er touched earthly faces” they do touch objectified unearthly ones.

And this is presumably why Kraftwerk inspire such huge devotion, and also why a total of seven spoken words put over a sparse electronic beat with no discernible bassline can feel curiously and oddly emotional - as the meaning of Musique Non Stop is quite literally… what you please :

http://openlearn.open.ac.uk/course/view.php?id=1306

http://www.kraftwerk.com/

Money Update

Cost : 8 pence
Current Value : 3 pounds and 37 pence. Gosh, this wasn’t just not a hit in the UK but anywhere. Every single country it was released in… it totally stopped.
Current Profit : 332 pounds and 55 pence. You, like me, probably ignore this bit these days. But hey, it’s musique to my ears.

Want to hear some cover versions of this song? Make the most of them, this has never happened before. Click here.

Want to hear Karl Bartos’ (a Kraftwerk founder member but now ex-Kraftwerk) fantabulous version of Baby Come Back ? It is almost precisely like Musique Non Stop - but on much stronger drugs :

Supporting Cast Update : Smith, Will

Click above for big pictures, click below to play me…

Basements are, by their very nature, always situated downstairs - and Biba’s Basement is no different in this regard, located as it is bang slap between Biba’s legs.

Biba’s Pet Name For Her Vagina… Is Her Basement ?

Biba’s personal referencing system for her own genitalia is sadly unrecorded, but it seems Ken Foreman - the lead singer of Thrashing Doves - certainly likes to view it in that way. Unfortunately however with this song Ken also wishes to voice his displeasure concerning the general overall state of Biba’s Basement, as when he popped down there recently to check that it was all still watertight… he found something ticking.

Ticking ?

Yes - and he isn’t referring to the watch he accidentally left behind the curtains on his previous visit either, as he appears to be using the word ticking in what posh linguists would describe as the present participle ie Biba’s Basement… is covered in ticks.

Ugh.

Don’t panic though as Ken is clearly on the case and after a brief investigation is currently laying the blame for this ticking squarely, if not necessarily entirely fairly, on the fact that Biba’s Basement has a Persian rug outside it’s door.

Errr… Isn’t That A Perfectly Natural Look For A Vagina ?

In my strictly limited experience, yes – but it doesn’t appear to be to Kens taste at all.

Anyway, in a desperate attempt to gain control of the situation he has just tried smoking the ticks out of Biba’s rug, but that made no real difference to the overall basement. In fact, so bad is the infestation that he is currently rather candidly advising Biba she may well want to consider getting some sort of a replacement.

Rug ?

Basement.

Now, I want to state plainly here that I don’t think such a transplant is either particularly viable or especially necessary either but - whatever the rights and wrongs of the situation - it’s too late now… as if you take a look at the front cover Biba is already

a) under sedation

b) mid operation, and

c) having her right breast groped by the surgeon who apparently just can’t help himself.

The big perve.

Hmmm… I don’t trust this lead singer of Thrashing Doves at all – we met previously you see about a year ago, and in that instance he was found to be rather arrogantly withholding some vital truths of the situation within which he found himself, and as a result made me look rather stupid.

Well, that tendency to lie hasn’t really changed I’m afraid. Just listen to the end of the second verse for example, where he rather stupidly tries to convince us that Guy Fawkes was a close personal acquaintance of his - which would make Ken at least 402 years old, the silly bugger.

Perhaps He Meant To Say Guy Ritchie ?

Guy Ritchie ? Why on earth would the lead singer of Thrashing Doves possibly be a friend of Guy Ritchie ?

Well, towards the end of this song I note that Ken claims to have also recently visited the basement belonging to Guy’s soon to be ex-wife, Madonna – so it could be that Guy had coincidentally popped down to her basement to start collecting his stuff at the same time that Ken was there.

That would certainly make Madonna’s basement a tad overcrowded wouldn’t it ? Anyway, I think you’ve probably misheard a rather key lyric here, as Ken doesn’t refer to Maddies basement – but Maggie’s Basement.

As in Margaret Thatcher.

Fucking hell. Ken has been rooting around Margaret Thatcher’s basement as well ?

I am afraid that when it comes to basements… our Ken isn’t really that picky.

What’s more, in a coincidence which is all too rather revealing, once he got down there he found Margaret Thatcher’s basement to be bloody well ticking too… so, just like Biba, he has advised her to get a replacement.

The Sick. Fucking. Bastard.

It is, I must admit, a bit of a coincidence that of the two basements most recently visited by Ken both were found to be ticking. As such it is becoming increasingly obvious to me that Ken is the sick man infected with the genital ticks - and he is consciously, purposefully and maliciously spreading them around any old basement he can get his hands on before then using his camp powers of persuasion to force himself onto his victims and carry out some totally unnecessary vaginal replacement surgery.

Then, if that wasn’t enough, he also cops a quick feel of their breasts and takes a photograph as some sort of a ’souvenir’.

This man needs help.

Fast.

Would Margaret Thatcher Ever Get Her Revenge On Thrashing Doves For This Sleight On Her Vaginal Health ?

Yes – she would mercilessly and unrelentingly bring down their entire fucking career at the exact moment their next single was released.

We have, as I say, met Thrashing Doves here before with their previous effort Matchstick Flotilla. So, if you don’t know the full story of how Margaret Thatcher Got Her Own Back – or even if you just want to read a famous tale you already know of but this time with the phrase ‘they were totally fucked’ as part of the narrative – then click here:

http://www.iamnotthebeatles.com/?p=89

Incidentally, the link above also details what all the members are up to these days – although we did miss out one by mistake :

http://www.iamnotthebeatles.com/?page_id=318

Just How Camp Is Ken’s Performance?

Very.

In fact,I have just held my ever trusty campometer (otherwise known as my left ear) up to the speaker and it currently claims that this vocal for Biba’s Basement is a rather astounding 147 times more camp than the 4 minute mincefest that is Matchstick Flotilla - as this time Ken seems doubly incapable of refraining himself from ooohing and aaahing all over the place making this song sound not unlike Alan Carr : The Musical.

The best bit though is the intro :

“One, two… one two three PHWOARRRR…” it all begins as if Ken is touching himself whilst looking at a photograph of the slightly tearful remaining members of Take That just after Robbie Williams had left – with both his Phwoarrrr and his passion obviously reserved for Mark Owen.

Is Ken As Camp As His Singing Would Suggest ?

You can find out for yourself if you like, by watching the video :

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rUUoLFnBagk

Sorry, I Can’t Be Bothered To Do That… Can’t You Just Tell Me ?

Ok - the answer is ‘No… But.’

With the ‘but’ bit being the fact that every single ounce of camp floating around in the known universe appears to have been distilled into Ken’s right leg which is the campest right leg I have ever set my eyes on… but the rest of him, oddly, remains totally unaffected.

Which is all a bit unsettling to be honest.

Money Update

Cost : 8 pence. Want to find out more about Thrashing Doves ? http://www.thrashingdoves.co.uk/html/press_archive.html

Current Value : 2 pounds and 34 pence… which is 1 pound and 4 pence less than their previous effort. Incidentally, if you are the owner of a basement which is unfortunately ticking you may want to get one of these : http://www.lymediseaseaction.org.uk/information/tick_removal.htm

Current Profit : 205 pounds and 83 pence. The box… is ticked.

Supporting Cast Update : Winton, Dale; Carr, Allan; Owen, Mark; William, Robbie

Click above for big pictures, click below to play me…

Sing Song is a song about writing a song.

More specifically, Sing Song is a song about writing a song which is the actual song you are listening to.

In other words, Sing Song is a song about writing this song, Sing Song.

Unfortunately, this song is the same song as the song Sudden Sway are currently singing about writing - they are both one and the same - and how can you start writing a song about writing a song when the original song written about the song you are writing hasn’t been written yet ? Just as worryingly, the song you are currently writing a song about can only appear once you have written the song about writing the song - so if you are not bloody careful you’ll just end up in the pub reminiscing about the song you never got around to writing.

Sudden Sway confront this admittedly tricky problem by very cleverly making the original Sing Song (whichever one that is) into a very silly pop song.

By doing this they can write a lyric of almost total nonsense which not only comments on the genius banality of the very best pop music, but also becomes the very best pop music. This means the song can basically write itself as the best way to write about total nonsense, of course, is by writing total nonsense.

In essence then, this is a song which means simultaneously absolutely nothing whatsoever but also - because silly pop music can rather ironically be the best music to utterly lose yourself within - absolutely everything important to you at that moment.

Sorry…Errr…How Many Songs Called Sing Song Are There ?

Depending upon what you want to believe, there is either just 1 song called Sing Song… or an infinite number of Sing Song’s.

What Are You Going On About ?

Remembering that this Sing Song is subtitled f-a-E-G-s-i-n-g on the record label, the really quite lovely front cover suggests this is in fact version 4 of 8 different songs called Sing Song which (according to the equally brilliant back cover) were all packaged in the same record sleeve and sent randomly to record shops. Thus, the person buying the record would have no idea which version they were buying, or indeed if they’d even heard it before.

Remembering that logically if one song exists about writing a song there must always be another song about writing a song about to be written and vice-versa, there are arguably an infinite number of Sing Song’s all consistently writing both themselves and each other for all eternity.

And herein, one supposes, lies Sudden Sway’s point :

If there is always another song about to be written about writing a song, why not write it yourself ?

And What If The Record Cover Is Lying ?

If that is the case then there is only one song called Sing Song.

This one.

So Is This Sing Song Any Good ?

Luckily, yes.

Taking notes from M’s equally spectacular Pop Muzik (which pulls the same trick as this song by taking the brilliant banality of pop music as it’s subject by writing a song of brilliant banality) it is completely and utterly fabulous.

The back cover repeats the point that brilliantly silly pop music is ironically sometimes the most meaningful stating as it does ‘Permitted Freedom Illusion : Freedom’. ie For the three minutes that a brilliant pop song allows you to immerse yourself within it, there are times when nothing else matters.

Frankly, it seems to be saying, if you don’t thrill at the sound of a grown man straining his vocal chords to order you to do such things as getting ‘busy with your busy whizzy house mouse’ and scream such words as ‘Doggedyheadsticker’ , then I would give up on this whole pop music malarkey altogether if I were you.

Were There Really 8 Sing Song’s ?

A quick run around the internet says that, yes, there really were - and they really were sent randomly to record shops in the same record sleeve. It is worth pointing out that we are not talking about 8 lazy remixes of the same song with no input from the band, but 8 independently recorded songs all with the same song title - with different producers. Adrian Sherwood did one, as did the bloke who used to produce Bucks Fizz.

This would of course have been a totally brilliant marketing exercise if thousands of people obsessively bought lots of them on the off-chance of collecting the set, making the record a bit like a Panini sticker album with that one missing bloody sticker.

Unfortunately for Sudden Sway however… they didn’t.

Either way, this does explain the equally brilliant b-side, entitled Creative Marketing In Eight Dimensions :

In fact, I am so in love with this song after a few listens, I have created this page in it’s honour where you can listen to all 8 of the different songs called Sing Song and save yourself the absolute hassle I just went through to find them.

Where Are Sudden Sway Now ?

Although other band members came and went Sudden Sway seem to be at their core Simon Childs, Pete Jostins and Michael McGuire… and sadly, nobody knows where they have gone.

They were signed to Blanco Y Negro (part of WEA) by a chap called Mike Alway who formed the label after leaving Cherry Red (he then later started el records). He describes WEA allowing him to sign Sudden Sway as ‘indulging’ him in an interview here.

It is possible that Simon played the guitar on a limited edition record made to accompany a fancy book with a print run of just 35 copies called ‘Dust, Dobros, Desert Flowers’ by famous artist Richard Long. The book and record would have cost you over six and half thousand dollars to buy it at the time - but if it is just the record you’re after, a mere 90 dollars will get you a listen these days :

http://www.editionjs.com/img/long/

Whether the Richard Long connection is true or not however, this probably isn’t Simon’s bouncy castle .

On a similar non-inflatably-bouncy art theme, it also possible that Pete played on a record called Placement and Recognition which was published by the Museum of Modern Art in Oxford :

http://www.discogs.com/viewimages?what=R&obid=801503

But again, whether or not John Simons recently tiled his wet room and kitchen floor with Bisazza glass mosaics is a bit more up for grabs.

Beyond that there is also a web design company called Sudden Sway , a really scary looking man called Michael McGuire who works at Sun Microsystems, and also quite a few internet warnings informing us politely that wind turbulance can make your trailer suddenly sway - but none of that really helps us.

The only legal Sudden Sway you’ll find on the internet is Cherry Red’s re-release of their second album ‘76 Kids Forever which is described as a ’soap opera musical’ here. However, Spacemate (the boxed album which a version of Sing Song was on) has basically disappeared and their third album Ko-Opera is only available secondhand.

Incidentally, Spacemate looks bloody brilliant - take a look at this review from Smash Hits. One of the reasons it looks so good is both that and this lovely single cover were designed by a chap called Jon Wozencroft who later went on to form Touch.

There is a Yahoo group for fans old and new of Sudden Sway if you feel the need for further investigation. All the members seem tremendously nice, and there are scans of some of the Spacemate inserts and lots of other goodies to take a look at :

http://launch.groups.yahoo.com/group/suddensway/

Here is a short article about Sudden Sway, apparently written by the keyboardist from Scritti Politti, with a nice link to their second admittedly odd Peel Session called Hypnostroll :

http://rhodri.biz/cos-e-tech/

And here they are, in dodgy sounding VHS glory, playing on Whistle Test. In a box :

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K3d7tUs7K7g

” hehe i know the guitarist, hes ma sisters dad livs in scotland” claims one of the comments below it…

Simon ? In Scotland ?

Money Update

Cost : 8 pence

Current Value : This is a bit tricky. The entire point of the exercise was, of course, for nobody to know which particular Sing Song was inside each identical cover and none I could find actually specified their contents. I will therefore just take the lowest price I can find - safe in the knowledge that Sudden Sway’s shenanigans are still being successful over 20 years after they started them : a rather magnificent 5 pounds and 54 pence.

Current Profit : 158 pounds and a single solitary penny. Which made me sing a bit.

Supporting Cast Update : Scritti Politti; Bucks Fizz; Sherwood, Adrian; Long, Richard

Click above for big pictures, click below to play me…

On the evidence of this truly excellent song, Secession may well be the most cruelly overlooked band here. Essentially a pop song for The Secret Goth Inside Us All, ‘The Magician’ is nothing short of majestic.

Taking ‘I Will Survive’ as its basis and the reflective finale of ‘The French Lieutenants Woman’ as its centrepoint, this song exists in the haze of a post-coital cigarette mere moments after Sisters Of Mercy have given New Order a rather ill-advised right royal seeing to in a crappy B&B in Lyme Regis.

Realising these painful attempts at a relationship to be a mistake they leave New Order dozing lightly and, slipping on their blackest cloaks, they go. They walk out the door and head down to Lyme Bay for a tearful walk along it’s famous cob - looking, as they always do, like the four Meryl Streeps of the apocalypse.

Standing at the Cob’s nether reaches with the empty sky above them and violent sea spraying unforgiving salt onto their mirrored shades, they are now bang slap in the middle of their own middle 8. This is the mystical place where the mysterious magician - Is this a metaphor for the human heart? Is it your next infatuation ? - allows the hurt of lost love and separation to pass and for the individual to move on.

The Magician knows that this hurt will always be replaced with the eternal dull ache of lost opportunity, but also that this is the way it must be. Without this we would never realise - as Charles does at the end of ‘The French Lieutenant’s Woman’ - that ‘life is not merely a symbol, it is not one riddle and one failure to guess it, it is not to inhabit one face alone or to be given up after one losing throw of the dice; but it is to be, however inadequately, emptily, hopelessly into the city’s iron heart, endured. And out again, upon the unplumb’d, salt, estranging sea’.

Brilliant.

Secession Update

Secession hail from Glasgow in Scotland, and the story that surrounds them is typical of many a local music scene. ie Fledgling bands often nick each other’s members in an attempt to find that hidden magic formula.

Various musicians and vocalists later of Reef, Kula Shaker and Toploader all played together in different permutations of the same band when growing up, for example - and somewhat more illustriously, two members of Secession would very soon go on to be in another Glasgow band cited by Kurt Cobain to be a major influence on his songwriting.

Before the Nirvana part of this story however, let us first note that information concerning Secession is not exactly easy to find. Their unofficial myspace site has only managed to scrape together a pretty lonesome 15 friends :

http://www.myspace.com/secessiongroup

Worse, all the information they give about the band was just copied and pasted from their extremely brief Wikipedia entry. This entry has the definite whiff of an ironic inside job about it, as it includes everybody’s middle initial in a (very successful) attempt to confuse Google - and (at the time of writing, please see the note at the bottom of this article) describes another Secession song called ‘Sneakyville’ rather knowingly as ‘a popular dance hit about the Charles Manson Family murders’ :

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Secession_(band)

Now, the above link also claims that Secession’s lovely gruff vocalist - Peter Thomson - sadly died in the late 1990’s.

Interestingly however, a reasonably well known Scottish artist - also called Peter Thomson - graduated from the Glasgow School Of Art one year after Secession were formed, apparently disappeared for the entire length of their existence, then only started doing any actual exhibitions one year after they split up… which is six years after he graduated. This Peter Thomson is alive and painting so, even if it isn’t Peter from Secession, it is still one fuck of a coincidence :

http://www.compassgallery.co.uk/cg-exhibitions-7.htm

Hmmm… anyway, although it will come as no surprise that nobody’s tried to make the above vaguely dodgy link with Secession before, it will probably come as a bit of a surprise that nobody also seems to have noticed the following…

Nirvana Update

The drummer in Secession is a chap called Charlie Kelly and the bassist is called James Seenan.

Charlie’s brother is called Eugene. A friend of Eugene’s called Frances McKee was once in a band, called The Pretty Flowers, with both Sean Dickson soon to be from the Soup Dragons and Norman Blake soon to be from Teenage Fanclub. This band split and eventually Frances started a band with Eugene called The Vaselines.

Eugene then asked his brother Charlie and his friend James - both from Secession - if they wanted to join too, and they said yes :

http://www.geocities.com/SunsetStrip/Towers/7085/index.html

The Vaselines went on to be Not Very Famous At All At The Time, but were that previously mentioned major musical influence on Kurt Cobain, and their reputation has only grown. Indeed, according to the biography ‘Heavier Than Heaven’ Kurt even named his daughter after one of The Vaselines : Frances Bean Cobain. To help you realise how long ago all this was, here is a picture of Frances with her mother these days :

http://tinyurl.com/2kkot6

Anyway, as well as recording a few of their songs with Nirvana, Kurt also invited Eugene Kelly onstage at the 1991 Reading Festival for a duet of The Vaseline’s song Molly’s Lips - a moment Kurt would later claim to be one of the greatest moments of his life. There is a more in depth look at this relationship, along with a nice picture of Kurt singing with Eugene, here :

http://www.geocities.com/SunsetStrip/Towers/7085/index.html

And Finally…

James went on to record in a few bands like The Painkillers and Suckle with Frances McKee - but has since gone missing.

Charlie went on playing with his brother Eugene in Captain America (later renamed Eugenius) and hasn’t disappeared as such - but with his myspace profile set to ‘Private’ details are certainly sparse :

http://www.myspace.com/charlieboykelly

Which only leaves Carole Branston… so presuming that she didn’t retire to her family’s mansion to count her Branston Pickle millions - Carole, where are you ?

Money Update

Cost : 8 pence

Current Value : 3 pounds and 9 pennies. They’ll never understand the joy this gave me - as the last time anything was worth more than this was six weeks ago, with Boys Wonder

Current profit : 143 pounds and 70 pence. Want a copy of their allegedly superb only album, ‘A Dark Enchantment’? It’ll cost you - usually 80 quid or more - but here, thanks a generous exchange rate, is a cheap one for 50 : http://www.amazon.com/A-Dark-Enchantment/dp/B0009E5YJY EDIT - Friday 23rd November. Well, there was one there. But one of you appears to have bought it.

Supporting Cast Update : Sisters Of Mercy; New Order; Reef; Kula Shaker; Toploader; Kurt Cobain; Nirvana; Eugene Kelly; Frances McKee; The Soup Dragons; Teenage Fanclub

I Am Not The Beatles Update : As you have probably already noticed, a very lovely person called Funk Police appears to have updated the Wikipedia link with more inside information than you can possibly imagine, thus making all my speculation above look really rather silly. It’s about bloody time though isn’t it? All I ever seem to do is moan about Wikipedia, and then never actually do anything about it. Thank you Funk Police… whoever you are. Oh, and thank you also to Margaret - Peter’s widow - for contacting us  and being incredibly lovely. Pop off to the comments to see how it all unfolded.

Click above for big pictures, click below to play me…

Miltary HQ

The sergeant sits behind a desk. A soldier runs in breathlessly.

Quick sir, you’ve got to help.

What is it soldier ?

It’s the army sir. It’s in distress.

(Decisively) Right. I have dealt with exactly this kind of thing before, and what you have to promise me son is that no matter what happens - don’t get low about the situation, OK ?

Don’t get low, Sergeant ?

That’s what I said, soldier.

Forgive me if you think I am speaking out of turn here Sergeant, but the army is surrounded and hopelessly outnumbered. Thousands of our best men and women are about to die, and you are asking to me not to get low about it ?

This is more complicated than you realise. But can I just say we are a … (he leans forward secretively, and taps his nose) ‘Generation of Loneliness’.

A ‘Generation of Loneliness’, Sergeant ?

That’s what I said, soldier.

Errr… isn’t that the title of a 1987 single recorded by Rupert Everett sir ?

Yes soldier. Yes it is.

Our army and, as a consequence, possibly our very way of life is about to be annihilated and you are quoting Rupert Everett at me ?

I am afraid it’s worse than that.

What could possibly be worse than that ?

I think you’d better sit down.

(The soldier sits.)

(Whispers) Look son, not only am I quoting the title of a 1987 single released by erstwhile actor Rupert Everett… we both actually are that song.

We are that song, Sergeant ?

(Sighing) That’s what I said, soldier.

(confused) Oh, I see… errr… I think. So how long is this song within which we exist ?

Just over three and a half minutes, son.

Then we have less time than I thought - we need to act decisively and quickly. Sergeant, what are we going to do about the army in distress ?

Well, luckily ‘Generation Of Loneliness’ is very clear in this regard. Our chorus quite plainly states that if we ’see an army in distress… don’t get low’.

Isn’t that more than just a little self centred, sir ?

I wouldn’t know, son - we’re soldiers, and we follow orders.

Great, so we do nothing… and what happens after three and a half minutes of us doing nothing except not getting low about it all?

We… slowly fade out. To nothing.

Good God.

( Doing his best ‘Deck Of Cards’ Wink Martindale impression) You see soldier, our existence is really a metaphor for the human condition. Every single person on this planet is initially pressed, then packaged and eventually released to sing for their three and a half minutes of existence. For these brief shining moments human beings can show the world who they really are. Then, like the countless anonymous billions before them, they too will eventually fade… to nothing. But here is the key : the really lucky ones are given a darn good chorus to sing.

(swallowing hard and almost in tears) Do we have a good chorus, sir ?

No soldier. No, we don’t. But promise me something : don’t get low about that.

OK ?

What’s The Song Like ?

It is a song which is a little bit too worried about its own mortgage, and forever glancing over the fence to see if next door’s got a better car or not.

In an era where property is identity and socialism a dirty word, it’s time may well have just come again…

Where Is Rupert ?

Rupert is, of course Very Famous Indeed - even if for the life of me I can’t quite remember exactly why. Was he in that film about pretending to a woman’s boyfriend or something, even though the character was hilariously gay ? I have no idea, so fuck it, let’s look at IMDB :

http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000391/

Have you seen many films on that list ?

I wonder if he knows the exact reason why he’s famous ?

Anyway, he is about to be in yet another film - St Trinian’s :

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/6675169.stm

I am not trying to be clever here, by the way - I just truly cannot remember and, bizarrely, IMDB jogged no memories at all…

Oh well, here’s a picture of him with Andy Warhol and Bianca Jagger instead :

http://www.richardyoungonline.com/ilovery/photos/11964?letters=y

Nice Cover ?

Yes it is. Ignore the front cover where Rupert looks like your gran, and pop straight to the back. It is a photograph taken by Werner Bischof in 1947. Werner died in 1954, but his works on the devastation and recovery in Post World War II Europe made him one of the foremost photojournalists of the time.

http://www.wernerbischof.com/

http://tinyurl.com/2qlm37

Interesting innit ?

And Finally ?

Rupert actually wrote this song with a chap called Bruce Woolley. Bruce has been involved in loads of stuff from Buggles to The Orb - but currently plays with the Radio Science Orchestra :

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bruce_Woolley

http://www.myspace.com/brucewoolley

Money Update

Cost : 8 pence

Current Value : 1 very small pound and 15 lonely pennies.

Current Profit : 132 pounds and 77 pence.

Supporting Cast Update : Buggles - Orb, The - Martindale, Wink