I Am Not The Beatles

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

“What’s in a name?”

Romeo and Juliet - William Shakespeare

If you’re a little wary at the prospect of dealing with yet another record which doesn’t have a nice picture to look at on the cover then just wait until you hear the bloody thing - as the more this song bounces along to slowly reveal it’s casually noxious update of the Romeo and Juliet story, the more it feels you could well be listening to Black Lace performing a surprisingly perky cover of an old Prussian Blue B side entitled Love Is A Racial Divide That Should Never Be Conquered… But If You Insist On Doing So Please Be Prepared To Die.

On one side of a river stands Running Bear himself, who is native American. You can tell he is native American as he is only able to express himself in simplistic quasi mystical nonsensical terms, such as his love which is as big as the sky.

As metaphors for love go however, this is of course no good whatsoever - as the entire point of such metaphoric mayhem is to compare the desire you feel for your lucky loved one to something either endlessly eternal or immeasurably infinite… and no matter how bloody big the sky may actually be, it does unfortunately have a very definite surface area.

The big thickie.

On the opposite side of the river stands the other main protagonist who is female - and this is made perfectly clear by the fact that, like all good women, she doesn’t get to say anything at all for the entire duration of the piece… although she does hang around silently looking glamorous and emoting quite a bit. Also, almost as if Burnette were drunkenly eyeing her up whilst propping up a bar late at night in his local suburban nightclub, her character is rather condescendingly labelled as a bird.

Most important for our purposes however is the colour of this bird… for the bird… is white.

So what happens when the native American Bear and the White Bird dare enter the strangely metaphorical river in an attempt at a bit of genial interracial groin grabbing ?

Well, in a disappointingly reactionary turn of events, and before they even manage to get a decent snog in, they are both ruthlessly killed and the river turns into… a river of blood.

Which as a summation of Burnette’s personal view on the value of romance between cultures is more than just a little bit depressing, and also slightly sinister.

Why Is That Sinister ? Doesn’t Juliet Die In Romeo and Juliet Too ?

She does, but she ends up committing suicide almost by accident after a Carry On style farcical mix up over phials of poison. Tragic though this turn of events may be it is important to note that her suicide is a direct result of a miscommunication between her and Romeo and that she most definitely isn’t viciously and self righteously drowned alongside her partner in something that is plainly a metaphor for modern society purely because of what her name is and what relationship she chooses be in.

To make matters worse, Burnette even tries to put a stupidly positive spin on this blatant act of racially motivated murder by telling us that -after all that unmentionable terror they both have go through first as they choke their way wide eyed to a despicable and imminent death - they are at least in a really rather patronising happy hunting ground these days.

Which, let’s face it, is a phraseology that heavily suggests he believes they are probably better off there anyway.

Burn The Burnette !

It turns out that this isn’t really all Burnette’s fault after all. Sure, he may have been a tad naive to record it, but crucially he didn’t actually write it. Nope, that was a chap called… The Big Bopper…

Burn the Bopper !

… and you can’t burn him either, as J P Richardson (Mr Bopper’s real name) is already inhabiting his own happy hunting ground in a graveyard in Beaumont, Texas after the plane he was flying in fell out of the strictly limitedly sized sky and killed him - alongside Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens and the pilot Roger Peterson.

Interestingly however, although he isn’t around his son is - as he was born just 84 days after his father was killed and they thus never met each other. In an effort to prove that this undoubted personal tragedy has in no way affected him or the life decisions he has chosen to make, his son really rather oddly now makes his money by calling himself Big Bopper Jr… and impersonating his own father :

http://www.officialbigbopper.com/video2.htm

Well, I say they have never met each other - but this isn’t strictly 100% true. It is probably much safer to say that they never actually met each other when they were both alive, as in March 2007 the body belonging to Big Bopper Snr was exhumed… and his son took this chance to have a good look at his father’s ever rotting corpse and say hello.

Well, you would wouldn’t you ?

http://tinyurl.com/3md3ul

” His mottled, bluish face was slightly moldy and misshapen - perhaps by globs of mortician’s putty needed to reconstruct his crushed skull - but he was no gelatinous pile of disarticulated bones, as some had expected. His chest had caved inward. His ringless fingers had mummified into curled, dark brown talons. He wore socks, but no shoes. “

Which as a description is, of course, all scarily reminsicent of Geoffrey Moore :

http://www.iamnotthebeatles.com/?p=81

So Just How Big Is Running Bear’s Love For Little White Dove ?

Errr… well, this isn’t anywhere near as straightforward as I initially thought - but ‘we’ do apparently ‘know two things’, even if I don’t personally know or particularly understand them myself :

” …one is that the circumference of a circle is 360 degrees, and is defined as 2 x pi x radius (pi is a number that equals about 3.1415) and the other is that the surface area of a sphere is 4 x pi x (radius)^2.

If 2 x pi x radius=360 degrees then one radius=360 / (2 x pi)=about 57.3 degrees (57.2958 to be more precise). Simply plug that into the second equation to get 4 x pi x 57.3^2=41253 square degrees. “

[There are therefore] over 40 thousand square degrees in the sky.”

http://www.badastronomy.com/bitesize/bigsky.html

The sky, and therefore Running Bear’s love, the article thus concludes “… is pretty big.”

Which isn’t, I must confess, the kind of totally precise answer I was really after.

Money Update

Cost: 8 pence. Where is Burnette ? I have no idea. I swam the raging river of the internet… and wasn’t exactly drowned with pertinent information… Oh well, want to see why my choice of phrase native American would upset some people ?

http://www.csmonitor.com/2004/0211/p08s03-comv.html

Current Value : 3 let’s patronise the primitives pounds and 56 then killthemkillthemkillthem pence. Incredibly, we are now 74 records in and this frankly over inflated value currently puts Burnette in 13th position in the league table. Yes, it is time to hold your hands up Steps-style to the sides of your head… because this is a fucking tragedy.

Current Profit : 199 pounds and 16 pence. Want to hear the original, sung by Johnny Preston in 1959 ? The Rock ‘n’ Roll groove may be a definite improvement, but the message is still exactly the same… http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kX-zgSZOjkY

Supporting Cast Update : Holly, Buddy; Valens, Ritchie; Peterson, Roger; Prussian Blue; Steps; Preston, Johnny

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

Do you remember Tommy ?

Of course I do. How is he these days ?

Tremendously well… he’s got himself a good job.

Really ? What excellent news. It’s been ages since he was sacked from the Ealing branch of Homebase for beating up the coloureds.

I beg your pardon ?

Obviously beating up the coloureds wasn’t enough to make him lose his job at Homebase in itself – oh no, he had to spend a good afternoon beating up the queers as well in order to ensure anything like that occurred - but… anyway, what am I talking about… that was years ago and we’ve all moved on since then. So what is this new good job that Tommy has now ?

Errr…

Yes ?

Well, now…he walks around Belfast…

Yes ?

…beating up the coloureds and beating up the queers.

Oh.

Are those the kind of people skills that can get you gainfully employed these days ?

Apparently yes.

Gosh, the job market really has changed since I last looked– still, he did have a particular penchant for it if I recall the local newspaper headlines correctly, so it’s nice that he’s found his niche. Is he happy ?

Absolutely – he fucking hates coloureds and queers so he’s having a great time.

What about coloured queers ?

Sorry ?

I already note that his job description obviously relates his tremendous propensity for beating up coloureds and queers in total isolation of each other – but what if you happen to be both ? Is this something Tommy can help with ?

Well, he’s only been doing the job for a couple of weeks so I suspect he needs to hand off those more complex and sensitive cases of integrated colouredyqueerness for his senior officers to deal with… but if I know Tommy as well as I think I do, it won’t be too long before he gets promoted so he can beat them up all by himself.

Good for him… I doubt I’d be very good at his good job though - after all, I rather like coloureds and queers.

What? All Coloureds And Queers ?

Well no, obviously not all coloured and queers – a certain percentage of the human race, as I assume you are suggesting, are always bound to be utter wankers – that’s just a fact of life. Indeed, I was at a dinner party with a friend of mine just the other day and during one of those embarrassing moments where the conversation briefly dried up the hostess turned to him and cooed “Oooh, you should meet Jonathan.. he’s black and gay too…”

How did your friend respond ?

“ I am sure he is, but he may also be a twat. ”

Good point.

I thought so.

Is There Anything Queer About This Record?

Yes there is.

Firstly the record label, you will note in the gallery, is marked not as A and B but as side C and side D - and secondly this poor unloved record doesn’t even have it’s own record sleeve to cover it’s fragile nakedness, which means it’s all gone a bit crackly. The only sad conclusion we can draw from this is that it used to be part of one of those new fangled doublepacks - even if I can’t find out for the life of me what the other record may have actually been.

In a way though this doesn’t really matter as, in a bizarre implementation of fascist segregationist policy, Tommy’s Got A Good Job has obviously been ripped heartlessly from the bosom of it’s immediate family by the record shop owner and then thrown naked and alone into an anonymous pack of 12… before almost being suffocated to death in clingfilm.

Is it, we must openly question, because it is black ?

Tell Me About Light A Big Fire

A few people rate Light A Big Fire alot - and on the strength of this song alone I don’t really blame them. Some claim they are the best Irish band of the era. I unfortunately can’t tell you about every single person involved in the band for the very good reason that I have no idea who most of them actually are, but two people have certainly emerged smiling eagerly from the ashes :

a) Their drummer is a chap called Mark Sheppard - who has also played drums for Robyn Hitchcock and Television Personalities in his time. He has since given up drumming however, has moved to Los Angeles and become an actor - seen most recently with Michelle Ryan in Bionic Woman:

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

b) The singer and songwriter in Light A Big Fire is one Thomas McLaughlin and he is now a playwright - although he also composes music for theatre, rather poshly is a board member of the Irish Playwrights and Screenwriters Guild and, just like Mark, has even been known to tread the boards himself :

http://www.irishplayography.com/search/person.asp?PersonID=1695

Incidentally his play The Way The Buffalo Went looks really rather fabulous, based as it is on the life of a lady called Sarah Winchester. Just read this fascinating blurb… she was the

“widow of the inventor of the Winchester repeating rifle which played a leading role in the annihilation of Native Americans. Following her husband’s death, Sarah’s guilt drove her to a medium who advised her to protect herself by always living in a remote house that was always in a state of construction. When she died thirty years later, Sarah Winchester left behind a house containing 160 rooms, 10,000 windows, 467 doors, 47 fireplaces, 40 staircases, 6 kitchens and 3 lifts.”

Want to see the ridiculously large house ?

http://www.winchestermysteryhouse.com/press.html

Want to see the ridiculously large factory where the guns were made ?

http://www.winchestercollector.org/guns/w-history.shtml

Can You Tell Me About Beating Up The Coloureds And Beating Up The Queers Of Northern Ireland Please ?

Errr… kind of…

I would recommend a quick squizz at Divided Society - Ethnic Minorities and Racism in Northern Ireland :

http://tinyurl.com/5ztyrs

which is very interesting as it essentially suggests that because of that whole Catholic/Protestant stuff any other religious/ethnic minority rarely gets a look in - and, when you’ve read that… why not note that, in 1999 at least, gay men in Ulster were 30 times more likely to attempt suicide than their heterosexual counterparts mainly due to bullying :

http://news.ulster.ac.uk/releases/1999/168.html

whilst homophobic attacks in Northern Ireland apparently doubled in 2004 :

http://tinyurl.com/5ouoz7

All of which isn’t - I will admit - exactly uplifting reading.

I Am A Bit Depressed Now. Can You Tell Me About Some Fantastic Ways To Light A Big Fire Of My Own ?

I would recommend undertaking such an exciting endeavour with either just a Coke Can and some chocolate for company… or a 9 volt battery and some steel wool :

http://tinyurl.com/4jaqd8

Which all looks rather fun.

Any Big Conclusion To Relight My Fire With ?

Yes.

This song is one of three live recordings on this record and, seeing as it was the bit of a package that was supposed to be free with something else, no real one song is the A side as such. I chose Tommy’s Got A Good Job because frankly, it is obviously utterly brilliant - despite the inherent scratchiness. After all, a little bit scratchy is precisely what I would be feeling like if I had been lying naked in a box for twenty years too… so I can feel it’s pain.

If you want to hear the original version of this song then follow the next link - I warn you though after hearing the superfast rough and tumbly live version, then the slightly slower Official Studio Version can seem a little too polite in comparison :

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

Still, you might get a chance to see it live for real soon… as there are nine Light A Big Fire songs to listen too at Youtube - and a comment left at one of them by somebody who claims to know, says an imminent reformation is due… in November.

So this is our bread today, but that maybe our jam tomorrow.

Money Update

Cost - 8 pence
Current Value - An orphaned record with no sleeve that was supposed to free and attached to another bit which I never had ? You’ve guessed it…Minus 8 pence.
Current Profit - 195 pounds and 68 pence. Definitely not a good job.

Supporting Cast Update : Television Personalities; Hitchcock, Robyn

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

” Is this a Mel Smith which I see before me ? “
It certainly is.

” Love handles toward my hand ? “
It is quite hard to tell with any real certainty as he is wearing a particularly all encompassing spacesuit – but yes, I suppose it’s possible.

” Come let me clutch thee… “
I wouldn’t really recommend that – spacesuits can be notoriously sweaty so, love handles or not, any attempt to clutch any part of Mel’s naked anatomy once he extricates himself from his suit will probably see him wobbling from your grasp as if you were trying to give a massage to a half melted block of Stork margarine.

” I have thee not, and yet I see thee still… “
I know. It is an image that rather burns into the retina isn’t it ?

Indeed, viewers of a particularly nervous disposition may well want to start looking away now as – if you click one small click for you but one giant click for mankind and take a look at the back cover - it seems that quizzical Spaceman Mel is joined not only by a bespectacled Griff Rhys Jones who has the shifty look of a man who is both on the phone and simultaneously having a piss at the same time, but also by a strangely bewigged Jimmy Nail looking over his shoulder from the bathroom door as he tries to convey his utter contempt at the very idea of such a dual activity.

“But then…” his world weary face seems to be saying, “…we’ve all done it haven’t we ?”

” Art thou not, fatal vision, sensible
To feeling as to sight? or art thou but
A Mel Smith of the mind, a false creation,
Proceeding from the heat-oppress’d brain? “
If I wanted to have a hallucination I would hope my subconscious would conjure up something a little racier than Mel Smith in a spacesuit.

What’s more, no matter how much of a fatal vision your heat opress’d brain may want this record to be, it seems that Morons From Outer Space - and you may want to whisper this - actually isn’t a pile of poo.

This does come with the rather large health warning that it took me 25 listens on autorepeat before I realised this was anything approaching the case - but luckily for you all the hard work has now been done on your behalf and you can reach the same realisation in just one quick and easy listen… but only if you follow these handy guidelines :

1) Shake off your totally understandable preconceptions of awfulness, and actually expect this song to be quite good. I found chanting ‘This song is utterly brilliant’ out loud quite alot whilst flagellating myself with a stinging nettle before pressing the play button worked for me.

2) Do your absolute best to ignore all those really bloody annoying orchestra hits that keep popping up to the surface like wet farts in a bath. And,

3) Most importantly and most definitively, listen to the song… as if it is written by and being performed by Blur.

” Mine eyes are made the fools o’ the other senses,
Or else worth all the rest. “
The preconceptions we feed our senses are an odd thing and - in much the same way that Macbeth may never have hauled himself up the ever blood stained monarchical pole if the three witches hadn’t pointed out to him that such a thing were actually possible - once you notice Morons From Outer Space really is a Blur song it is impossible to listen to it in any other way and, luckily for everyone involved I feel, you don’t have to murder anybody called Duncan to hear the immediate positive result.

” I go, and it is done; the bell invites me…
It is a knell that summons thee to heaven or to hell. “
The morons of this song are aliens who crash land on another planet and then immerse themselves in the inanities of every day living and finding themselves enjoying every single bloody second of it.

And this is, of course, also the plotline miniaturised by Damon Albarn and shoehorned into his sexually adventurous Girls and Boys who all follow the herd down to Greece. Where else, insinuates Girls and Boys, is this drunken anglicised Greece they end up copulating banally with each other in… except another planet ?

Indeed, it could be argued that Morons From Outer Space isn’t just a more expansive original version of that story, but that it is also a tad more honest - as it does at least make clear that the writer believes the subjects are morons from the outset - whilst Damon very naughtily pretends otherwise whilst simultaneously sniggering at his subjects from inside the panic room hidden in the basement of his very big house in the country.

When you finally add to all of the above that the groove of the song was obviously plundered in There’s No Other Way, that the first two lines of each verse sound almost identical to the same bit in The Universal, that the idea of using Jimmy Nail as a slightly shouty bloke in it was copied with the addition of Phil Daniels in Parklife, and that the overall lyrical styling which cleverly places the commonplace centre stage in an attempt to make our everyday lives somehow transformative - a trick Damon still uses to this day - we are left with the very big and terrifying possibility that Mel Smith actually is Damon Albarn.

After all, have you seen Mel Smith recently ?

Errr… Has Anybody Seen Mel Smith Recently ?

Luckily, yes - he is in a film alongside Derek Jacobi which is about to be released called The Riddle. Although the name of it sadly doesn’t appear to be based on the Nik Kershaw song of the same name, this does probably means he isn’t actually Damon Albarn after all :

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0790741/

Which is a relief.

Oooh, I’m Glad You Mentioned That Song By Nik Kershaw. I Have Always Wondered What The Riddle Was All About..

Well, wonder no more… as according to Nik himself, quoted in a forum :

“…we started recording and I threw a rough guide vocal down using jibberish lyrics. As the album progressed, I tried various different lyric ideas but nothing seemed to fit as well as the guide lyric. So we decided to stick with what we had. “Let’s call it the Riddle”, I thought. Then people would think it was actually about something. In short, “The Riddle” is nonsense, rubbish, bollocks. “

So there you go - a confession that it was all a silly load of old nonsense… but what was the first response ?

“I think Nik was lying.”

And the second ?

“I also believe Kershaw is lying”

Sometimes you just can’t win can you ?

http://www.songmeanings.net/lyric.php?lid=6421

Where Are Griff and Jimmy ?

Griff Rhys Jones is on telly loads these days :

http://www.griff-rhysjones.co.uk/

However since 2004 - when he appeared in Auf Weidersehn, Pet - Jimmy Nail appears to have completely disappeared…

http://www.jimmynail.org/

Oh well - want to watch Ain’t No Doubt to cheer yourself up ?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4iF47M3YDlg

Can You Tell Me Moron ?

Yes I can, and don’t call me Ron.

The song Morons From Outer Space is from a film of the same name I’ve never seen, and was directed by a chap called Mike Hodges who was also the director of famous stuff like Get Carter and Flash Gordon. It’s central premise is to suggest that aliens do exist - but when they finally arrive it turns out we are worryingly more intelligent than they are :

http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0388198

http://www.sci-fi-online.com/reviews/dvd/05-01-24_MoronsOuterSpace.htm

Want to see a real flying saucer ?

http://www.livescience.com/php/video/player.php?video_id=310707FlyingSaucer1

Don’t forget to read all of the viewers comments beneath it - that’s almost as much fun as the video itself…

Money Update

Cost : 8 pence
Current Value : I am not exactly hopeful …. errrr… 1 pound and 5 pence. Which isn’t very much at all but is just a little bit more than that randy Geoffrey Moore-on.
Current Profit : 195 pounds and 76 pence. Incidentally, the most Damon Albarny bit is a little shout of Hey!Hey! at 2 minutes and 17 seconds… so stick with it intrepid listeners…

Supporting Cast Update : Jacobi, Derek; Kershaw, Nik; Daniels, Phil; Macbeth.

‘Where three balalaika players meet, the fourth one ought to be a communist.’
Vladimir Lenin

‘Where three communists meet, the fourth one ought to be a guitar player.’
Woody Guthrie

‘We are in… united state,’ this record asserts in its chorus – and the importance of the exact phrasing of this seemingly innocent sentence cannot be overstated.

For it is not saying we are in a united state, in the same way that we obviously all live in a mindbogglingly large and very possibly invisible yellow submarine. No, it is more subtle than that - as there is no ‘a’ as a prefix – which rather worrying for The Lift means that we are in… united state in the same way that we are in… deep shit.

Are We In… Deep Shit ?

We are certainly in some really weird shit, as this record starts off sounding like a drunken ‘A’ level politics student doing his best ABC impression at an end of term party in an increasingly shrieky attempt to impress the girls… and then ends up wanting to be that one crossover record ravers request at 4:50 in the morning when both their E and the sun is rising.

Does It Make You Feel Lift-ed ?

Not really.

The problem here is this is a song which concerns itself with the possibility of us all being in some sort of theoretical united state which we may wish to try and experience at some point in some sort of theoretical future, and it therefore follows that this is categorically not a song designed to create the atmosphere necessary to actually put us in some sort of united state in the first place - whether socialist or hedonistic, and as such it kind of misses the point.

Indeed, after all the initial excitement at the beginning where we take it in turns to try and figure out exactly which bit is the chorus, I suspect the only united state we all as listeners will commonly attest to is one of vague detached bewilderment as we desperately reach for a calming and reassuring glass of chardonnay.

What Sort Of Song Is United State ?

Any perceived failure however should be tempered by the fact that The Lift have attempted to write that most tricky of tunes, the we-are-song and pretty much all attempts at such an endeavour usually end in abject and totally embarrassing we-are-most-definitely-not type failure.

When Rod Stewart, for example, tries to convince us that no matter how landlocked our lives may appear to be geographically and/or socially we are actually in a very deep sense always metaphorically sailing home across the metaphorical sea, the only response most sensible music lovers feel is a desire to very sensibly metaphorically vomit overboard.

Were The Lift Shaft-ed ?

Well this song wasn’t a hit if that’s what you mean, and – in a shocking turn of events - if you listen very carefully you will note that so unsuccessful was this song the snare drum used within it is actually a sample of the single gunshot fired by Magnet record executives into the head of the man that signed them.

This disturbing fact however is quite literally just about all I can tell you, as nobody has this successfully jumped off the planet never to be seen or heard of again since the dark days when Level 42 jammed with Scott Walker, Death and the ever lovable… Steve Carlton.

In quite a pleasing episode though, this does at least mean that both members of The Lift are currently in a very united state indeed – even if it is only the United State Of Total Disappearance.

Oh Well. Have You Found Any Other Interesting Lifts Instead ?

I certainly have.

Here are pictures of some of the world’s most amazing lifts, as well as a few videos of people travelling inside them. Please take a peek, as just the look of some of them may well make you poo your pants a little :

http://deputy-dog.com/2007/10/02/interesting-elevators

Meanwhile, here is one interesting lift the above link doesn’t mention - at a place called the Dom Aquaree in Berlin. Brilliantly, it takes you right through the middle of a stupidly large indoor aquarium :

http://www.flickr.com/photos/chrys/63665332

And if you think that’s odd, how about this for an idea : The Space Elevator. I must state here that this truly is a Very Serious Project and is in no way taking the piss…

“For a space elevator to function, a cable with one end attached to the Earth’s surface stretches upwards, reaching beyond geosynchronous orbit, at 21,700 miles (35,000-kilometer altitude). After that, simple physics takes charge…”

http://tinyurl.com/12v2

Is There Something You Probably Shouldn’t Mention But Just Can’t Help Yourself ?

Yes.

The B-side of this song is called L.I.F.T. - and here it is :

After enjoying United State please play this and stick with it until you at least hear the ‘If music be the food of love…’ bit, because that scary eyed chap on the front cover who I am presuming is the vocalist - and who is stamping his heels on the heads of the general populace below him as if to show what would really happen to you and I in any so-called united state if he ever got even the slightest whiff of power - does

a) A few overrexcited raps

b) One or two manly Huh’s for good measure, and

c) Despite the fact he probably hails from a small village in Wiltshire or somesuch, he does both a) and b)… in a not very close approximation of an American accent.

This horror is made all the more poignant as, in a sad echo of the A side’s fatality, the snare drum used within this B-side isn’t actually a sample at all - but is the sound of a gun being passed around Magnet record executives as they slowly shoot themselves in the head.

One. By. One.

Money Update

Cost : 8 pence

Current Value : 1 pound and 15 pence. We are in… solvent.

Current Profit : 194 uplifting pounds and 79 united pennies. Not a bad state to be in.

Supporting Cast Update : ABC; Stewart, Rod; Guthrie, Woody; Lenin, Vladimir