Grandad 2.0

INT: Grandad’s house.

Dad: So, Jimmy. Looking forward to seeing your grandfather?

Jimmy: Yes, dad. I hope he is better.

Dad: Doctors say that he’s clean now, son. Two years without a drop.

Mum: Amazing to think he’s changed so much. You’d hardly recognise him.

Dad: Yeah, I think everything’s going to be fine. Jimmy:

Yeah! Grandad is great!

Grandad opens the door. His silver hair is neatly combed and his eyes glimmer with lively sobriety. He welcomes them in.

Grandad: Hello! Lovely to see you. Jimmy! My grandson.

Jimmy: Hello grandad. You look great!

Grandad: Thanks, grandad is all better. Do you all want a nice cup of tea? I have some orange juice for Jimmy.

Dad: Sounds good dad, place looks brilliant. You’ve taken good care of it.

Grandad: Yep. Keeping active, doing all kinds of stuff about the house. Let me just go to the kitchen and get the tea.

Grandad disappears from the room.

Dad: Brilliant. He’s really done well. Hasn’t he, Jimmy?

Jimmy: Yes dad. Suddenly, a smashing sound is heard, and the sound of screaming.

Grandad enters the room, swigging from a bottle, eyes red raw, hair caked and matted against a shimmering, sweating head. He is partially retching.

Grandad: FUCK! fuckinellldooyoocuntsget in…HIC…help her fuckin…fuc…self to my fucinstuff wontyer.. 

Dad: Dad! What happened to you? You were only in there two minutes!

Grandad: Been FUCKING WELL HAVING SOME GOOD TIMES inni EH? Fore I have to look at your stupid faces…what’s that thing?

Jimmy: I’m your grandson Grandad.

Grandad: SMALL face on that cunt, like yours but smaller. *Points at Jimmy* Getcher small face sorted out, ‘therwise you’re never going to grow up, small face.

Jimmy: I’m a kid, Grandad.

Grandad: TIT OFF SHITBALLS, WEEEEEEEEHE! OOS THIS PIECE OF ASS?

Dad: It’s your daughter in law. My wife.

Grandad: BIT OF FUCKING ALRIIGHT. SHIT THIS TWO CUNTS OFF SWEETHEA…..HIC..ART…I’ll show you some old dog’s fuckin’ tricks..

Mum: Sob.

Grandad: WWWWWWWWWWWOOOAAAH!!!!

'My Bastard Dog': Another sit-com idea.

INT: Man’s house.

Man: Oi. Dog. Come here.

Dog: Arf…woof!

Man: How original. As you know, I’ve been working my balls off for a year to keep us living and you in Pedigree Chum. Which by the way isn’t fucking cheap.

Dog: Yelp! Grr…woof!

Man: …..yes. Anyway, I’m going on holiday. I picked it out of a hat full of ideas. The Arctic. Sounds nice. Sort of continental. Anyway, while I am off sunning the fuck out of my cock and bollocks, you’re looking after the place.

Dog: Yip! Bark…

Man: What I absolutely don’t want is to come back to a house that’s burned down, empty of my stuff, or covered in shit.

Dog: Howl…

Man: Which means you need to look after it you cunt. Look. I’ve left the oven on so you can cook some potatoes or something. There are some baked beans as well and the stove’s on. REMEMBER TO TURN THE CUNT OFF when they’re done. My taxi’s in two minutes.

Dog: ARF! WOOF!

Man. Good. Glad we understand each other. Fuck, i’m late. Well, have fun, and don’t shit on the furniture, you absolute cockend. (Man walks down the path and leaves the front door open.)

Man: LEFT THE FUCKING FRONT DOOR OPEN SO YOU CAN WALK YOURSELF! Don’t forget to CLOSE IT WHEN YOU GET BACK IN!!

Dog: Yelp! WOOF ARF!

Man: (Does wanker sign at dog.) Fuck off, prick. I’m off. Two weeks of sun!

TWO WEEKS LATER:

Man: What a great holiday. I don’t think. Who’d have thought the fucking Arctic would be that cold. I should have gone in July, I suppo….FUCK! (The front door is open. Dog shit all over the floor. Man enters the house.)

Man: What the FUCK is this? Where’s all my stuff?

Dog: YELP! ARF!

Man: Fucking prick. I TOLD YOU TO CLOSE THE DOOR!!

Fade out to titles.

Alan overlord.

I am Titchmarsh, the single most terrifying beast in the world. I crush skulls in my fist. I paint trees with the blood of my victims. I wear a hat made from ears, and my car’s seats are made from the skin of sinners. I am Titchmarsh.

If you don’t listen to me, I will rend you asunder and leave your scarred bones on the floor of a public toilet, to be eaten by the dogs.

That said, I am here to talk about tea. Tea, if you will humour me, is the single greatest intoxicant of our time. It is better than cocaine, speed, or cracks. Tea makes me a God, tea makes my garden grow and my cock grow roots. You think you’ve seen a man fully erect? You haven’t until you’ve seen me consume tea and fuck my way through a good area of Sussex in an all night tea fuck-frenzy.

Tea was invented a long time ago, and used to be in black and white. Back then it was sold in giant bin-bags. There were no “tea-bags” back then. Tea would be strained in sacks, condoms, and pigskins. There was only two teas back then. White and black. Milk or no milk. In fact, the first cow was made by scientists for the sole use of tea drinkers.

There are many ways to drink it. It is very versatile. You can drink it in a prison cell. You can drink it in a bin. You can drink it at a funeral. You can even drink it while attacking your family with a fork. Tea can be consumed in any orifice, but must ALWAYS be finished. If you don’t, I will cave your fucking head in. Here are my favourite teas.

1. Earl Grey. – Aromatic, nice with a burned rabbit cock.

2. Normal. – You can buy it anywhere. Put it in a mug and drink the bollocks out of it. The most famous of these is PG probably. Or Tetley. There’s Value, but you’re a cunt if you drink that.

3. Camomile. I don’t know what the fuck this one is. I think it’s probably drunk by rich people or something.

4. Human tea. Made from the secretions of humans. I drink a lot of my own tea. I am made of me. I am made of tea. Do you see? So, to end this harvest of facts, if I see ANY of you not drinking tea, I will drape your intestines over my cock and wank myself to a screaming orgasm.

So there it is. Everything you need to know about my taste in hot beverages. Now fuck off. I have a cup of tea to tip into my juddering fucking maw.

Alan Titchmarsh is a writer of romantic fiction, and a lover of tea. He also does some thing in gardens I expect.

Optimo @ Hoults Yard Think Tank. Sat 27th July. + Live mix.

On Saturday, if you're ears are tuned to the correct frequency, all roads head towards Newcastles East end to the Think Tank space down at Hoults Yard for a long overdue visit to our city for both JD Twitch and JG Wilkes, collectively known as 'Optimo'.

I won't run off at the mouth too much about them as I'm assuming that if you're reading this you'll already be aware of the gravity of reputation they hold. For anyone who may not realise this here's a a quick potted history.

Launched back in the late 1990s as Britain's 'superclubs' began to imploded, Optimo, - Jonnie Wilkes and Keith McIvor – alias JG Wilkes and JD Twitch – founded a regular Sunday night hoedown in fair Glasgow (somewhere round late '97 to be more accurate) at the Sub Club. With a music policy and party attitude that crossed borders, religions and philosophies of all kinds. And the rest, as they say, is history. Optimo, then went on to first take Glasgow, then the world.

Like John Peel before them, fundamentally they are true enthusiasts, easily among the UK’s most catholic and discerning record collector, their sets (bloated with the kind of exquisite obscurities that most would kill for) reflecting this with post-punk and acid house sitting comfortably along side krautrock, psyche and dub techno, never less than bang on the money.

They gave up regular Sunday night party in late 2010, setting their sights on a more regular international touring schedule as well as clearing out more time to focus on production, but recently they have been popping up on a bi-monthly basis back at The Sub Club.

So, Saturday see's  both Twitch and Wilkes team up (first time BOTH have played together in Newcastle!) once more to reprise the sound which defined Glasgow's last decade and a half. In these jaded times, Wilkes and Twitch make clubbing once again seem like the most exciting activity in the world.

Details on tickets and other stuff here.

Big love. X

Optimo Live @ Honey Soundsystem (02/12/12) by Thoughts On Love And Smoking. on Mixcloud

First look at 'Cosmos: A SpaceTime Odyssey'

In a in a follow up to my post about the new series of 'Cosmos' it turns out that the makers released the teaser trailer for the new show on YouTube earlier this week. With a visual tone somewhere between Aronofsky's  'The Fountain' and Terrence Malik's 'Tree Of Life' is more than apparent that the producers have thrown some pretty serious money at the show.

Presented by Neil deGrasse Tyson, 'Cosmos: A SpaceTime Odyssey' picks up where Carl Sagan’s iconic 'Cosmos: A Personal Voyage' left off. With the series is set to run on Fox and the National Geographic Channel in the US and a yet undisclosed channel in the UK (although word has it that Sky are in advanced negotiations to snap it up). With production by Seth MacFarlane and Sagan’s widow Ann Druyan, fingers crossed we could be waiting for the next big thing in 'must see' television!

About the author.

For years, Mark has pronounced the word 'Faux' as 'Fox'. Which doesn’t sound like that big of a deal until you step into a PETA meeting and announce to everyone in the room to 'relax' cause the coat you are wearing is made "entirely out of Fox Fur".

He is the bloke who pulls up too far away from the McDonalds drive-through and has to open his door to lay his entire body through the window to get his food. He lives in the hearts of hardworking Northerners. Anytime a stressed-out factory worker prays for the strength to finish another shift or a immigrant African baby sees snow for the first time, he is there.

In a much more literal sense, he lives outside Newcastle. He is 40 years old and has won several international awards in fields as diverse as music, street boxing, writing and lovemaking. He is a personal friend of Johan Cruyff and Desmond Tutu. He is also a liar.

Some have referred to Mark as a renaissance man, not because he is skilled in many disciplines, but because he has a 15th Century understanding of science and geography, also he has gout and carries around a sword. He thinks Kanye West is an airline, Billie Halliday was a rest day and that The Bay City Rollers are an attraction at Alton Towers theme park.

He is available for children’s parties - not to read or entertain; he just has a lot of free time and enjoys cake. This is his web-log: a 'blog' where Mark breaks all the rules. ,,,, Well, not ALL the rules,,,, the whole arson rule is definitely not broken and nothing like tax fraud, murder or anything serious like that. When I think about it, he still follows an overwhelming majority of the rules.

Here endeth the lesson.

My New Sitcom

Lets face it comedy sitcoms are utter rubbish these days, I swear I’ve seen funnier plots in a children’s cemetery. But don’t worry, since we dissolved our involvement in the old Tourist-Mag blog we've not just been sitting about resting on our arses, no no, we've been using the extra time this has free'd up writing this really top class sit-com to pitch to the Channel 4 or BBC 3 or sutin' and it's chock full of proper fucking hi-larious capers and stuff that I wanted to tell you cats about.

Like there’s this one scene where my brothers and I ask our Mum which one of us she loves the most and she responds, “It’s a tie …for last place!” (cue studio audience goeing PURE stark raving acka.) It’s full of super edgy, radge situations and stuff like that. Like there will be a scene where a poisonous snake bites my upper thigh right and my friend has to suck the poison out but he’s all hesitant to because he doesn’t want to appear to be a massive gaylord! Insert MEGALOLZ here!

You know, cause men would rather have their friends die screaming in front of them then to do something that kind of looks similar to something a homo person would do yeah?. That's just comedy! Here, I’m in stitches just thinking about it man. Also we are going to insert the word “bro” into other words,,,, a lot! Like a girl will ask my character, “Are you pro-life?” and I’ll respond “I’m bro-life!” Then I will high-five the one black guy friend I'm going to write into the show, who I will have a… wait for it…wait for it,,,,, 'bro-mance' with. FUCKING LOLZILLA!

Also a lot of this 'hip irreverent comedy' will focus around me and my pals relationship. The relationship will run the spectrum of 'It’s funny cause they are guys and have almost a ‘couples’ relationship, ya know, almost like they are gay but we know they are not from all the poon they slay.” to “it’s funny because they are uncomfortable in situations that may be misconstrued as gay.' LOL! Put on your laughing hats folks, it’s going to be a fucking LOLOCAUST!

Mark Algar: Let's never come here again because it will never be as much fun,,,, by Thoughts On Love And Smoking. on Mixcloud

"Dead or alive you're coming with me."

I’m not a fan of Robocop. Its a faintly dreary science fiction franchise about a metal cop who clanks and whirs his way through three incredibly depressing films, and barely manages to stop some men doing some crime stuff with some things that they made. It’s so boring there’s no point remembering who the villains are and exactly why they have to be stopped. The only thing to remember is that Robocop himself is a boring tin-man. A tedious motherboard in a tin hat. A rubbish Terminator. A normal man wearing a terrible fancy dress constume.

He’s also absolutely rubbish. There’s never been a more terrible super-hero, though I doubt he even qualifies as one?! For a start, there’s his shit suit. It looks like a fancy dress costume of the character he’s playing. It doesn’t look like a proper suit. It looks like it cost exactly five pounds ninety nine pence at the market, and was made for someone to go to a party dressed like Robocop.

Secondly, he’s slow as fuck. His walking speed is about two miles an hour. Thank God for cars, because if he didn’t have one of those, he’d be fucked. "Oi, Robocop! There's a terrorist attack you need to stop. Three days to get there? Okay, cheers then."  By that time shit is fucked up and the hostages are dead! There’s a reason there’s only one Robocop. He’s a prick. They only keep him around to laugh at him. The other cops are fleshy and weak, but at least they can get to a crime on time, and dodge a fucking bullet. Robocop is a trudging vending machine who wanders blithely into bullets and bombs. He’s a cock. There’s no stealth for a start! He makes more noises when he walks than a bag full of cutlery being tossed down a fucking great lift shaft.

So far then thats, slow, no agility and noisy. He can’t sneak in. He’s got a jet pack, but he’s so shit at flying that he just gets missiles tossed at him by criminals who luckily miss all the time due to their aim being so bad because they're pissing themselves laughing at the flying bin!
The only thing in his favour is ability to withstand damage. That’s because he’s so shit at everything, it’s all he can do. He just stands there, looking like a plastic prick, while being hammered with weaponry. It works to a certain point, until someone sticks a bit of dynamite into one of the holes in his crap armour, then bang, he’s fucked.

Robocop gets regularly trashed. And the ONLY reason he survives is the same weak humans he’s supposed to be better than fixing him up like a weary car owner who desperately hopes it will stay fixed, so he doesn’t have to buy a new one. “Oh. Robocop’s trashed again. Fuck’s sake. Okay, we’ll patch him up and send him back out to soak up some more bullets, the tin tosser.” That’s the gist.

In the LAST film (Before this awful series comes back in 2014) at the very last scene, Robocop has to fight two scary Japanese bot type things. He manages to spar with them for precisely twenty seconds, before they knock him over. He gets out of this by lying motionless, while some woman and a kid sort it out for him. It’s like an adult pretending their shit kid is good at drawing, when the kid keeps showing them another picture of a dog that looks like a shit tossed into a ceiling fan.

Robocop is a cunt.

You can force your story's shape, but the colo(u)r will always bloom.

This year's cinema landscape – to this point – has been a dry, arid wasteland of disappointing blockbusters, unfunny broad comedies and paint-by-numbers horror films. Pretty much like every year to be honest. For people who love and want to see intelligent, creative, original filmmaking that isn't risk-averse and tries to show audiences something they haven't seen before, the wait has been long and unsatisfying. Until now.

Writer director Shane Carruth's new film 'Upstream Colour' is an improvement in almost every single way over his dizzyingly confusing time travel stroy 'Primer' (shot for a reported $9000) and the leap from Carruth's debut feature to this  9 years later, is the kind of exhilarating jump you only see from a very select group of filmmakers. Where 'Primer' was cold, confusing, calculating and distant (all intentional on some level, and could never overcome its own desire to keep the viewer at arm's length) it ultimately felt like an exercise in filmmaking rather than a full-blooded film, more interested in constructing and showing off its Rubik's Cube-like time-travel logic than in creating a work of art (or entertainment) which is why 'Primer' remains a little-seen cult favorite exactly because of those flaws, 'Upstream Color' is luscious, cinematic, engaging. Where 'Primer' felt like it was trying to fry your brain and stay three steps ahead of you, nothing about this film feels thick of puzzle obsessed.


In fact, one of the beauties of Carruth's direction, editing and script is that it treats its audience with an abundance of respect. It neither dumbs itself down, nor does it sacrifice its rhythms and pacing to make sure everything is spelled out. Scenes flow almost unevenly, starting later and concluding sooner than audiences are traditionally used to seeing. This isn't sloppiness or cuteness, but a trust on the part of Carruth that if you are watching his film, you are intelligent enough to decipher and understand what's going on in a given scene and that you can put two-and-two together. That doesn't sound revolutionary, but the film's elliptical, yet concise nature isn't something one generally finds in most mainstream pictures. Sure, unanswered questions remain and linger, but they add to the film's enigmatic nature instead of becoming the foundation for a frustrating, irritating viewing.

All of which is a long-winded way of saying that I don't really want to tell you much more about it. I want everyone's first viewing to be as unencumbered by foreknowledge as mine was and I believe the less you know or think about it before and while you're watching it, the better, more entrancing that experience will be.

Much of the film almost entirely eschews dialogue, opting instead for a confident, rapid editing process marked by beautiful digital photography and an auditory combination of sounds and music that play a huge part not only in our watching of the movie, but of what's going on in the film itself. Even though the dialogue ebbs towards the end and things occur (starting with a climax featuring piglets) that cannot be readily explained, it never threatens to slide into absurdity or parody (a charge even Malick has not fully escaped with his latest work). It's not boring. It's not frustrating. It's not amateurish. What it is, is a film that uncomfortably pokes away at our conceptions of identity, commitment, control, relationships, loss and love. It invokes the power of nature, relishes in the explainable, while complexly but confidently moving with elegance and effortlessness towards its almost tragic grand finale. It's not a puzzle film designed to confuse, stump or trick you. It wants you to go along with it and immerse yourself – maybe hypnotically on some level – into its world and this existential story about the things that make us human (life, love, loss, broken beings and uncovered redemption) and beings of nature we know only a little about.

Carruth's primary theme and interpretation revolves around identity and 'whether we control our identity or whether our identity controls us.' As if that wasn't heady enough stuff to touch, there are other ways of looking at the film, including a notable subtext of drug culture and addiction and how it affects individuals, relationships and society at large. Upstream Color feels like a new kind of film and Carruth seems to be at the vanguard of a brave new generation of American auteurs. It is the kind of art that results in the best kind of life cycle for movie lovers and audiences: curiosity, investigation, analysis, obsession.
In summation, this really is extraordinary.

 

Wake up! Wake up! You’re already dead.

"People often accuse me of being a lefty,,,,"
Since the early 1990s Adam Curtis has made a number of serial documentaries and films for the BBC using a seemingly playful mix of journalistic reportage and a wide range of avant-garde filmmaking techniques. The films are linked through their interest in using and reassembling the fragments of the past—recorded on film and video―to try and make sense of the chaotic events of the present. While Curtis himself is not an artist, many artists over the last decade or two have become increasingly interested in how his films break down the divide between art and modern political reportage, opening up a dialogue between the two. The most recent of these has seen Curtis team up with Robert '3D' Del Naja of Massive attack, connecting the dark, intense music and visual work art of both with the thought-provoking vision of Curtis as a filmmaker in a haunted, captivating production. From the universally rave reviews this partnership has received, it sounds as though the two have genuinely completely redefine the very idea of "the gig". If this sounds like your thing or if your interested in finding out more about Curtis (many may well remember him from early series' of Charlie Brookers 'Screenwipe') and we encourage that you do, then grab your thinking cap, settle down, and enjoy some time with of one of the UK’s most revelatory filmmakers. A good place to start, and my personal favourite of his work is his 2007 series 'The Trap: What Happened To Our Dream Of Freedom' which covers subjects such as cold war era Game Theory, behaviour modifying drugs, Dawkins' 'selfish gene' analogy as reductionism and Isiah Berlin's concepts of positive and negative liberty.

 

Curtis' most recent dissection of life in the modern era 'All Watched Over By Machines Of Loving Grace' is another work of almost unparraled brilliance. Shown on BBC 2 back in 2011 this series of three films see's Curtis argue that we have been colonised by the machines we have built. From the dreams of internet Utopians and again he refers back to the "selfish gene" theory of human behaviour and onwards to the Twitter and Facebook revolutions. The films show dramatically how in every case there is an underlying vision of human beings as nodes in networks acting and reacting to flows of information around the system. As usual, Curtis illustrates his ideas by telling an extraordinary range of stories, from novelist Ayn Rand’s tragic love affairs to the dreams and the frightening reality of the hippie communes, to the brutal politics of the Belgian Congo. In an age disillusioned by politics, this machine ideology seemed to offer a new way of ordering the world. But the shift in ideologies has come at a very high price – the idea that progress and political struggle can change the world for the better.

   
All watched over by machines of loving grace from mayo11 on Vimeo.

Well, we usually try to give you some music to listen to in our posts and in the interests of nothing more than self promotion we decided to whack up a mix I did for the radio show back in January when the show had first aired. Quiet timely actually as the Femi Kuti and Alicia Keys tracks are finally getting full releases now so I guess we'll say that's the reason we've put this particular mix up. Yes, that'll do. X

 

Mark Algar * Scrap Irony mix. by Thoughts On Love And Smoking. on Mixcloud

Live mix: Cheap Nob Gags Vol 3.

 Just a quick post for a mix I did for our monthly Saturday night radio show last weekend. I remembered to hit record at the start this time so you get the full 2 hours live and direct, crackles, scratches and fuck ups galore. Enjoy. X

 

Mark Algar: Cheap Nob Gags Vol #3 by Thoughts On Love And Smoking on Mixcloud

Billions and billions.

It's no secret to anyone who knows me or had read the old 'Tourist' blog (on which I wrote extensively about him) that Carl Sagan was and still is a huge personal hero of mine. He would have been 79 years old last month if he was still alive. He was an educator, astronomer, best selling author, and creator and host of Cosmos, which to this day remains the most widely-watched non cable series in the American TV history.
He was every bit the hard-nosed scientist while able to somehow, simultaneously not just recognize but celebrate our humanity which he found to be every bit as wonderful and mysterious as the universe within which we somehow managed to find ourselves. He did many remarkable things remarkably well before leaving us too soon at the age of 62 in 1996. It seems fitting to remember his life, work and continued impact by noting the incredible things that have been discovered and achieved since his passing that he, no doubt, would have liked very much. Among those that come to mind are the jaw-dropping images that have been sent back from the Hubble Telescope. We have found evidence of water on Mars and the moon alike. And very recently NASA scientists have determined that amino acids, proteins precursors and the building blocks of life, have been detected on the surface of a comet. Not as contradictory as it may appear on the surface of things, Sagan was highly skeptical of sightings of UFOs and tales of abductions but was also one of the driving forces behind the quest for signs of life out there and served as a trustee for the SETI Institute whose core mission is to explore and explain the existence of life throughout the universe. He wanted us to celebrate our lives here on earth and to continue the search for it elsewhere. He simply asked that we embrace and employ good, sound methods, and he was genuinely, infectiously enthusiastic about that.
Thanks to the wonders of the internet, we can revisit his groundbreaking series 'Cosmos' in part or in full any time on Youtube. (since none of us probably have the 12 hours to dig in right now)
Anyhoo, my main point to this post is that 'Cosmos: A Space Time Odyssey' a brand new follow-up to Sagan's original 'Cosmos: A Personal Vovage' documentary series has finally been scheduled to be shown in early 2014. The new series will be presented by another of my all time favourite science teachers, the brilliant Neil  deGrasse Tysson and is produced, somewhat puzzlingly by Seth MacFarlane of 'Family Guy' fame (I'll put my mistrust of the writer and producer of that awful piece of TV on the back burner!) and Sagan's widow and co-writer and producer of the original series Ann Duryan.

"For small creatures such as we the vastness is bearable only through love."
- Carl Sagan.

Ivan Smagghe & Andrew Weatherall: For (social) club use only.

You're living in the distopian, urban wasteland yeah? WELL THIS SHIT COULD SAVE YOUR LIFE! The Complete guide to 'Gangsta slang',,,, Ashington style,,,,,

1. Assassassination: a gangland hit on a rivals arse.
2. Biddy: An older gangster who dons a floral dress and has his hair blue-rinsed in order to display his elevated status within the gang heirarchy.
3. Blongin': Something both lengthy and ostentatious, such as a gold hosepipe.
4. Chalet: Ones home.
5. The Bronx: Wallsend.
6. Chevy Chase: Being persued by 5-0 in a Chevette.
7. Crisps: Crisps.
8. Danger Trumpet: A gun. ("I be parpin' 'you are dead' on my danger trumpet" - 'I Am Hard' by 50 Cent.)
9. Elsie: A gangsters winkie.
10. Fart One Off: To drop a heavy rhyme ("Causin' bubbles in yo bath when I fart one off" - 'Pass The Soap' by Jay-Z.)
11. Fifi: An effeminate 'Dawg.
12. Gang Banger: a sausage-like gangsta.
13. Goin' Margot: To go absolutely apeshit in manner similar to Penelope Keiths character in 'The Good Life'. ("You keep frontin' like Briars, I'm goin' Margot on yo' ass" - 'Naff Off' by Nas.)
14. Jiggy: A wig made of jelly. ("I rock a blackcurrant jiggy 'neath a cashmere kangol!" - 'Ponce Strutt' By Snoop Dogg.)
15. Ye Olde Boobe Shoppe: A prozzer.
16. Scone Vouchers: Money ("Got my stack of scone vouchers, where the fucks my clotted cream ho'?" - 'Cream Tea Thuggin'' By Noreaga')
17. Water Pistol: A makeshift gun made of ice, often used in a prison fight.
18. Pebble Dash: A crackheads fevered sprint to their local dealers house.
19. Mr Kippling: A drug dealer who possess some exceedingly good crack.

And if that shit isn't enough for you here's a mix that we've I've had on steady rotation since it energed back in December '12. Ivan Smagghe and Andrew Weatherall going back to back over almost 4 hours at Bigfoot Strikes. Big.

Weatherall & Smagghe live @ Bigfoot Strikes. Aberdeen. 14/12/12 by Tourist-Mag on Mixcloud

Op-ti-mo,,, on the ra-di-o-o-o-o!!

The monthly Optimo radio show on Rinse FM has become somewhat of a musical high point (along with Dan Avery's show) each month since it began at the start of the year. Keith and Johnny's broadcast remains one of the, if not THE best chance of hearing a record, regardless of genre or age that still has the power to stop you in your tracks and give you a real 'what the fuck' moment. We've been uploading their shows, along with other assorted oddities and bits that have caught our attention for some time now and just thought we'd give anyone missing out a polite, friendly nudge in their direction.
You can thank us later.
Big love. X

Optimo: Rinse FM. 08/07/2013 by Tourist on Mixcloud

'Lord Of The Isles' Mix.

There's been a lot of heat on 'Lord Of The Isles' recently! Occasionally a producer can quietly develop for some years before they come to the wider attention of the public, each release surrounding the talent with more good will and promoting their name in the process. The name Lord of the Isles has been increasingly spread of late. From modest beginnings, releasing on relatively unknown labels like Adult Contemporary, Catune and Ene, the producer’s name has gone from a whisper to a buzz, catching the attention of the Phonica, Unthank and Shevchenko imprints more recently. His hypnotic brand of disco and boogie-tinged house has found favor among the listening public as well, furthering his reputation and placing his releases in high demand. With little information on the Scottish talent otherwise known as Neil McDonald I've bunged this mix uop for your listening pleasure. Now go on,,,, get it up ye!!

 

Lord Of The Isles DJ set @ ReviveHer (Corsica Studios, London) 09.03.13 by Tourist on Mixcloud

The Elegant Gentleman's Guide To Knife Fighting.

It goes without sayin' that you have to admire the determination of Ms. Pankhurst's crew when it came to letting themselves be heard and bringing the much needed attention to the plight of women's rights in the days when Charlie Chaplin was actually liked by J. Edgar Hoover. By the 1960s we had Germain Greer having lengthy conversations, (as well as lengthy fanny hair,) with the food in her fridge and relentlessly campaigning for middle class women to get those boardroom jobs that middle class men were usually boxed off with. As we enter a brave new millenium you would be forgiven for thinking that womankind had reached the pinnacle of existence, hmmmm,,,
That is until you wander in to any bar in Newcastle, or in fact, in any city, on any night over the 4 day weekend. You can't move for women, who have taken up the mantle of independence and confidence,,,, lying on their back or puking in a pissy corner. Yep, it would seem that the hard efforts of the many women who came before them fall somewhat silent on the bulk of the female population of today. Sadly, the theme music from the Charlies Angels film doesnt go down too well whilst being played in a club with most of the independent women staggering around the gaff with their snide Prada strides hanging off, or crawling across the damp carpet to the bogs.
WOMEN, nowadays, are just as handy as fellas for road rage or keeping the local courtroom economy in tip top shape. We even got female England hooligans now, wanting to stick it to Johnny Foreigner as a preference to their previous-tedious lifestyle, such as watching Corrie or Eastenders or spending all day and night on fucking MSN Messenger.
Times seem to now have changed since the 1960s and now most middle class women want to be presenting the Footy, as opposed to being a bank manager or controller of the BBC. THOUGH many may think this determination is a modern development, I have to add that, back in the early 1980s the Suffragettes of The Toon were sporting cagoules, Gang Of Four T-Shirts, Trimm Trabs and drainpipes.
This sent a bit of an ambiguous message and confused girls this side of the Tyne. Was it a fashion statement? A Sexual Revolution? Had the fighting spirit of Germaine Greer reached the shores of Newcastle? Sadly not, it was just the early wardrobe of the female smack head.
Not always renowned for their sartorial efforts, this particular look spread to many field, near and far! I recently read an old article on the net from the music press, dated way back in the mid 1980s, a sensationalized piece that was based around an A.C.R. gig down in London.
Rather than the journalist's version of events, which opened with reference to a chap arguing with his girl outside the venue, it has since been disclosed that what had actually happened was that the journalist responsible for the article actually caught the end of an argument which had resulted in a yarkin upper-cut on the lad by his missus in a row over who was wearing the best Trainers? Him or her? Apparently it was her, as she was sporting Adidas SL's whilst he was still in a pair of Hi-Tech, ouuuch! OFTEN the vanguard of the women's rights movement is the eternal hater of men.
Now, some men deserve to be called fit to burn when it comes to how they view or treat women. This isn't the case of all men, though this does not deter the hater of men and that legendary line is never far away: 'A woman does not need a man to get pregnant, a turkey baster will do! AHAHHAHAAAA' Thing is, turkey basters are poor conversationalists, look ridiculous in a sun hat and string vest on holiday,,, AND CANT CHANGE A FUCKING PLUG FOR YOUR NEW CERAMIC BASTARD HAIR STRAIGTENERS FOR YOU YOU FAT, STINKING, BARREN, MAN-HATING BULL-DYKE FUCK!!

 

Andrew Weatherall * Music Is Not For Everyone by Tourist on Mixcloud