"Come all you rambling boys of pleasure
And ladies of easy leisure
We must say Adiós! until we see
Almeria once again"

Eugh some dirty cunt-stomer gave me germs and stuff and made me have to have two extra days off. It wasn't all that unpleasant really having to sit there in my armchair playing my PS3 games from Christmas and eating my sweets of yore. (drumsticks, sherbet fountains, black jacks, chalk lollies and parma violets) Mmmm lovely. Anyway I forgot what I was going to write about so I'll try to come up with something. I'm a little bit disappointed about the fact that everywhere got snow fairly heavily and we got it for about a day and a half. Although my road is still covered in a sheet of compacted snow yet to melt. It is quite funny to watch people walking past as if they've had an accident in their trousers. To tell the truth I'd rather have about three foot outside the door and more on the way so that I could get snowed in at home so I can get further along with Call of Juarez and Wolverine whilst chomping away on sweets. I'd like to have been bedecked in my new Modern Warfare 2 t shirt whilst also playing that game but for the life of me I can't find it, just like my sex life and self esteem it has just disappeared into thin air.
Still, pay day this weekend and I've got it off for a change so that'll be me off to Poole for a full English, comics and a laugh at the great unwashed. I must remember to take a notepad to write down my witticisms and scathing character assassinations.
Anyway in the meantime here's the Jam box set 'Direction Reaction Creation' for you. Enjoy the music.

"Now watch this
Toodle langa langa Toodle langa fang
Toodle langa langa
oodle langa fang I'm in heaven
I'm In heaven I'm In heaven when you smile."

I made this (It's the Internet) for a friend at work. If you haven't seen it it's from the I.T Crowd which is really funny and I hope there's a fourth series. Anyway, I did really well this year as far as presents go both received and given. Everybody was happy with what I bought them and some people even resisted the urge to open them before the big day itself. I was pretty pleased with all the stuff I got for others too. I had a change to the original plans for Christmas day instead of the planned fry up we went for Pukka pies, mash and peas mmm lovely. My favourite present (although they were all good) was the unexpected bonus box of sweeties from my childhood. I'd forgotten how much I liked Sherbet Dib Dabs, Sherbet Fountains, Black Jacks and Fruit Salads mmmm. Anyway Christmas was a very nice break only spoilt by the fact that I had to go back to work on Boxing day to put up with people bringing back stuff that their son Mungo has broken by smashing his fists on them whilst chained up in the basement. I was upset not for that reason but for the fact that I had to get a taxi into work as it was pissing down and there was no bus service on Boxing day but the company won't reimburse me the thirty quid I had to spend. If I'd known I'd have stayed at home and taken the loss of wages instead. But the reason I didn't walk out after shouting at my manager was the fact that I wanted my 50" tv. New year's eve was spent playing one of my presents Batman Arkham Asylum so I missed it all. That is until I suddenly thought at around 0030 hrs "Hmm there's a lot of fireworks... must go to bed... Oh it's new years eve." Suddenly I felt sad that I wasn't getting a New Year snog (or better) but this was passing so I went to bed. I finished Arkham Asylum the next day (great game, buy it), and ate more sherbet (Thanks Jimmy) I need more now so come pay day I'm going to probably end up a diabetic. The first working day of the new year was interesting... well I say interesting I meant bloody awful. The full moon did it's usual job of bringing out the 'special needs' cunt-stomers. How I remain calm I'll never know. I have tired of retail and am wondering what to do next, will I go back to the old ways of working in a factory, laundry or just wash dishes for a living because I'm tired of thinking for others? Or shall I stay put for the while and endure like I always do? As ever the future is spread out before me like a great junction without road signs.

Anyway here's the part you've all been waiting for. The Music, it's the 5 disk box set from The Style Council - The Complete Adventures of. I've written all the id3 tags and named the tracks so they come up on mp3 players named correctly now.

Enjoy

Merry Christmas

To

You All

"Harry rag, harry rag
Do anything just to get a harry rag
And he curses himself for the life he's led
And rolls himself a harry rag and puts himself to bed"

So imagine me happy go lucky old me. There I was enjoying life at the moment and on my way to an event I've been looking forward to for at least six months having booked the day off for the gig especially. I take my camera along (not the great big one but my pocket camera), but the moronic security turds make me put it in the security office because its a camera with a lens on it (to quote them). Well all cameras have a lens on them otherwise they aren't cameras just box of electronics doing nothing. But they were insistent so I went and put it in there. The dumbass in the office said I'll give you a receipt for it in case you forget to come and get it. "Not bloody likely it was quite expensive" I say and snatch the receipt and walk off whilst he's in mid sentence. Then the gorilla-a-likes snatch the bottle of Lucozade from my hand and rip the top of the bottle saying I couldn't have it with a top on in the arena, but gave no explanation as to why. I only bought it for after the gig. I wrote to Chrissy Boy on the official site only to be told that it was at his request as 'he owns all the rights to the Madness photos'. So that's it as far as I'm concerned the Madness stops here. That was my final gig. To be treated like that at the behest of a band I've supported through thick and thin is a slap in the face to say the least. If I can't take a camera in to a concert to have a memento of a gig by a band I've loved and followed for thirty years all of a sudden then fuck it. To be honest what kind of shot would I have gotten from the balcony? Certainly not a professional shot by any means. I mean when it was the lean years of '86 - '92 when I bought Voice of the Beehive, The Nutty Boys, The Madness, Butterfield 8 and The Farm just because of the connection with Madness. They couldn't do enough for you if you met them in a pub or at a gig. I remember when they split up I'd been in M.I.S for about four years by then (I still have the card), I got a parcel of merchandise from them twice as big as they'd advertised just because that's the type of guys they were, generous. But I suppose as they hurtle towards retirement they are feathering their nests more and more. Well you pay for them to do that if you want but I wont anymore.
The irony is that I've just written a piece for my company magazine all about Quadrophenia being a story of betrayal and how the whole film is a flashback of all the reasons why Jimmy walks away from Mod by killing the Ace Face's scooter, and now here I am doing the same suddenly realising the true faces of my heroes. I've always tried not to put people on pedestals as I've always been disappointed and I hadn't realised I was still doing that with Madness. I should have known really that with the whole 'look at me thing' that celebrities do because they can't do the real world stuff like the rest of us 'norms' do, all celebrities are self serving arses without exception. Case in point during the gig Suggs asks us all even though we've bought Norton Folgate and Total to buy the remasters of Absolutely. Why? So I can own something I already own in several different formats? Basically all they are doing is selling me the compilations I used to make when I was a kid so no, no more albums, gigs, books, t shirts or anything related to the band. He referred to the band as a 'corporation' there is always a kernel of truth in every joke.

And now I feel the need to kill something on Modern Warfare 2... again.

Anyway here's a video I found online called Ska Beatz, which is directed by Joe Massot and seems to be alternate takes from Dance Craze. A great post by the original poster. Also I've given you Bollocks to Christmas an alternate and punk Christmas album.

"Broken windows and empty hall ways
Pale dead moon in a sky streaked with grey
Human kindness is overflowing
And I think it`s going to rain today"

Do you know life's ok at the moment, even with arsehole customers and idiot colleagues (Note: drying your footwear in a microwave is disgusting and will result in me making you buy a new one you disgusting little Frodo lookalike). Ok, so I spent most of this months wages within a week on ebay and Amazon most of it was for the baby Jeebus' Birthday so that's ok and some of it was due to forgetting how much I had left. But, there you go. I mean OK I had to stand in the cold for nearly an hour the other night due to the bus being late and it was eight before I got my dinner which is more frequent occurance than I'd like. Still shit happens I suppose? Let's look at the positive side of things I have some very good friends and a really nice social life to boot. Every month we go out to a meal on payday and have a nice couple of hours sitting having some decent food and a chin wag and occassional laugh or two. Sometimes the meal is followed by a film it depends whats on. It might not be the cup of tea that everyone likes but that's fair enough I enjoy it and so do the rest of us. There are people who think it's a great night out if they spend all their money on spewing up and having a fight, personally that's never been me even in my days as a Skinnyhead. I enjoyed my long weekend off the other day as I found out my weekly bus ticket that I buy enables me to go out into the sticks which I did. I had a trainspotting moment where I just had to get out of the town and into the green and brown world. It worked, then the next day I went to Poole and with its crowds of badly dressed people, hoopy earrings and leggings everywhere it was. By the end of the trip to Poole I really wanted to be out in the country again. I wish I drove then I'd be out there more. The third day I just spent blowing shit up in Modern Warfare 2 which I must say was well worth the wait. Maybe it's just me having a midlife crisis or something but I've really had enough of people at the moment. I think I need to retreat from retail ...or just become a hermit. But, I'm glad I'm not the bus driver I served the other day who had to buy a spy camera to protect himself from racial abuse on his bus. He told me that he came to Britain 10 years or so ago and drove in London and suffered no abuse or anything he then gets here and is called a black so and so. I wasn't suprised when he told me the area of town either but there you go, I felt for the guy and told him so. It made me ashamed of this burgh for a bit, but then with my new found positive attitude that I try to foster I realised that there are more intelligent non racist people in the town than there are knuckle draggers.

Anyways up here's the latest Madness concert I went to in Bournemouth. I bought this as an mp3 on a little Madness logo shaped USB stick which was nice. Great gig spoiled by the B.I.C Gestapo more of that next post. Plus I've posted Bad Manners Skinhead and We Are The League by Anti Nowhere League and finally Ministry of Sound Electronic '80's.

"Shaking in me knee bones and me elbows,
its driving me around the bend
Uncontrollable feelings sends me reeling,
There's no need to pretend"

Well hello there, I suppose I should have posted a bit whilst off on holiday but you know what with one thing and another (Call of Duty, Force Unleashed and the Jeremy Isaacs series Cold War) I forgot to do it. One thing I didn't forget to do though is half my Christmas shopping leaving the final four presents to buy at the end of November. This leaves me with a sizeable chunk to be put aside for the TV I want (it will be the size of the one above, although sadly not with the oriental lady) with the December pay packet. I would however like to state that my blog will not be affected... much anyway. Although with all the writing I've not been doing lately I had to kill my Farm on Facebook as I had over 5 million points and it took two hours to fully harvest, plow then seed every night. So I stopped it. Pity farming isn't that easy in the real world then I could get an EU subsidy to not grow anything in order to help reduce the EU 'wine lake', 'butter mountain' or 'cheese hillock' or whatever nonsensical newspaper invented thing there is.
I did however think (again) about dumping the blog, but thanks to the comments that came flooding in quite literally in their ones I have thought again, despite the 'worldwide blogging downturn' in WIRED magazine. After all however will you get your daily quota of ill informed badly spelled and grammatically incorrect load of old bollocks if I retire after these 4 years or so?
My colleague and friend at work has decided that she is more or less going to go to the good ole' USA of A for 6 months next year. I said that it's better to do it now and not wait like I did and find yourself never doing these things. I had all the enthusiasm but none of the money when I was younger to travel and now I have the money to do it I don't want to go anywhere. Bloody life.
I am however making friends again at work with some of the population of Bournemouth through my cheery demeanour (no really), I have an elderly gentleman who comes in now and again to chat about aircraft with me. I've just given him my copy of Vulcan 607 which you should read if you get the chance. It's about the story of Operation Black Buck against Port Stanley airfield back in 1982. Although there's no jingoistic flag waving 'up your Junta!' Sun type cobblers in it, it does what a good book should do and just present the facts from all sides concerned and lets the reader decide what's what. Personally I thought it was a miracle we hit the runway at all when you read the book not to mention the typical British 'sellotape bits to military equipment to make it work' ethos. So all this hoo hah at the moment of not having the right kit and not enough helicopters etc is nothing new.

Anyway here's the music Madness' - Remastered version of One Step Beyond and The Housemartins' Deluxe Edition of London 0 - Hull 4.

Oh by the way a friend of mine gave me this article to read. It basically says what I have always maintained. Home taping never killed music and it never will. Here's the article

The music as ever is in the comments.

"I never give you my pillow
I only send you my invitations
And in the middle of the celebrations
I break down"
John Peel
30 August 1939 - 25 October 2004

Well it's that time of year again where we all remember the late great John Peel and how British broadcasting is all the poorer for this loss. Can it really be five years since the evening I was stopped dead in my tracks on the stairs when I heard the terrible news of his untimely passing coming from my landlord's TV? I recently listened to some old radio shows of his that I still have on my iPod it can often bring a smile to my face when I hear the three occasions where he mentioned me or my friend Raymone from the South of France or Yara from Mexico or with some Peelesque witticism . Quite often back in the days of dial up interweb we'd all be sat there in our respective homes either side of the Atlantic ocean listening to him play fuck knows what. The Atlantic was our reeeeaaallllly big coffee table as we sat there IM-ing each other with what we thought about the tracks the thing is with his playlists was that if you absolutely hated the three minute thirty of some Germans banging metal tubes and/or screaming then just wait because the next one would be better. It was through him that I discovered a lot of bands and rediscovered others. Peel sessions excluded I think it would be impossible to calculate the amount of groups or artists that he'd given me since 1978 when I first discovered that the radio carried on past the time my parents insisted I went to bed and the delight headphones can bring you. The two main artists that I remember most though would have been Madness' Peel session in Aug 1979 I can't remember what it was exactly what caught my ear about it because so much more music has happened to me since. But I suppose it was a bit different from the normal punk and post punk around at the time. It was certainly different enough for me to notice in my formative years. The other was when the late John Walters, John Peel's then producer, came bounding into the studio late for the start of the show explaining the fact that he'd just seen live this wonderful artist called Billy Bragg, whom (if I recall it correctly) he then played. I also remember the Smiths but I think I missed the first session and heard David Kid Jensen play them first one evening as we travelled to get a Chinese meal from the next town over and then caught one of the many times they repeated the session. PJ Harvey is another artist he introduced me to. There have been many more artists that I liked but the ravages of time have taken their toll on my memory and I no longer remember where I heard them first. . But suffice to say that my iPod is a testament to the fact that if John Peel taught me anything it was to listen to diverse music and try to hear new stuff as often as possible and above all share it all.

Speaking of which here's the music. All are Peel related, either groups he championed or introduced live. Obviously I can't upload every group he championed otherwise I'd be writing this for another couple of hours or so at least so make do with what you get here, download them all and play them loud and remember a great DJ.

Billy Bragg - Back to Basics
The Buzzcocks - Spiral Scratch EP
David Bowie - In Concert 1973 John Peel
Half Man Half Biscuit - Peel Session 1999
Humble Pie - BBC Sessions
Various Artists - The Pig's Big '78's
Various Artists - John Peel A Tribute
Joy Division - Peel Sessions 1979
Various Artists - Festive Fifty 1989
Madness - Peel Session 1979
Various Artists - Right Time Wrong Speed
The Wedding Present - Peel Sessions (1992 - 1995)
TheFaces - Live Paris Theatre 1973
The Fall - Grotesque (After Gramme)

That's all for now.