Off Topic The Review Thread

Have you seen Alabama 3 before Stan ? (I assume you have). I’ve seen them over a dozen times and they are one of the best bands around with their Country/Acid House/Techno sound.
Never quite sure how many will turn up as I’ve seen them with just Larry Love and Rev D Wayne in Slough..... to about 20 of them in Clapham (including tattooed bouncer chicks and nurses with giant syringes)......always a good concert.
But remember little man........Don’t you go to Goa !!

 

Seen them 3 or 4 times Stainsey, but not for a good 10 years for some reason, always good value if sometimes a bit chaotic. I will be taking 3 un-initiated (including my wife) and their last experience of me at a gig was me moaning loudly and being generally disgraceful watching Texas at some barn in Birmingham. The promotional material has a squad of about 10 pictured.

 

Alabama 3 are excellent - been a few years since I last saw them.

Off to one of my favourite venues this evening, The Barrowlands in the east-end of Glasgow. Previously an old fashioned dance hall, it still has a wonderful wooden floor that really gets bouncing once the crowd gets going. Capacity of about 1500.

Tonight it's Aussie songstress Courtney Barnett, who has a really lovely, gravelly voice.

 

That venue sounds a bit like the old Hammersmith Palais, a sad loss.

 

Been a long, long time since I was in there!

Some pics of Barrowlands

 

Saw my first live band there
The pogues
What a night
1986

Used to love the palais
Grab a granny night on Wednesday nights
Was gutted when my sister told me the bastards pulled it down

 

Cadburys new dark milk chocolate

Bloody nice

 

I am hugely gratified by Camilla Long’s review of the Meades programme in the Sunday Times today. She hated it, and attacks him and the programme in her very best poorly written tripe style. Excellent, the day I find myself in agreement with Long (a woman with no discernible expertise or talent who has (cleverly I will admit) fallen into a living writing garbage) is the day I will wander into the woods with a bottle of high quality scotch, a fistful of opioids and a shotgun. The subtext to her criticism is that she didn’t understand the programme and that Meades used words she doesn’t understand, which she equates to using jargon, which Meades was eviscerating. Brilliant, your own ignorance and limited vocabulary is your basis for criticising someone who is eminently unemcumbered by these disabilities and refuses to cater for those who suffer from them by dumbing down. The irony will be lost on her, happily.

 

Been out for a few hours and forgot to take my phone with me.

My review of being off grid, network free is entirely positive. Pretty soon found myself much more focussed on what was going on around me, the people I was with (and how daft they looked playing with their phones) what a lovely day it is. I aim to do this for a least a couple of hours a day from now on, and not when I’m watching telly, walking the dog or asleep.

Back to the future!

 

Went to see the theatre version of Young Frankenstein last week. Loved the film, but wasn't really sure what to expect from the stage show. Turns out, it's a full-on, all-singing, all-dancing musical, which is not usually my kind of thing. I'd say I enjoyed it over all, but I'm not sure it really works that well, and it's just not as funny as the film. The set pieces - Puttin' on the Ritz, and the scene with the blind man - were laugh out loud funny, but some of the other jokes- Igor's movable hump for example - just fell a bit flat (see what I did there?). Mrs Stroller (who, remarkably, had never seen the film), thought the whole thing was wonderful, though.

 

Stand by for Blazing Saddles next as Mel Brooks mines his (brilliant) back catalogue. Puttin’ on the Ritz is about the funniest thing I have seen on film.

I read today that they are making a musical of Father Ted, in which Ted becomes Pope. It’s the original two writers and the bloke from Divine Comedy doing the music, who was also involved with the original series, which I still love. It’s a scarily long time ago now when that was new.

 

I've just finished reading "The Colour of Bee Larkhams Murder" by Sarah J Harris - not the usual type of book that I'd read, but had been given it as a freebie last time I was in Waterstones. Having enjoyed "The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time" about a boy with autism/aspergers I thought I'd give this a go.

The main character Jasper suffers from synaesthesia and "sees" the world in colour, each sound has its individual and unique colour. He can't see faces, he can only recognise them through the colour of their voices. A new neighbour moves in next door, a music tutor, and he becomes fascinated with both her and the parakeets that have nested in a tree in her garden. However, all is not cosy, and she enlists him as a go between with one of her students, a fellow schoolboy of Jasper, who she is having an affair with. Things go awry one night, and a new colour emerges - that of murder......unable to identify anyone, Jasper paints his story to try and find out whodunnit.

Really enjoyable read, with some good twists. My son has a very mild form of synaesthesia, where he sees numbers and music in colours, he's convinced it's one of the reasons he's a brilliant musician. The thought of being "face-blind" though is terrifying, and is really captured well when Jasper is at school and the fear he feels when walking between classes is palpable.

The book received 4.8/5 from Waterstones reviewers...

The Colour of Bee Larkham's Murder by Sarah J. Harris | Waterstones https://www.waterstones.com/book/the-colour-of-bee-larkhams-murder/sarah-j-harris/9780008256371

 

Read that too - fingers crossed it comes off, and they decide to make it into a film too (or filum) - the writers decided that if Trump can make it to the White House, or Corbyn can become Labour leader, then it's not much of a stretch for Ted to become Pope - sure it will be hilarious.

 

The one I'm looking forward to is the Pogues musical. Apparently, David Simon, the creator of The Wire, is a massive fan and has been working on bringing a musical based on their music to the stage. Can't wait.

 

A freebie the last time I was in waterstones
Or shoplifting as its called in the rest of the world

 

Today is the 150th anniversary of the birth of Charles Rennie Mackintosh......lots of things going on in Glasgow to celebrate the artists work, preceded by a fascinating program on BBC2 a couple of days ago....now available on iPlayer

Mackintosh: Glasgow's Neglected Genius: www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b0b5ydcz via @bbciplayer

Also, a great article on him and his work...

Charles Rennie Mackintosh and the rooms that inspired Europe - BBC News https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-44315755

 

As it can be a bit boring during Ramadan here, me and the GF went to the cinema and just randomly chose something to watch at the midnight showing.

Chose to see Distorted, a 'scary & intense' thriller

Complete load of cobblers. Quite how much they paid Cristina Ricci & John Cusack to appear in that fifth rate no plot hokum I have no idea.

No script, no real characterization, terrible effects and so on.

Avoid

 

As an early Fathers Day present to myself, purchased in the certain knowledge that my kids would forget and anyway can’t afford the stuff I want, I have purchased a Heston Blumenthal branded Sage Barista Express, which is a mini coffee machine looking very much like the ones you get in proper coffee shops.

Grinds the beans, heats the water, provides steam for frothing and looks lovely (and gains the spousal approval on style alone). As it is a beast of imagination which offers you choices in coarseness and length of grinding, steam pressure, single or double shot etc. it takes a bit of calibration and experimentation. As always with new toys I have been playing with it in search of the best combination (in truth they have all been good) and have now had about 8 espressos in 30 minutes. I’m wired, the dog is going to be rapidly walked this evening.

This is an extravagance undoubtedly, but no other bugger is going to treat me, i might as well do it myself. And I foresee years of joy from this machine, I love coffee and have a worlds worth of beans from different places to test.....

Recommended for the hedonist.

 

Two coffees sends me to the moon these days, hate to imagine what 8 espressos would do to me