stuff i thought i'd lost - the postcard brochure

too frazzled by moving and whatnot to think so here's an i wondered where that'd gone things you find when you start packing long lost treasure










the go betweens - people say

help me somebody

hello everybody. my name is ally and i have a problem. james bond was not my first. oh no. before him there were fifty more. fifty together all at once at the same time. me and fifty of the bastards. i just couldn't help myself. i mean how's anyone supposed to resist ? it's a giant fibreglass icecream for gawd's sake and things don't get any better than that not even secret agent paperbacks with gorgeous covers.

our northern exile has been saved by the seaside. the seaside is ace. not the coast mind cos that's just the countyside with some extra water but proper seaside. blackpool morecambe fleetwood . but salvation comes at a price and now all art and beauty is nothing to me since i have been dazzled by the majesty of the giant fibreglass icecream. i can't pass one without oooohing and aaaahing and taking a million pictures and i dream of nothing but a giant fibreglass icecream of my very own. i still can't quite believe that i haven't been sentenced to a lifetimes hard labour for robbing one but it's just in my imagination that i'm dragging one down the golden mile being chased by the sweeney.
so for now i make do with fifty first class and jonathan richman on constant repeat and scheme evil and dastardly schemes in readiness for margate and southend...

jonathan richman and the modern lovers - ice cream man

philately will get you nowhere

how fabulous are these ? very fabulous obviously. i keep meaning to send more stuff through the post and these are a massive enouragement. even if my letters are rubbish my envelopes will always thrill. not that i'll actually be able to bring myself to part with any. they're mine...all mine...

rex garvin and the mighty cravers - sock it to 'em jb

jackie mitoo - james bond

biological hazard warning

so we're still here in the dark and rainy north. the fair is packing up and pulling out now they've run out of customers for the incredible exploding women show and we're waiting for the council to turn up to start fencing us in and putting up the beware ye all would enter and site of plague pit jan 2008 signs or at the very least hoardes of mad scientists in space suits like when ET's poorly to start prodding us and doing dastardly experiments.
i'm using the occasional gaps in the coughing spluttering and sneezing to have a good old cockney walkabout practice what with the dear old east end being the centre of all fashion and culture these days. well my pal roy's stall's down brick lane anyway. i can't find any clips of vic and bob showing how it really should be done unfortunately so you'll have to make do with the small faces and the artful dodger and work it out of yourselves. cor blimey.

small faces - lazy sunday (bbc session version)

diccapilly

i wish i'd seen piccadilly in it's neon wonderland pomp before it'd been entirely surrendered to horridly disappointed tourists and shoddy shopping centres and always boarded up eros. it always looked so beautifully suited to rain and turned up collars and lost loves and new infatuations and jumping on the back of routemasters and all the mad magic possiblities of a london night. or maybe it was always rubbish the way things in guide books are always rubbish and i'd've hated the wrigleys advert as much as i do the macdonalds one. i'm too full of germs to think.

lord kitchener - london is the place for me

look homeward angel

overflowing with diabolical germs and raging with estate agent fueled fury but still excited as hell to be picking up the keys to a london's bustling west end flat tomorrow. manchester's alright if you like that sort of thing (he were funny... if you like laughing) but it just isn't home...

chairmen of the board - i'm on my way to a better place

happy new year and all.

romantic embelishments of real life

surely you must be sick of telly by now (and don't call me shirley) so how's about a go at creating your own pictures in your clever old noggins as you listen along to the most marvelous sherlock holmes adaptations you'll find anywhere ever great detective or not.
originally broadcast on radio four and starring clive merrison and michael williams the whole darned collected stories now live in a big box of cassettes that i'd carry with me always if i had a bag big enough but instead are guarded by particularly vicious monsters under the bed. i assume there are cds of them these days and i can't recommend them enough.
it's watson that is the heart of these for me - his honour and loyalty and love for his friend, and the best stories by far centre on the relationship between him and holmes rather than some mad impossible mystery or foul crime. and i love how they exist as fictional characters within the stories themselves, how we're being let into their real lives. oh and all sorts of other things. i'm rubbish at explaining why i like stuff, especially when i'm not in a dingy boozer with a glass or three of something lovely.
so listen for yourselves.

the casebook of sherlock holmes - the lion's mane