Swinging London

(I originally wrote this piece years ago as a parody of both the "Choose Your Own Adventure" book series and the stagnant landfill-indie gig scene which then seemed to dominate London.  Much of it probably already seems dated and irrelevant, but actually, so much of it still isn't.  There really are still this many useless bands out there, and some of them have even enjoyed some popularity.  So never mind, I say - here it is again).

Swinging London (an adult Choose Your Own Adventure game)

This mission – should you choose to accept it, adventurer – will only need one die.  It is your task to attempt to find originality, excitement and wonder on the talent-crowded London gig circuit, which you must sign to your newly formed indie label Single Sock Records.  With so much cutting edge talent to choose from in the Capital, you’ll need a keen pair of eyes and ears, and perhaps a bit of luck too!

ROLL YOUR DIE NOW AND GO TO THE CORRESPONDING ENTRY.

1.

You go to see Blind Box playing at the NME Spotlight Night at the Unigate Dairy Club. They are a band with two guitarists, a singer, and a drummer. The singer, Peter Variable, has a floppy fringe with spikey hair nearer the back, which has been dyed a sickly shade of tarmac black. It looks rigid and plastic, strangely inflexible. He wears eyeliner in a panda-ish way that would look profoundly ridiculous on a woman.

Their songs, such as “No Rest”, “Scarlet Trains”, and “Missed Again” are melodramatic affairs filled with epic choruses, rather like the ones the Manic Street Preachers used on “Everything Must Go”, but stripped of any string arrangements. The verses and middle eights are just distractions, mere afterthoughts that lead up to the Epic Choruses.

The lead singer is static on stage but screws his brow up at every intense bit, as if he’s trying to force drops of emotion from his performance rather like a dehydrated man attempting to wring drops of water out of a stone dry sponge.

A posh girl next to you instigates conversation. In fifteen seconds time, she will say “My boyfriend’s in a band. They’re called The Korova Bandits. They’ve been tipped for the top by Jonathan King. Have you heard of them?”

You leave. Adventure Over.
2.

You go to see Couldbe Queens play the Jump up and Dance Brothers Sisters and Aliens!!! Night in the Ploughshed. They are some sort of dated Electroclash band with a keyboard player, a singer and two obvious ex-drama students whose precise roles are rather unclear. They wear tight leather and make-up, and pull a variety of slightly camp faces which have clearly been learnt through careful study, both from bad drag queens and the mirrors in their bedrooms.
Their songs, such as “Your Mother’s Desecrated Ass”, “Motorbike Queen”, and “I Know Where To Shove It”, are all pounding electronic numbers where lyrical and musical subtlety is not at any point an option. One of the members, whose name appears to be Needles, spends much of the gig threatening individual members of the audience to a fight. At one point, he throws what appears to be urine at someone. It turns out to be Lucozade, though. Everyone is most amused, as well as being visibly relieved. Rock and roll!

The man stood next to you instigates a conversation, and in fifteen seconds time he will say “Do you know where I could score some coke?”

You leave. Adventure Over.
3.

You go to see The Lotion play the Go Johnny Gogogo Night at the Cow and Flagon. They are a band with two guitarists, a singer, and a drummer. The singer has Strokeshair, which has been dyed a sickly shade of tarmac black. He wears a rather ordinary suit jacket with a pair of far too tight blue jeans, and his performance speciality appears to be a pop-eyed glare which he directs at the audience to notify “intensity”.

The songs, “Reverse! Reverse!! Reverse!!!”, “Churchill” and “Plague Pets” are slightly mournful but somehow energetic ditties that manage to bridge the gap between Joy Division and The Ramones. The lead singer Joe’s voice is a hollering, barking cross between Jim Morrison’s and Ian Curtis’s. At one point he sings “I feel claustrophobic on the outside/ and safer on the inside” repeatedly and with some intensity. You wonder what this might mean.

The posh teenage girl stood next to you instigates a conversation. In fifteen seconds time, she will say “My boyfriend’s in a band. They’re called The Korova Bandits. They’ve been tipped for the top by Jonathan King. Have you heard of them?”

You leave. Adventure Over.
4.

You go to see Peace Corp play the Shilly Shally Night at the Tail-cock Bar. They are a band with two guitarists, a singer, and a drummer. The band all sport the kind of haircuts last seen in 1991, bowlhaired and possibly rather obstructive to safe road crossing routines. Alvin Stardust would consider them out of their tiny minds. The lead singer pouts a little, and shakes his microphone like it’s a maraca.

Their songs, “Cities”, “I Can See You” and “Ladders Without Snakes” all take their cues from the back catalogue of the Stone Roses, but are pale and diluted examples. The guitarist is average, the vocalist riding on arrogance alone, and the drummer too self-consciously showy and obsessed with random fills to cut it. They will also never play a four minute song where it can be needlessly padded out to nine minutes with bland repetition. Between songs, the lead singer cries out “Peace!” to great applause.

The man stood next to you instigates conversation. In fifteen seconds time, he will say “Do you know where I could score some coke?”.

You leave. Adventure Over.
5.

You go to see The Riptide play at the Pickled Onion Surprise Club at the Camptown Races venue, but the gig is cancelled due to the lead singer suffering from salmonella poisoning due to an undercooked meal he had from the kebab shop that afternoon.

Roll the die again.
6.

Congratulations, you have rolled a six!

You go to see The Glamour Chase play at the Sugden Arms. They claim to be a “reaction against mediocrity”. They are, in fact, a band with two guitarists, a singer, a drummer and a keyboard player. The band all sport Duran Duran haircuts, only dyed bright red and glaring peroxide blonde, and wear foundation and eyeliner. They do indeed look like Eighties Smash Hits cover star material.

Their songs “Return To Grace”, “Night Owls” and “The Backstreet Union Boys” owe an enormous debt to Bowie, Suede and Duran Duran. The epic choruses in particular have an anthemic quality which has been well thought through, but the verses and middle eights are afterthoughts, distractions, obstacles in the way of the rousing choruses.

The lead singer, Nicolas Hatherley-Gore, strides up and down the stage confidently, and screws his brow up at every intense bit, as if he’s trying to force drops of emotion from his performance rather like a thirsty man attempting to wring drops of water out of a stone dry sponge.

A beautiful woman stood next to you instigates conversation. She has a weeping cold sore on her upper lip. In fifteen seconds time, she will say: “My boyfriend’s in a band. They’re called The Korova Bandits. They’ve been tipped for the top by Jonathan King. Have you heard of them?”

You leave. Adventure Over.

London

As the man in the Bell Pub

with grey octopus hair

tried to tell me, there is

poetry in this city –

you can find it (son)

in the warm vanilla ice

cream light of night

time terraced houses, the

hilltop display of Christmas

lights strung out

across midnight wires of

roads, the sight of

Canary Wharf, viewed

like a quiet, gently

humming generator from afar.

Try to see it (he said)

in the Heathrow Planes

morsing signals of

life to us down below,

winking that there is

even more life and love

above, and try to

understand that

every scuff your feet

leave on the pavement is

another line on the

city’s Pollock painting.

Your problem (he sneered) is

just that it always continues,

with or without you, and

you cannot see it all at once.

It cannot be fixed, defined,

badged with single

metaphors, and soft

signs of easy requited love.

It writes itself, and will

continue to do so,

even when you’re gone.

“How do you like that?” he

asked, leaning back in

his chair, killing me off

with the point of a single

stinking, righteous finger.

The Two Types of Male Romantic

(Because ladies, you know it's so very often true...)

The ones tall and dashing

who thrill you with glances,

flirtation and fine wine,

and those short and skinny

whose smiles and poetry,

make you dial 999.

Wiping the Slate

(The basic draft for this was written as I travelled on a coach through the Australian outback. This may be relevant. Then again it might not.)

The light spikes out, a

fruit cocktail of neon

arching through city

streets, past rows of

buildings, wiping

through the concrete of

tired and fickle urban fashion.

It twists around fingers and

waists, curves down

suburban crescents,

knifes through the

snaking pasta of by-passes,

then points in all directions, a

compass giving no clues of

escape or renewed options.

One flash and it

fades with us,

leaving no trace of it or us.

The noise of trees

burning in its wake is

just nature, old,

arthritic, cracking her

bones but carrying on.

It has no concept of

committee, discussion,

debate or worth, cannot be

validated or invalidated, and

views these explosions as

periodically necessary.

It does not know, or care,

about you.

A Perfect Shot/ All The Hometown Friends You've Forgotten

Years and years ago I put out a limited run pamphlet of ten poems - thanks to the use of a Local Council work photocopier after hours - which was bookended by these two prose pieces, both presented in small print and italics at the front and rear.  I'm sure the decision to have them acting as opening and closing brackets for the collection made some sense at the time rather than being a peculiar random brainfart, since I actually spent far too long thinking about what was supposed to be a really basic, xeroxed publication to sell at gigs.  I've got to be honest, however, I didn't keep a diary or journal in those days and I've long forgotten the logic behind it. 


A few people liked "A Perfect Shot", but within about one week of printing the pamphlet I decided I hated it (I'm still not particularly keen) and never used it in any context again and only read it live once at someone else's behest.  "All The Hometown Friends You've Forgotten", on the other hand, still gets pulled out at live readings very occasionally, though I find the content of it to be less true these days than I once did.

A Perfect Shot

she didn’t believe she could be struck by lightning, and to see her laugh in the face of a camera flash you’d guess she didn’t fear more earthly terrors too.  It was picture perfect, each photo catching her radiance bubbling before it died.  Every shot for her was the picture they’d use in the paper for you or I if we were murdered, in the lonely hearts column if we needed to be held, in the missing person column if we inexplicably vanished.  Her face begged you to look at her, look out for her.  It was as if the lightning fork had found her on a distant plain, frozen in time laughing at the world, laughing at what was to come.  

All The Hometown Friends You've Forgotten

All the hometown friends you’ve forgotten can be seen on Oxford Street in the Autumn, rubbing their DNA on everyone you’ll never know.  They’ll catch your eye for a second like hungry pigeons before being sucked away by the crowd into the bargain electrical store.

You think these people are just the slightly fatter brothers and sisters of ex-friends and lovers, that their hair is the wrong colour, but you would be mistaken.  They’ve just got older and are hiding the grey with new shades, trying to stand out and get your attention.

You think there’s no conspiracy, no notable coincidence in bumping into ghosts in the busiest High Street in the South East in November, but you’re wrong.  They think this is where all Londoners shop.  They believed it inevitable you’d pass someday.  They’ve been walking up and down all year, cowering, crouching, their feet the roots of plants outgrown their pots, mangled toes twisting in their shoes.  You made them this way.  Your time will come to catch their eye.  They’ll make sure you remember them this time.