No Matter How Many Remixes I Listen To…

…Part Of Me Will Always Want To Jump Off Speakers

Despite my proud declarations of what I consider credible choices in music over the years, the endless hours I spend on HypeMachine listening to mash-ups of Miike Snow tracks (and other tracks, for the record) and Spotify compiling the ultimate playlist – i have a somewhat guilty pleasure. I don’t half love a nice bit of classic rock. Yes really. It all started when I got my first non-baby-sitting job at 16yrs old at a hippy emporium in the Granary Wharf in Leeds. It was the ultimate crusty-that-washed gig – my friends were, despite their protest otherwise, all well jealous.

 ANYWAY, this shop was under the train arches so we got freakish amounts of dust every day and being a lowly assistant – I got the enviable task of dusting the various imported wooden statues & trinkets my boss had brought back from Pakistan & Nepal. First of all, these wooden delights were clearly manufactured for the western market as I really didn’t see wooden toadstools and spliff-toting gnomes being a massive hit East-side but second of all, there was A LOT of them. My boss and his son were massive fans of classic rock so my musical landscapes were opened up along with my capacity for other imports that made their way along with all the paraphernalia brought over each month. Our favourite cds were a set of 60s 70s and 80s rock cds, one for each year. I never did remember which my favourite year was but it was here that I became wickedly fond of such gems as Black Sabbath’s ‘Paranoid’ (by the far the best track ever to dust elephant’s heads to, I’d thoroughly recommend it), Journey’s ‘Don’t Stop Believin’ , Rainbow’s ‘Since You’ve Been Gone, Europe’s ‘The Final Countdown’ and the cheese-fest Starship’s ‘We Built This City’(performed in duet form whenever possible).

Later on this fetish diversified to more mainstream territory as I developed the inevitable weakness for boys with tats that play guitars and ideally jump off speakers at any given opportunity. It’s come back to it’s original roots in the past couple of years in the form of the comeback of AC/DC. While Black Ice didn’t really do it for me (Back In Black &Highway To Hell For Me – I actually air-drum to If You Want Blood, it’s beyond tragic) , seeing them play at O2 last year was everything I hoped it would be and more. I was the only girl in my area, not really a surprise when you consider the topic of song subject and the (magnificent) stage sets – AC/DC are over the top, about as far away from PC as you can get. You can tell why so many blokes of a certain age(who I was surrounded by at O2) use them as their form of escapism. They’re just fun, and over the top, and hilarious. Fittingly, Iron Man 2’s soundtrack is rammed full of AC/DC’s back catalogue – I couldn’t think of a better fit, enjoy…

 

:::NB – this post is dedicated to my dear friend Kelly Abernethy, the original girl that was Born To Rock – HAPPY BIRTHDAY, KEL – I MISS YOU!!:::

Brighton Beach, YSL 100s and Julie Driscoll – I’ll always have a soft spot for Mods

Fighting The Filth

Unlike ooh, roughly 80% of the population it would appear, I don’t mind Mondays. Don’t choke on your Nescafe, you read that correctly – I don’t hate the first day of the week. Can’t stand Sunday nights if I don’t make a conscious effort to distract myself from what night of the week it is, but that is quite another matter to be discussed when I don’t have anything else to blog about. Ahem, possibly.

ANYWAYS, I digress, Monday’s are a not hideous because you get to make New Week’s Resolutions. They’re like New Year’s Resolutions only, For The Realistic, essentially. If you don’t stick to a new diet, exercise, healthy eating, not drinking, not shopping, not watching sh*t telly and reading more books regime then stuff it, just start again on the Monday = simples.

This week my regime is to Stop Using Having A Crap Aerial That Requires Serious Gymnastic Contortionist Skills To Get  A Decent Picture As An Excuse To Watch Sh*t Telly. We’re on Day One and due to consumption of far too many Sour Skittles this afternoon, I’m afraid the E-numbers have left my brain far too jittery and ADD to be able to tolerate David Attenborough talking about a bunch of flies that are apparently good for the environment because they eat certain sort of lavae or something (I just heard mass buzzing and wigged out and switch channels to ANOTHER Live At The Apollo repeat, I confess).

Perhaps nature documentaries are a little bit ambitious for Day One. I refuse to watch I’m A Z-List Get Me An Iceland Ad Deal, X- Factor is allowed because it’s what people  talk about when they have nothing in common and are lost for small talk.  And also I’m hardcore and I Tweet along with Popjustice et all as I watch the various contestants murder whatever theme-based-around-a-prominent-album-release it is that week. Doing a running p*ss-take via Twitter keeps the essential  ‘I’m only watching this because I’m into Pop Culture and find this whole experience deeply ironic, yah’ element to watching X Factor while feebly attempting to appear credible, obviously…ahem…

Seeing as BBC4 and More 4 are both only available when Nerdy Bloke Next Door goes out (he must have one hell of a powerful hard-drive, frankly – I get internet reception and everything when he’s out of town, it’s brilliant) and I’ve done some exceptionally bendy contortionism with the aerial, things are limited. Dave appears to be the channel of compromise if I’m trying to resist E4 and ITV2’s pure filth, tonight though? I admitted defeat after Miranda (surprisingly hilarious, mind you I should have known poking fun at the terminally middle-class would be a rich source of comedy, who doesn’t love Fawlty Towers for goodness sake) and switched on the radio instead. Tomorrow I’ll watch Requiem For A Dream instead. That I admittedly only bought in the HMV sale because it starts Jordan Catalano (sigh). Oh FFS, you have to start somewhere…