FOUR ROCK 'N' ROLL ARSEHOLES
In an epic of tedium lasting, seemingly, all night long, Sunday 14th June, BBC 4, Paul Weller, the sage of Woking, talked lovingly of his hair, his clothes and himself.
Featuring his shouty songs, his shouty mates and his shouty Dad/Manager, Weller senior - a ghastly mongrel cross between Ronnie Kray and Malcolm McLaren - the ModFather relates the aritistic struggle of an Estuary Narcissuss, revealing how, after years of producing boring shouty drivel, he has now reached a high plateau of critical acceptance by immature, shouty cockneys. And become the knitwear industry's Man of the Millenium.
The whole, uncritical fanzine is rendered worthwile by a five second clip of Lord Windbag, in his rock 'n' roll days, grandstanding in front of a bunch of pasty, fuckwit musos,"united" "against" "Thatcher" in the democratic pursuit of increased album sales. I'd just like to say, quips Kinnock, that Red Wedge is not the name of my hairstyle. Bless.
Daily Telegraph readers will be disappointed that Lord Billy Bragg, pictured next to Mayor Ken, features only barely in this Saga of Mod and thankfully without his atonal tinny guitar of Socialist Reform, the cunt.
Tearing himself away from his hairdryer, the mature Weller confesses that he now realises that politicians are all just in it for themselves. There is, as we often reflect, no business like showbusiness.
Old Paul is much loved by the schedulers at the Beeb and The Weller rockumentary will be repeated endlessly. It is well worth avoiding.
6 comments:
Mr Ishmael,
I caught five minutes of it. Odious and vacuous as the gobshite is/was, I have to admit that a small shred of nostalgia appeared on the collar of me skin-tight, striped shirt. Yes, I too was that shouty, spotty, puerile dickhead. Ahhh, it was grand to be young. We rolled about in it, our ghostly-white, stick-insect bodies slick with stupidity.
Turned it off, as I say, after five minutes overwhelmed by nothing. For penance, Father, I shall this evening search me out some Leonard Cohen on the jukebox. Let's sing another song, boys. This one has grown old and bitter.
Whoever said politics was showbusiness for ugly fuckers was right
Dear Mr Ishmael
As the possessor of a pair of white stillettoes (are there any other shoes?) I really must protest at your designation of Woking as "Estuary".
Wokin is in Surrey, it is well norf - or west, who knows wiv these west-end types - of Teddington Locks, it is practically Windsor, which is why he wrote the Eton Rifles.
Yer Estury starts at the mudflats at the Tahah ov Lunnon, just by Traitors' Gate as was, or some say earlier below Blackfriars Bridge where the old River Fleet still joins the Thames. It ends at Sarfend. I've bin on a rivver boat from Westminster Pier and seen it all. No sign of Weller.
His website modestly says "Here was the new soul vision that Kevin Rowland had been promising five years earlier with Dexys Midnight Runners’ Searching For The Young Soul Rebels."
Rubbish. Rowland always knew were the young soul rebels were, although being smashed out of his gourd, he had to ask the audience where they were hidden.
Dear Mrs Woman On A Raft
I only meant Estuary in the sense of a dialect, perhaps a set of values and not as a matter of geographical certainty; y'know, how Cardinal Blair used to speak a unique, verbless, form of Estuary
Anyway, to we dwelling in the Far North, such distinctions as you raise are meaningless, anywhere South of Hadrian's Wall being a polyglot nightmare.
I will look at the clip when my connection -via Avanti, Australian-Italian IT Fraudsters - permits. Always had a soft spot for Kevin, he was barking mad wasn't he, and the more of those we have entertain us the wiser shall we be.
ps Mr Mongoose
As it happens the Cohen World Tour Concert, also on BBC 4, is an antidote to those weary of Dr Bob's eternal reinvention of his catalogue; Cohens tunes are more or less faithful to the original arrangement but dramatically improved by a band of virtuosi, you wouldn't believe such delights could be wrung from the old roue's turgid complaints.
Mr Ishmael,
Thank-you, I shall delve more deeply.
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