Brilliant. Someone has brought their kid in. Every time this happens, the women flock to it, often shrieking with delight at the little terd.
Sorry about that. No matter how hard you try, you find yourself inexorably drawn into a world to which you think you don’t belong. This is entirely understandable. As a middle class, well-educated liberal with extreme delusions of artistic grandeur, I cannot help but think that I am basically spending seven hours a day rotting away in a physical, intellectual and moral compost heap.
My physical degradation bothers me the least. Sitting has often been one of my favourite pastimes, so atrophy is nothing new. Sure, I can actually feel the (small) muscles in my body turn into blubber but I have a thrice daily trip to the vending machine. This means I break a sweat throughout the day. That’s not to mention the epic journey outside for some fresh air. It’s not all good though. Constant typing has turned my hands into arthritic wrecks, so that by the end of the day I am barely able to lift the mashed potato I seem to always be eating to my mouth. And I come home with yet another illness. The air in here, by 4 p.m. is brackish and stagnant. Sometimes I eat mouldy food solely on the hope that it contains some penicillin to cure my ever increasing ails. I have also become a massive hypochondriac. I’m pretty certain that I have some sort of cancer, and if so it’s definitely because I work in an office.
As I write, I do so like a member of la resistance. I quickly switch screens (alt-tab folks) whenever anyone important walks by. Not because I fear recrimination and punishment. Rather, it is because in this environment any kind of intellectual discourse is considered heresy. There is no room for Vivaldi, or Kubrick, or Napoleon, or Eco. This is a world of solutionising, of task management, of spreadsheets. So severe is the busin-rot that has set in that there is actually one folder containing the following sub-folders: desk instructions, drafts, goals, metrics, process improvement, RMS PREP, SOX, staff, useful information*. Now, I don’t know what RMS PREP or SOX is but I’m pretty sure that if I read each file contained within I’d probably become so bored that I would collapse and die. This job has made me so brain dead that I am actually struggling to think about what intellectual conversations I’d like to have with my colleagues. I used to like all that shit, but now I just go home and watch the hits.
If you do feel the need to talk to colleagues about something other than ‘actioning the business plan’, then broadly speaking there are but three avenues you can go down. Sport (usually football) and plans for the weekend are deceptive cul-de-sacs. They can normally only be sustained for a few minutes before both parties go back to work feeling wholly unsatisfied and actually a little bit irate. The third avenue, however, often turns out to be a route 66 of conversation that can lead to laughter, friendship, and possibly hopefully sex: gossip. I have actually found myself trying to ingratiate myself with people by listening to their trite complaints about others’ fuckups and agreeing that he or she in question is surplus to requirements. Everyone, including myself, spends most of their time judging someone else.
This is the real problem with my office. I can take the absence of intellectual and physical stimulation because I can find these in my spare time (or not at all because I cant really be bothered). The moral reprehensibility of this job, however, is almost insurmountable. I actually have become a shit. I bitch about people just to pass the time and judge them because they are shit at a shit job. But it gets better. I am also a corporate bastard. My job basically entails making sure that debt collectors get their money from poor people who turned to the wrong people for a cash injection. I am the electronic equivalent of a sledgehammer. I break people with emails. One particular example stands out above all else to illustrate this.
I opened a sizeable envelope containing a list of everyone that one of our clients, CBN if you’re interested (ha!), had made bankrupt that year. I handed the document, which was well over fifty pages thick, to my Italian boss. She looked at it and began laughing. When I asked why, she said it was because they were all Sicilian, and everyone hates Sicilians. On the hope that I could get a pay rise, I started to laugh as well. It worked, though, because for seven fifty an hour I’d pretty much do anything.
*contains nothing useful.
N.B. Since writing this, I have received a letter from one of the debt collectors I work for demanding ninety quid. I’m not going to pay.
Words: Giles Skerry
Wednesday 25 June 2008
Thursday 19 June 2008
NEW ADVERB MIX
Download the new installment of the Broomfields Festival podcasts @ Stronglook...
http://stronglook.blogspot.com/2008/06/broomfields-festival-dj-mix-adverb.html
Cairo Dairy (#2): Water
Adam Thomas, who lived in Egypt for a year, presents another right honourable extract from his diary
In Cairo you never feel clean. This is mostly because you never are; the air is heavy with dust and exhaust fumes that burn the back of your throat and coat your skin. It gets in your hair and pores and when you sweat it out you even your sweat tastes worse than normal. There is also a variety of smells to be had. Our street often smelled of vomit. Sometimes it smelled like barbeque; sometimes of both. Sometimes garlic. We found out later that this was because the top floor of our building was full of boxes stacked filled with garlic, slowly going bad. But we didn’t worry, we just took what we needed and left. Also the water is full of chlorine. This is because they use it to kill all the stuff that you get in the Nile - because it is bear dirty. Trouble is, now the water is full of chlorine, we couldn’t drink it; on account of our precious white skin, which turns green if chlorine gets in it. Also it turns you into a lifeguard, and then you can’t go about you business any more because people are always shouting “Oi lifeguard, come over here and look at my shoes, you stupid bastard” and stupid stuff like that.
Words: Adam Thomas
In Cairo you never feel clean. This is mostly because you never are; the air is heavy with dust and exhaust fumes that burn the back of your throat and coat your skin. It gets in your hair and pores and when you sweat it out you even your sweat tastes worse than normal. There is also a variety of smells to be had. Our street often smelled of vomit. Sometimes it smelled like barbeque; sometimes of both. Sometimes garlic. We found out later that this was because the top floor of our building was full of boxes stacked filled with garlic, slowly going bad. But we didn’t worry, we just took what we needed and left. Also the water is full of chlorine. This is because they use it to kill all the stuff that you get in the Nile - because it is bear dirty. Trouble is, now the water is full of chlorine, we couldn’t drink it; on account of our precious white skin, which turns green if chlorine gets in it. Also it turns you into a lifeguard, and then you can’t go about you business any more because people are always shouting “Oi lifeguard, come over here and look at my shoes, you stupid bastard” and stupid stuff like that.
Words: Adam Thomas
Cairo Diary (#1): The Adventures of al-Gore
During the time of The Festival of Sacrifice in Cairo the streets are a wash with animal sacrifice, Adam Thomas tells of his experiences
During the height of the Winter ‘Eid, the roads in Downtown run with blood and piss. It is at this time that the mass slaughter of the herds of sheep and cows that have been huddled outside butchers and roaming the streets over the past week or so takes place. There are mounds of crap, and also guts and feet. Once on the way to my friends flat I was lucky enough to find a horn; I wanted to keep it but then I realised this was a bit disgusting. Walking around even wealthy and relatively westernised areas such as Mohandiseen where I lived, you have to watch where you tread in case you accidentally step on something’s colon or stomach. It was around this time that my flatmate James saw a man pushing a wheelbarrow piled high with shit down our street, singing. He came home fuming, demanding to know “Where has he got the shit from? where is he taking it? And why is he singing to it?!” I told him I didn’t know, but suggested that he might be related to the cake selling midget who had chased him down Sharia’ Shehab the week before.
These gruesome – and massively unhygienic - sights therefore jar somewhat with the festival atmosphere that infects central Cairo and its inhabitants during these few days at the end of the year. This is the ‘Eid al-AdHaa, The Festival of the Sacrifice (in Egypt ‘Eid al-Kabir), The Big ‘Eid, which starts for three days the 10th day of the 12th month of the Islamic Calendar, the month in which the Hajj takes place. This is around the 17th of December, and commemorates the actions of Abraham who was ready to sacrifice his own son, Ishmael, as God had commanded. After Abraham had thus demonstrated his devotion to the Lord over all things, God took mercy on him and allowed him to sacrifice a sheep in place of his first born. It is for this reason that the best animals are selected and herded up in back alleys and main roads alike in preparation for the ‘Eid. In one particular street, the animals had been gathered under a large fairy light lit pavilion, built like the entrance to a fairground over the front of the regular butcher’s shop, where their throats were slit and their blood drained before they were skinned, gutted and turned into the meat for the many large and communal feasts that would take place over the next few days. The whole process took place in the street, late at night, in front of the crowd that had gathered there excitedly, and watched as an employee of the butcher’s shop recited the traditional prayers into a microphone at the top of his voice, at times reaching a sort of euphoric wail that seemed to spring from his very gut. Children ran and played around the animals and their various deposits; screaming and singing and swarming around my brother - blue eyed and friendly faced as he is.
Second only to the atmosphere of festivity that buzzes in the air during the ‘Eids is the sense of community. As in Ramadan, where food is often taken en masse and outside in large communal areas; the meat from this festival is not simply eaten, it is feasted upon, shared amongst families and friends and even strangers who happen to be walking past. As is decreed in the Qu’ran, meat is also provided for those who cannot afford their own, and wealthy Muslims with their own livestock are expected to contribute their best animals to be slaughtered to look after the poor and hungry, which in Egypt is a lot of people.
This is why even as you watch the blade being drawn across the throat, the blood spilling and the legs twitching, the skin being tugged from the flesh and finally the flat slab of meat being slapped onto the board; it is hard not to be fascinated, even enthralled by the whole gruesome process, just as the people are who come to watch it happening. It is probably something quite primitive, and what you are watching is – at is most basic level - ritual sacrifice. But even so, it’s pretty fuckin gnarly.
words: Adam Thomas
During the height of the Winter ‘Eid, the roads in Downtown run with blood and piss. It is at this time that the mass slaughter of the herds of sheep and cows that have been huddled outside butchers and roaming the streets over the past week or so takes place. There are mounds of crap, and also guts and feet. Once on the way to my friends flat I was lucky enough to find a horn; I wanted to keep it but then I realised this was a bit disgusting. Walking around even wealthy and relatively westernised areas such as Mohandiseen where I lived, you have to watch where you tread in case you accidentally step on something’s colon or stomach. It was around this time that my flatmate James saw a man pushing a wheelbarrow piled high with shit down our street, singing. He came home fuming, demanding to know “Where has he got the shit from? where is he taking it? And why is he singing to it?!” I told him I didn’t know, but suggested that he might be related to the cake selling midget who had chased him down Sharia’ Shehab the week before.
These gruesome – and massively unhygienic - sights therefore jar somewhat with the festival atmosphere that infects central Cairo and its inhabitants during these few days at the end of the year. This is the ‘Eid al-AdHaa, The Festival of the Sacrifice (in Egypt ‘Eid al-Kabir), The Big ‘Eid, which starts for three days the 10th day of the 12th month of the Islamic Calendar, the month in which the Hajj takes place. This is around the 17th of December, and commemorates the actions of Abraham who was ready to sacrifice his own son, Ishmael, as God had commanded. After Abraham had thus demonstrated his devotion to the Lord over all things, God took mercy on him and allowed him to sacrifice a sheep in place of his first born. It is for this reason that the best animals are selected and herded up in back alleys and main roads alike in preparation for the ‘Eid. In one particular street, the animals had been gathered under a large fairy light lit pavilion, built like the entrance to a fairground over the front of the regular butcher’s shop, where their throats were slit and their blood drained before they were skinned, gutted and turned into the meat for the many large and communal feasts that would take place over the next few days. The whole process took place in the street, late at night, in front of the crowd that had gathered there excitedly, and watched as an employee of the butcher’s shop recited the traditional prayers into a microphone at the top of his voice, at times reaching a sort of euphoric wail that seemed to spring from his very gut. Children ran and played around the animals and their various deposits; screaming and singing and swarming around my brother - blue eyed and friendly faced as he is.
Second only to the atmosphere of festivity that buzzes in the air during the ‘Eids is the sense of community. As in Ramadan, where food is often taken en masse and outside in large communal areas; the meat from this festival is not simply eaten, it is feasted upon, shared amongst families and friends and even strangers who happen to be walking past. As is decreed in the Qu’ran, meat is also provided for those who cannot afford their own, and wealthy Muslims with their own livestock are expected to contribute their best animals to be slaughtered to look after the poor and hungry, which in Egypt is a lot of people.
This is why even as you watch the blade being drawn across the throat, the blood spilling and the legs twitching, the skin being tugged from the flesh and finally the flat slab of meat being slapped onto the board; it is hard not to be fascinated, even enthralled by the whole gruesome process, just as the people are who come to watch it happening. It is probably something quite primitive, and what you are watching is – at is most basic level - ritual sacrifice. But even so, it’s pretty fuckin gnarly.
words: Adam Thomas
Tuesday 17 June 2008
Around the world in 80 pages: #1 Moon(walker) pie, what a time to be alive
Believe it or not, I spent a good twenty minutes working out the title to this, my inaugural, post. Reading Wikipedia entries all day, obviously the best possible use of my time at work, I stumbled across a page about Michael Jackson’s 1988 dance odyssey Moonwalker where my eyes were immediately drawn to the text about Smooth Criminal.
I remembered very little about the video as I read; Alien Ant Farm’s unfortunate cover version had obscured my vision of Jackson at his inimitable best like a University rugby player drawing a penis over every page of the only copy of Edward Gibbon’s The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. Fortunately, I rushed home to remind myself exactly why, for a number of years, Michael Jackson was the biggest superstar in the world.
For those who haven’t seen it in its entirety, definitely check it out. It is without doubt the best music video I have ever seen. From the improbably well tossed quarter that slides neatly into the slot of the Jukebox to the renowned anti-gravity lean, there is not a moment that dips below utter perfection. Its such a shame, then, that Michael Jackson will be remembered not for the style, the moves, the talent he oozes throughout but for his dubious relationship with children and plastic surgery. And that’s the best thing about the video; there isn’t a bottle of bleach or child in sight. (O.K that’s only half true, but it’s the kids watching Jackson prance around in a seedy, backalley, speakeasy and not the other way round).
N.B. When I made a film with my friends during sixth form I held lofty ambitions that the climactic scene could be as good as Jacko‘s video. Well, not quite as good. Nowhere near as good. A decent attempt. Alright, an attempt. I suppose in that sense we succeeded. It was slightly unfair, though, because we only had six dancers, all of whom were poorly directed and untalented. And we filmed it in a rather small room in my mother’s house. Oh, and there was very little choreography. Or budget. Other than that, it was exactly the same. You can see the (completely transformed) end result here.
This week I have been listening to Musik, by Plastikman.
Next time: Serial killers, serial thrillers.
words: Giles Skerry
Monday 16 June 2008
Confessions of a serial killer. Part 1.
Matthew Hamblin presents us with an extract from this latest work that delves into the darkest of all human psyches; the mind of a serial killer
Blood is the only part of killing that I find unpleasant. That’s why I mainly use blunt weapons; strangling would be fine if I was stronger, but my average strength means I can only usually strangle women.
I know people won’t understand. They were raised to not understand, to ignore passion and instinct in order to do what they believe is the ‘honest’ thing, not seeing that it is as far from honest as possible. They despise people like me, people who live true to thier feelings but yet they admire ‘our’ soldiers who aren’t following their desires at all they are just following the orders of our supposed leaders who do what I do just on a larger scale. At least I don’t do it for material objects; money and oil mean nothing to me. People no longer live true to their instincts. That’s why the only time I feel even a smidgeon of respect for the fuckers is in the final moments before they die, everything is then instinct. They no longer show they are hurting with the customary “ouch”, they forget all they have learnt; they no longer regurgitate bullshit. Instead the noises come from deep within them, noises that would usually frighten them; grunts and screams that sound as if they are the product of an explosion in their stomachs. The noises get more and more frantic, as the situation approaches the inevitable crescendo. And then the noises stop and I’m left alone - with beautiful silence - feeling as alive as it is physically possible.
Words: Matthew Hamblin
Blood is the only part of killing that I find unpleasant. That’s why I mainly use blunt weapons; strangling would be fine if I was stronger, but my average strength means I can only usually strangle women.
I know people won’t understand. They were raised to not understand, to ignore passion and instinct in order to do what they believe is the ‘honest’ thing, not seeing that it is as far from honest as possible. They despise people like me, people who live true to thier feelings but yet they admire ‘our’ soldiers who aren’t following their desires at all they are just following the orders of our supposed leaders who do what I do just on a larger scale. At least I don’t do it for material objects; money and oil mean nothing to me. People no longer live true to their instincts. That’s why the only time I feel even a smidgeon of respect for the fuckers is in the final moments before they die, everything is then instinct. They no longer show they are hurting with the customary “ouch”, they forget all they have learnt; they no longer regurgitate bullshit. Instead the noises come from deep within them, noises that would usually frighten them; grunts and screams that sound as if they are the product of an explosion in their stomachs. The noises get more and more frantic, as the situation approaches the inevitable crescendo. And then the noises stop and I’m left alone - with beautiful silence - feeling as alive as it is physically possible.
Words: Matthew Hamblin
Adverb gone electro vinyl mix..
Electro Mayhem from This.is.Sick's - ADVERB...
http://www.zshare.net/download/13693779424b0cb7/
The rise of the Chelmsford scene...
Over the past year or so, the Chelmsford underground clubbing scene has had a period of self-discovery; Adam Saville looks at the major players on the scene
My return from the culture capital, Glasgow, to the culturally backwards, Chelmsford, after four years of mind-expansion was hardly an exciting prospect. The gut-wretching prospect of the Dukes Genesis Experience was alot like the thought of spending a night in an abattoir. However, not long after my arrival during the summer of 2007, I soon realised that things were just getting going and that it was only just the beginning.
The emergence of The Chelmsford Ravers has played a huge part; setting the balls rolling and giving other people the courage to provide something that the town craves even though it is too afraid to admit it. Events like the The Black Holes left shimmering impressions, and we await with baited breath the arrival of Dub:Tech this summer. But one group cannot be held up as sole providers of a wave of mentality that can most certainly be traced way back. A number of recent events have brought to light a communal desire to chemically alter our minds and dance to particular styles of music for want of a higher state of social consciousness.
Notably, Nobody Don't Dance No More miraculously transformed the grottiness of Saturday night drinking at The Fleece into a night that has showcased serious contenders on London's live circuit, most memorably Dead Kids, then followed them up with the pick of Chelmsford's wealth of local DJing talent - with regular appearances from Badspeller, JBic, Ro and TIS's Crossbones. Its enormous success has been such that it has been able to branch out and occupy a monthly slot @ Industry Bar, Old Street, in London.
NBDDNM is not the only example of Chelmsford DJs breaking onto the London scene. The Lost Souls daytime residency at Public Life in Brick Lane, which has become recognised as one of the most significant underground events in London, has welcomed regular appearances from the CR's very own Lee Hume, Lepsy, Ro and Avtex.
Other nights have sprung up in allegiance with the very small pool of local DJing talent bolstering the scene and adding variety; these include Pulse, Dujitex, and Korkus. And not to mention, the outstanding and immaculately organised basement party, Cornerbeats @ Cornerhouse - we all eargerly await the next one.
It is with these developments in mind that This.is.Sick embarks on its monthly residency at Bar Toucan. Its purpose will be to bring together the local DJing talent of Chelmsford and also book bigger names that will attract large crowds of like-minded people.
This movement is set to culminate with the Broomfields festival, hopefully opening up a path to bigger and better things: This.is.Sick, NBDDNM, The Chelmsford Ravers, Strong.Look and The Flea Market have collaborated to present a one-day event at a secret location in the Chelmsford area.
The bands include:
Drum of Death (GrecoRoman)
*A Super Super Special Guest*
The Badical
Futurecop!
Cathouse
The Dead Formats
DJs include:
Crossbones
Adverb
Quailman
Ro
Lepsy
Badspeller
Pocobawa
Mark Wrongson
The Dead Formats Sound System
words: Adam Saville
My return from the culture capital, Glasgow, to the culturally backwards, Chelmsford, after four years of mind-expansion was hardly an exciting prospect. The gut-wretching prospect of the Dukes Genesis Experience was alot like the thought of spending a night in an abattoir. However, not long after my arrival during the summer of 2007, I soon realised that things were just getting going and that it was only just the beginning.
The emergence of The Chelmsford Ravers has played a huge part; setting the balls rolling and giving other people the courage to provide something that the town craves even though it is too afraid to admit it. Events like the The Black Holes left shimmering impressions, and we await with baited breath the arrival of Dub:Tech this summer. But one group cannot be held up as sole providers of a wave of mentality that can most certainly be traced way back. A number of recent events have brought to light a communal desire to chemically alter our minds and dance to particular styles of music for want of a higher state of social consciousness.
Notably, Nobody Don't Dance No More miraculously transformed the grottiness of Saturday night drinking at The Fleece into a night that has showcased serious contenders on London's live circuit, most memorably Dead Kids, then followed them up with the pick of Chelmsford's wealth of local DJing talent - with regular appearances from Badspeller, JBic, Ro and TIS's Crossbones. Its enormous success has been such that it has been able to branch out and occupy a monthly slot @ Industry Bar, Old Street, in London.
NBDDNM is not the only example of Chelmsford DJs breaking onto the London scene. The Lost Souls daytime residency at Public Life in Brick Lane, which has become recognised as one of the most significant underground events in London, has welcomed regular appearances from the CR's very own Lee Hume, Lepsy, Ro and Avtex.
Other nights have sprung up in allegiance with the very small pool of local DJing talent bolstering the scene and adding variety; these include Pulse, Dujitex, and Korkus. And not to mention, the outstanding and immaculately organised basement party, Cornerbeats @ Cornerhouse - we all eargerly await the next one.
It is with these developments in mind that This.is.Sick embarks on its monthly residency at Bar Toucan. Its purpose will be to bring together the local DJing talent of Chelmsford and also book bigger names that will attract large crowds of like-minded people.
This movement is set to culminate with the Broomfields festival, hopefully opening up a path to bigger and better things: This.is.Sick, NBDDNM, The Chelmsford Ravers, Strong.Look and The Flea Market have collaborated to present a one-day event at a secret location in the Chelmsford area.
The bands include:
Drum of Death (GrecoRoman)
*A Super Super Special Guest*
The Badical
Futurecop!
Cathouse
The Dead Formats
DJs include:
Crossbones
Adverb
Quailman
Ro
Lepsy
Badspeller
Pocobawa
Mark Wrongson
The Dead Formats Sound System
words: Adam Saville
Sunday 15 June 2008
Things for campin'
In today's frantic world, it is often easy to forget the important things in life, Adam Thomas helps us remember the things we should never forget (when we go camping)
As soon as Davey proclaimed that his grandfather was the inventor of paper underpants, we knew that this trip would be mighty sweet. We all had sharp sticks and one of us had a brace of rabbits. They swung from the end of his bindle as we walked, looking for which field would be most accommodatin' for a few young gents short on money and down on their luck to pitch in for the night. After maybe half hours a-walkin, we found a real good one, mostly empty, flat and with a cove of trees in one corner where we could bed down; on account of it provided shelter and hid us some from whatever farmer owned these parts. There was even a good pile of firewood, dry as a bone and standing shoulder high. We felt as if the good ol lord done fixed up this field for us special. So we set about it, pitchin' the tents and building the fire a fore the night closed in. There was beer and the little one had a quart of whisky, which he done swigged on awhile he was workin'. We whistled and sung the same work songs that we sing out on the fields, or on the railroad, or quarry, factory or any of the other scraps of work that fellas like us pick up here and there, movin from place to place, as if they was dead leaves that got caught up in our boot laces. Some folk don’t like to sing work songs when they’re not a workin, but for me it always seemed to make that time all the more sweet; on account of it reminded me I weren’t at work, and I’d done chose to sing the songs; of my own volition, as it were, like a frog what jumps into a pond knowin' full well he can get out when he pleases. Right about then, after we was full up of rabbit and set down to stargazin' and the fire was lulling, i checked my list of things for campin:
1. Tent
2. A sharp stick
3. Beer
4. Vittles (camping word for food)
5. Know how
6. A good ol patch o lan’. Flat and mostly without stones. Sometimes you think there’s stones but really thems is just hard clods of mud. Remember to remove any hard clods of mud, they are as bad as stones.
7. Buddies
8. A spookelele
9. The love of a good woman
10. A sharp stick
11. Mule/ donkey: curmudgeonly, fat leggs
12. Stories about unusual horses with those growths they sometimes get that look a bit like you might eat em if you wanted, but then again maybe they'd just stir up the appetite without settin her back down again.
Yessir, this trip was gonna be mighty sweet.
Words: Adam Thomas
As soon as Davey proclaimed that his grandfather was the inventor of paper underpants, we knew that this trip would be mighty sweet. We all had sharp sticks and one of us had a brace of rabbits. They swung from the end of his bindle as we walked, looking for which field would be most accommodatin' for a few young gents short on money and down on their luck to pitch in for the night. After maybe half hours a-walkin, we found a real good one, mostly empty, flat and with a cove of trees in one corner where we could bed down; on account of it provided shelter and hid us some from whatever farmer owned these parts. There was even a good pile of firewood, dry as a bone and standing shoulder high. We felt as if the good ol lord done fixed up this field for us special. So we set about it, pitchin' the tents and building the fire a fore the night closed in. There was beer and the little one had a quart of whisky, which he done swigged on awhile he was workin'. We whistled and sung the same work songs that we sing out on the fields, or on the railroad, or quarry, factory or any of the other scraps of work that fellas like us pick up here and there, movin from place to place, as if they was dead leaves that got caught up in our boot laces. Some folk don’t like to sing work songs when they’re not a workin, but for me it always seemed to make that time all the more sweet; on account of it reminded me I weren’t at work, and I’d done chose to sing the songs; of my own volition, as it were, like a frog what jumps into a pond knowin' full well he can get out when he pleases. Right about then, after we was full up of rabbit and set down to stargazin' and the fire was lulling, i checked my list of things for campin:
1. Tent
2. A sharp stick
3. Beer
4. Vittles (camping word for food)
5. Know how
6. A good ol patch o lan’. Flat and mostly without stones. Sometimes you think there’s stones but really thems is just hard clods of mud. Remember to remove any hard clods of mud, they are as bad as stones.
7. Buddies
8. A spookelele
9. The love of a good woman
10. A sharp stick
11. Mule/ donkey: curmudgeonly, fat leggs
12. Stories about unusual horses with those growths they sometimes get that look a bit like you might eat em if you wanted, but then again maybe they'd just stir up the appetite without settin her back down again.
Yessir, this trip was gonna be mighty sweet.
Words: Adam Thomas
Thursday 12 June 2008
Listen to: Drums of Death
Signed to Hot Chip's label, Grecoroman, Drums of Death frightens children. If there was anything a drunk, paranoid mother did'nt want her ruby-cheeked child to hear - it's the shrilling worble of Drums of Death. Not only does he evoke the sort of k-hole inducing wobbling dubstep basslines that have claimed the sanity of hoards of ravers across the nation, he jacks it up with whips and cracks that have enough force to give Mr Manhattan whip-lash. At times dirty minimal, and at others grime-tech - this is why Bassline House is gaining so much credence, it has literally every thing. FUCK!
http://www.myspace.com/drumsofdeath4eva
You can catch Drums of Death @ The Broomfields Festival - 30th August 2008
Words: Adam Saville
Wednesday 11 June 2008
Top Five Secret Historical 'Facts'
1.Between the ages of 9 and 13 Shakespeare ate three pencils for breakfast, this is why he was so good at writing.
2.King George the fourth was not mad, just very, very hungry.
3.Shortly after the Great Fire of London, when killing and raping were highly fashionable, there were approximately three million sharks released into the Thames in an attempt to "clean up the streets".
4. The Holocaust never happened.
5. During the start of the Tudor period there was a branch of the military whose job it was to go around the towns giving people more appropriate hair cuts. When questioned about this, King Henry proclaimed: "Listen here brother, don't wave that goddamn thang in ma face, i wouldn't come all up in your crib waving no goddamn dictaphone in YOUR face."
words: Matthew Hamblin
Tuesday 10 June 2008
Whatever happened to garage music?
When I was reading Ben Esser’s Dazed blog about Club Zeus in Chelmsford, which happened to be the first club I was allowed into as a baby faced 16 year old, I noticed that he mentioned 'garage is the shittest thing ever'. Now, this is something I would have probably agreed with three years ago; living in Essex, you tend to associate garage music with idiotic women with knee-high boots, bleached blonde hair and an ass-brimming skirt, and men who think that finding out that a woman is a slut makes good ground for an early marriage. But today, what is it that is getting the skinny jeaned, ex-indie chompers onto dancefloors? It's big-beat/garage. Just check any track by Sinden, Herve, Crookers, Boy-8 Bit or check out upstairs at the Vice pub Old Blue Last in Old Street on a Friday night. It's as if today's generation, whose ipods are just as likely to contain Arcade Fire as, say, a bugged out mix by Erol Alkan, have inherited a liking to thick bass lines and repetitive vocals - something that, during their adolescence, they were most probably repelled by. Call it nostalgia, or call it some sort of innate transfusion that took place during the oblivion induced by underage drinking - whatever it is, there's no denying that, today, garage is bigger, better and more appealing than ever. Rather than admit it, we hide our shame by re-naming it “bassline”.
Top five tunes that are garage but we are too afraid to admit are garage:
1) Sinden & Count - Beeper
2) The Count of Monte Cristal – Bounce that Ass
3) South Rakkas Crew – Mad Again (Boy 8-bit remix)
4) Crookers – My Penny
5) Grovesnor – Drive You Car (Bird Peterson remix)
Words: Adam Saville
adsav2001@hotmail.co.uk
Top five tunes that are garage but we are too afraid to admit are garage:
1) Sinden & Count - Beeper
2) The Count of Monte Cristal – Bounce that Ass
3) South Rakkas Crew – Mad Again (Boy 8-bit remix)
4) Crookers – My Penny
5) Grovesnor – Drive You Car (Bird Peterson remix)
Words: Adam Saville
adsav2001@hotmail.co.uk
Listen to: L-Vis 1990
L-Vis 1990 draws his influences from the last six years to create what he calls his "hyper bass sound". His bass heavy sound fuses elements of grime or dubstep with jackin' techno beats, electro bleeps, cut-up vocals and rave melodies. When he booked NY's Drop the Lime for his Brighton club night he saw it as an "official funeral" for the new rave of old. As he recalls: "We painted a giant banner with the words "New Rave R.I.P" written in blood. I think that was the turning point for me, the return of bass".
L-Vis 1990 E.P is out now.
You can catch him:
12th June @ Proud Galleries
13th June @ Fabric
July 25-27 @ Secret Garden Festival
words: Adam Saville
This.is.Sick goes monthly... a time for reflection.
This.is.Sick sprung onto the Chelmsford scene with its unmistakable brand of electro, bassline and techno on two occasions: the Christmas bank holiday 2007 and the Easter bank holiday 2008. What it provided was a bass-heavy attack on like-minded people, leaving them with a feeling of optimism over the future of Chelmsford nightlife. There was a real buzz, people began to realise that there was more on offer in Chelmsford than the trashy, gut-wrenching Dukes Experience. This was not an immediate realisation; the coming of age of the Chelmsford’s underground club scene had been set in motion way before – so where did it all begin?
Historically, Essex has been home to some remarkable dance acts and movements – UK garage thrived here, The Prodigy came out of Braintree and pirate drum & bass stations have been ten a penny over the last decade. But what we associate Essex’s dance scene with is not what is being vented at TIS. TIS draws its influence from wider catchments than UK garage or D&B – naturally, these sounds do exist intrinsically, but the heart and soul of the music we play spans out much further. We do not relate to Modern day hip-hop, gangster rap, or grime lyrics – we appreciate the darkness of the streets but we do not aspire to survival in a cutthroat world by way of an aggressive tongue. Instead, it is the sound of the wobbly bass line, the terrific snare and offbeat high-hat that reaches us. We are eighties children – we were brought up on Transformers and Corey Haim – twinkling synthesisers and Air Jordans. Our role models were the Fresh Prince of Bel-Air and Micheal J. Fox before he got Parkinson’s. Our elder brothers and sisters were ravers - they discovered ecstasy and glow sticks, and how to testify their love for someone they had never met for an evening/night/morning to never see them again. Our parents listened to The Beatles, northern soul, punk, funk, reggae, Motown soul, rockabilly, no-wave, new-wave, PETER GABRIEL (and so have we). The day we discovered Kraftwerk was possibly the most important day of our lives. All of this has affected us and it is there in the music we produce, play, listen to and dance to.
This.is.Sick embarks on a monthly residency @ Bar Toucan on the 18th July 2008.
August 8th 2008 – This.is.Sick presents… The Broomfields mini-fest Launch Party.
August 30th2008– In association with This.is.Sick, The Chelmsford Ravers, Nobody Don’t Dance No More, Strong.Look – The Broomfields Festival.
Check: www.myspace.com/thisissickchelmsford
words: Adam Saville
This.is.Sick presents... The Broomfields Launch Party.
This.is.Sick is providing Chelmsford with a chance to taste the party aspect of the Broomfields mini-fest three weeks before @ the official launch night.
DJs adverb, crossbones, quailman plus more TBC will bring you a night of jackin' electro, boob-ticklin' bassline and wobbly dubstep...
As well as dancing you bollocks off, there will be an opportunity to grab official merchandise, purchase last minute tickets (subject to availability) and sign up to the Broomfields/T.I.S mailing list.
This is gonna be KILLER!
adverb
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