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When they came on stage I smiled, I continued to smile throughout the evening, realising after that I am such a po faced gal these days it’s rare for me to feel such contentment.
What’s not to love? They display consummate musicianship. Their songs are shiny sing-a-longy witty slices of pop rock. They are clever and caustic yet warm and wonderful. The on-stage banter between Ed and Steve is funnier than most comedians can manage, the harmonies shimmer, Steve’s dancing is amazing. They free styled a great rap about a ride on Brighton pier. Watching them is like watching friends that you adore, people that “get” you. I can so easily imagine being their chum, I assume that most of their fan base think the same.
Oh, and great puns. I only just worked out that their recent albums “BNL are me”, and “BNL are men” pun into BNL army and BNL amen. Ha ha ha ha.
They ended with Steven Pages enormous voice soaring into “Midnight, not a sound from the …” tossing off the classic musical number so effortlessly, just because, y’know, he can.
They make their talent look easy, I know that it is not. There have been many years of honing their craft, tears and pain and depression and struggle, success and glittering accolades followed by perceived failure. Throughout they have carried on, working through, shining, trying. They have their own independent label and are constantly looking for new ways of reaching their fans. They held a successful cruise this year “Ships and dips”, they are repeating it in January (fuck, I’d love to go on it…) they make USB sticks of each performance available straight after the concert, downloads of each show are also available online. Far as I am concerned they are awesomeness personified. AND they have a double bass player. Enough said.

I have been reminded that the British Book Awards (the Galaxy British Book Awards to be exact) are taking place very soon. The shortlists were announced yesterday, and a right mixed bunch they are too.

The fun part is that you can vote for your own particular faves, and it will only take a few moments of your time. Not only do you get to have your say, but you might win some book tokens too. Hurrah.
http://surveys.bookmarketing.co.uk/awardsvote.htm

I think that the inclusion of popular lit chicky stuff etc may well put some off. It’s not your usual literary list after all. I am soooo guilty of incredible snobbishness when it comes to the books and writers I love, but I AM WRONG TO BE THAT WAY. I read Nick Hornby’s “Complete Polysyllabic spree”

http://www.waterstones.com/waterstonesweb/displayProductDetails.do?sku=3892754
and he cured me of my stinky attitude. Reading is good, it should be fun, my fun is not necessarily your fun, your favourite writer not mine and so on. If a person derives pleasure from a book that’s a great thing. Lately I have been listening to Elvis, and I have been astounded by his range, depth and power. I am currently reading Raymond Carver, and his stories are wonderful. Both of these men are hugely popular, neither anywhere near being crap. Popular is defined in the dictionary as meaning “regarded with great favour, approval, or affection especially by the general public”, not such a bad thing eh? Dan Brown is still shit though, not that he’s anywhere in this years lists, I just felt like saying!

I have a very talented friend, Paolo Cabrelli, who has co-written a rather brilliant short film called “One Last Drink Before Morning.” It was recently screened at the first London Film Makers Convention, and at the Short Film Festival of India in Chennai, the film has now been accepted by the Cinequest Online Viewers Voice competition and can be viewed and rated on their website. To watch and rate the film you must first register (free) with Cinequest. You can do this at:
http://www.cinequestonline.org/2007/registration/index.php
Then login and go to the Viewers Voice section and select the letter O at the bottom to find the film. Or you can go directly to the film by entering: http://www.cinequestonline.org/2007/theater/detail_view.php?m=1152
To rate the film, you must view it completely and then click on one of the stars at the bottom. One short film will win official entry into the Cinequest Film Festival during each of the following voting periods: February, Mar -June, July – Oct and Nov – Jan. Cinequest Film Festival (San Jotse, California) was recently named the Top 10 festival in the world by the Ultimate Film Festival Survival Guide.

It’s a bit of a faff to sign up and download stuff I know, but it’s well worth it as it gives you access to a huge range of films and info. I hadn’t heard of Cinequest but in their words their “vision” is to provide “a leading-edge means of getting films to their fans while providing additional educational and historical value to student and professional film makers.” which can only be good.

MUSIC/SINGER/WOMAN/VOICE/BAND/ALBUM OF THE YEAR.

Without question (Beth Ditto)/Gossip for “Standing in the way of control”.
What an awesome voice. Strong, clear, gorgeous. And she’s a gloriously fat, feisty beauty. The whole sound is stripped down, bare of frills and unnecessary twiddles. The songs all have unbelievable hooks and a sing-a-longa quality too. One track even has anthemic pauses for one to clap along with! Perfect.

Oh yeah, thanks Matt!

BOOK OF THE YEAR.

This is difficult. There have been books that I have really enjoyed reading this year, but I honestly can’t think of one that outshone the rest. There are 4 books that I eagerly waited for so I’ll list them instead;

Helen Simpson “Constitutional”
Derren Brown “Tricks of the mind.”
Courtney Love “Dirty Blonde.”
Yehuda Koren, Eilat Negev “A lover of unreason.”

I have yet to read the Derren Brown one, having received it for Christmas, but it looks fascinating. Helen Simpson I have raved about previously. Courtney’s book is an arty scrap book of jottings and pics. It is a fan girl buy as opposed to a biography in which one will learn anything. I will attempt a review of the Assia Wevill bio soon.

TELEVISION OF THE YEAR.

Soprano’s.
Ace as a very ace thing. From the opening episode I was, cliche style, sat on the edge of my seat. I can’t wait for the next batch of this last ever series, but I want it to go on forever. Christopher Moltisanti remains my telly crush, I mean who wouldn’t go all wibbly at the sight of a crack addicted murdering misogynistic alpha male like Chris?

Veronica Mars.
I was delighted to be advised to watch this by the very fab team over at http://lowculture.proboards34.com/index.cgi? They said it would be gripping and it was. Teen snappy wise cracker Veronica assists her private eye dad solve the many layered mysteries in her home town. It rocks.

Neighbours.
Always Neighbours. It’s my safe place, my chill out and mellow zone. With added morality tale too!

POET OF THE YEAR.

Les Murray has published “The Biplane houses” this year. It is astonishing, simple, truthful and wondrous.

FOOD OF THE YEAR.

Marzipan has made a comeback for me. Having not eaten much of it for a few years I have rediscovered the almondy squishy joy of it.

Toast is always great, usually I have it with marmite.

CUSTOMER OF THE YEAR.

I am going to award this prestigious accolade to the man who on the 23rd December (ie/ the frantic busy Saturday just before Christmas) pointed out that the book he was buying said “£6.99 in the UK only” on the back.
Our exchange went something like this;
“Yes, that’s the price.”
“But it says in the UK only?”
“Yes?”
“So what happens when I take it to the States? Will they confiscate it?”
“…Erm…no.”
“They confiscate all sorts though, food, drugs, liquids.”
“It’s just a book, it refers to the price that you have to pay here when you buy it. It won’t affect anything in the U.S.”
“ARE YOU SURE? IS THAT FACT OR JUST YOUR OPINION?”
“Fact. I think…” goes red and feels a bit strange and unsure.
“Ahh, thanks for your help.”
“K, Bye.”
AAARRRGGGHH etcetera.

That’s all folks…

I wish you a new year full of love, light and happiness.

There’s a great competition at DBA Lehane’s site;

http://shortshortfiction.blogspot.com/2006/11/short-short-short-short-short-short.html

The challenge is to write a complete short story in just 6 words. As someone who has been struggling to flesh out my stories it is really good fun to try and pare it down this much. It is inspired by Ernest Hemingway’s story “For sale. Baby shoes. Never worn.” which succeeds astonishingly well.
Only one entry per person allowed, I have emailed mine which is a very obvious one, but once it popped into my head I could think of no better.

I work in a bookshop. I love books. I covet books. I buy books. I have two huge bookcases in my lounge stuffed with the very best of my books. I read book reviews and think, hmmm, that one sounds great, I’d love to read it. I put stock out at work and store interesting titles and my favourite authors in the staff reservations cupboard until one day when I can afford them. This month there are at least 7 titles that I really want to read, but, sad face, I have no money.
At my old book shop we were allowed to borrow the books that we wanted to. The manager felt that as long as they were returned in pristine condition that it was fine for us to do this. He liked the fact that we had in depth knowledge of our stock. I would borrow the hardback books and read them ultra carefully, nobody would ever be able to tell that I had read it. The bookshop I now work in doesn’t allow this practice, and I really understand why. As a buyer I would be beyond furious to know that someone had already opened my book. I like uncracked spines and clean pages and general newness. That is why i loathe and detest library books. they feel slightly sticky, they lack the whoo heady glory of a brand new publication, and other people have eeew, touched them.
When I was young I swear I found dried spunk on the pages of a sex scene. This scarred me.
Now, I am poor. And I have children who I wish to encourage to read. I kept on buying then ace kids book from work, but even with a staff discount providing enough books for my twins is too costly. So in summer we signed up to our local village library, and the boys did the Reading Mission. I have been going back and swapping 4 books every couple of weeks. This week for the first time I stood there and pondered on the fact that there are adult books too. Suddenly a light bulb went off in my head;

*I could read books for free*

I could just borrow books. it was as if the concept of a library had previously escaped me. What a wonderful and amazing thing. One can borrow books to read. And not pay. Amazing.

So I duly scoured the shelves for books I want. I am after particularly “A lover of unreason” the new biography of Assia Wevil (Ted Hughes second wife), I want to read Margaret Atwood’s latest collection of stories, Kate Atkinson’s new one “One good turn”, Mark Haddon’s “A spot of bother”, one by a new author, and I can’t remember her name right now, but I’d know it if I saw it!, the new Les Murray “The biplane houses”, and I also want Melissa Banks “The wonder spot.”
I looked for all of these, and found none. So I then looked at every book on each fiction/biography and poetry shelf. This didn’t actually take very long. There aren’t that many books there. I found “Prep” by Curtis Sittenfeld, and yes, I have looked at that before and thought I wouldn’t mind reading it. And I found a very trashy read; “Paula, Michael and Bob” all about Paula Yates. That’s it. That’s when the joy faded and I realised that I could read any number of historical romances but the only current new literary fiction hardback available was “The vanishing of Esme Lennox” by Maggie O’farrell, and no offence to Ms O’Farrell, I just am not terribly keen on her writing. There were 3 books in the poetry section. 3!!! ; The collected works of Ted Hughes, Old Possums cat doo dah, and a battered anthology.

Sigh.

Still, I am enjoying the Paula Yates one. Only I have to keep washing my hands with anti bac soap…

I went into our local Somerfield with my twins to buy this weeks exciting issue of Match. The way the magazines are set out there is with three low shelves atop one large shelf. Women’s interest and TV is on the left, and on the right there are 2 shelves of kids comics (I’m talking Thomas the Tank Engine and Barbie etcetera), and the top shelf is Nuts/Zoo/Boobs R Us soft porn men’s mags.
Remember I said these shelves are low? Right, so my kids are almost eye level with Michelle Marshes air brushed boobage, and start saying “Mummy, why have those ladies got no clothes on?” and so on.
Hmmm.
I went back in today, alone, and I looked at the shelves and just thought how incongruous it is to have those magazines with the children’s stuff. Then I thought that actually I feel quite cross about it. I am getting heartily sick of the constant reduction of women to the size of their breasts. What message does this give to young boys? It is becoming more and more acceptable to see soft porn images right across the media. I recall Labour MP’s being angry about page 3 girls, and now they are everywhere.
So, I went over to an assistant and said I had a complaint. She got the supervisor. I explained that I was unhappy that the men’s mags were with the children’s and she said;
“That’s where they are located.”
“Yes, I can see that, but why are they with the children’s comics, that’s inappropriate surely?”
“They have to go there on the top shelf.”
“Hmmm, yes, but it’s nowhere near as high as for instance the top shelf in the newsagents which is well out of children’s reach, is it?”
“No, but it has to go there.”
“With the kid’s stuff?”
“Well where else could it go?”
“Perhaps, if you must sell such things, they could go over with the women’s magazines and at least not be where kids can easily see them?”
“Oh no, it wouldn’t be right! The women wouldn’t like it.”
“…?…”
“Perhaps we could put them under the children’s magazines, at the back.”
“Hmmm. Perhaps you could pass on my comments to your manager?OK, thanks, bye.”

Summer holidays are over as of today, and I have packed my boys back off to school. They each gave themself a motto for the new school year, Dylan’s is “It’s showtime baby!” and he says he will show people who he really is, Ted’s is “Keep on rocking” as he says he wishes to maintain last years glory!
I don’t have a motto for myself, if I did it would probably be along the lines of “Get a move on fatty!” as my ability to procrastinate seemingly knows no bounds. Because of this I have organised my own timetable to follow, which, if followed correctly, will allow me the grand total of 12 hours a week for my writing.
Si pointed out that if I were to work extra hours at the bookshop I would be unavailable to the people who phone me during the day and talk for hours, he says I need to take my writing seriously enough to count it as being work and not answer the phone and not get sucked in to conversations with the many old ladies who like to chatter to me on my way back from school. He is right of course. I guess in some way it is hard for me to validate my words. I know too many deluded people who think they are special because of some talent they perceive they have when in truth…ach, I’ll give it a go eh?