Guilty pleasures volume 437

Oh gawd, I really shouldn't have spouted off about how good the old Genesis albums were going as I ploughed through their voluminous back catalogue - Mex's law dictated as soon as I let slip that frankly ludicrous opinion, the quality of the rest would immediately drop like a Hercules executing the Khe Sanh approach. And, boy, was I right... "...And then there were three" is blander than a Sportscene presenter's after dinner banter and not really worthy of further comment - jeez, I really didn't see 'em missing old Steve Hackett but there ya go - other than to say "Royaume Uni, nil points". Bummer.

However, "Abacab" is, remarkably, even worse - w-a-y worse, a shit sandwich without the bread as the old Tap-ism goes. Horrendous MOR slop of the kind that even their drummer would dismiss from his future solo work as too insipid for human (and progger) consumption. Doesn't help that the last few MP3s towards the end of my copy of said elpee are jumpier than Ashy's vest (another one for the Hillhousians out there) - so much for bloody BitTorrent digital media purchases from legitimate vendors, eh ? Anyways, I won't be re-visiting that one - and I'm not 100% sure about sampling the rest of 'em either now... balls, I've got terrible visions of having to sit through three hours of that shite in July at Old Trafford - aww, crap... just what the fuck was I thinking ???

On a similar potentially unpleasant note, I'm going to see Journey on Saturday at the Armadillo and I'm feeling a fair old bit of trepidation...no, not at the prospect of another two and a half hours of eighties AOR baby-baby-baby lighters-aloft slush (that's a given) but more that the uncanny Steve Perry-a-like on lead vox has been given the Spanish and replaced with Jeff Scott Soto, late of Thingumy Wankstein's band IIRC. Hmmm. AFAIR (from way back in my teenage years, y'understand), this particular fella has a fair set of pipes on him so it does probably pay to give him a chance...but changing squealer mid-stream is generally not a good sign for any band. If the bugger butchers "Open Arms" then it really will cause tears before bedtime in more than one household I can tell you...

Yuck, after all that MOR / AOR talk I really feel like I should rinse out my psyche with something a bit more, um, substantial. Ah, now that's much better. Like taking a good, long, cold shower after sitting for an hour in a bath of warm piss - a delightful image I'm sure you'll agree.

You need coolin'...??? Oh Lord yeah !!!

Yes, daft as a box of frogs but pretty darn close to genius. This is top drawer canine cojones, the kind of utter gonzoid brilliance that justifies the whole mash-up shooting match in four minutes of colossal riffage...

Those little things that get on my nerves #2

Went to a lovely concert tonight. The ever excellent SCO at home in Glasgow City Hall. A tasty, filling little diet of Philip Glass and John Adams, always right up my street, especially the welcome dissonance of Adams' Chamber Symphony, a glorious racket taking me right back to the days of my old Arnold loading the latest "classic" from ye olde cassette and the big yin here humming along with ten minutes of speed write 0 data transfer before, say, Roland In Time kicks in. Beautiful. Ahem...anyway, that's all well and good. What wasn't/isn't/will never be so clever is the endless flippin' coughing and retching polluting the collective airspace during every single "serious" music concert I've ever been to or, in fact, have ever even heard on the bloody radio...

Frankly, it is truly, truly awful and I can't imagine how bad it must be for the poor performers up there on stage or in the pit. A full jarring, noises on re-enactment of the Somme performed with improvised phlegm solos by the bucket load at every single break between movements. Those tossers don't even have the basic wherewithal to even try and mask their fetid hacking up during the loud fucking bits - they actually wait 'til the silences to launch into their sputum barrage. Now don't get me wrong, there are a fair few oldsters in the audience at these things, plenty of denizens of the undead with the full Savini slap who would make even Uncle Mex look like a healthy, well developed young specimen. I can just about turn the other way when they are giving their lungs the old Highland clearance. It's the rest of the ignorant bar stewards who have no excuses, none at all.

Old Mexy here has been through thirty years of chronic catarrh, the odd bout of bronchitis as well as an ongoing battle with asthma (not helped by living in Ice Station Zebra). Anyone who has known me long enough will verify that I have pretty much had a persistent cold since, oh, around some time in 1975. And yet, somehow, I can manage to go to a concert, arrive on time, sit down AND SHUT THE FUCK UP FOR THE DURATION WITHOUT CHUCKING MY FUCKING GUTS UP. So how do I manage it ??? Hmm, it ain't that hard, really. Maybe not being a complete ignoranus gives me an unfair advantage. Grrr....I tell ya, they want fucking shooting, the lot of 'em.

While I'm here, sod it, I'll put the boot into another of my favourite species. The big man is the archetypal nervous wreck about being on time for things. I always turn up well in advance, especially for the movies. I'm normally first one in the place so I can pick my seat (Woody Allen, back row centre, screen one, GFT), read my paper and dispose of my munchies in good time before the picture starts. I have only ever breached this when in the company of norms but that is obviously only under duress - and frankly I usually don't have that problem when going to see some 1935 black and white Polish B-movie or suchlike.

Anyway, so far so neurotic. However, there is another breed of person who doesn't seem to be able to even use a watch or read a clock, and seems to have absolutely no problem with missing the first ten minutes of the thing he's paid good money to see. Okay, okay, I know it happens - folk miss connections, are busy bumping gums, forget the time, et cetera. I can accept that. What I can't accept is that these sausage jockeys generally seem to be utterly unperturbed by their (re-)tardiness, and generally spend the first five minutes on entering the theatre looking for the optimum seat when they should be simply fucking grateful for being allowed in at all in the first place and make a bee line for the one nearest their sorry ass.

Of course, a further five minutes is inevitably wasted with them standing up, taking off their jackets and coats whilst persistently blocking the view of those poor patient patrons who have got there IN DAMN GOOD TIME only to be treated with such knob-ish contempt by dullards. Even more minutes are then spent dicking around with their preposterously illuminated mobile phones instead of simply pressing the bloody "off" button like good considerate citizens (urgh, mobile phones... must... resist... lengthy... digression.. into... apocalypse... of... fury).

However, the pièce de résistance for me is when said feckless felchers suddenly decide that, actually, yes, they would like something from the sweet stall (BTW, I blame that bastard advert in the bigger chains saying "Ladies and Gentlemen, there is still time to buy snacks and drinks" for this - NO, THERE ISN'T "STILL TIME", YOU'VE HAD PLENTY OF TIME BEFORE THE PROJECTOR KICKED OFF, SIT DOWN ON YOUR FAT ARSE AND SHUT THE FUCK UP). Of course, when they come back from said snack vendor, a whole new circle of hell opens up for everyone as we put up with their fuckwitted paper rustling and their hotdogs odious odours for the duration of the film. If you're really unlucky, a sub-strata of this archetype spend most of the rest of the movie explaining the fine detail of the plot to their bovine spouses... okay, maybe the Seventh Seal has a panoply of lovingly crafted existential nuances which are hard to catch at first pass but Tallageda fucking Nights? Hmm, methinks you fine people oughta have stayed in to watch Celebrity Big Brother, you ignorant fuckwits. Please, somebody push them towards Chuck.

Jeez, I really am feeling pretty damn misanthropic today (just today???) - had better take a wee lie down and stick on Music for Airports...aahhh, deep breaths. Feeling better already.


There you go. Two moans for the price of one. Champion. I was going to go for the hat trick but cyclists will be getting the size twelves in a post of their own at some later date. Too much bile to be shared at this one sitting I'd wager...

Made with the help of -

1. Genesis "A Trick of the Tail" - Christ, I had to finally admit it and confess that I really, genuinely like loads of their seventies stuff. Gentle, eccentric prog with some quirky pop sensibilities creeping in here and there, especially just after Peter G left. Throw stones at me if it makes you feel better. Don't know whether anyone will ever excuse me going to see them this summer... (aww naw, big man, how could you let that slip out in a public place ???)

2. Kling Klang "The Esthetik of Destruction" - This is pretty damn special IMHO. Feels to me like glorious, slow droning doom metal as played by Kraftwerk instead of you know who. Like Saint Vitus playing instrumentals only with Jon Lord on keys replacing Dave Chandler's guitar. Heard them on Peelie's show (R.I.P.) years ago and its taken me this long to get around to getting into them.

A demented refugee from the (late) eighties writes...

I thought I'd cracked it, folks - I thought I'd finally found that old Konami arcade shooter I had played in Electronic Experience all those years ago with the beautiful rip off/homage of Chopin as the level one music - Yes, indeedy, Thunder Cross seriously, genuinely, desperately looked like it fitted the whole goddamn bill...

The look of the thing definitely rings some major bells with the old boy, especially the section with the multi-level parallax red cloud background (still a sucker for that stuff). Other wee touches like the big old metallic bosses (no, not another errant Sabs reference) are very much in the mould of the mystery game I'm thinking of... and I am still 90% sure it was published by Konami...

However, as that famed Zen master Roy Walker might have said when confronting this particular situation, "mmm...it's good...but it's not right". The dread realisation was something that I confirmed for myself first hand when I stumbled across this vid of the game being played from start to finish - it's full of standard issue late eighties synthy j-rock game music, all well done natch but nothing at all like the game music I'm hearing in my head - all upbeat, bass heavy, eminently danceable shit, no moody piano sonatas whatsoever, zero zilch zip nada. I sat through it all and watched the whole f**king thing being played to completion (yes, I am one singularly sad bas - hell, you must know that already) but, grud on a greeny, it just ain't the one... :-(((

So my (deservedly) lonely quest goes on - I move on to another place, assume another fake surname again, hope to God the folk in the next town don't make me angry (sorry, different quest, wrong meeting, erm, carry on)...anyway, I'm begging you, please, someone out there has just got to help me !!! Do I have to plough through every single friggin' japanese horizontal scrolling blaster released between 1985 and 1992 before I get any satisfaction around here ?!??!

Damn you! God damn you all to hell!

Oh Lord Yawn - Uncle Mex's Albums of 2006

Greetings music lovers! Yes, I'm finally getting around to posting that "best of 2006" albums list that I promised a couple of posts back. Er, it seems that the whole notion somehow got lost in the midst of the traditional new years alcoholic stupor - mea culpa. So, please bear with me while I disappear up my own fundament and indulge some of my frustrated wannabe Melody Maker scribe fantasies and get all Lester Bangs on yo ass. Only a top five, once again - and why not?

Black Mountain - Black Mountain

Said on the tin Neil Young meets Sabbath by way of "Animals"-era Floyd. Well, I'd certainly buy that for a dollar. In fact, I did buy that for a dollar (or, erm, ten). And they weren't kidding. Saw them at the ABC and they were pretty damn sweet live. Has to be said, heroic levels of facial hair, even the women (er, well I was very, very drunk).

Mogwai - Mr Beast

Moggies on auto-pilot, frankly, but still good enough for old Mex - in fact, Glasgow Mega-Snake would have got this one 5 Ks in Kerrang on its own if anything to say about it I had, young padawan. Saw them live at the Albert Hall (no less) last autumn and it was just about the best f***ing thing that I have ever seen. Really. Sounded like sticking your head in an aircraft engine as the afterburners kick in - something Uncle Mex himself tried one time in days past but we won't go there.

Boards Of Canada - Trans Canada Highway E.P.

Not a full album but this is my bloody list so bollocks to the lot of you. This is more of the same dreamy, ethereal, yada yada "intelligent techno" (barf!) that they've been peddling for a good few years now. Like most folk who listen to it, I also find it taking me right back to school television circa 1978. A good thing I'm sure you would agree (right???). Don't care about them covering the same old ground every year. Another ten along exactly the same lines would suit me, thanks.

Swan Island - The Centre Will Hold

Stumbled across this one whilst searching Google news one morning for new scriptures from my God(s) - it's amazing the number of tenuous links made to the dark lords by desperate writers covering any band who peels off the odd palm-muted, (slightly) down-tuned riff or two. Hmm, don't see it myself from these ladies but this is a wee gem nonetheless. Sounds to these jaded ears like a new wave band having a bash at classic rock - say Blondie playing, erm, Bachman Turner Overdrive. But so much better than that, honestly.

Sunn O))) - Black One

Moves like a supertanker crossing the Arctic Circle on a particularly stormy midwinter's night. Slow slow, quick quick, slow. Without the quick quick. Seismic detonations at the bass end of the scale running at 16 and a half rpm - at a push. Jeez, I've been waiting on this kind of stuff all my miserable life. Saw them twice at the ABC last year and both times they did a better clear out job on my bowels than a steam powered hydrochloric acid enema - another Uncle Mex speciality that will be discussed at a later date (or maybe not). All told, not for everyone.


Well, how do you like them apples ? Admittedly, this whole nerd list creation thing is probably just another manifestation of my inner Aspergers geek-need to order and categorize every little thing I come across - hmm, that might just be another wee list to ponder...probs keep that one to myself, thankyouverymuch. Anyways, same again same time next year - super.

Those little things that get on my nerves #1

Noticed yet another new Aerosmith compilation in the record shops, humorously titled The Very Best Of, which has apparently been out for a few months now...and what utter balls it is. They've tacked on two genuine seventies classics (Dream On and Sweet Emotion) to an otherwise relentless trawl through a parade of nineties MOR bilge that makes even their eighties MTV bilge look a fine vintage in comparison.

Hilariously/tragically, they've even seen fit to include all of that little run of (s)hit singles where, as my old mate iKon pointed out at the time, they seemed to be releasing the same fucking song again and again with merely a slightly modified chorus to help us tell 'em apart from each other (Cryin', Jaded, Crazy, and Amazing if you must know). Terrible, soul destroying mush, hate it all. What's almost as awful is the inclusion of the Run DMC version of Walk This Way in place of their own original version. Don't get me wrong, that probably is the better version of the two but, FFS, on your own frigging hits compilation ? Jeez, would Led Zep have put that Puff Daddy atrocity cover of Kashmir on Remasters instead of their own original? Two chances of that, mate, and slim just left town. Shocking, absolutely shocking. Naw, I'm not buying it, either figuratively or literally. This might just be the point where the Aero boys have finally choked on Satan's scaly pecker. What a waste.

Made with the help of -

Aerosmith's Greatest Hits - I still can't believe how good this is. Back In The Saddle, Kings And Queens, Walkin' In The Sand, priceless slabs of old skool rawk magic at every turn. And that was back when they were hoovering Bolivian marching powder up their collective hooters by the ton. A few years after they hit rehab, they end up hitting us with Don't Want To Miss A Fucking Thing. The moral of this story : just say yes, kids...

Yippee-Ki-Yay ! Uncle Mex's Movies of 2006

Hey-ho, it's that time of year again when I decide to bore all lurkers out there with my opinions on the best popular culture offerings I've seen this year (BTW, listing the sight of that lovely neighbour in the altogether almost counted as my favourite art installation but I've resisted the temptation to include it). Anyhoo, I'm kicking off with my favourite films of the year - it could have been a top fifty given that I'm in there every bloody week but seeing as I'm not being paid for this shit, let's press on with a top five. Disappointingly mainstream list this year as well but the indies did absolutely zip for me so fully deserve the dustbin of historical ignominy (Little Miss Sunshine, The Squid and the Whale for just two of 'em - double order of meh with meh on the side). Anyhoo, let's get on with it. The best five. Erm, that I can remember at any rate. Not in any order either.

1. Casino Royale - If Dan Craig actually had a face like a welders bench, it would be better than the one he's got now. That's a good thing, BTW. He looks like a proper hard bastard and it wasn't a stretch to see him seriously knock seven shades out of generic heavies the way it was with old Remington Steele in the tux. And they binned the invisible f***ing Aston as well, thank Geezer.

2. Enron : The Smartest Guys in the Room - Don't know if this was a 2006 movie but I saw it this year so it's going in. Sensational documentary, among the best I've ever seen. Not much else to say. Beautifully made, funny and very frightening.

3. Pan's Labyrinth - As good as everyone says it is. Bizarre, glorious shotgun wedding of, erm, Hellboy and Land and Freedom. But better, much better, than that sounds. Words don't do it justice so I'll STFU save for recommending it wholeheartedly.

4. Superman Returns - Yup, I did like this one. The lad Routh did a good job channelling the great Mr Reeve, it was all put together with a grand, old school look about it, and it genuinely felt like a real Superman movie. Hope this re-starts the franchise. Please.

5. A Scanner Darkly - Probably the most faithful PKD adaptation ever to make the cut (though I'd still like to see that Gilliam Ubik fanboy fantasy come to life). Jeez, I think Keanu is finally getting the message. Minimalism. Don't act, you can't. Play it all down. Just be yourself as a starter. If you've got nothing else in the locker (news just in, no you haven't) stick with the simplicity. Given that old Bob Arctor is a total stoner, that ain't a stretch for you Bill so don't sweat it. Following Constantine, that's two in a row of his I've managed to sit through without wanting to fly over to LA and gouge his f***ing eyes out. Good work fella.

Oh, and BTW the sainted Noni is in this as well and is obviously gorgeous, wonderful and worthy of some kind of award - I'd certainly give her one (oh dear, have I said something wrong ?)


Right, that's enough from me. City of God is about to come on telly. Anyways, joy of joys, my favourite albums list for 2006 will be right up shortly! Yes, be still your beating f***king hearts.