FOOTBALL RIP

Secular prayer: May Chelsea fail to secure any awards this season. May the Special One leave the Premiership. May West Ham be relegated. May Leeds be relegated too. And may Spurs be rewarded with European football next season.

THE BURKINI IN BRITAIN

Muslim women in swimsuits

CAMPUS CRIMUS

When I moved to the University of Texas at Austin in August 1991 my roommate and I went into a pawn shop to look for a secondhand television, a toaster, and other appliances to help set up our student digs. A big shop assistant comes over to us and says, 'Hi fellas, are y'all lookin' for a gun or a TV?" That was our first experience of Texas retail. We didn't bother going to the firearms counter. In August 1966 a sniper at UT killed 15 people from the University Tower . The CNN, FOX, ABC, CBS, NBC axis is blaming the VT massacre on many factors, though the easy availability of guns is low on the list. Gun lobbyists are saying that if the kids had been allowed to carry weapons on campus they might have saved lives and taken the shooter out before he could have done so much harm. More guns make you more secure, apparently. A surge? I wonder how many more students will now go out and buy guns for their 'protection'. Guns R Us. The shooter was a South Korean with a Green Card. He's lived in the US since 1992 and is technically a Resident Alien. His alien status will doubtless become more emphasised as the networks squeeze every last bit of pus out of the story. The TV movie must be in the works. Producers are probably saying, 'We gotta get an Ashton Kutcher lookalike for the hero in the German class'.

A student gun club a couple of weeks ago
University of Terrorism
Is Rap Racist?

PRAIRIE RAMBLERS--Monkeys Is the Cwaziest People
ALABAMA 3 & GARY LUCAS--Woke Up This Morning (Live)
JOHNNY CASH--Flushed From The Bathroom Of Your Heart
DALE WATSON--I Wish I Was Crazy Again
TANYA TUCKER--Would You Lay With Me (In A Field Of Stone)
DON HO--I Love The Simple Folk
THE REVELS--Dead Man's Stroll (Midnight Stroll)
CLAUDINE LONGET--Lullaby From Rosemary's Baby (Sleep Safe And Warm)
THE FLEETWOODS--Mr. Blue (A Capella Version)
LESLEY GORE--You Don't Own Me
CAROLE KING--School Bells Are Ringing
SHOP ASSISTANTS--I Don't Wanna Be Friends With You
THE VASELINES--Jesus Wants Me For A Sunbeam
THE DYNAMICS--Murder In The First Degree
LAVICE & COMPANY--Thoughs Were The Days
GRAVEDIGGAZ--1-800 Suicide
CHESSE ROOTS--Rambo Salute
UNKNOWN ARTIST--Jeitili
M.I.A.--Bird Flu (Guns Up Buraka Remix)
SHELLSHOCK--Cheaptalk
BILL EVANS--Peace Piece
SMITH'S SACRED SINGERS--Where We'll Never Grow Old
FIDDLIN' POWERS FAMILY--Old Virginia Reel

SAFE AS HOUSES OF PARLIAMENT

So it goes

Regime change







MUTAMASSIK--Abdel Wahab's 'Zeina' (Occupation Mix)
NMS--Evacuate The White House
LIL WAYNE--Georgia... Bush
J DILLA--The $ (Instrumental)
J DILLA--The $
GHETTO GIRLZ--My Man's Playing Tricks On Me
KID CREOLE & THE COCONUTS--Annie I'm Not Your Daddy (Special Edit)
LUOMO--Wanna Tell
KARIZMA--All Teched Out
TIGA--Burning Down The House
COMMON--New Wave (Playgroup Remix)
DJ 3000--Merchants Of Identity (The Marketplace)
CRASS--Walls (Fun In The Oven)
GLAXO BABIES--Christine Keeler
MISTER FREEDOM--Balls!
BUSDRIVER--Lefty's Lament
KAM--Stereotype
DON CARLOS--Pass Me The Lazer Beam
SERGIO MENDES & BRASIL 66--For What's It's Worth
MERLE HAGGARD & THE STRANGERS--Sing Me Back Home
CIBELLE--London London (featuring Devendra Banhart)

THE QUITTER

I used to read The Beano and 2000 AD and have dabbled in graphic novels off and on. Saw the movie American Splendor but haven't read the book of the comic. Pekar's work is mostly autobiographical but The Quitter is seriously close to the bone. No frills. Dean Haspiel's hard-edged drawings apply black humour to 50s B-movie noir figures and landscapes. This ain't no Sweet Smell of Success though, but a discomfiting memoir that brings you layers of self-loathing, and fesses up to the bad things one does as a youth (like beating up guys for peer cred). Pekar's persistent fear is that he might not make enough money to get by. The young Pekar tends to fuck up in minor ways and loses jobs. The Quitter lends some insight into the tedious casual labour that young people do and then moves on to the lives of working stiffs in offices. The older Pekar is still anxious about paying the bills, providing for partner and daughter, despite some success and cult fame as a comic book auteur. The Quitter's characterisations are sharp and unfussy. It would be easy to blame the parents. But there's no bitterness with the neurosis. Vivid sketches include his downbeat Mom (it's all going to turn to custard, always), lonely ex-Navy cousin who lodges upstairs, and his angry father who thinks everything America is shit compared to the European. No immigration clichés here. The Pekars came to Cleveland from the shtetls of Poland. At times you'll have your head in your hands in despair like Pekar, though you might also gnaw at your cuticles. Music is not quite a saving grace but the love of jazz records and writing about them helps to validate Pekar in a more respectable way than kicking the shit out of other tough nuts in school and the neighbourhood. The Quitter flipped some backpages to melancholia and the crack-ups of mundanity.

READING THESE DAYS

Wax Poetics
Total Chaos

NO REST FOR THE JIHADIS

"My beard's longer than your beard (na na na-na na)"

HELLO SAILOR

Polly Toynbee on Faye Turney
She works hard for the money







JULIE LONDON--Hot Toddy
MIKKI WILCOX--Alright, OK, You Win
KEELY SMITH--A Hard Day's Night
ESTHER PHILLIPS--I'm Getting 'Long Alright
MILLIE JACKSON--Loving Arms
BETTY HARRIS--What'd I Do Wrong
RENALDO DOMINO--Not Too Cool To Cry
SHARON TANDY--Stay With Me
BESSIE BANKS--Try To Leave Me If You Can (I Bet You Can't Do It)
SAM BAKER--Sunny
BOB & GENE--I Can Be Cool
ARETHA FRANKLIN--I Can't Wait To See My Baby's Face
JEAN GRAE--Not The One (DJ Raize & Ski Beatz Remix)
CASS ELLIOT--All For Me
AMY WINEHOUSE--Love Is A Losing Game (Acoustic)
TRACEY THORN--Goodbye Joe
KELLY HOGAN & THE PINE VALLEY COSMONAUTS--Papa Was A Rodeo
DEAN & BRITTA--Words You Used To Say
BRAD MEHLDAU--River Man
IRIS--Song For A Past
POLE--Sylvenstein
DON FRENCH--Lonely Saturday Night
KETTY LESTER--Love Letters