| Defeat, or victory? Nick Griffin on Question Time |
[Oct. 22nd, 2009|11:50 pm] |
Well, after all the hype and chaos, the censorious left trying to break into Television Centre, Peter Hain's desperate attempts to prevent it, I just watched Question Time.
How did Nick Griffin come out of it? Well, he's rather better spoken, and seemingly better educated, than I'd expected. And to be completely fair to him, he reacted with good humour to what must, for him, have been a horrendous experience. But it blew the BNP and their policies to kingdom come. He was absolutely savaged by both the audience and the other panelists.
He did make some valid points, but got thoroughly run down (as if by a train!) by the points others made against him. He tried to wriggle out of the holocaust denial accusations but got nailed firmly to the floor. The youtube video footage issue he absolutely couldn't answer.
One thing it did bring out - it forced all the main party representatives to back each other up as all being totally opposed to the BNP policies. When Labour ministers and Conservative spokesmen, who'd normally be tearing each other apart, are in complete agreement both with each other and the Liberal Democrats, it proves something, I think.
The (mixed-race, I think) guy who asked "where would you send me" scored massively - effectively he forced Griffin to change the BNP's policy there and then (unless they'd seen the writing and done it already?), from "all imigrants and children of immigrants must go" to "only the troublemakers should be ejected".
And 10/10 for style to the lesbian woman at the end who replied to Griffin's homophobic comments with "the abhorrence is mutual". Nice!
Who came out of it worst? The censorists. Closely followed by the BNP.
Well done to the BBC for staging it. |
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| Anyone fancy a Flock? |
[Oct. 2nd, 2009|01:17 pm] |
It's Flock time again, tonight's pre-club is run by the Leeds Gothic Society (9pm - 10pm) and featured free entry for students with a student ID card - and that includes entry to Flock itself, from 10pm - well past most sheepses bedtimes.
For anyone who isn't a student, entry is £3 before 11pm, £4 after.
At The Subculture, round the side of the Merrion Centre.
See you there! |
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| Phone Scam Warning |
[Sep. 21st, 2009|02:27 pm] |
Phone scam being reported by both BT and Offcom:
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/09/19/phone_disconnection_scam/
Basically someone calls, claims to be from a telco or Offcom, says there's a debt and you'll be cut off if it's not paid immediately. If challenged, they'll say they're disconnecting immediately, and if you don't believe them, hang up and try and make a call.
What they actually do is stay on the line, with mute pressed. Landline phone calls can only be cut off from the caller's end - so when you try and use the phone, you get silence, because the original call is still connected. The scammer can still hear the person they've called, so they know when that person hangs up again - at which point they cut the call and call back, asking for credit card details.
Whole thing is s scam. If anyone gets a call like that, hang up and ignore it. After a short while they'll give up, as the call that's tying up your line is costing them money. |
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| Post-futurepop toasterpunk! |
[Sep. 1st, 2009|12:44 pm] |
Mandr01d
Nuclear Is Cool
The unacceptable face of the post-futurepop future of musikind, Mandroid stagger out of the wreckage of their time machine and onto the stage of Leeds' infamous "Subculture" alternative club where they attempt to warn us of the true horrors of the coming age of toasterpunk. Nuclear is dangerous!
The Summer Of 6.9
"That was the upgrade of my life!" |
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| North, me hearties, north! |
[Aug. 28th, 2009|01:47 pm] |
Saturday 29th August 2009
Zeitgeist Zero + Spekulus
Chillingham Arms, Newcastle, UK.
I'm part of the convoy, we'll be rolling into Newcastle in a fleet of limousines some time early tomorrow afternoon. Might try and get some photos with the spectacular bridges as a backdrop, if time permits.
Hope to see some of you there! |
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| The Eden House live in London |
[Aug. 17th, 2009|01:50 pm] |
And finally the headliners. They played a superb set, containing some breathtaking music.
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| 4-4-7-2 |
[Aug. 17th, 2009|12:48 am] |
More videos from the London Legion gig - here's the mighty Rhombus doing the fantastic "4-4-7-2"
Ignore the shaking camera for the first seven seconds - it steadies after that
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| Marriot hotel blames victim for rape |
[Aug. 16th, 2009|01:56 pm] |
Potentially a good reason to boycott the Marriot hotel chain: The Stamford Marriott Hotel & Spa is claiming that a woman who was raped in their parking garage on October 10, 2006 "failed to exercise due care for her own safety and the safety of her children and proper use of her senses and facilities."
Basically the lady in question was putting her two children, aged 3 and 5, into their car safety seats in her car, in the hotel's parking garage, when a man armed with a gun attacked her from behind, forced her to strip, threatened to sexually assault one of the children, and then raped her. He's now doing 20 years jail having been caught and convicted, but the hotel are trying to defend themselves from a claim that they should have prevented him from being in the car park (where aparently he'd been loitering and acting suspiciously for some time) by saying that she and the children "didn't do enough to mitigate the attack". W.T.F.??????
This is confirmed by news reports, see article from The Connetticut Post, here. |
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| Some things |
[Aug. 14th, 2009|01:29 pm] |
Filament: Filament is an erotic magazine for straight women. Given the vast amount of erotica out there aimed at straight men, you'd think that the only problems facing a similar product for women would be the standard business ones of identifying demand and marketting.
Seems it's not like that at all though. There's a very interesting Guardian article here: When images of women as sex objects fill newsagents, why has a magazine featuring semi-naked men faced so many hurdles? (thanks to ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) asw909 for the link).
The question I'm left with though is why, in a society where the depction of naked women for erotic pleasure is regarded as perfectly OK, is there a problem with showing arroused men? That discriminates against both women and gay men. I gather they also had distributor problems because no-one wanted to handle a women's magazine with a man on the cover. WTF???
The NHS and Professor Stephen Hawking: There's a massive debate going on in the USA at the moment over healthcare. To UK and European eyes the USA system is completely bonkers, they pay more tax than we do yet there is no national health system over there, people have to buy (very expensive) private medical insurance. Which means millions of US citizens have no health care provision at all - they get sick, they get sick, end of. Barbaric and primitive to those of us used to state-funded healthcare, but in keeping with the very strongly engrained US ideal that "anyone who isn't rich just hasn't worked hard enough".
But recently a hard-right columnist claimed that "Were Professor Hawking British, he'd have been left to die by their (our) NHS because of his disabilities".
The rather fundamental, showstopping even, problem with this being that Professor Hawking *is* British, and that a big chunk (all?) of the treatment that's kept him alive was indeed delivered by the NHS. Presumably, whoever wrote the original piece genuinely believed that only the USA's medical establishment could have provided the high-tech treatment that keeps the good professor alive. Which is either monumental stupidity on a truly spectacular scale, or an equally spectacular dose of cultural imperialism. |
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| Two moments of history |
[Aug. 13th, 2009|07:09 pm] |
Two moments of history, 13th August 2009:
Rock guitar pioneer Les Paul dies
Les Paul, whose pioneering electric guitars were used by a legion of rock stars, has died at the age of 94.
Women's boxing gains Olympic spot
Women boxers will have the chance to fight for gold at the 2012 Olympics. International Olympic Committee chiefs voted on Thursday to lift the barrier to the last all-male summer sport.
Les Paul: I'd imagine that people round the world will mourn Les Paul. Along with Leo Fender, he really was one of the 'Fathers of Rock', creating the instruments (and seemingly a lot of the recording facilities) that allowed the whole electric guitar driven musical revolution to happen.
Farwell, and Salute!
Women's Boxing: A big step forward for equality. Needless to say the usual "boxing should be banned" brigade are up in arms about this, but I see it as a positive thing. No-one's forced to enter a boxing ring, and if women want to do so, and fight, then that's entirely up to them. I've long thought that a sign of true equality will be when it's just as common to see women digging up the roads as it is to see men doing it, but women also need to be accepted into the heavy duty compettitive sports too. Ultimately we need to see female players in a Premier League that's as compettitive as the men's one, driving Formula 1 cars, and yes, fighting it out in the boxing ring. |
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| Legion live in London - Shadow Scene |
[Aug. 13th, 2009|01:15 pm] |
Here's another track from Legion's London gig the other week. These videos were shot with the video camera placed at the very front of the sound engineer's booth, just in front of the desk, which in the Scala means a perfect view of the stage and crystal clear sound.
If you want to see more, including the stunning track "Lust", filmed at Beyond The Veil in Leeds, have a look at the Wisefire Promotions YouTube channel, here: http://www.youtube.com/user/wisefiredj |
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| Legion live in London - Rosanna! |
[Aug. 13th, 2009|12:03 pm] |
Legion played their first London gig, opening the show at La Scala for a gig that included The Mariana Hollow, Rhombus, and The Eden House. They went down a storm with the enthusiastic crowd, here's one of the tracks, "Rosanna".
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| I've always known that fungi are Hellspawned evil incarnate |
[Aug. 12th, 2009|07:17 pm] |
Meet Ophiocordyceps unilateralis, which turns its victims into the walking dead, making them travel to and die in locations that best suit the fungus, which then consumes the victim from within before sprouting a hideous spore distributor from the back of the host's neck.
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/08/12/ant_zombie_fungus_horror/
Today it's ants, but you can bet that somewhere there's a team of researchers busily working away in a sealed lab developing a military version that attacks humans. Imagine a fungal plague that made its victims climb to the tallest point they could reach before dying, whereupon a growth erupts from their neck or face (so as not to be obstructed by clothing), spreading spores across a city.
And people wonder why I don't like mushrooms... |
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| Give us, this day, all that you showed me, the power and the glory, till my engine comes! |
[Aug. 12th, 2009|01:37 pm] |
Sunday saw Kenny, Laura, Chris and I take a trip to Barrow Hill Roundhouse, a preserved locomotive maintenance depot near Chesterfield where quite a lot of herritage diesel and electric locomotives, plus a few steamers, are based. They were having a "Type 5 / Twin Engine Gala", which basically means we got to play with lots of very large locomotives. The demonstration line is only about a mile long, so the main attraction isn't so much the train ride as the chance to wander around so many beautifully restored machines, plus see inside the Deltic Preservation Society's shed. They also had the engine from one of the long gone "Baby Deltic" class 22s mounted in the body of a scrap Class 37, and fired it up every couple of hours so we could hear the very strange sound it made! Aparently there is a plan to actually build a replica using frames, bogies, and other parts from redundant Class 20s and 37s (there are loads of those preserved properly, so using a couple that would otherwise just go for scrap makes sense if they can raise the funds).
Needless to say I took loads of photos but given that trains are more interesting when moving, here's a video I shot of Class 55 "Deltic" No 55 015 hauling the three coach demonstration train, plus a Class 47 on the back (to bring the ensemble back again), out of the roundhouse's station platform. Deltic and coaches are in imaculate BR Blue livery, just as they would have been in the halcyon high summer days of the late 1970s and early 1980s.
PS: You can see an assortment of short railway clips (mostly filmed with my still camera on video mode) on YouTube at http://www.youtube.com/alycidonrising |
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| Thank Flock It's Friday! |
[Aug. 7th, 2009|01:45 pm] |
Goth / Alternative / 80s / Industrial / StuffGoth / Alternative / 80s / Industrial / Stuff
8pm to 10pm, live music from Dyonisis supported by Violet Vortex.
10pm to 3am, the top-notch DJing you all know and love from Phono Paul and Mr Vodka.
And we've lovely weather for it too - great weekends always start with a Flock!
http://www.fridayflock.net |
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| Friday Flock and Friday Flock Live, this Friday! |
[Aug. 3rd, 2009|12:58 pm] |
I'm sure there'll be a graphical version of this along in a minute, but until then:It's Flock Time!Friday Flock this Friday, 10pm till 3am with request-friendly DJs playing the classic sound of the Phono plus all the best of the current Goth and Industrial scenes. Only £3 on the door!
Plus from 8pm till the club starts at 10, Friday Flock Live, featuring two of the scene's best up and coming bands, and including free entry to Flock aferwards.
Dyonisis + Violet VortexDyonisis danced out of the musical pandora's box whilst no-one was looking, bringing with them a breath of musical fresh air and playing layered ethereal soundscapes driven along by pulsing basslines. Two voices, individual from each other yet blending together, weaving emotion, memories and impressions into songs embroidered by haunting guitarlines. Formed in 2005 the band hit the live scene running, playing with the likes of NFD and Emilie Autumn, and going on to win the WGW "Battle Of The Bands".
Violet Vortex are a fairly new band hailing from Lancashire who play dark gothic rock with a slight industrial twist. Think Suspiria crossed with "Tyranny of Inaction"-era Rosetta Stone. Expect spooky atmospheric soundscapes, epic choruses and seductive female vocals, original but strangely catchy.
Live before Friday Flock - 7th August 2009
Doors 7:30pm, first band onstage 8pm
£4adv - includes free entry to Friday Flock clubnight after the bands.
Advance tickets from Friday Flock Live On-Line Tickets. |
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