#notmurdered - He's Leaving Home

It's a holiday in Mancunia ... where the people dress in black - part II

I love that holiday feeling, the one where you know you're on your way and whatever the holiday holds is ahead of you. I didn't have much time to enjoy that feeling for this trip because I had pressing matters to address. I do a bit of volunteer work on a  local arts and music newsletter and I had an edition to get off to the printers. That would mean an hour at the computer and then a trip into town to deliver the artwork. I also needed my hair cut badly I also badly needed a haircut.

Coleraine at 9am is pretty much a desert. My favourite gentleman's barbershop is closed. I gatecrash a salon without an appointment. Punk rock, let's go. Even though my haircut is achieved, the morning is going Clockwise-esque. A summary of tasks in hand:

1. haircut
2. deliver pen drive of artwork to printer
3. change £70 worth of holiday fund coins into notes

I fail on 3. I have to take my bags of coins home again with me. It doesn't matter. There are two banks and a post office in Portstewart.

There are no longer any banks in Portstewart and the post office is closed due to 'unforeseen circumstances'. I stuff the bags into my rucksack. I am so pleased I make my 2pm departure time for the airport that the realisation that I have forgotten to leave Carlosita's laptop round to her mum's is a real pisser. Turning round, getting it and delivering it adds half an hour onto my travel time. I'm now looking tight for getting through security at the airport, still the best part of an hour's drive away.

"Have you got coins in your bag?"
"No. Wait. Coins? Yes."

What is it about quasi-official questions that make you sound flustered and stupid? At least I got to the airport just on time. I only have time enough to do one of two things: have my habitual pre-flight whiskey OR go to the duty free. I go to the duty free. One till is down, the other has a long queue. I buy a bottle of Bushmills for my hosts and leg it to the gate. I needn't have bothered. A long, immobile line of sweaty travellers is still waiting to board.

Flying Belfast to Liverpool is hardly a flight at all. You're no sooner up than down again. I'm too cross to buy an inflated drink from the 'travel kiosk'. I read about the nightlife in Berlin I have missed in three visits and bingo, we have landed. I'm forcibly reminded that I'm about to entrust my personal safety to people I have never met. I only have the sketchiest idea how they look. What if they're awful? What if they're axe murderers?

I have to call home to say I landed safely. I know it's a delaying tactic. They're waiting in Arrivals and I'm hovering in the baggage hall. My nose is running and my ears are blocked - summer cold or hayfever, I don't know which. I'm just a tad nervous. This could be a colossal mistake. I wish I was drunk.

Oh dear ...

And there they are. @CardinalPhink and @Jellopuss. I'm shy, it's all a bit awkward. I'm not a great socialiser. I needn't have worried ...

The run to Greater Manchester from Liverpool is fun. I can't hear a thing in the back of the car, @CardinalPhink is a brisk and deft driver. I feel like I'm on a rollercoaster. I don't offer much by way of conversation. I'm not that guy. I'm beginning to wonder if they're wondering if I'm a nutter.

At Casa Phinky there is a gift basket in the spare bedroom. There are two cats - one chummy, one invisible. There is punk rock, speciality ale, vodka, Châteauneuf du Pape, Bushmills, cheese, pork pie with black pudding on top - on top! - and there is pie, glorious home-made pie for tea.

A vat of booze is consumed, the craic is great. I don't know how I get to bed. Feels like home ...

In the next instalment: bar-hopping, the best jukebox in the world and after some tribulations, I meet a personal hero.

Read the prologue
If you like my writing, please consider giving my novel a go - thanks!

#notmurdered - the prologue

It's a holiday in Mancunia, where the people dress in black ...

Behind the blank anonymity of your connected device, you can create a character for yourself that is closer to how you wish to be than how you actually are. It's very easy to make up for your known deficiencies by being bold and funny, or flirty, or coy or whatever: you can give yourself the attributes you desire. This principle began in online role-playing alternative universes such as Second Life. Now it applies to your 'real' self, or at least how you wish your 'real' self to be perceived.

Social media thrives on social validation. You can seek this validation in a number of ways. One is by volume - the number of followers or friends you acquire, regardless of their interest or interaction with your actual life. Another is in the type of friend/follower you acquire: they may be more like the real friends you wish you had than the ones you actually have.

So social media is a bluffer's paradise, right?

Well, here's the thing. If you're using social media properly, the real world is much closer over the horizon than you think. You're very likely to have befriended people you know in the real world, and they will immediately pick up on any crap or fantasy and pull you on it. Everyone needs at least one friend like this, by the way. One of the delicious ironies of a global social network is that the people you befriend may be closer that you think - in your town or even a short 'plane ride away.

Which brings me to my own Rubicon. I have been chatting on Twitter to Prestwich tweeps @CardinalPhink and @JelloPuss via an introduction from a mutual friend for about a year. We quickly discovered a shared love of punk rock, specifically Buzzcocks to whom @JelloPuss has a very direct personal connection. When Buzzcocks announce a landmark show (Back to Front, Manchester Apollo - to be reviewed separately), I know I will be going - as a fan and as admin of the official Buzzcocks fansite SecretPublic.com. In fact, there is no way I won't be attending ... In an odd twist of fate - or maybe it's destino - @CardinalPhink's favourite band The Damned are playing in Belfast the following night.

A whirlwind of punk rock bonhomie is unleashed. Invitations are extended. I'm going to Prestwich to stay with people I only know from Twitter and have never met ...

In the next instalment: I buy a bottle of whiskey and encounter a gift basket and some cats.
If you like my writing, please consider giving my novel a go - thanks!

2012 - a Buzzcocks Odyssey Part 3

There is something a bit dreary about a venue immediately post-gig. It's a little like casual sex - the lights come on, the excitement and intimacy is over and you're left with an unsettling vision of how shabby and sticky things are. And yet you don't want to leave. You want that little thrill to be more than a memory. You want the residual excitement to continue to light you up. But it's a forlorn hope. The party is over. The hosts want you out of the house.

I don't know if it's my perception changing over the years, maybe it's health and safety. Venues want you out as quickly as possible these days. Didn't bother me that everyone was being steadily herded away from the stage. I knew from prior experience that the aftershow would be in the upstairs bar, so I hung around looking smug at the foot of the stairs, behind the velvet rope. It would surely only be a  matter of time before I'm whisked up to the inner sanctum for some proper ligging.

OK, I'll wait in the lobby.

OK, I'll wait outside. The band will be out in a minute and we'll go back to the hotel for a proper chat.

It's getting bloody cold. Scantily-dressed young women are going into the venue. Something's Gone Wrong Again.

I spot Buzzcocks' manager Raf packing up at the merchandise booth. I front up to the bouncer (which I should have done an hour ago). "OK if I nip in and buy a T shirt?" He nods. I'm clearly old and not looking to blag my way into the nightclub with the totty. Raf remembers me from various other occasions.

"Have you been backstage yet?"

Raf takes me backstage. The band are more or less leaving. I walk down to the car with Pete. He's telling me about the primitive wired internet at his hotel. We pause at his transport, which is waiting to leave.

"Short and sweet", he says and we shake hands.
"See you in Manchester", I say.

And then he's gone. Ever fallen in love with a band you shouldn't've fallen in love with?

Next time out - Manchester here I come!

2012 - a Buzzcocks Odyssey Part 2

The Lee Harveys

Frankly, the Dublin Academy is looking a bit sparsely attended. As the Lee Harveys take the stage, there is just a thin crust of punters around the bar and the edge of the pit. Doesn't seem to bother the band as they race through a blistering set of short, sharp punk tunes. Retro styling - maybe. Let's call it 'timeless'. It's no frills, the Ramones-style three-chord rush with a Celtic flavour. The band banter, the drummer wants to slow down. "We've got another 84 songs to do yet", quips the frontman and off they go again. Good steam, as they say round these parts.

If you book them, they will come. The magic starts to happen and the place is filling up. I don't know if Steve Diggle won a bet on the way over or whether the sound guy just can't be arsed but the background music is Paul Weller. It's not what I would have chosen to preface a performance by one of the original - and easily the best - veterans of the punk rock wars. The crowd is a familiar one. Not in the same faces but in composition. There are those living in a permanent personal 1977, where punk never died, never grew out if its bumflaps and dayglo dreads; there are the punk-curious and their partners; there are the young'uns who have heard their new best favourite guitar bands citing Buzzcocks as their role models. They're all here and they're all a-buzz with excitement.

Rightly so. Buzzcocks amble on.  Diggle's clutching a bottle of Moet et Chandon, the most famous item on their infamous rider. There's a bit of knob twiddling. Then we're straight into 'Boredom'. The communion has begun. The beauty of the band's long, idiosyncratic and uncompromising career is that songs from any era of their existence fit together seamlessly. The cognoscenti will happily tell you which epoch each song represents. It's irrelevant that tonight's set opens with an extended nod to their first album before rushing headlong, via a couple of drum-heavy excursions, into what the casual punter wants - the singles.

Pete breaks a string during  'Why She’s a Girl From the Chainstore'. He carries on singing while his spare guitar is tuned, and he straps it on perfectly in time for the solo. Slick and professional. polished, even.

There's a token pause after 'What Do I Get?' when the band leave the stage but they're soon back to give us a further battering. We're in Dublin after all, so Steve Diggle uses 'Harmony in my Head' to deliver a rambling homage to James Joyce. He introduces the song as " ... inspired by Ulysses". I think he's over-pitched it. The crowd just want to jump and bellow. And they do. We're all orgasm addicts.

Setlist
Boredom
Fast Cars
I Don’t Mind
Autonomy
Get On Our Own
Whatever Happened to?
Why She’s a Girl From the Chainstore
Sick City Sometimes
Moving Aay From The Pulsebeat
Nothing Left
Noise Annoys
Breakdown
Promises
Love You More
What Do I Get?

Encore
Harmony In My Head
Ever Fallen In Love (With Someone You Shouldn’t’ve)?
Orgasm Addict

Part 3 - aftershow ...

2012 - a Buzzcocks Odyssey Part 1

In case you didn't know already, I bloody love Buzzcocks. It is a 35-year love affair that has never dimmed. When their May gig in Dublin was confirmed, there was no possibility that I wouldn't be going. I do a bit of work in Buzzcocks-world. I know I'm lucky to have got to know the band over the years. I'm not dropping names when I mention them, it's part of the story - forgive me.

There are some immediate difficulties to consider. Firstly, a 160-mile drive immediately after work to get there. Secondly, some technical difficulties with the car - I can't lock it and there is a paperwork issue that will not withstand intense scrutiny. Thirdly, nowhere to stay. So a quick trip to Asda for clicker batteries and fuel, a prayer and the throwing of a duvet into the back sorts me out and off I go, a little after 4pm.

I haven't done this kind of almost impromptu road trip for a long time. My life is busy and complicated, there isn't much that I can do that is unplanned so even a run down to Dublin and back needs a bit of forethought. I think I know where I can park, I know I am on the guestlist for the gig, I have a few lay-bys in mind for my stopover on the way back ... All of the variables run through my mind as I hit the road. The traffic is light, I'm happy to cruise at an economical speed. The sun is shining. All is good.

I make my first stop just over the invisible border, in a hotel car park. It's good to stretch my legs. I'm making good time and I think I'll be in Dublin well before the 8pm I had set myself. You never know with these city centre venues. Some of them revert to nightclubs after gigs. I don't want to be caught out by an early stage time. More than this, I have a few things I want to speak to Pete Shelley about. My stop doesn't last long and I'm soon back on the road.

Terrifically convenient as it is, the new road to Dublin is dull dull dull. I amuse myself by working out the mile equivalents of the distances in kilometres. And by listening to Placebo. I have, of course, got Singles Going Steady in the car but I don't want to listen to it. I want my Buzzcocks straight from the well today. When the CD finishes, I let the radio autotune itself through a number of dance music stations until I hear something vaguely listenable and stick with it.

The run into Dublin is straightforward until I take what I think is an intuitive left turn, signposted 'city centre'. As I do so, the radio plays Orange Juice - 'Rip It Up'. The song quotes Buzzcocks' first recorded work and I feel the cosmos is reassuring me. I call this Buzzcockicity - references to the band pop up mathematically impossibly coincidentally. It happens a lot. I feel better about being slightly lost in Dublin. Even though this is not the way I would normally go, I feel confident, so I go for it. My confidence is shortlived. I'm soon in only vaguely familiar territory. I know I'm generally travelling in the right direction and, frankly, the city centre is not far, so I start looking for a car park. This is more of a problem than you might imagine. My original research had uncovered that a lot of the city car parks close at night. I don't want to be walking the streets until 7am to recover my car/bed. Eventually I find myself parked onstreet near Custom House Square. I had been following signs for the N1/N2, to go round again. This will have to do.

As soon as I park, I spy the hi vis jackets of two lady Guards patrolling up the street towards me. My car is quite shabby, it's parked onstreet in Dublin with a Northern registration, my load cover is pulled over to conceal my duvet and my manbag (these Mercedes-Benz people think of everything). Frankly, I'd be suspicious. I have to act quickly. I spring out of the car and ask some confusing questions - can I park here? What's the best way to O'Connell Street? My diversion works, they answer helpfully and walk on. Phew. They didn't look at that which I hoped they wouldn't.

It's a ten-minute walk to the venue. Things are back on track. There is the usual kerfuffle at the door. It's cheeky to ask to be on the guestlist and I usually don't. On the odd occasion I am, I never know if I'm down as my Buzzcocks-world self or under my real name. Anyway, I'm found on the list and waved in. I realise, of course, as soon as I get into the venue that I have no Euros at all for a drink. I have to go out and in again. This time I waltz straight in.

Because I help out with a few things in Buzzocks-world, I get to speak to Pete Shelley sometimes. I have missed the soundcheck and hope that he'll come out to watch the support act. He often does. We have an exchange of texts from within the building:

Me: I'm watching the support band.
Pete: I'm in the lobby [I go to the lobby. No-one there]
Me: You must be invisible ;-) [some minutes pass]
Me: Try to catch you after.
Pete: Ok

We don't hook up.

Read Part 2 - the gig ...

A matter of conscience

There has been a Formula One grand prix in Bahrain since 2004. This makes it a relatively recent addition to a race calendar that is increasingly turning its back on the traditional circuits - the heartland of motorsport - in favour of chasing the new money. The big stories about Formula One in recent times have been about money: about how to make more of it more quickly, and how to divvy up the spoils between its owners and participants. The people whose bank accounts end up replenished through this process call this 'globalising the brand'.

Against this multi-billion pound business backdrop, the actual sporting spectacle becomes a bit of a sideshow, a dancing bear at the boardroom circus. Yes, it's loud and glamorous. In recent times it has even become exciting again. However, the real overtaking and fast cornering is largely done in private. Much of the three-cornered relationship between (in broad terms) the rights owners, the teams and the regulators is cloaked in secrecy.

In the context of this juggernaut of commercial progress, human rights issues in the sport's host countries become a bit of an elephant in the room. Whatever else Formula One does, it puts its hosts in the global sporting spotlight for one week in the year. It's time to hide the dust under the carpet, give the windows an extra polish and get the best crockery out. The rich relatives are coming to visit with their video camera and we wouldn't want anything to spoil it.

Unfortunately for Bahrain, there is the little matter of its pro-democracy campaigners and government oppression. A little local difficulty, most of the time. It's not as if this is Syria, after all. Last year, Formula One had to withdraw from its commitments in Bahrain. Not that anyone but race fans cared - the circuit owners still paid up the full fee.

This year, the race goes ahead amid a gale of hand-wringing and very visible concerns. Does Formula One, as a sport, care?

I would argue it does not.

What Formula One worries about is not caring, but being seen to care. If abuse of human rights was an issue that Formula One had a moral conscience about, there would not be races in China, the US or the UK ... in fact, which nation comes out of that particular question with a spotless record?

As for the fans, I doubt many of us could point to Bahrain on a map, or have anything but the shallowest wiki-ed knowledge of the country. We didn't care pre-Formula One and we're only pretending to care now. We certainly didn't care about human rights abuses in Bahrain 2004-2010.

There's too much money at stake for the decision to race there or not to be anything other than a commercial one. So here's an idea. Run the race behind closed doors. Don't televise it. If Formula One really, REALLY cares about human rights issues, let it donate the £multi-million race fee to Amnesty International.

Better yet - Mercedes-Benz and Ferrari et al, close your showrooms in Bahrain ...

One man's freedom fighter ...

The Breivik trial has brought into focus just how easily we can park and overlook those thoughts and feelings that are inconvenient for us and do not fit with our particular ideologies. As Breivik's drama plays out, it's comfortable to be swept along in the revulsion at the horror of his acts, the inhumanity of his actions and his chilling lack of remorse. These are the proper responses to such an overwhelming human tragedy.

And there it would end, with Breivik facing the cool analyis of Norwegian law and being judged and punished for his actions. After that judgement, he will fade from the public view, or be overwritten by a new panic.

However, Breivik seems to be claiming legitimacy for his actions by calling them political acts. In this he joins the ranks of Oklahoma bomber Tim McVeigh, the Omagh car bombers, the 9/11 terrorists and legions of suicide bombers, buddhist monks, paramilitaries of all stripes - all of whom have used violence acts against others - or themselves - to effect make a political statement.

Depending on where you are standing (and this is my point), these are easy to file away as 'bad' political acts.

But what about the 'good' acts of violence? The armed forces of the so-called 'free' world roam a number of foreign territories, armed with explosives and weaponry. Their remit is pretty much the same as Breivik's - to prevent an 'unacceptable' change to our society by using violence or the threat of violence.

Yet our troops are heroes.

Our troops don't kill indiscriminately, do they? The most shallow of research will uncover a three-figure number of investigations by British military police into the murder of Afghan civilians, incuding the stabbing of a ten year old boy and the beheading of an Afghan civilian's corpse. Add to this allegations of Koran burning and the massacre of Iraqi civilians by US forces ...

'Our forces work to a government mandate', we cry. 'Like the SS did', we whisper.

Breivik will get comfortable incarceration. His victims' families will not get justice. We feel for them because they're like us. I don't condone political violence in any context. Our forces do a job that few of us would contemplate doing, to keep us safe not from violence but from change. Take away the legitimacy that their uniforms and badges give them and you have, however, men and women doing what Breivik did. In his mental landscape, he's defending an ideal. Just like us.