Courtesy of webofevil - one of the most fantastic cover versions I've ever heard/seen. A steel band perform "Transmission" by Joy Division:

This is specifically for rhodri, but all can enjoy the prog-rock/early 80s politics crossover:



Still looking good re: flat, am keeping fingers crossed.

At long last, I've made an offer on a flat and it got accepted. I gazumped (sp?) someone, which I'm not completely happy about, but having been outmanoeuvred at the last minute twice already, that's just how it will have to be. It's a basement/ground floor flat on a rather nice road in Streatham Hill, with a good big lounge that opens on to a patio/light well type thing, lovely bathroom, and a decent sized bedroom (replete with huge mirrored wardrobe on one side of the room - oo-er. Still at least they're not on the ceiling.)

I'm still being a bit cautious, given the circumstances, until contracts are exchanged etc., but still, yay!

I am Not Well. Some sort of stomach bug. Running a temperature in 30 degree hot weather is not pleasant.

Just uploaded to my Flickr page some photos - of Stornoway, a couple from Edinburgh, some from Strasbourg back in January, and a few from the last of Bob's Thames tours last summer.


Stornoway


Gift shop in Edinburgh


Thames tour


Strasbourg

I am writing this, to be posted later, on a train heading home from west Wales. ( some reflections )

I'm writing this from Stornoway, where it's 10.30 pm, and it's only just started getting dark. It's very quiet here, and quite beautiful, without being picture postcardy - like Ullapool, which I visited six years or so, it's a working town, full of fishing boats and nets and such, ordinary shops and people making a living. My Dad was right - fish tastes so much better here. I had haddock and chips for dinner - although not out of a newspaper. It's quiet and calm, occasionally cars will speed past the hotel and honk; it took me ages to work out that this is people who know each other saying "hello". And I saw a map with Stoneybridge on it!

kisobel posted recently about not posting, and felt her days of LJ were coming to an end. I sort of feel the same - this is only my fourth posting in about five weeks - but it's more as a result of being fiendishly busy and/or knackered. I've done and seen lots I've wanted to post about, but I've had to travel all the way to the other end of the UK to have the time, space and peace to write any of it down.

The new job is so interesting. I've met lots of people, nearly all of whom have been lovely, and given me lots to think about in my new role. Things are moving quickly at Parliament - ironically, all the expenses malarkey has made outreach more important than before, and ideas that I and others have had to increase accessibility and openness that would have taken months, even years to get attended to are being taken up with increasing speed. We'll see whether it lasts.

I'm still looking for somewhere to live, but if my experience of the past couple of weeks is anything to go by, people are beginning to put their places up for sale, and some of the places I've seen have been pleasant and affordable. Hopefully I'll find somewhere before too long.

Last week, I met up with an old school friend, Peter, who I hadn't seen for about 10 years. We went for dinner at Gabriel's Wharf, and got on as we always had - and he understood my life and where I was at as brilliantly as he always did.

I also went to see the new production of Arcadia at the Duke of York's theatre, with my friend and ex-student, Ana, who was in the A-level class I taught the play to back in 2000. It was such brilliant experience going to see it after all these years, and I thoroughly enjoyed the staging of what might be my favourite play ever. Neil Pearson and Samantha Bond are in it, giving reliably good performances, but Ed Stoppard underplays brilliantly and, along with the chap who plays Septimus, pretty much pwns the show.

I realised that there were all sorts of things I didn't mention about the Saint Etienne gig I saw three weeks ago - the way the gig was so much more impressive than the last time I saw them (1993), the parade of famous Wilsons on the back projection during "Wilson", the sort of blissful, off-kilter trance I was swept into by "Like the Swallow", the way Sarah Cracknell is perhaps more gorgeous than ever, the beautiful art deco ballroom the gig was at, and the brilliant departure of Pete Wiggs from the stage at the end, where he tried to say goodbye to the fans, was hit by a wave of squealing feedback, winced, turned round, knocked over a mic-ed up keyboard, creating more feedback, tripped then turned laughing to the audience and walked off flicking the Vs.

Last night was the fourth ever performance of the remarkable, irrepressible, extra sensory perceptible Hoboerotica, and nudejournal joined me to watch Dr. Cochrane, Ms Churly the esteemed Professor Bobworth Kingham and the gang do their thing and drag the country out of recession with their own brand of funk, jazz and swearing. The gig was hosted at the Cavendish Arms at Stockwell - a genuine hidden gem of a pub - and was perhaps their most focused and polished, even a little somber at points, gig to date. I shall keep you posted of their future activities.

Tomorrow I have to talk about Parliament, the day after look at houses. On the seventh day I shall rest. Next week, Wales.

Hurrah for free wi-fi in hotels!

It's been so long since I posted on here I imagine you've forgotten what I look like. Well, I look like that picture of Bob Peck.

My new job is the main good thing in my life right now. I've been to Edinburgh already, where I didn't have my laptop so missed out on a chance to do a proper update, so instead watched "LA Story" and got a tiny bit tearful because I am a big softie, gurly and wet and an utter weed.

I've visited adult learners in Clacton, and round the corner from work on Horseferry road. I've been to lots of meetings with people from Scope, the Terrance Higgins Trust, the Big Lottery Fund, the Electoral Commission and so forth. I've got a new team of lovely colleagues. I've had adventures - of sorts. A train journey back from Edinburgh with a 69 year old namesake who recounted his many previous sexual conquests and several key fights from his career. I've just had a plane journey with a very personable engineer who'd just got back from Algeria, but who was A Bit Of A One, and about whom I exchanged several "What's he like?" glances with a not-at-all unattractive stewardess (it's member of cabin staff, now, isn't it? Sorry.)

I have had zero luck finding a decent flat, and to be honest, I'm getting pretty fed up with the whole business.

I have been out for several excellent meals, and been drinking with pals, and best of all on Saturday got to see my favourite band ever, Saint Etienne, perform all of their first album, Foxbase Alpha, live, plus a selection of hits. I was moping a bit earlier in the day, saying to lowlowprices that maybe I'd just rather stay in and watch Eurovision and eat snacks, to which he correctly retorted something like, "Oh yeah, it's such a chore that you have to go out and see your favourite band in the whole world." It was a telling point. The gig was splendid - they've come a long way in terms of live performance since I last saw them in 1992 (or was it 93?) I now have "Like The Swallow" stuck in my head all the time, which is, as they say, A Good Thing.

I'm sure there were lots of other things - end of Mad Men, more plz. New series of Ashes to Ashes, big improvement on the first, which I enjoyed anyway, but this is a lot more three-dimensional. Haven't seen Star Trek yet, though I really want to.

If anyone knows of a decent two-bed flat for sale in the London area that the owner would let me take of their hands for about 165 grand, let me know would you? It'd save an awful lot of aggravation.

Anyone else unable to log in to Facebook, or is it just me?

No art deco flat in Streatham's "posh"* Crown Point district for me. But it apparently went for above the asking price. In the middle of a housing crash. Like, WTF? Is this recession thing on?

* posh, in this case, means "profusion of fried chicken shops and off licences".

So - dinner with thefairmelissa and kisobel at the Oxford and Cambridge Club on Wednesday night:



Followed by drinks in Claridges bar last night with my cousin Sylvia and some of her friends



and we then went off for dinner at Hakkasan on Hanway Place:



followed by delicious milk shakes at the Eagle Bar and Diner. Yeah baby!

All of this has nothing to do with my new job, a fact of which I have to keep reminding myself. I'm going to Clacton on Tuesday, where, if I'm lucky, I might get a bag of chips on the sea front.

(Hakkasan is brilliant, BTW - not cheap, but brilliant. The fact that it's round the corner from the Spanish bar and the Troy is a lovely bit of inappropriate London juxtaposition.)

I'm three days into my new job. Today, among other things, I sat in on a session for four Russian MPs from St. Petersburg. In the main, however, my activities will be confined to Scotland, Northern Ireland and Wales, as well as London. I'm working with voluntary organisations, civic groups, adult learners, museums and libraries to explain the role of Parliament and explain how people can get involved. I'm going to Edinburgh, Cardiff, Aberdeen and Stornoway next month, and Clacton next week. Yes, Clacton. Look impressed.

Yesterday, I put in my final offer for a rather nice flat near Crown Point, just off Streatham Common. I'll put more details up if I actually get it - it's all authentic 1930s art deco loveliness. I spent all of my easter holidays looking at houses, and if I don't get this one, I'll have to start all over again, which is enough to make me hope my offer is accepted.

How are you all? I'm rather sad that LJ isn't as popular as it once was, but I'm as much to blame as anyone, and it's not even because I'm on Twitter all the time.

There was new Family Guy on BBC3 on Sunday, and lowlowprices and I were laughing ourselves to tears at this:

I went to Black Plastic on Saturday! I haven't been clubbing much in the past year or so, and when I have, I've usually relied on ultraruby to hold my hand (which she did again, with usual aplomb). I was really nervy and jittery when I first arrived, and I really am beginning to feel like I've got a big sign over my head with "THIS MAN IS 38 YEARS OLD" when I go out among the young and the beautiful. But there were lots of friendly faces there, and I settled in as the evening drew on (and was perversely reassured by p_dan_tic's desire to kill everyone there.)

Anyway, the most important thing was that the music - in large part courtesy of exliontamer and class_worrier - was fantastic. I got to do a secret, we-are-a-bit-older-than-everyone hi-five with Iain cos we both recognised "I Travel" by Simple Minds (early, GRATE, Simple Minds, mark you), and indeed, I felt we were both time-travel ambassadors for the 80s for the evening. I also remembered, probably about 30 seconds into dancing to "The Village" by New Order, why I still want to go to clubs: because, even though I'm probably a bit rub, I love dancing. I like it a lot.

It all went a bit post-modern and mental when everyone went crazy, but in a restrained, hemmed-in 80s electopop dancey way, to an extended workout featuring "Sound of the Crowd" by the Human League and some track by The Bug featuring Warrior Queen (if anyone can point me in the direction of this uber-mashup, I'd be most grateful). I found myself, as someone who can actually remember the Human League from, like, being around and watching Top of the Pops at the time, dancing alongside people who were almost certainly not born when the record came out, but wearing clothes that echoed the style of the era, which I was too young to be part of as a square boy with a pudding bowl haircut who'd just started secondary school. In my head, at least for a moment, we were all recreating this:



All this, and I got to have a major chat with class_worrier about devolution. I know how to party.

This week I am on holiday, and supposed to be looking at flats, but am really finding activities to distract me from calling up ESTATE AGENTS. Because then they will know I want a flat, and will insist on calling me up all the time to make me look at things I don't want.

I got the job! I was utterly, utterly convinced on Monday afternoon/evening that I'd completely f*cked up the interview - going over and over bits where I thought I'd really made a fool of myself. But I got it, and did a "very strong interview", apparently. I know this is blowing my own trumpet, but I'm so pleased. This job of parliamentary outreach officer looks so interesting and fun - I get to travel around the country and meet vol orgs and civic groups and explain how to get involved with Parliament, and I get to travel to the devolved Parliaments in Cardiff, Edinburgh and Belfast - three places I really, really love. And I might get to work on projects with ultraruby! So made up - fantastic.

I have been busy. I saw Watchmen on Friday, at the IMAX in Greenwich. Despite tucking into to a big meal beforehand, I still made sure I stocked up on the "free" nachos, popcorn, chocolates and pop that my £23 ticket entitled me to before I went in. My verdict is essentially similar to that of martylog (his thoughts are here, but YOU MUST BE A FRIEND OF MARTYLOG TO ENTER) except ( tiny spoilers )

Over the weekend I did two things: prepare for an interview that I had yesterday for a new job at the HoC, and go on a long walk with my friends Bob and ornette from St. James's palace in the west of London to Arnold Circus in Shoreditch in the east.

The interview yesterday was...okay. I thought it had gone alright at first, and as yesterday dragged on became more and more depressed about it for no real reason. Just a gut feeling that I'd screwed it up. I still feel a bit like this today, but more resigned to it. It's a shame because I am pretty keen on the idea of it (it's an outreach job, promoting Parliament to the public) but I may be able to have another go next year.

The walk was brilliant. The weather was warm and springlike, and London looked wonderful - intriguing, spectacular, quietly beautiful, all hidden treasures and odd secrets. I took lots of photos, some for Bob to use in his next project, and some for me.

( photos )

There are more on my Flickr page.

My mood has been all over the place. I was going to call this post "The sun makes you feel worse anyway" because I went for a walk from Knightsbridge through St. James park to work earlier, and at first, was unpleasantly reminded of how rotten it is feeling sadness and self-pity in fine weather - the whole world seems to be jeering and mocking you. But the walk in the fine weather actually did its work, and along with the random act of kindness of showing a tourist where Buckingham Palace was (when he was standing about 500 yards away), I perked up a bit by the time I got to Parliament.

I saw a bit of "House of Cards" on Yesterday (the new, rather foolish, name for UK History) earlier, and was surprised a little by how alien it all felt, when it seemed such an incisive picture of politics in its day, particularly the idea that the audience are supposed to accept as given that the Tories will always remain in charge, no matter what. Even now, on the verge of the Conservatives' return to power, this still seems v. odd and a hundreds years away.

Is anyone seeing a strange anime character in the userpic for this post?

(It should be my "Strictly Saved My Life" pic that webofevil made for me.)

ETA - seems that everyone is seeing the anime thingy. How annoying. Will have to try and re-upload the right picture when I get home)

No news on the job/internal post yet, but I've decided that even if I don't get an interview, I'm going to ask the woman in charge if there's any chance of doing some shadowing or a secondment or something.

Anyone see the first part of the Red Riding trilogy on Thursday? It was a beautifully shot thing, with a superb cast which all recreated the austere, bleak and doomy atmosphere of the David Peace books very well. However, as someone who doesn't usually get too precious about what is and isn't dispensed with in TV/film adaptations of books, I was v. disappointed to see exactly how much and exactly what had been eviscerated from the novel to make the transition to TV. The plot changes really were to the detriment of the overall effect, and there were some really key scenes in the book that would have been really gripping on TV, I thought, which will now never be seen. Moreover, given that they're apparently squashing four books into a TV "trilogy" I can only assume that this process will accelerate. It doesn't help that I've a nasty suspicion it's all being squashed into such a short space because C4's "event television" mentality won't tolerate anything running for longer than three weeks.

Oh yeah, on the subject of David Peace, the trailer for The Damned United is out - looks a lot less bleak than the book, but interesting, all the same:



I was listening again to Now Listen Again the other day, and was arrested by a sample that turned out to be a fantastic poem, "Jumbled in the Common Box", by W.H. Auden ( Full poem under the cut ), and I got thinking about the recent meme on favourite/influential albums, and about samples, and some of my favourites.

"Rock and Roll (Could Never Hip Hop Like This)" by Handsome Boy Modelling School starts off with an Irish bloke, presumably from some show band album, declaring "When you have talented young men making music it's something. But when they're all from the one family, well, it's worth hearing. And what's more, they're brothers as well!" which is a cracking opening, and always makes me smile.

"Mario's Cafe" by Saint Etienne starts with a slightly weary voice saying "A cigarette, a cup of tea, a bun", which turns out to be from a world war two poem by Dirk Bogarde, called "Steel Cathedrals". It's rather good.

I mentioned "Megatop Phoenix" by Big Audio Dynamite the other day, and that's chock full of terrific samples. It opens up with the "This is the universe. Big isn't it?" line from "A Matter of Life and Death" (you can check the opening of this wonderful movie here, about 1.58 in.) and goes on from there, via David Niven, Bernard Cribbins, an advert for Bird's Trifle and on to the "The Great Escape".

I think I've mentioned the "A Perfect Day to Drop the Bomb" by Carter USM before - kings of quirky UK samples on their first album, this track not only starts with the sound of a Spectrum loading, but ends with a recontextualising of the sample at the end this advert:

"You can't sing, you can't play, you look awful. You'll go a long way."

Somehow, the way they've placed it on the fade out of what is already a pretty apocalyptic track makes it sound like the most unsettling thing in the world.

These are just the few that spring to mind - it's not much of a meme, as such, but consider yourself tagged if you're interested.

I've had a good week off - got the flat straightened out, a proper spring clean. It feels like a time of renewal, time to visit dry cleaners, sort out bills, see doctor/dentist etc etc. Got six new shirts for work for £100 - score! Bought lots of new albums, watched some more of series one of The Wire. All good.

Anyway, drinks with ultraruby, and inevitable talk of the top ten albums meme. After almost no arm-twisting at all, I agreed that I'd have a go. Consider yourself tagged if you're that way inclined. In keeping with the spirit observed elsewhere, I've listed those that had the biggest effect on me in one way or another, not "the best", or my favourites (no Saint Etienne, or "Pet Sounds", for instance.) ( Albums, and lots of pretty album covers, under the cut )

Off the back of this, ultraruby and I got chatting about "American Boy" by Estelle, which features Kanye West rapping about Ribena, and "Rerhbish", and I started excitedly waving my hands about and talking about songs like that one, and "Quid Control" by People Under The Stairs and DJ Yoda, and "Bristol" by Ugly Duckling, which all have American perspectives on UK ephemera. I couldn't think of any more though - there must be some. I like them because we take a lot of our cultural similarities with the US for granted, but even a cursory listen to De La Soul banging on about Twizzlers or the detritus on the kitchen floor in "ET", or about 50 per cent. of the gags about TV personalities in "Family Guy" show that we inhabit separate, if English-speaking, universes. It's rare though to see how odd our stuff looks from a US perspective. Anyone know of any more?