Marc Nash's Blog, page 38

No Dumping - Friday Flash

“What do you think you’re doing?”
“Who the hell are you?”
“I asked you first”
“What does it look like I’m doing? Same as you”
“No, no, no! This is my spot!”
“What do you mean? I’ve been coming to this place for some twelve years now”
“So? I’ve got five years on you”
“Seventeen eh? Impressive”
“So that gives me priority”
“The hell it does. Depends on your frequency doesn’t it? I could be operating double your rate for all you know”
“Suppose so. Surprised I haven’t bumped into you before then if you’ve been coming here all this time”
“Yeah well, it’s big enough to hide us all”
“That’s kind of the point”
“Exactly, so I say there’s plenty to go round. No need to get all territorial about it”
“How do I know you are what you say you are? That might just be your old lady you’re taking out there”
“Suspicious ain’t we? I could show you the bodies”
“A skeleton’s a skeleton”
“The more recent ones would still have some flesh on ‘em. You’d recognise your own right? I show you women’s bodies, you gotta know they’re not yours. So then we’re cool”
“Still don’t mean they’re yours. Could be anybody’s. I bump into you here for the first time, doesn’t mean there aren’t others working here”
“You seen any others?”
“No. But then I ain’t seen you before today either”
“You work on a cycle?”
“Yeah”
“Me too. Just I’m off schedule cos I just got released from the hospital. Small medical procedure needed attending to. But the Docs gave me the all-clear to return to work”
“Ha! Bet they didn’t imagine this was your line of work. That would kill them to find out”
“But they’re not going to find out are they?”
“Too true… What’s yours then?”
“Strangulation”
“Mine too. With a ligature”
“Oh no. I gotta have the feel of my hands on their flesh. Can’t beat that”
“I get that. But forensics. Trace evidence and DNA”
“But they got to catch me first to compare. I’m not on any database. Besides, they gotta discover this place and dig ‘em up to get any trace and that ain’t happened yet”
“No one knows you huh?”
“Hey I know that glint. Come try it if you think you can take me before I take you”
“I gotta kill you cos you seen my face”
“I’m not going to snitch now am, I? We’re brothers in arms here”
“What is this the union? Serial Killers Local 516?”
“No but that would be pretty neat. Dues paid in blood and I’d like to see the Mafia try and muscle in and control us!”
“Regular comedian ain’t we? I take my work seriously”
“Oh so do I I assure you. You take a trophy?”
“Of course…”
“Wha’d’ya take?”
“Finger”
“Aw come on man, give me more than that. Which is it? Ring finger? Index? Thumb? Pinkie?”
“Only one you left out. They can’t flip the bird when I’m done with ‘em”
“Heh that’s funny. Giving the finger to the cops without a finger! That’ll play merry hell with their psychological profiles”
“Cops ain’t going to find them so there ain’t going to be any profiling. Sounds to me like you wanna get caught and have all that stuff”
“No, not at all. But it might be nice to have our work discovered and appreciated”
“No. It’s only ever about the kill for me. That’s all that matters”
“Aren’t you going to ask me then?”
“Ask you what?”
“If I take any trophies?”
“Yeah cos I’m really dying to know”
“I take noses”
“Noses?”
“Yeah. My corpse’s got no nose. How does she smell? Pretty bad for the first month or so out here”
“Okay that does it. You go on your way now. I’ve serious business to attend to here”
“Yeah me too. Nice meeting you.”

“Whatever. Don’t go doing anything I wouldn’t do”  


*

This story was prompted by the revelation that there are some body dump sites in the US where police think generations of killers have been using to hide their crimes. A pretty shocking revelation. The article below talks of one such in New York State.

http://www.foxnews.com/us/2011/05/14/new-york-beach-community-dumping-ground-death/

Let Me Explain It To You Then Wayne

Wayne Rooney says sometimes he doesn't get what the UK Press are trying to say when they print stories about him. One is tempted to lay the fault with dear Wayne, pandering to the stereotype of him as not the sharpest tool in the box. but rather than score a cheap barb, I'll try and go on to explain it for you Wayne, speaking from the perspective of an England fan with no parochial club rivalry sharpening any axe, since my club are not in the Premiership and must be one of the few Championship sides not to have a single player at the World Cup.

The latest issue seems to be when the Press were invited into their 15 minute window to observe the England squad training, they spotted Rooney training with the so-called 'stiffs' that is those players unlikely to be in the starting IX for the next match and drew the conclusion that this meant Wayne too wasn't going to start. Rooney countered that he was putting in hard training with the stiffs (whereas the first team starters were doing less robust training to preserve their energies) at his own request.

Okay, first question, why does Rooney feel he needs extra training? Because he's not fit enough (stamina)? or maybe he's not sharp enough or maybe because he finds it harder to keep the weight off than others. If it's either point 1 or 2, then that suggests that Rooney knows he isn't up to scratch and that this can only put his place in doubt. Point 3 is more of a reflection of his whole career. This is the man remember, who one season Sir Alex Ferguson, no bad judge of a player's prowess, sent off on holiday to the sun for some winter training and thereby missing matches, because he was concerned about Rooney's fitness. Rooney has been photographed smoking and is also known to like a drink in his downtime and has come back to pre-season training overweight by his own admission.

Second, let me explain how the Press works Wayne. If as you say you requested extra training rather than having been banished to the stiffs because you will not be starting the next game as one newspaper claimed, then clearly the newspaper's story is not factually correct. But dear Wayne, they don't care. Why don't they care? Because they not only want it to be true, they are campaigning to have it thus. They are reporting in the guise of advocating. How much influence do they have over their readers and how much influence do their readers have over the England manager is not a question I can answer. But they're going to have a go at getting a groundswell of opinion going to influence selection decisions anyway.

Why have they turned on you? Because they feel you no longer justify your place in the team by right. The right afforded you by your reputation. Yeah they built you up when you burst on the football scene as a teenager at Everton and you were hailed as the next great hope. You were constantly talked of as becoming a world class player, up there with Messi and your old mate Cristiano Ronaldo. And you have not delivered, you have not made good on your talent. And whatever the Press are saying, we the supporter feel cheated. We feel you haven't looked after your body or your fitness as above. You haven't trained on. Whatever your achievements in club football and they certainly haven't been consistent season in season out like Messi and Ronaldo, you certainly have not delivered for England. We no longer trust your reputation as meriting a starting berth.

You have won lots of medals and trophies at the best club in England over the last ten years. But while they have been consistent, you have not. Some seasons you have contributed heavily to the success of the club, others you haven't. Apart from being sent away for mid-season training mentioned above, your then manager wondered if he should transfer you and cash in on any residual value your reputation still garnered. And on other occasions you had the temerity to march into his office and demand that he play you in a certain position, just as you are doing now with the England manager, or you have briefed against him as you and your agent machinate for a pay rise as again, with utter chutzpah you demanded the manager surround you with better quality players or you would be seeking employment elsewhere. Ronaldo is a bit like this at Real Madrid, but then he's scored 50 goals a season. I don't believe Messi makes such demands on his club and he's scored hatfuls of hat-tricks that you can only dream of these days.

And here's the rub you see. By raising this query with your treatment at the hands of the Press, you have made our world cup campaign all about you, instead of it being about the team, the country which the manager has clearly been trying to instil in order to get away from the bad practises of previous dire tournaments for England. When you burst on the international scene, you'd had barely a handful of games. Now Raheem Sterling is bursting on the scene, with a completely successful season under his belt, playing for a teaming challenging for the title, but we have learned our lesson from dubbing you world class. We love his progress, but no one is even whispering the term 'world class' in association with him. Same thing Ross Barkley. These players however we welcome into the England fold because we credit they are in the squad on merit. In a way we don't necessarily feel applies to you any longer. As with your club, your call to be played in a certain position implies the team should be built around you. The shape of the play has to be designed around your talents. But we fans feel these new guys are, or should be the guys around whose talents the team shape is designed. We feel they are in better form than you. We feel they are on the up while you are on the downslide and that they have already surpassed you. Sturridge is the best man for the job as the number 9. Sterling is the best man for the number 10. Where does that leave you? The manager decided it meant playing on the left. You have state that 'while happy' to play anywhere on the pitch, it is not really a position you favour. Despite making the goal against Italy, you were poor on the left. we were exposed time and again down your flank, which is not just your fault, but you must bear some culpability. You gave away the ball more than most and you missed a priceless and by anyone's standards a fairly straightforward chance to equalise for the country.

Sorry Wayne, but I hope the Press campaign to bring in someone else in your place is successful. You have disappointed us for too long now. Whole you are not unique in this failure to live up to expectation, you have fallen the most short because you had the furthest target to attain because of the promise your talent seemed to offer.

Guest Post - Virginia Moffatt

Today I've a very special guest post from a writer and twitter friend Virginia Moffatt to celebrate the publication of her debut collection of stories. The book is a fascinating pairing of stories that partner or respond to one another, all about the theme of love and relationships and pleasingly offers a very realistic and truthful view of love rather than overly-romanticising it.

I first met Virginia through the Friday Flash writing community via Twitter the history of how she came by it echoes very much with that of my own. We've become good friends discussing politics, protest, family and whether there artists (particularly comedians) are entitled to a right to cause offence, in addition to reading each other's work during the writing process. It was entirely down to Virginia that I'm also being published by Gumbo Press with a collection of flash stories, since she encouraged me to submit when I'd already decided I didn't have a chance of submitting successfully.

So I'm delighted to welcome Virginia to talk about how the book came about and to wish her all the best not only with publication, but also with her live reading at the Albion Beatnik in Oxford this Saturday for National Flash Fiction Day.

Thanks Marc for this opportunity to share some thoughts about the launch of my  collection, "Rapture and what comes after" (published by Gumbo Press). 

I became a flash fiction writer by chance.  In 2009, following advice from my twin sister, Julia Williams, a successful novelist, I set up my blog "A Room of My Own" as a way of promoting my work. I started posting in July, but I was still building my social media presence and finding it difficult to attract visitors. Then my husband, Chris, noticed a friend of his taking part in Friday Flash and suggested I give it a try. I had nothing to lose, so I posted my first story "Happy New Year" on New Year's Day, 2010. To my delight, I received loads of comments and was welcomed into the community with open arms. What started as an experiment soon became a fixture, and for six months I posted pretty much every week.  I soon built up a list of regular readers with fellow writers like Marc, whose stories helped shape my own, and a writing group with whom I felt at home. And although I don't write flash quite so often now, Friday Flash is still a huge part of my writing life. 

"Rapture and what comes after" is drawn from many of these Friday Flash posts. I began putting it together last year, when I realised that I had unintentionally created a number of paired stories, revealing the light and dark sides of love. There weren't enough for a collection, so I looked at pieces that I particularly liked and began writing partners for them.  The result is fifteen stories where the characters are relatively happy in their relationships and fifteen where they definitely aren't. Some stories feature the same characters ("Rapture/"What comes after", "Happy Birthday Darling" and "Telling the Family") . Some, use similar motifs such as an item of clothing, ("The Scarf/The Jumper") or the weather ("Let it Snow/Waiting for the Thaw"). And some are linked by a theme such as gender expectations ("A Woman's Work"/"A Man's Job") or the difficulty of coming to a decision ("No doubt about it/"Hesitation").  

Despite the dark tone of the second part, I believe in love. But, I also know it's not easy. I know that even the happiest and most devoted couples have their struggles. I know that often love doesn't work out the way people hoped, and, though that can be terrible, it's not always a bad thing. Stories should entertain, move, or amuse the reader. I hope this collection does all of those things, whilst providing a true reflection of what it means to live and love.

Cover Reveal - "28 Far Cries"

Really excited that my fourth collection of flash fiction is imminent. This is my first that will be in both print and kindle, through the auspices of Gumbo Press who are publishing it.



Stories of warlords, pole dancers, alien invasions, synesthesia, incubi, railway viaducts, graffiti artists, dying superheroes, living statues, cyanide pills, vultures, toxic relationships, the first language, beheadings...

Out next week hopefully!

Inglorious Failure - England lose to Italy

I enjoyed England's performance last night against Italy. Compared with the dross we've been served up under Capello and Ericsson in previous tournaments, this was refreshing. However any enthusiasm must be tempered by serious technical and tactical shortcomings, which still permeate the English game and for all our bright young things on the pitch last night, show no signs of changing any time soon.

1) Apart from the goal and the one chance when Baines played Rooney in but he missed at the near post, we never got behind the Italian defence. We had lots of shots from distance, most of which flashed wide. We didn't create all that much to threaten the Italians.

2) This is because there was a very limited creativity in midfield. There was very little quick passing, cutting through the Azzuri. Instead what we had was lots of individuals running with the ball. Sterling, Sturridge, Barkley and Wilshire. Sterling and Sturridge were clearly very good at it. Barkley makes too many wrong decisions when to do so. And Wilshire? I just don't see what he does that is different and certainly not better to any of these. Welbeck looked decent at short, quick passing, but he didn't seem willing to give and go, that is to surge forward to receive a return pass. I suspect because of his defensive responsibilities. Ricky Lambert is someone who knits the play up well with clever passing, while Lallana is the one midfielder who can do this too.

3) Steven Gerrard had one of his more ineffective games in a while. HE and Henderson couldn't seal up midfield, because the Italians didn't go through the middle, but always sought out the very productive right winger. But even with the ball, Gerrard's 'Quarterback" role where he hits 40 yard cross-field passes to feet was snuffed out by the Italians. A lesser team or one less well drilled tactically might suffer from Gerrard's pinpoint passes, but it was one-dimensional to the Italians.

4) Wayne Rooney... Wayne Rooney was out least effective attacking player of the 4 (Sturridge, Sterling and Welbeck). His one contribution was the goal which was excellent, but he gave the ball away 8 times, missed a golden chance (for which he turned like a battleship to get on to Baines's pass and made him hurry his shot) and could not sort out the left side defensively with Baines. I believe Wayne Rooney's time is probably up, with better alternatives in the squad. It will be interesting to see what Hodgson's selection against Uruguay is.

5) Hodgson's substitutes were baffling. Barkley for Welbeck I can sort of see, though unless Welbeck had run out of gas, I think he was doing a good job and would probably have taken off either Henderson Rooney at that juncture. But Wilshire as I have said is only more of the same as to what was on the pitch. You need a goal, then why not bring on Lambert whose brief international career has shown he can score off the bench. He also allows you to go to 4-4-2 and changing systems for the last 15 minutes would have asked questions of the Italians to adapt and react. I would have brought him and Lallana on together to have their understanding from playing for the same club out on the pitch. Lallana came on too late and didn't contribute, while all I remember Wilshire doing was give the ball away.

6) People point to our territorial domination of the last quarter of the match, but remember we failed to score against Honduras for 90 minutes and part of that time they only had 10 men on the pitch. Honduras are no Italy. After Italy retook the lead, I think they dropped back consciously and let us have the ball. Partly that was their tactical decision, but also I think they were looking to preserve their energy since they have all three of their games in those difficult conditions of the tropical north of Brazil. Was it significant that Italian players didn't go down with cramp during the match, but several England players did? What it did reveal was how much chasing England had to do in the first half where the Italians dominated possession and made us run around after them.

But there is hope going forward. Uruguay were appalling yesterday. If Suarez returns against England, and I find it significant that even in desperate straits at 2-1 down the manager didn't bring Suarez on to dig them out of their hole, I don't think he is going to be sufficiently fit to pose his usual full threat. I think we will beat Uruguay, thus knocking them out. Then that leaves a winner takes all match with Costa Rica. And as enjoyable as it was to see Costa Rica beat Uruguay, if England can't get the result against them then we deserve not to move round to the knock-out phase. We should be able to defend balls into the box that Uruguay couldn't cope with. And we know their danger man Joel Campbell and have to devise a way of snuffing out his threat.

Reading For Two - Friday Flash

She was once a prodigious reader. But now her eyes are almost permanently sealed. They say hearing is the last sense to go. I would have thought the more primal sense of smell would persist, but of course other than a wrinkling of the nostrils perhaps, there was no way for her to convey any response to a smell, either pleasant or acrid.
I had tried audio-books for her. But seeing as the Royal Shakespeare Company actors with the most mellifluous voices sent me off to sleep, this wasn’t something I felt conducive to her getting the full benefit of the words.
So I picked up the mantle. Even though not a reader myself, I sat down by the side of her bed and resolved to read to her. The first snag had been which book to pick. I didn’t dare buy a new one that I ventured she might not have read before, because I was afraid I’d choose wrong. I wasn’t familiar enough with literature to match her taste ranged across the bookshelves running above our bed. She would have to forgive me, I would read one she had doubtlessly finished cover to cover before. I had no idea if it had been a success first time round or not. Maybe she might glean something different in the telling on this reading.
The second conundrum was how much to read at any one sitting. I idly assumed I would read a nice round thirty minutes’ worth at a sitting. But on the first occasion that left me mid-chapter and so clearly didn’t make much sense. I flicked through the pages of the book to see if the chapters were of similar length, for then I could apportion a set number of them to each of our sessions. Then I realised the chapters were listed in the beginning of the book, complete with page numbers and reproached myself for my philistinism that meant I hadn’t even been aware of this. I returned to the shelves and sifted for a book with approximately equal length chapters. Not the most sophisticated method of choosing one’s reading matter. 
So I commenced reading the story. I concentrated very hard on the printed words. I didn’t want to  mispronounce any, or get the flow of the sentence all confounded in my desperation to get through the lengthy sentences. I gripped the book so tight, the pages shook as the blood drained from my fingers, making reading the damn words all the harder. I was certain that I was unlikely to be putting the right expressiveness int the words. Reading them as they were meant to be read. As she might have read them. Yet I was so wrapped up in my performance, I had no comprehension of how my efforts were being received. Was the faintest flicker of a smile playing across her lips? Had her breathing slowed a glimmer, or softened in volume by a notch? I couldn’t bring myself to raise my head from the pages in case I lost my place. I had no idea if this was even working. 
I steeled myself that i was reading for two now. So eventually I grew more confident and began to ease myself into the words themselves. I suddenly appreciated I was now also reading this story to myself. I began to follow the twists and turns of the characters and their relationships. But then I also took myself back out of their travails and tribulations as I checked on her for any response. Any indication that she was able to take in my voiced rendition of the book. Some days her sleep was restive, others she seemed utterly reposed. I surmised it bore no correlation with my reading to her whatsoever. No judgement of either me or the book. Or my choice of reading for her. 
What was I supposed to do? Such absented moments thinking about her meant I lost the thread of the story. Should I go back and re-read them? But what if she’d grasped them unadulterated in the first reading? I resolved to catch back up in my own time during the breaks between reading sessions. But then I got to considering what if her own diverse states meant she too wasn’t able to steadily absorb the narrative? But there was simply no way I could penetrate the true state of affairs there as she was unresponsive to verbal inquiry. 
There were days when i felt I was just reading into a void. When even I felt alienated from the sound of my droning voice. I prayed for just one reaction, one single confirmation that what I was doing made some sense. Served some purpose. I resented the author for putting both me and my wife through this ordeal, even though that was plainly preposterous. I held the book with one hand and her fingers with my other, which broke up my rhythm as at the end of each page I had to fumble with my chin to try and turn over the page without disturbing the stroke of my fingers kneading hers. I’d stopped listening to the story long previous to this stage. Still she listened on uncritically. 

And then we were approaching the end of the book. Mounting panic filled me. Could I face going through all this again? Which book would I choose? What if it turned out to be worse than this one? What if it turned out to be superior, what shadow would that cast over the paucity and ignorance of my original choice of this tome? She spared me these minor terrors by drawing her final breath after I enunciated the final full stop on the last page. I was still holding her hand in mine. 

National Flash Fiction Day

Saturday 21st June is the third annual National Flash Fiction Day. A day in which the shortest form of story is celebrated  and my third year of participation.

This year I have not one, not two, but three ways in which I'm participating.

Firstly I'm reading live in Bristol, my first time in that fine city. I'll be reading with a lot of other great UK flash writers and feel honoured to have been asked to participate.


Secondly my third collection of flash fiction "Long Stories Short" will be free to every reader who emails me for a kindle copy to be sent to them from June 20th to June 22nd at 23.00 hours BST. My email details are sewell (dot) d (at) googlemail (dot) com


And if that wasn't enough fine flash fiction for you, my fourth collection "28 Far Cries" will be published on National Flash Fiction Day, in both print and e-book formats. Twenty-eight tales about fading super heroes, alien invasions, living statues, fathering, suicide pills, bar brawls, the first human language, the Red Army, Vultures, Radioactive Love, Pole Dancers, Lycanthropy, Beheadings, Warlords, Incubuses...
Twitter hashtag for all the news on the day #NFFD
For now I'll hopefully whet your appetites with a couple of videos of my flash.
"Just Aphasia Going Through"

"Flash Fiction"

"7 Earworms"

Stained Glass - Friday Flash

He stood in the centre of the church’s murk. The heavy wooden pews were empty, but he conceived the devotees kneeling there would be swathed in darkness. Only the votive candles gave any illumination. Kindling the memories of the dead in order to light the ways of the still living. And thereby keeping them plunged in gloom.
As he moved he saw he cast no shadow. No place for light and shade in this particular realm he mused. He studied the stained glass windows. The only stab of colour in a world of black or white truth. The reds and blues were heavy and thick. They absorbed all the brightness from outside and devoured it. Imagine that, windows that actually served to stop up the light. The lapis lazuli ultramarine was very pure, untainted. While the cochineal reds were smoky, full of tiny grains. The reds were mainly used for the clothes of supplicants and the headwear of women, covering up the sinful flesh. Blue was for the garb of the saints. It was crystal clear to his eye the message of the glass. Only the halos were yellow and less dense, admitting a tiny amount of light to make them glow. 
He looked up into the heart of the cupola. There the colour was in the murals, while clear glass allowed the light to stream down into the upper reaches of the church in ribbons. The dizzying heights where man could not scale and approach the face of god. They would have to content themselves with contemplating him from far below on their knees. Looking up into the divine light as insects. The architecture of power was so transparent. How could people have fallen for this? Did they really believe this to be the natural order of how matter was arranged? One step outside of the church’s heavy wooden portal would have delivered them into the blinding sunlight of summer. That should have informed them of the artificial manipulation of light and dark they had just exited.
“Let there be light” the holy writ had commanded. So he picked up a floor candelabra and swung it at the stained glass. The glass shattered with a dull tintinnabulation. Ha he thought, let these serve as a call to prayer. He continued striking at each window in turn. The light outside seemed almost tentative, as if it were unsure whether flooding in might be a trespass. This only enraged him more.
“What are you doing?” spluttered the priest who had been summoned by the bruit. The man turned to face him and struck him with the iron candelabra. The priest fell straight to the ground groaning. The man leaned down and picked up a shard of the broken glass and drove it into the priest’s neck. The holy man’s white collar began to stain red. The red against the blood was of a light hue. The man studied the glass in his hand. It was a red slither and he regarded how the man’s blood was the same shade as the dark cochineal and couldn’t be picked out against it. Just as he imagined it would be. He drove it back into the man’s jugular.
He examined his hand as it too was bleeding. He was about to bring the cut to his mouth, when he caught himself. Leaded windows and five hundred year of insect dye was probably not conducive to his future wellbeing. He smirked and moved to exit the church. As his last act of desecration, he blew out each of the votive candles. Extinction was the only indisputable truth. He turned back into the interior of the church and was delighted to see that the light had apologetically begun to flow through the broken windows and begin to lift the gloom.
*

With slides spotted with red under microscopic lenses and the DNA drawn from his blood on the glass shard recovered from the dead priest’s neck, forensic science were able to bring the man to book. This was the natural arrangement of matter. And god’s, or was it man’s, arrangement of justice.

Criminal songs - 10 songs about crime

I've published a music chart of Murder Songs but here's one of other crimes.


1) Genesis - Robbery, Assault And Battery"
You'd probably never believe it given my music collection as it currently stands, dominated by New Wave, Hip-Hop, Reggae & Art Noise, but Genesis were one of the first bands I ever got into. Peter Gabriel Genesis rather than Phil Collins Genesis of course. But still, I find them impossible to listen to now. Weren't videos made in the 1970s really rubbish?



2) The Prodigy - "Firestarter"
The album this comes from "The Fat Of The Land" is almost excellent, but as with this track I just feel each song on it threatens a lot sonically and musically but somehow always manages to truncate it without nailing it. Maybe that's why Liam sacked the rest of the band.




3) New Order - "Thieves Like Us"
Um I loved this period New Order (that yielded the album "Power, Corruption and Lies". Not my normal type of music, but I guess there was a sentimental attachment from the Joy division days. I wonder if they lost any fans who felt the synth-heavy sound meant that they had sold out the Joy Division legacy? I certainly felt similar when one of my favourite noise bands The Swans went all quite singer-songwritery and recently when my favourite contemporary band Liars produced a second successive album that ditched their art-noise roots for plinky-computer game soundtrack music.




4) Renegade Soundwave - "Probably A Robbery"
I can't remember anything else about this band. One-hit wonders? Probably.




5) The Jam - "Thick As Thieves"
Supposedly a concept album because 3 of the songs were linked, of which this was one. But ignoring that, Paul Weller's gift for longing back to a childhood of being able to belong to something never bettered than in this song.




6) The Clash - "Bankrobber"
 I never pass up any excuse to play this song really! I always thought it was just another one of their reggae covers before I discovered that no, they'd penned it themselves. Very hard to do white reggae well, but this is definitely at the top of the white reggae charts.




7) Ministry - "The Land Of Rape & Honey"
This band are from Texas. They don't fit in very well down there...




8) MC 900Ft Jesus - "The City Sleeps"
Criminally (get it?) under-appreciated artist, really sorry they stopped after a couple of killer albums. This is waaay more menacing than anything the cartoon gangster rappers might pontificate upon.




9) Pulp - "Joyriders"
Never really a Pulp fan, a mix of professional Northerner with auto-didact intellectual, just didn't strike a chord with me. Sort of Morrisey without the racial prejudice.



10) Swans - "Blackmail"
This period Swans when female vocalist Jarboe joined the band saw their enormous power sound teeter on the point of fracturing as her voice cut against it. It was brilliant these two divergent muscularities.



11) Beastie Boys - "Car Thief"
Well you know I love all things Beastie Boys. I chose this song because of the title, but let's face it, the video for their song "Sabotage" which spoofs Starsky & Hutch's opening credits is one of the best music videos every made, so I'm linking to that! Makes me a bit of a cheat, but not a criminal!



12) 50 Cent - "P.I.M.P"
The Caribbean steel band vibe of this is genius, no matter how desultory the song would be without it. #guiltypleasure



13) Gary Clail - "Two Thieves And A Liar"
Another artist like The Prodigy who has the germ of brilliant songs but never quite manages to see them through (I find this also with Adrian Sherwood's Tackhead from which Clail spawned). But this song delivers all the way through.




14) Slits - "Shoplifting"
Another band who teetered on the brink of great tunesmithery but always managed to pull back. All the elements are there, but somehow the song sounds slightly weedy, which for dub is a bit odd. I did like their track "New Town" though.



15) Ice-T - "Grand Larceny"
The granddaddy of blustering gangster rap and where is he now? Oh yeah in a police drama series on TV. Oh the irony.

A Moment In Time - Friday Flash

The offer of travelling back in time. As a tourist to see some great event in history. As an educator attempting to better equip folk with knowledge to save themselves. As an advocate trying to right some injustice. As an activist, seeking to prevent some atrocity through assassination.
My motives were more humble. From over far more shrunken a horizon. Nevertheless I did want to put right a wrong. To bring back a life. Or at least to preserve it, where its possessor had snuffed it out at their own hand. 
I would go back and not spurn his proposal of marriage. His yearning for children, confetti, confessions, the lot. No longer would I wantonly demolish his hopes and deny him his envisioned life. Never did I foresee the fatal consequences it would lead to. 
This time I would accept. But it’s not so much as doing it in the light of what I know now. Probably would entail me grabbing the noose from his hand and putting it around my own neck. So I guess I also need to find out why I turned him down flatly. I mean I know I struggle to commit to anyone for the long haul, but I’m unsure as to why I am forever a black hole to the star-crossed.
Perhaps it’s not that that moment when he was down on one knee and I crushed him with my hammer blow of a refusal. Maybe I need to range further back that that. For even now I haven’t a clue where my reluctance stems from. That’s what I need to discover. To derive the source.
How far back in time might I need to go then? Adolescence? When none of us could possibly commit to anything, for fear that we might miss out on some future dish. Even those who fell pregnant and decided to terminate rather than yoke themselves. Man oh man, imagine going back to that point, keeping the baby this time round in the knowledge that you once slew it. But luckily that had never been any part of my story.
Presumably I venture back into my childhood and see what about my experiences left me with a phobia of commitment. To that good life where none of us ever want to leave. Of endless summers and no responsibilities. But we all felt that and none of my peers have go on to remain footloose and fancy free. Though just as miserable.
So maybe I need to drive further back still. Perhaps all the way back into the womb? But why stop there? I’d only have to regress further and delve into the lives of both my parents when they were children. But I how could I split myself between their two physicalities? This time travel choice is a real conundrum. How to pick a moment, the right moment… Do I go back to the birth of man? Beyond that to the Big Bang itself when our species weren’t even a twinkling in space dust’s eye?
Yet would even reliving my life provide me with any insight to bring into the present day? Maybe I should just spurn this corporate offer to make private restitution. To let sleeping dogs lie. To leave lifeless lovers at the end of their line.

I resolve against going down the line myself. There is no such thing as a moment in time along the continuum of a person’s being. I fold the circular in two and tear it in half. Then I tear those two halves further…