WOEBOT

Optical Effects on 3 Famous Records.

1. Gang of Four: Entertainment.

Take your copy of The Gang of Four's "Entertainment" to a dark room, or where the lighting is low, and wobble it up and down. You'll see the type "shaking". This can also be performed with Pylon's first LP. I tried to film this myself but it didn't come out.

2. Mark Stewart: As the Veneer of Democracy Starts to Fade.

Had to bite my lip when this LP came up in conversation at Uncarved recently. Put the record on the deck and switch it on. Look closely for one minute at the swirling pattern. Then look at something else. SCARY! This bit of Flash performs the same task perfectly, and will spare you a few bob on a really ropey record.

3. Faust: The Faust Tapes.

Neatly in sync with Bridget Riley exhibition at the British Tate. Every stoners' favorite cover. But did you look closely enough? Give it at least 15 seconds and then you'll really appreciate this Op-art splendour.

There's Gs on these.*

There's Gs on these.*

Still picking up bits and pieces and tuning in occasionally (I have a wife and kid you know, I can't duck off the whole time!) It's as much fun as I get out of modern music these days, a real sense that in 10 years time this will matter. Strange to look at it like this (backwards through a decade-long telescope), but its something like a compliment. This music is SO FRESH its gonna last that long. That poster "Sticky, Semtex etc" is still up on the Eastenders set, though I noticed this evening it's top end has become torn and frayed.

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Major Ace: Countdown Special Delivery.
Decentred hiccoughing intro with a bassline sliding up in the mix. Multi-layered vocals like a Steelie & Cleevie dub. The Countdown rap (10,9,8,7 etc)** tossed back and forth between MC Neat and Major Ace. Confusion Fear of a Black Planet style. Maximalising intensifying deliveries squeezing all the space out of the riddim. Best track thus far this year (coo!).

Boo Kroo: BK Theme.
Touched on at Heronbone. Social Circles! Such style to issue a glorious piss-take like this alongside more "serious" joints, they're not quite V records, more SubBase. Quote: "We join our heroes working on a toon: "eh wat flex we need to make a toon, turn on the Playstation." (Ardkore) Novelty records ahoy! "Cmon guys this is too urban, think of the kids, you've got to go SUBURBAN."

Donao: Bounce (Miami Bass Mix).
Better than the original, by a long shot. Wicked tippity-toes rap by MC Bubble Bomb (?) the track gymnastically switching to Donao's creamy smoove chorus. Wiley disses Donao, and I've heard the Social Circles CD Promo of his solo LP, it's no great shakes, but you gotta hear this.

Shystie-vs-The Streets: I Luv U.
Shystie sounds like a charming young lady (cough). This is a terrible answer record I picked up because I'm a sucker for cheeky mementos. All the sex and drama sucked out of every media whore's favourite record. Heaven knows how they were allowed to used the riddim. I suspect Mike Skinner is lurking somewhere behind this, which leads one to calculate his career is more up the tubes than you'd initially have thought.

Aylesbury All Stars: Buss Red Light.
Suburban nastiness from Buckinghamshire. We're gonna knock you off the road. There's a number on the label so I text it: "JKrime. Lazy Journalist here. Buss Red Light. Would you really knock me off my bike? Peace. M." I should call it but... All those old mobile numbers on old Ardkore 12" White Labels you regret never having the chance to ring, like Gappa G's number on "Roach is Burning". They haven't got back to me yet, presumably consulting a lawyer.

All Out: Live Caller.
Slightly old-skoolish riddim (echoes of Some People's Dangerous) from this Acton crew. The idea is MCs "ring in" to the track and drop their rhymes. Acton is way out west. They're also representing Ealing W13 on this. East is where it's at unfortunately. Incredibly strange how this micro-geographical difference acquires such a massive significance. Still this track is fun and the fact that this is a peripheral record is another reason for it's existence, because the big boys just make riddims these days and save rapping for the PAs and Radio shows.

Youngstarr: Revival.
Boss riddim. Incredible depth to the production which is raw-as-carrots beats. Kind of like Deep Dish meets Rhythmatic (the production on those old Network tracks was pretty bad). Very much derivative of Wiley's sound, and no way as distinctive but pretty damn tuff nonetheless.

Wiley: Igloo Remix and Blue Rizla.
I wanted to buy these, but 8 quid! That's too much for ANOTHER riddim. It's symptomatic of the small runs these records get (1,000?) that the costs of producing them rockets. For 2,000 the producers probably only have to pay a few quid more, but then they can't guarantee to shift 'em. Wiley is an awesomely impressive figure. Right now he's getting stronger, more daring and distinctive every week. I think, no exaggerating here, that he's probably more important than George Clinton, Miles Davis, Jimi Hendrix, Sun Ra and Derrick May rolled into one. You want hyperbole, you've come to the right place. Igloo is overpoweringly funky and strangely for a remix, features drums while the original didn't. Actually fuck it I might have to go and pick these up. Falling for my own hype! What next?

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*eh?
**spelling raps suck, but counting raps...well that's an entirely different matter!

(Un)Coil(ing).

I was pleased Simon shared his opinions on the value of the MUSIK by the core Industrial gang. I guess my position is pretty clear. I'm not convinced by it and I'm like the rocking vicar when it comes to the seamy undertones. Eugh! Eden has been filing a spotter-ish 10 Best LPs of the Industrial Scene series (which I understand is to be printed on gold leaf and buried at Stonehenge when he completes it in 2117), so check that out if, like me, you're a non-believer.

In the meantime Coil are EVERYWHERE. Everyone who's anyone is giving them the nod and the wink. I picked up "Windowpane" on 12" the other day, partly out of guilt at not giving them any dues, but also because the "Astral Paddington" Mix of that track is really quite cool. The main mix however (which I'd never heard before) confirms all my suspicions. I can finger two similar "sounds" with quite deadening accuracy, the Happy Mondays circa "Bummed" and closer, almost depressing this, The Beloved. It's possible "Windowpane" predates the records in question (like, so what!); I can't for the life of me be arsed to do any research on the matter. My point would be, such lofty exstakic prose for THIS! I know the recent "Time Machines" stuff is in thrall of La Monte Young (my 'ero, the daft old tosser that he is). However somehow that seems anachronistic, though (yes) everyone else has picked up on the stark modernity of La Monte's music, but NOT it's opiated florid psychedelia.

Besides the "Astral Paddington" Mix, which IS great, the cover is also very noteworthy. Presumably stills from an ancient video, the colours evocatively saturated, capturing Balance, off his tits, at some loch-side at dusk. Reminds me of those messy dawns back in the day (aw shaddup grandad!)

Red Rob.

"They were taken with thing called improving music, improving culture, which is good for you, and naff culture, which is bad for you, and children must be guided away from all these bad things. The more I read about it, I realised that this tendency had been going on for centuries. The church, for example, used to have a problem with rabble music. Organised church music was elevating, and the music of the rabble, when they got pissed, caught sexual diseases and that sort of thing was the bad kind. The church monitored the rabble with totalitarian verve, intervening constantly to break down the power of mob culture and mob music. Following on from that, you couldn't shock my parents' communist or egalitarian friends by saying "I don't believe in God", but you could by saying "I don't believe in Mozart"...The left missed a trick there, because the idea that serious music was morally elevating took a bit of a battering after the Second World War." Robert Wyatt 2003.

Really I could sling inverted commas round the whole piece and leave it there. Wyatt's a fantastic thinker. He was probably the person responsible for coming up with the term "World Music", which while both a good AND bad thing is certainly a coinage to be reckoned with. Brian Eno would spend long afternoons with him in the seventies chatting, casually teeving his thoughts. Wyatt, and I read John Peel revealing this, has two houses a mile apart from one another which he swaps between. Cool! So many ideas swilling through this it's difficult to know where to pick up the thread.

The first thing I noticed was that Wyatt was exploring the tension between what Simon Reynolds would call the "Avant-Lumpen" and what we might call the "Beatnik". We talked about this here a while ago under the guise of "classic Cartesian dualism" Beatnik-vs-AvantYob. It's pretty safe to suppose Wyatt's family were classic Bohemians or Beatniks. They were part of poet/author Rupert Graves circle, and would holiday with them in the South of France. Isn't the idea of British bohemian retreats only having to be as far away as Majorca (Kevin Ayers and Terence Stamp's bolt hole) and the Provence wonderful? Nowadays folk have to own their own villa in Essouria or Mustique. I know I do.

Music which "improves" one is one of the hallmarks of Beatnik culture. It's one of the criteria that separates The Beatles from The Stones (ad infinitum). Wyatt's term "naff culture" spells it out larger. Reynolds might splice naff up with football culture, herd thinking, mass abandon on LSD, in short everything one might infer from The Mover's "Mescalinum United" alias. Wyatt's historical comparisons with church repression immediately made me flash on Greil Marcus's discovery of Jon of Leyden, medieval Germany's Johnny Rotten and also the thought that once-upon-a-time folk music* constituted this notional great unwashed. I guess Wyatt represents one part of a transgressive tradition that is neither "Beatnik" nor "Yob", but square to the politik of both.

What really stimulated me was his idea that the left had "missed a trick". It's got to be true. Right from the outset Communism (then Socialism) has persistently backed the wrong dog. The very earliest Communist experiments with siring a culture of their own were the Avant-Garde projects of Tatlin, Vertov, El Lizissitsky. A total cock-up in terms of state sanctioned art, sure we can enjoy the fruits of it as the western bourgeoisie but what possible success did it suspect to have with the "proletariat". Ditto the heavy-handed romanticism of Stalinist cinema and art with its top-down dogma and cut-out sentiments, almost not culture at all but untrammeled propaganda. You couldn't expect people to suck on a culture as bland as that. As for Capitalism, we've the compulsive shenanigans of Hollywood and Pop music leading us a merry dance down the supermarket.

Flash forward to Billy Bragg and his thoroughly bohemian re-shaping of The Clash as Woody Guthrie. It's no stronger a signal, in the final reckoning a culture of opposition which is eternally doomed to be the underdog. So where next Comrades? Well this is the germ of an idea I saw hatching in Wyatt's article. Why hasn't Socialism attached itself to "the invisible culture", the culture without trappings that is mob ecstasy? It's a snug fit with the political rally. Surely that's the missed trick Wyatt's referring to? Of course they picked up the folk thing in the early sixties all that pre-Bringing it Back Home swirl of Peter Paul and Mary** and Joan Baez. But by that stage folk music was, to use a term hijacked from Luka in a state of "Half-Life", it's radioactive fizz subsided to a degree that it was safe for the middle-classes to appropriate it. That whole wave of post Harry Smith's The Anthology folk was gestural rather than harboring potency.

What if Socialism had harnessed the rave? I'll bet I'm gonna receive a few dozen emails pointing me to the Socialist Worker's Bank Holiday party at Camber Sands with Judge Jules' Political Science Graduate brother on the decks. Red Square in a heavy fog of dry ice, the cupolas of St.Basil’s ablaze with lasers, grubby street-urchins selling black-market vodka-flavored gum, enormous inflatable tanks and submarines, a 4000k Turbo rig manned by Cossacks on a microdot ration, 100,000 strong crowd of Soviet ravers chewing their cheeks, Vladimir Putin in loose-fitting clothes sneakers and a medallion urging the legion on and upwards with quotes from Das Kapital and the latest corn production figures from Georgia, huge Stalinist Tower-block-sized screens playing old skool stroboscopic videos like “The Man with the Movie Camera” and proto-rave visuals like “Earth”. Monday morning back down the tin-mine the dutiful weekenders have Trotsky on a white horse dancing across their corneas.

The Christians had a good crack, if not much success. I saw an hilarious programme on TV the other night with the god squad cruising Ibiza, teaching holiday-makers how to DJ, playing at Mambo (was it?) before Carl Cox. The highlight being one of the girls in the outfit recounting seeing an angel at one of the islands superclubs, no really! Sit down because you'll wet yourself over this, what did he look like this angel: "Really cheeky...he looked really cheeky, like a regular clubber." Actually I couldn't laugh either, I was numb. So you see despite Chris Brain the Anglicans are still trying to have their way with the four-four beat. And why shouldn't the Socialists too? I expect they'll cotton on sometime in 2015 when we're all driving hovercrafts amid the frenzy of “scent” culture, I tell you the ears have had their day, onwards the nose!

Hard won spoils of the fame game.

You'd imagine I'd be delighted by Kodwo Eshun's hyperbolic write-up of TWANBOC in this months The Wire. Well let me tell you, oh naive pedant, those words cost me dear.

As is the usual proceedure with press of this sort, the article was run past Silvers and Hodge my entertainment lawyers. You'd not recognise the first draft. Naturally my opening demand was that Eshun about-face over The Pillbox. There was a tone of unbridled worship, an unhealthy fauning over Penman's "telekinetic flow" his "truly startling de-propriation of avant-garde thinking" his "glyphic inventiveness" and most displeasing an admiration for his "wide-screen cultural perspektiv", for crying out loud, this for a poxy music magazine! My only strong bargaining point this early in the negotiations being continuing high-profile plugs for his (ok truly stunning) oevre. Easy victory there.

I was happy enough about his comments on Blissblog, though suggested he remove a few paragraphs. My very gravest concerns were over my own write-up, which was sandwiched amongst those for a whole host of other (rabbits ears) minor blogs, those of the Spizzazz crew, Nathalie Phenotext, Scott Somedisco, Olly Time for Fear, John Uncarved, and Ozzie Angus, (allusions to which would have to be excised). Eshun described TWANBOC in the most unflattering of terms: "The smug and preening Ingram manages to know very little about a lot. An occupational hazard with blogs, he frequently descends into sub-Woody-Allen-esque self-loathing routines which this reader finds at best wearing. His sideways forays into flashy programming and graphics fail to detract attention from his lumpen protestant prose. Worst of all Ingram seems to be in the late throes of a paranoid delusion, taking sleight at the wholly innocent comments of his fellow bloggers and contributing to a general unease amid the enchanted online community." Disgraceful!

Eshun is, you might be surprised to hear, a bon viveur. The "offer" I tabled was a weeks' fishing on my beat on the Tweed in exchange for a greater degree of "co-operation". When Kodwo's people got back and informed us that wasn't going to change his tune we upped the stakes to include a dedicated gilly and a choice of the last weeks of August (the Salmon go CRAZY then!) If I may extend the fishy metaphor: That hooked him!

Yet more costly was Luka's entry. It should be no suprise to longtime readers of this particular "bit of crap" that I feel a responsibilty to the young heronbone chap, my wee nestling! I'm not even going to go into the particulars here of Eshun's original disparaging remarks, but it was nothing a brace of woodcock and a crate of port couldn't remedy.

Bye to all that...

And now presenting, direct to you from the hipster with the heart, the second T.W.A.N.B.O.C. Megamix. It's closely themed as from the time before acid house yet after electro. From that era when the spores of electro had wafted across a whole variety of genres (African music, Arty NYC Post-punk, London Roots, Art Rock and Kraut) which then proceeded to play catch up too late. It's a transitional period when everything was up in the air, when possibilities were still being worked out. The value of presenting it here? Well to my ears it sounds fresh, and that's all the excuse I need. A depressing view of the acceptable retro window sliding forward in time? Incidentally Andy Weatherall seemed to read the brief wrongly on his "Nine O'Clock drop compilation", there wasn't much post-punky about that, it seems closer to this, fruitfully prescient or big gaff?

0000 Pee Wee Herman (from Pee Wee's Big Adventure)
My favourite movie. Well one of them...

0006 Ray Lema: Marabout (Iyolela) from Medicine LP (Celluloid 1984?)
Electro from Zaire from genre-buster Ray Lema. Martin Meissonner at the helm. Lovely Dennis Morris cover. Impossible to find. Lema's "Gaia" LP easier to track down and also excellent.

0420 Les Liasons Dangereuses: Avant - apres Mars from Eponymous LP (CHBB 1981)
Who for years I confused with Palais Schaumberg. This LP has been recently reissued. Check it out!

0624 Lady's Choice: Girl's Night Out (Serious Party Dub) 12" (Streetwise 1983)
Richard Scher and Lotti Golden in covert Warp 9 action.

0859 Wally Badarou: Chief Inspector 12" (4th & Broadway 1985)
The hipster himself. Compass point magic.

0952 Chakk: They Say (Fon 1985)
Really blew me away. The Sheffield crew ply dub.

1157 Manu Dibango: Abele Dance (Dub) (Celluloid 1985)
Meissonner again, let no-one else near African music! Head-caving beats and truly joyous fruity sax.

1513 Akabu: Watch Yourself 12" (Body Rock 1984)
This label the joint progeny of On-U and Tommy Boy. Presumably as Sherwood was steering the rhythm section over here.

1515 Bang The Party: Rubbadubb from Back to Prison LP (Warriors Dance 1990)
Kid Batchelor you is a god! Nice tie in with the afro-dubs of Paul "Groucho" Smykle at the Addis Ababa studios.

1759 Coach House Rhythm Section: Timewarp 12" (Ice 1977)
Eddy Grant casually inventing house music.

2029 David Van Tieghem: In a Gadda Da Vida (Black Light Mix) (Wide Angle 1986)
From that exciting time Basquiat/Haring etc. Kenny Scharff day-glo cover on this. Strikingly pre-acid. Ecstacy going down.

2316 Lake Eerie: The Nightmare (Bonesbreaks "Go Bongo" Dub) (Nu Groove 1988)
Which I found recently in London. Can't say enough how much I love the Nu Groove aesthetic.

2524 Aqua Regia: NYC Smile on me from DFC Ambient House Compilation (Irdial 1991)
Wandering round India half-naked stark raving mad, having discarded my clothes, carrying only a haversack full of bootleg cassettes. Getting lost in Bombay cul-de-sacs listening to this. Walking walking walking.

Anyway I hope you enjoy it. I need a break, so I'm off for 10 days. Luka has informed me that I'm not to approach a computer. Peace and Love.

I'm only posting this cos I'm embarassed.

Sure I'm NOBODY (this is true), and you're Ian Penman. And yes I'm an egotist. Aren't you? And actually if you read it again it's patently clear I know you're not talking about ME-ME-ME. I quote: "it's probably not aimed squarely at me" and "the latest Penman slur is just a hook to hang it on" and "(addressed to the arching panoply of the heavens)" So you see I'm not talking to you. Sorry to offend you even further, get OVER yourself etc etc etc. Except of course it would be dishonest to try and slip that one under anyone's nose. I'm not about to walk into what is to all intents and purposes a crowded room and stand in the corner and pretend I'm not there.

I did read that post very carefully, and I was very moved by it. I actually wrote three nice caring emails then ditched each one, too "worthy", too "trendy", too I dunno. Trying to make clear, gently, whatever, that I care. That I'm not a "grubbing" evil person. I love. Also thinking what's the point, I'll not get a reply. So eventually the sentiment comes out backwards. Sorry.

This is like being at school.

Penman in the frame...again! cuz

cuz we're right down to Darwinian ratrace grubbing and stomping here aren't we, and it's not even along race lines or class lines or sex lines, it's just how things are - 'ARDKORE - oh yeah, middle class record collectors and media whores who think Dizzee is jes the most darlingly authentic trip or TING dere iz?

Penman cracks me up yet again. It's probably not aimed squarely at me, just me and all the other Reynolds' clones. In truth I'm probably more the upper middle class 'Ardkore collector. A finer breed than all these grubbing middle-class 'Ardkore collectors. I couldn't quite get how the stab {break} featured amid the rest of the {flow} a tirade against working-class under-18 cat botherers. Yeah and being cruel to animals is no joke, we've had a string of abandoned greyhounds. We don't endorse that here at T.W.A.N.B.O.C. (dieing laughter)

Let me quickly fill you in on the plan for the next couple of weeks. This scrap. One MAJOR post. Then nothing. I'm away on holiday. I'll be back though. My final point, and I'm not going to address this again, and the latest Penman slur is just a hook to hang it on (no more). It concerns me that certain people might be under the impression that I'm some slavering mono-dimensional asshole. A "media whore". A greedy capitalist. An air-headed show-off. A slave to fashion. All I seem to talk about is music. Vinyl. Christ even Reynolds and Carlin (the Godz) talk about real-life, politics, feelings etc! I'm like a stuck record. I've often been tempted to "open up" and talk about other things but that's not the game-plan here. The plan is to talk about music.

And you can print this: (addressed to the arching panoply of the heavens) I'll wager I'm a hundred times the fuck-up, and a thousand times the gangster you are. You don't know shit about me, or what I've done, or what has happened to me. So be a little more careful with your assumptions.

k-punk on data.

Mark has been talking interestingly in reaction to Paul Morley's 7"-vs-iPod head-to-head. Mark does alot of reacting these days, I think he's mapped it onto and perhaps invokes it as validation "the derrive" (is that spelung korect?) which is Derrida's digression wotsit. He's making an art-form out of it. I get frustrated by digressing myself. Even frustrated by feeling impelled to contribute to a debate!

I wonder what Reynolds thinks about mp3s? I have a queer feeling he's avoiding broaching the subject like an arch politician. I picked up alot of antipathy towards the digital media in Joy's recent piece on digital publishing, maybe that's the house-line? I really felt Mark's elegant point: "And will people pay for Pop if it is 'just music', without staging, spectacle?" because that's the balance I try to address here. With the evaporation of all music's attendant trappings I feel bound to vainly re-apply all that's lost. Maybe that's the drive behind all this rabid on-line theorising too? It's incredibly myopic of the music industry to assume all they're selling is music. Recent incorporations of tiny amounts of image data into mp3s doesn't really help.

However I do think mp3s are valid, though I'd naively concieve of them as a taster of "Real Product", certainly that is how i've always used them, even when sanity dictated otherwise. I've yet to develop a data fetish, and after 3 years of downloading mp3s it seems unlikely I'll foster one. Will hardware replace the content as the object of fetishisation? Unlikely given that no-one can afford to buy a string of them, you know, "keep topping up their iPod collection."

He's the Drummer in a Free Jazz Band.

Announcing the Winner!

Congratulations Job de Wit! You've saved me a fortune in cosmetics.

The winning answers:

1) Purple
2) Bryan Ferry
3) Richard Burton
4) 50 pence
5) "it's so stupendously ugly and oppressive"

A copy of "Batucada Fantastica" winging it's way over to the Netherlands!

Links.

Jay's been busy
Though I'd take him to task on a number of issues like making the distinction between "Rastafarian" Dub and "Tripped-out" Dub, eh? Quoting Reynolds on Dub? Er, taking The Pop Group to task for "We Are All Prostitutes" and predictions like this: "African 60s and 70s music is soon to be the new dub, the new tropicalia, the new krautrock – whatever it is that people move on to when they’re bored with rock and roll", though that last thing should be read against a west-coast perspective, we've been drowning (not unpleasantly) in repackaged African Comps for years over here.

Jess 'Arvell on Early Chungle.
As evidenced here the smart money has been on Ibiza/Kemet/3rd Party for some time. Reynolds has a well-documented Noise Factory weak-spot. I met this lot in 1994 at the time of the Kemet "The Seed" LP, a disappointing record if memory serves. They were occupying a recently abandoned warehouse in a Tottenham back-street and were in the process of converting it into a Multi-media centre. Mark X shared some SERIOUSLY scary Broadwater Farm bad-bwoy stories with us tourists from the middle-classes.

Tom Ewing's crew have had a face-lift.
I'd like to thank Tom for the linkage. Respekt to the daddies! Only hope I'm living up to expectations, which considering recent gripes seems unlikely: (a) Always trying to out-Reynolds Reynolds (OK fair enough!), (b) That my Bob Dylan thing was extremely Q magazine (that from the voice in my head) and also that various items had no appointed description, the brand of the lady's cigarette, the sofa fabric, Bob's hairdresser etc, (c) That there were typos on the Maclise poem (where?), (d) That I'm a superficial posh show-off loser vinyl bore who doesn't watch enough Telly, who really needs to get to grips with his theory and would probably do as well to approach "Record Collector" magazine for gainful employment.

...and this letter from...

Sometimes in the process of doing this blog I feel like Jimmy Saville atop a pile of Royal Mail, on other occasions a member of "Jackass for Music Journalists". It's all good! I love doing it, and I've noticed similar sentiments issuing from k-punk and The Pillbox.

There's been some great correspondence recently. First up, and I wasn't sure how to react to this, stomach-wrenching guilt or delight, I got an email from Alasdair Roberts. Did you remember my piece of Sunday April 27th? I quote (myself): "Alasdair Roberts: I’ve actually met this guy. He was singing these 13th century ballads on London Bridge Will Oldham style. I gave him 20p, then on second thoughts I went back, took all his earnings, and kicked him in the balls. Not that I condone violence of any sort." and "Richard Youngs: I’ve actually met this guy. He was singing these 12th century ballads on Waterloo Bridge Alastair Roberts style. I gave him 10p, then on second thoughts I went back, took all his earnings his guitar and floppy hat, kicked him in the balls and then pushed him over the edge onto a passing silage barge. Not that I condone violence of any sort, but occasionally it can be a crude but effective means to an end." Well I thought I got a bit carried away (titter) and how would you think those artists would feel about that? Yeah, one to consider definitely... And how did Alasdair respond: "Matthew, Thanks for the hilarious themed mention of me (and Richard Youngs) on your website. Love, Alasdair Roberts." So here's bigging up Alasdair for being a nice dude and EVERYONE has to go and buy his records. Especially Dave Howie/Cozen/I have Zero Money/Everything's Usable/Scout Sniper/A Catalogue of Wrecks/±Lack, whatever the fuck he's calling himself this morning...a word from the stoopid choose and stick...it's a brand thing ;-)

Next up an email from Jeffrey Wittliff: "My name is Jeffrey Wittliff. I am 14 years old. I wish to be a part of the hollow earth convention. I think it would be good to have a diversity of age at the convention. How can I become a member of the ISCE? Please send me the information. Thanks, Jeff." I love it when I get emails for the ICSE at www.hollow-earth.org. They're my longstanding neighbours. I think they begrudge me beating them to the dash.

Also this from DigitalDjigit on the tWist tip: "I am on the oldskool list that Twist started back in '98. He has since left (about 2-3 years ago) and I think he was talking about selling off his collection. He didn't come across as difficult to talk to (on the list anyway). He was one of the most intelligent members I thought and was an idealist about the whole rave thing (anti-capitalist and all that). I think he was into folk music as well. There's a few peeps on that list that are FAR more obsessive collectors than Twist. More records and more focused. Destiny, the list moderator comes to mind. He (destiny) is also involved with the Kniteforce (back again, releasing new stuff) crew, doing their website and even a release or two on the oldschool tip." Still searching for Mr.tWist the legend grows...

I managed to find ANOTHER Wiley show last night (he was on Desire Monday night with members of East Connection and N.A.S.T.Y. Crew...Luka found that) it was awesome stuff with Flow Dan and Wiley himself on form. But I forgot to hit the record button, doh! Still that's not the point, eh! It's all about living for the moment (curses!)

Literally hundreds of applicants for the "bIt oF cRAP" Summer Competition, my assistants are working full time to sift through the entrys. Though DO PLEASE remember to enclose the $10 entry fee...

Angus Maclise.

+ INTRO +

He was waiting at the top of the hill

In his high little house near the sky,

On a night of great longing, his mind

Being filled with a dazzling light.

It had become the center of the great world

And his imaginary embraces with

The scintilla of this great light

Brought him close to the storms

Which rage, without our knowledge,

At the perimeters of our immediate world;

Swept into the violent gales

He was visited there on that hilltop

By an announcing angel of terrific beauty.

Glistening with the signs of her station

And aspect, she handed him a letter

From a great bundle in her hand -

Give me a Dhol Beat!

Bloggers at Desi Beats: 1xtra Birthday Bash Monday August 11th 2003.

First review filed? Heronbone and k-punk had that glazed "I AM ABSORBING CONTENT" look from time to time, so with any luck they'll be mad at me for beating them to the pinch. Though presumably Luka would render his impressions as feral poetry. Respect also to Cooper who showed up out of the blue. No fellow Bloggers spotted. We did look for other socially crippled white people, but no, just gorgeous tawny sisters with flowing hair and sikhs in crisp white shirts. I'm beginning to look like those "too old" dudes who you'd see at parties "exercising", nah I fitted right in in spite of my conspicuous pallor. I keep telling you I'm dead trendy yunnuh!

There was a huge degree of excitement in the air. A tangible sensation that, as the event was beamed out live on Radio One, that this was Desi culture making it's mark on the mainstream. Certainly Panjabi Hit Squad, one of whom is gleefully introduced as the man teaching Craig David how to speak Punjabi, are red hot right now, working their way from Mariah Carey and Ashanti to Keith Murray. This from Kodwo Eshun who, in spite of his huge appearance fee, pulled a no-show: "Desi's a diss/ slang that snobbish RIs - Resident Indians- use against NRIs -Non Resident Indians ie Brit Asians Indian-Americans -the whole Indian diaspora", he made the point that it's another chapter in the sub-cultural tradition of "embracing the insult." Jazz, Punk, Gabba, Desi. It's a great starting point for any genre.

If Bashy culture is a glorious transcendence of the fake, imported music with the real mixed out, a dutty mash-up of musics that'd only share a stage in the UK, then Desi is an almost prismatic many-splendoured refraction of street culture. In a sense everything that's great about bashy, the inauthentic, is amplified and spun into whole new geographies by Desi. It's like my fave Glaswegian delicacy, curry sauce on chips.

After about half an hour I found I couldn't stop dancing. Desi Bhangra is pitched at a twice-walking-pace riddim timed exactly around the falling and re-organising of limbs. It's a divine formula that bewitching sitar loop, a roll of dhol then BASS. Factor in the helium-pitched hypersexuality of voices like Lata Mangeshkar or Asha Bhosle, the doyennes of Bollywood, and yo' ass is shaking. Since the days of Bally Sagoo the drums of Bhangra have come to match the brushed-metal perfection of Hip-Hop and Garage. No more sloppy wood-block beats, Desi r-r-r-rolls. Flashing lights, waving arms, cuties ring-dancing, dry ice, whiskey, all blurring into a no-time no-place ecstacy. And still you're twitching.

There's a shade of formality to Asian culture. They're trying to shake it off. They're maybe even embarrassed about it. A seriousness, earnestness, tidiness. But that's great. Notice how beautifully the event is choreographed, how Punjabi Hit Squad manage the rush. Rewinds aren't Jamaican-diaspora-messy like those of Semtex now the archetypal bashy DJ (who does a kool set), they're immaculate. You almost want to bow. Desi Highlights include Jassi Siddhu ("Reality Check") who's just back from Nairobi. He's joined by twin dhol drummers live on-stage. Woo! If this was a drum and bass night, with a live bass-player (snicker) I'd be cynical but here this is coming direct from the Bhangra Wedding bands, and it's done, as with everything in Desi, in a joyfully uncynical manner, you're just swept along in the enthusiasm. Also a wicked live performance by the ravishing Ms Scandalous, who stretched her tune (was it "Hai Hai", guffaw, c'mon I'm doing well here!) over 20 minutes. I was weak at the knees. Though the blogsterati all concluded that Jay Sean, the Asian so-called future of of UK R'n'B would do as well to climb back in his box. Back in yer box mate!

Heartless Crew are more reassuringly grimey though they fit the Desi agenda. Mighty Moe is that curious thing an Arabian who MCs in patois, a true fake. Out of the gate they rock 3 versions of Diwali, any notion of faithfulness to Garage proper is out of the window. Heartless floated Mark Ryder's "Joy" the late 90s Garage re-rub of Tainted Love, Shy FX and Apachi Indian's "Original Nuttah", a stack of Wiley riddims and their own classic "The Superglue Riddim". Heartless are shameless showmen, and maybe this reluctance to cleave to a straight Garage set is much to do with the fact that the crowd would tire. Bushkin strips off his purple flowery towelling tracksuit top, gets his washboard out for the ladies, swaps with Fonti on the decks. It might not be as seductive as a show as the Bhangra crews, but Heartless lit the party's wick.

Walking eastwards pissed with Luka, breakdancer extraordinaire pontificating about varying hybrids of lichen, a gang stopped at the lights in a saloon. That squeaky Superglue riddim on a tape. "Oh yeah!" I waded towards them, "Yeah we saw the Heartless Crew tonight", confused but cheerful conversation ensued. The lights change. "See ya mate!"

Bringing It All Back Home.

Be sure it's fully loaded then have a nose around!

The "bIT oF cRAP" Summer Holiday Competition.

Roll up! It's the "bIT oF cRAP" Summer Holiday Competition!*

First prize is this wonderful Batacada LP, one of my few remaining doubles. I paid next to nothing for it. Utterly funky percussion which sounds like it was recorded in a cave (deep, dark, natural echo...echo...echo...) My friend Sacha pays his rent with this record! It's the bomb!

All you have to do is answer these following questions:

1. What colour was the Heron Luka saw at the canal?
2. Who did Ian come "this close" to writing the official autobiography of?
3. Which husband of Elizabeth Taylors' squares with the vigorous k-punk aesthetic?
4. How much did Marcello reccommend paying for the Kym Marsh record?
5. Why did Simon like the Mark One vs Plasticman 12"?

There will be a draw of the winners and the successful applicant be contacted by representatives of this blog to acquire their terrestrial address and provide the necesssary counselling in the event of such a drastic swing in their fortunes.

The competition closing date is 12.00PM GMT (natch) Thursday 14th August. Whereupon the correct answers will be revealed! The booby prize, a clean copy of Oxide and Neutrino's "Up Middle Finger", will go to the person with the most preposterously incorrect answers.

Morrissey.

Ian is probably right about Morrissey. I quote: "that he PURSUES people he idolises, and loves meeting them, and WHEN he meets them, it practically looks like HIS EYES ARE COMING..." Penman probably had some up-close industry encounters with him as twendy NME scribe, though I've a tale from quite the other side of the fence. A fanboy shard.

While never a lover of The Smiths I did swallow and wallow in "Hatful of Hollow". That record has great stripped-back production, all those renditions, while sourced from various conventional releases, were performances from the Peel shows of the day. On the LPs (The Smiths, Meat is Murder, The Queen is Dead) I found the sound a total disaster, a woeful stodgy mix when all that was needed was crisp guitars. The Hatful of Hollow's versions are brazen, bright and sharp. The perfect setting for those beatnik ululations. I used to get fairly lachrymose over "Please Please Please let me get what I want" and "Reel around the fountain". I'd shove a bunch of dahlias up my arse. However, my favourite bit of The Smiths' music was the intro to "How soon is now".

Aah that tasty reverb and those crashing chords! I even like the lyrics: "I am the son/sun, and the heir/air........of a shyness that is criminally vulgar". My very close friend of the time, the rogue who fixed me up to the spliff, was a more serious Smiths fan. He had an awesomely glamorous background, and I lay the charge at his door that it's his fault I'm a star-fucked tossbag. My friend's Dad was a famous film director, and then (1988) at the peak of his powers. He'd just completed one of those once-in-a-blue-moon movies whereupon Britain defeats Hollywood and had popped back to London where he was turning out jaw-dropping commercials which blurred that old art/commerce line. My friend and I would loll round his uber-hip batchelor appartment and rush on music with the great man. It must have been uncomfortable for my friend (who I love like a brother) to have his mates so in thrall of his Dad, especially when he could be a right bastard.

One of the adverts he'd just finished was for a brand of jeans and "How soon is now?" was the music they used on it. The opening frames,a shot from below, had a native american in eagle's wings spiralling atop a desert pillar. It was the perfect counterpoint to Johnny Marr's locked fret-throb. The ad cut a rain-dance against a bunch of London kids sheltering from a storm. My pal even had a cameo. It was a VERY beautiful commercial, and hugely celebrated. I remember one of those "History of Commercials" programmes on Channel 4 in the early nineties (damn thats a cheap programme to make, like MTV eh! Free content!) and after all Ridley Scott's Hovis micro-epics they asked "What of the future of commercials?", and they chose that ad to illustrate the poetic possibilities.

One day my friend joined us in his room, where we were scraping around the sofa's inners searching for stray roaches we could martial into something resembling a joint (that sad), and sat down with a pale face. "Morrissey is upstairs with my Dad." I was shocked. What was he doing there? Shmoozing? Dammnit he was supposed to be on the moors, or down the docks, or crying in a potting shed. Morrissey disappeared just as quickly as he showed up, prompting even more discomfort. What! Fast transport! Where's his bike? The whole thing left me mildly disillusioned. My friend, I know, felt yet more upset. What space is there for post-adolescent angst when Morrissey wants to hang with your father?

Sadder still...

New friend Cooper Bethea told me about these comps: The History of Our World Volume 1 and Volume 2. They've got nice Dave Nodz covers (Pedro Bell, Limonius, Alan Oldham AND Dave Nodz, dammnit I've nearly got an article here) and a great selection of tracks, but not nearly the depth of obscurity that I think is recquired. Here's my collection, which is OK. I'm always linking to this Excel document because it's SOOOO sad, something to be truly proud of. I get the varying spellings of Ruffige Cru down pat as well as the catalogue numbers.

But folks, there are MUCH sadder Ardkore collectors than my good self. I've only ever encountered him on the internet where he went by the pseudonyms of "Twist" and "Hungry Ghost". He used to run an FTP server which was DOMINATING, trust me stocked with the rarest tracks and stupendous volumes of them. Two years ago, after that site went down, I sent him a naggy email, he told me he'd dumped everything on Audiogalaxy, which was easier to maintain. "Twist" is the kind of dude who I imagine it would be difficult to have a coherent conversation with, a "monogeneric" collector like my Reggae pal Steve (I kid you not) Caruana, and Darren "I bought all of the African sub-continents records" Booker. The world would be an emptier place without such degrees of fanatacism. If there is to be an even 'arf decent ardkore comp, it needs to operate at these nutty levels. If anyone knows "Twist" get him to drop me a line.

Possibly the best Ardkore collection I know is Kodwo Eshun's "Routes from the Jungle". I'm talking here in terms of an "arty" reading of the era. Smile (based in NYC), who put out the "History of Our World" compilations, have a healthy rep, and strong connections to Moving Shadow. They might even be up to the task given their geography lends them a healthy perspective. Smile put out a great 2 Bad Mice Double LP as well as licensing loads of great Shadow stuff straight to 12". My fantasy Ardkore comp would probably be on Breakdown (the SubBase subsidiary who put out the greatest Jungle comps) compiled "Lenny Kaye-style" by Reynolds (gush gush) and it would definitely require some kind of suede or leather "luxury" packaging.

Messthetics.

Took delivery of an astonishing package yesterday from Chuck Warner's Hyped2Death organisation, all 8 of the Messthetics series. I say all, but the series is organised alphabetically and there is a HUGE gap between "E" and "R", and I understand that Chuck is having to go legit and therefore this may never be plugged. If I were you I'd get thee hence before that point and secure these volumes (and the Homework series) sharp-ish.

"Messthetics" is an astonishing body of work, you'd never imagine how many D.I.Y. punk and post-punk singles got made by gangs of losers from Dundee, Coventry, Birmingham etc etc. It makes a very strong case for viewing that era within the same frame as American psych-punk and UK Ardkore, such is the overwhelming fecundity and "can-do-up-and-at-em" spirit. Surely to do with abandoning the major labels. There was no need for this lot to require the authentification that a 5 year deal with Sony bestows. Parrallels with the Nuggetts, Pebbles, Back to the Grave and Rubble are inevitable, strengthened in part by the rockist slant that characterises the music. That might sound disparaging coming from me, though I'll admit I'm scraping the surface at the moment, and actually what I've heard today has been distinctly un-rock, current fave being The Rest's "Raga" London 1980, which is the split of the early Beta Band. Also with such a quantity of music any broad impression becomes like a tint through which one sees more individual currents.

The only other comps which can even begin to hold a candle to Messthetics are the "Instant Pop Classics" series of two, which chronicled the same era lovingly, all one-shot-DIY-losers, but which were limited to 500 and disappeared quickly through the cracks. I know other rock pals of mine Jay Strongman and Dan Setzer snaffled copies in San Francisco and New York, and actually I got mine shipped from Japan so they must have been spread (albeit thinly) across the globe. See if you can find 'em, they've got awesome cover art and lovingly collated rears, little snapshots of all the 7"s sleeves. My own Launderette effort is definitely pitched on a less obscure terrain than these comps, but it's more tightly focussed. I stand by it, it was through the gate pretty early. Mention must be made of the recent Rough Trade round-up, personally I don't know why they bothered slinging in all the new stuff, all this linking of the two scenes is, I think, over-stressing the equation. It's lazy and boring. Why does a music which draws on the past for influence suddenly get packaged so tightly with it. You never heard compilations with Jesus and the Mary Chain and The Velvet Underground on them. While I'm not a huge fan of the new stuff, I believe it should be allowed to stand on it's own merits. A similar charge could be levelled at Gomma's (excellent) Anti-NY comp, you didn't need the modern remixes there fellers!

All this has made me wonder why there has yet to be a solid compilation of the Ardkore era. Yeah I know about the millions of comps of this era, but they're all bucket-shop cheap nasty efforts, with little respect for the material. Crazy innit, I'm like the saddest git in the world, I mean "lovingly-packaged-ardkore" have you ever considered such a wholly contradictory thing.

The Politics of Production.

Oakey and Co. have an incredibly boring conversation as to whether or not, and how, to release (the above pictured Flexi-disc) which they're talking on.

Spizzazzz Spaz.

we dont like "in da pub" and if you all thought we did you should read closer and stop listening to your worst premier beats of all time compilations.

I was dead surprised when E Crunk over at spizzazzz lashed out at me after I threw them a friendly link. I didn't think there was anything wrong with him! He doesn't get "In Da Pub", that's a genius record. That's what I like about these avant-garde funny records (Kevin Blechdom's "Bitches without Britches", (Not) Chris Morris's "Batty Dread" and 50 Pence's "In Da Pub") they're all examples of true devotion spilling over into humour. They're more serious than the straight-up copy. "In Da Pub" isn't really a comedy record anyway, it's practically the apogee of bashy culture, more so than a million Def Jam Imports. Added to which it's a pleasant antidote to the increasingly boring formulae of Ghetto Fabulous rap. Ever since the best producers lost their way (Timbaland, NERD), and "The Stars" (Jay Z, Beyonce, Ja Rule, Ludacris) took over I've been losing interest.

It's dead strange being bitten thus by E Crunk (seriously, are you alright mate?) because he's not your usual Hip-Hop bore. When I went into Mr. Bongos the other day (more backpackers than C&J Sports) they scoffed when I asked whether they had the new Joe Budden record. Over here the divide between "true hip hop" and "what is not" firmly excludes the popular stuff. Though Fat Beats in New York, the West Village's finest Hip Hop store, while full of pasty-faced twats looking all down-home and serious, has absorbed the platinum stuff and mixed it up with everything else (watch the racks of the Undie stores over here long enough and you'll see it slide in).

Looking back over a childhood of misspent record purchasing I realised recently that the records I took MOST SERIOUSLY were piss-takes as well. The Butthole Surfers "Locust Abortion Technician", Pere Ubu's "The Modern Dance", Public Enemy's "It takes a Nation of Millions..." and every bit of Ardkore I ever bought. I still hate Frank Zappa. And don't think for a minute I'm endorsing irony.

Ah E you're just mad cos I picked up Lil Missy from the BBC in my Morris Minor and felt her knee at Shepherd's Bush. "You Posh Loser!", she said when she slapped me, "I say!" I said. Anyway I thought you liked my DJ Premier comp, at least that's what you said when we matriculated from Media Studies at Cardiff.

Did anyone else notice this........ever?

I love the look of early computer-generated imagery. It's clumsy and raw, everything digital art has, in these Maya dominated times, swung away from. This is a spotty record featuring alot of very bad sax playing which I left out of my East-coast Post-Punk special. It has one highlight, a tune written and sung by Gordon's collaborator Arthur Russell, called "That Hat." I've been dismissive of this track before (scraping the Arthur Russell barrel blah blah blah) but actually it's wicked.

On the paper insert that comes with my record there is a photo of Peter Gordon:

He looks quite the sultry young egg-head. Boy genius, not. Look closer at that perfectly shaved dome:

If that isn't a mosquito snacking on his grey matter! You see you've got to pay attention, or you miss these things.

...more like EXTRA ordinary.

Got on the tube at Ladbroke Grove, and fuck me if that wasn't Dizzy Rascal sitting opposite me. Sounds like a bit of addled fiction, no? I've been around Dizzy before, and to be truthful I wasn't wholly sure, but the resemblance was scary as hell. What would you have done?

The tube swayed along the track. "Dizzy" checked his texts. I had a quick glance at a copy of Muzik in my bag. Thumbs to page 27. Yep, scary likeness. This dude all in black, peaked cap, hooded lids. But how to broach the subject? You don't want to fall down that: "Oh you think all black geezers look the same..." trap. I reason if I screw up I can change carriage, cringe elsewhere so. And time waits for no man so I lean forward:

"Excuse me mate, don't take this the wrong way, but you're not in Garage are you." Well put, all bases covered. He looks pleased, "It's just that I think I recognise you." "Yeah mate, everyone says I look like Dizzy Rascal." I breathe a sigh of relief. "So are you in a crew?", "Yeah Devil's Advocates, we do Freez FM on Mondays."

He's on his way to a party in Southall. Roll Deep and Nasty Crew are on the bill. But as we discuss, now they're getting big, those lot often do a "no-show". My friend says he's not even sure if he's gonna show up tonight. Devil's Advocates are one of a few crews from the West of London. The spotlight is very much on the East we both agree (the fuck I know). He asks what stations I catch. Deja Vu. Raw Mission. Bassline. Actually I'm a bit rusty this month. He seems quite surprised. Yeah I guess I'm not the picture of the demographic, though you know (primping myself) I don't look TOO untrendy. I wear trainers! I should get myself a wee portrait on here, like Auspicious Fish's one, on second thoughts... Does he know Scobee's lot? No.

We shake and he peels off. That was fun. I like accosting strangers. You're not meant to are you.

Out Raving...

Was with my mate Sacha last night. He's back from hot-footing around Switzerland (great silos of old vinyl there) buying records. Which he then sells to likes of (ooh gasp) Andy Weatherall and Jerry Dammers. Sacha was playing at a gallery opening and I was enrolled to keep him stocked with lager and fancy nibbles. Managed to roll my eyes at a few of his selections too, though you don't play Jean Schwartz and Pygmy records at a gig like this. The Mrs called up and spoke to him (Glaswegian accent), "tapping away on his wee phone is he?" She knows me too well that woman, I'd been making a list of the tunes he'd been spinning, cheap Blog material ya get me. Do I ever relax?

-----------------------------------------

Nina Simone: Baltimore.
Penman would have liked this, an amazing fake Reggae version of the Randy Newman tune. Sacha had it on a fat CTI 12", sounds like Grace Jones on codeine. Cheap drug reference I know, but so apt here.

Al Green: Light my Fire.
Popular improbable cover version, see also Jose Feliciano and Horace Andy.

Rob: Make it fast, Make it slow.
From the recent Ghana Soundz comp. These African reissues are pretty ace.

Kamale Orchestre: Lipua-Lipua.
Music from Zaire Volume 3 on the DERAM label. Sparking guitar and well-accurate 3 part harmonies.

Johnny Osbourne: We need love.
Bit of vintage Studio One action.

Glen Brown: Take a step in my direction.
Our hero, singing on one of his rock-hard riddims. Pantomime we love you!

Keith and Tex: Tonight.
Off the Trojan 10" re-issue. Sacha's cool like that, doesn't care too much for all that "it has to be a 'riginal 7" malarkey".

Mckay: Take me over.
Fun mash-up of old riddim with new vocals. Like those spate of wicked Steelie and Cleevie re-versions of 70s Roots hits with the original vocalists and sampled riffs but packing dancehall punch. Nice!

Peggy Lee: Manana.
From his Mum's collection. 50s US suburban hawaian-shirt barbecue action.

Willis Jackson: Nuther'n like Thuther'n.
Full bloodied Blue Note-styled Jazz-Funk. Like Horace Silver's "The Sidewinder" with balls.

Doctor Rockit: Cafe de Flo.
Aah Herbert!

Tom Silverster.
Quite Mutant-Dishco-y. "I'm a former music journalist...now on wheels!" Ian Penman.

Truby Trio: Jaleo.
Awful Gipsy Kings flamenco styled house. Orrible. I laughed at Sacha, poor bugger, I'm like his worst enemy.

Pepe Paddock: Get Down Dub Angola remix.
This was quite lovely, and I'm gonna track this down. Brings to mind the imminent third coming of My Life in The Bush of Ghosts. We're feeling that record at TWANBOC at the moment.

Flying Lizards: Money.
Blah Blah everyone loves it. The artist doing a swift trade selling her pictures downstairs beneath us.

Vivienne Goldman: Launderette.
Not just for me, we was in Ladbroke Grove and Sach felt like it. I got him this in Amsterdam 3 years ago. I'm generous like that.

The Specials: Ghost Town.
Shivers down our spines. We recollect the first time we heard it as kids. Sacha has a signed copy: "Sacre Bleu, C'est Sacha Dieu! Which Jerry "The Wolfman" Dammers gave him. Sach tells me a great story of how Jerry, I worshipped this man as a 9 year-old, showed him the organ he wrote "Ghost Town" on. Apparently the original had gone missing back-in-the-day, but he tracked down another one.

That love cats/missy elliott booty.
Bit of 2002 action ;-)

ESG: Moody.
Off the Soul Jazz reissue. It's a different mix than on the EP spotters! Not as cold and cavernous either!

Zapp: More Bounce to the Ounce.
My selection, I'm tired and going home. Sacha proably up there for a couple more hours. Great evening. Extraordinary meeting on the tube, which I'll share with yous later. I'm out like a trout.