Happy Shakespeare Day and St George’s Day.
One of London’s celebrations tonight is an open-air screening of Monty Python And The Holy Grail in Trafalgar Square. But I know the film so well I can pretty much run it in my head at any time.
Mr Dan Rhodes sends me a compilation CD. It’s the second time this year I’ve been sent music by an acclaimed author, following a two-cd affair by Scott Heim.
In fact, Mr Rhodes sends it to me care of The Boogaloo, which is something else that’s started to happen to me. Just as well I go in the pub fairly often.
At his book event there the other week to launch his new novel Gold, he provided his own choice of music for the bar’s CD player. There was one song I rather liked but was unfamiliar with, so he’s sent me a few tracks. I’m now pretty sure it’s My Heart’s On Fire by Richard James. Not the Aphex Twin one. The one from the now defunct Welsh indie band, Gorky’s Zygotic Mynci.
And I’ve just found out that another Richard James is the inventor of the popular Slinky toy. It’s discovering this kind of information that puts a spring into my step, ho ho.
Mr Rhodes also provides me with Blue Flower by Slapp Happy, the eccentric German band of the early 70s. And again, my mind makes little trivia connections and I think of the two rather good cover versions of this rather good song. Like buses they appeared within months of each other, in the early 90s. One by Mazzy Star and one by the Pale Saints.
Here’s the video to the Pale Saints version, spotlighting singer Meriel Barham’s striking countenance. The Pale Saints belong to that rare subsection of bands who replace their lead singer with one of the opposite sex, in the midst of their recording career. She took over from Ian Masters, who had a beautiful, girlish voice and indeed a rather feminine hairdo. So I like the symmetry of Ms B’s boyish hairdo in this video.
(checks YouTube link)
Oh, it’s not on YouTube anymore. Surely this is a common sensation of the day? In which case, someone must come up with a word to describe it. It’s a very 2007 feeling.
YOUTUBESOLATION,n. Disappointment on finding a YouTube video has been removed.
I listen to some tracks by the USA band My Favorite before watching a movie on DVD called Another Gay Movie. It’s a John Waters-esque bad taste romantic comedy, putting a gay spin on those American Pie type films. Jokes about quiche in that same capacity. Has its moments, not least Scott Thompson of The Kids In The Hall playing a gay version of the Eugene Levy embarrassed-dad role. Graham Norton also appears as a Russian teacher lusted after by one of his pupils.
During the film, I hear a song I rather like playing in the background and look it up. Turns out to be The Happiest Days Of My Life by My Favorite:
This is diary is nothing if not a record of the way my brain works. Trivia, ephemera, connections, tangents, androgyny, twists, degrees of separation, coincidences, synchronicity and symmetry. Little thought-dances.
And here’s that Richard James song, assuming I can get these links to work.
