Love Song

'Sovegna vos a temps de ma dolor.

Poi s'ascose nel foco che gli affina.'



Last night exhausted,

Weak and battered as a cod in chip shop sauce,

I listened to the haunting songs we love of course.

Sublime amongst the music and the realization . . . that ghosts,

laid out, shall never rest;

Thankfully I'm a masochist.


To wreckless arms that held the violin,

To manners lost amongst the microphone,

To Sapphic arms left long ago amongst the throng,

I no longer belong . . .


We took the yellow smoke between our lips and rolled,

The motley crowd inside is lulled.

The lamb's lane winding crooked by, (is dulled).

I'm unfulfilled.


A restless one night cheap hotel,

Becomes . . . the warmest, kindest hell.


'Via Dolorosa'

We held it in our hands,
At the old kind devil's hall,
And sensibly we passed it on.
I carried hazel on my back,
Painting shadows in th' cellar black.
You were given fruit and I refused to eat.

The yellow smoke, the crooked talking cat,
The silver platter, the gentle hatter,
With an iron crown of nails . . . a trick that looked too comfortable.

In her room she comes and goes,
Now thinking . . . Oberammergau.


Sweet circle dare I eat this fruit?

Shall I seek the mirror and the eyes that see me best?

Shall I dare to talk of it?

Do I know its name?

These secrets known . . . can I ever tell?

The simple fact of revelation,

Leading to a private devastation, (meaning subject to evaporation)

Would tear down the walls to this private plantation

Where I am enslaved by a simple, never ending reflection.

Thresholds

Imprisoned in my cell awaiting bail in Montparnasse (I lost my patience with a clochard and poked him soundly with my stick, thrashing the snakes that sounded from within his slack & pickled skin), I think on the door to freedom.

Why do we fear to cross the threshold to the new and taste the other? Why do we drag ourselves like zombies through the secular cathedrals of the great god SPEND with our skin itching, throat aching and time ticking on to the flicker of unnatural light.

Never entertain a faceless house that’s first purpose is to take your money. Never queue to seek an audience with a machine.

We’re held in narrow cells confined and weary awaiting judgement.

Cross the thresholds of the secret places, pass through one new door each day, break the apathetic fear that manifests in the blunt and lazy whimper of tomorrow.

There is no past, there is no future, there is only NOW and the end is always nigh. (Repeat)

Therapeutic Blasphemy

 ‎"I never liked David Hockney; Delius bores me ridged and J.B. Priestley was a Fraud" 


This is the unholy Blasphemy of the Bradford Black Mass. Cross yourself thrice and sing ‘On Ilkla Moor Baht 'at’ backwards whilst burning an effigy of Christa Ackroyd (if you don't have the real thing to hand) and in exchange for your soul you will be given as much copper as you can carry in a flat cap. It’s not an amazing deal but that’s Bradford for you; times being what they are.

Alternatively if you’re a hard up arts entrepreneur you could try your hand at the D.I.Y. arts scene. It’s very fashionable right now. In this age of austerity it’s almost as cool as being uncool.  It’s all a part of Cameron’s Big Society. We’ll be digging for victory in the allotments before long for the hipsters are on the run ‘cause up is down and down is up. Let’s live off the poor by a vampirical process of osmosis. Let’s eat the poor, let’s desiccate the people; we’ll sell them their own culture repackaged and seasoned with a bastardisation of their original ideologies. I’m getting hard just thinking about it.

I have prepared a call to arms: “What the Fuck is DIY Culture?”

Do it yourself; let no one else tell you how to. Do it yourself; get up from your bed and walk you lazy bunch of bastards. Do it yourself and expect it will be stolen by those who lack imagination.  Do it yourself and don’t be afraid; it doesn’t require grace, money or intelligence.

Our children produce better work than most that’s framed in the great white halls ‘cause they did it themselves and their struggle resonates within their work.

I’m not saying don’t stand on giants shoulders but climb up there with your own two hands; do it yourself and don’t expect the group to like it, do it yourself; take risks, be dangerous and exciting.

Don’t think I mean don’t work with others though I’m sick to death of manipulated tired recycled projects disguised as collaborations. Do it yourself and others will always join you.

Do it yourself; it’s not left or right but its always political, always religious, local and personal. Do it yourself; don’t limp along seeking ‘the doctor’s’ advice when you know in your heart how to manifest from your imagination; it’s as easy as breathing just stop thinking and start doing.

Do it yourself; don’t wait at the door they made for you or try to seek admittance to a world that could not know you. Do it yourself and turn none away. Dance, paint, act, channel, play, frame, write, record, spend, save, destroy, create, whack off naked on a segway...  whichever way; however your heart, your head, your hands or stomach guide you; do it your god damn self.

This month I mostly recommend sloe gin. 

It’s a mean old scene.

Listen up ya shower of Bastards:  Bradford’s Brilliant.

So I poisoned my household this morning. I mistook daffodil bulbs for onions. No permanent liver damage but some convulsions and vomiting due to alkaloid poisoning.  No deaths.  Being the only carnivore in a house of radicalised vegetarians I find that accidents like this, which can happen all too frequently,  keep me chugging along from day to day.

It’s at this point I normally make myself scarce and get myself down to the Sparrow for a pint or a whisky or both. The Sparrow bar is perfect for a gentle recovery with its unfinished floors and understated chic as it quietly kicks the shit out of every other Belgian Beer Bar worth mentioning.  Ask the Barkeep to wear the crooked hat...  he will know what you mean.

The poster wall near the entrance is possibly the best alternative tourist information point you are likely to find. Good designs in Bradford too... I’m particularly fond of the No-hands posters; last Friday of every month at the Polish on Edmund St. (the eternal rolling after party) and the “Wilful Missing,” Album Launch poster which I’m sure will be an excellent party on the 3^rd at the New Beehive Inn.

Last time I was in the Polish Club we arrived for the after party in a drunken parade with the Horn Dog Brass Band in tow. We were on our way back from the Inflagrante Festival brandishing burning torches looking very much like we were going to crucify Frankenstein. We’d narrowly avoided being stopped by the police (They seemed to accept our lie that this was a council sponsored lynching party) and so we gathered outside chanting: “Were burning down the polish club!” to the frightened faces of alternative youths pressed up against the steamy windows. The`gig was heaving with The Abbots aptly chosen Bands such as the amazingly talented Guitar Orchestra. Later we shook to the dark forces of the 20 piece Drum Machine Ensemble sourced by Miss Musgrave. The uncrowned princes of Bradford with their crew of misfit DJ’s were also cranking it up and up and up and up. Thankfully a friend spiked my drink soon after. I remember leading the whole crew off to the after-after party across town in the cellar of the Beehive before it got really messy. The No-hands scene has played host to the “Ways of Looking” international photography festival after party and two turner prize winners.

Galleries are not boring places, they are dens of holy iniquity with a good makeover. You get to see behind the scenes if you can find the after parties. They have a crusty cliquey surface with a jammy centre of unconditional love underneath. Turn up to the previews; just watch out for the swingers.

I’m dragging burning coffee down my gullet and forcing some kind of kick start into my head as I write this... whisky.  The gent sitting across from me doesn’t appreciate me reading aloud as I type. God damn bastard won’t see me coming next time.  

They wouldn’t laugh at my stories of failed micro genocide in 1 in 12. God damn hippy vegans deserve all they get... not that I’m singling out Vegans, I mean some of my best friends are Vegans, and I definitely would piss on them if they were on fire but Jesus they are so fucking right on n’ holier than thou with their born again atheism and anarchic  anti politic.  

They have a wicked club and do the best punk alternative scene I have ever come across. An internationally famous stage at the 1 in 12 down Albion Street; PJ Harvey was turned down because she enjoys a bit of blood sports.  Me too; I’ve been thinking of new types of Alternative Urban blood sports recently... like grey squirrel baiting... could do it with a very small cage and a lot of pissed off squirrels. I hear of plans to release a lorry load of cats into Centenary Square. About 5000 captured street cats, some rock salt and a sawn off shot gun should do it. This Christmas I want to achieve my dream and get a sled pulled by ferrets, about 30 angry ferrets, and go hunting for small yappy type pets.  Like a deranged Santa Claus dressed with the frozen carcases of Yorkshire terriers to hand out to naughty children at the Christmas Market.

Yeah 1 in 12, do great music, great food on a Saturday and have the cheapest bar this side of the eighties; they even do Buckfast on Tap. To help me deal with this scene I have created a cocktail I call the fucked-fast that demands 4 shots of cheap whiskey, 150 ml of Buckfast and Tabasco sauce to taste.

Why does the best art grow on the edge of a shithole?

For god sake follow this link.

Artistic urban permaculture:  New cultural movements and scenes grow like mould. The bread makers see it as poison and disinfect it with their bleach and scrub it with their by-proxy obsessive top down structures. I prefer to see these cultures as medicines or at least a fine drug. They inoculate and recycle the worn out structures of humanity purging in an alchemic process that turns the dross to nectar. New cultural movements raise our expectations showing us visions that allow us to take flight. Be careful though, if you get too high you’ll jump off a building, you’ll burn your wings or turn into an orange and peel yourself. Fuck that: we were born to die and I celebrate that big burn right here right now. Glow bright and fly high cause when a million years shall come to pass what does it matter if we live long or die young? 

Here’s the clincher... if we didn’t try to manage our creatives or hem them in or silo them or try to define them then I firmly believe they would self regulate. Definitions and measurements are empirical. We do the same to the arts as we do to our farming. Eradicate variety, find strong breeds with high yields and promote those to the exclusion of all else. I’m fed up of waxing granny smiths tits; it strictures our cultural evolution.

Dick.

Bourgeois is Beautiful

Man-Hua Chu translated the song: " Who is this man here beside me? Who sings exactly the same words as me? Even if his mouth is not quite the same It opens and closes its just same as I love the smell of his clothes I like his hair and his accent if our eyes met I kiss now and we will love forever Who is this man here beside me? Who sings exactly the same words as me? And if I ever breathed the tempo Is this human being would do it in sync? It would be really too good Who is this human being that breathes with me? Six billion people who breathe by my side. "

I’m obsessing repetitively with my favourite cliché ridden paintings attempting to culturally fumigate them of crass associations.

I’m trying to erase the damnable link that turgid classical muzak has with a raw energetic work of art.

Take for example: “The boating party” by Renior; because It has been dulled and muddied by musical chintz it’s now as irksome as a pack of dogs playing poker in a pub.  

Art resonates and advertisers know this so they’ve beaten it to death with over reproduction; like a poor bitch bred to death.  Damn you, damn you all to hell.

Another example: I take a photo at a party in the Sparrow and with just a smidgen of imagination I can find resemblances and perceive that Renoir has captured an eternal truth; a cliquey wine ridden group of lushes and riddled thinkers having it large on a Saturday afternoon.  

I recommend playing some Saul Williams full blast in your headphones whilst walking through any gallery where the paintings are supposed to be high art. The notion of high art interrupts my ability to commune with the work. Art is the rope between the gutter and the stars; if you lose one or t’other of the ends you’ll burn like Iccarus or wallow in the mire.

The insistent beat smashes any painting into contemporary associations.  However, not even the addition of a soft porn soundtrack can bring me to a sticky Hieros Gamos with the painting-by-numbers-jigsaw on display in Cartwright hall... which I do recommend you view; some chap called David Hockney’s to blame.

Are we (W)hole?

We suffer from an increasing lack of incorporation into our environment; from the TV sets in the student union that blast out cheap pop music on contract before the Omar Souleyman gig to the big unrepresentative dystopian screen in Centenary square; like the green, green city centre park we all howl out for and instead are fed a massive, ugly polluting hole. We must take the city back with our own visions before it is too late. William Blake would be with me on this one for sure.

A local witch told me that Squeaky clean shoulder pads are poncing around the city like post modern vampires. Did you know that a container full of money is coming into this city? It’s going to attract a lot of vermin. Everyone’s going to have an opinion about Bradford in the lobbies and national papers.  Like flies round shit they will descend. So if you have something to say get it said this year. Red riding approaches.  Unfortunately it is my opinion that most of this money will be handed out in council tax rebates in a desperate attempt to appease precisely those businesses that disenfranchise us in the first instance and keep city centre retail rates too high; we shall see. This stymies the micro capitalist or any other type of regeneration; it destroys our city; it is the rich stealing from the poor.

I’m off to finish my bottle of whisky.