A sighting… (scraps)

A girl in patent leather shoes with a white fiberglass double-bass case strapped to her back like a rucksack walks along the street looking flushed.

Conflict Anthology

I’m delighted to say that Ian Whates, publisher of the Celebration anthology, has asked me to contribute to his forthcoming “Conflicts” anthology.

Whates says of Conflicts: “[It's to be a] strongly SF themed book… If things work out as planned, there will be a signed limited edition — 150 or so.”

Whates has already accepted stories from several well-known SF authors, with more contributing.

Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds announce new guitarist, festival dates

Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds announce the first of a string of summer festival appearances.

The band, featuring Ed Kuepper on guitar, will headline at German festivals Southside (Neuhausen Ob Eck) and Hurricane (Scheesel) in June, Scotland’s T in the Park on 10th July and Oxegen Festival in Ireland on 11th July.

Kuepper, formally of Australian bands The Saints and Laughing Clowns, completes the current Bad Seeds live line up of Warren Ellis, Martyn Casey, Thomas Wydler, Jim Sclavunos and Conway Savage.

Kuepper has been, and continues to be, a significant influence on contemporary Australian music. He formed the original version of the proto punk band The Saints in 1973 whilst in high school and when the original Saints split he formed what, in the eyes of many, was an even bolder enterprise, Laughing Clowns.

The Clowns broke up in 1984 and Kuepper launched a prolific solo career which has seen the release of more than 20 albums and several film and soundtrack projects. His latest studio recording was ‘Jean Lee and the Yellow Dog’ in 2007.

This full schedule of festival dates promises to include some of the best and most exciting festivals that Europe and the British Isles have to offer. These festival dates mark the band’s first European appearances since their sold-out London Troxy shows in November 2008. More details will be announced very soon.

Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds and Mute are set to release their first four albums in a series that will see the band’s entire album catalogue digitally re-mastered and remixed in 5.1 surround sound.

All 14 albums will be available as re-mastered CD and as a deluxe Collectors Edition starting with the release of From Her To Eternity, The Firstborn Is Dead, Kicking Against The Pricks and Your Funeral… My Trial on 30th March 2009.

It’s not new this Virgin Media thing…

This is from an old post dated 25/5/07. (They don’t know I’m the man who fought Tesco and WON! (with some help. OK – I did some helping…)).

You might be aware that Telewest [spit] has been taken over by Virgin Media. Well, the facade is now Virgin Media, but it’s all still Telewest underneath, and the service is just as useless. Absolutely useless. Complete and utterly useless. Am I making myself clear?

They promote the fact that there’s loads of films you can download at any time and such like. You can pause Uma Therman, etc, etc. But it just doesn’t work. Three times I’ve phoned them in the last month. The first time was when I tried to buy a film for the kids as a treat on the last day of the Easter holiday. I selected the movie, input my pin, it told me I’d paid, told me that the programme was about to start.

Then a notice appeared: this service is currently unavailable.

I dial 150.

Have you reset the box, the guy says. Yeah, I tell him, we have to do that most days. I can only apologise, he says. I’ll get a tech person to ring you back within the next five days. They won’t phone, I tell him. He assures me they will.

They don’t.

I phone again about two weeks later. Have you tried resetting the box? Yeah. It doesn’t work, I say. OK. I’ll have to pass you on to the tech guys. Music begins to play. 25 minutes later I hang up. I’m a pretty chilled out kind of guy most of the time, but I’m starting to get angry. Don’t make me angry. You wouldn’t like me when I’m angry…

A few days later I try ordering a film for my daughter to watch as she’s off school ill. I select the movie, input my pin, it tells me I’ve paid, and then that this programme is about to start. A familiar notice appears…

I phone again. This time I’m angry.

I rant so much, my voice a-tremble I’m so bleeding livid, that the Liverpudlian woman on the other end has to stop me. Have you tried resetting the box? she asks. YES! I’m sorry about this, she says, this happened to mine I know how frustrating it is (another platitude thay always spout – the fact that your problem happened to them is along the same lines in customer support-speak as “I’ve got one of these myself” in retail sales-speak)… Let me speak to the tech guys, she says, I’ll come back to you in two minues. OK, I tell her. I’m waiting two minutes and if you don’t come back I’m putting the bloody phone down. (See, I know how to scare ‘em.)

She does come back to me, and informs me that, basically, the on demand service doesn’t work, they know it doesn’t work, and they don’t know when it will work.

Utterly useless. And now I’ve got a ripped shirt to boot…

Skins dream

My wife and I are forced to move house.
We visit a shared property.
It is quiet when we get there and we are given a bedroom on the first floor.
We and the kids move in.
On our first night there the place is like the scene from the Skins trailer: people having sex in the kitchen, up against the cupboards, next to someone washing up.
Huge noise and loud music.
We can’t stay here. What about the kids? We can’t let them see these things/be exposed to this.
But we’ve paid £1025 in rent and have nowhere to go.