About book curation

Facebook has once again demonstrated the abject wrongness of its advertising algorithms by suggesting that I might like to avail myself of the services of a book curator, someone who I am expected to pay to acquire and arrange reading material on my behalf. (Unless of course the placing of the ad on my feed was purchased by someone who just wanted to irritate me, in which case, nice work, Facebook, job done.)

This outrage did however prompt me into a half-arsed renovation of my shelves, rearranging a few into some semblance of logic and even filling a couple of boxes for the charity shop run. Inevitably this process was derailed by a desire to read every other book that passed through my hands, but that’s perfectly OK because it gives me something to blog about. Ha, take that, Marie bloody Kondo.

First, yet another cracking one-liner that would have fitted nicely into my dissertation: this time it’s EM Forster, from a speech he made at Harvard in 1947, about people whose aesthetic preferences remain just that, unassailed by critical faculties:

‘Oh I do like Bach,’ cries one appreciator, and the other cries, ‘Do you? I don’t. I like Chopin.’ Exit in opposing directions chanting Bach and Chopin respectively, and hearing less the composers than their own voices.

And then an old favourite, Roald Dahl’s The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar. One image that’s stuck with me since I first read it at the age of 10 or so is the redeemed Sugar hurling all his casino winnings from his Mayfair balcony to the people on the pavement below; and I wake up to the news that a man in Chongqing has done the same thing (although he was off his face on methamphetamine at the time).

Lou Reed, the Daily Mail and Paul Gambaccini

I was going to write something about Lou Reed and about how I discovered the second Velvet Underground album when I was about 15 and how it changed, well, pretty much everything, even though I never started a band. But then I read somewhere something that Lou himself had once said: “To me, ‘RIP’ is the microwave dinner of posthumous honours.” And there was enough RIP-ing going on already; damn, even Miley Cyrus had something to say, tweeting between the twerking. And then I was going to write something concerning the odious Daily Mail article about Lou, fingering through his entrails before his corpse was cold, tutting and sneering over his various debaucheries, much as that squalid rag did for the blameless Stephen Gately. But as I wrote it I began to feel the bile rising in my throat and the veins throbbing in my head and quickly realised that the whole repulsive article was a massive trollfest and for once I wasn’t going to be lured. Better to remember the real reason we’re mourning him wallow in the delicious playlist that Everett True compiled in the old grump’s honour.

But I’ll leave the final word to Paul Gambaccini. I have nothing in particular against Mr Gambaccini; he once gave me some chocolate and a Nancy Wilson album for being able to name five famous Belgians and several years later, in absentia, prompted a heated public argument between me and another journalist over 12 cans of Guinness and a publishing contract, but that’s a couple of stories for another day. No, I just think that his tweeted response to Lou’s death (to which I was alerted by Ern Malley) says, in its own strange way, something about media – social and otherwise – and celebrity and journalism and all sorts of matters. Take it away, Gambo:

I was at two private gatherings late Sunday. I don't take phones to such occasions. Thus I missed sad Lou Reed news & the chance to comment.
— Paul Gambaccini (@PaulGambaccini) October 28, 2013

PS: And then there’s this, from Metro, via The Poke and Gavin Martin:

PPS: And Suzanne Moore is very good on why Lady Gaga is a poor substitute for Mr Reed, among other things.

Amnesty Interactive

Amnesty International in New Zealand has come up with a neat idea. If you go to this site, your Facebook history is scanned and you find out which of your activities will mean you fall foul of the authorities in specific countries, and how many times you might risk imprisonment, torture or even execution. Of course, their app is simply searching for specific words, so it’s potentially as clunky as Facebook’s own attempts to determine what sort of person you might be from what you post, and thus which advertisers might have an interest in you.

For example, because I had expressed a fondness for the popular beat combo XTC, the Amnesty bot decided that I take drugs. XTC = ecstasy, geddit? Also in the likes list was gospel music, as a result of which I am assumed to be a Christian. Now neither of these is the case, which at first implies a certain flaw in the whole thing. But then you realise what it really means; if a state decides that being a Christian is against the law, you don’t actually need to be a Christian to fall foul of that law. In just needs an authority figure to infer that you’re a Christian, perhaps from your CD collection. Oppression is just as bad when it’s incompetent, arbitrary and misinformed as it is when it’s ruthlessly efficient.

And if you’re interested, by Amnesty’s calculation, for my online sins I’d be beaten 55 times, tortured 52 times, imprisoned 47 times and shot dead just the once.

If those evil robots win

Thesis: Singapore. The no-spitting, no-chewing, no-jaywalking, no-blowjobbing, always-flushing, politely authoritarian economic powerhouse of South-East Asia, where an ounce of cannabis can bring an appointment with the hangman.

Antithesis: The Flaming Lips. A popular beat combo from Oklahoma. I suspect they may have jaywalked occasionally.



So the Lips play the Lion City, in the congruously incongruous setting of a vast complex that incorporates a shopping mall and casino. The band is consigned to the basement, because the best rooms are occupied by a BMW sales conference. But there’s a good turnout, representing the ethnic diversity of this strange island-city-state-concept: scowling Chinese goths with cleaver-sharp cheekbones; Indian indie kids who all look to a greater or lesser extent like Graham Coxon; sweaty ang moh, straight from the office, still in their stripy shirts. But for all their countercultural trappings, they’re good kids really. The tidy, doubled-back queue that forms for the mandatory bag check is entirely spontaneous, as is the one inside at the bar. Between the two is a small sign warning of “some profanity”. How considerate.

In support, we have the Raveonettes, all the way from Denmark. Now, I have no idea whether any of them have so much as looked at a controlled substance, but they are a drug band in the sense that they look how you might expect a band to look if it took certain drugs (see Randy Newman’s analysis of ‘A Horse With No Name’ as being about a kid who thinks he’s taken acid). They sometimes sound like the Shangri-Las stuck in a Chilean mineshaft with Ron Asheton’s guitar collection, but not often enough to make it all worthwhile. They’re a Velvets tribute band who’ve been reduced to Nico and three Doug Yules.



But then the Lips appear, and it’s like Dorothy opening the door to Oz, not least because the Danes’ black-and-peroxide look is bodyslammed aside by riotous colour, from the freakish back projections to the orange-clad dancers, go-go-ing Oompa Loompas on day release from Guantánamo. Not to mention, of course, the streamers and the confetti and the balloons and the balloons filled with confetti, just yearning to be popped. This sort of thing is startling enough in the context of Glastonbury or Lollapalooza: this time, you’re constantly reminding yourself that the Yves St Laurent shop is holding a polite champagne-and-nibbles do three or four storeys above.

And at the heart of it all is Mr Wayne Coyne, whether he’s rolling over the heads of the audience in a giant plastic ball or channelling Kenny Everett with his giant, laser-shooting hands. He plays percussion and bugle and loud-hailer and a succession of increasingly damaged guitars, but his real instrument is the audience, which he plays like a clitoral theremin. Yes, the songs are strong, ‘She Don’t Use Jelly’ and ‘Yoshimi’ and ‘Yeah Yeah Yeah’ morphing into glorious, gleeful football chants, but that’s not really the point, is it? This isn’t so much a gig, it’s more like one of those energetic, content-free musical theatre shows – Stomp, Blue Man, that sort of thing – sprinkled with the influence of crushed-up, naughty sweeties. To enter Coyneworld is to occupy a parallel time stream, one in which Syd Barrett got a bit – but not completely – better, and ended up as the drummer for Earth, Wind and Fire.

Coyne and his Lips offer something that Singapore lacks. Not drugs. Not really happiness; the locals are to a great extent happy, queuing, flushing, eating fish-head curry, making money. But something bigger, more ambitious, more challenging, more scary, wilder. They offer JOY, dancing-on-the-ceiling, knickers-on-the-head joy.



I’m not really sure whether Singapore yet knows what hit it.

(All pics by Small Boo.)

Marmalade skies

News of the death of Albert Hofmann, inventor of LSD, reaches us just as a giant inflatable pig is reported missing above the California desert. Coincidence? I think not.

Yes/No/Maybe

I'm a big fan of Amy Winehouse. She's hugely talented and genuinely interesting, which automatically raises her above about 96% of her pop contemporaries. But if, as it appears, she's undergoing treatment for overindulgence in extra-strong fizzy pop and/or special sweeties, do you reckon she now regrets recording a song that would be such a gift to lazy tabloid sub-editors? I mean, it's not as if George Michael wrote a song called "They tried to get me to flash my willy at a policeman in a public convenience in Los Angeles but I said no, no, no", is it?

Heat of the moment

I've never really been into drugs. I dabbled in hash and speed when I was younger, but only if it was in the vicinity. I drink, but hardly to excess. The closest I've ever come to addiction was my caffeine habit, and I've pretty much broken that now.

Yesterday, however, I discovered a new, natural, legal high. Unlike banana skins, it works, and unlike morning glory seeds, it doesn't give you bizarre flashbacks for months afterwards. All you need to do is to walk around Bangkok in the middle of the day, at the height of the hot season, well away from any air-conditioning or shelter. After a few hours, everything starts to ache and you feel as if you're running in treacle. The fortunate thing is that this stage (the equivalent of the comedown or the hangover) comes first. The following day is spent in a spaced-out trance, where everything is three steps sideways from reality and the most peculiar songs leap undbidden from the depths of your memory.

And best of all, if the Thai authorities stop you at the airport with half a kilo of heatstroke up your bottom, they can't do anything. Although they may ask to share it.

It ain't over till the fat lady turns into a talking goldfish

According to a survey carried out by the University of Leicester, 12% of opera lovers have taken magic mushrooms.


Opera being one of the few musical forms that's never really sparked my motor (with all due deference to my darling departed grandma, for whom Placido Domingo was second only to David Gower in the geriatric crush stakes), I have to wonder if four hours of Wagner might go a little faster if one is enjoying a Huxley moment. Also, considering the picture above, I reckon the figures for performers may be considerably higher.

Also plucked from the cultural snowdrift in recent days: Rock's Backpages, that inavaluable resource for lazy music journalists everywhere, hits its fifth anniversary and 10,000th article; Charlie Brooker destroys Justin Timberlake ("testes the size of capers" indeed); Conservative Party activists freelance as art critics; a woman with even less talent than breast tissue is voted the greatest ever Hollywood starlet; and finally we get to see what Girl With A One-Track Mind looks like. She seems to be the sort of nice, middle-class Jewish girl my other grandma might have wanted me to settle down with; but, more to the point, is Sharon Osbourne turning into the mum from The Brady Bunch, or what?

And finally, I need your advice. Some of you may recall that I've joined LibraryThing, the online book catalogue site; indeed, a number appear to have followed suit. Well, I have a dilemma. For my birthday, Small Boo gave the Pocket Penguins 70th anniversary box set, which comprises 70 little books. Now, should I enter all 70; or just put in one entry, for the box?

Your thoughts on the matter, or any matter, except bloody opera, are welcome.

Feeling the pinch

Apparently, smoking bans have provoked an increase in sales of snuff.

Personally, I'm all in favour of this. I remember attempting to kick off a snuff craze when I was at college, offering gobbets of cinnamon-scented powder in the same way that others would pass around their untipped Camels. It was foppish and affected of course, but when the alternative was stealing traffic cones, I'm happy to plead guilty. In any case, I was conclusively outfopped by a dissolute law undergraduate named Harry Dickinson (also perpetrator of the best Anthony Blanche impression I've ever heard) who managed to procure some white peppermint snuff. One lunchtime, he proceeded to snort several lines off it off the tables of the student union bar, with the aid of a £20 note. In those days, even at Exeter, it was regarded as more suspicious if a student was in possession of a twenty...

Specialist subject, the bleeding obvious (slight return)

Doctors at St George's Hospital in south London (where else?) have revealed that a patient took 40,000 ecstasy tablets over nine years. That's about 12 a day. And that doesn't include the cannabis. Or the previous use of acid. And amphetamines, and cocaine. And solvents. Did I mention the heroin? That too.

"The Mini-Mental State Exam revealed disorientation to time, poor concentration, and short-term memory difficulties," they observe, sagely, in George Clooney voices.

That's all well and good (except for him, of course), but what we really want to know is: does he still dance when the microwave beeps?

Update, 8 April: Sam Leith in the Telegraph points out that an equivalent dosage of espressos might have a similar effect, or worse.