I know it’s old, but I love this story (courtesy, of course, of StumbleUpon).
The guy has his own blog if you want to know what he’s been up to since…
I know it’s old, but I love this story (courtesy, of course, of StumbleUpon).
The guy has his own blog if you want to know what he’s been up to since…
Anyone who watched Big Brother with a hint of guilt will remember the magic moment when one of the contestants revealed that he had never heard of shakespeare.
Now, he has a recording deal to read the works of Shakespeare for Borders. Supposedly it’s to encourage people who have never heard of Shakespeare either to discover high-brow literature.
Whatever about that, the simple fact that the the guy won Big Brother outright on the basis of being “adorably dumb” stinks of what I can only call Jade-ism. Why is stupidity and ignorance (in the literal sense before I get complaints) suddenly something to be admired? Why is that something that should be held up as an example to young people? It’s the kind of logic that leads to the smart kids being bullied because being smart isn’t cool… I know Big Brother shouldn’t be thought of as a creator of role-models, but the sad fact is that that’s what is happening.
Scary.
Daithí has already blogged about the shortlist, and having preempted the post-writing with a nice heated discussion with me it’s safe to say he covered all the important points.
Except one, which is as follows: The Reluctant Fundamentalist Must Win.
I say that having just finished it, and having also read fellow shortlistEEd (can we make that a word?) On Chesil Beach and The Gathering. I’ll have to read the other three to be sure, but if I’m wrong I’ll be sure to correct myself!
The Gathering starts well, in that I didn’t have the usual sense of dread that I get when trawling through the story of a miserable Irish childhood that inevitably becomes a parody of itself. I have to be careful here not to give away too much of the story, but towards the end the book gets a bit too formulaic. In fact I don’t think it would be ruining the book at all if I gave away the whole thing, because anyone who has read the blurb on the back cover could probably guess it, and unfortunately would be right. It’s well written, but god why couldn’t it have had more to it?
On Chesil Beach is very good, but possibly suffers from but-wait-its-McEwan-he-can-do-better-ISM.
The premise of a nervous couple on their wedding night is a good one, but the last ten pages (and bear in mind this is a novella so that’s a relatively big chunk) feel too much like he chickened out at the last minute. Maybe it was getting too complex, maybe the simplicity would have been lost in any full exploration of what came next, but in the absence of anything more than what McEwan leaves us with in those pages, it’s hard to be satisfied by it.
The Reluctant Fundamentalist benefits from being both different and relevant. It tells the story of a young man who leaves his home in Pakistan to make a life for himself in America, only to see it fall apart in the aftermath of 9/11. I like almost everything about it, and would urge you to go and find out why for yourself.
Now I know my views are heavily tainted by the fact that I’ve only read half the list, but still - The Reluctant Fundamentalist MUST win!!
One problem with a four day weekend. Coming back to work after the kids get back to school, and realising your usual bus now takes an extra 30 minutes (bear in mind the original journey took 25).
Halfway through this journey, at around the point where I should have been ordering my morning coffee before strolling into the office a solid quarter hour early, I looked up from my book to assess the situation. Literally nowhere near my destination. Stuck in a stream of cars. Three buses that I can see. And cars, forever, in every direction. Cars with pretty much the same number of people in each. One driver. One kid (in full, fresh, clean uniform). One large empty space.
Nobody on my bus was feeling calm at this point. So why should I??
The spanish students who have been quite frankly clogging up the dublin bus system for the last four or five months have now been replaced with the native variety. Which is mostly fine, or at least understandable. A disturbing number of them seem to think farting on each other is a source of entertainment, and an increasing number of the 12 year old girls have joined the legions of “working women” who put their makeup on on public transport, but otherwise this is all okay.
The thing is, we put up with the bus packed with frequently ignorant school children, because that is the bus we must get so we can get to work on time. So why should we have to put up with them interfering with that basic, necessary punctuality too? In particular, why should we have to get up half an hour earlier every morning for the next 10 months so that every (ever-so-ironically-titled) Yummy Mummy can make sure their Little Johnny arrives to school sufficiently wrapped in cotton wool to ensure no meaningful social interaction for the first three decades of his life??
Empty cars clog up the roads, clog up the air, and cause many an ulcer to poor sods stuck on the road behind them in a smelly stuffed-up bus. Car-pooling is now actively encouraged by most major companies. Why not cradle-pooling?
Here’s my idea (and come on, give it a chance, could it really be worse than the status quo?):
Now, I know that may sound a little extreme, but it’s not as bad as it sounds, and it’s completely justifiable. Not to mention, can we take a moment to acknowledge that we’ve done quite enough damage to the environment and extreme action is at this stage a definitive requirement?
So, here’s how it works:
Obviously this is a simplistic take on how it would work in practice. Similar to speeding fines, the fine would be less if you don’t challenge it in court etc.
As I said, this may seem extreme, but nothing like this would work if it wasn’t exactly that extreme. Slaps on wrists don’t work - especially in this country.
The plastic bag levy and the smoking ban are continuously held up as two of the best pieces of legislation in the history of the state - because they are innovative, and they make a real difference.
Surely that shouldn’t be the end of innovation. Surely it can’t be.
Tomorrow, when you are, like me, stuck behind a steady stream of empty cars ferrying pampered princesses from door to door (god forbid they get a bit of fresh air, or, GASP, some exercise!), give it a think. Extreme needn’t always be a bad thing.
So. It’s over…
But, while it lasted - dagnammit, it was great.
Electric Picnic has a habit of living up to my expectations, which I’m sure sounds like a good thing, but the morning after (the morning after) Picnic when you have to go back to work and you can no longer spend the day emailing around rumours of new acts added to the lineup, it’s a bit less fun.
Only a bit though.
We got there before 11am on Friday. Somehow we managed to hit the road just in time to completely avoid any traffic. No, really - there was none. Waited a while to meet a few people then headed to set up camp. The new tent (with obligatory standing-room) was perfect. Loads of room (even for a party when the rain set in on Sunday) and tall enough to stand in. Lovely stuff, truly.
Tents were pitched by lunchtime, a few drinks were had, and we set forth to explore the main festival site. It’s strange returning to a festival the following year and realising you recognise the place, for some reason it’s a bit eerie. Like if you went to the same apartment block in Ibiza two years in a row - but cleaner, and less trashy, and a few other things…
We checked out the Bacardi B-Live tent first, which had improved in some ways (the roof came in handy when the rain started) but also some things that I personally wish hadn’t been changed (Mojitos need crushed ice, not giant ice cubes!!). The Ukelele Orchestra kicked things off on the main stage, which was a bit different but I liked it. Then headed to the end of the Scott Matthews set before returning to the main stage for Hot Chip. They were good, and they woke people up a bit which was needed. Time to settle in for the night and remember we’re at a festival!!
I’ve heard a lot of criticism of the Manics for their latest album, but personally I liked seeing them live - admittedly that might be because it was the first time I’d seen them, and songs like A Design for Life deserve to be heard live at least once. Bjork, I maintain, was worth seeing, though it was the kind of set I just couldn’t get sucked into, so left after a few songs. GB&Q were… top-hatted!? I hadn’t heard them before so didn’t really know what to expect, but I liked it.
Tried to get in to Modest Mouse but there was no chance of it - and this wasn’t the last time the tents were wrongly allocated, but I’ll get back to that. LCD Soundsystem closed the first day and they were nothing short of brilliant.
Saturday morning began with crepes - and they were great. Missed the company, which I didn’t mean to do, but caught the second half of Marlena Shaw’s set and she was great, perfect for the little bit of sun that broke through the clouds at that stage. Then there was the Complete Works of Shkspr Abrgd (or something) - which was fantastic, but unfortunately ran over time (way, way over time).. so we missed… god I can’t say this… we missed the !!! gig…
Yeah. Missed the “Gig of the Weekend”, for something that was being repeated the next day anyway. Nice one.
Wandered around Easystar Allstars, and MIA (both great), before heading to hear Fionn Regan. Unfortunately, despite being maybe 15 people from the front, we couldn’t actually hear Fionn Regan. At all. Sound Engineer number 1 gets the sack.
The Magic Numbers were lovely stuff, as of course were the Polyphonic Spree with a bit of Ladytron in between and a little Erasure after (not a patch on cheezy favourites Pet Shop Boys last year!). Couldn’t get near Beastie Boys, and completely forgot Duke Special was on, so ended up heading over to see the Camembert Quartet for a pre-Chemicals cynicFest - but they weren’t there! Jinx Lennon had taken their place, much to our collective dismay, so we ended up vegitating randomly for an hour in the Body and Soul area. That place is highly addictive, and you could easily spend the whole weekend there and completely forget that anything else was going on outside.
The Chemical Brothers lifted us out of our collective exhausted stupour, and they were incredible. Not surprising really. But incredible.
Putting the Dublin Gospel Choir on stage at midday on the Sunday was pure inspiration. Possibly literally. Waking up to gospel being sung from afar, in the rain, was priceless.
For some reason ended up spending more of Sunday away from the music than the other days. Went for brekkie in the Body and Soul area, and ended up catching Lisa Hannigan’s set which was great.
Hearing Soul II Soul from a distance was a little surreal - and we yet again missed the Beastie Boys having confined ourselves to our tents for the rain delays. Rilo Kiley was worth the trek though, and Clap Your Hands Say Yeah! would have been. If we could hear them. Sound engineer 2 gets fired.
Missed UNKLE but could hear Sonic Youth from the Pieminister queue (which was a bit long, but always worth it) and they did good. Kila drew a huge crowd, and again were in the wrong tent for it, but the Go! Team were delayed by a solid 20 minutes because of sound problems so a little too much time was spent standing waiting for something to happen. What’s that you say? Sound engineer 3? Pink Slip??
So. Conclusions. The General Kind, with no more references to more than three musical acts in one sentence.
Aiken are wonderful. Aiken should print campaign t-shirts with witty slogans (like Mud Causes Despair) and sell them at their gigs. I would buy one of those t-shirts.
I know I was very clear about my post-Oxegen (or, p’Oxegen if you will) rage, but Aiken really did do the simple things right. Within reason (by which I mean, ‘given that you are at a festival not a four star hotel’), they did things right. There was a main pathway in the campsite made of metal (as opposed to mud). The toilets were more than okay every time I went near them. There were bins everywhere - literally everywhere - and even a ploy to get people to bring their rubbish to a central collection point. There were re-usable cups to eliminate waste from the plastic kind. It’s almost like someone who is specifically paid to spend 12 months planning every little detail really did sit down and plan every little detail.
The food was great, and not badly priced. For example, the new addition of Real Gourmet Burger had pretty much the same prices as they have in their normal restaurant in Dun Laoghaire. The added bonus bits? Were just great craic. The security guys were everywhere - checking wristbands every 2 minutes - which, particularly after oxegen, was reassuring rather than irritating. The weather wasn’t ideal, but it was fine, and even when the rain set in on the Sunday it didn’t seem to bother anyone much. More of a “sure it’s a festival, let’s deal with it” attitude rather than “deadly now the rugby tackle I’ve been perfecting will be all the more effective on that random stranger” one.
That was the one thing that struck me, particularly in the Body & Soul area on the Saturday night. We were sitting in a large crowd, with open fires all over the place, a few feet away, and people were dancing, or relaxing, or whatever. The embodiment of Live and Let Live.
Compare this to the Other festival. What the hell would the Oxegen crowd do with open flames??
The crowd at picnic are different, and I accept wholeheartedly that Aiken have an easier time of it in that respect, but the simple fact is that people at Oxegen go stir-crazy because nothing and nobody is stopping them. It’s about time MCD took responsibility for that.
Woe is me that we have to wait another 12 months for the next picnic. But at least now I know I wasn’t imagining how great it was this time last year?
