Mr. Mondo

Some of the techniques employed in the film are great, though that is not one of the parts that I like. The film has a great soundtrack, great ending and a good performance from Dawson’s James van der Beek, though in no way as good as Christian Bale in American Psycho. It is a film that is good, but does not hold up to repeated viewings. 3/5 (originally 4/5 on first viewing)

This is a very hard film for me to form an opinion about for a number of reasons. Firstly, I am from Cheshire and was a student in Manchester, so this film is part of the history of the area where I have lived and worked. I am a fan of ‘New Order’, ‘Electronic’, ‘The Other Two’ and ‘Monaco’, so it is part of the history of the bands of love, though I am also a fan of ‘Depeche Mode’, ‘U2’, Billy Mackenzie and ‘INXS’, which may or may not be an important factor as well in my review. As this is a ‘cinema’ thread and not the one in the ‘indie’ section, I think on this occasion I must try to detach my love of the music contained within from that of the narrative, and not base my opinions on the icon. Even though I was expecting great things from this film, I did not like this kind of ‘social realism’ at all. I found the film a chore to watch and was thankful when it was over. I was not entertained by the narrative even though this may have been the definitive story of all the events that had happened. I think it was because the film was directed by an iconic photographer, it was more like observing an art installation rather than the ‘gripping’ feature it should be or maybe it was simply because that 1960s style social realism is not something I would be normally bothered about. I do not know what everybody’s opinions are on films such as ‘Cathy Come Home’, but I know if ‘Control’ was showing on ‘Film4’ and I had switched on to it unaware at a non-musical point, I know I would have switched over to ‘Dave’ before the five minutes was up. Also, I did not care for some of the acting especially as the offstage portrayal of the band made them look more like rejects from Jarvis Cocker’s ‘Bad Cover’ video than ‘Joy Division’. I know the filmmakers would not want to go to heavily down the ‘looky-likey’ route, but I felt there was something missing from some of the characters that we know. However, whilst Bernard looked like he was ‘Dick Grayson’ waiting for ‘Batman’ and with a drummer picked up at random from ‘The Tasty Fish’, the film did have good portrayals of Curtis and Hook, though Wilson and Gretton were awful. Not only would the film have benefited by having Paddy Considine as Gretton here, but actually it would have been better having Steve Coogan’s ‘mock’ (turtle) Tony Wilson as well. At this point, with these characterisations, it was starting to feel like I was watching Lucas and Walliam’s ‘Rock Profile’ on an old black and white television, whilst ‘Crackerjack’ laughing from the younger members of the audience did not help matters. Even though there was a level of immaturity coming from the back rows, where rude words were concerned, it is good to see that the film attracted a large number of teenage viewers, though as Curtis is like Manchester’s Cobain and with Factory still a huge part of Manchester’s ‘mythology’, it is culture that students are very aware of here in this part of the country. Whilst I would not recommend this film to anyone, apart from those students who would want end up ‘chin-stroking’ with C.P. Lee on a late night ‘After Dark’ arts discussion programme, I would definitely recommend the soundtrack. I would also recommend the excellent ’24 Hour Party People’, not only because it is more relevant to the rock history I have lived through, but because I feel that is a better filmed account of that history, even though in most cases it is the exaggerated ‘legend’ that is being shown rather than the actual truth. ‘Control’ – 2/5 The Soundtrack - 5/5 ’24 Hour Party People’ – 5/5

I wonder if the opinion was truncated before anyone called Liam was criticised.

After that show they revamped the format to ‘French Fields’ and situated the action in ‘France’, though I cannot remember if they actually filmed in France or if it was like ‘Allo ‘Allo and used just a mock-up.

Oh yes, ‘Alf’, who was another great Sparkes character. I forgot that he did him as it was very similar to that other ‘old giffer character’ called ‘Alf’ that appeared in the ‘Fast Show’. I think the two have got merged in my memories along the way into one character.

I think this should be in the ‘indie’ section as that is what the NME is all about. I would expect the ‘indie’ section is still the place where all the 18 year old students go, that is if the music scene is still anything like it was in the mid 1990s and when I was in higher education.

I do not know the song, but they must be very popular in the Manchester area, as the record stores have stocked loads of their singles and on the first day they were all sold out by 5pm.

What do you mean by obscure? As a great deal of the indie 80s and 90s acts that I like would be obscure to 16 year old and most of the acts they would think as being ‘cool’ would mean nothing to me. I do not think I could tell a ‘Jing Jong’ from a ‘Ting Ting’ if they were played back to back to me, and even if they had been played every week on Sunday night ‘Pure’ I think I would still be none the wiser.

Adele – Hometown Glory Has anybody else heard this song, which is picking up loads of airplay on Stuart Maconie’s show on Radio 2 recently. It’s an excellent haunting piano led tune from a vocalist who sounds a bit like an 1980s indie Amy Winehouse.

TV12a: ‘After Dark’ Remembered as that show where people sit around a table talking, ‘After Dark’ returns to ‘More 4’ as part of Channel 4’s 25th birthday celebrations. The show was an open ended discussion programme featuring a number of intellectuals, which went on from some time after midnight, till whenever all the guests ran out of things to say. I always thought that this was always a bizarre schedule filler, it was shown in the days before all the Quiz TV channels, and something that would always crop up in “What’s On Tonight? Nothing but…’ type of conversations. I am wondering if there is anybody who tuned in on a regular basis and managed to actually stay until the end of the show.

TV12: John Sparkes, Gregor Fisher in ‘Naked Video’ and ‘Absolutely’ Did anybody else here enjoy the two ‘Celtic’ comedy shows that were called ‘Naked Video’ and ‘Absolutely’, the ones that amongst the largely Scottish casts featured the Welsh comedy genius John Sparkes. Living in ‘Granadaland’, I only get the ‘Radio Times’ that has all the ‘North and Yorkshire’ programming in it, so I am not going to say that he is a lost comedy genius, just in case he is a major star on ‘S4C’, though to me he is. John Sparkes first came to my attention in the mid 1980s, as a member of the BBC 2 comedy sketch show ‘Naked Video’. Like the ‘Mary Whitehouse Experience’ and the ‘Flight of the Conchords’, the show was originally a radio show, and because I did not listen to them at the time, I do not know if the cast was all Scottish at that point, or also featured contributions from John Sparkes. As well as John Sparkes, ‘Naked Video’ also featured Tony Roper, Gregor Fisher and Elaine C Smith, faces who you might remember from the iconic Scottish comedy series ‘Rab C. Nesbitt’. In fact, ‘Rab C. Nesbitt’ was first seen in sketch form on the show and, as with the sitcom, was shown in his grubby headband and vest, talking in his broad dialect, a dialect which some people needed subtitles for to understand. Also making his debut on the show was another sitcom star, ‘The Baldy Man’, though his ‘Mr Bean’ type of adventures proved more successful when spun off into advertising. Both ‘Rab’ and ‘the Baldy Man’ were played by Gregor Fisher, whose other main character on the show was an anchorman for a local broadcaster, a television station called ‘OHBC’. In fact, if this station had been given a licence by the IBA to make it a real Independent Television station, then it would have beaten ‘Channel’ to the title of Britain’s smallest station, as ‘OHBC’ stood for the ‘Outer Hebrides Broadcasting Corporation’. I cannot remember if they had their own version of ‘Puffin Pla(i)ce’, but in a way predicted the future when small community channels and Gaelic language channels would appear on people’s electronic programme guides. From a Scottish view to one of Wales; and one of my favourite characters of all time. ‘Siadwell’ was an anorak wearing Welsh poet, a ‘complete bard’ in fact, who would sit in his room and tell tales of the week gone by. If I remember correctly he had an honouree O-Level from a local university, was given one shoe for a present and had a Gran who was afraid of the floor, which was because “it’s not the fall that kills you, it’s the floor”. Unfortunately ‘Siadwell’ would not appear in all the series of ‘Naked Video’ because after a few series, Sparkes moved to another Scottish based comedy show, the one on ‘Channel 4’ that was called ‘Absolutely’. On ‘Absolutely’, Sparkes who play a number of recurring characters, though none were as brilliant as ‘Siadwell’, they were all great. Moving from the bedroom to the toilet, Frank Hovis was a ‘Northern Working Man’s club turn’ and gave his life’s perspectives from perched upon his lavatory seat. As you would have guessed from this set up, most of the humour for this section was ‘lavatorial’ in nature and very rude, though the actual observational style was not a million miles away from that of the ‘Welsh Bard’. Whilst Hovis was from the ‘backwards’ North of England, ‘Gwyneth & Denzel’ were Welsh. Here Sparkes played ‘Denzel’ and this character’s ‘Welsh-ness’ would be played up even more than with ‘Siadwell’. The sections would be filmed with subtitles so it looked like it was actually ‘S4C’ that you were watching, though the characters would be speaking ‘English’ and the subtitles would be in ‘Welsh’. These subtitles were not really ‘Welsh’ but an approximation of the Welsh language with lots of ‘fffff’s’ dropped in, whilst the characters would have trouble with their ‘woovres’ rather than having problems with their vacuum cleaners. This warping of the sound of local dialects, was also in affect in the sketches that were set in the small Scottish town of Stoneybridge, a town famous for its ‘Stoney’ stone bridge. Here the town council would try to promote the town in any which way they could, most famously producing a promotional ‘vi-do’ that would target French investors. This ‘vi-do’, or as I would be corrected by the council ‘vid-day-oh’, focused on a lot of the wonderful things that the town had to offer, such as their ‘stoneybridge’, a bridge that was made of stone. I would have liked ‘Stonebridge’ to have been spun off into a proper sitcom as it would have been like a Scottish ‘Royston Vasey’. On the other hand, the characters of ‘Mr Don and Mr George’ were briefly seen in their own sitcom before Jack Docherty became Channel 5’s ‘Letterman’ clone. I never really liked ‘Mr Don and Mr George’ in the show, preferring characters like the incredibly boring Callum Gilhooley and his ‘Honda Bike’ obsession instead.

I read it was upbeat 60s ‘R&B’ rather than ‘lover’s soul’.

I cannot comment as I am not a ‘muso’ myself and only have the songs to go off.

They were much better as ‘Kaja’ with Nick Beggs as vocalist. As for the question, I do not think I have anything to put here as there are no artists that I hate, there may be a number of records that I am not keen on but I do not have to listen to them, I can skip the track. On the other hand if ‘Girls Aloud’ release a brilliant record, my loyalties might be tested, but as they are a pop band it is more likely that Cheryl Cole and the two ‘Kim Wilde’ types will release solo singles first, and so I will not have to decide.

Why is that?

His new album is actually alright and a return to form. I gave up on Prince’s records sometime in the mid 1990s as he seemed to churn out a lot of substandard stuff with no quality control. The ‘New Power Generation’ were in no way comparable to ‘the Revolution’ and it seemed that he was more interested in portraying himself as the ‘Slave’, than making great music. I cannot say if he is the greatest performer as I have never seen him live, and so the honour would have to fall to someone like Siouxsie or Jarvis.

26. ‘Simply Red’ This morning in the oxymoron that is the ‘Manchester Evening News’, it was reported that ‘Simply Red’ are to split up after 25 years together. Due to the fact that Mick Hucknall wants to take his career in a new ‘retro R&B’ direction, it’s the end of the road for the band. However, I was slightly surprised that ‘Simply Red’ could actually split up, as I was under the impression that ‘Simply Red’ was, for the last 15 years or so, essentially Mick Hucknall with a number of additional musicians that could be hired and fired when he wanted them to be. I did not think there was an actual band mentally, where moneys would be split equally between each members and whereby each would be as important as the rest. In fact, I thought that the last time ‘Simply Red’ had been a proper group was in the pre-‘Olive’ days when Tim Kellett was a member. I was under the impression that ‘Simply Red’ had become like ‘Aztec Camera’ and ‘Black’, with Hucknall only trading under a band name. Even so, as this may look like I am going to launch into a critique of Mick Hucknall’s works, may I just add that I think he is great. He is one of the best ‘blue eyed soul’ singers that Britain has ever produced and one which I would rate on the same high level as those other British ‘Soul & Funk’ singers such as George Michael and Jay Kay. Even though ‘Picture Box’ is a great album and probably the ‘Simply Red’ album that everybody here will say is the greatest, I actually like ‘Men & Women’ better, especially for ‘Infidelity’ and the late night 80s ‘cool jazz’ tones of ‘Maybe Someday’.

Were all these shows from the 1970s? I do not remember watching any of those when I was a child in the 1980s, but have seen many reviewed in magazines and on ‘Cult TV’ retrospectives.

Sorry, but what is ‘mho’?

‘The Almighty’? The heavy metal/hard rock group that was signed to Chrysalis Records in the 1990s? Surely it is not them? If so, have they done a ‘Darkness’ type of remix?

Even though I have not read those magazines in a long time, those magazines are weekly and I do not know about you, but I always find weekly magazines hard to keep track of, as one week seems to go very these days. I like to read the monthly publications such as ‘The Word’, ‘Uncut’ and ‘Q Magazine’, the later being a magazine of which I have all the back issues from 1986 stored at home.

‘Eurythmics’ – Savage “I was dreaming like a Texan girl. A girl who thinks she's got the right to everything...” Re: Videos that should be re-issued onto DVD. With the press reporting on Sarah’s new Yootha Joyce haircut, I also was reminded of the ‘video album’ that was recorded by ‘the Eurythmics’ for their 1987 album called ‘Savage’, and especially the video for that amazing record called ‘Beethoven (I Love To Listen To…)’. I remember when I first saw that record as an exclusive at the beginning of the Chart Show, all those years ago, because the record was quite a shock coming after all the ‘soul-infused-rock’ on their previous couple of albums. Instead of records that were very in tune to the ‘American Radio’ sound of the day, here was a sparse electro thud with a vocal, part spoken part intoned by Annie Lennox. At first, the video was another bizarre moment as Annie Lennox played a Yootha Joyce style of housewife, who was just cleaning her house and slowly going mad. By the end of the video she has given up on her chores, abandoned that ‘Yootha’ housewife look and has emerged as a ‘glamourpuss’ in peroxide blonde wig. Unlike early 1980s video albums by ‘Soft Cell’ and ‘Blondie’, ‘Savage’ remains unavailable on DVD, which is a shame as I think it is their best album and one which is improved by the visuals on the VHS tape.

ITV Sitcoms of the ‘70s’ and ‘80s’ (with Leonard Rossiter, Yootha Joyce and Richard O Sullivan) (TELEVISION MEMORIES 11) Last night I was catching up on the remainder of all the weekend newspapers, when I noticed that one of the ‘redtop’ tabloid newspapers had mocked ‘Stockport Sarah’ from ‘Girls Aloud’ for having a new haircut that made her look like 1970s sitcom star Yootha Joyce. Now, whereas I would expect that more people would be interested in talking about all the ‘Alternative Comedy’ from the 1980s and all the surreal comedy from the late 1960s, I think that there might be somebody who is also interested in shows such as ‘Man About The House’ or ‘George & Mildred’. Even if there are few fans of the output, I guess there will be numerous people who grew up with all these types of ITV sitcoms of the 1970s and early 1980s to get a varied opinion on all the different shows. Excepting the ever wonderful ‘Rising Damp’, ITV situation comedy has always had a bad reputation, especially when viewed against the ‘comedy powerhouse’ that was the BBC. It is true to say that a lot of these shows have not ‘stood the test of time’. The shows are very dated, but then again so is every situation comedy from the past, that was filmed in a studio setting with fixed cameras whilst an audience laughed along (or should I say when ‘canned laugher’ was added). Back when I was younger I used to watch and enjoy a great deal of the comedy shows that ITV put out, whether they were shows in prime-time such as ‘Duty Free’ and ‘Keep It In The Family’ or ones that featured post-watershed material, such as ‘Hot Metal’ (a Sunday night show featuring Richard Wilson, that was similar in concept to ‘Drop The Dead Donkey’) or ‘The New Statesman’. Some shows were utter rubbish, but were made enjoyable by the talent involved in the production. For example, ‘Tripper’s Day’ is usually voted as one of the worst sitcoms ever made, but at the time, the show was made bearable by the presence of Leonard Rossiter, a brilliant actor who had built up a lot of ‘good will’ in the audience from appearing in shows like ‘Reggie Perrin’ and ‘Rising Damp’. Unfortunately, not so long after the first series, Rossiter died and a second series was unbelievably put into production as ‘Slinger’s Day’ with Bruce Forsyth taking over Rossiter’s role. Whilst Forsyth is a brilliant entertainer and quiz show host with his ‘Generation Game’ and ‘Play Your Cards Right’, as a fill-in for an extremely gifted and skilled comedy actor such as Rossiter he was just doomed to fail and so no further series were made.

I cannot say as the ‘Alternative Comedy Revolution’ has ‘damned’ the show from being ever repeated.

Disregarding any ‘Rock ‘N’ Roll’ records there may have been I would have actually said this record as well. Ray is very influential and a genius too. Did you all get the ‘Sunday Times’ yesterday for his new album, I did and I think it is a very good CD.