Brennig Jones (and friends)

Folk music has always been a vehicle used to convey messages of protest, of discontent.

Artists like Joni Mitchell, Phil Ochs, and Judy Collins popularised the protest song and brought it to a 1960s audience who were both hungry for a new art form and discontent with their lot.

Twenty five years later NWA were the first group to bring rap to a wider audience as a means of carrying a different type of message of dissatisfaction with their mean, meaty and very crude Straight Outta Compton.

Almost another twenty years later and Eminem elevated rap higher when he introduced a new type of street poetry that highlighted his anger with and aspects of world-wide hypocrisy with his third album The Eminem Show.

Yesterday, six years after I first heard The Eminem Show, I heard another voice – though the band Disposable Heroes Of Hiphoprisy – vocalise its intense dislike of the modern world with the anger-ridden, media-focussed anthem Television The Drug Of The Nation.

Adam Curry asked in a Daily Source Code podcast where today’s protest songs were.

I think they’re here Adam. In rap.

Here’s the lyrics to Television The Drug Of The Nation – to get the full wrath you need to listen to the track – but you’ll get a good impression of the quality of DHOH’s artistry and articulation of anger from these words.

Disposable Heroes Of Hiphoprisy – Television The Drug Of The Nation

One nation under God has turned into
one nation under the influence of one drug

Television the drug of the Nation
Breeding ignorance and feeding radiation

TV,
It satellite links our United States of Unconsciousness,
Apathetic therapeutic and extremely addictive.
The methadone metronome pumping out 150 channels 24 hours a day,
you can flip through all of them and still there’s nothing worth watching.

TV,
is the reason why less than 10 per cent of our Nation reads books daily,
Why most people think Central America means Kansas,
Socialism means unAmerican
and Apartheid is a new headache remedy.

Absorbed in its world it’s so hard to find us.
It shapes our mind the most, maybe the mother of our Nation
should remind us that we’re sitting too close to…

Television, the drug of the Nation
Breeding ignorance and feeding radiation

T.V. is the stomping ground for political candidates
Where bears in the woods are chased by Grecian Formula’d bald eagles.
T.V. is mechanized politics,
remote control over the masses,
co-sponsored by environmentally safe gases (watch for the PBS special).

It’s the perpetuation of the two party system,
where image takes precedence over wisdom,
Where sound bite politics are served to the fastfood culture,
Where straight teeth in your mouth
are more important than the words that come out of it.

Race baiting is the way to get selected
Willie Horton or
Will he not get elected on…

Television, the drug of the Nation
Breeding ignorance and feeding radiation

T.V., is it the reflector or the director?
Does it imitate us or do we imitate it – because a child
watches 1500 murders before he’s twelve years old
and we wonder why we’ve created a Jason generation that learns to laugh
rather than to abhor the horror?

T.V. is the place where armchair generals and quarterbacks
can experience first hand the excitement of warfare
as the theme song is sung in the background.

Sugar sweet sitcoms that leave us with a bad actor taste while
pop stars metamorphosize into soda pop stars.
You saw the video, you heard the soundtrack?
Well now go buy the soft drink.

Well, the only cola that I support
would be a union C.O.L.A.(Cost Of Living Allowance)
On television.

Television, the drug of the Nation
Breeding ignorance and feeding radiation

Back again, “New and improved”.
We return to our irregularly programmed schedule
hidden cleverly between heavy breasted
beer and car commercials
CNN ESPN ABC TNT but mostly B.S.

Where oxymoronic language like
“virtually spotless”, “fresh frozen”
“light yet filling” and “military intelligence”
have become standard.

T.V. is the place where phrases are redefined
like “recession” to “necessary downturn”
“Crude oil on a beach” to “mousse”
“Civilian death” to “collateral damages” and
being killed by your own Army is now called “friendly fire”.

T.V. is the place where the pursuit of happiness has become the pursuit of trivia,
Where toothpaste and cars have become sex objects,
Where imagination is sucked out of children by a cathode ray nipple.
T.V. is the only wet nurse that would create a cripple

Television, the drug of the Nation
Breeding ignorance and feeding radiation

B.

We woke up early, fell asleep, woke up later and I delivered tea in bed and decided (with little resistance) that we should take advantage of the blue sky, lack of clouds and falling-from-above water and head for Worcester.

Getting bathroomed and dressed first, obv.

The multi-storey in the centre of the city looked almost deserted by normal weekend standards, the same couldn’t be said for the centre – it wasn’t packed but there were more than enough folk around for this simple country bumpkin.

We headed smartly for Café Rouge – they change from breakfast to lunch menu at 12.00, a deadline that we made, but only just!

Sipping hot chocolate whilst waiting for my Crepe Champignon (they do the best ever!) we gazed at the folk.

There was one guy in there with a huge bushy beard that resembled an out-of-control privet hedge. When he lowered his coffee cup we could see that his drink left a line of froth on his draggly moustache. Way unattractive, dude! But here’s a thing. He’d know about it right? I mean, a bushy draggly beard/moustache combo like that, it didn’t just occur overnight would it? So have a little personal hygiene dude. We don’t want to see your food and/or liquid remains. Thanks.

The Lovely S told me off for giving a noisy child the Vulcan Death Glare and I felt admonished. But only very slightly.

We chatted about nothing much and after a while I dived in to the complimentary copy of The Independent on Sunday.

I’m ashamed to admit that we were in, ordered, eaten, paid and out again in less than 40 minutes – it seems indecently hasty in retrospect.

Then we shopped.

Aren’t Christmas Vouchers the best thing ever?

Today I scored in HMV Abbey Road (The Beatles), Soup (best of Housemartins and Beautiful South) and S scored White Chalk (PJ Harvey). While we were there we also scored an interesting piece of information about a band called Vampire Weekend who have an album coming out tomorrow. HMV were playing the album (as well as some real dross) and it sounded really interesting. Stuff for the future maybe? Watch, listen, wait and see.

Over the road in M&S I acquired a belt. No, not around the ears. The kind that loops through your trousers…

Although we did have a bit of a moment while we were queuing to pay for said item. The Lovely S pointed out that M&S had a Spiderman costume for sale. I asked if I should buy it. Then, I said, I could put it on this evening and jump in through the bedroom door – while she was in bed, natch – in my lovely new Spiderman costume.

The woman in front of us thought this was amusing and asked for photographs. We should have taken her contact details because then I could tell her… it isn’t happening. Not tonight. Not ever.

Then to Costa for more hot chocolate, reading and people watching.

In a way I’m a little disappointed with Worcester today. Not Chavless exactly, but they weren’t in full flood as they usually are.

Then back home for a change (me) then to the yard for big-orange-thing-sitting-on (aka taking Vin for a hack, while The Lovely S drove on in to Detroitwich to do wonderful things with books.

Vin was Full of Beans, A Right Handful and A Barrel of Laughs. The use of caps is to highlight just how manic and stupid he was. We were trotting around one field when he did a massive starfish/spook and telegraphed to me “What the fuck is that?”.

“It’s a tree Vin.”

“Really? Oh, OK. If you say so.”

He really is a complete dickhead sometimes.

Back at the yard the rest of the horses were coming in for the evening. Trish and I had a long chat about competitions, competition centres, trainers and stuff; it’s useful to have her perspective, I value her experience and her views.

Then The Lovely S arrived and we headed for home (via McD’s where a pair of apple pies and sundaes came in to our possession).

The contraband eaten, an episode of 24 watched and the new albums iPodded, we sit here feeling as though we might need a snack but not a meal while the sounds of new music fill the lounge only just covering Milly the Basset Hound Next Door’s almost continual howling.

It has been a running away Sunday. I should have been digging deep into OU stuff but frankly it’s been such a non-stop fortnight in my world that I needed the time off. And I feel as though my batteries have had a recharge.

It’s another 05.15 alarm tomorrow, the cycle starts all over again.

Except for next weekend. That will be different.

B.

Hey!

It’s 11.00 on a beautiful sunny Sunday morning and on impulse we’re going out for breakfast.

Anyone want to join us?

B.

I have spent what seems like every waking moment for a week turning each single aspect of this offer and every decision possibility over in my head.

And I’ve been talking about the concept with many people. And have sent 18 (responded-to) emails to the people in the US. And had four telephone calls to the east- and west-coast. And researched the strike. And had four email conversations with the WGA (west) and one with WGA (east).

It’s now 03.30 and my brain won’t let my body sleep until I tell the studio and Jay Leno’s people my decision (because this offer has plainly been on my mind even while I’ve been sleeping – random dreams about sitting in a pool with a typewriter while my deceased grandmother, she lived in north Hollywood, paddled in the shallow end with Julia Roberts just aren’t my normal nocturnal fayre!).

So I’ve let them know and it was hard to decline – especially after the flattering things they’ve said over the week about my humour – but ‘no’ is my decision.

Why?

Because I want to play the long game, not the short one.

External labour that breaks a strike in the US finds, generally speaking, that it becomes almost impossible to get employment in that line of work once the strike is over and the dust has settled. This, folks, is a fact of life. There are many tales of people in this position having to move from west to east coast (or vice versa), having to change their media and having to write under an assumed name to make a living.

I know this wouldn’t necessarily be the way forward for me, but I don’t want my writing career in the US to begin and end as a one-hit wonder working as an uncredited writer on a team of ten.

I have more ambition than just being a stop-gap one-off writer for a TV show in the US market, it’s that simple. One of my SciFi shorts has been widely published over there, I know it’s a different medium and a different genre but the publisher’s feedback tells me it was very well received.

In this instance the US production company (and apparently Leno himself) has raved about my ‘zany intellectual English (yeah, really!) humour’ and one production exec in particular (Hi Greg!) said the most trouser-hardening things about my readability and how easily it could translate to visual media.

So it’s been a tough temptation to mull over, but my ambitions for the long game have beaten the (potentially) short game offer in to second place.

Even now I’m sitting here wondering if I’ve done the right thing.

Actually…

Actually I’m not sure that I have done the right thing – to turn one firm offer down in favour of another offer not even on the table? Bonkers. But what can I say apart from ‘I have ambitions’.

Well obviously I have (writing) ambitions, otherwise I wouldn’t have started down this road in the first place, got a bunch of shorts published around the world, got other shorts in pre-production, got the first novel out and wouldn’t now be working on my second!

Der!

So it’s thanks. But no thanks.

I want more.

I have an idea – actually, I have a couple of ideas – that with some time, planning, help from some willing volunteers (that could be you!) and a little effort – I’m going to roll out.

I hope the first will get my ‘product’ (I really hate that word in this context, but it’s as accurate as any other) out to a wider, new media audience. I’ve given this project a significant amount of brain-time, I’ve drafted a loose set of presentational rules and I’ve begun working on content.

The second will naturally follow behind the first, if the first takes off.

The bottom line is…

I’m going to concentrate on my writing, begin acting on a plan to roll out the new project and invest what time and effort I can in improving certain levels of my writing and getting it out to a wider audience.

I may well spend the rest of my life regretting the Leno decision but I can’t substantiate the probable short-term effect as being an acceptable risk to my possible writing future.

So there you are, it’s official. I am an arse.

But I’m an ambitious one.

B.

WTF?

The next James Bond film will be called what?

Quantum of Shoelace (or something similar)?

I can see the US market loving the title.

Not.

B.

I love new things in all their forms.

I love changes that I can get hooked on – I love the ‘being hooked’ but I also love the freshness that a new thing brings with it; it’s a little like meeting a new person and walking away afterwards thinking ‘I really liked them!’.

So many things (books, horses, music) haven’t been new for such a long time that I can’t remember the excitement of discovering them.

But I can remember the excitement of rediscovering them after a long lay-off (when I competition sailed, when I returned to the UK from a period of living abroad where one of these things – usually horses – were denied me).

In more modern times I remember discovering the iPod (and therefore, in a way, rediscovering aspects of music), digital photography, texting (sad, I know) and the rampant excitement that unlimited storage space that external USB drives bring.

But now there’s a new newness, a new excitement.

Of course, it’s all Colin’s fault.

He has introduced me to the Podcast.

The Lovely S downloads her Podcast favourites regularly (Russell Brand, Scott Mills etc), but I’ve not been taken by any – Mark Radcliffe and Stuart Maconie (despite having the world’s most entertaining four nights a week show on Radio 2 – no hyperbole here folks!) don’t have a Podcast for some inexplicable reason only known to the BBC.

And then Colin asked ‘Have you heard of this guy? He’s a bit in your face but…’.

Needless to say I hadn’t heard.

So I went home that evening and looked.

And found.

And downloaded.

And listened.

And…

Hook, line and sinker.

I’m keeping the precise details under wraps for now because the germ of an idea is beginning to percolate (look, I know germs don’t exactly percolate but humour me) around the inside of my head.

But it’s safe to say that my morning and evening commutes will be shared between my OU media and my iPod media.

Oh yes.

And Colin… Thanks. I appreciate it.

B.

What would you do if an American TV company asked you to work on a script for them during the US scriptwriters strike?

A script for an edition of a well-known talk show which will be broadcast after the Oscars have been announced on 24th February?

B.

Five months of my six month contract gone.

So last week I put my CV out and yesterday (dude, it’s Saturday afternoon!) a phone call.

Do you speak any languages? I’ve got a really juicy two-year Finance system implementation and you tick all the right boxes.

I’ve done many large-scale system implementations, one of which was a replacement finance application.

I bite back the giggly temptation to say I speak Welsh and English – well, he did as if I speak any languages.

Spanish, I say. And bad German.

Shame, he says. This contract is based in Paris and we need a Dutch/French speaker.

I tell him I can say ‘I love you’ in Dutch and French.

Oh, how he laughs.

Then says he’ll call if he gets anything suitable for me.

B.

Prompted by Ginny’s post on search terms, I thought I’d give you just a few phrases that people have used to find my blog since 18.00 today. I can’t go any further back because sitemeter only retains the 100 most recent visits.

how does rousseau argue that obedience to the genral will increase our moral liberty
Ah, an Open University question – the A103 course, TMA05. Is it just me or does anyone else find it peculiar that someone would google a precise assignment question? Except, of course, this student has mis-spelt the word ‘general’!

the lictors returning to brutus the bodies of his sons tma05
And another one!

txts funny
Hmmm… perhaps it’s time to do another one of those, my phone is getting full.

usb killed person
Fuck me, really?

brennig
Hey, that’s me! Hello there!

ant dec takeaway mud
I quite like Ant and Dec’s Saturday Night Takeway. Not sure where the mud comes from though.

top of building
Erm…

whats it like working for easy jet?
It’s really great! And you get to wear orange which is just the coolest colour ever!

the gherkin
Ah yes, the gherkin… (cackles, evil laughter).

1. how does rousseau argue that obedience to the general will increases our moral liberty?
Wow, straight out of the A103 book of questions – with the ’1.’ to indicate the first of two parts. Are you looking for the answer or assistance (of the kind ‘I wish someone else would do this assignment for me’ variety)?

anal sex
Should I say something here?

dogging sites in worcestershire
ROFL!

he was fcuking my wife
He was? Fcuking her? With his ccok?

lyrics brand new cheesy song
Ummm… There’s about nine different sets of lyrics (I think). You could always try getting up at 06.30 and taping it?

how to design a showjumping course
Well, you get a load of poles and wings and things…

hairy minge
Not in this house there isn’t.

not waving drowning clifford t ward
A brilliant track from his groundbreaking Home Thoughts from Abroad album; Worcestershire’s finest – and one of England’s best – singer songwriters. Ever.

blog wank train daring
Ummm…

B.

Ah, Worcestershire life!

This morning I had breakfast in bed.

Woo-hoo!

The Lovely S woke me with a mug of tea and a bowl of porridge. I don’t want you to think I’m pampered. Because I am.

Fed, showered, shaved, dressed and smelling sweetly clean we went shopping in Bromsgrove.

The tally was:

A new sidelight bulb for my car
A five litre container of battery water for the lorry
A heavy duty battery charger (see lorry above)
Various food-related things

Flushed with the success of shopping we went to Costa where we did those things that The Lovely S and I do very well.

She drank coffee, I drank hot chocolate, we read newspapers and we people watched.

Bromsgrove is a great place for people and chav watching, it’s not the capital of chavdom – which is Worcester.

But we discovered a new subcategory today:

Wannabe chavs.  These are very young schoolgirls who dress as if they’re chavs, but everyone can tell from their young-girly-but-not-chavlike behaviour that really, deep down beneath their badly applied tarty makeup they’re respectable girls.

Which makes me want to ask why such girls would to dress like wannabe chavs, but I guess that’s an unanswerable question, here and now.

Much watching and reading time later a visit to Blockbuster beckoned. Evan Almighty was duly selected. A trip to Greggs for lunch and then home to eat.

About 15.00 I changed in to riding clothes and drove to the yard.

To be met by Christine who asked if she could borrow my power pack because her lorry wouldn’t start.

We coupled it up and tried again; bloody thing still wouldn’t turn over. I offered her the use of my newly-acquired heavy duty battery charger which we connected and turned on, then Christine rang Gary the lorry mechanic that we both use and I went to groom and tack up.

Vin took one look at the slice of apple in my hand and whickered just like Beech used to. Bless!

We jumped today; flushed with success from some gridwork last night, I thought Vinnie would be ready for a little undemanding jumping.

The minute I mounted in the arena the heavens opened and it pissed down.  I thought ‘oh well, we’re here now’ and carried on.

Perhaps – with hindsight – that wasn’t the greatest piece of thinking I’ve done this week. Or month.

After working in (flatwork) and establishing all three paces and doing a little work on transitions we cantered in to the first fence – a small crosspole.

I should preface all further comments with this piece of information…

Jumping Vin scares me. He’s a big, fit, strong and powerfully fast horse. And he was bred to race and trained for racing for two years. He jumps fast and although he and I have a brilliant partnership on the flat (we’ve been placed in our last four dressage competitions), our jumping partnership has barely been established. 

Anyway, on with the day.

The first fence was a simple crosspole, we cantered in to it at a steady, balanced pace and…

He put in a dirty stop on the take-off stride, we skidded forward and he knocked it over.

Christine rebuilt the fence, we came in again, met it on a perfect jumping stride and pace and sailed over. Jumped it three more times.

However at the more challenging staggered upright we came in just a little too quick, landed much faster and with each of the next three strides, got much, much quicker with every footfall.

We were at the end of the arena, I steered him around the corner, even though we were much too fast.

Vin put in a little buck as we were motorbiking around the corner and with me so far out of position and still trying to get speed under control he unseated me. And I hit the deck.

Slightly winded with a bruised leg I climbed back onboard.

He was totally hyper, I could feel how flashed out his head was.

We flatworked to re-establish some kind of rapport then came at the fence again – this time I was prepared for him to tank off on landing.

I took a firmer contact than I would normally like and rode him up to the bridle.

We circuited and jumped that fence five times, gaining more control, balance and rhythm each time.

Then we called it a day.

I was soaked through, Vin felt very pleased with himself and my leg felt less sore.

Back home I stood inside the front door and peeled each sodden layer of clothing off then naked, dashed up to the shower.

The Lovely S had tea ready. Then Evan Almighty was watched.

What a day.

And now I’m sitting here wondering what the weather’s going to be doing tomorrow. If it’s good I’m going to jump him again.

Feeling brave, obviously.

B.