For anyone wondering why Blog Royale has dissapeared...it hasn't.

It simply moved away as its content became more and more irrelevant to the band...and in fact everything.

It is now found here:

http://www.blood-royale.blogspot.com/

We will now use this myspace blog to update Ox news as and when it comes in.

All the love.

OELM.

I know I haven't been keeping up with this blog as well as I should, but I promise it's because I'm in the midst of working on some stuff that's been taking up pretty much 23 hours of every day. And I've been dividing that final hour between deliberately not watching 'The Wire' just to be different, and preparing a wreath for Jeff Goldblum's memorial service. When what needs to be done is done, well...things will be different.

In the meantime accept my apology below... It's something that my close friend Heardism just informed me of, a collaboration I never knew existed, nor had ever imagined, between Salvador Dali and Walt Disney. I think its beautiful and I wanted to share it with you. And I promise I'll return soon with something as informative as ever.



1ove

So it appears I was wrong.

It IS in fact possible to book three of S Club's original seven members in some sort of low budget student union retromemberance of days gone by. Although, according to their website, you are only applicable to do so if you happen to OWN a club yourself, and it's NOT your birthday.

But surely that's not too much to ask, when this is what you're letting yourself in for...



A: One of the surviving members of 2007's celebrity-racist Big Brother triumvirate, and erstwhile lead singer Jo O'Meara: Now a failed solo star and (failed?) mother in her own right, I can imagine having only more in common with her as time goes by.



2: Bradley Mcintosh...odd considering I thought his solo career was really taking off. If his myspace is to be believed (myspace.com/smokeweedwithmeincoventgarden) then he's not only a singer but also a songwriter...with the recent additions of 'rapper' AND 'producer'. His real talent however, is still being able to look 16, even though he's approaching his mid 30s.



D: The final piece of the puzzle is Paul Cattermole, whose part in the project leaves me genuinely upset. Lest we forget, S Club lost their '7' when he quit back in '02 to return to his welsh numetal band 'Skua'. Although he cited his hatred of commercial music as his key reason for leaving, after two unsigned attempts at real music (see also 'Charlie Bullit' circa '05) he finds himself right back where he started, only minus four companions to share the mic...and the pain.
N.B.: 'In 2003 he moonlighted on drums with a newly reformed Shed 7.'
WTF?



For booking information - get in contact with Lorna who should pass on your offer to their agent Matt. You can do this on the 'contact' page of sclub3.com

"Do NOT use this Form for Fan mail to S Club 3, as it will not be passed on!"

Yes, I'm sure THAT'S the reason S Club 3 aren't getting any fanmail.



Reach.

Last week, a friend of mine made himself quite clear: "Twitter ruined your blog."



He's right of course; cutting up a whole blog post into individual sentences and randomly splattering them every couple of hours or days is a sure fire way to make one's online presence both less interesting AND less amusing...but I'll make it up to you. Or at least I'll try.
How about three blogs in one week?

Let's start in the early hours of Monday 11th May 2009, with a short vignette that I have chosen to entitle:

'My Lowest Ebb'

Foreword: I am not, nor have I ever been, a thief. I never shoplifted. I never gave into teenage peer pressure. I never ran out of Pizza Hut without paying. Nothing. Ever. Never.

End of foreword.

I don't know what time it was exactly, but I remember the sun had started to rise, and we were sat in a service station about two hours out of London, waiting for the RAC pick up truck to turn up, say wassup, pick us up. Fuck.

Why do service stations make Harrods look like poundland? They price themselves in the most arrogant way possible, knowing that the customers have no choice but to pay whatever they ask, because there's literally no alternative.

For anyone who's never felt the road side party vibe before, let me give you a little taste of the menu that seems to remain the same regardless of chain...

Vegetarian Breakfast - £6.99
Traditional Breakfast - £7.99
Full English Breakfast - £9.99

And we are NOT talking quality merchandise here...we are talking, straight out of a can, through a warm tube onto a cold moist plate. Gruel and tripe painted the colour of breakfast. Hunger's favourite colour.

I hadn't eaten in a while. I had five pound coins on me, purloined from an Elvis themed slot machine about seven hours earlier.
Now I knew £5 wasn't going to stretch very far. But I suddenly had this overwhelming sense of rebellion wash over me...like if I didn't beat the system, no one would.

Probably reminiscent of how Keanu Reeves feels in the Matrix...or more likely how Robin Williams feels in Bi-Centennial man. When he finally gains the capacity to feel about a hundred minutes in.

By default, I ordered what I could afford:

Hot Chocolate £2.49
Cinnamon Danish £1.99

"Take a bag for the danish, it's self service", the till assistant informed me.

And on that bombshell she turned around to cobble together the hot chocolate, leaving me in a bright white deserted cafeteria, facing a wall of pastries...
As I looked down at the stale low grade snacks, I realised that I had to think fast.
Here I was, with a pair of metal tongs in one hand, and a paper bag in the other.
Whilst the only member of staff on duty had their back towards me.

Now I know how gravediggers feel when they're left alone with corpses smothered in jewellery.

Temptation.

I reached for the first danish, bagged it up, and after a pause that felt like a lifetime, I reached for a second.

The job was done. Two for the price of one. And I was ready to run. But had I won?

Regret.

She turned around and I suddenly felt like I'd shot a child with a rifle at point blank range.
I was sweating dishonour, and I could swear she smelt it on me.

Humiliation.

Now I don't know if she'd caught my reflection in the shiny surface of the coffee machine, or had heard one too many rustlings, but as she stared into my swindling eyes, I knew I'd been rumbled.

Judgement.

"How many cinnamon danishes was it you said you wanted?", she asked.

"Just the one", I lied, keeping the paper bag well below the counter.

"Just the one?" - I could feel my moral totem beginning to collapse...

"Just the one." I verified. All around me, I could hear lie detectors screaming with laughter.

Silence.

My pathetic life began to flash before my eyes.

"Do you mind if I have a look in the bag?" she asked.

Game, set, and match. I was sure Martin Kemp and the SAS would be arriving any minute.

This was the real money shot. Nowhere to run. Nowhere to hide. I lifted the bag that now seemed to hold the weight of a million stolen pastries, peeling it open to reveal the miserable loot.

"Sorry" I lied, "I must have picked up two by mistake."

"By mistake...I see...So how many is it you're buying?", she replied...showing that she was clearly a lot more used to this shit than I was. I looked around and realised that she hadn't called the manager or the police, or even sprayed Mace in my eyes.

"Erm, yeah it was just the one. Yup, one"

As I tonged out the illegal second danish (I put back the larger of the two in some sort of insignificant act of penitence), she asked for my £4.48 and that was it. I handed over my fiver and walked shamefully out towards the car. The fact that she hadn't even got angry made it all the worse. I just had to live with myself, my attempted robbery, and my lowest ebb.

As my twitter informs me, I have recently been amused by a number of things:

'Let the Right One In'
(left the cinema in tears)

'Crack the Skye'
(now I'm lost in oblivion)

'Damned United + Frost/ Nixon'
(good to see Michael Sheen rising through the ranks of British acting talent)

'Primary Colours'
(is this only good because I've never really listened to My Bloody Valentine?)

Overall, I think I've probably bored you all to death of late with inconsistent ratings out of five (or is it ten) that I cant help but give every film I see and every album I hear. I would do well to remember that my opinion is simply a drop of Ribena in the ocean...it won't make it taste any better. I'm so sorry.

So why blog?

Is blogging solely just writing about the things one is 'in to'? And if so, for whose amusement?
Instead, shall I tell you about some of the interesting things I've done? I mean I've watched The Apprentice, eaten some rice at Wagamama's, wondered why nobody made any good musicals in the 90s...oh no I said INTERESTING things. Shit, then no, I can't really help you out.

I was sitting next to a girl on an aeroplane (hah this stupid mac text edit programme tells me I should spell that 'airplane') the other week on my way back to the homeland, and I immediately, albeit with very hollow reasoning, took a disliking to her. Of course we'd never met before, and our conversation consisted of me passing her some headphones and her muttering thanks.
So why did I start throwing stones around glass houses? Let's look at the facts/

First of all, she was wearing flip flops and track suit trousers...clearly one of those people who likes to 'get comfortable 'before a plane journey. Hmmmm, reading that back: pretty weak first reason.

Secondly, I swear I noticed her chuckle to herself when I chose to watch High School Musical 3 (why were no big musicals made in the 90s? Disney films don't count...I'm talking ludicrously high budget, poorly written but somehow wonderful extravaganzas) whilst she opted for the far more intellectual 'Yes Man' (I hear it jostles against 'Fun With Dick & Jane' as Carrey's real low point).

Thirdly, she asked for the vegetarian pasta, ate half and rejected her pudding - not offereing it to me. Obviously I was too scared to ask so just watched it lie dormant for a while.

Finally though, and most importantly (I only went back and decided the first three actions really got on my goat as a result of this) when the flight attendant asked us what drink we'd like, she said "could I please have an apple and cranberry juice?".

...








...








...








What the fuck?

Apple and cranberry juice? Are you serious? I don't even have a shop in a mile radius of my house that sells apple and cranberry juice, so why would they be serving it on a fucking plane? Unless the airlines have been bulk ordering it, thus making it immensely rare...Obviously the woman serving drinks just stared at her in shock. And so did I.

Moral: Don't make first class demands when you can clearly only afford recession class.

Everybody knows the drill: Beer, Wine, Coke, Orange Juice, Sprite if you're lucky, and AJ (can I say that?) if you're very lucky. This is good to learn, because it doesn't just apply to 'airplanes' but also family gatherings and school theatre performances. How this mysterious Cranbapple hybrid entered her head, I would love to know. Maybe she's still sitting on that seat, staring into the eyes of the speechless air hostess, both frozen in a suspended state of disbelief at  one other.

Well that's what I'd like to think, but in reality, I saw her mum come and pick her up from the airport as I left, four hours after High School Musical finished, and four hours after she settled for an orange (no cranberry) "with ice".

Shit, if I'd talked to her she might have been the girl of my dreams.

But then I'd never have got to write this blog...



Madame Two Swords.

x

Firstly a tribute. This man passed away earlier in the month, and I wanted to say a few words about him.



Johnny Rhythm, indie legend, a man without whom so many wonderful things might never have happened. He was responsible for giving my first band 'Les Incompetents' our first ever gig, at the rhythm factory, a venue in Whitechapel that he basically ran for a few years during the peak of the post-Strokes 'new rock revolution' era.
He had a big hand in putting on a lot of the first shows I ever went to, including a good five of the fifteen or so times I saw the Libertines when I was about sixteen. He then continued to make appearances all over London, bringing a boundless energy and humour to venues all over, whether DJing, promoting, or just having a good time.

We sort of lost touch over the last few years, which made the news of his passing all the more sudden. But what it triggered in my memory was that during the years I referenced above - 2003, 2004, 2005, there was a real passion and excitement about music throughout the country. Fair enough, regional music 'scenes' (including London) were often more exciting than the actual bands and songs themselves, but I could swear I felt a slightly higher and more genuine sense of enthusiasm.

And now those days are gone...



Having said that, I guess it can't have been that much of a heyday, because all we were left with was, 'The Coral', 'Up The Bracket' and 'Whatever You Say I Am, That's What I'm Not' plus a couple of good British Sea Power records and potentially the Futureheards' debut. A pretty sorry output compared to 'Is This It', 'Room on Fire', 'Turn on the Bright Lights', 'Antics', 'White Blood Cells', 'Elephant', 'Fever to Tell'. 'Echoes', 'Pawn Shoppe Heart', 'Bows and Arrows' etcetera, etcetera, etcetera.

To cut to the chase, I'm excited about British music again. And I think you should be too. I have faith that 2009 will be the straw that breaks the camel's back. Last month, I heard the Horrors second album. Last week I heard the second Noah and the Whale album. Next week I hear the second Lightspeed Champion album. And it's not just about sophomore works, though I think those will be three killers. In fact, I know they will.

But there's also a tonne of new bands I love. Which is very rare.

Whether it's Loverman, my teenage next door neighbour turned primal lethario of stage and screen:



Or The XX with their grim home made bus depot pop -



Or S.C.U.M, the only slice of London monochrome indie invoking any feelings of real torment and darkness. It probably isn't real, but I don't think it's meant to be. It just makes for an even more stunning and over the top live experience:



Or even Alan Pownall...Richmond's answer to a young Sinatra, and a man who never ceases to provide insightful quips, "You like grunge?", he asks. "Listen to No Doubt".



And of course Video Nasties' debut album 'On All Fours' finally comes out next month, a monolithic teenage celebration, and labour of love, that I've been waiting for for about five years. Check out their series of free album launch shows this month, and I'll post more info on the release as it comes.

I have to sleep now, I'm going on a forsaken trip to Austria in five hours time, but I'll leave you with this track. It became my single of the year on first listen, and I haven't stopped pressing the play button since.
Romantic, sentimental, experimental: essential.
The Big Pink - Velvet.
Wow.



x

Real. Fucking. Life. 2006.



Young Carter, go farther,
Go further, go harder.
Is that not why we came?
And if not, then why bother?

This is a photo of an alluring yet decrepit cinema, three minutes from my house, which having laid dormant for the last three years, is now apparently being semi-demolished only to be turned back in to a cinema in the near future. I wait with baited breath.

I like the cinema. Its like an adult you can really trust. Like when your parents hammer it in to you not to speak to strangers as a child, and you get so worried and scared that you eventually believe everyone who isn't related to you is clearly on the sex offenders register. But then at some point you meet a stranger who changes everything, and you decide that not only can you trust said stranger, but that you'll probably never be able to trust your parents again.



Ever since my friends started working at a couple of cinemas, I've been visiting more regularly and more regularly. And very recently even more regularly.
I guess I look at it less like "I'm a fan of cinema" and more like "I'm a fan of the cinema".
They genuinely don't seem to mind me going almost twice a week, which I am more than happy about, but as a result, it's got to this stage where I barely care what I see. The way I look at it is that watching a film, however bad or good, is like having at least 90 minutes of information injected in to your brain. If you enjoy it because it's good that's a bonus. If you enjoy it because it's bad that's a bonus too.
Either way, you win.
Either way you get to sit in a completely relaxed environment, whether with friends or alone, just aligning yourself with the ideas of the writer/director/actor or whoever before re-connecting with your own life afterwards, very simply.
Nine times out of ten I forget I even have a body.
Which for £7 - £10 is pretty impressive but for free/cheap...why I can think of no better way to spend an afternoon.
My grandfather always used to talk about how he'd go to the cinema three times a week and watch everything from news to cartoons to films to ballet and I never really connected with that idea, but now I fantasize about what it would be like if the cinema was like television and you could drop in and drop out, paying by the hour just to slip off the back of your mind in to someone else's. If instant toilet facilities were provided along with waiter service and a pillow, then I could imagine us all just staying in there for days.
In the last couple of weeks across three cinemas I've been to see Vicky Cristina Barcelona, Anvil, Unborn, Watchmen, Wendy and Lucy, and Surveillance. I would rate all of these above 7/10 with Anvil above 8/10 and Surveillance potentially around the 9 mark. But either way, this isn't meant to be a diatribe about quality cinema, it's about putting the concept before the practical element, and just having faith in enjoying the experience rather than the outcome I guess.

There's no real conclusion.
Maybe the conclusion is - I need to get a real job.



I also like music. This is a photo of Klaxons' secret show at White Heat a few weeks back. I went down because I heard they would be playing new material and wanted to hear it first hand after all the desciptions of the songs that had been given to me seemed to contradict. "Much heavier", were what some people had said, whereas others were talking about "A much lighter ethereal vibe".
"Lighter and heavier?" I thought to myself. Hmmmm.
One song in particular 'Valley of the Calm Trees' stuck in my mind. It felt like the music was starting to hit a newer depth, and I felt positive thoughts about what I believed was the impending album.
But then weeks pass and a few days ago I read THIS.

The record label have apparently intervened meaning that it will clearly be a while longer before anything finalised and concrete appears.

In the meantime, for those of you salivating over second albums, I have had the pleasure of hearing a vast percentage of material from the Horrors 'sophomore effort' as Pitchfork would put it.
Earlier I mentioned Surveillance - Jennifer Lynch's second film. The quality of this album similarly hangs around the 9/10 mark throughout, really stepping things up. After a seemingly rushed debut, I believe that what will soon be with us is already a contender for the record of the year.
I love being proved wrong by bands with a clear vision of what it means to improve and progress.
Keep checking  thehorrors.co.uk  where come midnight on Monday, we are all in for something special.

Meanwhile, on almost the other side of the world



It seems like everyone has something to bring to the Pasta Party, and at some point, maybe sooner rather than later, I too, shall reveal my dish.

At last, the most exciting British television adaptation since Ted Danson starred in 'Gullivers Travels' on Channel 4....



Epic/ Murder/ Corruption...

YES!

Recently we've had to make do with an episode of Eastenders that namechecked Blood Red Shoes, The Subways and The Others (?!) out of nowhere, a real hit and miss third series of Skins, and various dull awards ceremonies.
To be honest, it hasn't been easy.
At least the 15 minute Pet Shop Boys medley mixed things up a bit.

But getting back to the point, the Red Riding Trilogy really looks like something to get excited about:



And it's happening tomorrow.

Sean Bean has surely made enough of a mark in Hollywood (obviously I'm talking about Goldeneye, Silent Hill and the remake of The Hitcher) to now comfortably return to his rightful home of Thursday night TV set in the North of England, and how's this for a supporting cast... Mark Addy (The Full Monty), Jim Carter (Cranford), Warren Clarke (Dalziel & Pascoe), Paddy Considine (Dead Man’s Shoes), Rebecca Hall (Vicky Cristina Barcelona), Sean Harris (24 Hour Party People), John Henshaw (Early Doors), Gerard Kearns (Shameless), Eddie Marsan (Vera Drake), David Morrissey (The Deal), Daniel Mays (White Girl), Peter Mullan (Boy A), Maxine Peake (Shameless), Saskia Reeves (The Fixer) and Lesley Sharp (Afterlife).

That list of cast members is all very much copied and pasted from elsewhere, and if I'm brutally honest, I  have no idea who Saskia Reeves is, nor am I aware of 'Cranford' etc. but the point is, the second I first set eyes on the gargantuan billboard for this series at Tottenham Court Road, I knew we were in for some good and proper homegrown television.

We've talked enough about Brookside and Byker and days gone by.

Let's look to the future.

Speaking of the future, or more specifically the present, you or may not know I spend at least 16% of my time writing lyrics and singing in a band called Ox.Eagle.Lion.Man. Well our broken home of a label, Transgressive, forgot to tell us that the record we finished making towards the end of last year is now in shops. I  found out myself, quite by accident, whilst looking for Oxbow CD's in HMV. It turns out they were in the metal section. And we weren't. Merked.

So if you're struggling to find a blog where you can download an illegal mp3 version, by all means go and buy a copy of 'Obscured By A Setting Sun'. I genuinely think it's pretty good.

It may not be as good as this:



But it is at least as good as this:

 

Aka 4/5.

"Oh I’m just like you...I never hear the bad news."



sic.

Don't get me wrong, as much as MTV Two is going down the pan (see: the death of 120 Minutes, less episodes of Gonzo each year etc), it has been a pleasure being employed by them for the last six/seven months. Not that I had much choice in accepting the job.

See, I did try and get a position as a shop assistant at this place called Behave (Soho branch) that sells Cheap Monday jeans and plaid shirts. I even did a trial day and enjoyed it, and I think the guy who ran it liked my vibe. But then he never called me back. And whenever I rang the shop he seemed to be out.
Harsh.
If you're reading this after googling 'behave soho' and there's ever a job going again. I still want it.

What did I do to let you down?

So, back in the present day, other than interviewing Mick Foley and Irish people, sometimes I have to do these discussion panel shows hosted by Zane Lowe. I say sometimes, I've done one. But it was a great day, sharing screen time with two childhood heroes, Corey Taylor and Carl Barat. Anyway, I've either told you the story before or you saw it. Probably more likely the former, although I think it did make late night TMF.

The long and short of it is that tomorrow another panel show beckons. This time, the 'greatest albums' of the MTV generation (aka post 1981). I don't know about you, but looking down this top ten doesn't really inspire me...

10:  Arctic Monkeys - Whatever People Say I Am, Thats What I'm Not

9:    Rage Against The Machine - Rage Against The Machine

8:    Oasis - Definitely Maybe

7:    Pixies - Doolittle

6:    The Stone Roses - The Stone Roses

5:    The Strokes - Is This It

4:    The Smiths - The Queen Is Dead

3:    Guns n Roses - Appetite For Destruction

2:    Radiohead - OK Computer

1:    Nirvana – Nevermind

Yes, some of those are great albums, but surely they're not the best ten since 1981. It seems more like a list that celebrates the ten safest bets that can be talked about for an hour without upsetting too many people. And there's some in there (I won't name names for fear of losing friends) that I hope I never have to listen to again.

Lame.

Where's Nick Cave? Where's Tom Waits? Where's the Mars Volta?
Where's the Liza Minelli/ Pet Shop Boys collab?
I know everyone has their own tastes but I think a truly transcendental album can do more than simply 'change your life'.
Not having enough money on your Oyster card changes your life. But nobody puts that in a top ten list.

Now for something completely different.

This seems to be one of the few British blogs that didn't have a whole week's worth of entries based on the couple of snow-filled days that entered all of our lives the other week. The snow arrived literally over night much to everyone's surprise and delight. I enjoyed it most fully at it's freshest between 12.30AM and 4.30AM on the morning of Monday 2nd February.

I won't boar you with the finer details but my favourite moment (that I will leave you with) was finding this woman lying down in the middle of the road on Redchurch street at about four in the morning. She didn't seem to know where she'd been or where she was going. Nor would she accept our help. She just lay there. Looking at the sky, as the snow fell.



And I thought to myself...



Idiot.