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Pool Pipe Dream

Forget the Argentina vs Mexico match, the match of the weekend was my 3-0 victory aqainst Alec at pool.

I won the first game only by default - he potted the white in the process of potting the black - but the other 2 were won entirely on my own steam, including one which involved potting the black with a nifty ricochet. Not since my China Jump triumph of 2004 have I had such sweet victories at pool because basically, I've rarely had any victories. I've only had very occasional games here and there with Alec and Jacob, and I always lose.

But on a Friday night about 3 weeks ago I decided, for no reason in particular, that I felt like some pool. Alec then proceeded to wipe the floor with me for the next hour, but instead of accepting this philosophically as usual, this time I vowed something had to change.

The next Saturday, in between World Cup matches, I managed to pwn David before Alec pwned us both.

And this weekend, this glorious weekend, I pwned Alec 3-0.

Things are going rather well. I hope to put in more practice, move onto snooker (which I fully realize will pwn me for ages before I'm even vaguely decent), eventually become a hustler for big bucks, buy myself out of my scholarship bond and start a new life as Johnny Depp's masseuse.

IT COULD HAPPEN.

Nuggets Of Love

During some mid-workday emailing, Alec and I are discussing some friends of ours who are migrating to New Zealand and opening a restaurant. We both agree it's a damn cool thing to do, but Alec mentions that it's a risky move without prior experience in the restaurant industry.

He continues:

"But then I'm very unromantic about business. I quite like the idea of starting my own business but I'd focus on low cost, high turnover food where start up costs are lower and potential profits are far higher. When I'm manager of McDonald's Pasir Ris I'll bring you back french fries every night. I'll fill a bath tub with their mother fucking chilli sauce."

Unromantic my foot. Now I'm all choked up.

Hanoi: Day Three

[I suddenly realized that I really should try and finish one trip's worth of travel blog entries (Vietnam) before going on the next (Kuching for my second RWMF, next Thursday). Of course, I still only have 5 days blogged out of last August's 17 day trip to London, Norway and Germany but Vietnam makes more sense as far as the art of the possible is concerned.]

For this day and the next, we're on a tour to Ha Long Bay with Handspan Tours. After an early start, I drowse happily in the minibus, waking up intermittently to enjoy the bucolic countryside views and to steal Alec's book every time he falls asleep (because for some reason I didn't feel like reading my own). Of course, I soon fall asleep clutching it, wake up to find he's stolen it back, and the whole cycle begins again.

The jetty is packed with pleasure boats parked at least five deep, and according to no discernable order or plan. We board one that will take us out to our eventual boat, the Dragon's Pearl. Manoeuvring the boat out of the "berth" through all the others involves the sort of comedy hijinks that you thought only existed in the days of vaudeville or The Simple Life: Interns. The boats crash into each other gently but frequently, with crew members often using pure muscle power to push the boats out of a clinch. Tiny boats dart fearlessly in and out of the chaos, hoping to score a quick fruit sale to idle passengers. Our boat is in great shape, which is a relief after all the bangers we passed on the way, including more than a few names that I recognise from the other tour companies' websites I surfed while trying to decide which tour to book.

We check into our clean wood-panelled room and report for lunch, which introduces us to the only disappointment of the tour: the food. It's the sort of utterly bland, only nominally Oriental stuff that I haven't tasted since we stopped for takeaway while driving through the English Midlands several years ago and I ordered Singapore Fried Rice for kicks. I assume it's intended to cater to Western tastebuds, but it does both the country and Western tastebuds a huge disservice by doing so. I distract myself from the growing suspicion that I'm eating corrugated cardboard by running out frequently onto the deck to take pictures.

After lunch we make our first stop, at the Sung Sot "Amazing Cave". Which, to be fair, is pretty amazing.

It's quite dramatically lighted and has smoothened paths for people to walk along, but even if this detracts from the sort of raw "naturalness" that some people may want from a cave, it really still is spectacular.

Alec remarked that this picture makes him think of a mushroom cloud. Note the rather small people on the right for an idea of the scale of the place.

On the way out of the bay, we pass our first floating village. The next stop is Titop Island, which I think is the highest island in Ha Long Bay. You can climb to the top for a view of the karsts, which is okay but still inferior to drifting among them. The climb is straightforward but sweaty. Sodden with sweat halfway up, I suddenly remember doing a similar climb to my castle hostel in Bacharach, Germany - except with a backpack, and in the rain, and alone - and from then on it's easy peasy.

There's a swimming stop after this, but my eczema's bad as it always is during any holiday where I spend a protracted amount of time in outdoor heat, and I'm wary of immersing raw skin where I don't know how clean the water is. Later on, dinner features more mediocre food. Although our dinner companions are perfectly amiable, Alec's beginning to feel the effects of yesterday's street food on his digestive system and is a little under the weather, which affects my mood. (I become a ridiculous miserable wreck when anyone I love is ill and uncomfortable.)

After dinner, we sit on the empty top deck of the boat, which is anchored in the middle of Ha Long Bay for the night. As far as the eye can see, there are only the shadowy karsts, other boats in the distance with their lights reflected in the still water, and a clear sky full of stars.

Clan Of The Nick Cave Barenaked Ladies

This Coudal Partners contest on book/band mashups (via Daryl) is fun! Here are just a few of the entries that took my fancy:

• Charlie and the C&C Music Factory


• Chromeo and Juliet


• Qur'an Duran


• Courtney Love in the Time of Cholera


• Bridge over the River Jamiroquai


• The Odyssey and Cake


• Pop Will Eat Shoots And Leaves
• The Sun Also RZA (probably my favourite)

The contest's over already, but as usual with these sort of things I couldn't resist coming up with some of my own anyway.

Children's books:

• The BFG-Unit


• Harriet the Spinal Tap


• The Little Bonnie Prince Billy


• The Curious Incident of the Snoop Dogg in the Three Dog Night
(double mashup!)

• Smokey Robinson Crusoe


• Alec Empire Of The Sun (okay objectively this one isn't great but I'm sure you understand why it amuses me)

Penguin Classics:

• Of Mice Parade And Men


• East 17 Of Eden


• Northanger ABBA


• To The Lighthouse Family


• The Autumn Of the Patrick Wolf


• Mason And Dixie Chicks


• Pnine Inch Nails


• The Chemical Brothers Karamazov


• Donna Summer Quixote


• Tess of the D'urbervillage People

Others:

• The Amazing Adventures Of Kavalier And Clay Aiken


• Kafka On The Beach Boys


• We Need To Talk Talk About Kevin


• If On A Winter's Night A Blues Traveller


• Anil's Ghostface Killah


• New Thom Yorke Trilogy


• True History of the Kelly Gang Starr


• Last Exit To Crooklyn Dodgers
• Fear and Loathing in Las Ketchup

So awful that I just couldn't leave them out:

• W-iliad Grant Conspiracy


• The Anticon-Tiki Expedition (yes, I know, record label)


• The Bonjovifire of the Vanities


• The Alcutchemist

Let's hear yours!

Sonic Nurse, Two Years Late

I was just about to SQUEEEEEEEEEE all over this blog about Sonic Youth's new album, which I got my hands on yesterday, but suddenly remembered that my reaction to the previous album was still languishing in my as yet unpublished top 10 list of 2004. Yes, I know.

So, since it's not like this blog is overloading you with entries to read these days, I thought I'd just dig that up and post it as a prelude.

Sonic Nurse (Sonic Youth):

I should begin by admitting that I am incapable of being objective about this album. I've tried and failed to figure out how I would react to it if it were the first Sonic Youth album I'd ever heard, perhaps listening to it only because I'd read a good Pitchfork review, rather than in the context of what feels like the culmination of my decade of fanhood.

This album is vintage Sonic Youth firing on all songwriter and instrumentalist cylinders, and they know it. Pattern Recognition starts things off with what feels like unassailable confidence; you realize that this band which has collaborated with artists running the gamut from free jazz to glitchy ambient electronica and released entire albums of pure feedback is finally doing a tribute to themselves, and it's going to be stunning. There are no dud tracks here - every song could have been the highlight of some lesser band's career-peak album. New Hampshire, probably my favourite, is as broody and propulsive as anything on Daydream Nation, and although they keep this album version pretty tight at just a little over 5 minutes, it's the sort of track that's just begging for a protracted screaming-guitar-noise-freakout jam when done live. I don't think I've ever been able to describe Kim Gordon's singing as "heartfelt" before, but in I Love You Golden Blue she breathes her lines with a vulnerability I find surprisingly affecting.

In Paper Cup Exit, the line "I don't mind if you sing a different song, sing a different song, just as long as you sing, as you sing, sing along" may seem incoherent or contradictory, but if you're a Sonic Youth fan it makes total sense. As this excellent review at Stylus observed, "despite the consistently fine song-writing the band has to offer, it isn't the songs themselves that keep their fans coming back. Rather, Sonic Youth is a band at perfect synergy with itself. Every tangential instrumental passage seems not premeditated, but psychically transposed."

I heard Daydream Nation when I was 14; it changed the way I listened to music. Ten years on, as much as my musical horizons have expanded, Sonic Youth's sprawling dissonance still explodes more stars in my head and quickens my heartbeat with more pure aural joy than anything else does. Sonic Nurse is my number one album of the year for more reasons than musical brilliance alone - it is beautiful unmistakable proof to me that my favourite band, 24 years, 19 albums, countless experimental tangents, and immeasurable critical acclaim after its formation, has not ceased to listen, create, and rock.

Breathe And Stop

I found myself thrust upon the horns of a dilemma on the bus home after dinner the other night. The bus stank of sweaty teenage boys and BO that had triumphed despite Lynx's most valiant efforts. On the other hand, after a meal at the Garlic Restaurant, my breath presumably stank too.

And so a challenging question of civic consciousness arose - should I breathe through my mouth or nose? The former would spare me the olfactory assault of Eau de Adolescence, but the latter would spare my surrounding passengers the feeling of sizzling in a wok while awaiting the addition of pak choy and oyster sauce.

I eventually decided in favour of the former. We were all just ingredients in an armpit stew anyway.

Anyone Up For A Ruck?

An event news snippet from the latest Wire:

"London's Institute of Contemporary Arts (ICA) has awarded £10,000 to artist Jo Mitchell to stage a reenactment of a notorious 1984 ICA performance involving members of Einstürzende Neubauten and Fad Gadget's Frank Tovey, among others. Called Concerto for Voice and Machine, the event was legendarily chaotic, with members of the group attacking the wooden stage with pneumatic drills, purportedly in order to reach secret tunnels rumoured to run between government departments and Buckingham Palace underneath The Mall, and the audience joining in by tossing glasses into a cement mixer. It ended when ICA staff turned the power off. The reenactment is scheduled to take place in February 2007. www.ica.org.uk"

It's not that I'm particularly enamoured of wanton destruction (unless it's of Coldplay, in which case it ain't wanton) but I'm impressed and quite charmed by the idea of the ICA sponsoring the reenactment of an event that, 12 years ago, involved destruction of its own property and plunging its staff into panic. Regardless of whether I'd personally classify this as "art", I like the idea of living in a place where there are people who would. How far I have come. How far in the wrong direction.

Drum'N'Bass'N'Strings

Something dramatic was needed to break my obsessive aural dependency on the sound of Elliott Yamin's voice, so I revisited Venetian Snares' Rossz Csillag Allat Szuletett, which I'd been enjoying quite a lot before Elliott poured molten sex into my ears.

It isn't easy to describe why this album's fusion of (mostly) classical music with drill'n'bass works for me, because at first blush the concept sounds insufferable. The thing is, as drum'n'bass subgenres go, I like drill'n'bass because it has a certain drama and intensity that I find lacking in the jazzy stuff. On the other hand, classical music has lots of drama and intensity but lacks riddim.

Track 8's sampling of Elgar's cello concerto in E minor fascinates me. The sample of that famous bit of melody is cut off one note later than you expect it to be - one would have thought cutting the segment off on the D would make for the obvious easy loop but instead it's left for one more note, which weirds up the time signature and the listener's feel of the melody. Every time I listen to the track it always makes me feel a bit off-balance at the start, but then I descend into a geeky wanky happy place where I muse about whether I'd feel the same way if I didn't already know the classical piece, and whether this use of the sample is deliberately intended to elicit this response in the listener, and then I look to the track title for any help but unfortunately it's called "Szarmar Madar" so nothing gained there; meanwhile, there's an opera singer throwin' down high E's and the chaotic beat's just tearing shit up, and I start thinking tasteless thoughts about how even Jacqueline du Pre would dance to this except oh wait oops and I'm not even sure whether any of this is good or bad but I like the fact that the song is making me think it.