Abi Rhodes' Zigzag Wanderings

The Architects of our Downfall and Depression

Do you remember these 2 villains. They're called Raymond Baxter [left] and James Burke. From 1965, in a TV programme called 'Tomorrow's World,' they bombarded us with futuristic designs, ideas and inventions which would free us from wage slavery and bring increasing leisure to all our lives. We could expect a future of prosperity, idleness and pleasure.

Well, many of us have the idleness although not in the way we were led to expect. Others do in fact have the pleasure and prosperity - but number only a measly 2-3% of our population. Many of us are being forced to spend the evenings of our lives as drudges or searching for jobs that do not exist.

These men stand accused of selling us similar dreams to those peddled by the likes of Mao, Stalin and Hitler.

They have betrayed generations. They should be rounded up tried for treachery of the highest order.

Mini-Maxibition

Last Friday evening took us on a rare trip away from Brighton. We went to Salisbury for the official opening of Artist Tom Walker's 'Snooker in the Frame' exhibition at the studios of Trinity Photography in the city's Trinity Street.

Some of you may have seen Tom's TV regular appearances at UK and World Snooker Championships over the last few years. He has completed his target of 147 snooker related pastel works. The subjects vary from pure snooker studies to word plays on snooker terminology to homages to great artists with a snooker twist. Most are very witty if not downright hilarious,  a few are a bit more serious but all are carefully observed and include the colours associated with the balls and the beize.

The  Salisbury exhibition, which had previously been shown complete for the first time at Sheffield's World Championship last month, does not include every piece, but those not present are represented in print form. The opening was crowded, due partly, no doubt, to the presence of Steve Davis, who did the honours of launching the show.

For those of you unable to visit the show which continues until 5th June, I urge you to visit Tom's website to sample some of its delights. Those of you who can get along, please don't miss the opportunity - you'll be glad you went. Besides a number of originals still available for purchase [many at the price of £147], there are prints of the whole set available in various sizes and a limited edition book showing all 147 in full colour.

Being somewhat biased having been the artist's friend for over 30 years I refer you to Global Snooker . Com for  more critical review than I might present!

Find the location of Trinity Photography and more details of the exhibition by visiting http://www.trinity-photography.co.uk/

147 - maximum break

Eurovision Song Contest 2008 Analysis

Eurovision Song Contest 2008 Analysis

Weirdness from Bosnia in the form of Laka

Well Eurovision has come and gone again. It was a good competition this year – although I thought the winning Russian entry wasn’t all that wonderful. I would have preferred Bosnia-Herzegovina, Azerbaijan, Armenia and Greece in that order. But I think the general quality has greatly improved since the Eastern countries have become independent and more liberated in their approach to music. I love the hybrid musics resulting from the combination of modern rock and dance rhythms etc with their various ethnic traditions.

There does seem to be a problem with countries voting for their near neighbours and political allies, but wasn’t it ever so? The resulting hoo-ha about whether Western European countries should continue entering is a bit of a red herring. The truth is these countries just do not take the competition seriously enough. The only way to overcome the tribalism inherent in the voting structure is to produce some better songs.

Andy Abrahams’ song was probably the best we’ve entered for some years now but it really was pretty conventional and totally lacking in innovation or drama. It wasn’t even modern R’n’B, but more a standard second-rate 70s sould song. If it hadn’t been our entry to the Contest it wouldn’t have stood a chance in our charts let alone anywhere else.

You’ve only got to analyse the pop charts in the UK to pick out dozens of better songs than his tawdry effort. Our entry should be the best song available from a much wider spectrum than those that get into the ‘Song for Europe’ handicap each spring. Why aren’t the likes of Lily Allen, The Streets or Girls Aloud entering the fray. I’ll tell you why – it’s because the whole British establishment thinks that Eurovision is a joke – much in the way the Irish entry by Dustin the Turkey portrayed it to be [and sadly but justifiably got knocked out in the semi-final].

A joky song is one thing but as long as the competition is looked down upon in such a way then it will be a self fulfilling prophesy that we won’t stand a chance. Terry Wogan has always been a most amusing compere for the UK, but maybe his likely retirement from the annual bash will offer a chance for a new start in the attitude department. We don’t want to be so serious that to lose will lead to hara-kiri in the streets by performers and fans. But if we could build a team of presenters who treated the whole thing with a little more respect and exhibited a little less cynicism especially towards the Eastern block, then perhaps some of our more accomplished and creative songwriters and performers would put themselves forward as entrants.

Kalomoira - Greece's very own Britney

I love Eurovision. I think it’s one of the most entertaining evening’s TV of the year. It would be a great shame if we opted out for little more reason than sour grapes – for that’s what it would be. Let’s press the powers that be to treat the contest with the seriousness and respect we exhibit in some of the finest sporting events where we struggle to compete. Cricket and cycling, for example – we know we’re unlikely to be top dog but we respect the other entrants and go all out to do the best we can under the circumstances. Let’s show some of the Eddie the Eagle spirit and be heroic losers rather than pick up our ball and stomp off home in disgust.

Did You See...

New York Rocks at the BBC on BBC4 last night?

Most of the acts were filmed either on The Old Grey Whistle Test or Later with Jools Holland. It included footage of Blondie, the New York Dolls, Talking Heads, Television, Velvet Underground, The Ramones, Patti Smith, anthony & the Johnsons and a few others I can'r immediately recall. Also there were 'solo' performances from members of tsome of the above.

For me the highlights were Patti singing 'Horses' which has encouraged me to look out the album [not difficult to find as I listento it regularly] and it's playing as I write, and John Cale doing Venus In Furs - his viola playing is still as haunting as it was back in the 60s. Everybody's favourite uncle, Lou Reed appeared a couple of times and proved, despite never having been too hot on hitting the note, he wrote some classic stuff. Debbie Harry in a mini-skirt and boots still gives me goose bumps.

KING & QUEEN OF NEW YORK

It was a good show and could have gone on all night as far as I was concerned. Sadly, I missed the preceding programme on the history of NY music, covering jazz, hip=hop, punk etc - I'll look out for the repeat. BBC3 & 4 are pretty good at doing these sorts of programmes and to add spice they are uninterrupted by crap ads.

Eurovision Music Lovers Handicap 2007

Last Night was the annual TV bash which masquerades under the name of the Eurovision Song Contest.

THE HELSINKI STADIUM

After last year's slightly disappointing final, the overall quality of the music and songs this year recommenced its upward climb which it has been maintaining over the past decade. Time was the Contest was a showcase of everything poor and reactionary in European Popular Music. Now, and especially this year, it has blossomed into a festival of diversity and creativity - shame that the vast majority of the audience across the continent is still stuck firmly in the past. Their voting is dominated by regional & political allegiences and very conservative musical tastes. Happily some very original acts are breaking through the barriers of the national selection processes and making their mark internationally.

It's not all down to the local loyalties displayed by the Balkan and Baltic states as suggested by the likes of His Highness Sir Terence of Wogan. The western states of europe are probably to blame for their old fashioned approach to the selection of their entries. The UK entry, Flying the Flag by Scooch, was not as bad as many have proposed but suffered from being modelled on a style of successful composition popular in the seventies. We need to drag ourself into the new millennium. If only our vibrant music scene could turn its attention away from football and turn it towards success in Eurovision, we could wipe the floor.

Ireland, similarly relied on traditional Celtic charm with Dervish performing They Can't Stop the Spring a rather poor song presented by a second rate singer and hotch-potch of pub musicians in an attempt to reproduce previous popularity. Thankfully they failed to hit the mark and took the bottom place that should have been occupied by Turkey's dire effort but mysteriously contented for the top five throughout.

Likewise, France tried and failed to reproduce the nuttiness of Plastique Bertrand and Spain fielded a crappy boy band dressed in white singing a slighty flamenco-flavoured dance ditty, which seemed very passe and extremely dull. Germany tried the same trick as last year by giving us a jazz combo singing a croony swing number and repeated the dismal result the acheived then, and Sweden avoided originality by a formulaic glam-rock band singing a number which sounded like a pastiche of all the cliches from that era.

Originality was largely supplied with adventurous stuff from the old eastern Block and this showed in the results although the voters picked a few bummers in between. The spread of styles was amazing - the old habit of entering something in the ancient cultural tradition of each country is a thing of the past and exploration of the Whole World of Musical Experience is very much the current thing.

We had only a couple of ballads - the best being a rather dull entry from Armenia. There were flavours of multiculturism throughout including several sub-Evanescance Goth presentations, a Multi-Lingual Folksong from Romania, some strange Latvian quasi-operatic pop, Russia's professional but highly derivative piece of girly pop building on the Tatu traditionand a Devo-like piece of pre-war German Cabaret which did surprisingly well.

The winner was a pretty good number from Serbia - their first entry under that country's sole name - Marija ŠERIFOVIĆ sang Molitva but this was far from being the best offering available.

SERBIAN WINNERS

My tips for ones to watch were the Hungarian entry - Unsubstantial Blues by Magdi Ruzsa - a thoroughly modern update of the Chicago genre, Slovenia's Alenka Govar, a true Gothic Diva, treated us to Cvet Z Juga - a soaring metalled-up Wagnerian aria, the Greek entry, Yassou Maria by Sarbel - the most professional and complete piece of Europop imaginable but my personal favourite was Bulgaria's Elitza Todorova and Stoyan Yankoulov singing an exciting number Water which included Japanese style percussion and Jew's Harp.

BULGARIAN STARS OF THE FUTURE?

This was definitely the best Eurovision Song Contest to date and I hope it sets a Benchmark for future years in terms of diversity and originality. It's a shame the Western Music Scene can't take it a little more seriously.

I might even go out and buy the CD of all the entries if I can afford it.

Can't wait next year!

Lloyds-TSB ad: For The Journey

I have ascertained that the fab music on the Lloyds-TSB:For the journey ad is called 'Eliza Aria' and is performed by Elena Kats-Chernin. Many thanks to Gordon Pirrie and Colin Scott at the Lloyds-TSB Online Helpdesk for furnishing this infomation.

It's available on an album:

E Kats-Chernin: Ragtime & Blue - Sarah Nicolls, piano; Nicola Sweeney, violin

Label - Signum

Cat. No. - SIGCD058

Queue Up for Art

This is a painting entitled Brass Band by Artist Tom Walker

From 15th January until 3rd February you can view paintings from this new series of pastels entitled

SNOOKER IN THE FRAME by Tom Walker at the Star Gallery in Lewes

visit his website to see further examples of the work on display

During the coming week Tom will be travelling upto Sheffield to be interviewed about his snooker pictures by the BBC during the UK Snooker Championships. Watch out for Tom on the Box!

Edukashun, Edukashun, Edukashun......

I think I've mentioned on a previous occasion, that I'm appalled by the frequency that education issues appear in headline news. Not a day seems to go by without this or that new announcement, initiative, review, enquiry etc etc etc being declared.
Now when I were a lad, you never heard nuffink abat edukashun from one year to the next. And life seemed a whole lot better for that.

Today's bandwagon is that old chestnut about the 'high' percentage of school-students attaining leaving age without developing a satisfactory ability in reading and/or writing.

Now while I recognise that in the UK there seems to have been a 'golden age' in school performance probably peaking in the 60s or 70s, I would contend that there always was and always will be a certain amount of school failure in the 'basic skills'.

The reason for this is obvious to me - that is they are not basic at all. In fact they are totally artificial - figments of our fertile human imaginations, pounced upon by the powers that be as a useful stick with which to beat us.

If The Supreme Being had intended us to be readin', writin' amnd rithmetisin' it'd not have waited till the Lil Ol Yuman race commed along afore it started insistin' on it.

Trilobites, Stromatolites, Dinosaurs, CumuloNimbus, Cannabis Sattiva and everything else would have been reading, writing and arithmetising well before now. But no, that doesn't seem to have happened. And even when Our Lot pops up it seems to take squillions of years before anyone thinks about these activities and lots more before it's even suggested that the majority should aquire these entirely invented skills.

Is it not possible that for any number of reasons to do with neurological development, personal preference or different priority many many many folk may just not be equipped to acquire the so-called basic skills? I think this is entirely possible.

My experience 'in the workplace' has shown me that in all age groups there are small numbers of very good workers who struggle with literacy and/or numeracy and it does not make them any less a valuable citizen even though the dim-witted among them might persecute them for being differently skilled.

So, I'm happy with Mr Gordon Brown to be trying to restore the place in the curriculum for methods which identify struggling pupils at the age of six or any age for that matter, but I am not happy with people who use statistics to try and convince us that things are getting worse and everybody should be getting PhDs even though they think that standards are falling etc etc etc

We should not be thinking that the system is failing just because X% cannot read and write. Rather we should be asking what else can these people be doing to help them feel included and take up useful positions in society.

In the Old Days there were tons of manual and manufacturing jobs in which they could develop other skills and feel highly valued. Successions of short sighted governments - mainly under the influence of Mrs T [a fore-rummer of mrsa!] - have demolished British Industry and only replaced it with crappy second rate service industries which most of us don't really need anyway.

Meanwhile schools still go on as if we're still in charge of the world and need to churn out godzillions of Oxbridge educated bureaucrats to keep the rest of the buggers in their proper place! Skools are an outdated relic of the Industrial Revolution. We probably do not need universal schooling at all any more. Education should be almost entirely experiential. Kids should have the freedom to explore and time to enjoy the wider world around them and creatively find out where they want to take their lives - something skools are VERY VERY BAD at. Besides real life, there are plenty of good educational tools around in the form of computers, TV & Radio, libraries, etc etc etc from which they can draw inspiration in the company of grown up more mature friends and neighbours and if they deem it useful and necessary they will learn to read and write - at least just as many will do as do so at present.

The NUT has perpetrated a grievous mendacious myth with its slogan..

'If you can read this, thank a teacher'

Teachers can and do do a lot of good but when it comes down to it most kids actually teach themselves to read and motivation is the most important ingredient in the mix which will get them there, although it should be accepted that some people will never acquire the skill, and many only barely adequately.

Please let's become a little more tolerant and imaginative about what folk need to achieve to be good citizens and stop demonising those who have different levels of skill and ability and find them good roles in society so that they can feel included and proud of their abilities and the contributions they can make.

Climb down off soapbox.....

ITV Local Brighton

ITV Local Brighton

Copied from GavPOLITICS

ITV is piloting a local TV station for Brighton and another for Hastings.

This is the start of a new era in television - use of the internet to reach an audience smaller than is economical or logistically possible using traditional transmission methods. And the omnipresent BBC is planning to do something similar soon.

A brief watch this afternoon has convinced me that this is the future. In the connected home where this can be streamed onto TVs in living rooms and where internet TV and Freeview/satellite can be switched between seamlessly, the very local focus of the channel will have many, many viewers.

The weather forecast is focused on the Brighton area with attention directed from Worthing to Newhaven along the coast and not as far north as Crawley. There are separate, concurrent channels showing News and Sport, Weather, What’s On, Classified Ads, locally-produced films and a couple of others I haven’t watched yet.

The channel’s not completely finished yet - you cannot upload content or classified ads yet - but the power to communicate via the televisual medium to a very local audience will be very, very useful.

ITV Local

I do believe it is long past the time we should have been able to watch BBC television on the internet - but I can see the licence fee problem for this availability… But commercial television (Channel Four and ITV) - they’ve got nothing to lose by having a new audience consuming their adverts! I look forward to further exploitation of the internet’s potential!