Like 2

Part two of me spreading the love..... here goes.

1. Kill Your Friends

John Niven's first full length novel is a scathing satire on the music business based on his experiences working as an A+R man for a major records company, where he passed up the opportunity to sign both Coldplay and Muse. I fucking love it! It's set in the mid 90's during the Britpop boom, and follows Simon Stelfox, man more dedicated to his own personal mission of hedonism than discovering the next big thing. There are so many things to love about this book - the way Simon and his colleagues are constantly making bad calls about music. He signs a dance record called "(I want you to) suck my fucking dick" for a million quid and yet declares Radiohead's OK Computer "commercial suicide". He is deeply misogynistic but to the point of farce... "Cher, at seventy? Playing keepy uppy with her fucking jugs? Cunt like a wizards sleeve? Face like a melted bucket of concrete. Fuck that" He is a deeply unpleasant person on every level, always keen to point out the difference between his band of hedonistic chums and regular people: "Look at how you're living!" he exclaims to himself after chatting to a policeman. One might argue that plot is largely lifted from American Psycho, but where Stelfox differs from Patrick Bateman is in how acerbic and nasty the main character is. "Laugh? We nearly needed Oxygen masks."

2. Thunder Road by Bruce Springsteen

There's not really a great deal I can say about Thunder Road that hasn't been said already, or for that matter Bruce Springsteen. In fact, if reading this you have loved The Boss for a long time, none or what I'm about to say will be particularly insightful. I'm not reviewing though, I'm just saying I like it. There is a much more insightful look at this song from a writer.much more talented than I - Nick Hornby rates it as his most listened to song of all time which means he has a better insight as well as a superior writing ability. It's in his 31 Songs book which may be a future edition of Rossylikes itself, so if you enjoy this then read that too (or maybe don't, as I will look a bit of a chump compared to the man who wrote High Fidelity).

The fact is, this is my favourite Springsteen song and one that would easily slot into a top 5 all time list for me. But I have only recently become a member of the church of Bruce - in fact my earliest encounters with his music, I found him to be a bit boring and depressing. I look back now at my immaturity with a sadness as it probably only would have taken me to listen to Born To Run to realise Bruce is a legend of the highest order, a songwriter of the highest eminence. I mean, he wrote Because The Night for fucks sake! We all make mistakes though,but if anyone reading this has made the mistake of writing Bruce off, listen to this, Born to Run or Rosalita and try and tell me he's boring. I dare you.

I guess Thunder Road remains my favourite of all of his songs, mainly because of my identification with its themes of hope and despair. It's harmonica led intro brings to mind hazy nostalgia, and yet Bruce sings like a man on the edge of desperation, desperate to escape the prison of his home town, desperate to not become an average nobody (this has a particular resonance when you grew up in Lincolnshire). The song comes to its climax, where Bruce sings "I'm pulling out of here to win" and the song crescendos into its bombastic finale, a stomping piano riff that seems to signify hope, new beginnings and fulfilment. I can't help but get goosebumps every time I hear it, and even reading about it stimulates a similar response.

So that is that really. There are more acclaimed songs by The Boss, but this one is my favourite.

Post script - I've just heard the awful news that Clarence Clemons, the saxophone player in the E-Street band has passed away after suffering a stroke. As someone who has seen the after-effects of a stroke, I am deeply saddened to hear of anyone suffering from such an awful trauma, and when it is one of my heroes I am doubly so. RIP Clarence, your memory will live on.

3. Blade Runner

Although Star Wars is probably my favourite all time saga of movies, I would choose Blade Runner over any of the individual movies as my favourite movie of all time. I can't imagine a lot of people would agree with me, but I am a sci fi geek and this film was one of the first grown up sci fi movies I ever saw as a child, and it still speaks to me to this day, so much so that I bought the Final Cut: Special Collectors Edition (in the steelbook case no less) and yet I still want to buy the Blu Ray as well. In fact, I purchased the film on videotape about four times as well, just to get different versions of it.

Anyone unfamiliar with the plot? Rick Deckard (Harrison Ford) is paid to hunt and kill replicants, a type of android slave used on off world colonies that are illegal on Earth. The replicants seek out their creator to try and extend their short lives, Deckard kills four of them and falls in love with another and runs away with her. Of course, if that's all there is to it, it would be a pretty unremarkable film. Right?

What makes it stand out to me is the incredible vision created by Ridley Scott and his production team, creating a neo-noir landscape of a futuristic L.A. that incorporates a melting pot of modernism and contemporary technology and so doesn't seem dated some 20 years later. Nothing dates more than a vision of the future - check out Total Recall if you don't believe me (CRT televisions on a tube train? hahahahahaha!!!!) - and yet Blade Runner still seems to be timeless, the only betrayal of its time being the odd bit of 80's costume design (witness Rachel's shoulder padded jacket when she is first introduced). We might still be a few years away from the dystopian landscape presented in the film, not to mention flying cars and android slaves.

I'm not gonna talk about "is Deckard a replicant or isn't he?" at all. I'm aware of the argument, but it isn't why I love the film. I fell in love with the original cut of the film, with Harrison Ford's sardonic voiceover (apparently it was to deliberately sabotage the voiceover as neither he nor Ridley Scott wanted to put it in the movie) and the forced happy ending. The director's and final cuts add extra layers to the meaning, which is great, but my love for this film is much more superficial to be honest. If you do want to read about it, i'm sure there are many a blog discussing the orange glint in Deckard's eye after he kills Leon, the piano scene blah blah blah. Or you could just watch it and make your own mind up. I would recomend the latter.