It's one of those English words that in isolation you cannot be sure of what it means or how it's pronounced. It can mean nearer (and this is probably how you actually normally read it) or the opposite of opener.
The reason I've chosen it it is because of a section in the Joy Division film where they talked of the title of their second album, which I always assumed was the former meaning, but give the tomb on the cover, the death of Ian Curtis and the fact that it was the final Joy Division album the latter meaning makes far more sense.
This is the first post of August and we had another downpour during the night but the sky is just a uniform grey as it was last November recorded in this post.
I watched a film "The Colony" last night which was a lot better that it's 5.3 IMDB rating although there was some Walking Dead grade horror, but my only problem was the extremely sudden ending when there was actually and decent chink of hope.
So we obviously go with "Colony" from "Closer" by Joy Division on this first day of August.
I can hardly believe the extreme heat and extreme rain we've been having, and amazed the the people in power don't seem to see a problem. We've been lucky we haven't been hit by floods but I made the mistake of trying to walk to work without an umbrella today and got hit by two heavy showers. Looking out the window it's grey with some impressive cloud formations.
"The Illuminatus Trilogy" is going along but it's essentially stream of consciousness slipping between realities with long meaninglessly titled chapters / splits but I'm about two thirds through book one "The Eye In The Pyramid" coming across the detective Saul Goodman, Atlantis , gratuitous sex ., pyramids, giant submarines and right wing southern USA jail stays but you are never in the same place for long. I'm enjoying the read / ride but this will not be most people's cup of petrol.
I watched a couple of films on Amazon Prime including the remake of "Suspiria" which has a lot of touchpoints of "The Illuminatus Trilogy" and an experience to watch with a Thom Yorke soundtrack, I may have to watch the original now which is an hour shorter.
I also watched a documentary on Joy Division which again was excellent and to me their music sound as fresh and pertinent now as when it first came out. The thing is everything was generally analogue so the sounds and noises were actually made and not just something downloaded. A highly watchable film following on from Nico 1988 that I watched the other week.
So I am going to share the excellent video for Joy Division's "Atmosphere" always one of my favourites, as i get ready for bed.
Like the 1999 post the 2001 post will go the same way except not with the Prince song but the Arthur C Clarke book and the Stanley Kubrick film which still look jaw droppingly awesome now, fifty years sich it was brought to us in the days before CGI, and thank god no one has decided to to ty and remake it for a modern audience.
The original main theme is "Also Spake Zarathustra" (there are various alternate spellings and wordings by Richard Strauss , also used to open Elvis Presley's '68 Comeback Special , but remember being shouted down in a pab discussion when the shouters said it was Holst, proves that shouting louder does win the argument.
Johann Strauss was the composer of the "Blue Danube" for the docking scene included below.
So this is post 2001 with some appropriately great video and musical accompaniment. I know there's not many words but it is good to be able to share this film and book and if you haven't read the book or seen the film do yourself a favour and make time to do it now.
I don't know whether I expected to do this many posts. I do know I expected to have a book written but the ideas come and go, and I expected to have some recordings out there and a combination of laziness and "not having enough time" , life and things have distracted me from hitting those targets.
My first Millennium Post can be seen by clicking on the link and was about eight and a half years after I started this blog. This one is about four years after the last one so the rate of posting has doubled and again I'm not sure if the quality has improved although the quantity definitely has.
One of things in the last four years I have started walking a million steps every three months on a rolling basis which was inspired by the Diabetes UK One Million Step Challenge which raises money for charity. I just did it to see if I could do it and it has helped me discover a lot of places that I would never have seen if I had not been on foot.
The fact that this has fallen on a Sunday would have some kind of divine significance for some people but lets face it there was a one in seven chance it would happen. At the beginning of the year I wanted to hit two thousand posts by the end of the year, and because I kept posting I realised I could actually hit it this month, so I have done that.
This means I will soon have the number of posts up to our number of Anno Domini years whether that's significant or not.
So nothing momentous to write about, and trying to think of a significant song for this , should we go with Pulp's "Disco 2000" or The Rolling Stones "2000 Light Years From Home" but definitely not Robbie Williams "Millennium" (which I always thought was spelt with one 'n') or "2000 Man" by Kiss , but then I saw on "Their Satanic Majesties Request" the Stones had a song called "2000 Man" so we will go with that, with it's heavy Kinks influences. The video is full of images that appear in "The Illuminatus Trilogy" so it's strange how many things just coincide.
I thought Captain Beefheart had a song called "2000 Man" but I had got it mixed up with "25th Century Quaker" , understandable mistake.
So it's a sunny-ish Sunday have a good one and thank you for reading.
This is post number 1999 so there's only one way this is going isn't there. In fact the next few posts could all definitely be music related, but "1999" is one of those all time perfect songs.
It's not like the album was short on quality but opening with the title track followed by "Little Red Corvette" and you already have a killer, and this was pre CD so I had a double vinyl copy, and it is one to consider for my vinyl collection.
I'm quite surprised I'm on my third paragraph and everyone knows who I am talking about but I haven't yet even mentioned him by name, the sadly missed , immensely talented guitar titing funkster Prince Rogers Nelson.
Though 1999 appears in lots of artwork , books and film , as well as music as the pre millenium year this is what the Google search gives you. so you don't even have to search.
We're in the middle of summer and a week of rain is forecast. The good thing is that you don't need sprinklers and water plants and garden, but does mean you need to have some kind of rain protection although it's still very hot so a waterproof jacket or coat is not an option and umbrellas are often cumbersome.
I never thought I would wear a hat, but many years ago in a windy wet Whitby , someone suggested I spend £12 waterproof hat (which you can see here) and that was brilliant , it keeps you mostly dry , leaves both hands free, and stays om your head when it's windy, and generally when it's raining it's my preferred method of keeping dry.
After the mess of the leak in the extension not being addressed by the last lot of disappearing fixers , the excellent and professional Responsive Roofing came and looked and put a temporary fix up which kept us dry last night, now I'm just waiting for the estimate which will punch another big hole in my finances, but it has to be done, and they are great guys and happy knowing the will do a good job. The problem is we expect things to last forever and they don't.
So what do we go with this morning, maybe "Wonder Toys That Last Forever" an absolutely brilliant song from Bill Nelson's (one of Yorkshire's finest) Red Noise (post Be Bop Deluxe) , yes it's very 1980's in it's production but it is a great song.
The Bake in Byker (a lebanese restaurant I have not yest visited but heard great reports about) has a presence in The Grainger Market called Felafel Al Hana, which I visited briefly when it first opened and was treated to complimentary felafel. I had been a couple of times and decided the main courses were too much for lunch, but passed today and checked out the hot starters and these actually looked like more than enough for a meal.
I ordered Batata Harra and Fried Vegetables , which was a more that decent serving of fried spiced potato cubes with sauce , bread , olives , mushrooms and a lot more vegetables , so an aleast vegetarian if not vegan meal , along with a cold jug of water, all for undet four pounds.
Service and the people were very welcoming and I have a few more items on th estarter menu that I am going to try. It is one of the many brilliant places to eat in the Grainger Market and far better thatn most of the chains in The Eldon (Incidentally Giraffe has gone).
You can see what I had here. It was as good as it looks.
I wasn't sure exactly what music to have on this but as I had just got a new Facebook friend who was a friend of the lead singer with the Coyotemen, Helmut Bruiser,
I think their last single "Can She Cook" should suffice as Felafel Al HAna certainly can cook
