Posts by Russell Brown
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Talking of dodgy old records..can I plug my new Ripper Records page here? Of course I can....
Wow. When you bring it all together like that it's dodgy, but legendary.
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Way back when I edited Planet, we ran a column by Chris Hegan on the subject of verbing nouns, including the emergence of "trial" as a verb in business-speak.
I headlined it: 'These things are sent to trial us'. Made my day.
Prof Hay may have a view on whether "headlined" is a verbed noun that has attained respectability.
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I've had long discussions with Assoc-Prof Hay on this sort of thing. As I understand it, she sees linguistics as being descriptive rather than prescriptive.
To use the musician analogy: I think (if asked) she'd inform you that your 'C' was a eighth-tone flat -- but she wouldn't suggest for a moment that you stopped playing it. She'd just try to figure out how your brain worked in making sense of a eighth-tone flat 'C'.
That makes sense. I can't parse a sentence, but I feel entirely comfortable writing one, and generally contrive to do so correctly. I feel sufficiently confident in this to, say, tell the Microsoft Word grammar-checker to piss off on occasion.
By contrast, I have no such feel for music, although I enjoy consuming it. And I know people who have a great deal more affinity for books than I do, but cannot write good prose to save themselves.
And seeing as no one asked, yes I am feeling better. Perhaps in a few hours I will eat.
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If Chirs Finlayson ends up becoming the next Arts Minister, here's his form speech: "Good evening. Love you all, love your work, have a drink on me. Good night." :) And if all else fails, let's hope there's some contrary cuss up the back of the hall to say the Emperor not only has no clothes, but he's fat and has a microscopically tiny Weiner.
Actually, Finlayson did himself a hell of a lot of good on Frontseat recently by (a) appearing to know what he was talking about, and (b) appearing to care.
Clark's problem is that she always gives The Speech. As in, the same speech, every event, every year. She barks out the cheerleading points, notes some recent successes, and everyone claps, but it's getting a bit stale. I understand staff have attempted to point this out.
But it is true that she has had a rapturous reception pretty much every time she's given it since 2000 -- the industry is genuinely grateful, and Labour's explicit recognition of local music as something that mattered created the climate for a lot of other things to happen. But maybe now she'll consent to someone drafting her something more lyrical.
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Russell: THANKYOU FOR THE KARAJOZ!! Caffeine-soaked weekend.
How you got it through the letterbox remains a mystery.If I told you I'd have to kill you, and that would be unfortunate ...
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Could someone post the wiki link again?
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Thanks Deborah. I'd say more, but I've been up half the night with a rather distracting gastric bug ...
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I don't think that what I wrote justified what was subsequently written about me. It might have justified me being told I had made a mistake, that I had misinterpreted Craig, but not what was actually written.
Yep. The proper response was "not what I meant", or, better yet, Heather's interpretation.
My concern was not just that I was subjected to what you call bitchiness, and I saw as abuse, but that no one asked Craig to stop, despite all the comment elsewhere on PA, and that when someone did, another poster leapt in to defend the person who was being bitchy / abusive. THEATRE was only called after Craig was told, by a newcomer, that he was out of line. So it wasn't THEATRE when Craig was being bitchy / abusive to me, but it was THEATRE when someone posted a comment critical of Craig.
What's a girl to think about all this?
Er, let's not get too hung up on "theatre", chuffed as I am for it to have actually become part of the culture of these forums.
Craig presumably couldn't help himself dropping a few snark bombs in what could have been reasonable replies, but people called him on his tone immediately, and more than once. I hope he apologises to you, but I don't think it went unremarked.
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The Injury That Ruined My Career as a Rock Star Before it Even Began
I was in the 2nd XV in the six form. At practice one afternoon early in the season, during a tackling drill, I thought I'd tackle our captain before he even caught the ball -- just for a lark.
I did, chuckling as we went down. But taken by surprise, the captain fell awkwardly, and his weight came down on my left wrist, forcing the hand back and sideways. I telled out and then sat up to see a wrist that just looked bad. The coach drew breath, then told me to go over to the tap and run cold water on it for as long as I could stand it. (This turned out to be good advice.)
There was clearly little prospect of me riding my bike home, so I went over to the staffroom, showed off my injury to a couple of teachers who were still there and called my mum, to say I'd sprained my wrist and could she please come and pick me up.
To her eternal embarrassment, she was unsympathetic and unwilling to come and get me. I had to tell her in very strong terms that she was coming. Her lack of sympathy was wholly out of character, and when she arrived and saw my arm, she was extremely remorseful.
So off we went to the hospital, where an x-ray revealed a reasonably bad break -- a couple of the bones in my wrist had been crushed together. I got a cast the next day, and wore it for the duration, but I was never sent to physio.
As a result that wrist has never been right since. In particular, curling what was supposed to be my fretting hand around a guitar neck was painful. In the age of punk rock, when anyone could pick up a guitar, I could not even learn to play.
But don't be sad. If I'm to be honest, the major obstacle to guitar stardom for me was not a broken wrist, but a singular lack of musical talent. FFS, I was reduced to impotent frustration trying to play the recorder in primary school. It wouldn't have turned out well.
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Golly.
Alright, if anyone cares, I'm saying:
1. I don't think that Craig's original comment was offensive, nor was it intended to be so.
2. It was fair enough to take issue with its logic, but not to impute motive.
3. Craig's subsequent replies were needlessly bitchy.
4. The use of the "theatre" call was appropriate, given that the discussion had become inappropriately acrimonious.
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