Dream on dreamer, life gets in the way

On Sunday I had a rather bizarre thought that still plagues me occasionally. I'm writing this blog entry in a vain attempt to clear it from my mind. The initial thought was, what's becoming of the old Woolies in Hanley? The answer still seems to be “nowt”.

So then of course my thought was what would I do if I were to re-open this fairly large and nicely located space right in the centre of Stoke on Trent's main shopping area? Would any funds be available from the council to help kick-start something? After all they're not gonna want an eyesore in their central shopping thoroughfare. However judging by the above article it's not even clear where the council stand as to who currently owns the property. (Same goes for their Longton, Stoke and Burslem branches)

My thoughts seemed to conclude on the idea of a shop that sold almost exclusively locally made goods; be it art, pottery, food, music ... whatever. The back of the shop would be a place for local musicians to play acoustic sets and do CD signing sessions, perhaps it would work as a comedy venue too - with a coffee/juice bar to boot. There could perhaps be a way to work with Cross Rhythms (who of course I still have strong connections with), in order to have a place in Stoke that sells a wide range of good quality Christian music.

After watching a recent Panorama it was clear that Woolworths were selling CDs and DVDs at a loss. If this shop actually happened (and that's a huge if), aside from that Cross Rhythms collaboration idea, CDs would only be from local artists. As with all local produce items would be sold in a co-operative manner – in other words the shop and the artist/producer would agree a set rate of what their cut from each sale would be.

Local artists (in a varied forms of media) could perhaps display their work around the shop in order to add to the aesthetic of the place and of course provide them a valid avenue of potential revenue. Staffordshire is considered the creative county yet the past fifty years has seen a decline in the pottery industry with little coming along to replace it in terms of creativity. Our innate local talent needs to be championed more.

After a short amount of research it turns out at least one council has worked with local creatives to stop the old Woolies becoming an eyesore. Stroud District Council (Gloucestershire) has been given temporary permission to jazz up their town centre store. They're tapping into the £3m government initiative to help communities reduce the impact of empty shops, stopping town centres from becoming ghost towns. The better known example of a reborn former Woolworths store is that of Wellworths in Dorchester.

I'm sure this will just remain a pipe dream but at least now I've typed up some of the bare bones of my idea it will hopefully stop bugging me ... unless someone else out there has the know-how and/or the passion to help make this happen and gets in contact with me.

What's with all the effin' and jeffin'?

Earlier this week I watched In The Loop with Lisa. Much to both our surprise she really enjoyed it and it goes without saying that I did too. The story was solid and the slightly rejigged and extended cast of The Thick of It were all on top form. But with both the TV series and the film what really brings home the oats are the semi-improvised oneliners. Many of these highlights were provided by the mighty spin doctor supremo Malcolm Tucker, whose gritty wit was strong enough to put down the highest of ministers and the largest of Americans.

Cross Rhythms (for whom I present a show) have a resident film critic and their review was bound to touch on the matter of the colourful language. At the time I did wonder whether I should have been laughing so hard at such coarse language but then my rational has always been about how the other person perceives it. Someone can call me whatever they like and it's unlikely offend me unless there is real venom behind their words but I of course am sensitive to other people's feelings and generally don't tend to swear. So I am fairly comfortable to see someone swear in a fictional backdrop as no-one is genuinely going to be hurt by those words. Also the character of Malcom Tucker (and his fellow Scottish press officer) would be significantly diminished if his blunt language was refined, in other words he wouldn't be Malcolm Tucker.

On another note the almost boundless cynicism that ripples through the film will almost certainly be met with bemusement in Obama-infatuated America. We here in the UK shouldn't encounter any such problems when the extremely realistic truths echo through the picture, watch out for the line about MP expenses (filmed before the Jacqui Smith saga) if you want an example.

Cross Rhythms are always rolling out great articles, here's a couple of recent highlights: Check out Ben Jack's unpacking of the sickening compensation culture that we all too happily seem to be embracing and Mike Rimmer's ever relevant challenge to Christians who want to make good music and get out a contemporary and thought-provoking message at the same time.

If you're easily offended don't go and see In The Loop, if you have a backbone I heartily recommend it. Lisa will testify that you don't need to be a politics/satire nerd to enjoy one of the best British films in recent memory.

“Science is the answer to how. God is the answer to why.” Discuss

One of my most recent facebook status' was a paraphrase of something someone said in a recent BBC documentary. The programme was called Did Darwin Kill God? and the paraphrase was taken from Francis Collins, “Science is the answer to how. God is the answer to why.”

He's a very interesting man who for more than a decade headed up the Human Genome Project. He's a firm believer in God whilst being an active and influential scientist, another quote attributed to him is, "Evolution is God's way of giving upgrades."

My facebook status garnered a few comments and quickly descended into a full blown debate on the merits of science and faith, which ultimately lead me to the conclusion that a more accurate description of my own position would be, “Science attempts to answer how but God will always answer why.”

For me science is very important - without it many of the things we take for granted wouldn't exist, I wouldn't be able to travel to work nor would my job exist; without the scientific discoveries over the centuries we'd still be stuck in the same position we were in thousands of years ago. I guess there may be a small band of Christians that wouldn't have a problem with that but most can surely acknowledge that as knowledge and technology increases so does the human experience.

Most Christians happily take advantage of the comforts that modern technology can provide, nor would anyone want to see the medicines and treatments that have been worked on for decades be simply taken away. And yet the majority of conservative Christians seem to have this rather worrying phobia of science, as if there really is only one option Science or Religion.

There are very very few places where there is even the potential for the bible and science to clash yet a lot of Christians do get rather hung up on them and as a result seem to have a rather wary view of science. In defense of fundamentalist Christians I would say that it isn't the role of science to answer the big philosophical questions of life, strangely enough that's more ... well ... philosophy than science. Lets make sure it's only the bathwater we throw out though, the vast majority of science is there to further our existence. It's to improve our health, our technology, our transport, to better understand our surroundings et cetera.

You'll have noticed I've not yet expressed my position on the whole creation versus evolution debate, I'll leave that for another day. The other debate that might be worth delving into off the back of this is does modern technology make life too comfortable and stop us from being fully aware of our own humanity?

Harry Hill and the Gurkhas

Rightly so Harry Hill has been once again been named the UK's best entertainment performer at the Baftas. For some bizarre reason some news organisations have decided to focus more on the fact that Jonathan Ross lost:

SKY News

The Herald


The best man won, FACT. That's the story isn't it?

Another recent story to take my interest is the government's decision to limit the number of Gurkha veterans allowed to settle in the UK. These are guys who were on the frontline of numerous battles and wars for the UK and yet we seem to have refused them entry. Thankfully public opinion seems to be on the side of rewarding them for their bravery. Joanna Lumley has been battling over this issue for years and now the Lib Dems have taken the debate within parliament.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/8019745.stm

Clegg et al seem to be doing a better job of getting the political headlines at the moment, despite it being the Conservatives' spring conference. The Lib Dem leader has urged his fellow party leaders to back his plans for reforming MPs' second-homes allowances.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/8019853.stm

Both Clegg and David Cameron have thankfully rejected the PM's plan for a flat-rate fee based on attendance at Westminster.

This week I have been mainly

This week I was mostly listening to
Through Solace – The World on Standby
Absolutely stunning! It’s been so nice to follow over the last few years this bands evolution from metalcore start-ups to serious players. Technically very impressive and a nice more melodic edge to their still-brutal sound.
The Devil Wears Prada - With Roots Above and Branches Below
I managed to get hold of the two-track promo of their forthcoming album (comes out May 5th). I can guarantee I'll be giving airplay to the wonderfully titled Assistant to the Regional Manager.
The Glorious Unseen - The Cries Of The Broken
One on the few worship bands that are able to create truly original music. You could kinda describe it as emo worship. This is the EP that bridges between their amazing debut and their forthcoming follow-up.

This week I was mainly watching
Flight of the Conchords
I noticed that Series 2 of the ‘New Zealand musical two-piece based in America’ comedy is soon to hit UK screens so I decided to re-watch Series 1. It’s wonderful low-energy comedy; probably the second best comedy HBO has ever been behind.
The State of Play
An American political thriller that follows a journalist's probe into the suspicious death of a Congressman's mistress. What I didn’t realise until afterwards was that it’s a film adaptation of a 6-part BBC serial by the same name, which first aired on BBC One in 2003. The fact I now wanna watch the TV series should be testament to my enjoyment of the film.

This week I was mainly reading
Nothing out of choice really, I read about 5 pages of The Shack (I’m so bad at finishing books). It was mainly lots of contracts and things I needed to sign.

Other things of note from this week
I got a new car. Initially it seemed surprisingly simple, as the week went on it got more stressful and more taxing. Oscar the Octavia is dead long live Carol the Corsa … don’t worry I wont actually call my car that.

On Monday the cam belt snapped and the wheels came off on Wednesday

The New Labour project is dead. That's not to say that the Labour Party are definitely lame ducks a full year before the next general election* but that a number of the key values of the Anthony Giddens-inspired Third Way were broken, neigh shattered, yesterday in the face of the grim reality of our current economic conditions. To quote the BBC's Nick Robinson, “Britain is in the sharpest recession, has the highest borrowing and is about to experience the biggest public spending squeeze since the war.”

To increase the tax rate for the highest earners is to go against one of the key tenants of New Labour, not penalising high achievers. To break Gordon Brown's golden rules and announce yet another target completely missed goes against their 'end of boom and bust' boast. The net debt forecast is double what Gordon Brown deemed acceptable for a western economy, it's hit a whopping 79 per cent of GDP. You don't need to understand the figures to realise that an overhaul is needed on what it is to be a power-seeking social democratic party.

Granted, Alistair Darling did not have an envious job to do, whatever he was gonna say was not gonna be music to our ears but the sheer magnitude is simply staggering. David Cameron's reaction to the budget was clearly that of a prime minister in waiting and Nick Clegg's reaction made me chuckle too. Considering the magnitude Darling was remarkably daring to suggest that we'd be on an upturn by this time next year, certainly Labour will be banking on this being the case if they have any chance of once again holding off the Conservatives.

There were a couple of other eye-catching moments, one being supposedly we'd get two grand if we scrapped our ten-year old motors in favour of a new one. The fact is that the government would only meet half of that figure and the dealers will do everything in their power to not let that eat into their own overheads too much. For one thing, you're not gonna see so many people being able to barter down new cars from their initial ticket price.

Perhaps the most New Labour element to their budget was their claim to either find a job or train up an under-25 who has spent more than one year out of work. It's commendable but is surely one of those things that's easier said than done and would soon be full of loopholes. Gordon Brown would suggest that New Labour is all about aspirations, making sure people make the most of their potential and increasing opportunities for people to go out and achieve but now he's taxing more those who have achieved.

For the record, the cam belt refers to my car. On Tuesday I had to say goodbye to Oscar the Octavia.

* Under the assumption that the next general election is spring 2010.

The cheats way out

Today I've been inspired to write two seperate blog entries, neither of which I'll publish right now.

One was on a truly historic UK Budget, as delivered by Alistair Darling, however I've not fully digested all the detail so I'll save that for another day. The other was on how some Christians view science, I've not quite finished writing that but I promise to publish it very soon.

So instead I'm going to cop out and draw your attention to an article my friend recently wrote,

http://www.localmotoring.com/pages/local-motoring-news.php?b=2&a=1161

My old school friend Paul Forrester wrote a lovely message to me last week saying how he'd enjoyed reading parts of my blog so to return the favour a few of our mutual friends (if no-one else) may find the above link worth a view. I certainly enjoyed reading it.

Tomorrow I promise to actually write something of merit myself though...

TheAppeal.co.uk

Back in my late teens and early twenties I was what local newspapers or radio stations would call a “budding comedy writer”. On two occasions I made a little bit of progress through BBC Talent and did various other bits and bobs, I'll do the full ego-trip some other time ... you lucky lucky people!

For now I just want to remind myself that I do like writing and I want to get back into the habit of writing comedy regularly again. Hopefully I'll read my own blog in a few weeks time (because I'm a bit weird like that) and it'll spur me on.

The reason behind my prompt is firstly that a new satirical website is starting up in May, theappeal.co.uk, and I was contacted by the bloke behind it to submit stuff to it prior to it going live.* We've stayed in contact with each other after both falling at the penultimate hurdle of a BBC Talent scheme a few years back. The second reason behind my forthcoming (potential) burst of writing is that a new show is soon to start on BBC 7 and it's open door.

I used to write pretty much every week in my teens and uni years, but my Masters put pay to that and for some reason I never quite got back into the swing of things afterwards with the occasional odd burst, as it were. I'm fairly certain I'll never try stand up again though...

Don't forget that this blog is mainly to allow to me to write stuff down that interests or inspires me before I forget it. If you happen to enjoy what I write even better. I am the key demographic, bully for you if you're enjoying the ride!

* Until it goes live the link won't work of course.

The (other) Trent Vale poet takes early retirement

To round off my fairly short series of posts demonstrating how I can string together something equating to a poem in a matter of minutes; below are my two earliest attempts.

At the bottom of this post are the links to my two previous entries on this theme, the first one gives a little more background as to who/what these poems were written for. And this is the link for the actual Trent Vale Poet.

The first one was themed around Coventry and Warwickshire, all I simply did was hijack a William Blake poem, the second theme was Weather. For the record Bob Brolly is a presenter on the station I was writing it for.

And did those feet in ancient time,
Walk upon England’s mountains green
And was the holy Lamb of God,
On England’s pleasant pastures seen
And did the Countenance Divine,
Shine forth upon our clouded hills?
And was Jerusalem builded here,
Among these dark Satanic Mills?
No
Until then, Stratford, Warwick, Leamington and Cov.
Will be the closest taste of Heaven here on earth
Us mere mortals will ever get to taste of the above
I wish I could say that it's filled my heart with mirth

An Indian summer, that's what my friend said she was hoping for last week
Her optimism was radiant but the sun wasn't, hiding instead behind thick dark clouds of peril
Watch out for surface water on the M6, I'm already sick of saying it
And yet there's still more to come.
Bob Brolly's namesake has been used extensively this week, the weatherman has not been good to him.
But however overcast we might feel we've got it pretty good here on this little island
Not lying on a faultline and not even the sniff of a tropical storm
Grin and bear it, it's the British way

http://gregsammons.blogspot.com/2009/04/trent-vale-poet-has-no-clear.html

http://gregsammons.blogspot.com/2009/03/other-trent-vale-poet.html

Five qued gerrin! You’re josheen aren’t ya duck?

There are few things in Stoke on Trent that truly bring in the outsiders. Stoke really is one of those cities that people aspire to leave rather than draw in people who aspire to live here. However one of those few attractions has really been burgeoning the last ten years or so is Trentham Gardens, especially after the introduction of the Monkey Forest.

On the back of that investment came the development of the new paths, the Italian Gardens and the shops between the garden centre and the lake. At the start of this year some wise guy decided to charge people to walk around the lake, something which had been free for as long as the lake had been there.

Now, I’d been aware that this charge was imminent and as such wasn’t entirely surprised when yesterday ‘may un mar lady’ were asked to dig our hands in our pockets. However a fresh dose of outrage came over Lisa, hence the title of the blog. Yes she’s a true Potteries girl but I don’t think she actually said, “Five qued gerrin! You’re josheen aren’t ya duck?” You’ll have to allow me poetic license there I’m afraid.

It must be noted that on one of the sunniest days of the year so far the car park was half empty, less people were in the shops than usual and from what we could see the path around the lake looked like a ghost town. I really feel for the shop-keepers as passing trade must have dropped significantly. It might be rather late to join now but this facebook group is still heavily subscribed to and I urge you to join in unison with me when I say “Five qued gerrin! Hast thee avin me on mar mate?”

Fives - The five records labels that'll keep your ears happy

Fives is a feature I’ve been meaning to start on my show for a while now. It’s basically a way for relative newcomers to the Rock and Hard Place to get properly stuck into their scene. In future weeks I’ll list 5 must metal bands, 5 hardcore bands that truly get you pumped, 5 British acts that really should be bigger, 5 emo outfits that actually bring something new to the table, 5 zines and forums that’ll keep you up to speed etc…

This week it’s five music labels that’ll give you a bountiful supply of great faith-inspired bands:

Tooth and Nail / Solid State Records
Easily the largest label in terms of bands played on my show and in the Christian alternative scene. However they wouldn’t call themselves a Christian label but to a label who "allow artists who are Christians to create their art.” One day I’ll explain the ‘Christian band v Christians in a band’ debate but now’s not the time. They started in 1993 and quickly developed a number of sub-labels as their commercial success grew; the one of most note to me is Solid State as that’s where the heavier bands reside.
Notable Solid State alumni: Becoming the Archetype, Demon Hunter, Living Sacrifice, Norma Jean, Soul Embraced, Trenches, Underoath.
Former notables: Blindside, Extol, Life in Your Way, Figure Four
Notable Tooth and Nail alumni: Children 18:3, The Classic Crime, Emery, Hawk Nelson, MewithoutYou, Project 86, Showbread, Spoken, Thousand Foot Krutch.
Former notables: Anberlin, Beloved, Brave Saint Saturn, Dead Poetic, The Juliana Theory, The O.C. Supertones, P.O.D.

Facedown Records (plus imprint labels Dreamt and Strikefirst)
Possibly my favourite label due to their family feel and their social conscience. Jason Dunn started it out as a hardcore label but it now has a much wider range of bands. Still to this day though (with the exception of Thives and Liars) their best bands would fall into the metal and hardcore categories.
Notable Facedown/Strikefirst/Dreamt alumni:
Hands, Impending Doom, Jesus Wept, No Innocent Victim, Take it Back!, Thieves and Liars, Through Solace.
Former notables: Bloodlined Calligraphy, Comeback Kid, XDEATHSTARX, Immortal Souls, Nodes of Ranvier, Sinai Beach, xDisciplex A.D.

Flicker / Essential Records
Until it was bought by Provident Label Group (one of the big CCM powerhouses) Flicker Records was one of the most exciting independent labels out there. They’d stumbled upon some great fortune by making Pillar one of their first signings. Their commercial success allowed the label to grow to the point that it became an attractive purchase and as a result lost most of it’s alternative credibility. If you want safe but fairly rocking music this is your best bet (you may also wanna try SRE Recordings - home of Disciple, Flyleaf, POD, Skillet etc).
Notable Facedown/Strikefirst/Dreamt alumni: Fireflight, Flatfoot 56, Kids in the Way, Pillar, Red.
Former notables: Mortal Treason, Staple, Subseven.

Metal Blade
If you’re a little more daring and don’t mind bursting your Christian bubble a little you’ll no doubt be aware that there is a whole world of great faith-inspired bands that are signed to mainstream labels. In metal circles there are few labels with the same credibility as Metal Blade. Here’s a list of some of the current and former greats: As I Lay Dying, Aletheian, Austrian Death Machine, Believer, Woe of Tyrants, Winter Solstice.

Ferret
One of the great hardcore labels (a difficult concept as to be truly hardcore how can you be signed to a successful label?) and full of Christian musicians. Currently on their books are: The Devil Wears Prada, Maylene and the Sons of Disaster, Underneath the Gun and the mighty Zao!

NB: Each label’s notable roster is in alphabetical order rather than in order or preference or notoriety. All bands and labels should be fairly easy to find via myspace or google but feel free to contact me for links or questions.

This week I have been mainly

This week I was mostly listening to
A Plea For Purging - Depravity
A bosting lead single, a huge lead singer who has a wonderful self-depreciating sense of humour and just a huge chunky sound. Their best release to date.
Portishead - Third
After being silent for neigh on a decade the trip hop pioneers take a slightly more industrial turn on this 2008 release. It’s a nice album to chill out to when you get you fancy a break from rock, metal and hardcore.
David Crowder Band – A Collision
One of only a handful of truly creative worship bands. Chris Tomlin, Bluetree and the Glorious Unseen are the only other artists that readily spring to mind.

This week I was mainly watching
The Apprentice
It’s picking up nicely now and I have a weird admiration for the series villain. If anything the show that follows, You’re Fired, is better than the programme itself!
Sideways
Lisa had not seen it and before whacking it on ebay we gave it a watch. This was the third time I’d watched it and I still love it!
A lot of negative TV coverage against the police
TV news of the last few days has been giving a lot of coverage to Hillsborough and ever since G20 of people making claims against police brutality. Both stories show the police in a negative light and I’d like to go on record of showing my support to the boys in blue. It’s becoming increasingly hard for them to be able to carry out their job. Yes there a few idiots in the force – same goes for every profession.

This week I was mainly reading
Brochures of things to do in and around York and a lot of the gubbins that you get when you go to the places in and around York.

Other things of note from this week
Tuesday and Wednesday I went to York with Lisa. Maybe at some point I’ll go into detail as to what tickled and inspired me whilst there but for now I’ll just do a simple list of things we did and saw (so I don’t forget them!). Castle Howard, a walk around the city wall, York Minster, York Dungeons, lots of twee little shops and museums, York Art Gallery … but not The Tandoori Night, despite all the subliminal advertising.

Adsense

You may have noticed that I’m not a socialist by the simple fact I have allowed google to advertise on my blog. One day I might go more into my politics and why they’re coloured the way they are but for now I’d like to ask a simple favour.

For some reason they suspended my adsense account (that’s what the advert monitoring service is called). They feel that the service is being abused, which most likely means that someone was doing me a favour by over-clicking on the links to generate some money for me. Thank you for helping me out but google seem to think that’s not a great idea as it creates a false impression as to how many people clicked on the links with good intent.

The adsense set up only pays a few cents (it’s in US currency you see) a day so it’s really not a money making scheme but just a nice little way that every few months I get a little reward for keeping myself creative and writing. Please do click on the adverts if they appeal to you but for google’s and my own sake it’s not a good idea to abuse them. The reason behind my blog being here is explained in my first every post. Thanks for reading and feel free to suggest future topics or to comment on what’s been written so far.

I've just come back from a couple of lovely days in York. I've felt inspired in various ways and want to work on a few ideas, in the fullness of time some of these ideas may spill over onto here.

So you want to be metal?

What do you mean "no"?

I've been enjoying playing the lead single from A Plea For Purging's latest album on the Rock and Hard Place and as such decided to check out the video for it. I found it both informative and enjoyable. If you too want to be metal here's a few handy hints,

A PLEA FOR PURGING "Malevolence"


There's a comedian in the US called Brian Posehn. His whole USP is that he's a metal head. Despite this I generally find him rather boring - I mean a weird rant about Slayer could potentially be funny but he seems to fail to deliver. However this video did tickle me a couple of years back,



\m/

The Trent Vale Poet has no clear competition

Despite currently living in Trent Vale (Stoke on Trent) I really don't think the Trent Vale Poet has anything to worry about in terms of competition.

You can read the background to why I wrote these poems and where they were broadcast here. The photo is of John Butler, the presenter of the show I wrote them for. It should be fairly clear (but I'll say it anyway) that the two themes I had to write about this time round were Winter and Bonfire Night.

In the bleak midwinter
There's a fifty percent chance of snow on my birthday
There was a fifty percent chance of my fifth being the best
Aged five my dad proudly showed my present that year
Two yellow plastic sledges ideal for the nearby hills
The odds fell in our favour and it snowed all weekend
Allowing me and he to slide down those frosted slopes

But those blissful childhood birthdays are long gone
So has my love for those cold, dank, grim, short days
Worse still is that it's just begun, early days for winter
It's great to sit warm inside and watch the cold outside
But you've gotta go out sometime and taste that bitter air
It freshens my lungs as I wait for that next birthday sledge

Bonfire Night
As the firewood crackles around Guy Fawkes
My mind flies back to the days of the days of yore
The bang, the whizz and the smell of burnt meats
The gloves, the scarves and the wellies on my feet
It's been too long since my last fireworks night
I say I'm too old to have the same delight

That I had when I was ten and my fresh face went red
In the cold that felt so comforting like a warm winter bed

I know I want to go but I pretend I dont
So I imagine the night that wont
Be happening for real just in my head
I'm not outside having fun, I'm in bed

Dreaming that I'm ten again and not twenty four
So I won't be smelling that burnt wood anymore
Not til I have my own kids when I can be ten again
Standing in my scarf and wellies in the pouring rain

A day to be thankful and to be in awe

For some reason Christmas has ended up trumping Easter as the big Christian festival, I assume it's due to the present giving nature of it and the way the world of advertising works.

But if you know the basics of how the Christian faith works you'd hopefully realise that it's the events of Good Friday and Easter Sunday which more than anything else defines what we believe. Jesus took on all our sins, so that we can go to him for full forgiveness when we recognise our shortcomings, and then took them to the cross as the ultimate sacrifice. Ergo, He died for our sins.

It's because of that event we can be fully restored and be right with God. Jesus' death gives us full freedom from sin – a deeply liberating experience for any Christian who fully realises the consequence of this.

Of course that's only half of the story. Jesus overcoming death gives us the most obvious demonstration that He has power over life and death, and as such has the ability to give people eternal life. Paul goes into more detail on this in Corinthians.

I used to quite regularly visit a social networking site called UK Christians. It was a good way to promote my show on Cross Rhythms as well as to talk about various bits and bobs with other people. I hardly touch it now but I quite liked the below link which went up on Friday and is equally apt for today:

http://www.ukchristians.net/forum/topics/its-friday-but-sundays-a

Laments on Gazzetta Della Grog - Part 2

As you probably gathered from my previous entry I was mainly describing the paper edition of GDG but that's only the half of it ... you probably also realised that both versions were written in my juvenile and pre-Christian days. I feel like putting one of those kind of “the views expressed by the author are not those expressed by the present day Greg Sammons” disclaimers in.

The same motley crew that were behind the newsletter stayed on for Sixth Form and decided, for some unknown reason, that we should embrace the 21st Century (which had only just started then of course) and do it online. The thinking being that no busy-body teacher could stop us from ranting about pointless gubbins and swear for no obvious reason.

I didn't have the html skills to start up the website so a wonderful Canadian gentle giant who happened to also be called Greg helped set it up and edited the web side of the things for the first few months. A small group of regular and occasional contributors kept the website ticking along nicely for a decent period of time until girlfriends and A-levels got in the way. It was the end of sixth form that was the final death knell as it saw us go our separate ways and as such the website quickly fell into stagnation, despite another gentle giant (Dan) offering to take over the editor's role.

In terms of highlights well as you head to the homepage you'd want to click on 'Classic GDG' to get to the really good stuff. If you're a teenage male (as we were back then) you may wish to check out our definitive list of names for the male phallus. As for other highlights, well quite frankly it's a lot of in-jokes (some in the form of poetry) and nostalgia that would only make sense to a small circle of old college/school friends. If you went to Tavistock then the review might bring back some memories, apparently Heaney has finally put his camcorder footage on DVD but I've yet to see it. At the time it was generally considered that the best column was written by a very bitter and remarkably twisted Nick McMullen. This link will get you to his last one with links from there to previous ones if you're not easily offended. As with me it may be advisable to remember that his views now may not be the same as those expressed then ... although knowing Nick as I do he's probably still as perverse as ever.

I was one very strange teenager (some things don't change I guess), as well as feeling the need to write the newsletter and website I also used to bring a dictaphone to sixth form and record mine and various other people's inane thoughts. I feel a tape listening session coming on...

This week I have been mainly

One day I'll read this and it'll remind me of something I once liked but have forgotten about.
For everyone else, you'll probably find this rather pointless...



This week I was mostly listening to
Becoming The Archetype - Dichotomy
Without a doubt one of my favourite albums of 2008 ... nah make that EVER. Amazing musicianship, deep and meaningful lyrics and just a kick-ass sound. Brutal progressive metal at it's zenith.
Woe of Tyrants – Kingdom of Might
A band fairly new to me and fairly new to The Rock and Hard Place. Progressive metal of a different type to BTA but still very entertaining. The two part title track is without doubt the highlight. One of the best heavy albums of 2009 so far.
Kate Nash – Made of Bricks
I would say it's a guilty secret but I'm not ashamed in any way to name it as one of my most enjoyable listens of the past year. Mariella is an amazing song, I chucked the CD in my car radio a few days ago and got goose pimples.

This week I was mainly watching
Yes We Can! The Lost Art of Oratory
Obviously it comes off the back of Obama-fever. I really am a sucker for soaring oratory, maybe I should go to a black-majority church once every month to get my fill. It pumps me up!
Newswipe
A spin-off from the excellent Charlie Brooker's Screenwipe. He dissects TV news in an educating, entertaining and downright funny way.
The Boat That Rocked
Richard Curtis' latest. As a bit of a radio nerd I was perhaps a little more interested in the detail than your average punter. But as a story it was not bad at all nicely playing on some good themes and tugging at the emotions. Certainly more enjoyable for me than his rom com back catalogue.

This week I was mainly reading
Gazzetta Della Grog
A wonderous nostalgia trip with the bittersweet knowledge that I'm a much different person to the bloke that wrote it.
Book of Job – The Bible
You think you've got it bad?! A wonderful story of being tested to the absolute limit and written in a very poetic way. There's only one thing you can put your absolute faith in.

Other things of note from this week
Last Sunday we went for a picnic on a very sunny, but remarkably chilly, day. We both managed to find inspiration, she wrote a poem and I came up with two different ideas for a book aimed at boys aged 8-12.

Broadcasting to Halesowen, Blackheath and surrounding areas ... ay it

It's the future!

http://www.bcrfm.com/

More as 'we' get it...

Laments on Gazzetta Della Grog - Part 1

If any of you might think I'm still a little immature I'd like to offer the below link as proof that I am improving, slowly.

http://www.geocities.com/gazzetta_della_grog/

I'll give you some pointers as to what is especially worth a butchers in the second part but for now let me give you a brief history of how Gazzetta Della Grog came about ... and you can humour me by nodding and going “yeah, yeah ... oh really? ... how interesting ... fancy that” and suchlike.

So it's 1997 and Tony Blair is still ace, in fact he's still got that Obama-esq 'anything is possible' glow about him, but some teenagers in Staffordshire are thinking, “this is all fine and dandy but where can I read some badly worded made-up gossip about my teachers and libel my fellow pupils?” Meanwhile I, Greg Sammons, was going through a phase where my friends would insist on giving me a different nickname each week – many of them had the same root, Grog. Being a bit weird I decided that I'd waste my parents inkjet cartridges and create a newsletter for my mates using Microsoft Publisher 95. Being even weirder I decided it paraphrase the name of an Italian football rag and call it Gazzetta Della Grog.

It snowballed. For every one copy I sold to my mate for less than it cost in ink to print another 5 or 6 people would read it on the school bus or between lessons. Even some of my teachers read our efforts and a number of my mates became regular contributors.

However one fateful evening I was typing up the latest issue and my mum decided to lean over my shoulder and read the handiwork. She wasn't particularly impressed that I'd once again ripped into the school scapegoat, an unfortunate 'friend' of mine called Matthew Pickford, and in the next sentence cast aspersions over a number of my teachers. Being a crazy mad woman (when you start to realise how bizarre my mum is you start to better understand how I turned out as I did) she grassed me up to my head of year.

The next day three friends and I were escorted into the head of year's office and asked to explain what we'd been up to. After a passionate missive on the right to free speech the poor teacher had no idea what to do with me ... other than hate the fact that a pesky thirteen-year-old had beaten him in a debate. Hence why later that day we're called into the Head Teacher's office. He makes up some gubbins about copyright, libel and various other things that were designed to scare and confuse four cheeky youths, with the bottom line being that we can't continue to let copies appear on school grounds.

And with that a silly little newsletter died and a legend was born.

Just in case you didn't realise I was a massive geek

Perhaps the hollowest boast I ever made was when I once told someone totally deadpan that in 1999 I was the 9th best under 16 subbuteo player in the UK.
It's no lie, in my teen years I did play competitively at a time when most lads were on their Sony Playstation or equivalent. And for a while I was starting to get pretty good, I could play fairly fluid, although perhaps a better defender than I ever was as an attacker.
The only problem was that aside from a few friends I convinced to play too most people thought I was insane to wanna play. At the ripe old of 16 I decided perhaps it was time to retire (girls, college, a part-time weekend job etc) and spent very little time in the following few years thinking about it until I made that appalling earlier boast a few months ago. Something within me clicked and I started looking online as to whether people still played. To my utter disbelief just before Christmas I found out that a fella I beat when I was 14 was now the WORLD NUMBER 2! He lost in the final of last year's world championships to a Dutch bloke. (Since then he's slipped to number 9 in the world)
At the start of this year I made it my pledge (and I don't care how sad it makes me) to get back into my flicking groove and make 2009 my year of preparation to become the 2010 world champion.
However since then I have acquired a girlfriend and it's quite possible that there may be a few things that could well take priority over this quest. I've starting going to the odd meeting at a local club and intend to go to one or two tournaments this year. Maybe it's gonna take a little longer but the dream still lives on.

For the record it's not me in the photo but a lovely man called Tom Taylor from whom I recently bought a team of claret and blue Sureshots.

I think you've missed the point mate

I came across a rather worrying article produced by the BNP the other day. In the story there's a ridiculously (and clearly) doctored photo of their supposed new poster campaign ahead of the European elections. More on the story can be found here amongst other places.
The advert features a picture of Jesus Christ and quotes a part of a verse from John 15:20, which Jesus says: "If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you". The verse comes in the context of Jesus' teaching about love. He of course also asks us to love our enemies...
What slightly confuses me is why on earth would a middle eastern Jew who stretched his hand out to the neighbouring races and communities want an 'all-white' Britain? There seems to be no logic in this ... not that there is in any form of racism mind you.
Whilst the Church of England has decided that under the maxim of 'all publicity is good publicity' it's best not to comment on the story, there other Christians that have.
God Bless Jonathan Bartley and his mates at Ekklesia and God Bless the bassist from one of my favourite bands who posted this message on a forum in response to the story,

"And who where some of the most vehement amongst Jesus' persecutors? The nationalistic Pharisee party. They where upset by His whole deal about loving those of other nationalities whom they considered where causing political, economic and spiritual ruin in the country. To say that they 'ran the church' is misleading - the church as we know it was non existent at this time... I am a Christian and I am totally offended by this poster and find that it borders on the blasphemous. If anything it pushes me even further away from your beliefs and makes me want to convince others to do the same. If you care about Christians at all you will get shot of it."

Admittedly Christians would love to see everyone in the UK be Christians too but we'd never want to do it by force or by restricting anyone else's ability to have their own beliefs. Who exactly is it that feels unable to worship God in a church? Who exactly is it that feels we're being forced to go to a Mosque instead? Who exactly is it that has such a fragile identity that they can't stand other people being different in any way, shape or form?

This week I have been mainly

Another week, another chance to self indulge.
If anything prompts you or takes your fancy, even better.



This week I was mostly listening to
The Gentlemen – Sending Cards
The new single from my soon-to-be interviewees. Their second album is out at the start of May and this is their first single from it. They're pushing a bit harder to break the mainstream this time.
Red – Innocence and Instinct
Considering how well it'd gone down in the US I decided it was probably a good idea I gave it a re-listen to see if I'd missed another tune for the Rock and Hard Place ... I hadn't.
Gomez – Bring It On
Deserved winners of the 1998 Mercury Music Prize.

This week I was mainly watching
Did Darwin Kill God
The Apprentice
FM
The top choice was done from the perspective of an evolution-believing Christian. Very interesting stuff. FM is a sitcom set in a radio station, on paper I should love it, on TV it's doing just about enough to keep me watching.

This week I was mainly reading
Libertas Insider libertasinsider.blogspot.com
Seventh Angel's myspace blog check out their entry for April 1st.

Other things of note from this week
Last weekend we went up to Leeds on the Friday evening for a Funeral For A Friend gig and to catch up with some friends. Saturday, on the way home we went via Huddersfield (it's where her indoors went to uni – a wee nostalgia trip was in order), Holmfirth (where Last of the Summer Wine was filmed ... obviously), the beautiful Woodhead Pass and Hadfield (the outside set of the League of Gentlemen). It was made even more fun when you factor in that she was still ill after having two days off sick. The steak and kidney pudding I had in Holmfirth was immense. The onion bhaji burger she had was equally tasty but not the best choice for a lady with a fragile tummy...
I also lost 1-0 in a game of subbuteo to the last winner of the Staffordshire Cup and a former England international. I'll mention more on my worrying relationship with little plastic men some other time.

Are you a Cartographer for Social Equality?

My dad is one of the best archetypes you can find for Middle England. He's middle class, middle aged, lives in the suburbs in the Midlands, wears socks and sandals in the summer, has a beard and glasses, is a member of the National Trust and English Heritage AND seems to possess pretty much every Ordinance Survey map going.

What is it with men and maps?* Worryingly I seem to have caught the bug myself but it's gonna be a while before I inherit his pink Landranger series or start a serious collection of my own ... I would imagine. But I certainly did use to study them very seriously and (according my mum) I used to know pretty much every capital city going.

A couple of years my dad got a free map with his subscription of National Geographic (yet another Middle England marker) which showed each country in correct proportion according to it's landmass compared to that of others. I was recently reminded of the Peters Projection in an episode of the West Wing, where a special interest group was trying to show the administration how regular world maps show a huge advantage to the northern hemisphere over the south. Places like Europe and the US appear much bigger than they should whilst Africa and South America look smaller than they are. It always annoyed me how massive Greenland (or Antarctica for that matter) appeared on maps when in an atlas or on a globe it clearly looked a lot smaller, so to find a map that actually catered to my anal pedantry was a dream come true.

So after watching said episode of the West Wing I googled away, however my lower lip quivered at the knowledge that there isn't a real organisation called Cartographers for Social Equality. I was almost tempted to start my own ... for now though I think I'll just join the Facebook group...

* Don't answer that, I do know the answer.

Ever fancied being an MEP?

What do you mean no? Well it's as simple as filling in 5 boxes on a website if Libertas were your party of choice.

http://www.libertas.eu/en/candidate

Now, when I first heard about a pro-EU party that was campaigning for reform in a uniquely pan-European way I have to say I was intrigued. But on trying to read more into the party all I got on their website was a couple of pages of hyperbole. It would seem that until May (just a few weeks before the European Elections) they don't have a manifesto or a plan of action as to what they'd do if they actually wielded any power.

The party was born out of the problems with the Lisbon Treaty, which was the precursor to a European Constitution. Up until they waded in it was a simple job being critical of anything in Europe – just simply throw the baby out with the bathwater; you choose the Conservative way (Euro-sceptic) or UKIP, who were plain Euro-phobic. But Declan Ganley showed that you can be a big fan of the great European project but still voice your concerns with the Lisbon Treaty. He wanted to lower bureaucracy and increase the democratic voice of Europeans. The Constitution in it's current form would do nothing to combat either and would in fact increase the potential for pitfalls in both areas.

It makes sense, what they're saying I fully agree with. Here's a couple of excerpts from their site,

“Libertas is offering a bold new future for Britain and Europe. We want a brand new kind of European Union, based on democracy, transparency and willing cooperation between sovereign nations. We want to return powers to Britain and take back control of our own destiny. We want to end the corruption and mismanagement of our tax money and ensure that we get value for money. We want to build a new European Union that our children can be proud to be a part of.”

“Whichever party you voted for last time made no difference; the EU is still pushing on relentlessly. British MEPs form less than 10% of the European Parliament, which means that they have very little influence. Libertas is the first pan-European party, standing in all 27 countries of the EU at the same time, with the same reform agenda.”

Yet without any clear policies as to what they'd actually do how can I vote for them? As things stand all they are is a protest party. It's a great way of putting a point across but an absolute waste of a vote. Hopefully in a couple of months time I'll have some actual meat and potatoes to get stuck into and be able to assess as to whether it'd be a waste of my vote or not.