Link to a Very Long List

It would be amiss of me to not mention that this week No Ripcord are running a huge feature of "The Best 100 Debut Albums of All Time". Essentially, they asked every contributor to send in their top 40 and went from there.

Yes, I know - I don't understand why they didn't include all the ones I picked either, but "democracy" takes precedence. Go and take a look at www.noripcord.com to see a few of my contributions.

At Least They Tried

Being a football fan is all the extremes. It’s what we remember – seasons that stick in the mind tend to be when you’re either going for the championship, or clinging on for survival against relegation. Nobody really talks about the time you came 13th and had nothing to play for after you got dumped out of the cups in the first round.

So it is with players too. Heroes and villains, geniuses and donkeys. Every club has had the reliable type, usually a centre half or full back, who plays 300 games with distinction, but it’s more likely that in the pub we’re talking about the enigmatic winger who can win a game on his own, or the liability of a goalkeeper who throws a few in every season.

In terms of the latter camp, we all enjoy a cheap laugh at the expense of some poor sap who just didn't click. They may well have been good, even very good: the likes of Alan Brazil, Kleberson and Neil Webb played at international tournaments and had plenty of success elsewhere. But for whatever reason (injury, pressure) it didn't work out for them at Manchester United. Here’s my top five Old Trafford failures in my time supporting the club.

Ralph Milne
To give him his dues, Ralphie was a big part of why Dundee United enjoyed some success in the mid 80s. A quick, skilful winger, he’s still their top scorer in European competitions and should have been a Scottish international.

Should have. Ah, the fatal kiss of promise, how bitter the taste lingers. Sadly, a penchant for a drink saw young Milne binned off to Charlton in 1986. But as they were a top flight team at the time, there was still a chance to turn it round. Alas, a few months later, he was shipped off to third division outfit Bristol City, having failed to set English football on fire.

Then, in a show of bizarre transfer dealing that would become a trademark, Fergie elected to give him a chance on the big stage again.

At £175,000, it was probably a gamble worth taking, but replacing as he did Jesper Olsen – an erratic player, but one always capable of a flash of flair – the sight of a prematurely aging Scotsman lumbering down the left wing was never going to prove popular with the Old Trafford faithful. He managed to hold down a place through most of the 1988/89 season, which proved to be our worst since relegation in 1974. Over the summer, Danny Wallace was brought in to take the 11 shirt, and with Lee Sharpe also making a name for himself, poor Ralphie was left to hang out in the reserve team for two years before he was given a free transfer to obscurity.

Jim Leighton
Sorry, Scots readers. I don’t want to be seen to be Jockophobic, but “Slippery” Jim’s name has long gone down in Manchester United history as a byword for erratic goalkeeping and disaster between the sticks.

But how was it so? After all, the man had long established himself as a top player both with Scotland (in the days they always qualified for the World Cup) and Aberdeen (in the days you didn't need to be called Celtic or Rangers to win something in Scottish football). With Gary Bailey retired, Gary Walsh too inexperienced and Chris Turner lacking in quality, he seemed the perfect man to improve a team that had finished second in 1988.

Instead, we endured two years of mid table mediocrity in the league during which he became a target of derision for fans: Red Issue magazine produced a spoof advert for the Jim Leighton Condom (“Catches nothing!”). Come the 1990 FA Cup final, he didn't look at all steady on his toes and it was only a late Mark Hughes goal that earned a reply. In a ruthless, but correct, move, Ferguson dropped the man he’d taken from Aberdeen to the World Cup in Mexico for Les Sealey, who was on loan from Luton.

Les, who gave truth to the adage of goalies being mad, played well in the replay and kept the shirt, earning a European Cup Winners Cup medal and the love from the fans that his predecessor never had. Poor Jim played one more game, against Halifax in the League Cup before drifting back across the border. To his huge credit, he re-found his form with impressive spells at Hibernian and back at Aberdeen, proving good enough to once again play at the World Cup in 1998.

Eric Djemba-Djemba
“So good, they named him twice!” was the joke at the time. Originally, it wasn't ironic, as his sorting of Sol Campbell on his Charity Shield debut earned many approving nods and having the same first name as the King also seemed some kind of omen.

With Roy Keane nearing the end of his days as linchpin of the midfield, a somewhat desperate search to fill the midfield began. Liam Miller and Kleberson were also brought in to different levels of failure in a search that wasn't really ended until Owen Hargreaves arrived in 2007. Of course, that solution turned out to be somewhat fleeting.

Poor Eric, meanwhile, turned out to be hopelessly out of his depth in the Premiership. My abiding memory is of his freakish goal against Leeds, where he managed to half-volley a cross into the roof of the net, after which he seemed as surprised as we were. We were equally surprised when he was offloaded to Aston Villa. One can only assume Martin O’Neill owed Fergie a huge favour as he was soon packed off on loan to Burnley.

His contract at Villa was later ripped up, and he seems to have found his level playing in the Danish league.

David Bellion
Proof that just being really, really fast isn't enough to be a top footballer, the career of David Bellion also showed that the lesson of Franz Carr was forgotten very quickly.

That aside, the reason we signed someone who hadn't exactly done the business at Sunderland baffles to this day. The term “headless chicken” doesn't quite do justice to David’s style of play, in which concepts such as a ball control, positioning and passing were thrown right out of the window. The highlight of his two year spell was scoring past Arsenal in the first few seconds of a League Cup tie, albeit helped by the keeper spooning his soft shot into the net.

Like Djemba-Djemba, the biggest surprise was not only that we managed to offload him, but that it was a top flight side that came in for him, and he returned to his native France with Nice. After a spell with Bordeaux, he's back there now, which shows somebody obviously rates him.

Bebe
We conclude on the most odd of the lot. Signed despite Fergie having never seen him play, all the stories at the time were that he’d pretty much been living in a cardboard box a year before. More annoying, especially given that most cruel of mistresses, hindsight, was that for the same money we could have had established international Rafael Van der Vaart.

The whole transfer was covered in mystery, with plenty of rumours that I probably shouldn't repeat under advice from my lawyer*. Needless to say, nobody saw us signing some random kid who had only played a few games for minor teams in Portugal. In terms of shock factor, it was a biggie and at the time, this hack wondered whether a stroke of genius had been pulled off. Sadly, in turns out that all those stories in football comics that I read as a kid, where some guy is spotted playing in the park on Friday and on Saturday is hammering in the winner for his favourite team in the cup final, turned out to not have any basis in reality.

Early on, he managed to bluff a couple of goals, which suggested he might have something about his game. But then came the fiasco against Crawley Town, where United laboured to a 1-0 victory against a non-league team. Nobody came out of that one with honours, but Bebe especially managed to perform as if the ball was some strange object that could cause lethal illness if touched. Subsequently, he was kept far away from the first team and was loaned out to Turkey in the summer. Only a few games into this fresh start, he broke his leg. Ouch.


*I don’t actually have a lawyer. I just wanted to say that to make myself sound “in the know”.

This is Real Life, You're Telling Me

Comic books based on a world I can identify as being this one haven’t generally interested me, unless there’s a good hook. I like a bit of escapism in this respect, whether it be Dr Manhattan walking around Mars with his dick out or Frank Castle mowing down rows of gangsters despite being well into his 50s.

Despite that, I found myself enjoying Alex Robinson’s Box Office Poison, even though I essentially thought most of the characters were incredibly unlikeable. Set in mid 90s New York, we initially follow Sherman, recently out of university and working as a clerk in a bookstore, a job which he initially dislikes and later hates.

Sherman, to be blunt, is a bit of a fuckwit and his misfortunes throughout tend to be of his own making. Though we can be sympathetic to his childhood problems (father walking out, mother dying of cancer), his habit of engaging in unsuitable relationships is the root of his inability to get happy. Throughout, I found myself questioning not only why he stuck with his girlfriend, a borderline alcoholic journalist, when he clearly wanted away with someone else. That it apparently came down to some issues with his old man, who seems to have a problem with monogamy, left a feeling of “is that all?”

Our man is also an aspiring writer – but lacks any kind of experience to make it. The one time we get to see his work, it’s a mediocre effort making in-jokes of his job. Also wanting to make it in the creative scene is Sherman’s best friend, Ed, who has long dreamed of working in comics. He gets a small break as an assistant to bitter old man Irving Flavor, who signed a bad contract as a young man and sees dollar none when one of his creations later becomes the star of a hugely successful film franchise. Ed, one of two characters I found myself hoping come out of things OK, takes it upon himself to find some “justice” for his boss, and this becomes one of the main plot strands in the second half of the book.

Where Robinson has his best writing moments is the portrayal of New York as a cruel, harsh place. Albeit one that is apparently nearly entirely occupied by white people, so it seems. We occasionally see two teenage runaway girls in passing (shoplifting, spying on Sherman having sex with his girlfriend) and think little of them until one is left alone by the other and meets a violent fate. The depth of this moment is not made clear until near the end, whereupon it hits hard.

Literary cliches aside, the art is great throughout. It being in black and white suits and some of the scene shifting is brilliant, all of which makes up for scripting shortcomings. Real life might not be as exciting as whatever Batman gets up to, but it's nice to read about people who have lives just as fucked up as your own.

Covering Yourself In Glory

Back in the 60s, when bands were under pressure to knock out an album (or two) every year, cover versions were almost essential to pad out the vinyl. But as time went on, they tended to be more in the realm of dodgy b-sides and album fillers, created in a mindset of “fuck, we’ve ran out of songs/dodgy remixes”.

Now, it tends to be the tool of the X-Factor contestent and crappy indie acts who want to show they know their history. So, in contrast, here's five of my favourites.

Al Green – I Want to Hold Your Hand
Recorded at the start of his career, when he was still prone to getting up to a bit of sauciness rather than preaching the good word. The straight-ahead pop of the Beatles is given a complete makeover in Memphis, making for a giant soul workout of a number.

After the death of Otis Redding, it was Green who took on the mantle of the best male voice in Southern Soul. Motown may have had Marvin, Smokey and Stubbs, but Al was the equal of any of them. His later work would take on a Motown-esque sheen at times, but he’s raw as can be here. The impression that’s given is that while he wants to hold this girl’s hand, he’d like her to hold something else entirely.

Stevie Wonder – We Can Work It Out
At this stage of the game, young Steveland didn’t need to rely on outside sources for material, but we can be glad he did on this occasion. Taking the jangling guitars of the Beatles original and bringing in a healthy dose of funk, young Wonder creates an anthem for the Civil Rights movement.

As with the Al Green number above, it’s testament to the genius of Lennon and McCartney that their songwriting carries off so effortlessly to other genres. Also, is Stevie Wonder the only person in popular music who can make the harmonica not sound like a seabird being sucked into a jet engine? Genius manifests itself in many ways.

The Beatles – Twist and Shout
I listened to the first Beatles album yesterday and while some of it comes across as twee or showing that they were still hedging their bets on becoming the “all round entertainers” that Epstein wanted them to be (as would later work for Cilla Black, sadly), they still managed to keep some aspects of their time as pill-popping, leathered up lads who played mammoth sets in Hamburg.

Twist and Shout still sounds thrilling, and will do until the end of time. In terms of sound and attitude, it’s as punk as anything the Pistols managed. John Lennon, croaking at the end of an all-day recording session, managed to crank out a screaming vocal. Blowing away the cobwebs of Cliff bloody Richard, this was the birth of British Rock and Roll as we know it.

Billy Bragg – Walk Away Renee
Slight cheat here, as it’s not a straight-forward ‘cover’. Instead, Johnny Marr picks out the basic melody of the original Left Banke/Four Tops (this being the b-side to the Levi Stubbs’ Tears single) number while our Bill laments a relationship with a girl.

Of course, this being Bragg, it’s equally funny and sad – when she speaks to him the first time, his nose begins to bleed. It starts well, but she “started going out with Mr Potato Head” and after a spell lamenting, “she cut her hair and I stopped loving her”. Never has the occasional shallowness of love been so brilliantly conveyed.

Top line: “I said ‘I’m the most eligible bachelor in town’/She said ‘yeah, that’s why I can never understand all those silly letters you send’”.

Slowdive – Some Velvet Morning
Forgot the atrocity that was the Primal Scream version, in which Bobby Gillespie finally managed to remove any trace of integrity by wheeling out Kate fucking Moss of all people.

No, Lee Hazelewood’s good work was much better done by Reading’s finest. Neil Halstead sings the verses as if in a dense fog before Rachel Goswell lifts it out for the chorus. Slowdive were amongst the least "pop" of the shoegazers, but here they show they could do something you could (almost) sing along with.

Game For An Idea

I had the misfortune the other week to watch the Max Payne film, living out a peculiar kind of self-masochism by seeing it out till the end. For those who don’t know, it was originally a video game from a decade ago that wasn't too bad. Though the storyline was clichéd beyond belief at times (man loses wife and child, goes mad, discovers huge conspiracy, goes madder still) the gunplay was fun.

On film, however, it doesn't work. You feel detached from the action and matters aren't helped by the fact that Mark Wahlberg isn't really much of an actor. It’s not the first to fall flat either. Quite how anyone thought Super Mario Bros would work as a film is beyond my ken and the end result would suggest everyone involved was equally confused. Same goes for the Street Fighter effort, which wasn't helped by having actors of the pedigree of Jean-Claude Van Damme and Kylie Minogue trying to lift it out of the mire – though I remember seeing an Anime version that took a totally different approach to much more impressive returns.

As an action film, Hitman works fairly well. From the perspective of someone who loved the games, it doesn't, as we despair that Agent 47 engages in shoot outs rather than use stealth. And herein lies the rub: gamers dismiss the film as crap because it’s not like the source material, everyone else has no emotional connection with the characters. No matter – as long as video games are making money, there will always be some lazy arse in the film industry with no decent original ideas who’ll snap up the rights. But wither the Metal Gear game?

From the opposite angle, the film-to-game route is nearly as old as video games themselves. Indeed, when I got my first computer, a much-beloved Sinclair +2 (128k of memory!), it came with a bundle of games called “Screen Heroes”, which was actually mainly dubious versions of TV shows: Miami Vice, Street Hawk and Knight Rider, I recall. But alongside the legendary Daley Thompson’s Super Test and the most baffling game of all time, Frankie Goes to Hollywood, was an incredibly average fighting game built around the-then contemporary Highlander film.

Mercifully, the limits of technology spared us the paradox of a Frenchman playing a Scotsman and a Scotsman playing a Spaniard and instead offered the chance to shuffle around in 2D trying to cut some guy’s head off. But this and others like it set the tone of buying up the license to a current hit film and slapping any old tosh out to try and cash in. One somewhat desperate example was a game for Moore-era Bond flick The Spy Who Loved Me being put out over a decade after the fact. Maybe the rights were going for 20p and they needed a title for a mediocre shooter.

Around the end of the last decade, games seemed to be trying with all they had to actually be something they weren't. The term “interactive movie” was bandied around like Billy-o and the Wing Commander series (itself turned into a wretched film) was a forerunner to this. Entering the world in the early 90s, it gave us very enjoyable space shooters with (for the time) a strong storyline and characters. The first two instalments rank up there with some of the best gaming experiences I've had, and then number III came along. Mark Hammill, Malcolm McDowell, John Rhys-Davies and Thomas F Wilson (Biff to you) stood in front of a load of blue screen and tried to keep straight faces, seemingly swallowing up the entire budget in the process, judging by the quality of the actual parts where you had something to do.

Thankfully, we seem to have dropped that particular craze and settled instead for just using the voices of famous thespians, which seems to be a better way of working. Though the technology used in LA Noire, where the actor’s facial movements are recorded may yet have some legs, even if the expressions used by someone who is lying don’t need the skills of Derren Brown to work out. More on that title when I complete it.

To conclude: games are games, films are films, and let’s not try to get them all mixed up. Hollywood, use your noggins and come up with new concepts. That said, I happen to know of one obscure game from the early 90s that I reckon could make for a great film. If any big shot producers want to throw me fifty grand, I reckon I could knock out a script in a couple of months…

Behind the Wheel

Contributing to a No Ripcord 'Top 100 Debut Albums' feature, I wrote a short piece about Joy Division’s Unknown Pleasures (I’m sure it’s not a major spoiler that it features) and commented that it was a great album to soundtrack driving around a city very late at night.

Driving just for the sake of it is a dying pastime, and for good reason. Petrol prices aren't going to stop rising and the death of the motorcar as we know it surely can’t be far away. It won’t be until a new method of shifting lumps of metal and plastic at a decent speed is discovered that we’ll be able to just head out for a drive.

Thinking of this not only reminded me how much I miss both my car (sob) and driving (cursed health issues), but also how much I used to like going out at 3am for a spin. Bouts of insomnia do have some good points.

Manchester is a particularly good city for this kind of thing. Though extensive renovation and redesign has taken a lot of the grime out of the city, there’s still enough bleak greyness in the flyovers to create a certain atmosphere as you speed through with Shadowplay in the background. Driving down an empty motorway can have a similar effect - it’s almost like you’re living in the front cover of the Comsat Angels’ Waiting For a Miracle album. Hypnotic to the point you need to constantly be aware of what you’re doing and not slip into some kind of trance state.

In contrast, driving out in the countryside on a sunny day offers a totally different experience, though no less pleasing. You swap the Chameleons for Teenage Fanclub, open the windows and put your shades on, if you’re feeling brave. I found the Peak District to be most enjoyable for moments like these, especially when you get off the main roads. There’s something exciting about making it round a corner when one mistake can send you shooting down a somewhat major drop.

But of course, there’s always the bigger risk that you get stuck behind some old git toddling along at 30mph in some piece of crap. “Flat Cap Brigade” was what my dad always called them, and the only plus point is getting a cheap laugh from spotting the inevitable tartan blanket in the back when you finally get past.

As a 17-year-old in West Cumbria, getting a driving license was a must, if only to enable you to get out of town to more exciting vistas. Even though the only wheels I had access to were my mother’s Vauxhall Corsa, it still meant I could go tear-arsing round the numerous country back roads only minutes from home.

I think this side of me can only have been borne from playing games like Out Run when I was an impressionable youth. The image of motoring along in a Ferrari with the ocean by your side remains one I want to live out before my time is up, though I’m a bit flexible on the type of car. I mean, I’d settle for a Porsche 911 or a Lamborghini.

Silver

I’m just too young to remember a time before Alex Ferguson managed Manchester United - in fact, perhaps we should refer to any year prior to 1986 as BF – but I was there at Old Trafford when he marked 25 years in the job and I was in the stand that from that day on bears his name.

What I can, just about, remember is the state of the club in the late 80s: full of players with drinking problems, injury problems and not-good-enough problems. He made some vital early signings (Brian McClair, Steve Bruce), not so vital signings (Viv Anderson, Jim Leighton) and cleared out the dead wood, despite some being fan favourites (Paul McGrath, Norman Whiteside). But he also brought back Mark Hughes, a move he described as giving the fans their “hero” back.

Despite finishing second behind Liverpool in his first full season (albeit by a huge distance), a slip into the mid-table mire followed. Much has been made of the FA Cup 3rd round tie vs Nottingham Forest in December 1989 and the subsequent run that saw our first bit of silverware under the Fergie regime. But for this fan, it didn't say that much. Sure, it was nice to win something, but from watching my “Official History” video, even the nine-year-old me knew it didn't say too much: previous wins in the same competition in 1977, 83 and 85 hadn't led to further glory.

No. The real turning point was a few months later, in a League Cup tie at Arsenal, at that point in the height of their George Graham-inspired powers. League title winners in 1990, they would do it again that season and were known for their rock solid defence and ability to grind out 1-0 victories. And we drubbed them 6-2. I've always been of the belief that the team that day, which featured Irwin, Bruce, Pallister, Ince, Sharpe and McClair, all of whom would play a part in bringing the title home after 26 years, gained a lot of their subsequent confidence that day, a feeling that they could at last compete with the best. Sad to say, Man City’s recent hammering of United could have the same effect.

The rest of Ferguson’s achievements are well listed. I remember when we won the league in 1993, some joker at school put up a load of posters listing the events that had happened in the years between that and our last championship: Berlin Wall coming down, man on the moon, Nelson Mandela being freed etc. The last line read something like “remember, United, it’s not winning the league once that’s important, it’s keeping hold of it”. 12 titles in 18 years has firmly put that one to bed and nearly knocked Liverpool “off their fucking perch”.

Nearly? Well, there’s still the matter of European Cups. We have three, they have five and it’s something they still hold over us. If not for the small matter of Barcelona being the best club in the world, we may well have equalled it, and I sometimes wonder if the pursuit of further glory in this competition is what drives the man on still.

At times, I've despaired at some of his decisions. Getting into a fight he could never win over some horse spunk with some Irish businessmen did nobody any favours, not least because they owned shares in the club which they subsequently sold to the Glazer family, miring the club into debt for the first time in years. That he should then come out in support of the parasitical fucks on several occasions is more depressing still.

Despite that, the man is a football manager and in that regard, he’s the top dog. Even Jose Mourinho, a man not known for his humble nature, stated that he didn’t call Fergie “Sir” or “Mr Ferguson” – he calls him “the Boss”.

Do The Right Thing

Right, to set the scene, I'm moping around Manchester Academy, waiting for a friend to arrive so we can go see Throwing Muses. Across the road, I spy a group of maybe 20 people waiting for the bus. Only I know they’re wasting their time, as that bus isn't coming. And it’s dang cold out there, let me tell you.

How do I know this? Because an hour or so earlier, I'd caught the bus going the other way (heading towards the city), which had taken a huge diversion, missing out about half the usual route. Somewhat baffled by this, though I ended up pretty much where I wanted to be, I glanced at a bus shelter and spotted a small note informing us that services where being changed as the road was being closed down the line due to some Eid-related festivities.

Fine. Only this note wasn't exactly put in a place people would notice it, and was worded in a way that students new to the town would understand – given it listed “Wilmslow Road services” rather than 143, 142, 42 etc etc. It’s stuff like this, and stupidly expensive tram services that are getting another price hike, that make me think GMPTE should be slapped with a wet haddock until they see sense.

Back in the moment, instead of being typically English and minding my own business, I jaunted over the road to explain the situation to the hapless travellers, telling them they had to walk five minutes back down the road to find a bus. Most were confused, especially the aforementioned students who had no idea what or where Rusholme is. But they were soon on their way and hopefully out of the cold.

The reason I'm telling you this is because it actually gave me a palatable sense of well-being to do something, well, something nice for people I had never met before, or doubtfully will meet again. I’m not looking for congrats or kudos – it's just that doing something good is, umm, good. And it reassured me that I’m not an evil clone after all, because if I had been, I'd have just stayed inside, at the bar, pointing and laughing at the poor saps waiting for a bus presumably driven by Godot. Which isn't that bad, I agree, but I assume an evil clone of me would be as equally unmotivated to do anything as I am.

After all that, Throwing Muses were mighty and I came to the conclusion that not only is Kristin Hersh a fab guitar player, but she's also blessed with one of the best screams in rock. I've seen her play before as a solo show and also with 50 Foot Wave, but I found her best of all with her original band. David Narcizo and Bernard Georges were a good a rhythm section as I've seen in ages and a top night was had.

Clone Ranger

Here's something: I have an evil clone.

Really, I'm serious. He’s been in Manchester at least as long as I have, as I can remember only weeks after my arrival my bezzy mate Nicky telling me she’d seen me in the city with some blonde woman. At the time, I dismissed it as mistaken identity, as I'd not been round there for a few days. Then, a year later, while slumped in a pub with my then-girlfriend, her friend turned up looking shocked at my presence.

“I just saw you walking down the street with some girl.”

She was very adamant it had been me. Same style of dress (all black), same style of walk (slouched over, headphones dug firmly in). But as I'd been sat in the exact spot for about an hour, barring trips to the bar, the only answer that came to mind was that I had an evil clone. Naturally, this weighed heavy on my mind, as did the fact that my clone was obviously something of a ladies man. There’s nothing worse than the idea that your clone is having a better time of it than you, trust me, though that train of thought probably explains why that relationship didn't go very far.

A second theory that came into my mind was the possibility that it was actually me, thrown back from the future into my present. This scared me even more, as I knew from the Jean-Claude Van Damme film Timecop that if we ever occupied the same space, we’d die a somewhat horrific death. However, I reasoned that if I ever was thrown back into the past, the first thing I’d do would be to dash to the bookies and place large sums of cash on football results that I already knew the results of.

So after making my mother swear that I had in fact been the only me born that day, the evil clone theory seems the most sound. Despite a few more sightings over the years, he’d slipped my mind until the other day, when my girlfriend spotted him not two hundred feet from the flat and now I'm worried I'm going to get blamed for his villainous doings.

But then I saw an episode of Futurama where Bender meets his own evil clone, Flexo. However, the twist is that it is Bender who is the evil one. What if this is the case for me? Perhaps I’m the one who is supposed to grow a moustache. It would certainly make sense of all those dreams where I rule the world.