American politics, a view from outside the ranch

Posted on April 20, 2016 by Mark Hayes

Having finally at least reached the point where equality between straight and gay was given in that most basic of things, the right to marry the one you love, the GOP in individual states is trying to drag the world back several decades.
Meanwhile, America is a nation, oft claiming to be the greatest country in the world, which has fallen through the cracks.
The Republican party, which often seems to be somewhat to the right of the BNP a British party almost universally derided, seems bound towards an ever increasing sprint to the far right, mixed with an equal desire to bring forth the rapture in their religious further.

Trying to understand American politics as a Brit is a complex business. Not only does it require getting your head around complexities like the difference between primaries and caucuses. Pac’s. Super Pac’s. The never ending polls. You also have to get your head around some very basic things about the American body politic that is a struggle to comprehend from this side of the Atlantic.
Image result for trump cruzEven though Donald, the builder, Trump seems a candidate of ridiculed, he also seems odds on to receive their nomination. The most worrying thing about this is not that Trump seems to be a  credible candidate, but that compared to his nearest rival Cruz he is the most palatable. Cruz is so right wing, and so mired in the evangelical religious further of the Republican party that he makes Trump a moderate in many ways.
The Democratic party on the other hand is… well… its party favoured candidate Mrs Clinton is further to the right than the Grantham grocer’s daughter who sat in number ten over here back in the 80’s. And she gets accused of been too Liberal? While Mr Sanders is a centre-left candidate, who would fit in most social democrat governments in Europe, just.
So we have a left wing party that’s mostly to the right of European ethos, and a right-wing party that’s slightly to the right of the extreme right. And the word Liberal is equitable to goat strangler.
In the last 20 years, the poor have, well stayed where they are. The rich have gotten considerably richer and the middle class have slumped in the wrong direction heading towards the poor while blaming that same poor for their problems. 
Image result for hilary sanders“if we were not paying wealth fare…” seems to be a rallying cry. Rather than the more obvious “If only the hyper-rich paid a little more…”  Could this be anything to do with the hyper rich owning 9/10ths of the media?
America is at least not unique in this, it is a trend across the western world, it is however seemingly more pronounced in the US.
The strange thing, however, as an outsider looking in, is the strange way in which the core of Americans seems to view the world.
The word Liberal appears to inspire vitriol and hate that is unsurpassed. This from a nation founded by liberals, which was the poster child for liberal democracy. It now equates liberalism as a poor man’s communism along with socialist.
The utter hatred for the concept of Medicare is also something utterly unfathomable to a European. The idea that what determines if you live or die in the US is the size of your bank account and if you have the insurance or not is beyond unfathomable in fact. There is this strange concept of not wanting to pay for other people’s healthcare, yet all the figures for universal health care show that the average American with health insurance would pay less in health taxes than they do for medical insurance now. 
Image result for liberal devilOn that subject I have a friend in the States, who is 18 years old, going through her second set of cancer treatments. If she were British, all she would be worrying about would be staying alive to get past her cancer and marry her boyfriend. Instead, she is caught in a cycle of debt she cannot pay, loans she cannot get to pay hospital bills she cannot afford. Trying to work in between treatments and soldier on regardless.
In an effort to do so she is even crowdfunding to try and raise money for her treatment. Crowdfunding, the internet’s way of paying for new board games, books and independent movies, it not a way for anyone to try and pay the bills to stay alive.
From the outside looking in American politics is a war,  its principal warriors the vain and self-obsessed, the foolish and the ill-educated. Its generals the vested self-interest of the status quo. Turning the poor and middle classes upon each other while they sit back and bask in delight at the madness.
The worrying thing is whoever wins the next war starts the day after in Americas obsession with the next cycle of elections.
While the winner will camp out in a white house hamstrung by Congress.
And the rest of the world looks on wondering in hope if the least worst candidate will win because the only one that makes any sense has no real chance.

I love my American friends, and individually they are lovely people. Collectively the nation looks intent on selling out its democracy to the highest bidder while they dream their American dream.  
note. to give to Jianna the girl i mentioned in the post please use the following link  https://pages.giveforward.com/medical/page-5x6n616/?utm_source=facebook 
Posted in politics | Leave a comment

Depression, talking about it

Posted on March 31, 2016 by Mark Hayes
Depression is not a natural subject for me to write about because I have suffered from it more than once in my adult life. It’s not a subject I find easy to talk about in general, less still when it relates to myself.  Indeed, not talking about it has long been one of my ‘coping mechanisms’ when it comes to the long dark tunnels into to which I have on occasion wondered. Not, I will admit a very good coping mechanism. Not one which worked awfully well for a start, or helped me get past that dark tunnel at any point. Just a defence against having to deal with my problems, and at the time because talking about them was the last thing I could bring myself to do.
You might well ask at this point, ‘Why is he talking about it now?’ which would be a fair question. The simple answer to which is, because I can. The more complex answer is probably because I should.
I can talk about my depression right now because I am not currently depressed. As has always been the case my depression is not a constant state, it comes and goes over the course of months or years, but has never taken up permanent residence. It tends to come in cycles, and it can be years between attacks. And every single time I get away from its grip I assure myself I will never let myself be dragged back down that tunnel. So as a consequence I don’t talk about my depression when I am not depressed either. Talking about it may bring about its return, why would I risk that?
So why am I talking about it now?
Well as I said the answer is complex but comes down to because I should. Because by doing so I may help others going down that dark road see there is light at the end of the tunnel, which is not an oncoming train. And because the disease of depression is one that can affect anyone and everyone, no matter who they are.
We are perhaps all products of our society and our environment as much as we are products of our own invention, and I grew up in the 70’s and 80’s when ‘real men’ we were told, did not get depressed. Indeed, for most of my life, the impression society has fostered upon me is that depression is a woman’s condition. Men just man up and get on with life.
This is of course what can only be termed as bollocks.
But never the less it was what society taught me back in my youth and a lesson that I took to heart back then. While at the same time suffering from depression in my teens to the point of contemplating suicide on more than one occasion. Dark thoughts in dark tunnels of my emotions. The feeling the world would be better without me. That I would be better without me. These feelings were so strong at times, and for all I got past them they are feelings that have come back more than once in my adult life. And yet I have seldom talked about it to anyone because society taught me to do so was wrong, weak and unmanly.
Like so many things in my life, I have found the prevailing logic of my youth to be saturated with untruths which we, as a society, have moved passed. Ideological concepts I despised in my youth have slowly withered away. Racism is on the retreat, all be its ugly head has arisen of late. Homophobia seems almost a thing of the past, talking to my children they would not believe the stigma I saw some of my friends coping with in the 90’s. While we have far from reaching a point where a strong feminist movement is no longer required even the most vitriolic feminist would agree we have come a long way in the last few decades. As a society, we have moved on in this and so many other ways.
With depression, there still seems to be a stigma that was always there in my youth. Real men do not get depressed (whatever real men are.)
Perhaps this is because, of all these things, depression is the one which has affected me directly. Perhaps I do not see the change in society in this regard, any more than a black lesbian in Hackney may not see that attitudes of racism, homophobia and the misogynous have not changed awfully much either.
Perhaps both I and my fictional Hacknian are fooled by our closeness to the subject, and we have progressed a long way as a society. I hope as much.
My last bout of depression started last spring; I lost my job and my focus, and a steady spiral that I suspect I had been sliding down for a while before that became a death slide. Looking back the signs had been there a long while. The relationship I was in at the time was struggling a little, and importantly I was not talking about my emotions and feelings much, but when it hit me, it hit me hard.
It a depression I have moved past, my relationship ended which inadvertently helped, if only because it gave me the impetus to move on and not having to struggle with the problems within the relationship gave me one less problem in my life to feed into the darkness. Finding a new job, all be it a short-term one in November, then finding a full-time job in January helped also, but mainly I managed with the help of friends to move past the walls of depression.
I am lucky in many respects; I can see positive things which came out of my depression. My first novel was finally finished and published because I needed focus and something to feel good about. Changing aspects of my personal life helped too, and once I had moved beyond the walls of that long dark tunnel, I found a new impetus for life that will keep me from slipping back.
But I know others among my friends and family who suffer from depression. Who don’t talk because they feel they can’t, or should not. That they will be seen as weak, or lacking in other ways if they admit how they feel.
Depression is an illness.
It should not bear a stigma.
It’s okay to be depressed, and it’s okay to talk about it.
It’s not weak to do so.
It’s hard I know, but find someone to talk to, don’t go through it alone.
You’re not alone.
There is always a light at the end of that tunnel, and it’s not an oncoming train
This is an important message we need to keep getting out there.
The links below talk more fluently on the subject
Additionally, if you can talk to no one else, or just want to talk to someone who will listen The Samaritans numbers are listed below, along with links to their websites

 

Posted in depression, mental-health, opinion, rights | Tagged , , , | 3 Comments

What did the treaty of Rome ever do for us?

Posted on February 26, 2016 by Mark Hayes
With apologies to my Non-British readers. Who will probably read little further than this, this is a post about the forthcoming in-out referendum on the EU that we will be having in Britain in a few months. Which for the British is more important than any other vote they have been asked to cast for about 30 years. In or out it’s a major choice, and the tabloid press who are mostly right wing has firm anti-Europe views. So this is perhaps an attempt to redress a little of the balance. Basically, however, all I am asking is that if you’re going to vote do so as an informed choice and read the argument for both sides, not the tabloid anti-Europe rhetoric and  jingoistic Europe bashing 
What follows was not actually written by me, but is a reproduction of a reproduction posted on Facebook, which itself is a reproduction of a letter to the guardian newspaper by Simon Sweeney referenced in Donnachadh McCarthy book ‘The prostitute state’ but in slight reference to a Monty Python sketch “What did the EU ever do for us?
Not much, apart from providing 57% of our trade;
structural funding to areas hit by industrial decline;
clean beaches and rivers;
cleaner air;
Lead-free petrol;
restrictions on landfill dumping;
a recycling culture;
cheaper mobile charges;
cheaper air travel;
improved consumer protection and food labelling;
a ban on growth hormones and other harmful food additives;
better product safety;
single market competition bringing quality improvements and better industrial performance;
break up of monopolies;
Europe-wide patent and copyright protection;
no paperwork or customs for exports throughout the single market;
price transparency and removal of commission on currency exchanges across the eurozone;
freedom to travel, live and work across Europe;
funded opportunities for young people to undertake study or work placements abroad;
access to European health services;
labour protection and enhanced social welfare;
smoke-free workplaces;
equal pay legislation;
holiday entitlement;
the right not to work more than a 48-hour week without overtime;
strongest wildlife protection in the world;
improved animal welfare in food production;
EU-funded research and industrial collaboration;
EU representation in international forums;
bloc EEA negotiation at the WTO;
EU diplomatic efforts to uphold the nuclear non-proliferation treaty;
European arrest warrant;
cross border policing to combat human trafficking, arms and drug smuggling; counter-terrorism intelligence;
European civil and military co-operation in post-conflict zones in Europe and Africa;
support for democracy and human rights across Europe and beyond;
investment across Europe contributing to better living standards and educational, social and cultural capital.
All of this is nothing compared with its greatest achievements: the EU has for 60 years been the foundation of peace between European neighbours after centuries of bloodshed.
It furthermore assisted the extraordinary political, social and economic transformation of 13 former dictatorships, now EU members, since 1980.
Now the union faces major challenges brought on by neoliberal economic globalisation, and worsened by its own systemic weaknesses. It is taking measures to overcome these. We in the UK should reflect on whether our net contribution of £7bn out of total government expenditure of £695bn is good value. We must play a full part in enabling the union to be a force for good in a multi-polar global future.
Simon Sweeney,
Lecturer in international political economy, University of York”
http://www.theprostitutestate.co.uk
Posted in politics, rites | Leave a comment

its not what you think it is ……

Posted on February 25, 2016 by Mark Hayes
“Reality is not want you think it is, it’s nothing more than a perception your mind is trained to accept. The truth? The truth is far greater than you could ever imagine. That flicker of movement in the corner of your eye. The shadows cast by nothing. A patch of darkness in the night which seems to move. The sounds in the lost hours that have no cause. A glimpse of faces in the abstracts of half-light. Catching your eye for a moment, and sending a shiver chilling down your spine. Raising the hairs on your neck in response to some long forgotten memories passed down through time from the caves of your ancestors.  Yet all these things are but a glimmer of a truth your mind will not, cannot accept, but is a truth all the same.“
So I stumbled across this pretentious prose while throwing some OU files onto my kindle to read later. A small passage (there’s about a page in all) that I wrote some time ago. The some time ago being, well I have no idea. The file says 2011, but that just the last time it was saved, or I read it then edited a bit, or when I put it on my kindle with some other files from one of my pc’s. To be honest, you see, I have no idea when I wrote it, or where it was going, what it was part of, and if I had a wider plan of where I was taking this bit of work. 
It not alone, I have hard drives full of bits and bobs. Half-formed ideas that were played with then dropped, scraps of stories. Character sketches and dialogues. 
I normally know what they were about, where they fitted. I know if they were thrown away for something else, or morphed into another story. They are seldom just forgotten. 
And if they are forgotten they are seldom as intriguing as this one. Enticing may be a better word. This feels like a story waiting to be told. It also feels like the introduction to a story I have told. It would slip perfectly into The Passing Place as an introduction as part of a longer piece, or just that paragraph alone, a small opening paragraph to set  readers mind alive. To set them up for the ride they are about to take. 
But here is the thing, I know, with absolute certainty, that this was not my intent when I wrote it.  Which is not normally an issue. the passing place is full of bits of ideas that were written originally as something else but found a home there because it turned out that was where they belonged. 
This piece though feels different. yet at the same time, it feels right. 
I have no idea what it is about. What its story is, and I would have to write it to find out. 
I guess that is the writers curse. 
Sometimes there is a story you really want to read, but your the one who has to write it. 
As +Neil Gaiman  has been known to say the process of writing is more or less put one word in front of another then do it again.    I guess to find out what this is, I’ll have to just do that and see where it takes me. 
#writerscurse
Posted in Esqwiths, writes | Leave a comment

Play like a girl, spit out the blood and carry on

Posted on February 15, 2016 by Mark Hayes
There is a culture some parts of the gaming community of bullying and sexism, based on the simple, but entirely wrong, perception. That perception is that girls don’t play video games well. More to the point the perception that they play, to be blunt, ‘like girls.’ Which is possibly the most idiotic insult imaginable.
Not only is it sexist, derisory to a huge community of female gamers, and says a great deal about the mentality of some male gamers, It’s also ill informed. Not least because while female gamers may well ‘play like girl’ it is perhaps worth noting that girls can be very very good at video games, and quite often far better than the kind of gamers who use the words ‘play like a girl’ to describe someone.
This may seem like a minor issue after all boys have been deriding girls ability to play sports for generations, why should e-sports be any different…..
Well perhaps because we all should be better than that. In particular, perhaps the gamer community should be better than that. Gamers live in a  world of pixels, where skill is not measured by physical prowess, but by reaction times, the speed of thought, quickness with a mouse and keyboard or gamepad, skill and understand of game mechanics.
As a side note, I would invite any bloke who uses the phrase ‘play like a girl’ in real sports to type rugby girl into google and watch the video of the America Rugby 7 play who had her nose broken in a  tackle, got up, spat out the blood and played on. In exactly the way a premiership footballer wouldn’t.

Gets up, spits out the blood, gets on with the game

But back to video games,
Gamers of the female gender face derision and abuse from their male counterparts.   Which it should be needless to say is unjustified on any level. Not just because a basic standard of decency ( yes I know this is the age of the internet and there is a culture of trolling brought about by the supposed anonymity of the internet that sometimes precluded any basic standards of decency), but mainly perhaps because girls can be and are often just as good or better than their male counterparts.
In my time as a gamer, I have come across and played with many female gamers. I ran a raiding guild in world of Warcraft for many years and the guilds girls were in some cased better players than the majority of the boys. They also tended to be more reliable, committed and willing to learn than the majority of the boys. Less likely to throw their toys out of the pram when things went wrong, and were seldom prima donna’s like some of the men in the guild.
Trust me on this, when it comes to running a gamer guild and dealing with thirty of forty egos, the girls are a lot less hassle than the boys as a rule. Perhaps because they have had to deal with the crap of been a girl in what some players still see it as a boys world. Needless to say, the players in question are the boys.
The prevalent attitude is often as follows:-
When a male player is not very good at a game it’s because he is a noob, or newbie or just a crap player.
When a female player is not very good at a game, it’s because ‘she a girl’.
The male newbie people will offer advice to ( even if it’s not wanted ) because he can improve, after all, no one is a newbie forever.
The female player is patronised at best, after all, they will always be a girl…
If that’s not bad enough there are all the other minefields for the female gamer to negotiate are well known, the accusations of being a 40 year old man pretending to be a girl for scrumptious reasons ( often levelled at any girl gamer who just happens to be a better player than the one doing the accusing. Which is strange in itself, when you think about it.
What does it say when someone would rather they were being shown up by the mad skills of someone they are accusing of been some kind of pervert than face the horror that it may really be someone of the opposite gender. “Yes you have beaten me, and you’re claiming to be a girl, but I know you are secretly some kind of pervert and have a dick so that’s alright.”
It’s a culture that sadly runs through the gaming community as anyone who has followed #gamergate on any level will know. If you haven’t then I suggest that you look it up at some point to see just how nasty it can get.  A controversy that ran through the industry when a female developer became the target for on-line trolling that started with games journalists and worked it’s way down to the bottom.
It’s a controversy that is still running when SXSW a large games expo announced a panel to discuss gamergate called #savepoint . Stating it would  cover “the current social-political climate of the gaming community” and “the importance of ethical integrity in gaming journalism” it caused a storm on twitter and later SXSW announced the panel had been cancelled along with an anti-GamerGate panel titled “Level Up: Overcoming Harassment in Games” due to “numerous threats of on-site violence.”

When you have to cancel a panel because talking about issues of sexism in games leads to threats of violence then your industry has a deep rooted problem.
And here is the thing, it’s all built on a fallacy, or perhaps that should be a phallic-y,,, I have played with gamers in the past who don’t speak online because then people would realise they were a woman. I have heard surprise, and in some cases, shock, when they finally do speak because the player who everyone thought was awesome, who had been carrying the team and dragging us all along behind them turns out not to have a penis. I have also witnessed the change in attitude this can inspire. Some male players become suddenly very helpful ( for helpful read patronising ) offering advice and suggestions to the player who has been doing perfectly fine or just plain better than them for weeks. While others become hostile towards them, in little ways mostly, often feeling lied to somehow, that they were been deceived by the player who actually never once claimed to be male or denied being female because somehow the default gender in gaming is male. 
 This in an industry which way back in 2014 knew that 52% of gamers were female. Or perhaps as the Guardian put it at the time, didn’t’.  It is however not that surprising that girls play games, or that about half the gaming community is female. This has been a planet-wide phenomena for about the last 40’000 years or so since mankind first started walking upright. Half of mankind aren’t men, shocking I know. The other half have had the worst of the deal for most of those 40’000 years or so. So I suspect it comes as little news to them that the same old sexism they find in society generally is also there in the gamer society.
So no great shock here.
But perhaps it should be, perhaps in the world of gamers and the internet one half of the human race can finally grow up and accept that the other half is just as able as they are to make pixels dance, get a head shot on COD, heal a raid in wow, burn up as a pyro on TF2 or any other game you can think of.
Finally, I would add the following.
My son, (in many ways a better gamer than I) plays in a  competitive TF2 team that’s marching up the rankings. The team’s leader and arguably best player is a girl called Kate.
A friend of mine called Cal has completed every achievement possible in both recent XCOM games and is probably on her way to doing the same in XCOM2. (if you have ever played any of the incarnations of X-Com you will know that just completing it on the easiest level is an achievement let alone doing iron man (iron girl) on impossible with only 4 soldiers…..)
The wow guild I ran had about 40% female players in its raid teams at its height when it was most successful.
And female rugby players spit out the blood and play on ….
‘Play like a girl’ should be high praise indeed, rather than an insult ….
Links

Posted in gaming, opinion, rights | Leave a comment

Genocide Watch

Posted on January 26, 2016 by Mark Hayes
One of the joys of doing a degree with the open university is learning new things, and that it makes you seek out further knowledge. The real joy is never the set reading but the further reading you seek out yourself. However in this lays an occasional problem, not least when you’re doing a degree in politics, philosophy and economics. The problem of living in a world occupied by that most insidious of creatures humanity.
Allow me to explain.
My current essay project is a written report for a fictional pressure group seeking to reinforce the United Nations principle of humanitarian intervention. Heady stuff I am sure you agree. As the subject matter is interventions in nation states to prevent genocides and ethnic cleansing. A side of humanity which is it has to be said not its best. That is, of course, an understatement. Humankind has a history of horrendous, murderous action, for reasons of race, religion or just one group seeking power over another at the end of a blade. We are a sadly vicious bunch. The example of the Nazis and the Holocaust is the most glaring example of the worst of humanity, but at least, we can recall that the Nazis and their evil ideology was defeated in 1945.
Here in however is the source of my current malaise, in researching for the essay I needed to find out about genocides committed since the end of world war 2, which is a number of horrifying size.
Most everyone will know of the genocides of Rwanda and Cambodia. Others will have heard of the killings in Sierra Leone or partition India. These are however the tip of a bloody and nasty iceberg. The numbers make dreadful reading.
The +genocide watch lists them all, in the kind of detail no one wants to read and everyone perhaps should. I am not going to go into details here, if only because I have no wish to depress myself with figures, I shall only say no matter what you think the number of genocides is since the end of WW2 your probably wrong and thinking of too low a number. The link below will take you to genocide watch, and you can look for yourself. Which is something everyone who votes, everyone who has ever listened to racist rhetoric or religious bigotry, or anyone who has ever sat next to someone telling a joke about ‘those other people‘ should do.
Genocide is an ongoing evil in the human condition. It is the worst of our nature, it is something we should all be aware of. It’s something we should all try to stop.

http://genocidewatch.com

Image result for genocide watch

Posted in depression, dystopia, humanrights, rights | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

Politics a bit of a rant

Posted on January 25, 2016 by Mark Hayes
(wrote this on my phone a couple of days ago while waiting for my girlfriend in a sports centre drinking a latte and generally passing time. so its a bit of a rant and perhaps not overly insightful , but then again so is most political commentary) 
There is something strange in the waters of British and American politics.
This to be fair is nothing new,  politics has always had its odd side on both sides of the political fence. The right has always had its reactionary’s, bigots and let us be honest here, racists and sexist’s. Meanwhile, the liberal left has had its own radical’s, whom are perhaps a little more loveable than the extreme right, but are no less extreme in their views.
There is an old saying, born a liberal die a conservative, but some of us never grow out of the liberal.
In Britain we have the return of the left, battling its age-old battles. Trying so had to do what it feels is right, Corban wants to scrap trident, yet has to face off with unions which want to preserve trident jobs, so comes up with the compromise of nuclear subs with no nuclear warheads. An insane compromise being forced upon him to safeguard a few jobs and keep the unions on board. Insane because the money it would cost could be spent creating so many jobs elsewhere. The right wing media rightly ridicules the idea. A sentence I never expect to write…..
Meanwhile in the USA, we have the radical right with its cheerleader billionaire Donald Trump, whose increasingly insane ideas would be as laughable as his hair, and boy do we laugh if he was not the leading republican candidate. There have been other radical right wing politicians with funny hair that were laughable, one of them did remarkably well in the German elections in the 1930’s. Remember how that turned out?
Comparing Trump to a failed Austrian art students political ascension may seem far fetched. Just as far fetched as believing America could elect someone  to the Whitehouse who openly spouts idiotic racist ideas. This is however an America who elected G.W.Bush twice, accepted the patriot act and  whose poorest states tend to be the most republican.
There is a prevalent belief that the British left is unelectable. Just as there is an equally prevalent belief that the American right is unelectable. But despite a right-leaning media in Britain and deceiving polls, there is a groundswell of support for a more left-leaning labour party. Why? Well because there is a generation that has grown to middle age that has lived through centralist politics and Blairite hypocrisy’s. Labour lost the last election not through been too far to the left, but by remaining in the same centralist tory lite they had moved to in the Blair-Brown era which lost them the previous election. Though under Margret Beckets’ report this week into the defeat labour has blamed everyone but themselves.
Centralism has had its day as a political position because apathy among the electorate has had its day. Both in America and the UK. The extremes now have more draw as people look for solutions to the mess centralism has given us. The downside of wanting to have a real choice is that the electorate may not choose what you want. Which leaves us with the prospect of an extreme right wing in Washington and a left wing political move in Westminster.
Democracy, Churchill’s ‘least worst way to run the world’, seems poised to throw a curve ball at us , to use an Americanism,  or bowl us a googly to use the British equivalent. There is something in the water, and the electorates of the two nations could give us a whole new ball game.

What’s the curse about interesting times?….
Posted in politics | Leave a comment

STRANGE SIGNS

Posted on January 13, 2016 by Mark Hayes
 Strange signs and portents appearing everywhere 
what could this mean 
never in the same place long 

find the strangest of visitors 

coming soon ……
Or as soon as I get past the next draft, proofreaders and the hell of self-publication angst 

Posted in Esqwiths | Leave a comment

When we were seventeen by Waiting for Wednesday Album review

Posted on December 18, 2015 by Mark Hayes

Having subjected everyone to my ‘music journalism‘ in my last post. I had no real intention of ever doing so again as I don’t claim to know much about music beyond what I like. I will admit what I like is a very long eclectic list, but I can’t play, can’t sing and would not know how to write a lyric if I tried. This may not matter a great deal to music industry journalists whom the same description may fit. But it matters to me if I am going to offer my opinion on my blog about someone’s hard work and talent.
I can talk about writers, I am one.
It doesn’t mean my opinion is of particular worth, but at least, I have a leg to stand on, even if its a wooden leg carved from a broom handle, but people who read my work, at least, may have an opinion of my work on which to ascribe a value to my opinion.
When it comes to music, I can only talk about what I like. Beyond that, it’s all conjecture as to the worth of anything I say.

a1589227203_10

Anyway all that on one side, and the reasons I will not be venturing into music journalism here very often. I do however get to see a lot of the West Yorkshire music scene, and get to see a few bands live on a regular basis, normally because I am in Bradford or the surrounding area to see friends and catch Nervous ‘Orse play, a band who’s members are all friends of mine, somewhere on the spectrum between nodding acquaintances and lifelong friends depending on which member we are talking of. The bonus of these friendships is I get to meet and listen to other musicians, those beautiful people of strange talents which were probably gains at the crossroads at midnight in negotiations with the devil. (I speak as one of the musically talentless who would therefore rather believe in some nefarious deals with Lucifer over hard work, practise and passion be getting music wonder.)

One of the bands I have caught the most is Waiting for Wednesday. A wonderfully talented duo of Laura Shackleton and Anna Watkins. Playing as support for, and on numerous occasion been supported by Nervous Orse., or just generally on the same bill ( Often higher up the bill than the ‘Orse) I think the first time was at a small pub music festival a couple of summers ago.

They both sing while Laura plays the guitar, their vocals complimenting each other with the kind of harmony’s that seem effortlessly entwined. Anna’s deeper huskier voice melodiously mixed with Laura’s lighter but equally powerful voice.

They remind me of First Aid Kit both lyrically and with those harmonies. The same haunting twilight to their lyrics that draws you in to listen.

Their new album gifted me something else on top of the live experience in the way of drums and other instruments on the backing track to and new depth to their recordings.

Anyway, enough waffling on, follow the link and listen for yourself. Go on give it a good listen before you read any further. Turn the volume up and take a seat for a moment. Give your ears a treat and your soul a moment of humanity

https://waitingforwednesday.bandcamp.com/album/when-we-were-seventeen

So anyway. In a review, I should really tell you what I think. That is sort of the point of a review after all.
It is, to use a vernacular I seldom write in, but as I come from the same part of the world I shall for once. Blooming marvellous.

The ladies are taking a break from playing live for a while, which I would say is sad if it was not because they are expecting the patter of the next generations feet in a few months. So it’s going to be a while before I get to listen to them live. However, this album ( and the previous one ) will fill the void I am sure. I suspect it will play at lot in the background as I write. Much like the might ‘Orse.

So there you go, go buy the album, and indeed their other ones. Invest in some glorious West Yorkshire musical muses work, your ears and your soul will love you for it.

 

Posted in 'orse, music, Uncategorized | Tagged | Leave a comment

Where This Now Finds Us , by Nervous ‘Orse album review

Posted on December 7, 2015 by Mark Hayes

Normally, in between random musings, occasional fiction and whatever else occurs to me, I review books on here by Indie authors. This being because as an Indie author myself I know how hard it can be to get reviews, and I like to think I know a modicum about good literature when I read it, what makes a good novel and  what I can worthily recommend to other. That and to be frank it gives me something to write about apart from the random musings, short fiction and ‘begging letters’ trying to encourage people to read my own work :).
I also occasionally review other things but generally shy away from reviewing music for two reasons.
Firstly, because music taste is a very ecliptic thing and I am particularity ecliptic when it comes to my own. I have broad and occasionally odd tastes in music.
Secondly, because while I have talents in other areas I have the musical ability of a  misshapen carrot after it’s been attacked by a rabid rabbit.
This is a sad thing in my opinion because I love music and musicians. It is not for want of trying either, I have two guitars in the house and occasionally twang away at them. I even took lessons way back in middle school, but like many things to become proficient at an instrument, let alone vaguely talented takes a lot of commitment, practise and work. Also importantly  a basic degree of natural talent, the latter of which I lack.
As I said, however, I love and respect musicians both as people and for the talents they have.
I am also somewhat blessed to have known a few over the years.
Among them, a couple of friends that I have known for more than half my life are Dave and Jon, two of the founding members of a group of Bradford musicians going under the name of Nervous ‘Orse.
As find a pair of individuals as you are ever likely to meet, and through them, I have been equally blessed to meet Danny and Jake the two other members of the mighty ‘Orse. And finally I have been blessed to witness their group grow collectively over the last year or so, from playing small gigs at local Bradford watering holes to opening the Indie stage at the Bingley festival this summer, (sadly I missed the festival gig, but I hope to catch the next one.)
Living in Middlesbrough means a 140-mile round trip to see the band at local gigs, so I don’;t get to see them as often as I would like, but every time is a pleasure, and the band group tighter and just plain better every time I see them play.
As well as been blessed to know these musicians I am blessed to know Emily, the wife of Dave and quite possibly the ‘fifth Orseman’, or the gaffer as they call her. Because Emily is known to work hard to get them gig’s radio exposure and everything else that comes from been manager of the band, right down to working the concession stand and been chief cheerleader on the dance floor. She also encouraged me to write a review of the bands début Album.
She can be very forceful when it comes to asking fro reviews, for a start she smiles at you, in a way that suggests that not writing a review will cause that smile to go away. This would be a bad thing obviously. I am not sure why but I get the impression the band would agree that Emily not smiling is a bad thing …..   they fear her , I can see it in their eyes. She drives them to rehearse because to not do so would incur a frown ….
So anyway with the mild and utterly undeserved character assassination of ‘the gaffer’ out of the way and because I would have review it anyway, there follows the review of Where This Now Finds Us, the debut Album of Nervous ‘Orse. on +Widemouth records But first , listen to them yourself … ( go on take 3 minutes and twenty-four seconds out of your life to experience a little pleasure )

Dead is the new alive by Nervous ‘Orse

Back ?  good , did you enjoy it , of course, you did.
That is the first single from the album, wasn’t its good 🙂

Okay, serious review time.

Nervous ‘Orse are collectively Dave McKinley on acoustic guitar, Jon Smith on electric , Danny Sapko on bass and Jacob Riley on drums. A familiar set up for a band. Two guitars, bass and drums is not an original set up let’s face it. It’s as tried and trusted as a formula as you can get in music. But the band are more than four instrument players, the band actually has eight instruments in use on ever track, the other four been the vocal cords of the band members,
While Dave may be lead vocalist on most tracks he is not alone on any of them, it is the collective harmonies of the four voices that really sets them apart as a band. Each of them not only can sing but does sing, and any of them could take the lead vocal on a track, and indeed do.
The harmonies of the voices are reminiscent of something you rarely get in modern bands, the kind of harmonies you got from the beach boys, but that doesn’t make them sound less fresh and new.
indeed, that’s the secret of the band , they are both fresh and new, and yet achingly familiar at the same time. Even if you have never heard them before you’ll find yourself drawn in as to an old friend in a new guise.
This is music at its best, tunes that stay in the mind, lyrics that catch you singing along as they hook you in. Simple songs that have depth, all the same, that ache with emotion and wisdom the way the best songs do.
You’ll print your own memories on them because that’s what we all do with good music. But that’s just it, this is an album on which you will imprint memories because that’s the kind of music the might ‘Orse make. Music for memories
Good memories that will be all the better for the music
Memories of smiles and laughter and the joy of life.
Another friend of mine said of them recently ( and I paraphrase only slightly )
“You and your kind are what makes life worth living for us all”
A sentiment that I find hard to decry.

So there you are.
A fine début album that you should listen to, buy , play and most importantly make memories with, and find yourself humming to when one of the songs gets stuck in your head first thing in a morning, Which will make your day a day of smiles and joy. Because that what good music does and this is damn fine music.

A final note, I shall never make a music journalist, any more than a musician. So I shall leave that to the professionals in future. Just as I do the music .

Buy it here , your inner self will love you for doing so…
Wide mouth records

+nervousorse.co.uk

 

Posted in 'orse | Leave a comment