chaunceyq

Did I Miss Something?

Was I visiting the Gents when Margaret Thatcher's reputation was reappraised?

Correct me if I'm wrong but isn't the Iron Lady something of a bogey woman?

So why is she being considered for a state funeral?

Now don't misunderstand me, I'm all for putting the (metaphorical) willies up her by banging on about her funeral while she's still here with us*, but I'd be telling her that we are going to be putting her out with the rubbish on Wednesday morning. Next to the recycling.

I blame that BBC 4 programme from a few months ago. They cast a good looking woman in the lead and the trailers trick you in to thinking it's some sub Carry On up Westminster romp when in actual fact it was a subtle horror tracing the rise of one of the most hateful women the world has ever seen.

Just because she's an old lady doesn't mean she's deserving of our sympathy, lots of the people whose jobs she took are old people too. Remember that and think on.

State funeral indeed.

Rock the boogie fatwa.

* Hell I'll bury her now if someone can lure her round to Streatham for me.

Bernie Clifton and Emu

While going through old emails and clearing the crap from my inbox/draft/sent/spam/extra folders I came across (in an entirely non sexual way) some stuff that I thought you good people here at Vox might be interested in. For example, this brief but illuminating little exchange between myself and Bernie Clifton.

Dear Sir Bernie,

Yesterday I was travelling through Sheffield and decided to take the opportunity to check out some of the local radio stations. Imagine my pleasure when I stumbled across your show. It really was a great joy to listen to you even if for only a short while.

One problem arose though, your quiz. By the time you revealed the answer I was out of range and no longer able to pick you up. I wonder if you could solve the dispute between myself and my beloved. She thinks that the connection between (the) Queen, Agatha Christie and the Everly Brothers is onstage bustups, I for my part believe it is sexuality.

Hopefully you can clear up this argument for us.

Yours,

CQ Monkhouse

P.S. We hope to see you back on our screens soon, are there any plans afoot for yourself and Emu to return to TV work anytime soon?

Hi there

Thanks for your interest. You were both wrong I'm afraid, the answer was that there were all educated at home.

Best wishes

Rock the boogie fatwa!

 

 

If only he wasn't so boring, he'd be very interesting...

Mohamed Al Fayed is the man to whom the title of this entry refers. Yes Mohamed Al Fayed is undoubtedly one crazy arsed son of a gun and no mistake, and if there's one thing we've all, likely, found over the years it's that being a crazy arsed son of a gun generally makes you, if nothing else, interesting. Al Fayed however needs to branch out a little to get the British public on his side. As any cursory glance through the history of great eccentrics* will show, diversity is the only way to ensure a long and fruitful stay in the public eye. People soon got bored of David Icke banging on about the Queen Mother and Boxcar Willie ruling the world with their lizard chums and people are becoming equally bored listening to MAF and his crazy conspiracy theories.

If by some peculiar and frankly unlikely turn of events Mr MAF happens across this blog I dare say he'll start accusing C.Q.Monkhouse of an important role in the "murders" of Di and Dodi. So I'm going to get my denial in now, I was sleeping off a hearty evening of drinking on a matress on the floor of a bedroom in High Wycombe when the news broke your Honour.

So now back to advice for MAF and David Icke should he be reading. (and no I'm not now nor have I ever been a lizard) I'm going to say one word to you boys, DIVERSIFY. What we need round here is a conspiracy theorist who isn't chained to one dull subject. We have thousands of TV stations, radio stations, books, magazines, newspapers and other stuff besides, if you want our eyes and ears you need our attention. So MAF, how about I give you a suggestion or two and you run with it, we all know you have the imagination. So supposing someone were to turn deepthroat and tell you that David Attenborough brainwashed the stingray that killed his arch rival Steve Irwin? Or maybe that scottish presenter from Coast isn't Scottish at all, just putting the accent on so that ladies find him more attractive... Yeah bears some thinking about doesn't it?

Well that's all from CQM for now, but remember to question everything...

Rock the conspiracy fatwa!

*Nutters

Paperback Reader

 

The Love Lush

As age and responsibility catch up to a man. As he finds it increasingly difficult to make it out for a night of revelry never mind get up the next morning. As his mind turns from debauchery to family. As the beer belly is replaced by the "milk tyre". As the wing tips and spats are replaced by brogues and slippers. As the... Well you get the picture.

As all this happens a man, which is of course a very different creature to the woman, looks to gentler things from which to get his proverbial kicks. CQM, while still able on occasion to cut a rug with terpsichore and down a mead with Bacchus has of late found his thrills planning 'zany' schemes with the artist formerly known as Midget and between soft covers (not with Midget). No you filthy minded preverts, CQM means the soft covers of paperback books. More specifically the kind you will find here http://www.bookscans.com/ .

It is something peculiar to the male of the species (though obviously there are exceptions both ways) that they are more prone to collecting and completism. Take for example the late 80's/early 90's when your chum CQM became enamoured of the pop styling of Michael Stipe and the R.E.M.ers. R.E.M. had been around since the beginning of the 80's but CQM was determined to have all of their recorded output, including bootlegs. Yes we men are a strange breed and thanks to the good folk at Abe Books Chauncey is able to indulge his new passion for whodunnits/thrillers of a vintage and paperback variety to his hearts content and hopefully too, his bank balance's content.

This affliction has not yet become uncontrollable, so far CQM has been able to restrict his purchases to books he actually wants to read, but mark you me, there may come a time when the urge must be fought to buy a book simply for it's cover, it's title or even, heaven forbid, it's tag line.

Look at them here, teasing with their come to bed covers, their voluptuos titles, their wanton tag lines. They're the painted ladies of the book world, tempting a good, honest family man to stray...

 

 

This is just a small selction because if I showed you all the pictures that I think are greater than any Van Gough or Renoir I'd have to buy Vox and clear all your blogs away to make space.

 

The G-String Murders

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sin Hellion

Seriously check out that site, it's great.

Rock the Bookie Fatwa...

CQM

Paxman in Romanian Slave Labour Shocker!

Yes Jeremy Paxman has been outed in the News of the World for paying his Romanian 'slave girl' a whopping £5 an hour. Now people are obviously saying that Paxo should be ashamed, but what they don't take in to consideration is that he only earns around £900,000 a year and his partner is just a lowly TV producer so she's not going to be bringing much to the table is she? Out of these two meagre wage packets they have to care for three children, run an Oxfordshire farmhouse, (which he only gets to enjoy for half the week because he's probably to busy the other half shouting at rich politicians and living in a rented solid gold bedsitter on the top floor of Harrods) and pay the wages of a gardener, cleaner and weekend cook. (yes you heard me correctly, a weekend cook. Lets be honest we're all partial to a nice poached weekend every now and then...) Take all this in to account and it's not surprising he had to pay the Romanian couple less than minimum wage, he must be bloody skint.

Still what do you expect from a man called Jeremy with M&S pant trouble? What with all these recent problems I think it's time the Beeb pensioned him off and made way for a new slightly more credible political interogator, and my money is on Barry Chuckle.

CQM

Viva Fauld Wood

I don't know if you have noticed but there has not only been a distinct dumbing down in our society, but also a very marked sissfying. I noticed children playing conkers in safety goggles and gauntlets the other day. Well, I though to myself, don't worry your pretty little head Chauncey m'dear, they're just kids, it's not like their going to have any bearing on our future, why don't you go on home and watch something with people continually doing reckless things like shoving teddy bears loose eyes down their baby's throats or making those same baby's lick toys covered in toxic paint from Taiwan. So last night I watched Watchdog with the nations barometer Nicky 'the pout' Campbell. Nicky 'the Scottish Sexpot' Campbell is of course all things to all men not to mention women who swoon at the mere mention of his name, but Chauncey isn't all men, to put it bluntly I have discovered what Nicky 'Smouldering' Campbell isn't. He isn't Lynne Faulds Wood.

You see back in the good old days there were standards to be reached before you could consider yourself worthy of a place on Watchdog. You had to be either A. A potential deathtrap. C. A toy with jagged metal parts small enough to be swallowed. or C. ripping off old age pensioners by charging them a fortune for non existent double glazing/roofing/central heating.

Having watched last nights episode I can tell you just what Nicky Campbell's influence has done to a once great consumer rights champion. Now you can't move for Nicky's celebrity pals like the Spice Girls complaining because somebody didn't get to see them 'sing'. Or some mug that wanted to see Led Zeppelin live because "I've been a fan since I was a kid and their dynamite on stage." Twit got ripped off by some ticket company and now he's run off to Nicky crying. Most importantly he didn't specify how much he'd spent on his tickets, Chauncey is guessing it's because it was an ammount that only lent further evidence to what a bumble brain he is. After all what kind of chumpington buys tickets to a gig that's (and here's the important bit) sold out?

Anyway as if all this wasn't enough to convince you that being a deathtrap doesn't cut it with Nicky 'the body' Campbell the next story might end any conjecture. A couple complaining because their holiday was ruined by the current upheavals in Kenya. Oh I'm sorry idiot couple, I'll just get on to someone in Kenya now and tell them to stop killing each other so you can get on with your holidays. I'm sure once they see that your hols are being ruined they'll snap out of it and realise there is a bigger picture here. I mean how selfish are these people to ruin your hols. My god and other sarcastic exclamations...

Well I'm glad I've got that off my chest and now if someone will start a facebook group to bring back Faulds Wood and Stapleton and have the other two shipped of somewhere that there's no cameras I'd be very grateful.

CQM

Rock on you funky dog shits

Sex, Drugs and Fast Living on the BBC

Remember Nigel and Nippi? They looked like they were going to be the next big comedy double act when their TV show A Place in France went out a couple of years back. The plot for A Place in France (because it wasn't a documentary now was it) was based around Nigel, a mid level TV documentary maker and journalist with upper middle class written through him like a stick of Blackpool rock, and his best pal Nippi Singh, the man who ran the post office in Nigel's home town. Yeah they were a bit like the Odd Couple, but odder. Nigel and Nippi decide to buy a property in France together as a holiday home. Unfortunately they went about it like Laurel and Hardy. The wide array of Build/Buy a New Life in the Country type presenters around the world sighed a collective sigh and shook one huge collective head at the two N's comedic escapades while the rest of the country laughed a little then got bored and didn't watch after episode 2.

 

 

Nippi & Nigel

Well I have no idea what Nippi is up to at the moment, probably hard at work in his post office, biding his time until he returns with the Citizen Kane of TV lifestyle docs, but Nigel has remained in the public eye with his outrageous shock docs A Seaside Parish and it's sexed up sequel An Island Parish. Just how these two slices of life in the raw managed to slip past the sensors I will never know, but if you like your documentaries depraved then Tuesday evening,BBC 2 at 8pm is the place to be.

I think of An Island Parish as being a bit like a more adult Pulp Fiction or Magnolia. Several lives and stories are guided expertly by Nigel, directing, producing and narating, to a usually bloody or ridiculously sexy climax at the end of each stand alone episode. Or if you want you can watch each episode as part of the larger picture. Frankly this show has got BAFTA written all over it. Everything is there, drama, comedy, a German vet with her own catchphrase. (just you wait, in 6 months everyone you meet will shout "country dude" at you in a German accent)

Watch it people, it's reinventing the wheel. Reinventing ithe wheel in to a TV show about the breakneck speed of life on the Scilly isles. If you aren't hooked after one episode then you aren't human because this is televisual gack of the highest grade.

Rock the Boogie Fatwa!

CQM

The Odd Record

As you may or may not know Chauncey is a fan of singing actors. You know the deal, Richard Harris belting out Macarthur Park, Robert Mitchum hicupping his way through an album of calypso classics, even  Goldie Hawn sighing gently and fey on a selection of seventies country and folk covers. However a new breed (and by new I mean about 30 years old) of record has come to my attention via the wonderful worldwide web.

 

The Odd Couple Sings

Yes it's your old chum Quincy and his pal from the Odd Couple tv series Tony Randall, and what they are doing to the songs on their only LP together god alone knows.

But as is the way with these things if you set yourself to the correct way of thinking then a lot of pleasure (and I use the word advisedly) can be derived from their combined assault on the old lug 'oles.

Of course when I say combined assault, I actually reserve most of the blame/credit firmly at Jack Klugman's dirty great plates. You see Klugman has a voice only a mother could love, and a cloth eared mother at that.

Randall goes for a more straightforward comedy style while Klugman's voice is in many ways like Les Dawson's piano-ing (yeah piano-ing, you want to make something of it professor?) so bad it must be a joke.

Anyhow as I've recently undergone a crash course in how to compute one off you can look over there to the right in my audio section and check out Your're So Vain. Frankly I don't know where Carly Simon gets off calling this 'her' song, anyone who has the dubious pleasure of hearing Randall and Klugman knows it's their little musical bitch from the first note to the last.

Enjoy cloth ears.

CQM

 

Free Dystopia

Some statistician with more time than sense worked out that, if the present rate of growth continues, by the year 2019, one in four of us will be an Elvis impersonator. If you wish we can discuss the many reasons why this is such a ridiculous theory, but that will have to wait because Chauncey Q Monkhouse has his own theory to grow in your brain.

By 2019 I believe that, at present rates of growth, Elvis impersonators, not to mention everybody else, will be massively outnumbered by people wandering the streets trying to foist free newspapers on to a fully expecting public.

I envision a scary post apocalyptic world, not dissimilar to the Mad Max movies, but instead of every person you meet trying to stab/shoot you and steal your meagre petrol supplies they will wrestle you to the ground and ram London Lite in to your coat pocket.

The police will lose control of the streets to warring factions of City A.M. and The London Paper gangs who will themselves go in to hiding on Friday's when the brutal Sport vendors swagger out in to the cruel daylight.

An underground guerilla army of Short List vendors will be glimpsed fleetingly out of the corner of your eye and before you realise it you'll be reading an ultimately unfulfilling article on Danny 'Pissing' Dyer.

Yes my friends, one day in the not so distant future you too will wake up and discover yourself wearing a cagoule in the colours of one of the free rags and then you will truly understand the terrible truth of the words I speak.

CQM

 

Grow Some Randy In Your Ear

Some time ago, before I was married (yes sorry to break it to you this way ladies but CQ Monkhouse is unavailiable, please try not to do anything stupid), a cruel man (and I'm not going to mention any of Midget/5 out of 10's names here in public) gave me a 'gift'. That gift looked something like this.

 

Randy

I listened to it once, for it was an album not just a picture, and once my recovery was complete I hid it at the back of my cd rack and tried to forget the whole sorry affair. Obviously it was difficult but in time I even managed to forgive my tormentor for his unfeeling present to me.

However on Friday whilst reading a review of the latest long player by unpopular beat combo British Sea Power I was remided of the unpleasant secret hid behind my Richard Harris and David McCallum albums. I don't mean for one moment to suggest that the latest from Brighton's 12th favourite sons was in any way compared to Randy Newman's own unique brand of bumptious, piano led twatfoolery. No what reminded me was the comment in the review about the dying art of the album liner notes.

Apparently the new BSP album has extensive liner notes of a light hearted and wholly irrelevent nature and that my fine feathered friends is what led me to retrieve my albumus horribilis from it's rightful place out of sight of human, not to mention cat, eyes.

You see if albums were judged not on the misic held within their grooves, or in the case of cd's within their... well within their whatever cd's have in the place of grooves, but on the quality of their liner notes then Randy Newman Creates Something New Under the Sun* would hold a place up there in the top ten.

Let me enlighten you further, here are the liner notes.

Randy Newman is the type who'll stop off at a vacant piano, pull out his aerated cushion, squoosh down, hunch over thekeys, one shoulder forward, the other leg out to one side. A pudgy Hoagy Carmichael, you'd guess, maybe 24 years old.

Randy Newman, leaning in there - his hair cut neat; a UCLA diploma in his trunk; a sports coat that looks like it's smuggling a six pack of bananas; a wrist watch that tells real time.

And if you say, "Randy, play something," he plays. Something like Love Story or Davy the Fat Boy.

And you sit there, and grow some Randy in your ear.

"Neat," you say. "Funny stuff."

The joke's on you.

Randy's songs do for pop music what Lenny Bruce did for humour; take a couple of ribs-showing, nervous characters, open up their hearts, and let The Real pour out.

Example: Somebody gives you a giant fat boy to take care of - who needs that? - so you put him in a circus freak show.

Randy's seen inside you. You've felt those same feels. You've repressed those same funky urges.

So you laugh at his slow drawl world.

The medium Randy uses to make you laugh is stretched out, remodeled blues. A sophisticated kind of blues which hangs out on the corner of Ray Charles Street and Gershwin Avenue. Peculiar blues. Vignettes of non-heroic life. You have to reach back to Sinclair Lewis and "Winesburg, Ohio" to find the like.

It doesn't fit. Small town, non-cosmic blues? Hell, this is practically 1970, and there's Randy, 24, and smiling at you the smile of the world's best insurance salesman.

It doesn't fit. It sounds as if Randy was reared in the Dust Bowl, which he wasn't, and never grew up in the fancy music community of Hollywood screen composers, which he did.

I'm not about to figure out Randy. I do know he's no nickle-and -dime misanthrope.

And I never bothered to ask Randy, "Randy, why don't you ever write any happy songs?" I know he'd answer: "I don't care." He always does. And it'd be a dumb question anyhow, like asking William, "William can't you get Lear to crack a couple of jokes?"

Randy does it all - writes, sings, arranges -his own way. Few enough of that around, and if it gives you trouble, Randy's got his answer. He'll lean in to a vacant piano and play you another picture of how you really are.

Stan Cronyn, 1968

Almost makes me want to listen to the album again but I don't particularly want any Randy growing in my ear. So come on bands/singers let's have more liner notes please, preferably by Stan Cronyn if you can find him.

CQ Monkhouse

Rock the Randy fatwa!

 

*For that is indeed the name of this epic album.