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Not a good week for traditional record shops as not only do we hear that Andy Cash is to shut up shop, but the Reddington’s Rare Records musical has been canceled.
Mayor of Timbuktu in Birmingham « AerosolArabic: Urban Islamic Art
The mayor of Timbuktu is in Birmingham… would I be able to meet and greet him!? No it wasn’t a practical joke, the mayor was actually in the UK as part of the twinning of the Welsh town Hay-on-Wye.
So we didn’t get it, but he popped in anyway. Good on you Said Ould Mahmoud.
Careless Talk
Morley Charles is a liar, not in the “attacks could be launched in as little as 45 minutes” sense - but in a more DC Thompson-esque way, fibbing and pretending to be foreign to battle the insecurities of starting secondary school. Although having the odd drink, and fantasising about seeing the next-door neighbour in the bath isn’t quite Winker Watson material. Careless Talk, his second adventure reads very much as a comic - apart from the undertones of self abuse and the way the insecurities of youth are a lot closer to the surface.
The heroes of The Beano are a way beneath young Morley too, who prefers Huck Finn, even if he does know more about them from his encyclopedia than actually reading Twain. It’s doubtful that he has much knowledge of the Mississippi when even Nechells is a far off place to be thought of with a little wonder.
Although the book is defiantly and actively set in Birmingham, in order to get past the Alton Douglas
“It’s set in the back end of Northfield, but it’s not really about Brum, and could have been set anywhere in England. Maybe it’s just name-dropping like the pubs - the Villa Tavern, Beehive, the Old Crown, they are still there so you can relate it back to them.”
This isn’t a bad thing as such, it’s a comic novel, not a local history text - I’m a great promoter of the idea that Birmingham needs its literary heritage bolstered - until they don’t become books “about Brum”, just books, and Birmingham is as mainstream a location for fiction as London or New York.
The book is very funny, and holds the right side of the line between bringing the past alive and simple Heartbeat-style nostalgia. The jacket features a glowing quote from David Nobbs (Tindal St are very good at getting these) and the book is Nobbsian - particularly Second from Last in the Sack Race
Another solid Tindal Street release then, and if nothing groundbreaking, it is proof that “a nice whimsical story, very easy going” (my Dad again) can have high standards as well as the odd refreshingly lowbrow joke - and local to boot. One for your parents’ Christmas present, but read it yourself first without breaking the spine first.
It’s a long way from Victoria Square to Moseley Road Baths, but at noon today as part of the bath’s 100th birthday celebrations some daft sods will be walking “the route that the Deputy Mayor took in 1907 to open the Baths for the first time” - wearing swimming costumes from through the ages.
To warm up, at this will be followed by a Edwardian Tea Dance organized by The Friends of Moseley Road Baths at the Methodist Church Hall opposite 2:30pm to 5:30pm. This is a free event with tea and cakes and a visit by Lord Mayor Randall Brew XI himself.
Via Brummie of The Year nominee Pete Ashton comes news of this K-Swiss (you know like adidas pumps but more stripes) sponsored freerunning competition. It involves you doing a bit of parkour in designated spots in Brum (by the Bank of Scotland is a favourite it seems), not killing yourself or any of the mini goths that hang around there, and uploading the videos.
The prize is a trip to Lisses, Paris which is the ‘home of freerunning’, but a bit like winning a trip to Coventry (which I imagine is brill for this urban jumpy stuff), so I guess you’d really need to be into this to enter.
The site has a nice map of good places to jump off, over and through around the city centre, and some video of peoples doing their things.
If there’s two things that we like to keep up to date on it’s Birmingham (obviously) and the world’s biggest dogs - for those reasons it seems that nothing Digby, Lord Jones of Birmingham does will slip by under our radar. From considering trade unions an irrelevance, to opposing the minimum wage, to hinting that he’d quite like to be mayor of Brum.
So in the flotsam of the interweb we learn that he’s to launch an infrastructure fund that plans to buy council offices and lease them back to them - and then give the profits to Simon Cowell and Alex Ferguson.
Facebook | Save Birmingham Central Library from demolition!
I think the link will only work if you have a Facebook account.
The Floozie in the Jacuzzi for Breast Cancer Awareness Month, originally uploaded by Steve Oliver.
“in Birmingham City Centre on 26 October 2007, they coloured the water in the fountain pink. Trouble is it looked a bit like red and therefore blood, which I don’t think was the effect they were hoping for! Would have been more effective if the sun had shone. I only had my camera phone with me, so sorry the quality’s not up to standards.”
Or bizarre tribute to Enoch Powell (4o years ago in April).
‘Walk of fame’ closed over safety
We promise you’ll be able to walk all over the Bummie of The Year Award. Nominations close on Wednesday, so keep them coming.
It’s Halloween next week, so instead of joining the media and other capitalists in their orgy of orange and black consumerism, you could take David Nikel’s line and just keep an eye out for ghosts around your area.
His blog post today pointed us to the Birmingham Ghosts and Hauntings website, where they take things a little more seriously than the woman off of Blue Peter - and even if the ’supernatural’ is a load of unfounded nonsense, there’s still interest in the historical and the reasons these legends grow up.
And on the 31st if any children knock at your door, tell them the traditional British day for legalised begging is November 5th - and they’ll have to stuff some old clothes with newspaper and put it in a pram if they want anything out of me.
