Of Cheese and Indie

I won't go on about politics today - it's too hot, which is something I don't deal with very well. I will just mention that the Daily Mail, of all rightwing racist papers, is going after David Cameron for his mortgage dealings - and a good thing too. I presume that they've decided that they need to keep their bitter, jealous Poujadist readers even if that means turning against their natural leaders.

I've had an action-packed weekend. Well, not exactly active, but varied. For Dan's birthday, we planned a walk along the Severn around Bridgnorth, and then to Birmingham for some fine lo-fi. So we all met at 11.45 to get the bus, except for Phil, who turned up an hour early, then wandered the streets of Wolverhampton in his disreputable shorts and beer-logo t-shirt. We sort of missed that bus - Dan's train was delayed, but it was filled to capacity anyway. So we wandered, and some of us decided to buy tickets for Mark Steel tonight. (Dan seemed to like his presents: I gave him a bottle of excellent Islay single malt and 7 CDs themed around birds and walking, Neal made him a bee nesting box which impressed us all mightily, and we presented him with a vintage mixing desk acquired perfectly legally).

Off to lovely Bridgnorth, where I had hopes of storming Bill Cash's mansion in Upton Cressett, but instead, Christine and her bloke bravely invited us for 'bread and cheese', even though Christine only knew Mark and I, and her husband had never heard of us. 'Bread and cheese' turned out to be Stinking Bishop, brilliant stilton, salads and jugs of Pimms, served in their beautiful English cottage garden overlooking the Severn valley. Needless to say, we couldn't tear ourselves away from fine company and gourmet food: the walk was cancelled. I'll stick some photographs up when I get into the office on Tuesday (no, I'm not having Monday off - I'm going to a conference on how to turn my job into a career. It's the New Deal for academics).

Later on, we took advantage of subsidised fares to get 4 train tickets to Brum for £4 and hit the coolest bars - we may not have enhanced this coolness. The Sunflower Lounge loses points for having one screen showing Celebrity Mr and Mrs Starring Morten Harket (is that right?), and wins some back for presenting Repo Man - in French. From there, off to the Victoria, where some of our party unsubtly admired the human form, chatted to Mark's ex's brother, drank fine ales, met another Bangor graduate, Mary, who has the required robust humour to cope with us, and then headed off to The Island, which was most stylish. I temporarily switched to margaritas because I don't think that it demeans my undoubted masculinity at all. No doubt the student I met there and in the next place we went will post the photo in Facebook to my enduring shame… Should have worn my Melt Banana shirt.

From there, we went to Snobs, the legendary Birmingham indie club. I went about 9 years ago and had a wonderful time. This time, it's fair to say, we didn't. Despite dosing ourselves regularly with gin and tonic, we couldn't help noticing that the music was rubbish - an incredibly uninventive dependence on mainstream sixties soul worn out by over-repetition. It was, frankly, reminiscent of 'Sound of Summer' CDs given out by middle market tabloids, leavened only by the most obvious Smiths or Stone Roses track: no inventiveness, no innovation, just deeply conservative choices.

I love a lot of 60s music - Velvet Underground, Ligeti, Reich, Northern Soul - but dancing for hours to music by dead people is a form of cultural suicide. It betrays a total lack of confidence in one's own generation, whether it's the musicians or the revellers you insult with assumptions about their unadventurousness. Dropping the occasional Curtis Mayfield track into a finely crafted set is one thing: serving up constant Stones songs with sporadic chunks of Paul Weller and (ugh) Ocean Colour Scene is the equivalent of going to a UKIP rally, the pop version of Classic FM (exclusively playing Classical Music From The Adverts).

What would I play? Northern Soul, Mogwai, Belle and Sebastian, Sons and Daughters, Magnetic Fields, G0-Betweens, Hydroplane, The Paradise Motel, Stereolab, Super Furries, Kraftwerk, Beulah, Tindersticks, Gil Scott Heron - lots of upbeat, interesting, danceable stuff which surprises and delights. Music for the brain and music for the groin. Music for the indie kids who carry library cards and make their own style.

So that was Saturday night. We returned by taxi, taking in every godforsaken urban sprawl between the Bullring and Beatties, arguing about whether dawn was breaking or just light pollution - both, I suspect. I got to sleep on my floor, thanks to my kind nature, and woke too early, feeling less than human. Lunch at the Newhampton Inn, reading newspapers under the fruit trees, then an ice cream in West Park restored my balance and here I am. Marking done, comedy to attend later, ironing not calling me for a change. I like ironing. There's a Zen-like calm which comes with achieving the perfect crease.

(Looking at the Bridgnorth tourism pages, reminds me to plug the Much Wenlock Olympian Games (10th-13th July) - I help run the fencing event, and compete too, and the Shropshire Biggest Liar Competition. Neal suggests that Bill Cash be given a clear run at this year's event).

So - you may not hear from me tomorrow - I'll be 'networking' (even typing the word makes me nauseous). Have a good day or so.

All my Christmases come at once

Today's greedy porker is Bill Cash MP. I punned about him last week and you all ignored me ('Did Bill Cash in?').

I particularly hate and despise him because he's my parents' MP, and was mine when I lived on the lovely Shropshire/Staffordshire border. He should have been turfed out in 97, but the Tories hurriedly removed the only urban area in the constituency, leaving only subsidy-sucking farmers and feudal barons. When the locals hang shot magpies on trees rather than Christmas lights (yes, they do), you know that they're going to vote Tory even if Fred West stood.

Anyway, Cash is one of the absolute, raving loons who made poor John Major's life a misery. I saw Black Beauty the other day. It's a terrible film, and in it, a bigoted old general shouts 'God, I'd love another crack at the wog'. Bill Cash would consider him a lily-livered liberal. Cash (who made millions from inheriting 'Cash's Name Tapes') wears those horrible, loudly striped blazers and thinks that foreigners think in English really, and pretend not to just to annoy. Though as a Catholic of a particularly rancid variety, I suspect he thinks in Latin. His delightful son William is a dubious 'journalist' famous for anti-semitic articles about 'culturally nihilist' Jews running Hollywood: he's married to one of the revolting rich currently trying to overthrow Chavez's government in Venezuela.

Anyway, the Daily Telegraph has caught him subsidising his delightful daughter.

Despite owning a posh London flat and claiming to live in his 'gentlemen's club', he charged the taxpayer £15,000 per year to rent her London flat - which she subsequently sold for a massive profit - which seems rather odd. Laetitia (I know, we should have some sympathy) is clearly a lovely human being too. Despite being a Conservative councillor for Bridgnorth (about as challenging as standing as a racist in 1980s South Africa), she seems to need a London base, and she's simultaneously standing against Hazel Blears in Salford (the setting for Coronation Street, only it's less pleasant in real life). She has a Facebook page, seemingly packed with Hooray Henrys and the idle rich.

Now, there's a race you wish both of them could lose. I actually didn't think there was anyone less working-class than Blears, especially in Salford - but I do have a mental image of lovely Laetitia turning up dressed in her hunting pinks, shouting 'Hallooo' and treating everybody much as Melchett treats Baldrick. What's her slogan? 'Hello Paupers! How would you like some Cash?' (Though according to Labour Mancunians, she spends a lot of time in posh London nightclubs and rather little in the northern city) and even the Daily Wail thinks she's a waster.

I'm loving this. Lots of rightwing Labour MPs are proving that they're corrupt and greedy - but far more Tories are proving that they haven't changed since the 18th Century: servants, stately homes, assuming that they'll be elected forever whatever they do (as this analysis proves), even hereditary politics. This is why PR or AV is needed: they abolish safe seats, thus making the candidates and sitting MPs work hard and keep their noses clean.

Some dreadful political puns

I haven't moaned about politicians for a few days. Why is Hazel Blears still employed, even though non-Ministers have been suspended from the Party for doing the same thing? Perhaps because he'd have to sack several other ministers too, and perhaps because she's vindictive enough to devote the rest of her career to undermining the Labour Party.

Have you noticed that the more rightwing the MPs are, the more corrupt they are? Rob Marris (though by my standards he's quite rightwing): innocent. Paul Flynn: innocent. Dennis Skinner: innocent. Hazel Blears, Geoff Hoon, Tories who charged us for 'duck islands' and moat cleaning: GUILTY GUILTY GUILTY.

There's a simple ideological reason for this. Being rightwing means privileging individualism. The appeal of the Tories and of New Labour is this: do whatever you can to get ahead, and we'll reward you. Everybody else is a loser. So naturally, corner-cutting and fraud is admirable under this system.

Socialism said: there's plenty to go round, so if we work together and look after each other, all our lives will improve.

So socialists don't steal from the citizens and capitalists do.

Pun time. The full details of MPs expenses aren't out yet. Did Bill Cash in? What did Ken Purchase? Did David Borrow? Did Liam Fox his constituents? Is Joan Humble? Were Greg Hands in the till? Does Sir Michael Lord it over us? Is Paddy Tipping a racist sport? When it came to negotiating with the fees office, did Jon Trickett? If so, did Derek Twigg? Was there a Steve Webb of deceit? Finally, was Tony Wright? Feel free to add more…