The Horror, the horror…

One of the scariest songs ever written is Tom Waits' bleak 'God's Away On Business'.
Seeing the Sesame Streets puppets singing it makes it even worse. But at least it introduces the kids to the idea that the universe is an arbitrary concoction indifferent to the activities of bipedal carbon-based life forms (who's in charge in God's absence? 'Killers, thieves and lawyers'). I had a friend who used to cry when I outlined this world-view. Ah well.



Mind you, there's always been a streak of savage violence to Kermit, as these early adverts show:

He is out of the office and will reply to your mail in due course

I quite like it when ancient institutions and corporations try to make themselves look cool and down with the kids by using new media and the like. They always do it badly: Paul Uppal MP has a moribund Twitter account, as does The Hegemon and a range of politicians: you can tell they don't mean it because they don't engage in any dialogue. Instead, they just send things out (Uppal doesn't even manage that) as an extension of their PR. I believe this is known as a FAIL.

However, it saddens even an evil atheist like me to see the Church of England stooping to our level. I saw a poster outside a church today which read 'God Answers Kneemail'. Tragic. And a hostage to fortune: it's tempting to phone the Advertising Standards Agency.

I tried it. This is all I got in reply:

For Ben

He's an obsessive Tom Waits fan, so here's something he'll enjoy - thanks to Zoot.





If you're not a Waits fan, you may be a bit befuddled. His work is utterly dark and disturbing, but if you listen to enough - say 10 or 12 albums - you start to detect glimmers of humour. Whether that means it's really there or you've had your mind warped by one of the most consistently creepy imaginations in entertainment, is unclear.

I do know that I'll never see Waits perform live. He only plays small venues, and the tickets cost hundreds of pounds once the touts have grabbed them all. Boo.