The Leeds Debacle - Mar 2011

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WELCOME ONCE MORE TO THE LEEDS DEBACLE

as well!

For the second time, the good, bad and indifferent people of Leeds have come up with stories, reviews, comments, fiction, poetry, rants and recollections on music, booze, theatre, literature, tv, film, curry, politics, sport and probably a load more stuff Issue two of The Debacle is: John Barran Ross Newsome Gethyn Pugh Adam Lee Jones Rachel Gardner Ringo Mountbatten Danny Egan Ed Teale Lee Peaks Sarah Francis Gareth Jones David Marshall Emily Hallewell Michael Lilley Robin Jahdi George Quinn Stuart Pearson Matthew Allen Harley Ellis Richard Sykes Luke Moseley Dave Barlow

If you would like to write, be written about, advertise, or anything else, please email thedebacle@hotmail. co.uk with your interest. Everybody welcome!

You can follow us at facebook.com/leedsdebacle and on twitter @theleedsdebacle Read all issues of The Debacle online at issuu.com/thedebacle 2_TheLeedsDebacle

I

N E E D T O S L E E P

need to sleep othing seems to let go, nocturnally offbeat ver-changing, inebriating thoughts condone my mind ach one no direct aversive, or sufficiently passes time eep in doubtful abhorrent questioning of achieve, or some kinda self worth onight sweaty placid skin, stinks like dirt ver and over & over again tifling limbs, paper to pen uxury morning light, please rain threw at the curtains mask bring out a new arly dawn, open the door ull off the sheets of this dark score

2011

Michael Lilley

i

t’s here with a bang, or should I say quake? I’ll be honest with you, I wasn’t expecting miracles in 2011 (it’s only just started), but real news would be nice for a change. I thought the days of having the football scores predicted by Paul the Octopus were bad enough, he’s dead now.

We had an earthquake… pictures fell from living room walls, dogs barked and net curtains shifted slightly; no casualties, no heart-wrenching appeals or emergency aid required. Low and behold it was on facebook within the seconds. It seems that if it’s not online it’s not news. For instance Cat Woman (not the superhero) was a household name after footage of her putting a defenceless moggy into a dustbin was released.

I’m all in favour of having the internet as a research tool and as a place to network, but to spend your days sweating behind a computer screen saturating the most mundane things is pointless. There’s a whole world out there waiting to be seen.

Write letters, take pictures with film, go to gigs, visit museums, meet new people, live your life, make something of yourself, see the world before (if you believe the news) global warming gobbles us all up.

Everything’s too online and digital; bring back the days of Blue Peter fact sheets and competitions entered via postcard. Life isn’t virtual, it’s reality.

2011: The year (fingers crossed) banal bullshit ends or common sense prevails.

Adam Lee Jones

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Gethyn Pugh takes a stab Noel & Co. sans that Blobby cunt.

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started a rumour on Facebook. It seemed like a good place to begin. All the contestants on Deal or No Deal are in possession of Equity Cards, poor actors who couldn’t even get a foot on the ladder in an episode of the Bill. I don’t know how far that rumour got, not very, I suspect, but it was worth a try. It’s not true of course, but have I cottoned onto something of substance with this train of thought? Roland Barthes, the distinguished French semiotician, wrote about the role that the ‘sport’ of wrestling played in reinforcing the model of good versus evil in his book ‘Mythologies’. Within this fake, theatrical amphitheatre, he expresses the importance of the ever-presence of binary opposites; essential to establishment thinking and so crucial in the strategic planning of how we should perceive ‘them and us’ with the necessary demonisation of our chosen ‘zeitgeist’ enemy – they are to be played out here in the WWF wrestling arena, and of course it almost goes without saying, far beyond. The fanciful imagineering of Disneyland asks for a leap of faith, not so much in the wrestling ring (its fans believe in it), but it is a prerequisite that at first glance is absent from the hideous equation that is Deal or No Deal.

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Contestants on this game show convey the desire for human beings to satisfy basic emotional needs. It provides them with the platform to bear witness to their cathartic craving for the authentic; that of acceptance, inclusion, and belonging - all tragically withering notions of sentience in modern society.

The house that Noel Edmonds lives in, the Deal or No Deal house, or the ‘Dream Factory’ as Noel likes to call it, is our Disneyland, but its protagonists are not larger than life caricatures – they appear as you and me, and therein lies the unthinkable paradox; that the context of this show and the obvious eagerness of its contestants to re-connect with the expression of human emotion, has the most tenuous connections with reality - the contestants on Deal or No Deal are as fantastical as Mickey Mouse. We must be unequivocal about one thing at least though; despite being a big ‘act’, this is the antithesis of theatre and protagonism of the thespian, and is the downright abstraction of the self in a shameless display that in Faustian terms at least, the Devil himself would be proud of.

Here, the lack of social cohesion in our society, the importance of the individual, and the dissolution of community spirit are nonexistent in this game show of game shows. The contestants, from all walks of life have one massive love-in, they all think everyone is great, and they each think the other deserves the best. Oh, and they’re all lovely people too. Once on the ‘Walk of Wealth’ there is no such thing as a shrinking violet as they strut around the stage like consummate method actors, unprompted as they go, developing their characters into the fully-rounded, humble, reverent, people-loving individuals that make up the Deal or No Deal society. Even the audience participate with wise counsel, often expressing caution in going for the big prize. We don’t want to be too greedy folks, not under this Neighbourhood Watch.

Then there’s Noel himself of course. His profundity weaves together the fabric of the spectacle. He is desperate to institutionalise the show, using phrases such as ‘the walk of wealth’, and ‘the dream factory’.

He has tamed the hyped-up Price is Right with a measured stoicism, aced the Vegas-styled Play Your Cards Right by not showing

his hand, and he’s completely forgotten about that bloke he killed by plunging him to earth from a great height in a wooden box.

It is a far cry from the battling council estates and the pofaced, high-fenced exclusivity of the leafy suburbs from which these contestants emerge so what is going on here? Why the elevation of the self to this Esther Rantzenesque ‘Hearts of Gold’ status?

Here’s a thought. People actually enjoy being nice to each other, but can only manage it these days in a contrived environment. They don’t need to be actors, because actually, it comes naturally to a human being but is suppressed by the dog-eat-dog reality of the world. In fact, it’s a vulnerability that has no consequence in the

Dream Factory, but which is so easily punishable in our real communities.

In a bafflingly simple TV gameshow format, people are selling the darker side of their souls and trading it for half an hour of the good stuff, and as a result it is all the more hideous to watch, knowing as we do that half an hour of being a complete wanker would be a much more healthy role-reversal as well as making it a damn site better viewing.

One thing I will say for the programme though that strikes a chord with reality – they’re all at the mercy of the banker.

I’ll end the article with some preemptive strikes.

“It’s just a game you middle class wanker – you’ve clearly too much

time on your hands” “How dare you berate Noel, he has done more for this country than you have I’ll bet and I’m not even talking about all the charity work he does” “What would you prefer, people attacking each other with pitchforks?”

“The man in the box was an unfortunate incident; I find your lack of forgiveness rather shocking”

izen Report

ctCit The Subje 2nd dossier) (the difficult

H

appy new year to you all.

I sincerely hope last months gems of undercover wisdom helped you along the yellow brick road of musical stardom.

For anyone wondering, I am well in the process of infiltrating the mainstream music industry, posing as a good-looking, charismatic, solo singer-songwriter, documenting my actions and filthy secrets I happen to uncover using my voice and guitar as a kind of musical Trojan horse. Genius?

It’s been a buzzing, busy eyeopener of a month pop pickers, crossing the Pennines on too much of a regular basis, sharing my notso-mysterious message with the beautiful bastards of the north.

First stop worth a mention was the launch of Bradford’s “I Heart Indie” where I was joined by The Mexanines, just one of BD’s many fast moving bands, and possibly the models of the tightest jeans on the circuit.

I, myself enjoy the skinny fit jean but unlike this bunch, appreciate the importance of the circulatory system.

A good night all round so don’t be surprised to hear good things become of “I Heart Indie” in 2011.

Also over this way was a night called “the mid winter ginger fringe’’ at Delius, where I debuted my new, self-titled song. It occurred to me in the strange part

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of a wintry morning three weeks ago, about the 4am (when the buzz refuses to increase no matter what) that many a successful artist will have a track or an album sharing their name. e.g; The Libertines, Eminem, Take That... S Club.

So now I have a Subject Citizen song and rest assured listeners, all four of it’s chords are beautiful and the lyrics not far short of perfect.

Also playing were Sharp Darts (very early Roses-esque with a hint of a ska note if you listen very carefully) and Analogue Bombs who are excellent to watch and you need concentrate much less to hear the ska.

On the back of my Bradford escapades, a musical ally of mine

t h e Thirsty Scholar gave my eyes and ears the opportunity to experience Naymedici as a full band for the first time and I wasn’t disappointed. The overall sound smacks of the libertines but cleaner and a bit darker but lighter but not to the extent that you’d label the band charlatans, (not the band Charlatans, you know what I’m getting at). that sentence will make more sense if you see for yourself.

Almost certainly getting yourself about, never turning down a gig no matter how big or small or shit and keeping in touch with all of your musical friends are essential ‘do’s’ on the beaten road to fame and godliness.

As this months instalment must end, I fear my identity has been compromised, I’m sure I’m being

“Mexanines, possibly the models of the tightest jeans on the circuit” has offered me a support slot for one of my idols. The voice of the once great, forever legendary The Seahorses’ Chris Helme, who rightfully belong in my top five favourite bands of all time. I’m considering playing ‘Blinded By The Sun’ in such an ornate fashion Chris will be too intimidated to take the stage and I win. Win what exactly? I’m not entirely sure yet....

Gigs at the Tiger Lounge again, B-lounge, again and a first visit to

followed. Don’t Look, I’m gonna try and lose him.

Simon Cowell’s goons on an assassination mission perhaps?

Maybe the first instalment was more popular that I had anticipated, What next?

Will I survive to reveal everything?

Will I live to get the message to the South?

Will I upstage my childhood idol?

Till next time amigo’s......

Office Toss F

or some, perhaps many, work is thing you do between 8am and 5pm (or there abouts).

A multinational company, to whom you’re nothing more than a number. I’m a six digit number that begins with the number three.

Working for ‘The Man’ is generally, pretty dull and you’re expected to feign interest in every aspect of office life.

To keep myself (and a few others) entertained, I have a few activities I indulge in...

1. Make a list of customers with funny names, it’s surely what Excel was invented for, so Bill Gates and co. could laugh at Mr. Boner or Mrs. Meatyard.

2. Intentionally make amusing, yet plausible, typos on documents your colleagues will see. Accunt instead of Account is possibly my favourite. Pissword rather than password?

And why not have a ‘Monday Sock Check’ to beat stock-check blues?

3. On public computers, when you’ve done, leave an eBay auction open of something naff. I’ve lately been drawn towards signed photos of Russ Abbott, Les Dennis and Ken Dodd, especially if they’re wearing a crap jumper.

4. Spreadsheet. It’s a reliable word, however it would appear it’s not suitable for every occasion. Our ‘Training team’ have started referring to spreadsheets as ‘Delivery Grids’. Aware of this silliness, myself and a colleague are pushing for the following alternatives to be adopted into office culture: Wisdom Waffle Learning Lattice Performance Portcullis Management Mesh I suggest you try this too.

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fromMaetoDecember Lee Peaks spent the night (calm down) with a local songstress

I

'm not happy, I am far from happy .

t is with deep irritation I find myself immersed in the repellent environs of a consumer frenzied Headrow on a Saturday evening in the midst of a violent downpour.

Water scoops up from my inadequate footwear and saturates the base of my jeans , soaks through and finds delicate flesh. I am rushing, charging psychotically towards my destination through dirty grey streets , past wobbly, deformed looking drunks hanging out of illreputed pubs , gasping on cheap cigarettes and satisfying their heaving lungs. Lifeless figures queue at bus stops, clutching on to masses of carrier bags for dear life, hindering my progress.

I take the opportunity to check my reflection in a passing window and find with some degree of consternation that I look nothing like the human being that stared back at me from a bathroom mirror some forty five minutes previously.

I panic slightly and attempt in

I take a quick right and find myself surrounded on all sides by tasteless neon signs proclaiming squalid takeaways hidden beneath, and seek the much needed solace of our m e e t i n g point: Sela bar.

Immediately I find myself engaged in a homely and comfortable ambience. Beautiful y o u n g creatures glide in dark silhouettes around the dimly lit basement and group together in loose, hushed circles. The atmosphere is European in flavour.

Leesa Mae is easily identifiable sat in the corner next to the bar.

She is tall, even sat down she is tall. Dressed casually, she beckons me over, looking every bit the insouciant musician. Her hair falls slightly over her left eye and she attends to it regularly, only for it to fall again seconds later. She looks eye- hurtingly beautiful as she sits stooped, delicately sipping from a tumbler of Jack Daniels and Coke before reflecting on her week.

calm on the surface with an underbelly of intrigue vain to flatten down my wild hair with a mouthful of sticky saliva.

For some inexplicable narcissistic reason I find myself aching to impress. After much schedule rearranging, tonight I am meeting a woman who, from her online portfolio, seems to subliminally warrant that extra effort. From her work as a well travelled singer / songwriter to her job as art director on Coronation Street this industrious local enigma appears worthy of this small consideration.

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“I haven't stopped since 5 o'clock Monday morning”, she muses cheerfully, “Corrie has just been mental recently". Her job takes her to Manchester five days a week where she "creates, develops and oversees the visual appearance of television scenes” that are broadcast into millions of homes several times a week. She previously worked on such shows as Heartbeat, Countdown and A Touch of Frost. I am intrigued to know how she manages to juggle such a challenging and

time consuming position with her musical workload.

“I generally play my gigs on weekend evenings and afternoons, although I do perform at some 'free mic' nights during the week whenever possible”. I can sense a constant bubble of excitement in her voice showing no sign of bursting as she begins to talk about her life in music. “I used to sing with my father while he played guitar, I listened hard and eventually learned to play a few chords on my own and I just got the bug from there”.

Her family is a big influence on her career and her brother features as lead guitarist in her current band.

“I started writing my own songs and eventually worked up the courage to get on stage. Once I got that feeling of performing and seeing the reaction on people's faces I wanted to do more and more”.

Leesa is charming and friendly, calm on the surface with an underbelly of intrigue. Much has, and much hasn't, changed since those early days of playing local pubs and acoustic nights.

She still plays Working Men's clubs and travels up to Richmond most Saturdays where she has a weekly commitment, but Leesa is ambitious and last year saw her take off to Australia on a selffunded musical tour. She plans to return this year to do some dates and perform her new album, and has already lined up gigs in Brisbane and Sydney.

She has developed into a strong, natural performer with a mesmerising, hypnotic vocal range

sense she likes being the centre of attention (she achieves by little more than inhaling and exhaling). A garrulous head turner, at times she seems every bit the walking contradiction: strong and independent yet fragile and delicate; uncomplicated and introvert yet cryptic and a complete show off.

I recapture her attention momentarily as I want to talk about her work for charity. Leesa recently stripped naked for a Cancer Research calendar.

“Cancer Research is something I hold dear to my heart, I lost a close member of my family to cancer so I do whatever I can to help, I am hoping to do more work for the cause this year”.

and a penchant for catchy hooks.

Never is this more evident than on her debut EP 'Love – Eternity', produced and recorded for free as part of the prize for winning the 'Live and Unsigned Exposure Award' in 2009.

Despite her arrival into her early thirties Leesa still clutches on to an unyielding belief that she can scale the heights of solo pop stardom. But even if she should fall short in this fearless determination she will certainly remain on a pedestal for all aspiring young ambitious performers out there. She is every bit the strong, independent ambassador for the city. A hod carrier for the 'X factor' cynics.

As I adjourn to the bar for more Jack Daniels to slake her parched throat I briefly look around to find her perusing the laboriously felt tipped posters advertising coming attractions, it seems she never misses the opportunity for more work. She looks tomboy-esque and one can almost imagine her spending her childhood climbing trees and wiping snot from her upper lip. As the evening clings to the night's chin, Leesa suggests we move on somewhere else, she

is 'in the mood for dancing'. I am almost sorry to bid farewell to the Sela and its warm, unpretentious clientele as we make our way to 'Verve' bar, a much pokier manufactured affair . The rain has intensified and Leesa puts her coat over her head.

As we scurry disjointedly along I find myself getting more and more captivated by what makes this woman tick and acting on my curiosity to delve into her personal life is, I fear, only a short sharp cocktail away.

“I was brought up into a musical family”, she informs me after interrogating the bar woman as to which is the best cocktail to satisfy her need for more Bourbon.

“We used to sit around and have sing songs all the time, in fact I'm sure there's a clip on Youtube of us somewhere”.

Her reminiscence is short lived as she breaks off and starts a conversation with a middle aged lady next to her. The woman smiles and warms to her immediately. Leesa seems to have this effect on most men and women in her vicinity and you

www.leesamaemusic.webs.com

With the Australian tour already in place, her local gigs pencilled in and her work on Britain's biggest soap, one wonders how she will find the time to cram more charity work in. But this is Leesa Mae, this is the woman who seemingly finds time to do anything she sets her mind to. Completely accidentally on her part she leaves you with a feeling of self unfulfilment, a need to achieve more in your own life.

This is not a bad thing.

Still slamming down the Bourbon long after the more liverrespecting souls have hailed down black cabs, the night takes on a more distracted and intoxicated feel. Leesa dances precariously on the tables, bursts into occasional tuneful whines and flirts crudely and cruelly with all comers. In my haze I give up trying to understand her and instead just marvel. For here is a person who knows what she wants and how to get it, knows when to have fun and when to work hard.

I slip away and back into the ceaseless rain. I pass a deformed looking wobbly drunk gasping on a cheap cigarette, stop and take a step back. I am mildly distressed, upon closer inspection, to discover it is my own reflection.

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THE PERFECT MARRIAGE Stuart Pearson is a ‘Beer Specialist’ for Different World Drinks, we get the impression he likes a shandy or two.

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lot has been said about wine and food and their faithful marriage – or perhaps, uncompromising togetherness. But just when that relationship looked to be heading into a position of unbridled eternity, the sudden attraction of beer has wowed and is eager to have a slice of the action. So, what’s the future for this newfound partnership? Can beer be the new wine?

I paired the beer with a trio of Alsace/German classics, starting with gourgeres (deep fried cheese) canapés, where I found the acidity of the beer was balanced by the smooth cheese.

Beer may have lost out to wine on many dinner tables in recent times but with CAMRA shouting of the revival of real ale, and the ever-increasing credibility of microbreweries, the beer industry certainly appears to be alive and kicking.

The classic Alsace dish of flammekuche, (thin bread dough topped with sour cream, onion and lardons) was the last of the entrées. The Kasteel Cru worked brilliantly with the light floury dough, whilst the onions complemented the slight hint of onion present in the hops.

In November, I had the pleasure of hosting a beer-and-food dinner for 25 beer novices, and shall I say, beer snobs. A carefully prepared five-course meal was scrupulously paired with five beers, each varying in style and complexity.

To begin the evening, I presented my guests with Kasteel Cru, a delicate Bière Blonde, with its own revolutionary twist – the use of special French sparkling wine yeasts to add subtlety of flavour and a fine, powder-light head 10_TheLeedsDebacle

The second canapé, pork sauerkraut, was an instant hit: the palette was cleansed as Kasteel Cru’s fine stream of bubbles lifted the saltiness from the pork sauerkraut.

And so to the starter, which was a delightful, fresh dish of crab and cucumber rolls, pickled vegetables, pak choi and bean sprouts. This needed a beer that would work brilliantly with the Asian flavours, so I paired it with a Singha Beer, brewed by Royal permission in Thailand since the 1930s. The bitter hops of the beer balanced the fresh chilli and ginger spices from the rolls, whilst the citrus notes in the lime salad helped bring out the flavour

of the beer to create a crisp-yetbalanced finish.

After clearing away the empty plates, my guests were treated to a duo of main courses. Firstly there was pan-roasted breast of duck; celeriac and thyme puree with sweet and sour beetroot, paired with the legendary India Pale Ale (IPA), Worthington’s White Shield. Brewed to an 1830 recipe Worthington’s White Shield is the bottled live beer that matures with age and the bitterness of the hops were a perfect partner for the strong flavour of the duck and the sweet beetroot. The roasting of the duck breast mellowed the robust flavour of the IPA, which enabled the celeriac and thyme to develop. The sweet and sour beetroot complemented the sweet malts within the IPA and helped neutralise the high carbonation of the beer.

Not finished yet, my guests were then treated to confit of veal breast with slow-cooked ratatouille. This I paired with Modelo Negra, a Munich-style lager that pronounces itself with an initial burst of sweetness that reacted with the tart acidity in the ratatouille. Slow cooking the veal the same way as the Amber malts balanced the robust

flavours of both the veal and the lager. The use of dark malts gives a toasted character, which was complemented by the meatiness of the veal.

And finally, to dessert. And whilst some were undoing the buckle on their belts, I assured them that the best was saved for last.

The final course of the evening was served: a pistachio and olive oil cake with candied ginger and orange sorbet. Choosing a beer for this was relatively easy, and I was quick to ensure that everyone had a bottle of the artfully crafted American beer, Blue Moon ready and waiting. This Belgian style ‘witte’ beer is a unique blend of wheat, rolled oats, Naval and

Valencia oranges and coriander.

The full-bodied taste reacted well with the light sponge, almost cleansing the palette, whilst the olive oil balanced the dryness of the beer. The orange sorbet enhanced the orange aromas in the beer whilst the high carbonation worked with the caramel of the candied ginger.

Once my guests had made sure every last crumb had been lifted from the plate, the reaction was one of sheer astonishment.

“I never knew beer could have such an effect on the way a dish tastes, the way in which I was able to pick up certain flavours from the beers and compare and contrast them to the food was extraordinary.” One guest noted.

The way in which each beer had associated itself with the flavours in the dishes helped create a wonderful evening.

Matching beer and food is about comparing and balancing styles and flavours. A spicy dish needs a carbonated beer to lift the spicy oils off the palate. High acidity in a dish needs sweetness to balance the flavours together.

A science? Maybe…

A marriage born? Definitely.

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Death of the Magazine Harley Ellis

B

logging. Whether you’re a morbid teenager or a 30 something year old dodging that tax report, you either have one or will have come across one during one of your frequent Google searches, and with the fast paced movement of the fashion industry, the Blog has a killer reputation for sending mouse pads moving to get a daily fix.

With over 50 million Blogs online and counting, it’s easy to feel like a little fish in a big sea, and unless you decide to take photos of yourself covered in glitter wearing 7inch heels with a tag line that reads ‘Sunday trip to Sainsbury’s’ it’s going to be pretty hard to get noticed.

The beauty of fashion Blogging is not necessarily what the latest trend is, or a report criticising the fact that Armani’s ready to wear collection wasn’t quite up to scratch as last years, but for the inspiration you need to create your own wardrobe fantasy fuelled

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by old photos and song lyrics.

You don’t need to have a branded reputation as a hipster to be in the ‘it crowd’ of fashion bloggers.

Step 1, take lots of ‘cool’ photographs of yourself and find other things that represent your style.

Step 2, advertise, advertise advertise, follow these quick steps and you will be well on your way for owning a fashion Blog. So, how exactly do these social diary networking sites rival the print publication? While you could go down to your local newsagents and pick up the latest copy of Vogue for £3.99, you could also log in to your virtual comfort zone and keep your monthly fashion intake updated, while not spending a penny (apart from your Wi-Fi costs of course) and with the magazine Blog being a constant fresh source, your monthly mag can now be turned into a quick click fashion fix. So, doesn’t this seem like the online fashion industry could kill the glossy? Of course it

does, with more and more people transforming into technological wizards we can take the internet wherever we go, you can show off the newest iPhone app you bought last week, or even email your distant cousin while waiting for the 9am bus, and whilst doing this the fashion media frenzy will be rapidly moving at a pace that not even the light of speed can understand. But of course the fashion magazine will never die so don’t be expecting an invitation for the funeral anytime soon, because with the excitement of A4 pages filled with beautiful photography, witty interesting articles that can never be deleted and of course, the oh so wonderful possibility of a freebie is something that I enjoy looking forward to each month, the wait is worth it when your planning your day figuring how to spent some quality time with your beloved printed paper. And at the end of the day, you can’t really take a laptop into a bubble bath now can you?

BEAUTY TRUTHS NOT

UGLY LIES

http://beautytruthsnotuglylies.blogspot.com

W

e all know that a heavy night frequenting bars can leave us feeling ever so delicate the next morning. Our body gets dehydrated and that shows in the skin, which becomes dull and hair becomes lifeless. There are some great products out there that will help to rehydrate, renew and gets us looking dazzling again.

Payot - Hydration 24 Corps (£24) Payot is fast becoming one of my favourite brands. Not only is the packaging stylish and chic, all the products I have used so far work wonders. Hydration 24 has a non-oily texture and delicately melts into the skin. Its rich formula keeps skin hydrated all day long leaving skin soft, smooth and supple. If that wasn’t enough it actively firms the skin at the same time making you much happier about any wobbly bits.

Angela Langford – Rest and Regenerate Nourishing Night Balm (£31.75) Luxurious doesn’t even come close to describing how sumptuous this rich night balm is.

Made with all natural ingredients it contains high levels of vitamin E and antioxidants to repair and protect your skin no matter how much you have neglected it. Massage into a clean face after a night out and your face will look bright and radiant on the outside even when you feel worse for wear on the inside.

Ahava – Pure Dead Sea Liquid Salt (£12) A completely unique product that provides an intense concentration of Dead Sea minerals to naturally reset the skin’s inner balance. It regenerates the skin by detoxifying its cells, strengthens its defence system and improves its metabolism. Rub all over body and rinse off after two minutes or drizzle into the bath to feel like you are bathing in the magical waters of the Dead Sea. Pure Anada – Luminous Eye Colour £6 Eyes can become a little dull the morning after so give them back their sparkle with Pure Anada’s range of luminous eye colours. There is a huge range of colours to choose from so you are bound to find a shade to suit you. They are versatile enough to be used wet or dry to create various intensities of colour.

Queen Cosmetics – Sensiderma Rich Hand Cream £9.10 Three eminent dermatologists created this nurturing hand cream over 80 years ago. The cream absorbs quickly into hands making them soft and deeply moisturised. Suitable for those with even the most sensitive of skins as it sooths dehydrated partied out hands.

Fish Hairdressing Co. – High Gloss Serum £4.99 Specially formulated to tackle dry, damaged and spilt hair. A super sleek serum revitalises tired tresses, nourishing the hair whilst adding shine to give you gorgeous, smooth glossy locks no matter what you got up to the night before!

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The Gendering of Caster Semenya Gethyn Pugh tackles the internationally fast lady Caster Semenya

W

ould the lack of a phallus necessarily assume, according to Richard Keys, that if Jamie Redknapp were in the vicinity of Caster Semenya, he would want to ‘smash it’?

Presumably, after Captain ‘Keys’ Caveman had dragged Semenya into his cave by her hair because of her ignorance of the Gender Rule he would’ve happily egged on the ‘Thomas Cock It Salesman of the Year’ to give ‘it’ the once over and thereby put an end to the biggest controversy in sport in contemporary times. Yes, that’s right Keys, your off-broadcast ablution of women in sport is just regurgitated and distilled residue of the real sexism in sport. You’re small fry, and now your own wife hates you for being so pathetically impotent – you’re not even a good sexist.

Semenya, a gold medallist in the 800 metres in the 2009 World Championships, has had to endure the most horrific and personal examination of the essence of her being in order to participate in her chosen field of expertise, not at the hands of the likes of Gray or Keys, but the various bodies of national and international athletics federations and associations that govern the sport.

It would seem that Semenya’s body is the subject of some kind 14_TheLeedsDebacle

of investigation into vulgarity, a cheating and guilty deformity that would allow her the highest accolade in her sport via the ‘back door’. Sex or gender testing has been inconclusive, and as a result she has been allowed to continue competing, albeit under a cloud of suspicion.

?

Synonymous with diving in football, blood capsules in rugby or the use of banned ‘performance enhancing’ substances across the sporting spectrum, it appears that choosing to test the limitations of a body that you are naturally born into within the capacity of sporting endeavour is something that must also come under suspicious scrutiny – if that is, you declare yourself a woman, and

previously considered debased and inhuman by the social elite.

Semenya’s sex has been described by that horrendous term in many reports as ‘Hermaphrodite’, meaning that to some degree or other she has both male and female sex organs.

All reports seem to confuse the terms ‘sex’ and ‘gender’ without much introspection about what either means in the context of the debate. A person’s sex is defined by biologically determined factors, whereas gender is considered to be something more like a role that person grows into because of the emphasis society places on the importance of sexual difference.

Germaine Greer notes in her seminal book ‘The Female Eunuch’ that when examining the sex cells

you’re bloody good at it.

of both men and women;

Let’s be clear about one thing; sport was considered vulgar until the public schools decided that it was something that needed to be enjoyed by the dominant classes and social groups. The professionalisation of sport caught up with athletics in the late 1970s, leaving its ‘vulgar’ amateurism behind it but even by then the formerly known International Amateur Athletics Association had long developed the role of regulating that which was

“…of forty-eight chromosomes only one is different: on this difference we base a complete separation of male and female, pretending as it were that all forty-eight were different.”

you’re not even a good sexist.

Semenya’s misfiring starting pistol is the best false start that the patriarchal hierarchy of the governing bodies, the spectacle of the spectator sport, and the service end of the industry could have possibly hoped for,

presenting Semenya as it does, with some pretty thick red tape through which she must cut to cross the finishing line.

Of course we’re used to this reaction to those excel in track events (but who don’t fit into the White Anglo Saxon Protestant body of athletics model) having their anatomy measured as much as their speed. Who can forget Linford Christie’s gold medals in the Olympic Games, World Championships, European Championships, and Commonwealth Games, without also recalling our press revelling in their own brand of Freudian penis envy with constant references to his ‘lunchbox’?

It is something more hideous though, when the prejudice an athlete faces is from the very organisation that is supposed to be the professional body that is promoting her sport. If Linford Christie’s lunchbox is considered

to be an emancipatory step forward from the 1936 Olympics, where black sprinter Jesse Owens exposed Adolf Hitler’s Aryan ideology as complete nonsense, are we to assume that this cross examination of Semenya is progressive in that it falls short of the consideration of allowing her to participate as long we can dissect her body after her death like they did with Sarah Baartman?

Sarah was paraded as a freak in the early 19th century after being shipped over from Africa. Her body type was used by scientists to try and prove that black women had overtly protruding genitalia and that this would be concurrent with the racially stereotypical thinking at that time that they were more likely to be sexually promiscuous, probably to the level of prostitution. After she died, she was cut up into pieces and her genitalia were exhibited in a museum, as if to prove this.

If the notion of ‘gender’ is to be key to all this then surely,

any accusations of ‘unfairness’ must be levelled at a society that demands she be one or the other; she has lived her life as a woman and that is clearly enough of a conformity that must and should allow her to compete as a woman in the athletic arena without prejudice, without examination and without question.

Fetishisation of the female body is all around us and sport does not disguise either the ‘guilt’ of that body having been investigated of its missing parts or the polarities of ‘love or hate for the size of its lust’ of the black male’s anatomy (thanks for that one Kermit, a classic hip-hop line). Semenya therefore, faces an uphill battle being a black South African woman should she be found to have both sets of organs and moreover should she continue to put up with this extremist and despicable treatment.

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WORLD WAR II WHAM BARS AND A GERBIL Gaz Jones gets his literary rhyme on...

I

was sat on my sofa reading a book about war, one that I found at the back of a store. The Real Adolf Hitler and World War Two, I couldn’t believe what this book said was true.

Everyone remembers Hitler he had no heart, but he wasn’t always like that, well not at the start. Hitler was an aspiring funny man; laughter not evil was his initial plan. One day he shaved in a genius tache, on the comedy circuit it was an instant smash.

Hitler became the talk of the town, Germany’s favourite comic clown.

Unfortunately for Hitler there was a nasty surprise, a man that dressed in identical guise. Charlie Chaplin was the same but with far more talent, Hitler as a person was far from gallant. Rather than fight it out for the top spot, Hitler retired moving into a squat.

Germany was in the middle of a big recession; Hitler fell into a world of depression. Chaplin became the funniest man of his time, while Hitler sulked in his world of grime.

Hitler was lonely so bought a pet, nothing too flash as he was saddled with debt. He bought a gerbil with a trusting fur face, and took him home in an old pencil case. Joseph the Gerbil was what he named his new pet, after he’d been registered at the vet.

Despite looking cute Joseph was an evil little thing, his views all radical and extremely right wing.

By nature he was a persuasive little chap, and had depressed Hitler eating out of his lap.

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Hitler had told Joseph about his life, who had concocted a plan to cause some strife. ‘You must fight back’ the gerbil suggested, Hitler was scared they’d both be arrested. Joseph’s evil plan was into stage one, people needed to see that Hitler was fun.

began to rejoice.

Joseph and his old gerbil friend Roland; broke into a sweet factory over the border in Poland. They stole loads of Wham bars and popping candy, along with a rocking horse that they agreed would be handy.

He added to his plan the end of the Jews, and turned everyone against them by using the news.

Hitler and Joseph were now in complete power, as Joseph stayed up fiddling with the shower.

So Joseph sent Hitler into Berlin, with a bag full of sweets and a violin. He told him to sit on the rocking horse, stating it would make him a comedy force.

Joseph was right, it was a massive success; Hitler was funny in fancy dress.

After a host of other similar stunts, Hitler grew in popularity on many fronts.

He became once again a national obsession, the man to lead Germany out of depression. In the background Joseph was always lurking, licking his lips as his plan was working.

Hitler became leader which was swell, no one knew of the gerbil’s spell. Over breakfast Hitler sat unsure, the Juice had no bits and wasn’t pure. ‘The Juice should be concentrated’ he screamed in his voice, Joseph misheard him and

The gerbil was raised by a family of Jews, who used to hit him with their hard leather shoes. It was only by chance that he escaped, the night little Abraham had planned a rape.

The rest of the world began to

complain, Hitler was not funny and was going insane. He was controlling the people by feeding them sweets; stolen from Poland without receipts.

An evil gerbil and Wham bars had saved Hitler’s life, but now they were causing a world of strife. It’s not quite the story I was taught at school, but books never lie, that’s the golden rule.

Auf Wierdersein......

Please send your three thing requests for issue three to thedebacle@hotmail.co.uk whoever’s suggestion Gaz uses will win a copy of his book Semi-Detached!

GALAXY OF THE LOST / Adam Lee Jones How am I going to explain this one?

Your neighbour’s car keys made this planet There are plenty of chairs, enough room to sit Would you believe it if I told you?

Your sister’s cat was the first one here Then came the Christmas trees and neglected beer Look around you, what do you see?

A landscape of the broken, borrowed and lost This is what we made at no extra cost

LEEDS / Emily Hallewell A Glittering Skyline Wastelands Green fields beyond City of dreams shining shop windows, tall towers with walls of reflected sky blue-grey, stormy sunlight Below my window an abandoned lot locked away rubble and rain But look to the future Building upwards brick and steel and glass Northern industry grit and shine We squat or climb above rolling hills, trees and tarns A new kind of life everything is possible

SUN OVER SOUTH LEEDS / Dave Barlow A LOVE BORN OF SPITE / John Barran I long for the odour Coitus on musk And break under order Of treacherous lust Immersed in a power That yearns for distrust Revenge is a supper Served rare and unjust.

I wake to the embers Our scattered remains Incessant foreboding The peeling stains That vanish remembered In cartoon distain It takes one to fuck one A sickening gain.

I run from the afters Embarrassing pride Unfetching desire A harrowing sight Our limbs hang together Like Jekyll in Hyde A love killed in hours A love born of spite.

When the sun shines down over Beeston you’d mistake it for being a nice place all the tramps on the bench have a less foisty stench and the gangs have a smile on their face And when the sun reflects off the whorehouse and over the woods beyond you can stroll up the path where used needles are stashed right up to Middleton pond And the pavements all glitter with diamonds or so it seems when it’s bright and it’s quiet though on closer inspection it’s just the reflection of glass from the previous night’s riot And the muggers all bask in the sunlight as it streams through the trees in the park and they gather like vultures round burnt out car sculptures til it’s time to start work after dark And there’s plenty to see here in Beeston we’ve got no castles or forts but we’ve a house that was actually a terrorist bomb factory and it was a tourist attraction of sorts So when planning your next summer holiday say no to Italy or France avoid all the sunspots follow the gunshots give sunny Beeston a chance

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Twin Shadow

Released in the latter part of last year to mildly rapturous reviews came an album we’d seen all before.

80s synths, cheap drumloops, vague dance beats, nostalgia, whimsy and bedroom production. One man from Brooklyn with pseudonym. This was so last year last year and then some. The news that the production is actually by Grizzly Bear’s Chris Taylor and the album was written alone after a break-up pressed all the fauxemotional Bon Iver buttons, only this time there was a suggestion that lo-fi wasn’t to make low budget sound cool and low talent sound hidden. Forget by Twin Shadow crept it’s way into many a scenester’s head and many a blogger’s top ten. Tragically poetic lyrics and unknowingly catchy tunes created an album that went way beyond it’s formula. The eleven tracks rarely veer from these ingredients yet somehow become it’s strength. Each 3-4 minutes are a snapshot of longing and regret, never overstaying their welcome, and, through beautifully understated melodies, each becomes it’s own. How well this would translate into a live spectacle was debatable and one that Mr George Lewis Jr answered resoundingly at The Cockpit. As a four-piece, the live versions make up in energy what they lose in atmosphere, from opener Shooting Stars guitar solo through Slow’s triumphant dance to Forget’s emotional end. Twin Shadow has been almost mockingly compared to any number of contrasting 80’s icons, from Prince to Morrissey. One album in, and from tonight’s evidence, Twin Shadow is his own man making his own music.

Papa Vs Pretty

I first heard of Papa vs Pretty whilst on holiday in Australia this Christmas. Triple J Radio were playing the lead song of the EP ‘Heavy harm’. I instantly fell in love with it, drove straight to a local record store and bought the EP. I even went to the extent of posting an update on mine and a few friends’ Facebook pages such ! was the extent of their impact. If you know me personally you will know how rare this is. They have a really interesting crossup mix mash of rock and accessible hooks that leave you still feeling cool but able to sing along to it after a few listens. There are elements of Muse but also a little nod towards more modern folk with intelligent song structures and dynamic developments. The riff that kicks in on track 5 ‘Ask Yourself’ is a beast, a modern sound whilst still feeling rooted in classic rock. It made me imagine Jimmy Page writing out the tab for Stairway To Heaven on an iPhone, if that makes any sense at all. The last ‘I Still Believe In Us’ is just downright amazing, the delicate build and great lyrics the perfect way to end this great first offering from the band. I was left wanting more.

They are based in Sydney, don’t seem to have any label support, but kick ass like a foot kicking an ass!

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Arthur Rigby & the Baskervylles

Lush. Majestic. Sweeping. Three words that pretty much sum up the sound of Leeds orchestral 8-piece Arthur Rigby & the Baskervylles. Whether these are words that get you turning up your B&W’s to the max or clambering for your Swamp Rats records will determine how you take their latest release, White Houses, an unashamedly grand four minutes. Slow strings build into bombast as a sincere vocal paints a romantic seaside setting to a lilting melody. A beautifully arranged, perfectly accomplished love song that could turn many listeners off and many more on. Live at The Library’s 360 Club, they are quite the spectacle as their many bodies and many more instruments pack onto the stage. Clearly talented musicians clearly loving what they are doing but they don’t quite let rip in a way that could turn this crafted, passionate, unique lineup into the epic ambition their music seeks.

Conor Owen

Visiting who knows where in Leeds on 29th March comes Conor Owen, a London singer-songwriter on an unusual trip around the country. In his yellow van Penelope, Conor will be travelling from south to north stopping off at various cities on the way to play his songs from forthcoming album The Observationalist at wherever takes his fancy every day at 17:30. The secret locations will be revealed on the same day at 14:00 on all the usual social networking sites and then be followed by a private show at anyone who would like to invite him back to play at theirs, so to speak.

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Hunter Or The Hunted?

George Quinn.

F

rom the alley floor, steam from the sewers rose through the drains, up past the twisted rusty remains of the fire escape, to the grime covered window of my office, before making its way up to the heavens.

It seemed that my best days were behind me. I was unkept, unshaven and my relationship with the bottle had become almost matrimonial. As I sat at my desk I groped the wound on my front that a year ago had nearly cost me my life, I iced up a glass, poured another slug of scotch and realised that it was over, the trail had melted away. I had gambled and lost everything, my job, my health, even that whore of a wife had split the second the dollars stopped rolling in.

‘You’re all washed up Drake!’

That was the last thing she said before the door slammed behind her and she walked out of my life.

I was 47, an old man in the crime fighting business. I had been knocked back, beaten up and shot at more times than a mad bull on a lethal rampage and even though my head was still sharp and strong my body had taken one hell of a kicking over the years. Who was I trying to kid? What Business? Noone had called for 2 months and even then I was only hired to tale unfaithful husbands and hopeless thugs. It wasn’t as though crime had just packed up and left town, it was more rampant than ever, but still the phone wouldn’t ring.

I figured that the word had gone around that I was out of the game and everyone, both friend and foe had forgotten about me. I’d been left to rot like a dead dog in the storm gutter.

I was tired, but I couldn’t sleep.

Insomnia once a great ally had become an ironic enemy. I poured myself the dregs of the bottle and swayed over to the door, it read Drake Hunter, Private Detective Agency. I took a marker pen out of my tattered trench coat and 20_TheLeedsDebacle

scrawled out of business over the sign. With my fate firmly placed in the hands of the gods I reset my fedora and for good or ill set out into the dreadful night.

Walking was the only thing that helped my sleeplessness. The doc said I had an overactive mind, no shit. Nothing they gave me could put me to sleep but walking helped. A stroll often gave me time to think and in a trance I would rearrange puzzles and dissipate the nervous energy that had built up. The rain poured as I walked through the meat packing district where the air smelt of day old death and rats the size of dogs wouldn’t even flinch as I stumbled through their domain.

Even through the pitter patter din of the storm I could hear the seedy sound of the city. Distant motors droned, whores screeched and the unmistakable rasp of gunfire whip cracked like lightning. High up above the flickering neon’s, low light bulbs revealed the silhouettes of the down trodden and denied as they growled, thrusted and backhanded at will.

These were the sounds and sights of any night in this part of town; it truly was a hellish place.

Naturally yet unwittingly, as any drunk would, I navigated downwards through the back streets until I came out at the docklands and McLafferty’s Bar, one of my regular haunts. Under the bridge, it was a rundown cellar dive into an underworld of sea salt, sweat and bar room brawls, but I always felt strangely at home there. That might have had something to do with Jerry the proprietor, a tower of a man who stank of gin and could just as easy fall on either side of the law. He was an old friend and the kind of guy that was good to know, he could get you out of a fix bang straight. Jerry kept a shrine of photos and cuttings of the city’s Irish boxers on the wall behind the bar.

‘Now then ya foul face.....What can I be getting foya?’ He drawled.

‘A bottle of the good stuff....And put it on the tab.’

‘Which tab would that be then?

The one that you still owe from last time?

‘Jerry how long have we known one another? My boats coming in soon...I swear.’

‘Wi brass buttons I’ll bet...And me own mother be the Queen of England.’

We both laughed and Jerry picked a faceless bottle from below the counter and passed it to me.

Still a hold with his shovel like hands he looked at me for a few seconds before letting go. As I sat and drank away my sorrows, low life’s gambled and shot pool in the back, Dockers came and went and the smoky air grew thicker with every cigarette. I chatted with Jerry about our glory days and conquests of old until our reminiscence was suddenly interrupted when a small fellow burst through the door like a wild horse, instantly commanding the attention of everyone in the joint.

‘A body, we found a body in the drink… We were unloading the princess at 4c under the bridge when O’Hara spotted her bobbing up and down like an apple. Hoiked her out we did, tried to save her, but alas, dead as a dormouse, poor wee lass’.

‘God rest her soul’ cried Jerry.

Everyone made the sign of the cross before settling back down to their own affairs. It wasn’t an unusual occurrence for this to happen and indeed I had picked up many a case this way in the past.

Jerry and the small fellow started to talk and drink but I stay stood, this could be the break I needed.

I shook off the booze, grabbed my things and bid my old pal farewell.

The police had yet to arrive and on the dockside next to a bollard a few men stood in prayer, cap in hand, around the dead girl. The storm had worn itself out and

the clouds had cleared to reveal a harvest moon that shone down and reflected off her pale skin.

She had drowned, of that I had no doubt, she was bound at the wrists and ankles and the twisted expression on her face gave it all away. Those last moments of terror and torment as the lungs fill, before endorphins flood the brain and death seems like a game were plain to see. Id been there myself, but id got lucky that time.

She was young and beautiful; her diamond eyes pointed towards the sky like a mirror for the stars and her sodden red hair, reduced to a sad waterfall of dripping flames.

There was nothing worse than a dead broad and it made me shudder to think that some sick fuck out there did this.

From the dockside I walked up onto the bridge which sprawled across the city’s river like the spread wings of some steel eagle.

From the middle I looked back and saw that the cops had arrived, the hard blue and red flashing lights lit up the sleepy night and officially confirmed the evening’s foul play.

Still, from where I stood the drama some how seemed diluted and almost surreal. Time stood still and not a car passed as I wondered how many pairs of concrete boots lie at the bottom of the river port.

I lit up a cigarette and as I made my way back along I didn’t notice the old man until he spluttered at me.

‘Got a spare one? For an old veteran?’I looked, then crouched down extending him a smoke.

‘Yeah old timer, here you go…..

Now tell me, how long you been sat up here?’ He was grey and gruff. His pruned skin hung off his face like a starved corpse, his possessions that lay strewn around him were just rubbish really, bags and boxes of torn filthy rags.

When he spoke again it was in the unconfident tone of a man who is down and out and will never end up back on top.

‘Yeah I bin here. I bin here all night, I bin here clear since they built this thing back in 39, on and off, y’know.’ I lit and he puffed.

‘You see anything? A girl perhaps?’

‘Yeah I seen her. I seen her

most days. She brings me food and sometimes, sometimes a li’l something to drink.’

‘What colour hair she have?’

‘Red. Redder than hellfire, and the face of a goddess. She was here, not long ago.’

‘Did she say anything?’

‘Not nothing today, she just gave me this.’ The old man’s face cracked into a smile as he held up a brown paper bag containing liquor of some kind.

‘Don’t know where she went.

She was peering over the edge. I took a hit o this here hooch and when I looked again..... She gone.

Some car must o picked her up or somethin’ It was her alright. It would have begun to sound like suicide had she not been tied up. I didn’t add up, perhaps it was my swirling head that couldn’t decide.

I didn’t share my knowledge of her death with the old man; instead I left him alone on the bridge side. Alone with his bottle. His fantasies of the red head and the kindness she had showed him were now no more than a warm memory on a cold night. I began to feel extremely tired and as my pendulum legs mindlessly marched me home my mind and conscious began to bow. I thought of the dead girl with the red hair. Why did she die? Maybe she got caught up in the wrong crowd, maybe she couldn’t love, or maybe she was too crazy to live. I didn’t know. She was at peace now, she would age no more, she had become immortal and her stone dead beauty would be forever entombed inside the planes of my mind.

That night I dreamt of her. I was in a bare dilapidated room. I banged my fists against the door and screamed let me out, but it was hopeless. In the small round glass of the door she appeared before me and she was the most beautiful creature I had ever seen. Her hair shone like a choir of angels, she looked at me and I at her.

I asked aloud.

‘Why did she die?....... Why did you die?’

My voice echoed throughout

my dream world as it would in an empty swimming pool. There was no answer, then the door opened and I peered outside, I could see her running. With haste I ran down the corridor and after her. The distorted physics of my dream world battled my desire to catch the girl and as I saw her in the distance, no matter how hard I tried to I couldn’t catch her. The passage in which we were in seemed only to get longer and when my legs turned to jelly I gave up and sat down.

Then, from nowhere I heard her spectral voice, it sounded like wind howling through the trees.

‘Don’t come here! He’s back’.

‘Who’s back? Where are you?’ But it was to no avail. I woke up in my dark room drenched in a boozy sweat.

The next day, I washed and shaved. It felt good to be sober. I picked up a copy of The Chronicle at the news stand down the street and read the cover story as I ate.

It was front page news. There was no identification of the body as yet, but I was sure there would be at some point soon. You don’t forget a face like hers in a hurry and someone somewhere would miss her for sure. The cops were appealing for information, same they do every day. The whole affair couldn’t escape my mind and the morning had given me a renewed vigour. I decided that in the previous nights drunken haze I had not been thorough enough and my intuition took me back to the bridge. When I got there the old pike was nowhere to be seen.

He’d probably being carted off by the cops for interrogation or wandered off in search of drink.

His things were still scattered on the floor and the liquor bottle he was drinking from was empty in its paper bag. Cars passed by bumper to bumper and their occupants stared as I rummaged through rags and bags looking for something, anything that would help. When I was close to giving up I kicked the bottle bag and as it smashed against the bridge side, as luck would have it, out fell a key. I praised my good fortune and picked it up; it read Chase TheLeedsDebacle_21

City Bank and had the number 063 scribed on the hub, I had a key of my own. I remembered the conversation Id had with the homeless man the previous night and in realising that the girl had given him the bottle I grasped the key tight and knew this was the lead to follow. With ease I hailed a cab from the bridge side and in 10 minutes or so we were approaching Third Street and the bank. The driver looked back at me through the rear view mirror.

‘Bad business back on that bridge, huh? I’ve seen the news.’

Our eyes met in the reflection.

‘You some kind o cop? You look like some kind o cop.’

‘Some kind, yeah.’I got out and passed him a 20 dollar bill through his window.‘Wait here, I wont be long.’

The Bank was a big old imperial building between the Library and the courts. Granite stairs led up to revolving doors which in turn opened into a sparkling foyer.

Polished stone floors covered with red carpet made the occasion royal as I walked in. I approached the counter.

‘Good afternoon sir how can I help you?’

‘I’d like to see my deposit box please, the names Drake Hunter.’I passed the clerk my ID and he checked the records.

‘Ok everything seems to be fine here. I trust you have your key with you sir?’I nodded and he asked me to follow him. The safety deposit boxes were at the back of the bank in an alcove out of direct view of the main section. Behind prison style bars, from floor to ceiling there must have been 500 vaults in there, a secure place for secrets of all kinds. Mine was 152 and as I unlocked it the clerk stood watching from the entrance.

The bank staff didn’t ask many questions about the contents, although to be safe I made sure my overcoat guarded his view of the box. I was searching through old case files, photos and memories trying desperately to think up some way of getting into the other box when I was handed another huge slice of luck. A child’s cry 22_TheLeedsDebacle

for her mother had temporarily distracted the clerk and handed me free reign in the room for a few seconds whilst he took her to the main desk. Without hesitation I quickly climbed half way up a ladder and opened box number 063. Inside there was nothing but a black case, which I took and then quickly shut the door. Had I taken ten seconds more I would have been caught and I had only just got back to my own drop box and put the briefcase down by my side when the clerk returned and ask if everything was ok. I gave him some old chat.

‘Old habits die hard.’ I said still sorting through my box.

‘Some never do.’ he chuckled as I found an unexpected roll of 50’s at the bottom of the locker. I locked up, turned round and passed the man one of the 50’s.

‘Sometimes it’s easier to get forgiveness than it is permission’.

I smiled as I left the bank.

The cab dropped me off at the drug store across the street, where I bought a small quart before going up into the office to examine what was in the case. It wasn’t locked and on opening it I discovered a file with a photo of the dead girl on the front and what I guessed was her name and address. She was Maria, she was 26 and she had been some kind of nurse in a hospital. She lived in the city and now I knew her name and address that would be my next port of call. In the briefcase, underneath the file was a black Berretta. I began to feel as though soon I may need it.

There were far more questions than answers as I walked down Hazel Boulevard to the apartment block where Maria had being a resident. It was a squalid place and I couldn’t imagine her living here. The door of the apartment had been kicked in, someone had been here looking for something or someone and perhaps they were still inside. I took out the gun, edged open what was left of the door with the barrel and peered inside. It was a mess, the whole place had been trashed, the contents of the drawers and cabinets were everywhere

and I was careful not to touch anything. There was damp on the floor and as I navigated through the rooms following the trail of water it became warmer as it soaked through my shoes. The lights flickered as I came to the bathroom door still cautiously wielding my weapon; this was where the water was coming from. When you’ve been in the game as long as I have you know when you’re about to find a body, but in this case it was more than obvious as the water had a red tint and that meant blood had been spilt. I opened the door. The body was face down in the overflowing blood bath and the hot tap was running full. As I turned it over, although bloated, half boiled and shot in the head I recognised that it was the old man from the night before. I turned away and instantly reeled in horror noticing the play on words that was now in front of me. The steam from the hot water had revealed a message on the bathroom mirror. It was chillingly obvious that it was meant for me.

“HUNTER OR THE HUNTED?” My grip on the Berretta suddenly became immeasurably tighter and my heart pounded like a giants drum when I noticed the gun had one round missing. Then it happened.

‘CPD! Freeze! Drop the gun and get the fuck down!’ It was a fix and Id been done up like a breakfast kipper. It came again, but this time they really meant it. ‘Drop your weapon and get the fuck down motherfucker!’ I dropped the gun and got the fuck down.

The cops knew who I was and they knew it wasn’t me; still they kept me there at the precinct playing games until well into the night. I had few friends in the force these days and most of the rotten bastards were as bent as a butchers hook. They interviewed me saying they could place me here and there for this and that, but I didn’t budge an inch and eventually, once they’d found the rolled up bills, they got tired, gave up and let me go. The walk home was a wet and lonely one.

I thought about going down the bar and getting drunk off my ass but when I remembered the tab at Mclafferty’s I decided that it wasn’t on the cards. I thought about getting a loan from Oldman Rice, but I couldn’t pay him back. I even thought about trying to find my ex-wife, but then I thought I better go home before I jumped off that god damn bridge myself. One thing was for certain.

Whoever it was that killed Maria and the old man knew exactly what they were doing, they left nothing behind and they did me good and proper. They’d killed before and they would again. By the time I got back I was soaked to the skin and when I opened my door the office seemed a comforting sight after the day I’d had. I was moving towards my desk for a drink when the sucker punch came. Cold and hard like a freight train to the back of the head, it was followed by darkness.

God only knows how long I was out for. My hands were cuffed, I was blindfolded and my head was hurting like a bitch, but the ground I was laying on was surprisingly soft. I turned and with a struggle sat up and backed up against the wall, wincing as I did. The wall was soft too, was I in some padded cell, like the one I had dreamt? Where was I? Could I remember anything? No. This was no dream, of that I was sure. This was a nightmare, a nightmare that had only just begun and one from which I couldn’t wake.

‘Having a little trouble down there?..................wi those cuffs on an shit.’ His laugh made me even more uneasy.

‘Who the fuck are you, you sick bastard. Where am I?’ ‘Now now drake, that is your name right? I’ll be asking the questions from here on I THINK!!’

He socked me one right in the ribs.

‘I’m your host, you’re friendly host and resident tormentor or overlord depending on your personal taste and I’m gonna look after you good.’

‘Slot me and get it over with you pussy.....C’mon! What are you waiting for?’

‘Patience my patient, all in good time.’ There was a silence and then a clink of bottles.

‘You just......couldn’t..... leave.....it alone could ya?...The girl.....Maria... You know who I mean, the dead chick right.

Just......couldn’t.....leave..... it alone. There’s so many girls out there drake. What was so interesting about mine?’

It was him alright, he’d been one step ahead from me right from the start and now I was at his mercy.

I could hear his heavy breathing now and it sounded as though he was pacing round the room.

‘She was never yours. You’re nothing but a deluded nut. A crazy freak son of a bitch. She was way outta your league buddy! Just like your way outta your mind!’

‘Don’t call me that!’ He bit back.

‘I aint no nut. She made me crazy, she made me like this!’ He went in to some confused verse.

‘Three times, Everyday, A shot in the arm, To make me calm, To make the pain Go away……..She was beautiful every inch of her. Do you know what it’s like to have someone so beautiful hurt you so much? Do you drake? We just played a little doctors and nurses that’s all. Just this time she was the patient’. I felt a tiny drip land on my cheek.

‘You’re not afraid of needles are you? Don’t worry; it’s just a little prick.’

The adrenalin reaction was instant. And I got a lucky head butt right on target. He let off a terrible scream and I sensed he had fallen back. I moved back against the wall and managed to rub the blindfold off. The bright light of a theatre lamp made me squint and I only caught a half glimpse of the killer for the first time. He was doubled over holding his face, so I made run for the door whilst I had the chance. Outside it was a different scenario, a dark corridor of some abandoned building. Its was beginning to make sense, but there was no time for that now, for as I limped through the dark passage behind me I heard more rambling from the psychopath,

once again conscious.

‘Arghh! Fuck! Look what you did to my beautiful face. I’m gonna make you squirm for this! You fucking worm!’ Although my vision was returning, I was still in a bad way. Tripping over god knows what I entered another dark room and fell over a stretcher. I lay there still for a moment trying to think and calm my nerves. This room, in which there was a little light, was a wash room and water poured from broken pipes onto sodden plaster and smashed tiles. I could hear him, he was getting closer and as I turned he burst through the door and I recognised him for the first time. He saw the look of bewilderment develop like a storm system on my face.

‘Seem familiar do I? Take a cab recently? Yeah that’s right, I been watching you since the very start, since you turned up on that god damn bridge.’ He pulled out a gun from his jacket and took aim as I lay there dumbstruck. ‘Goodbye Private Dick.’ My reactions once again had him beat and before he could finish me off I flung a handful of plaster and smashed tile square in his eyes. He fired off a round, but missed by a mile and now it was his turn to be blind.

I stood and charged at the freak with every remaining ounce and still hand cuffed I aimed for his neck.

‘Arghhhh!’ I hit him with such force that we both fell over backwards into one of the baths used to wash the inmates, only now they were filled with stagnant freezing cold water. I had the upper hand now and he kicked and thrashed as I pressed the chain against his neck and held it there for what seemed like an age, until he struggled no more. I looked at him and made sure he was gone. His cold dead eyes were as black as the brimstone of hell.

I slumped down exhausted and thanked whatever it was that had saved me.

TheLeedsDebacle_23

Real Ale Ramblings

Ed Teale, our resident booze-hound, takes us on a tour of where to have a pint of best after you’ve spent the majority of your weekly allowance in Leeds Market

D

espite the nights getting gradually lighter, don’t be fooled into thinking that winter is over and sitting in a proper pub, in front of an open fire, isn’t the place to be.

Step forward The Wrens, or The Wrens Hotel to give its full title, a title that is still justified because of the 8 en-suite rooms available after sampling a few too many of its fine real ales. You might have no need or desire to stay over at The Wrens, but sampling one of up to six cask ales is a must. Black Sheep Best Bitter is a quality regular, along with the paler, but just as enjoyable, Deuchars IPA. The pièce de résistance of The Wrens has to be the open fire place. Even if you aren’t an ale drinker, it is worth visiting The Wrens just to enjoy the warmth of one of the last open fires in central Leeds.

Upon exiting The Wrens, a left turn down Merrion Street will bring you out on Vicar Lane – the gateway to some of the finest ‘Market’ pubs a city could wish for. The Regent, The Duncan and the Duck & Drake are fine examples of these hostelries that come with an unusual allure.

They look rough around the edges because they are, but this should be the reason you go in, not carry on walking by. If you need more to entice you, between the three of them they offer cheap cask ale, live music and even the odd karaoke session(!). The Duncan is a house of Samuel Smith, but if you want to sample the finest Sam Smith pub in West Yorkshire, then seek out The Angel off Briggate.

Over 250 years have passed since the still independent brewery was set up in Tadcaster, and to this day they still offer one of the best value pints around. So how do they still manage a pint for under £1.50 in the days of rocketing inflation and an over zealous tax man? Tradition and doing things their own way seems to help, along with doing pretty much the opposite to their more famous relative, John Smith.

While one family member is employing Peter Kay to advertise its ale, Sam Smiths continue to own their own pubs, refuse to be over taken by a ‘pubco’, and stay true to their Yorkshire roots. Any pub that still resists selling the two big ‘cola’ brands deserves a pat on the back.

Go in peace, enjoy your ale.

24_TheLeedsDebacle

All conquerng poultry spicers

B

efore we begin, I must make sure you are aware of something about me. I am not an idiot. I am aware that a comparison between two completely different entities is not a comparison at all. Who's better, Cruyff or Beckenbauer, Pele or Maradona, Messi or Neville?

Compare and contrast one thing that has nothing to do with the other. Except sometimes one thing has everything to do with the other. Messi has everythiing to do with Neville because they both play football. Of a sort. And Nandos has everything to do with Westgate because they both serve food. Of a sort.

My experiment begins by going to Nandos. At this stage it is not strictly an experiment. It is a game of squash that has deprived me and squash partner of food between work and beer. With half-an-hour to eat something and our inablilty to accept Ronald McDonald as chef and the inability of Colonel Sanders to accept Leeds city centre as home, we are left with but one option: NANDOS. With the best of intentions we walk in, we are shown to our seats, and, accidently, one five and a half foot man and one skinny man suddenly feel oversized. I am male, 30 . My friend is male, 30.

We are positioned next to what many a great Russian author, many a Hollywood film and many a copy of Nuts magazine would have you believe is bliss. To the left: one table, one sixteen year old girl opposite one sixteen year old girl. To the right: one table, one sixteen year old girl opposite one

Westgate VS The Bradford carriage mans diner

sixteen year old girl.

lemonade for fear of falling over ice skating or bowling badly or not seeing Justin Bieber cleary, I am now adept at meals with no booze, and water with curry sure as hell beats lemonade with chips! The realisation that masala means actual masala and not the red bullshit we have become accustomed to avoid means we order three giant portions of the good stuff without having to utter the embarassing words "asian

Now I don't know if Russian novels, Hollywood films and Nuts magazine are written by pornstars or people who have never been to Nandos but I found the reality slightly less than bliss. In fact, as my tiny piece of chicken appeared on my tiny table next to my tiny chips next to my tiny teenagers I felt I became a mixture of paedophile and prick. Even a seventeenth helping of piripiri sauce is not enough.

• Roast 12 birds eye chillies in a preheated oven at 200 On the other degrees, cool then roughly chop. hand, Westgate. • Place in a saucepan the chillies, 1 clove of chopped Having spoken garlic, 1tsp oregano, 1tbsp paprika, 100mls olive oil, about a high 60mls red wine vinegar, pinch of salt & black pepper. street restaurant • Bring to a high simmer, stirring, then simmer for 5 that everyone mins. disagrees with • Cool and transfer to food processor, blend to a smooth my opinion of, consistency. let me speak • Place a full chicken and half the sauce into a sealable of an unknown plastic bag, seal and massage the sauce into meat then r e s t a u r a n t marinade for at least an hour. that everyone • Cook chicken on a griddle pan for 5 mins until golden gives no shit of brown then transfer to preheated medium oven for 30 anyone's opiion mins or until cooked through. of. Westgate is in • Pour over remaining heated sauce or save in a Bradford, pretty refrigerated sealed plastic container for next time. central but not • Serve with chips and salad.

Piri-piri chicken

enough to go there unless you'd bother. And usually you wouldn't and usually they wouldn't want you to. We did because a taxi driver told us to.

After entering the little hut we are not shown to a table so we either choose or take the only option of sitting between a table of four fat taxi drivers and a table of four thinner taxi drivers. Reassuring.

It is clear that we should not get the beers out of our bags for their religious reasons, but after Nandos' reasons of drinking

style" (if you're in Akbars and the like and you like curry do utter those words though, you'll be treated).

The lack of service, basic human friendliness, correct cutlery, decor and hygeine may be offputting. I guess that's why you might prefer sitting inbetween hot teenage girls eating the food they're eating. I preferred sitting inbetween fat taxi drivers eating the food they're eating.

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The Monarchy Is Fucking Ace Thoughts on the nations second favourite family from Ringo Mountbatten.

N

ow I’m all for democracy as a means of deciding who governs the country, but in terms of providing a head of state to go around and do important things, like attend opening ceremonies of sporting events and having their mug printed all over bank notes and things, surely democracy would be the worst possible system one could have.

The lengths politicians have to go to in order to make the population think that they’re good at their job and worthy of election, generally (no pun intended) means they’re forced to make a career out of scheming, lying, appearing ‘trustworthy’ and most importantly being able to smile in a fashion which is deemed ‘sincere’. Not that that’s their fault, they’re simply holding a giant mirror up to the electorate and essentially saying, that this is the way we need to speak, act and write in order to give us the best chance of winning more votes than the next bloke (or bird).

The same electorate that needed to be treated to a three-legged televised ‘debate’ so that those undecided voters (who presumably had been far too busy to actually read up on any of the policies of the respective parties up until that point) could decide for themselves whose jib they liked the cut of best, complete with upto-the-second analysis of a panel of audience members, hooked up 26_TheLeedsDebacle

to some brain-wave monitoring electrode system which informs us that Cameron’s ‘bookend’ gesture out-trumps Brown’s ‘beach ball’ by a factor of six point eight percent. That was in addition to the de rigueur hand-shaking (not to mention baby-kissing) tour of the country and £31 million of campaign expenditure. Anyone would think it was some sort of bloody popularity contest. And in case you needed any more convincing of how the electorate love shooting themselves in the foot, the people of London even elected Boris Johnson as their Mayor for fuck’s sake!

Well, luckily for us as nation we have a millennia-old system which ensures that when it comes to occupying the throne, the candidates for the role can rise well above all of the powerstruggles, in-fighting (erm, well, for the last hundred years or so at least) and all of the esteemshattering degradation that comes with playing the part of an electable leader to an ignorant and uninformed group of citizens, whom you both despise and rely

King of England, the best-qualified candidate tends land the job. The best qualified being the one who has spent their whole life being brought up in preparation for doing that one job, and that one job only, honing vital skills along the way; such as making sure they always chew their food properly, and being so very nice and polite to every single person they meet.

Sometimes they let you get slightly sidetracked by spending a few years flying around in a helicopter while you’re waiting for your turn, until its funding falls under the axe due to a financial crisis caused partly by those blarsted ‘elected’ types we mentioned earlier.

So what better way to prevent the risk of some power-hungry megalomaniac from seizing the most prestigious position in the country than by handing the reins to someone who has very little choice in the matter? “Here you go son, this job’s yours next, so when it’s time, just go and do it yeah?”

Bish-bash-bosh. Add to that the fact that the Royal Family are probably the most incorruptible people in Britain, maybe even

You’ve got a crazy, half-bionic, gin and tonic-quaffing, Great Grandmother solely upon to deliver you to your ambition of being the most powerful person in the land. Yes, when it comes to being Queen or

on the planet, who can easily turn down any offers of money or land in exchange for putting their powers to some evil use, since; A

- they have a huge amount of both already, and B - when or what would they spend it on that they haven’t already got anyway? It’s not like they can retire to a Pacific island that some oil barren bunged them once they’re out of a job. It is, in the non-traditional sense, a job for life.

Then of course you’re not going to sniff at the X-billion pounds they bring to the country through stereotypically American, stereotypically large, and stereotypically extremely irritating tourists when libraries are being closed left right and centre and forests sold off for a fraction of that amount. Consider also the time and energy Prince Charles puts into raising money and awareness for good causes all the way up and down the land. God bless ‘im. Work that he could not have spent his adult life doing had it not been for the hereditary title passed down to him, and could definitely not have spent his adult life doing if he had a day job to hold down like a regular member of the working population.

And if you think they don’t know about what normal family life is like you’d probably be right, as theirs is about as intriguing and unusual as any other you’d care to

think of. You’ve got semi-arranged marriages, affairs, divorces, a crazy half-bionic / gin and tonicquaffing now-passed-away great grandmother, and another death in the family surrounded by a wealth of conspiracy theories for over thirteen years (assassination by the secret service?? Now yer talkin’!). You’ve got a guy who was third in line to the throne last time I checked, who looks fuck all like his ‘Dad’ and happens to look an awful lot (they’ve both got ginger hair) like the guy his mum was (allegedly) shagging about the time he was conceived, and you just have to wonder at what point someone important is going to stand up and say look, you seriously need to do one of those Jeremy Kyle-style DNA paternity tests before you can let this imposter anywhere near the crown jewels.

You could not make it up. And as if all that wasn’t enough you’ve got the Queen’s husband playing the part of the comedy racist, greatuncle-type character, a man who embodies the very anti-thesis of political correctness, who must make all those around him wince with a sense of imminent doom every time he opens his mouth to anyone who isn’t quite as white-and-middle-to-upper-classand-English as his mates from down the polo club, whilst in

public. Somehow the Queen herself manages to emerge from all this with her dignity pretty much intact, like one of those graceful swans that she owns (all of) on the surface, smiling, accepting floral gifts and doing that wave she does, but frantically paddling down below the surface trying to keep the whole crazy show held together.

In the end though, none of that really matters as the Monarchy does not have to be burdened with the pressures of carrying out the will of the people who have elected you to your position, nor to make any decisions on whether it is right or wrong to implement a certain policy or law, in fact, they’re not required to show any sort of opinion on anything really, other than to apply basic moral judgement and moderate Christian beliefs. And even I could do that.

The irony of it all is that those who are most pro-Monarchy are the reason they have to live their ‘life’ as part of a constant media PR campaign so that more newspapers can be sold back to those citizens in a selfperpetuating cycle of intrigue and consumption which only serves to make them more ineffective at carrying out their (admittedly straight-forward) duties. I mean, does anyone really give a fucking toss about the speculation surrounding what Kate Middleton’s dress might look like come the big day??

One final thing that definitely needs sorting out pronto however is getting rid of the current national anthem, not for any particular ideological reason, more because it’s an utterly shite piece of music.

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Right now they are working on three projects:

F

ormed in 2005 as a theatre company, the two founding members, Matthew Allen and Anton Krasauskas, quickly realised they didn’t really go to the theatre, nor did they want to perform other people’s scripts.

The Skeleton Project

Fast-forward five years and the shape of The Skeleton Project looks a lot different. Still with an interest in creating "theatre they would want to see", they now also collaborate with a number of different artists from different backgrounds involved in different projects, taking in art, film, theatre, music and "whatever takes our fancy".

This means, according to Matthew Allen, "our work is usually very personal and has a very home made feel so we like to work with people that enjoy the same style. Now more than ever we are interested in making new theatre with an original script but we realise there are a lot of other people making the stuff we want to see too. Particularly in Leeds."

The home made feel is quite important to them in their work.

When they tour they carry one major rule. "If our set and props don’t fit into a back pack then we don’t use it in the show."

This allows them to take their shows anywhere. From the home made music as their soundtrack to video projection as their set, along with DIY programmes and posters, everything they make has a certain punk style.

LOLZ, performed in February 2011 in Leeds and developed with support of Stage@Leeds, is a dark comedy about the Internet and its uses. The hour-long performance also looks at the information available all around us and how easy it is to access other people’s thoughts, experiences and private information. The actors interact directly with the audience and, as with all shows by The Skeleton Project, it promises to be different every time it is performed.

WAIT is a new feature film using upcoming Leeds based actors which will be distributed freely online when completed. A surreal comedy exploring the ideas of what you do when you are waiting for a bus, an appointment and, more significantly, for your life to get back on track.

NEWK: NEw and unfinished WorK is an event run every two months in Leeds, showcasing three performances from talent associated with The Skeleton Project including theatre, dance and live art. It is an opportunity for the artist to test and develop pieces before taking them to larger events such as The Emerge festival and the Leeds Fringe festival, whilst the audience get to sample the emerging local talent for just £1.

BLACK SWAN

/Robin Jahdi

arren Aronofsky is the most bizarre multiplex success currently working.

Some people like to point to Chris Nolan as some kind of surreal success, and on the blockbuster level, he is. But nobody surprises me, when the general public flocks to see his films, as much as Aronofsky. Despite his first three films (π, Requiem for a Dream, the Fountain) being increasingly impressive, it was only when the Wrestler was released that your man on the street really started paying attention. Its success was largely justified: Mickey Rourke was excellent as a washed-up pro-wrestler/dad, and though it veered a tad too close to schmaltz on occasion, the Wrestler was a believable, sympathetic piece of work. It was just very unAronofsky in its sheer normality.

D

Black Swan, on the other hand, fits rather more comfortably in the director’s oeuvre. It lures people in with its posh trailers, ballet theme, star names and promise of obsession and hot lesbo action (most cinemagoers are deplorably base creatures).

But once bums are on seats, the audience is relatively captive, and the fun really begins. The close, at times claustrophobia-inducing filming has been described as ‘Wrestler-cam’, though the effect here is rather different. Where in the Rourke film the technique was used to add a legitimate, gritty, documentary feel, Black Swan has an otherworldly, dreamlike atmosphere.

This naturally has implications on the audience’s perception of the plot, making it easier to accept events that would appear unthinkable in a more naturalistic piece. The close shooting and slightly soft-focus look recall Stanley Kubrik’s Eyes Wide Shut (1999) or David Lynch’s Mulholland Drive (2001). Not wanting to make assumptions, but this kind of reference might correlate with a person’s enjoyment of the film: if you’ve seen those two,

you’ll be familiar with weird stuff going on. You’ll also be all too aware of the fine line between surreal and pretentious, if indeed one exists. (There’s nothing wrong with pretentiousness in cinema anyway; it’s the art of pretence, but I digress.) There are more similarities, such as all three films blurring the lines of dream/delusion and reality, and investigating themes of identity.

If you’ve not heard of those films, the readiness with which Black Swan departs from commonly held perceptions of reality may take you aback.

In Black Swan, as you no doubt by now know, Natalie Portman’s Nina is so obsessed with landing the role of the Swan Queen in Tchaikovsky’s ballet, that her sense of perspective, of reality, is comprised. Our job, in watching it, is to decide quite what elements of it - if any - are real.

We know that Mila Kunis plays Lily: the chaotic free spirit antithesis of Nina’s rigid discipline. But is Lily real? She certainly seems real; taking Nina out on the town, landing the role of Nina’s backup... making sweet love with evil bird-man Von Rothbart?! For every event that you swear is actually happening, there is an opposite fact to throw it into doubt. The girls went out one night; or was it, as Lily insists, just a hot dream (‘hot’ being the operative word)?

Lily clearly has her own face and personality; but she if often shows as Nina’s doppelganger. Lily keeps slyly making Nina late for things and distracting her; but it’s clear Nina is paranoid and a mentalist.

and now want to live vicariously through their daughters (Erica, played by a magnificently aged Barbara Hershey). The latter has a Frankenstein thing going on, as she pushes her daughter to be the perfect ballerina, but goes a bit too far and creates a monster which almost leads to her demise.

There’s also a reference to the Wrestler, as it becomes evident Aronofsky is fixated on killing his protagonists through one final fling doing what they love. Again, it’s that theme of being so driven to accomplish something that it proves to be your undoing. Or is that what actually happens?

So there are questions left, right and centre. It’s very odd, especially if you went into the cinema expecting Step Up: to the Ballet~! (or Centre Stage 3, in other words). But unlike the last couple of Lynch films, Aronofsky kindly gives you enough beauty and surface drama, as well as fantastically-shot ballet, to avoid totally losing you with cinematic dementia. It’s also legitimately scary in places. Portman is excellent as ballerina on the edge, as are Kunis as hot antagonist (their chemistry is up there with Laura Harring and Naomi Watts in Mulholland) and Vincent Cassel’s

it’s clear Nina is paranoid and a mentalist.

Not only is reality played with, but Aronofsky also has fun with with the passage of time. Presented in the film are ballerinas who want to get their big shot (Lily), are established and want to be stars (Nina), were stars but are now on the way out (Beth, played by Winona Ryder, who must have found that role rather too close to reality for comfort), and retired long ago

ballet company honcho. But Cassel is a force of nature, as anyone who saw Irreversible can attest, so we’d expect nothing less. If you haven’t seen Black Swan yet, do so. And soz for the spoilers, but you knew what you were letting yourself in for when you started reading. If you have, see it again. It’s better the second time around. And then see the Fountain, for that is Aronofsky’s finest work. It’s a deranged act of genius that, as he grows higher in profile and covered in plaudits, is likely to remain his definitive artistic statement. Black Swan will just have to make do with being one of the most magnificent films in years.

TheLeedsDebacle_29

T

he Bowery is a lovely little venue located just past Headinlgey’s Arndale Centre. Part coffee shop, part art space, it provides a welcome relief from the Pizza Expresses, Starbucks and Sainsburys dominating the area. Whilst the organic offerings, craft classes and literature recommendations might be a bit too Belle & Sebastian for The Box boozers it is a perfect setting to show off local talent. One such artist is Sarah Francis, who follows previous work, including A Short Series About Chairs (Bedchair, pictured), with her most recent work, In The Cracks Where Moments Form (198 Souls But One Pair Of Shoes, pictured), which is currently exhibited upstairs. A charming collection of images inspired by her childhood that manage to be both reassuringly familiar and eerily surreal. There is a dreamlike reality in the settings and a questionable memory in the subjects as we look at snapshots of her story, lovingly told but with darker undertones.

Sarah Francis Describe your art in one word: Quirky.

Describe yourself in one word: Offbeat.

Explain your influences in one word: Women.

Sum up Leeds in one word. Traffic.

If you could take one word to a desert island what would it be? Wibble.

TheLeedsDebacle_31

W

hen you’re sitting at home on a midweek evening trying not to open the second bottle of wine listening to the inane muzak of Sky’s TV guide with hollow eyes and numbing mind where do you stop? With thumb pressed down on down, passing James May night on Dave, James May night on Dave ja vu, Have I Got Mock Lie To The Buzzcocks series seventy-nine episode fifty-one, Gordon Oliver’s River Masterchef, CasualCity, the entire output of Come Dine With Me across various channels, I don’t agree to watch Forgetting Sarah Marshall on Film4, she doesn’t agree to watch the greyhound racing from Romford. My lazy eyes scan the dvd’s but I found out last night and the one before that and the one before that and the one before that.

Sex With Mum and Dad. Sun, Sex and Suspicious Parents. Brilliant titles by a moron or terrible titles by a genius, this is where I stop.

For those fortunate enough not to have resorted to joining me in the activity of pressing select whilst hovering over these worrying shows I will explain. BBC3 have taken to showing programmes that people will turn on simply out of curiousity of what could lurk beneath such dubious names.

Sex with mum and dad might be commonplace on pornfetish. com but who would have thought Auntie Beeb would expose us to

a condom on a cucumber, drawing stick men of their past conquests (50-3 to the kids!), discussing their favourite position (as his daughter announces reverse cowgirl, one father recoils, presumably having been expecting her to say centrehalf), putting Ken and Barbie in compromising situations and many more incomprehensible unhelpful activities. All of this is dictated

by Dutch sexologist and munter Maria Schopman, a hybrid of man, woman and buffalo who it is hard to believe could have gained expertise in this field through experience and who creates a seedy underbelly of getting off on all this.

To be allowed to get away with this shameful cringefest there is a pretence that knowing your mum used to be nicknamed “cocktease”, your dad likes it doggy-style, your daughter uses big black dildos and your son lost his virginity to a prostitute somehow brings the family closer together and, worse, that it is natural. It is not natural Maria.

Sex should be privately strived for and lyingly bragged about to our mates, not truthfully discussed with our parents and aired on national television.

Broken

their son is on stage in a lapdancing bar, head in strippers bosom such a thing? Well, of course they are not exposing us to such a thing but the reality of the programme isn’t entirely comfortable viewing either.

The premise of the programme is to take a teenager and get them to be open with their parents about sex. And vice versa. Cue embarassment overload all round as the families are given humiliating tasks such as putting 32_TheLeedsDebacle

families, ruined lives and images dreadful enough to put the kids off sex for life, all in the name of light entertainment!

Continuing with immoral offensive bullying masquerading as educational television, BBC3 next created Sun, Sex and Suspicious Parents. Not quite as incestuous a title, it nonetheless delivers a bewildering, possibly illegal document of teenagers

behaving badly abroad. After saving all year for their first ever holiday with friends, the show aims to ruin it all by filming it and inviting the parents along to watch. That’s right, as the eighteen year olds booze, brawl, snog and sunburn their way around yob island, mummy and daddy are only yards away, spying and lying.

It is a distressing sight watching a mother who can’t let go following her son halfway around the world, rifling through his hotel room to check that he hasn’t used his condoms, but they’d probably know if he had anyway because they’d’ve bloody well filmed it and bloody well watched it and so would we. It’s even more painful as they decide the most apt way of announcing their presence is to wander in whilst their son is on stage in a lapdancing bar, head in strippers bosom, belt undone. As the bunny-boiler mum tells her to stop, it is clear that this young man already has one bosom he will never escape.

As we lurk longer and delve deeper we are treated to many more mild misdemeanors, to which the parents swell with distasteful pride that their child is a cretin but not a criminal.

Ultimately, the kids don’t seem to mind when the parents reveal their sneeky, deceitful, judging selves, proving that they’ve managed to raise monsters as equally insane, a point emphasised by the horrified faces of friends who clearly want nothing more to do with this maniac. Or, as one eloquent internet commentator so succinctly put it: fuck having your family watching you like that.

THE SEASON SO FAR LEICESTER CITY V LEEDS UTD The dreary dredge of christmas over, the liver stumped, the stomach pumped, the braincells shrunk - oh the boxing day fixture, how we love your excuse to escape! The only time a trip to this horrible city is a pleasure, plus we are spoilt with the spiffing sight of sexy Sven for the second time this season! Oh what fun it is to see United win away! Until we throw away a fourth victory in a row.

LEEDS UTD V PORTSMOUTH Cruising after ten we’d really have to self-destruct to not win this one. Cue defensive saviour Andy O’Brien.

LEEDS UTD V MIDDLESBRO Full ground, empty bar, it can only be the new years day fixture.

Not much to waken us from our death-like state until we reverse the recent trend by us grabbing the last-minuter. Then nearly grabbing another last-minuter.

Anyone leaving before the end, have you learned nothing?

CARDIFF CITY V LEEDS UTD Craig Bellamy is a tosser.

ARSENAL V LEEDS UTD Damage limitation except we’re kind of holding our own and... PENALTY!!! Who needs Cesc Fabregas, we’ve got Rob Snodgrass!!! Theo throws himself to earn a replay, the only time we’re happy after conceding yet another last minute equaliser.

Later results confirm we’re better than Barcelona.

LEEDS UTD V ARSENAL Full house, crackling atmosphere, a taste of what promotion may bring. Unfortunately we also see the difference in class promotion may bring as we get abosolutely Nasri’d. A pleasure to watch and a pleasure to see one of Johnson’s impausible 30 yarders hit the net and not the stand.

LEEDS UTD V NORWICH CITY Feck. Arse. I bloody hate Norwich and their boring priest from Father Ted of a manager. Great attacking play undone again by defending too deep. Somma leathers his first touch to grab a point, Paynter misses his first touch to not grab three points. Fantastic match but my winless streak continues.

LEEDS UTD V BARNSLEY After the 2006 Oakwell debacle we limped to a draw in the home revenge. After the 2010 Oakwell debacle I expect more.

Unfortunately this magazine had to go to print before the match so think of this as some kind of soap-opera cliff-hanger. Except that by the time you read this you will know the score because the match will have happened.

Unless you don’t like football and gain all your knowledge from this magazine, in which case you can look forward to finding out in two months time you wierdo.

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Something to do every day...

MARCH

1st - Tim Key (Carriageworks) 2nd - U-Gallery: Youth Culture in Leeds & Dortmund (Leeds Art Gallery) 3rd - Drunken Chorus - And Hell Followed With Them (Leeds Met Studio Theatre) 4th - White Rose Ball (Queens) 5th - Subdub (Vox) 6th - Henry Moore (Leeds Art Gallery) 7th - Does It Offend You Yeah? (Cockpit), 8th - Oh No Oh My (Oporto) 9th - Richard Herring (Library) 10th - Calendar Girls (Grand) 11th - The Charlatans (Brudenell) 12th - Hercules & Love Affair (Fav) 13th - Handmade Nation (Shopkeepers) 14th - Stewart Lee (WYP) 15th - Sarah Francis & Jemima Yong (Bowery) 16th - Abigail’s Party (Seven) 17th - Headingley LitFest launch (HEART) 18th - Chase & Status (Academy) 19th - Leeds Beer Festival (Pusdsey Civic Hall) 20th - Spring Offensive Punk Festival (TJ’s) 21st - Simon Munnery (HiFi) 22nd - Interpol (Academy) 23rd - Dreams (HEART) 24th - Baaba Maal (Howard Assembly Room) 25th - John Grant (Holy Trinity) 26th - Ben Okri (HEART) 27th - Towton 1461 (Royal Armouries) 28th - Sean Collins & Mike Gunn (HiFi) 29th - Giggs (Uni) 30th - A Dish of Tea with Dr Johnson (Carriageworks) 31st - Noah & The Whale (Brudenell)

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APRIL

1st - Earth (Well) 2nd - Judy’s Affordable Vintage Fashion Fair (Corn Exchange) 3rd - Leeds Carnegie v Exeter Chiefs (Headingley) 4th - Dum Dum Girls (Brudenell) 5th - Collegium Regale (Parish Church) 6th - Esben & The Witch (Cockpit) 7th - NeWt (Sanitiago) 8th - Frankenstein live (Carriageworks) 9th - Grimethorpe Colliery Band (Morley Town Hall) 10th - The View (Cockpit) 11th - Mark Thomas (WYP) 12th - Pigeon Detectives (Leeds Met) 13th - My Darling Clemmie (Carriageworks) 14th - Frankie Armstrong (Seven) 15th - Jim Moray & Ewen McLennan (Brudenell) 16th - Leeds Utd v Watford (Elland Road) 17th - Fidelio (Grand) 18th - Taste: The Politics of Food and Drink (Abbey House) 19th - Carmen (Grand) 20th - Yorkshire v Notts (Headingley) 21st - Beady Eye (Academy) 22nd - Easter Eggstravaganza (Temple Newsham) 23rd - Easter Egg Roll (Leeds City Museum) 24th - Mad Hatter (Harewood) 25th - Leeds Rhinos v Crusaders (Headingley) 26th - Hamlet (WYP) 27th - Tim Booth (Cockpit) 28th - David Guetta (Academy) 29th - No Man’s Land (WYP) 30th - Live At Leeds (various)

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We understand that human beings have evolved on this planet. The time taken so far in that evolution is incomprehensible, and so we have religion. The planet is unaware that we live here, because only human beings can have an awareness. But daily, human beings dont see this, we are blind to the reason that we only exist, move and think to serve our evolution. We choose to ignore the empirical truth, that every single thought or action at any moment is motivated by the selfish will to gratify our minds and our beings - to survive and to evolve. Even my writing of this, and your reading of it. We help because we want to be helped, we give because we want to receive a sense of selflessness. Altruism is a word, it does not exist.

Love is a word, it does not exist. You are alone, just like me.

This is a race. a human race. d marshall

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