Arthur Russell: Vanished Into Music

The writer Olivia Laing presents an imaginative portrait of Arthur Russell.

Arthur Russell was a cellist, a composer, a songwriter and a disco auteur. He was active in the New York downtown scene of the 1970s and was a frequent collaborator with the likes of Allen Ginsberg and Philip Glass. Although extremely prolific, his inability to finish projects is often cited as part of the reason that very little of his music was released during his lifetime.

When Arthur Russell died in 1992 his Village Voice obituary read, "Arthur's songs were so personal that it seems as though he simply vanished into his music."

Please listen to this beautiful programme about Arthur Russell and his beautiful music on BBC iPlayer.

NB The actual opening description in the programme is; 'His name is Arthur Russell. He's 35. He's a gay man, a Buddhist, a cellist, a country singer, an avant garde composer, a disco queen. He's the greatest musician you've never heard of.'

Why did the BBC website delete all the gay stuff?

PS Watch David Byrne, Philip Glass and Allen Ginsberg chat about their friend and collaborator Arthur.

Radio: The World Of Simon Rich

I think this comedy of the absurd twoddle may be even funnier than David Sedaris.

Listen up!

Fagburn: Gone London

Top secret mission...

David Sedaris: We'll Meet Again

Quick reminder that Series 5 of Meet David Sedaris is on at 6.30pm.

PS If you're tired of waiting for the new book, there's plenty of LOLtastic recent essays on David's website.

Oliver Sacks: Book Of The Week

Now.

Fuck...

BBC Radio 4: Chemsex

Being a modern multi-media kinda guy I've been livetweeting during this Radio 4 shock doc. >>>

Might not calm down enough from hearing about the FULL ABJECT HORROR OF THIS SORDID GAY DRUGS DEATH CULT for a bit, but will try and write something like a proper review soon. x

Quick review: Not as ALL THESE GAY DRUG SLUTS ARE GONNA DIE as I'd feared. Much of it sounded like an ad for the chemsex scene. Clearly the work of David 'Chicken Licken' Stuart. I know of one contributor who spoke against his self-serving narco-hysteria narrative who was left on the cutting room floor. The conclusion - 'Why don't they go on dinner dates?' - was too funny for words.

PS Mobeen Azhar summarizes his programme in an article for Attitude online.

An interview with GT appears to have been written by a school matron trying to out vanilla him; 'So it’s a lonely and sad lifestyle?' etc etc

There's also a 10 minute report on the Victoria Derbyshire Programme on iPlayer (1.20 in).

You also might find this of interest; Sigma Research's The Chemsex Study: Drug Use In Sexual Settings Among Gay and Bisexual Men In Lambeth, Sothwark & Lewisham.

It's a serious and thorough piece of research, and not more of the dodgy and sensationalist narco-hysteria about gay men and drugs that the straight and gay media like to fixate on.

Radio 4: How Gay Became Ok

Why have British attitudes towards homosexuality changed so far and so fast? Less than 50 years ago, sex between men was a criminal act. Now they can marry. It's not just the law that has changed: we have. Surveys suggest that public opinion about homosexuality has undergone a dramatic shift over the same period. Jo Fidgen asks what drives this kind of change in collective attitudes.

Listen on BBC iPlayer.

You'll never guess who they've got on it!

Still not okay enough for Aunty Beeb to use a photo where you can see a gay couple's faces, it would seem.

PS And next week BBC Radio 4 does CHEMSEX!

The Robert Peston Interview Show: (With Eddie Mair)

Blimey, she's lost weight.

Loving your glamorous silver foxy make-over, Ed, what's your secret?

Coming up... in a bit.

Can't wait. x

General Election 2015: Pink Turning Red

I saw something very Brighton on Bank Holiday Monday. A woman putting bottles into a bottle bank noticed that one of them had a drop of wine left in it. She unscrewed the cap, downed it, and then dropped it in the bank. To combine recycling with alcoholism is about as Brighton as it gets...

Kemptown, in the east, has also seen a massive influx of Labour campaigners – and the dominance is shown in the number of Labour signs in windows. I spoke to a gay couple basking in the sun outside a café. One said: "Yeah, we’ll probably go with Labour… Ed’s not very impressive is he? But anything rather than Cameron.”

“Ed looks weird,” added his partner. “That mouth.”

I asked if the Tory embrace of gay marriage had made any difference to their voting intentions, and they said that it hadn’t. “I mean, we’ve not got married have we?” observed one with a raised eyebrow – suggesting that I’d opened a can of worms. “But Labour would’ve backed gay marriage anyway, so it doesn’t make any difference.” 

This is a view that might not be true, given national polling evidence that the Tories are now doing much better among gay voters * – although, not well enough to hold on to a constituency that could be described as the San Francisco of England. Then again, Kemptown has always been a very working-class kind of gay scene. There are a lot of middle-aged couples sporting tattoos that probably hail from the days of Margaret Thatcher...

Tim Stanley, Daily Telegraph.

Fagburn is proud to announce he is voting Nancy on Thursday - I think this may well swing the election.

PS Radio 4's Today attends a gay hustings in Vauxhall to find out 'Where is the pink vote?'

* Fagburn on why the Pink News' readers poll is unrepresentative of gay voters. Today also cited it without question.

Mind you, this one could be the most unscientific gay election survey of all time; Most Grindr Readers Back The SNP!

Neil MacGregor: Night At The Museum

The art historian behind the landmark radio series A History Of The World In 100 Objects has announced he is to step down as director of the British Museum.

Neil MacGregor, whose role in the 2010 BBC radio series made him a household name, will leave on 15 December to take on new projects.

In his 13 years at the helm of the British Museum he has overseen a near 50% increase in visitor numbers, making it the second-most visited museum in the world after the Louvre in Paris.

MacGregor, 68, said on Wednesday that his decision to leave the museum had been a difficult one. He said: “Working with this collection and above all with the colleagues here has been the greatest privilege of my professional life. But I’ve decided that now is the time to retire from full-time employment and the end of this year seems a good time to go.” ...

The Guardian.

And so soon after Nicholas Hytner left the National!

The British cultural Homintern is losing its grip.

PS How Neil MacGregor reinvented and revived the world's greatest museum, a fittingly glowing tribute in The Times. Edit: And in this Independent editorial, Neil MacGregor's exemplary tenure at the British Museum is an object lesson in curatorship. A giant of Britain's cultural life, The Guardian. Neil MacGregor made running the British Museum look easy, Telegraph.

Hopefully Katie Hopkins will pop up soon and say he was a disgusting old perv - for balance, like.

Update: My Hero: Neil MacGregor by Grayson Perry, Guardian.

Alan Bennett: Celebrating Britain's Best

"I thought, why not Swaledale? Or medieval churches. Or even, with all its shortcomings, the National Trust. But what I think we are best at in England - I do not say Britain - what I think we are best at in England, better than all the rest, is hypocrisy.

Take London; we extol its beauty and its dignity while at the same time we're happy to sell it off to the highest bidder. Or highest builder.

We glory in Shakespeare yet we close our public libraries.

A substantial minority of our children receive a better education than the rest because of the social situation of the parents. Then we wonder why things at the top do not change or society improve. But we know why. It's because we are hypocrites.

Our policemen are wonderful, provided you're white and middle class and don't take to the streets. And dying in custody is what happens in South America. It doesn't happen here.

And it gets into the language. We think irony very English and are rather proud of it. But in literary terms it's how we have it both ways. A refined hypocrisy.

And in language these days, words which start off as good and meaningful, terms like environment and energy saving, rapidly lose any credence because converted into political or PR slogans, ending up the clichéd stuff of an estate agents' brochure. A manual for hypocrisy.

A memorable phrase in Hamlet, and one of the few that hasn't been picked up as a quotation or a title for something else, is when Claudius is arranging for Hamlet to be arrested and executed when he gets to our shores. And in his letter he says; "Do it England". And we say we do it, or we're going to do it, but we don't. Scotland does it. And Wales. But not England.

In England, what we do best is lip service. And before you stampede for the Basildon bond or rather skitter for the Twitter I must say that I don't exempt myself from these strictures. How should I? I am English, I am a hypocrite. "

Alan was talking on Radio 4's The World At One, as part of their series, Celebrating Britain's Best.

You may hear it here.

Alan Bennett Watch: TV Or Not TV?

Alan Bennett has revealed that he enjoys watching "rubbish" on television and is a fan of Midsomer Murders, Family Guy and ''maybe the first Big Brother''.

The playwright, 80, is about to have a play, Denmark Hill, premiere on radio for the first time.

He said that he and partner Rupert Thomas ''probably (watch) more rubbish than we should''.

He told Radio Times magazine: ''I tend not to watch drama, and I don't like stand-up, so that cuts out an enormous amount. Apart from Stewart Lee, I like him because he's offensive. And Jeremy Hardy, but he's only on radio. The others just seem to be showing off.''

He added: ''We watch Midsomer Murders. It's not all rubbish. Andrew Graham-Dixon, that's not rubbish.''

Asked whether he watched any reality shows, Bennett told the magazine: ''Very few. Maybe the first Big Brother but I thought, 'God, they're all repellent.' I tend not to watch anything where one person is eliminated each week. There was even a programme about allotments: I thought, 'This'll be all right.' Then they introduced that format there! Allotments isn't a competitive activity.''

Quotes lovingly lifted by the Daily Telegraph (and me).

Alana B's play Denmark Hill will be broadcast by the Home Service on Saturday. 

He says he can't be arsed working with people in television anymore as they're a load of idiots.

Basically.

The Sun: Rage Against The Dying Of The Light

'More like a paraffin lamp in a brothel, than a Sun'

How the Morning Star summed up The Sun after Rupert Murdoch had bought it and revamped it in 1969.

Taken from a fascinating episode of The Reunion where ex-staffers discuss the good/bad old days at the Currant Bun.

All in hilarious; 'Weren't me, guv, honest' mode.

Much on its notorious homophobia in the 80s - though the paper's known homophobes-in-chief, Murdoch and then editor, Kelvin MacKenzie, were sadly unavailable for comment.

• Listen on BBC iPlayer. For more on the sorry, sordid saga of Murdoch's Sun read Peter Chippindale and Chris Horries' Stick It Up Your Punter! - probably the most revealing (and funniest) book ever written about British journalism.

Loxfest: What Has Am, What Has Am, What Has Ambridge Done To Deserve This?

Pet Shop Boys have been announced as the surprise headline act at Borsetshire's first and finest music festival, Loxfest!

Fagburn is too thrilled for words.

Apart from all the words I am now typing, clearly.

The episode will be broadcast on Monday.

This is like, I dunno, Chomsky appearing on Curb Your Enthusiasm or something.

Fagburn would like to pad this out with loads of hopeless farming puns on Pet Shop Boys' song titles - West End Cows, It's A Pig etc - but needs a lie-down now.

PS But does this mean Ambridge rejected Morrissey?

PPS Next Pets' stop Festival No. 6 at Portmeirion! Now that's a nice venue...

Newsnight: Here We Go!

Might get myself a tellybox.

Oh hang on, that might mean our Eddie stops doing PM!

Worst idea EVER!!!

PS Our Eddie on FILTH!

Fagburn: Going To A Gay Bar!

Well, it's been quite an exhausting weekend all-round.

So just popping out for a quick Babycham...

x

PS But hey! Let's not be negative.
This week I listened to this and it was fuck me sideways funny... Incredible Women.
And you can use that quote for the TV pitch.

Susan Calman: Is Convicted

Scottish lesbian radio comedy gold!
This week's episode is on the fine art of hating children.
Brava.

Gay Rights: Tying The Knot?

The first same-sex weddings in England and Wales take place on 29th March - yet marriage was the last thing on the minds of pioneering gay rights crusaders in the 60s and 70s. Reverend Richard Coles looks at how gay marriage became the defining issue of recent years - and asks whether it represents the last crusade of the campaign for gay rights.

He speaks to senior Stonewall figures Ben Summerskill, Michael Cashman and Angela Mason. He also hears from Peter Tatchell, the Conservative Party's first openly gay MP Alan Duncan and former Prime Minister Tony Blair who introduced Civil Partnerships.

Richard discovers that for many early activists, marriage was not only a far off prospect, it wasn't a very desirable one either, as many gay men and women sought the downfall of traditional institutions.

So where along the line did the idea of gay marriage become the number one campaigning issue? And with this last major legislative milestone passed, is it time for gay rights campaigners to pack up and go home?

BBC Radio 4 blurb.*

The radio programme everybody's been talking about, though no-one has heard was finally broadcast tonight.

And despite all the heat generated by Ben Summerskill calling the Lib Dems' support for gay marriage 'cynical and  opportunistic' - and those sodding cake toppers above - it was about far more than marriage equality, but was more a little history of how the fabled 'gay agenda' has changed over the last few decades.

Fagburn thought it was doubleplusgood.

Pink News ran its ninth story about Summerskillgate today - though this was an open letter by Lynne Featherstone so was quite relevant. 

And Peter Tatchell took to HuffPostGay in Up Against The Stonewall to accuse Ben Summerskill of possible 'party point-scoring' due to his closeness to the Labour party.

A fair point (score). 

* Also an iPlayer link.

Sparks: A Right Shower

A lovely documentary by Stuart Maconie, A Shower Of Sparks, taking as its starting point Ron and Russell Mael's hellzapoppin' first appearance on Top Of the Pops 40 years ago...

Christopher Jefferies: You Are The Quarry

In December 2010, Christopher Jefferies was arrested for the murder of landscape architect Jo Yeates and vilified by the press. Here, in his most personal and emotional account to date, he writes about the far-reaching impact of the episode, even after he was cleared.

BBC News magazine.

Listen to Christopher talk about his obscene vilification by the press - in collusion with the police - on Radio 4's A Life Less Ordinary tonight.