Tuesday 06 August 02

Hi there cats and kittens. So, what's new? Well, happened upon another bachelor cyber-pad and its owner has joined the illustrious visitors in the links section. Last night I created a page proclaiming my love of the French film Zazie dans le Metro, it's not very well-written but if it urges anyone to check out this wonderful cinematic gem then my work here is done!

Let's talk music. I have been buying a titload of CDs now I am back in the land of the earning, barely (still temping at the benefits agency in Pembroke Dock, but my contract has been extended for another three months!). Here's my most recent purchases:-

Django Reinhardt - "Crazy Rhythm"
Lou Reed - "Street Hassle/The Bells"
Shirley Bassey - "The Best Of"
Various (remixes) - "Club Class-Alternative"
Peggy Lee - "Black Coffee: The Best of the Decca Years"
Peggy Lee - "The Best Of Miss Peggy Lee"
Various - "21st Century Disco"
Various - "I Love Disco"
Phats and Small - "Now Phats What I Small Music"
Eurythmics - "Be Yourself Tonight"
Various - "A Taste of Two Tone"

I've no idea what a bizarre selection says about my tastes, and am not quite sure how Phats and Small got in there. Oh yeah - it was three ninety-nine in Woolies! The Peggy Lee and Shirley Bassey CDs show an alarming tendency towards divadom... Scarier still is the fact that my wish list at Amazon is starting to fill up with '80s pop (Cathy Dennis, Betty Boo, Johnny Hates Jazz, Climie Fisher...)! God, my record collection seems to be getting seriously faggy.

I recently re-watched a few of my cult favourites - "Sleuth", "Bedazzled" (the Peter Cook and Dudley Moore version, naturellement), "Myra Breckinridge", "O Lucky Man!" and "Beyond the Valley of the Dolls". Even though I featured "Dolls" in my Groovy Movies not long ago, I had forgotten just how EXTREME this film is! Each viewing reveals new nuggets of sixties hipster lingo each time you watch it (Current favourite: "It's a stone gas, man!"), the last half hour with Z-Man's drug-fuelled orgy (and the gratuitous lesbian sex scene) is even more whacked-out than I recall, and I didn't remember the climax being such a BLOODBATH!!! In fact, there's an awful lot of violence towards the end - Harris trying to beat up Lance and getting his ass kicked in the process, The Champ giving his soul brother a hiding... As Jackie Curtis would have lisped, "This is insane..." The 'pseudo moralistic' voiceover, wrapping the story up with corny moral cliches justifying each character's just desserts, had me crying with laughter at its outrageousness. In summary, folks, don't waste your money on the latest Austin Powers movie - you can still find 'BVD' on Amazon.co.uk and in branches of HMV!!!