Shipping Off to Boston

I have decided to flee the country. That's right, I'm going to Canada, as soon as I get a visa. I'm in the process, so hopefully it will be in the next few months after I get back from Download.

The response to this has been somewhat underwhelming. I expected people to drop to their knees, screaming in denial with tears pouring down their faces. 'No, why did he have to leave us?' 'He was still so young!' and the classic, 'How will we ever cope without you, Stevie?' What actually happened ranged from between a shrug to the over enthusiastic 'it'll be great!' and 'go, get out and never come back!' which gives me a sneaking suspicion that condeming me to the frozen north was the plan all along.

There are several reasons why I've decided to go, as if anyone needed an excuse to leave this god-forsaken cultural wilderness inhabited by prehistoric brutes and pretentious yuppies. The two formost reasons are listed below.

1) Morally Ambiguious Weather

The sky above England is a derranged schitzophrenic psychopath. This is scientifically true.

It snowed last week. In April. It snowed heavily, and it struck just as I was leaving for work. It wasn't the blistering cold, the wet feet or the fact I turned up at work looking like a Yeti and raging twice as much. I'm upset because of the fact that it had specifically chosen that particular day in April, the one day I have a reason to leave my dark and soiled lair, just to fuck me over. It is like the heavens themselves have transformed into a raging hormonal teenager, scorching us maniacally with blistering desert heat one minute whilst pelting us with rain, hail, snow, melancholia and angst the next. This interruption of mauradering arctic blasts was wedged between two days of glorious sunshine, the kind of weather than means I'll be attending a barbeque on Saturday. Again, this is in April, a month with precious few redeeming qualities.

I told this to someone and they pointed out, not unjustly, that it snows a lot in Canada and goes 22 below. This is true, but what is also true is that it is predictable. You expect a little snow in the Land of Always Winter, and the three day summer is quite beautiful to behold. It's not for warmer climes I'm moving. It is for the comfort of having weather you are genuinely prepared for.

2) Everything I Ever Cared About Has Become an Obscene Pantomime

That was a bit extreme.

Recently, the second thing that made me come to the academic conclusion of 'fuck this for a game of soliders' is the way that somewhere, at some point in history, everything stopped mattering and became a hyper-real Punch and Judy show. It's almost like I'm trapped in a waking nightmare. I did, at one point, study politics on the slightly naive assumption that people are generally decent and that everything could be better once I'd done a bit of research and ironed out all of the kinks. A kind of masocistic optimism, I suppose. I was an happy-go-lucky idealist once upon a time, but this has long been in decline from the moment I realized that people are pretty horrible, not taking things seriously and that ultimately, a benevolent god would smite us from the very earth itself.

Politically, this has come to a head over Pastygate. I'm not sure if it's called Pastygate, but it is a phrase that someone, somewhere would coin. And in a free and fair society, that person would have been laced by machine gun fire infront of their kids.

The pasty row blew up a few weeks ago when the Tories tried to slap VAT on bakery products, which caused a moral outrage and panic buying of sausage rolls. What should have been a rather innocuous price hike accompanied by big business grumbling to itself became a national spectacle. The whole premise, right from the off, was the assumption that something as ridiculous as a steak bake was suddenly critically important to us as a nation. The trouble is, that without going too in depth, it was really fucking stupid. I've long been of the assumption that politicans are laughing at us, but really - Pastygate?

I mean. Really?

It's like anything on the Horror Channel. How can you not realize he's the sociopath?

Cameron desperately defended his policy by defaulting to his 'man of the people' routine, inisiting that he had eaten one of these 'so-called pastry sandwiches' and enjoyed the oozing goodness inside. Miliband went a step further and bought some sausage rolls. Newspapers tried to outdo each other with coverage of the unfolding scandal and how they could imaginatively shoehorn pastry related jokes into their headlines. The entire debacle was like watching the last 20 minutes of Downfall, where a bunch of serious Nazi officers get drunk and then shoot themselves in the face.

Somewhere, while David struggled to remember when he bought his last pasty, thousands of people lost their jobs as Game went into administration. People died while their incapacity benefits were reassessed. Everyone agreed it had been a fantastic piece of theatre. There was a roll on the snare drum, followed by curtains.

So yeah, I'm leaving Britain for as long as legally possible, or until everyone has given up pretending and descended into rampant hedonism, casual bouts of excessive violence and cannibalism.

Darkest Darkness

This is part one in a ‘much abused words’ update. In which I get annoyed about much abused words, obviously, while pretending people care.

 What this world is sorely lacking is an abundance of horror, misery, and generally upsetting things. We need a balance, something to cut through all the unicorns and rainbows like a ray of utterly black sunshine. Blacker than black. Forever.

Now, really, I don’t honestly believe that. The world is not made of daisies and cupcakes and adorable round-eyed deer, and I don’t have a problem with viewing the grittier, grim side of affairs. Indeed, scientists are now claiming that I am a futuristic robot designed to herald the apocalypse by thriving on human misery. What I have a problem with is abuse of the word ‘dark’. I hate it. Darkly.

Allow me to clarify.

The word “dark”, “darkness” etcetera can be used to describe what time of day it is. It can also be used as a metaphor for the more disturbing side of the human condition, such as the book, “Heart of Darkness”. This is just fine. What it is not, though, is an excuse for poorly written diatribe churned out by people who want to write brooding Gothic pseudo religious horror but lack talent, narrative and a vague idea of what they’re doing.

In this scenario, saying that a play, song, story, artwork, interpretive dance, or post-Armageddon survival guide is “dark” is incorrect. It is not dark, it is shit. Don't even get me started by saying it's designed to shock and horrify and make you think. I hate the term 'it's designed to make you think'. I do think, you patronising pseudo intellectual. Proof of my continued existence hints at electrical impulses in the brain*. To classify this drivel as thought provoking, brain-jarring tactics would be like categorising  flashers, murderers and the American invasion of Iraq and Rick Ashley as 'shock artists'.

“Latest offering to the Tate Modern, entitled ‘Holy Shit, That’s Dark’.”*

Since I’m, you know, such a well regarded, successful middle class writer, I move in the circles of up and coming new poet laureates who challenge the genre, and subsequently do have a few particular pieces in mind when I’m writing this, but for the sake of good taste I won’t bother to specify exactly what they are. Suffice to say, they’re pretty terrible. Instead I will use a few examples not so close to home, which will spare me the risk of being ostracised by pretentious arseholes whose company I secretly crave.

Anal Cunt

Yes, they are a band. Yes, they are called ‘Anal Cunt’. They’re called Anal Cunt, presumably because it is grossly offensive, and people like being offended. This is quite a successful marketing strategy, as it draws attention away from just how shockingly bad they are. Dark doesn’t even being to describe the sound or style. A glowing teenager at some music festival proudly told me. “They like, rape women because they’re, like, brutal. It’s so cool. Their music is just so hardcore.” I won’t lie, I’m not a saint. The compulsion to stab him in the face was probably stronger than it had been all weekend by this point, but unfortunately I was drunk and would have, at best, only been able to gouge him with a tent peg. If a job is worth doing, it’s worth doing right. So I didn’t do it. Sorry humanity. Another one got away.

I assume this picture was taken when they were not flaying kittens. Because they're brutal.

The Skin I Live In

A dark film. This showed in a local cinema and was really dark, because the auditorium lights were off. The Skin I Live In might have some deeper contextual meaning, and may expand the human mind philosophically in a way I cannot even contemplate. What I do know is that “Oh, it’s dark”, said one viewer. And it should be, with “at least six rapes”* and multiple flayings, The Skin I Live In is somewhere about a doctor attempting to create durable human tissue after his wife burns to disfigureation/death. I don’t know, because unlike Anal Cunt, I was spared watching it by simply not going in. The speed at which the audience left ashen faced was enough to tell me that if I want 103 minutes of non-stop torture scenes, then that’s the film for my wedding.

I have since actually had a chance to research 'The Skin I Live In'. Apparently it's quite good. Perhaps a better offering would have been James Cameron's Galaxy of Terror, apparently a dry-run for Alien featuring a woman raped to death by an giant sex-crazed maggot.

I can only speculate.

Frankie Boyle

Frankie Boyle should need no introduction. Anyone who has seen Mock the Week will notice his absence has severed to raise the humour bar from the sewer and into the gutter. Someone I know postulated that Frankie is merely a character played by... Frankie, I think... and this character is designed to be offensive.

Whatever his reasons, Frankie Boyle does not make for dark comedy. He makes for racist comedy, sexist comedy, and whatever other ists you want to throw out there. His entire act seems to thrive on nervous laughter and crossing the boundaries of taste. And because I wouldn't be me without putting something intellectual out there, here's a nicely written humour article by someone fed up with rape jokes.

I admit, there are some jokes in bad taste I do laugh at. This blog does attempt to go for the grimmer side of humour. But still, I think there is a certain boundary - perhaps relative, but I doubt that - and there's definitely a danger to referring to Frankie in a human tense.

Sa' I unsefrum Glasgow an I dun it in China?

So there you have it, three examples of ‘dark’, gone wrong. Now we’re ready to attempt to create something dark and grim and brooding. Something that’ll show everyone just how much of a tortured creative soul you are. This can be achieved in a few easy steps.

1)      Be unkempt, dark and brooding.

You are at your best when you look your worse. Actively try for that windswept, mad woodsman hair and five o’clock shadow. Everyone knows talent is intrinsically linked to just how bad you look. Dress in dark clothes. Fill your house full of serious books about dark things. Drink red wine. Drink it from a goblet.

2)      Know nothing about the subject material you are writing.

Everyone knows that you don’t need experience to write dark stuff. In fact, you’re showing your true genius if you write about things you have never experienced or attempted to understand. You are thinking outside the box. If you want to do about child soldiers, make them babies that are physically unable to carry the heavy-duty ordnance you’ve laden them with. Make sure your characters snort weed and inject cocaine.

3)      Conform to boundary pushing cliché’s

Dark isn’t dark without rape, but make sure its gratuitous and badly executed. One rape can undermine the story. Four will make it. Make sure it exists purely as a horrifying senseless act designed purely to stun people without any deeper meaning or context to the rest of the storyline. At least two thirds of your female characters should be raped at some point, and half of those should be prostitutes with trashy names, no personalities, and high boots. Make sure there is abundant drug abuse by people, but make sure you get it wrong. This is paramount. I cannot stress how crucial it is to include stuff like torture, rape and drug abuse. They are the keystones of dark. Just make sure to get it all wrong.

If going for darkly Gothic and/or religious pick Roman Catholicism as an easy target. Maybe the priest could be a coke fuelled rapist? Make sure you reference sin a lot, and include pseudo religious phraseology and setting that has no scriptural basis. Purgatory makes a great setting for dark things, because it’s all dark and religious and stuff.

4)      Watch some stuff.

Anything by Frank Miller contains a lot of violence and tits, so should be a great starting point for your dark epic. Perhaps listening to some serious black metal will help get you in the mood. If your creativity is flagging, borrow as many concepts from stuff that has been done well, and hash it all together badly to disguise the fact that it isn’t original. Perhaps the lead character might be a hooker, like Pretty Woman, only the grim version. Maybe the benevolent god is actually a psychopath - like everything since the invention of religion. Try to convince the audience that they're living in Orwell's 1984, assuming 1984 was a top-shelf magazine featuring Catholic Nazi pornography.

5)      Do academia

Remember this is very different to actual research. Do some academia. Study language, creative writing, drama, music, art, politics and theology. All at once. The bits of paper you receive will bolster your credentials when you finally drop that big gritty turd. If you have studied writing, you must know how to write. If you have studied music, you must know how to play instruments. It all helps.

I hope the guide to ‘dark stuff’ has been helpful to aspiring creative genius’. I'm tempted to write something dark to prove what a tortured genius I am. Maybe it'll be called Sins of the Past Darkness of Lost Purgatory Orphans Raped Screaming In Hell.

It's a working title.

*Although it is true, I'm powered entirely by hate and meat feast pizzas. Brain activity is merely a side effect.
* While stealing this picture from google images, a pop-up exclaimed 'Do some Internet Providers keep you in the dark?'. I raged.
* I no longer move in those circles. Because I'm not dark enough.