Golf Tango Foxtrot

GTF Editor writes; Don't normally do much in the way of fiction.  Here's a wee story that's part of a bigger whole. Brad, Brad Washington speaks.... “ My name is Brad, Brad Washington ” is the line. “ I fly helicopters ”. The man warms to his theme. “ Meaning I earn a lot of money and in the eyes of all the women in the Spirit Level I have a glamourous well paid profession. Being Kenny, a turner from Bellshill just isn't the same attraction. Sending money back to keep the wife and kids and family back home just isn't what my life was meant to be. And so I turned myself into a work of art. I became my own creation. My shagging life as performance art. And why not? If loyalist killer Michael Stone can burst into Stormont while armed to the teeth to assassinate politicians and then in mitigation at his trial claim it to be performance art, why can't I? Like every artist I have my creative eras and periods. The “Brad...

Libertadores String Quartet played Aberdeen's Cowdray Hall on the 4 th of November. The Quartet are all members of the Simon Bolivar Symphony Orchestra of Venezuela and are products of "El Sistema" the musical education system developed in Venezuela by Maestro Jose Antonio Abreu. In Venezuela currently 300,000 children are being educated in this manner.  The intention being to produce not just musicians but happy adults with skills of teamwork, confidence, pride and aspiration to help them prosper. The charity Sistema Scotland seeks to   replicate this work through its Big Noise project in the Raploch area of Stirling and also in Govanhill in Glasgow. Interest has been expressed in Dundee and Aberdeen (hence the concert) about being the next location in Scotland for this work. There were many reasons to go to the concert, aside from a simple enjoyment of chamber music, or a general interest in musical education. An interest in the Bolivarian revo...

When I play blues harmonica and sing songs in a blues idiom, traddie music people sometimes say "but you're a fiddle player".  I play traddie fiddle or melodeon and other people will say "but you're a Blues Harp player and singer".  As for my minimalist electronica persona "The Indigenous Brothers" nobody has ever heard of that. I've stopped being surprised at the notion that you can only confine yourself to a particular field like music or even worse to a particular genre within the field. Let's look at two of the most creative people I know; Sheila MacFarlane and Freddie Wilkinson. Sheila is a visual artist who is well known for her print work but she also paints and sings.  Sheila turned me on to a lot of good traditional blues and traddie singers back in the day and also opened my eyes to a lot of visual stuff that would otherwise have passed me by. Freddie Wilkinson's musical interests are many and varied.  I have played w...

While not having a TV (or needing a license) I from time to time waste an hour or so watching the BBC iPlayer.  I'm a particular fan of Nordic crime dramas like The Killing or The Bridge .  The French also seem to do a good job on L'Engrenages  shown here as Spiral . The Wire , HBO's Baltimore-set drama is obviously a precursor and huge influence on all these shows and it's wonderful to see realistic drama which doesn't lie about the nature of its characters.  Or the nature of the state. Contrast this then with new BBC offering By Any Means .  Auntie Beeb describes it thus; "Drama following a clandestine unit living on the edge and playing the criminal elite at their own game, existing in the grey area between the letter of the law and true justice. Led by the sharp and elusive Jack Quinn, alongside straight-talking Jessica Jones and digital whizz-kid TomTom Tomkins, this brilliant team will stop at nothing to catch the criminals. Receiving their targe...

My friend Deshe has just had his application for asylum rejected by the Brit "Home" Office.   The "Home" Office is an ironic name for a (Westminster) Government Department which seems to spend most of its time splitting up families and not allowing folks to live together. The "Home" Office clearly think that Eritrea is a safe place to return to.  Clearly not so safe that Deshe can't prefer a life of destitution here (contrary to the lies of the Daily Mail, asylum seekers get NO benefits) to the prospect of death on his return. Deshe's problem of course is that he has no money.  If he had lots of money, some smart lawyer would easily persuade the "Home" Office that he would be a valuable addition to society.  Freedom of movement is only a right for the wealthy. When I was a kid at the height of the Cold War with the USSR, the constant propaganda was that these poor devils in the socialist world had no freedom of movement and couldn...

GTF is back from its summer holidays. It is now September and the summer is ending.  soon the geese will be returning from the north, passing overhead daily as they migrate to graze on fields and return to roost on the Montrose Basin. There has been a bumper crop of Geans (wild cherries in English) and the Plum tree overhanging from next door's garden is heavy with plums.  The air is getting chillier and winter approaches.  I will be heading for Barcelona soon for a few days to top up on some sun before digging in for the winter and the cold times to come. This week has seen the start of my reduction in hours at the day job to 21 per week.  Three days in effect.  This will give me more time to write and play music and do a bit of other work on the side with a view to keeping body and soul together. I am looking forward to some more freedom and self-efficacy.  For too many years I have been working too damned hard. That is not a rare complaint.  We ...

My musical connections with the House of Windsor have not been happy ones. I used to be in a band that was blackballed from the staff dance at Balmoral in the late 1980's. That was only the start of my musical confrontations with the English "Royal" family, oh no. During the time Prince Billy was an undergraduate at St Andrews University (what DID he study again?) I did the occasional gig at Aikman's Bar...a wonderful venue which I highly recommend. One fine evening I was playing there in an acoustic blues duo which had some popularity at the time. About halfway through the first set a group of young men entered the bar and ordered some drinks. You may know the type..Rosy-cheeked young men with blond locks, polished brogues, checked shirts, pressed chinos and sweaters tied around their necks. sometimes they are called “Yahs”, in a piss-take of their upper-crust accents. After taking their seats, one of them languidly detached himself from the group and ca...

Of note this week is David Cameron's plans to celebrate (sorry, commemorate) the centenary of the outbreak of the First World War in 2014. Now I am an oldish but by no means geriatric guy. In fact I was born in the year 1960.  This makes me fifty three this year. When I was a small child I first came up against the consequences of the First World War.  I was taken on a family visit to some distant relatives who lived in Laurencekirk, I would have been about four, certainly no more than five.  So, 1964 or 1965. These relatives were an elderly brother and sister who shared a household.  The sister had looked after the brother since he was invalided out of the the army in the First World War after being caught in a poison gas attack. Let's say 1916 or 1917.  This guy had basically been a bedridden invalid (as the phrase used to be) for more than forty five years.  That thought still has the power to shock me now.  Roughly the same interval of time a...

There is no difficulty in making an unremunerated career as a musician.  You can be out playing every night of the week for nothing.  However, as the Musicians Union says.  "This is work, not play".  As you may imagine, I write this on the back of another cancellation by someone interested enough to provisionally book. In doing so they prevent one taking any other gigs on that date but then of course never gets back to confirm, hums and haws, tries to beat you down in price and generally fucks you around shamelessly as if you are a worthless piece of shite. When someone complains to your face that "thon's an affa price for musicians.." You can tell that not only are they a cheapskate, they are probably too stupid to actually appreciate music.  If they did have the sensitivity and emotional facility to actually enjoy music, they wouldn't make such a crass comment to a musician. It seems that there is an expectation these days that musicians will play fo...

It's beautiful and sunny.  Warm and dry.  Note even a breeze to cool things down.  I have a washing out on the line and another one in the machine ready to swap over with it when it comes in dry.  I have played some guitar and put up some new tunes into the solo set list. A few more need to go in to the set list and I will be ready to tout myself in a solo blues act across the length and breadth of the country. Lots more filth needs to go in I think. More of the "You got nipples on your titties big as the end of my thumb, you got something between your legs can make a dead man come" sort of thing. What sorts of things should I be writing songs about?  Political situation of course, poverty, bedroom tax, repression in spain, turkey and greece. So why do all the songs I write end up coming out about lost love and cheating and personal stuff about relationships gone wrong? Possibly because most political songs are either boring or embarrassing. Not all of t...

In the news today, more scaremongering from the "Better Together" campaign.  This time prophesying that Scottish people living in England will become "foreigners".  Aside from what this says about "Better Together" attitudes to people it sees as foreign, this is simply mince. The Brit state, not even the "Rump UK" state has no powers to strip people of citizenship. Even though I will be proud to replace my British Passport with a Scottish one at the earliest opportunity, I will always have the facility even in an independent Scotland to travel on and be entitled to a British Passport. That is also the basis on which an independent Scotland would be admitted to the European Union.  Simply put, the European Union has no power to deprive people of citizenship of the European Union,  We have all been citizens of the EU for many years and that will continue. Similarly Scottish people living in England will have the ability to retain British ci...

We live and learn as they say.  That is an absolutely unacceptable use of cliche.  I'm not sure who it is totally unacceptable to but never mind. It seems this Blog has managed to annoy Dave MacDonald, local honcho  of the National Front in Aberdeen.  He is not happy at the last Blog entry which reported the things that were being said about him by the British National Party.  He challenges GTF to show the evidence that he fiddled the funds. GTF of course was only repeating what the British National Party have said about him. Dave is at pains to point out in his comment that he did not leave the British National Party because of allegations of fiddling money. Oh no...he left it because "it was going soft and was no longer a white racialist party".  Frankly I think that comment casts a greater shadow over Dave MacDonald's reputation than being accused of a bit of tea-leafing. But, that's just the GTF view. I guess Dave fancies himself as the Ernst ...

Today saw 20 members of the National Front protest in Aberdeen against the building of a mosque in the Seaton area of the city. They were countered by 200 Aberdonian Anti-Fascists opposed to such dirt.  Dirt is the best word for such white trash.  It is indeed the good Doric word for those and such as those. The National Front local chief is a guy called Dave MacDonald.  This creature used to be in the British National Party.  Until a little matter alleging the thieving of party funds came about. I have no way of knowing if any of the more lurid allegations of the British National Party in the matter have any basis in truth.  Certainly they are not at all flattering to Mr MacDonald's reputation, even if that reputation could survive public identification with the National Front that is. Be that as it may, nothing salubrious ever seems associated with the Fascist cause in Aberdeen. Even historically, this seems to be the case.  Aberdeen's Fascists ...

There is rioting in Istanbul.  the police responded to a demonstration yesterday against the closure of a park in Taksim Square in Istanbul with tear gas, water cannons and baton charges. The police seem to have gravely underestimated the anger of the demonstrators who are now being joined by many thousands of protesters marching over the Bosphurus bridge to join the demonstration in Taksim Square. For those of you who have never been to Istanbul, Taksim Square is in the European part of Istanbul on the north side of the Golden Horn.  It is essentially the heart of what in the United States would be called the "business district". Gezi Park in Taksim Square is probably the last green space in the area.  The plan is to uproot the trees and build another shopping mall.  This will allegedly recreate an ancient Ottoman military barracks which stood on the site. The demonstrators are not convinced.  Not convinced enough to physically seek to prevent the bulld...

 In the news today the European Commission is taking the "UK" to court because it discriminates against other EU nationals when it comes to receiving benefits.  In fact the "UK" places additional conditions on nationals of other EU countries before they can receive welfare benefits. So much for "Benefit Tourism". For some reason, I haven't heard anything from the feeble minded whingers who post crap on social media about "immigrants" getting more than indigenous people. The people who write for the "Daily Heil" know they are simply writing lies because that is what they are paid to do.  Only the feeble-minded believe it.  There seems to be growing numbers of the feeble-minded out there,  judging from the fact that the "English Defence League" managed to walk through London 1,000 strong last weekend. So I wonder how many of these fine fellows will mention this amazing fact that if you are an "immigrant" you ...

Thinking about the murder (it IS murder) of the young soldier in Woolwich the other day makes me think about the entirely paradoxical nature of it.  If the deed was politically inspired it is surely the act of the powerless.  If there were any popular support for the act, there would be no need to carry it out. Needless to say the far-right are making hay. They seem to be the only ones who stand to gain from it.  The British National Party and English Defence League are trumpeting their filth to anyone who will listen and find willing allies in the press and on social media. The paradox is that an act of powerless individuals representing no-one but themselves is recast by neo-Nazis and their state collaborators as the fiendish plan of some powerful conspiracy residing in the heart of every Muslim. This is simply untrue.  Like so many other lies and falsehoods peddled by those who should know better but silence their conscience for money. It is not true that...

Just back from two days in Amsterdam.  And a fine trip it was. Visited lots of my old haunts and discovered some of them were still there.  Chief among those was the "Fort Van Sjakoo".  A radical bookshop which has been on Jodenbreestraat since 1977. To be fair I only ever dealt with them since the first time I went to Amsterdam in 1981. From a radical political point of view, things appear to be very different.  In 1981, with the squatters movement in particular and all sorts of other campaigns and struggles there was more of a feeling of ferment and striving for a new world than seems to be evident these days. Nowhere was I reminded of this more than when I sat on a bench in the sunshine in Museumplein and recalled that one day I had been there with a million other people protesting against nuclear weapons.  That was a phenomenal demonstration. I don't think I have ever been part of a larger gathering.  Perhaps the demonstration in Glasgow agains...

The older I get, the more receptive to Anarchist ideas I become and less and less enamoured of any notion of the Leninist vanguard party.  This was one of the shibboleths of my youth.  A sacred cow that turned into a white elephant. Aside from the fact that the "vanguard parties" of the left seem to consist of two men (rarely are women involved) and their dog, there are other similarities.  Common to them all is an absolute disregard of doing anything that actually defends the working class or promotes its interests. The job of the vanguardists seems to be to build the party.  Sod the interests of the working class.  Let's build the party. Typically this consists of selling the paper and infiltrating the Trades Union movement.  Even the most far out of Trots seem to have given up on infiltrating or entering the Labour Party. The "Scottish" Labour Party must be the most undemocratic institution in the world.  At one time every single person I k...

This morning my Facebook and Twitter is vexed with the question of George Galloway's blog denouncing Scottish Nationalism and all its works. That's a rhetorical flourish there, George didn't actually use these words but I digress. As someone who usually finds himself on the same side of every argument as George Galloway it always intrigues me that the only thing that separates us is his unionism.  I nearly said "strident" unionism there but that would have been just another rhetorical flourish. In his blog http://redmolucca.wordpress.com/2013/05/19/scotland-farage-and-me/  George raises the spectre of an independent Scotland turning on immigrants and minorities.  If I believed this I would vote NO.   Where George and I will have to differ is that I believe it is the "UK" which turns on immigrants and minorities.  It is the "UK" which is a threat to social harmony and justice for all. George raises the question of sectarianism.  His ol...

Yesterday saw the UKIP leader Nigel Farage run out of Edinburgh by an angry mob.  I was delighted to see him on the receiving end of some mob rule. Even more so did I enjoy the petulant interview he had with BBC Scotland which culminated in him hanging up the phone in high dudgeon. As the saying goes, you don't stop being a racist just because you put on a suit. So farewell Nigel and don't trouble yourself to come back.  A party with only two policies; opposition to immigration and rejecting the European Union has little to offer Scotland.  Simply put; Farage is a would-be populist appealing to the basest instincts that the Daily Mail can whip up. Scotland needs immigrants, even from England (and I'm sure we'll get  many refugees from there when we declare independence).  We're getting older and need more working folk to pay for our pensions and care homes. Why is Farage and his shower of numpties so popular doon south?  They took more than one in fo...

Looking forward to going to Amsterdam for a couple of days next week.  I shall need to decide what I want to do.  In  no particular order I want to visit the Stedelijk, the Rijksmuseum, and the Van Gogh Museum. A trip to a Surinamse Restaurant is in order and perhaps a Rijstaffel.  A visit to Piet de Gruyter and my old haunts in the Stadsliedenbuurt will fill in most of the time I have at my disposal. The Surinamse restaurant I have in mind is the first one I ever visited.  Spraang Makandra is the name.  When I first visited in 1981 it was a real greasy spoon eatery.  It reminded me of the old Khushi's in Edinburgh's Drummond Street. I can recall my first meal there.  Moksie Mettie.  Literally translated as Mixed Meat. A linguistic reminder that Surninam used to be an English colony until the Dutch swapped it for New York.  It was a super meal. Surinam food must be the original fusion cooking.  The South American country re...

As I write one ear is listening to the Europa League Final.  Chelsea play Benfica in Amsterdam. So far there is no scoring, about twenty minutes in.  The commentator has noted that Eusebio is in the crowd watching the game.  Watching Eusebio play on an old grainy Black & White television as a child was the start of my fondness for Benfica. Eusebio was a super player, clearly world class and a man who could have played in any team in the world. Benfica was the team he played with for almost his entire career.  He was and remains a fan of the people's club. Benfica  (or Sport Lisboa Benfica to give it its real name) is the working class team in Lisbon.  Sporting is the club for the middle classes.  Benfica, owned by its fans is the team of the workers. Formed in 1904 the club has always been owned by its fans.  Members or "Socios" of the club have owned it since the start.  Tempted by higher wages some players left in 1906 to join ...