Uni Lad Mag: The Closet Man's Crumpet?





In February my attention was drawn to a student site called Uni Lad when the BBC ran a story stating that Uni Lad were accused of trivialising and making jokes about rape. Charges dropped and apologies seemingly accepted, three months later Uni Lad remains a wasp nest, thick with contentious stories that drink in the degradation of women. But Uni Lad had me a little bit hooked...

Firstly the name appealed. Uni Lad. I collect rare gay books and "Uni Lad" sounds just like the kind of pulp fiction that the Gay Man's Press distributed in the late 70s. You can picture it can't you. "Uni Lad": A young man's first term at university, the shared bathroom, sitting on the end of the bed knocking a cricket bat in, receiving essay feedback from a beady-eyed professor called Greaves. "Place your hands on the desk please Coleman."

Secondly I was disgusted by how despicable Uni Lad finds women who don't fit a certain template. Uni Lad flits between treating women like a University Challenge topic, and treating them like a pest. Uni Lad seems to forget that women make up half of the population. Sometimes Uni Lad hates girls with the real frothing of a Parisien designer having a hissy fit. More often Uni Lad's anger fancies itself as being quick-witted and comical, painting women as hapless charladies in the way that Somerset Maughan might have (but instead the jokes are never funny and have absolutely no aplomb).

There was something distantly familiar about Uni Lad. Then it hit me. The closet! Uni Lad is the blog embodiment of a bad teenage closet.

Which goes like this. Shout about women whilst craving cock. Slag off women, big up men, and describe women doing inappropriate things that you long to do - chiefly sucking cock. With its thirst for penis talk and constant discourse over naked men, could Uni Lad operate as an online anti-depressant pill for closet-cases? Is Uni Lad's loud racketing of banter a method of off-setting inner sexual turmoil and confusion? Is Uni Lad's incessant sharing of photos of men in compromising poses a way of building up a guilt-free porn stash? Is Uni Lad's attack on women a thinly-veiled jealousy? "Oh my!" I thought. Is Uni Lad ran by a bunch of rancid closets? Or even worse than the closet - a group of completely unwittingly repressed gays?

I'm sure that many lovely heterosexual men look at Uni Lad, enjoy its volley of tits jokes and comment on its photos without ever considering homosexual activitiy, unaware that they are feeding the maggots of closet trickery, because those readers are actually straight. (And someone could write a thesis on how Uni Lad damages the reputation of those straight men, confining them to its own small screwy two-dimensional fake-tanned puppet of masculinity that is animalistic, pumping with inaptitude and suffocatingly patriarchal - *and breath*). But inbetween Uni Lad's central narrative of ear-splittingly low-intellect fraternity threads another - blatant gayness.
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So I followed Uni Lad on Twitter for one month, May 2012, noting down the symptoms of the closet as and when they appeared. It is May 25th now, and I've had enough. The closet is such a poisonous and exhausting world. And remember - this is ONLY from May, and ONLY from Twitter. There's no time for the rest! For all I know Uni Lad's website might be an impressive exhibit of car crash editorial, flying high on some kind of inverted Warholian scale. Although I have my doubts.
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Here's my Top 10 Symptoms of The Gay Closeteria, as exhibited on Twitter in May 2012 by he who goes by the cock-thumping name of UNII LADDDDDDDD:

1) Directly inciting gay sex:

On the 3rd of May Uni Lad shared this picture with the caption "When spotting turns gay"

I showed this to my straight friend James. He said: "What - is the guy famous? Is it from a hidden camera show?". "No James, this photo in itself is supposed to be funny". James: "Oh"

Men in the closet enjoy talking about homosexuality A LOT. They're not getting it, so they're talking it, whilst genuinely straight boys are usually non-plussed about gay sex. Personally I encourage everyone to talk about gay sex to their hearts content. So does Uni Lad.

On the 21st of May Uni Lad tweeted about Brighton saying: "Brighton is full of sluts, but be careful of the willy-loving men, they are well disguised". I read out this to my straight friend Tom. He said: "Does he mean gay sluts? Brighton is the gay capital of Europe right, or is that Bournemouth? My advice would be don't go to gay bars and you'll be fine." I love the jaunty wobbly image that Uni Lad paints of "willy-loving men", like a Mr. Men character called Mr. Willy or something. Closet madness.

2)  Dicking around

A good way to vent the closet's thirst is to channel your horniness through jokes and games. On the 23rd of May Uni Lad tweeted this photograph running with the caption "Brave soldier lads dicking around". Can you think of a more gay sequence of 5 words? I can, but I'm massively gay.

I quite like this photo. It's hot. It's very, er, laddish. "Now let's take another one naked, THAT WOULD BE FUNNY, har har, *stomach is melting, please let me kiss your nipple*, har."

3) Touching the penis

Uni Lad likes to publish content related to touching men's cocks. Their first tweet in May was a rather poetic one: "That horrible wank when, as you finish, the camera zooms in on the man's penis". A non-sensical and fascinating thought that appeared on their Twitter out of nowhere. A symptom.

Uni Lad then shared this photo of a human Twister outfit which has been comically skewed to ensure a 75% chance of the player getting to fondle the boy's genital area:

I showed this to my gay friend Paul, he said: "That's fucking amazing, I wanna play!" I then showed it to my straight friend Ben, who said: "I don't think many girls would play that? But it's a good idea, probably designed by a paedophile"

4) Analysing the sexual performance of men

Uni Lad kindly takes it upon itself to understand the male sexual performance thoroughly. On the 15th of May Uni Lad tweeted: "During intercourse the male thrusts an average of 60 to 120 times"

...painting a mental tableau of a man thrusting forwards and backwards with a hard-on, his face perhaps lost in the intensity of sex...

Uni Lad then followed this up with "How many thrusts do you manage?". Classic closet-fodder here. Getting other men to confide in sex, to talk about their bodies, to confide in their bodies, to talk about their bodies having sex...

5) Focusing on semen

Sticking to their healthy interest in science, Uni Lad tweeted: "At around 15 calories per serving, sperm contains the same protein as the white of a large egg."

- Wow, thanks?

Interestingly egg whites are what boys eat for breakfast when they're body-building. This tweet is basically gay porn delivered in the voice of Stephen Fry. I love it.

Which brings me swiftly onto...

6) Uni Lad's adoration for Stephen Fry

Stephen Fry is great, and I in no way seek to claim him as gay community property, but he is a gay man that closet-cases can openly revel in, because Stephen Fry is public property. Uni Lad  really indulges in Stephen Fry, even though if Stephen Fry ever saw Uni Lad he would be completely repulsed by it. During May there were two Stephen Fry based tweets from Uni Lad. One focused on Fry's witty retort in the face of homophobic abuse: http://twitpic.com/9jiaex

So to be clear, I'm not saying liking Stephen Fry means you're a closet-case. Stephen Fry is for everyone. But. It's interesting isn't it...

7) Things going into mens arses

Life doesn't get more homosexual than the male anus being penetrated. Male anal penetration, whilst not part of all gay men's lives, has definitely got a placecard on the top table. (Not that I want to deter straight women from surprising their boyfriend occasionally with an unannounced thumb. He's got a G-spot there, let him use it). Anyway, Uni Lad loves a good joke about an object going into a bloke's arse.

Like this:

HAR HAR HAR! Fancy that! A thing going into a man's arse! HAR HAR H, oh wait, my boyfriend's calling me... brb.

8) Employing a niche gay referential framework

At its best Uni Lad reveals gifted insight into gay culture. Now I might be wrong here, but aren't glory holes something more for the gay man's scrap book? They started off in toilets, a same-sex enviroment, and I'm sure since then they have made a cameo in the odd straight porno or wo, but basically, my father doesn't know what a glory hole is, and my gay friends who are my father's age definitely will know what a glory hole is. Uni Lad posted this on the 12th of May:

Adding the joke "And is that a glory hole beneath the sign?". No. No it isn't. There's a glory hole in your local MacDonalds, but you knew that already didn't you Uni Lad?

9) Hating Caitlin Moran

Uni Lad is based in Plymouth, and I don't know how things go down there. But in London Caitlin Moran goes down pretty well. Sure, she's not for everyone, but by and large people want to buy Caitlin Moran a pint and chat to her about Bjork. So why does Uni Lad dislike Caitlin Moran? Is it the same reason that closet-cases dislike intelligent inquisitive women? The closet is a scary place. Once out of it you realise that A) the men you get are a lot hotter, and B) Caitlin Moran isn't that scary after all, I think she just wants stupid men to shut the fuck up and give clever girls their turn at making the odd global decision.

The Uni Lad Vs. Caitlin Moran saga is ongoing...

10) Things that only gay men consider

Sometimes Uni Lad shows its gay achilles heel. I relished these moments when they sprang up on Twitter throughout May.

On the 3rd of May they tweeted: "In the FHM shoot I swear Tulisa has been airbrushed". It was as if Perez Hilton had taken over the Uni Lad account. My mind was thrown back to boarding school, boys in the dorm tent-poling over the Maxim 100 Sexiest Women, and then me there on my bed thinking "Wow, Jeniffer Ellison's skin is so perfect, I wonder if it's been airbrushed?"

You've got to love Uni Lad for these 'true colours' moments.

Uni Lad shared this bizarre image which combines Finding Nemo with Carly Rae Jepsen's song 'Call Me Maybe'. I've shown this to six straight boys and not one of them was remotely interested! I think Uni Lad might have misjudged this one. Sometimes you accidentally open a closet door:

But then Uni Lad tweeted someone saying "You're about as useful as Anne Frank's drum kit". And the closet door was slammed tightly shut again.

Anyway.That's enough about Uni Lad. You get the idea. One month following @UniLadMag on Twitter. Uni Lad is a website that thinking people loathe, but a website that for me was an intriguing uber-cult-gay masochistic journey, a horse hair vest of itchy closet nostalgia, and a learning curve too - like who knew Plymouth has a university? And not only that, a university fulls of UNI LADS.

Here's to Uni Lad! Like unicorns, but even more phallic, and harder to find.

Let's finish with Uni Lad's favourite song 'Call Me Maybe'. I love the gay twist in the video, I wonder if Uni Lad does too? And I wonder if Carly is airbrushed at all in this...

@jackcullenuk

Gay 1950s Fashion Show in London

The YouTube channel Vintage Fashions has just uploaded this video of a mens beachwear show from 1951. The outrageous and daring display contains leopard print thongs, geometric design high-rise trunks that reveal part of the buttocks, as well as other flambuoyant designs that are both progressive for a post-war era and ahead of their time by a good ten years.

As equally alarming as the clothes is the setting and the attitude of the models. Looking like Tarzan-esque gigolos the models parade around a very intimate "closet" style catwalk whilst stiff upper-lipped spectators sit only inches away, making the whole affair not unlike a hen night style male strip show:

Taken from the British Pathe film archive, you can watch the video here:

The narrator hands over his commentary to the fashion designer who he says is called Dale Cavanagh. I've done a little bit of online research and cannot find any reference to this designer, but instead only one called John Cavanagh. I'm not sure if this is therefore a mistake in the newsreel?

I can't find any documentation of John Cavanagh designing forward-thinking gay fashion items like this though, only more refined pieces and high society womenswear. Of course many fashion designers fluctuate between making fun collections that are close to their heart and more serious collections that pull in cash from haute couture clients.

Also in the video is a humorous piece that says "Battersea Park" on the front of the crotch and "South Bank" across the arse. A predecessor to the tongue-in-cheek slogans and text-play of contemporary gay designers John Galliano, Jeremy Scott and Henry Holland.

John Cavanagh designed a collection of clothes for the Queen's Coronation in 1953, whilst the gay collection in this video is clearly tied into the 1951 Festival of Britain (which is probably the reason British Pathe got away with filming such an eye-raising little fashion show!). This is perhaps further evidence then that the designer Dale Cavanagh who is showcased here is in fact John Cavanagh?

I'd be really interested to hear from anyone who knows their mens fashion history? In the meantime I'll keep my eye on the YouTube comments. Watch the video in full on YouTube here.

Visit British Pathe's free fashion video archive here: The British Pathe Fashion Archive

Cindy Sherman's Office Killer came to London

Thanks to Little Joe Magazine we relished a rare treat last night: a late-night screening of Office Killer - the only feature-length film project to be made by American artist Cindy Sherman.

Office Killer is a gory comedy that follows Dorine, a troubled staff member at Constant Consumer magazine who kills her colleagues, and arranges them around her basement as a rash reaction to rumours of a pending downsize, ineffectually making her own office of the dead.

The film received terrible reviews upon its 1997 release, but as the editors of Little Joe Magazine explained, it is ready for a second-examination and is "a gem waiting to be retrieved from cinema's spam-folder". Office Killer works as a sort-of midlife retrospective of Sherman's work, taking influence from Untitled Film Stills, Centerfolds and her Fashion series, and is essential viewing for any Cindy Sherman fan, even if the artist has disowned the film from her official body of work.

Although low-budget and scarred by rushed editing, the film boasts striking composition and lighting. Every scene offers either an eye-catching tableau or a thought-provoking detail. The final gore scenes are fantastic, totally Sherman and reminded me of the filmed plays of Tadeusz Kantor.

The decision to screen Office Killer at 11.30pm on a Saturday in Dalston was a fun idea and the tipsy laughter of East London artisans and media-socrateses helped Sherman's gormless cast to bask in the comedic side of her tale. Still, Office Killer is well worth watching alone too, perhaps in a high-backed chair amongst candlelit photographs of Dennis Nilsen and Anthony Perkins.

Some of the film's themes are startlingly apparent to a 2012 audience. There are interesting surface motifs such as the arrival of technology, the introduction of email ("some people find it stops them from actually talking to their co-workers!" jokes the editor innocently) but also a deeper narrative runs through the course of Office Killer, a nauseous commentary on power and the invention of it. The relationship between visual and inner power, and the assertion of power within a corporate environment.

The nearly all-female cast of Office Killer is a bitchy sorority with the occasional punctuation of an attractive male post boy giving the film a Lorcan claustrophobia, it made me fantasise about a French and Saunders parody.

The challenging lighting, disobedient plot and awkwardly sparse script of Office Killer gives the film a reactionary and revolutionary air that seems to deliberately resist the magnetic conventions of Hollywood, and in doing-so gives a very Shermanian final production - a piece-de-resistance that borders on the irritable.

The ending is superb too, when we see Dorine driving to a new town with a blonde wig and sunglasses - she has effectively become Cindy Sherman heading to New York to start a career in art. Not to suggest that Cindy Sherman is a killer, although I'm sure in a another life she'd love to be.

There are tonnes of articles, reviews and discussions online about Office Killer so I won't keep you.

Thank You to Little Joe Magazine for their hard work and efforts in securing Office Killer for a UK screening, and for organising last night's event. It was a real calendar highlight for Cindy Sherman's fans across the pond.

Paul Foot: Kenny Larch Is Dead!

Comedian Paul Foot's 2012 Edinburgh Fringe show is to be called Kenny Larch Is Dead.

The sublime comic is currently wrapping up his Melbourne Comedy Festival where he has been performing last year's Edinburgh show Still Life, earning himself a Barry Award nomination, his second in a row in fact.

In true Footian style the description for Kenny Larch Is Dead on the Edinburgh Fringe program online is surreal and nonsensical:

"Deep within the sinking sands of the Perspex jungle of youth, in the forgotten nebula of nothingness, just off the warm waste waters of New Norfolk, comes an objet du désir - a trombone fruit. Needless to say, it's another warm year. ‘The most meaningless comedy ever seen. An entirely pointless evening, or your money back’ (Paul's disastrous guarantee)."

The press shot shows Paul sporting a silver space-like jacket and trademark bizarre tie, this time a metallic floral print by Duchamp.

As with the last three years, Foot is sticking with the Underbelly as his Edinburgh Fringe venue for the new show.

Keep an eye on his website, which features a racially inverted doll version of me, for more details:

http://www.paulfoot.tv/

Does this Milky Bar look a bit gay?

Well, I suppose "gay" is the wrong word, because straight women and bisexual men also enjoy playing with willies in their mouths, and straight men are the authority when it comes to inserting penis jokes into real life non-penis-related scenarios.

But yeah, I was a bit surprised to unwrap a Milky Bar this morning and find what looks like a squirting cock and two balls? Do I just have sex on the brain, or does that Milky Bar look more virile and good-for-you than its modest calcium promise?

You'd think Milky Bar have enough of an image complex, what with being called Milky Bar, opting for a cutesie and non-macho exterior and having a long-running world-famous ad campaign that looks like some kind of homegrown Michael Jackson Dating Agency in which small smooth blond boys turn up in back-water towns dressed like rodeos offering children chocolate, without having to go and actually craft male genitalia out of their product?

Upon closer inspection (turn the Milky Bar around) it becomes apparent that this is not a penis, but is in fact a donkey's head, being lassoed by the Milky Bar kid. Read what you will.

On a seperate pop music note, why hasn't Ke$ha or any of that lot ripped off the Milky Bar kid's song yet? Surely they're running low on nursery rhymes now, The Saturdays have released One, Two, Buckle My Shoe about six times. The Milky Bar kid's anthem is embedded deeply into our sub-conscious, it's light and upbeat, associated with fun times and receiving treats, and it would be easy enough for Cher Lloyd to sing with the aid of a few machines.

You could even throw a Nicki Minaj rap in for good kudos ("You want me to act milky? You like me cuz ahm silky. Well come give me your room key, and let's do something kaBOOM filthy?" etc)

Or perhaps a Lil' Kim rap, she's not done much lately ("You wanna milk me? Be my kiddy? You think you're strong and tough? Well I like it rough. Slide your bar into my chocolate bazaar. You old enough to ride my car? Be my semi-skinned Milky boy, I'll be your full fat moose" etc etc etc)

Or what about a Subway wrap? Kelis is too obvious.

Potential chart toppers:

"The Milky Bars Are On Me (Literally)" by Alexandra Burke (Freemasons remix)

"Strong And Tough" by Leona Lewis feat. Pitbull

"Milk E Bars R On Me" by Ke$ha

"Only The Creamiest Milk (Is Good Enough)" by The Saturdays

"Look It's The Milky Bar Kid!" by Cher Lloyd

"Fuck Me In Both Ends Please" by Kaya Jones

Alexander Boot is just another sad pathetic Daily Mail pest. But the gay community needs to forget the insipid mouth, and cut off the varnished hand that continually feeds it.

Here he is, look - Alexander Boot, a sad dreary old man with a powdery comb-over and a clumsy watch, one of the few photos of him on the internet because he isn't very reputable or venerated, appearing to look out, but actually he is looking very deeply in, because this is a lonely and disillusioned writer, riled by his own middling success, riddled with regret, grateful for any Daily Mail invoice that he can get, even if it means dancing fat and naked to their media agenda's drum, drowning in his own ink well and attacking several million people who he doesn't know but who he might envy perhaps due to a repressed homosexual streak that trickles down his conscience like a bead of ball sweat against a doughy unloved thigh.

Yesterday Alexander wrote a lovely piece in the Daily Mail stating that Homosexuality is a departure from the norm. And what is the norm Alexander? Heterosexuality? Divorce? Single Parenthood? Loneliness? Bigamy? Slavery? Coffee? He is deliberately confusing two words: Normal, and Common. It is perhaps more common, more frequent, more expected, that somebody will be heterosexual. But it isn't normal. It is normal that 1 in 15,000 people who take a Paracetemol might faint. It is normal that a Swedish pop star will top the British charts once every 200 weeks. Is is normal, as a combined average from several colossal studies, that 6-10 people out of every 100 will identify as gay, but in fact that many, many more will have a homosexual episode at some stage in their lives. It is normal for healthy heterosexual people to not bother themselves about the multitudinous normal existence of gay people.

Although Alexander Boot incorrectly says that "1% of us are inclined to be homosexual". I can't even be bothered to argue this one, like where did he get that from? Does he mean 1% of the boys in his history seminars at Warwick University that he makes stay behind for "feedback"? The Daily Mail have simply gone ahead and published an obvious lie. It's no different to them publishing "10% of pumpkins can chatter quietly amongst themselves before being plucked". It's JUST BOLLOCKS.

So why does the Daily Mail publish this bollocks? I write for magazines and know that sometimes a pitch works and sometimes it doesn't. Sometimes an editor will say "Yes! Do it!" and sometimes they will say "No, this one really doesn't fit with the issue this time, sorry."

So what is the Daily Mail's agenda? Let's forget about the sad whored-out "columnists" and focus on the editors. Which individuals at Northcliffe House are personally responsible for upsetting and trying to ruin the Saturday mornings of thousands? And how can the gay community put an end to the belligerent work of these life-wrecking media beasts who commission nasty, incorrect articles packed with lies with the touch of their Blackberry and then sit back in their garden and watch their kids playing, probably not stopping to think that one of their children might actually be gay when they grow up, and that they've just personally played a key part in securing an uphill climb in a nasty seething world of middle-class pith for their darling, darling child.

The answer is: Money.

The Daily Mail want gay people to get angry, read their stories, click, RT, huddle around Facebook statuses, frowning at emails, etc. etc.. It's page impressions, adverts, money. We know all of this, we keep saying it, "Ooh look at the Mail link-baiting", liberal writers and journalists like Hadley Freeman repeatedly flag up the Daily Mail, documenting how anti-feminist and fucked in the head the journalists at the Mail are, comparing the paper to an "abusive husband", but we still keep coming back, we keep arguing, spinning the money wheel, falling into the trap. But what's worse - we have to, because this is our lives that they are repeatedly messing with. This is our community that they are trying to make a horrible place for us.

Like a local funeral parlour that puts poison in the village well, but on a mass scale, it is almost too upsetting to dwell on the fact that the Daily Mail's editors continually publish venom that they know will worsen the lives of our country's most vunerable, whilst earning traumatised page hits out of its most sensible.

Because whilst I can sit here in Hampstead with my granola and yoghurt, typing away on my blog until hangover clearance o'clock, others can't. What about those gay individuals who are still dependent on their oppressors, who aren't blessed with the most tolerant of families? Imagine it. The homophobic step-dad reading aloud phrases from the Daily Mail at breakfast - "You should read this" - before cutting out a photo of a cute squirrel to send to his daughter from a previous marriage. The angst teenagers who slowly twist and cripple their own hearts whilst reading their parents' newspapers that they take as verbatim.

We use the word bigotry a lot here in media-savvy London, but I think more fitting words are misery, pain, upset, nastiness, sorrow - These are the feelings that the Daily Mail wants openly gay people to experience. What was once a newspaper, notice the word "news", is now nothing but a sharpened knife hiding behind J-Lo's arse.

And what can we do? How can we help? Perhaps Hadley could write a Guardian column advising us on how to respond as a community?

Do we leave futile comments on their website, wedged between the higgledy hip-replacement gibberish, saliva-splattered side comments and the beyond-help coos of horse-breeders's wives? Do we track down the editors, turn up at their pastel-coloured villas and ask them why they keep doing this to us? Do we ask gay people who work at the Daily Mail to get a reality check? Do we write to the Mail's advertisers?

It's so depressing, and as much as you want to see those latest photos of Kate Middleton playing hockey, the only answer is... to ignore the Daily Mail.

It won't make it go away, but it will make your life better.

Take comfort in the fact that there are millions of gay people living in the world, everywhere. Apple CEOs, Google executives, prime ministers, military leaders, astronauts, all the way down to us humble fodder, the bloggers, the bakers, the Fendi bag makers. Too many gay people to list. Always have been. Always will be. So let us just remember that.

And just as nature dictates that there will always be gay people, it also dictates that Alexander Boot and his po-faced editors are just mere mortals like the rest of us, just less interesting and more sour than most of us.

And in a few years Alexander Boot will be dead, lost, forgotten, his books unread, his Wikipedia page covered in weeds and unvisited.

And one day, as both probability and nature dictate, one of Alexander Boot's great grandchildren will be gay, and they might decide to research their family tree, and they will stumble across his journalistic legacy. And what could have been a happy day, "Look! Josh! Did you know my great-grand grandather was a national journalist!?", instead Boot's horrid stodgy scrawlings will be revealed, and his grandchild will swallow a small gulp of flem, turn to his boyfriend, and whisper "Fuck Josh, look! My great-grandfather was a homophobe..."

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Ooh, here's another sexy snap of our friend Alexander Boot:

Now if you spot him in the street you'll be able to go up to him and freak him out. If you're gay then you're not normal remember, so he probably won't be surprised if you start doing some abnormal things, like making yourself sick down his back.

And here are some other Alexanders. Gay ones. Much better ones:

Alexander The Great - I think we all accept that he did more than most.

Alexander McQueen (born Leigh) - one of the greatest British fashion designers to have ever lived, and the official choice of the Royal Family for the wedding dress of our future queen Katherine Middleton.

Nick Alexander - an award-winning novelists. That's right Mr. Boot, this guy's books are actually read by people and win awards. 

And finally - Alexander Pettyfer. OK so he's not actually gay, but we can dream can't we, and who knows what goes on on those casting couches...

"The City of Devi" by Manil Suri - Are Bloomsbury Heading for another Gay Fiction Smash in 2013?

Manil Suri's latest novel "The City of Devi" which features a gay muslim character at its centre could be the award-winning author's most successful title yet when it comes out next year. The novel tells the story of Sarita, a thirty-three year old statician who sets out to find her lost husband after he vanishes in Mumbai. Set against an intense and terrifying backdrop of nuclear annihilation in the face of India's global emergence, Sarita's journey collides with that of Jaz, a secretly gay muslim who is also trying to find a former lover. Sarita and Jaz decide to help each other's quests before realising that they are both looking for the same man...

Indian-American mathematician and author Manil Suri found success with his 2001 novel "The Death of Vishnu" which was long-listed for the Booker Prize and led to American publishing house W.W.Norton giving him a generous advance to write more.

Suri, who keeps in touch with fans over Facebook, posted on his page last December to announce W.W.Norton were all set to go with "The City of Devi" but that a UK publisher was yet to be secured. It is now rumoured that Bloomsbury will publish the book over here. Suri also let his fans voice their opinion over the book's title, with "The City of Devi" beating "Superdevi" narrowly in a poll.

Bloomsbury are emerging as one of the LGBT community's favoured publishing houses with an impressive track-record for investing in good quality gay fiction, not only boasting literary giants like Edmund White amongst their stable of authors (who published his first novel in seven years "Jack Holmes and his Friend" with Bloomsbury last year) but also running with less-mainstream exciting gay titles like Madeleine Miller's "The Song of Achilles" last summer - a fantastic read which really did deserve more mainstream attention, and presumably will in good time.

It seems the literary circuit is happy to venerate a gay title once every year, with Booker Prize recognition arriving perhaps once in every five, and we're used to seeing the same host of gay authors contest for that rotary throne - Alan Hollinghurst, Alan Bennett, Damon Galgut, Sarah Waters, Ali Smith.

Manil Suri's "The City of Devi" has picked, perhaps accidentally, a good time to come out - now that the noise following Hollinghurst's "The Stranger's Child" and White's "Jack Holmes and his Friend" has quietened down.

From the few tit-bit previews that can currently be found online "The City of Devi" sounds as if it will combine the social energy of a Hanif Kureishi novel with the cultural feast of Monica Ali, and the sexual adornment of a Pierre et Gilles portrait. Here's to hoping. Roll on 2013!

Apprentice Lookalikes 2012

I was disappointed with Episode 1 of this year's The Apprentice. Twelve candidates (who all look like Mattel dolls of former Apprentice candidates) participated in a hazy task that we'd all seen before, a faceless woman was fired, and the winning team were treated to... hold your breath... DRINKS AND NIBBLES back in the luxury setting of their BBC digs. There weren't many laugh-out-loud vox pops, Karen Brady seems to be running on low-battery mode and blah blah blah,

The point is, The Apprentice doesn't get good until you're a few weeks in.

In the meantime, here are some lookalikes for 5 of this year's candidates:

32-year-old former bread-stacker Adam Corbally looks a bit like fictional butcher's son Ashley off Coronation Street, particularly when you study his mannerisms. The reason I know this is because my Mum used to cook dinner in time for Coronation Street and then we'd have to sit in silence whilst she watched it. I've made a conscious effort in my own adult life to overrule history, and so when watching The Apprentice and I like to fill my house with noisy gays, distant fan-ovens and far too much white wine.

Editorial Research Director (what is that? who has those?) Katie Wright looks quite a lot like the model Jodie Kidd, or is it Jemma Kidd? Or Jemima Kidd? There are two of them, one used to be a model and now writes about beauty, the other one still is a model and also probably writes about beauty, I think? I've not researched this very well. I just remember [Jodie/Jemima] Kidd's face popping up in my Grandma's Daily Mail and then watching The Apprentice last night and thinking (after a few Chenin Blancs) - "Doesn't she look like her off the Daily Mail?" The photo I chose above isn't very good either, so you'll just have to trust me or his Google Images yourself.

Hero of last night's show Duane Bryan looks a bit like Simon Webbe, member of the boyband Blue and cousin to former Sugababe Keisha Buchanan. Let's hope Duane takes a leaf out of Simon's wardrobe (literally) and appears next Wednesday smothered in Clover and sporting a decorative rope coil and numerous tattooes.

Apprentice pretty-boy Nick Holzherr who started life selling golf balls that he found in hedges or something looks quite a lot like gay porn entrepreneur, adult model, online brand, former murder suspect, power bottom and professional toy boy Brent Corrigan. You never know, perhaps if the boys win next week Nick will hoist himself up onto the breakfast bar and take a few for the team... Whilst you're waiting for that to happen though, why not read Brent Corrigan's intriguing Wikipedia page.

And finally last night's losing team captain Jane McEvoy who I think looks like Catherine Tate's infamous character Elaine Figgis who dates strangers on the internet and marries a man on death row. It's hard to get a good Google image of Elaine, so this tacky grid of screengrabs is the best you're gonna get.

See the other candidates on this year's Apprentice here

As far as I can tell none of the candidates are gay on this year's Apprentice? Or am I wrong? Pray do tell.

@jackcullenuk

MDNA Review - Madonna! Read it now - You Wanna!

Ok ok, here it is, don’t take my gay card away from me, Madonna review coming through, coming through, MDNA, track by track review, gay jokes, all yer’ fucking favourites:

(NB. So this might not be the right track order, I’m just following my iPod and you know what they’re like when it comes to organising music, just shove any old shit anywhere, mid-album collaboration is it? – Let’s just file it as if it’s a completely different artist shall we – yeah that makes sense.) And we’re off...

Girl Gone Wild

The first time I heard Girl Gone Wild (which should really be called Gays Gone Wild, or failing that, Boys Gone Wild, or failing that, at least pluralise it to Girls Gone Wild which is what we all called it when it leaked onto the internet thirty-two years ago) had a vision of naked boys skidding in purple roller skates in a mirrored room (a bit like the one in Sweatbox Gay Gymnasium but bigger) whilst people in cardboard Madonna masks (like the ones we used to wear at Push The Button in Vauxhall before they totally caught on and now you even see Stag parties in them) throw buckets of Vera Wang Princess (the perfume of choice for girls in boarding schools aged 13-15, or maybe 16 if they’re still fat) from the sidelines (or possibly a spectator balcony?)

Did any of that paragraph make sense? MADONNA!

Then Dylan B Jones showed me this video of a slightly porky siren in a swimsuit dancing before psychedelic backgrounds with an Aphex Twin grin which is just insuperable: YOU WANNA!



Then I danced to the song in East Bloc whilst experiencing severe liver pains from the night before and this guy with a beard pointed out that Girl Gone Wild is basically a fusion of former Madonna hits Celebration, Get Together and Sorry. And now I’m totally over it, but now the album has come out, and it’s one of the tracks on the album, and you expect me to have an opinion on it – well sorry, I don’t*.

*Unless David LaChapelle wants to direct my video idea, using Helix Studios models and turn it into an Evian water campaign, THEN I'm interested again. L! U! V!

Gang Bang

Wait a minute, isn’t this Zombie Nation by Kernkraft 400 which I bought on CD single from Woolworth’s in Melton Mowbray in 1999 when the internet and mobile phones were still relatively new? Fast forward another twelve years and we find ourselves on Madonna’s twelfth album and it’s calling itself Gang Bang and wants some kudos in the blogosphere? Well instead I’m just going to sit here and sip my luke warm coffee and watch the March magnolias purr silently in the warm London breeze.

But I will say this – If you’re expecting a song about gang banging then think again. Disappointingly the title Gang Bang doesn’t deliver its promise of awful sexual innuendo, (unless “fish out of water” is a reference to hemorrhoids?) Turns out Gang Bang is some kind of fluid metaphor for shooting your boyfriend in the head, which in turn could be a metaphor for playing them this album. Talking of which, what happened to that cute olive skinned guy called Jesus who Madonna was banging? And has he made a sex tape with another guy yet? MADONNA!

I’m Addicted

I’m going to be car sick. Although I did just have a flashback of this tanned Spanish guy in just white socks on his parents sofa, curtains drawn, midday, family all busy down on the beach, so thanks for that Madonna. Y! O! U!

Turn Up The Radio

So we’ve all had a good giggle of late, on YouTube and via word of mouth, about how Madonna likes to recycle lyrics. Well two lyrical clichés that so many popstars cling to, and that need to be put to bed forever, are DJs and Radios. “Ask The DJ”, “Hey Mr. DJ”, “Last night a DJ saved my life”, “DJ’s got us falling in love again”... Right, DJs aren’t interactive artisans anymore. Most DJs today are just people in new t-shirts playing their iPod from a black pulpit trying for their life to look like they know anything about pop music and that they didn’t nick their playlist off their flatmate Sam and that their job is worth more than the minimum wage. Ok, so some DJs are really good, but that still doesn’t mean they talk to people on the dancefloor, and those that do are generally really god-awful shit provincial DJs in small clubs with names written in neon tubing like Shabby’s and Kawooosh and The Lid. So message to millionaire popstars who haven’t been to a discotheque since the 70s: WE DON’T TALK TO DJs.

“On the radio”, “Turn up the Radio”, “The radio’s playing my favourite song”, “I love my radio”, “All I need is a radio” ... Right, COOL KIDS DON’T LISTEN TO THE RADIO ANYMORE. Give us lyrics like “You’re at the top of my iTunes Date Added column”, or “You’re on my memory stick”, or “Spotify is playing my favourite song right now, because I chose it”, or “All I need is my Last.Fm account and a quick scan for YouTube links in my Facebook home feed to feel free”

So here we have the queen of pop telling us to turn up the radio. Well I don’t own a radio. My mum has one in her kitchen and I see her four times a year, so next time I’m there, I’ll remember, ta Madge.

(I should probably put it on the record here that I secretly adore Radio 4. Moving on...)

Some Girls

I quite like the backing vocalist, go her. I wonder how much she got paid? Did she even get to meet Madonna? Does Madonna know her name? Is Madonna even a person? Has this song finished yet? Did I really pay money for this album? Oh it has finished. Oh good....

Superstar

“You’re like Brando, you’re like James Dean” you’re like every other gay person that Hollywood wants to represent heterosexual attraction that I can think of without using Wikipedia. Superstar sounds like something Jedward wrote on Guitar Hero before they were famous. Talking of which Jedward throw some love towards Madonna on their hilariously quick-lived album, perhaps the trio could get something cooking?

I Don’t Give A (feat. Nicki Minaj)

One of the better tracks on MDNA, I want the video for I Don’t Give A to be Madonna running along an urban night-time Sonic Level collecting rings with Nicki Minaj’s face plastered all over repeated background scenery then at the end she bumps into a giant hovering rotating Gaga head and Madonna's rings go flying everywhere and Tails wags his finger like “you’re so vexed”. Disappointingly the bridge is cancered with that new Madonna mid-tempo that makes you think of grandmas line-dancing, and by "bridge" I don’t mean in the Sonic level video, no I’m using a clever musical term that Smash Hits taught me in-between working incredibly hard on ensuring that I would definitely grow up massively gay (by using a mixture of subliminal messages, editorial references to men being hot, excessive levels of exclamation and stickers of Ben from A1) - YOU WANNA!

I’m A Sinner

It’s going to take a stronger gay than me to push through to the end of this song. I’ll wait for the revised Spanglish thumbed-up using multiple accounts YouTube comment version.

Love Spent

After its tiring, tiring, trying intro Love Spent is OK I guess, forgetting the imagery it gives me of women being slot machines and male ejaculation a currency.

Masterpiece

It’s that song we all read about before actually hearing, Masterpiece, the Golden Globe-winning ballad that threw Elton John’s partner into a red carpet hissy fit when the Elton John song from his Elton John musical cartoon called Elf Head or Dwarf Land Peeky Boo or something didn’t win instead, a fact that is made all the more funny by the fact that Masterpiece is the most innocent, harmless, understated and gentle ballad in Madonna’s entire 200-track discography. This one’s definitely going on my sangria playlist. Thanks Madonna, it’s not great, but it’ll do, and everyone loves a lyrical framework that toys with fine art. (I bet Elton’s got it on his iPod secretly) L! U! V!

Falling Free

Ooh, weird spiritual bollocks from American Life raising its sour head alert. It's a bit Zelda, makes me think of a stills gallery on YouTube of Ohio sunsets. Skip, skippety, skip...

Beautiful Killer

Gives a big nod to Impressive Instant and other moments from Music. Sounds like an improvised Sophie Ellis-Bextor song, the sort she’d just jam to herself whilst making actual jam. It’s only one minute long on my iPod – is that an error or is Madonna being edgy? Who knows, we’re all happy... MADONNA!

I Fucked Up

Ooh interesting. I want to make a sped-up video montage of lilos deflating and mix it up with shots of Lana Del Rey on holiday with her parents. If I heard this at a spoken word poetry event in Covent Garden I'd be enthralled, but instead I’m hearing it on a fucking Madonna album and so consequently frowning a little bit. Going to the fridge, back in a mo....

B-Day Song

“And the beat goes on” – Is that a homage to Track 10 on Britney Spears’ debut album? I like the raw B-52’s Cindy Wilson esque vocal style, but then just when the song needs to do something, it decides to repeat itself instead, like so many songs on this album. A tall glass of flat Fanta. Y! O! U!

Best Friend

Yeah, again, who the fuck’s going to play this in their car? It’s like someone’s Sound Cloud off-cuts. BUT, my ‘grower’ light is flashing...

-THE END-

I award MDNA a casual 6 out of 10. In a saturated market where Jessie J, Katy Perry and Nicki Minaj are all releasing identical sounding singles, Madonna had a golden opportunity to smash everyone for six, but instead she’s fighting for air play against Alexandra Burke. MDNA will become just another Madonna album on your iTunes that you scroll past enroute to Mariah, or possibly Marianne Faithfull, or possibly Marilyn Manson. Whatever floats your boat, to quote Madonna, probably.

Read Dylan B Jones’ write up of MDNA here! - YOU WANNA!

@jackcullenuk

Flopped But Not Forgotten: E17, Thunderbugs and Laurence Jeffcoate

Last night was the Popjustquiz @Concrete in East London, a pub quiz held by (purveyors of amazing pop music) Pop Justice.

One of the evening's conditions was that you brought along a shit CD to giveaway, and so I set about charity shop shopping in Fitzrovia on my lunch, avoiding Oxfam of course where the rackety second-hand CD trade will set you back £3.99 for a scratched Windows 97 PC game in a Marvin & Tamara box.

So, first of all, for my Popjustquiz teammate Johnny (who doesn't really get lunchbreaks) I picked up this copy of Steam by E17 for 99p, featuring the hit Stay Another Day:

The best bit about the Steam CD is this advert for E17 merchandise:

I predict E17 towelling robes are going to be a micro-trend come June (when the the premature-ejaculator British summer is well and truly over for another eleven and a half months).

Also. Check out this band member looking like a waiter from the cafe in Limehaus Chariots:

Whether there's a connection between the E17 album being called Steam and the inside cover artwork connoting a gay sauna is anyone's guess. As far I know none of the boys in E17 were gay, in fact, they might have been a bit homophobic even (?) I think their manager was gay...

Then I saw this CD called Tears In Heaven or something by a grinning boy called Laurence Jeffcoate, also going for 99p. I was attracted by its homemade look, the large expanse of grey wall, and the boy's painful smile:

A quick search on my phone informed me that Laurence was a runner-up in the TV talent show I'd Do Anything, and that Michael Jackson used to visit him backstage, then a few months later he retired from playing Oliver altogether. "I'd Do Anything" - "Michael Jackson" - "small rosy-cheeked boy" - "never heard of again": My instincts told me not to touch this CD.

If Laurence Jeffcoate is still alive he would only be 15 or 16 today, so let's hope that he is, and let's hope that we hear from him again one day, God bless.

Then, as if by MAGIC, whilst flicking vaguely through a geological layer of Peter Kay charity singles with a dust-smudged index finger, this appeared:

THUNDERBUGS - Friends Forever

Four women who look like they've been dragged out of the queue at LLoyd's Pharmacy, dressed in an assortment of tablecloths, pram-liners and Burberry garments that were later incinerated in the famous Burberry-look burnings of 2003. And even better, the song is called "Friends Forever". Out came the 99p, in came a new obsession.

Friends Forever reached number 5 in the UK charts in September 1999, no doubt thanks to a big pre-millenial PR push and a few Smash Hits song cards. Here it is:



And here it is on 12", for your hardcore Thunderbugs fans. Norman Cook probably owns this:

You still might be wondering who Thunderbugs actually are/were. We've all heard of Thunderbirds, and we're all fans of the Dylan B Jones favourite Thundacub. But Thunderbugs?

Turns out Thunderbugs were a 90s girl band with a twist - not only did they play all of their own instruments like The Corrs, but their lead singer had GLASSES, which is why she looks like Anastasia to a contemporary eye.

Following Friends Forever they released this not-very-good follow-up single It's About Time You Were Mine:



The song enjoyed a remix by Skeewiff, you know, that famous dance act, basically the Grum of 96.

Following the failure of It's About Time You Were Mine, the band's album Delicious was postponed and then finally only released on minidisc, which is perhaps more embarrassing than it being scrapped altogether (although rumour has it there were a few CD versions knocking about in continental Europe).

Here is a miserable low-res thumbnail of a different version of It's About Time You Were Mine, one of the few relics on the internet that prove Thunderbugs ever existed.

Following their break-up the lead singer Jane Vaughan (you know, with the glasses) went on to sing a song called "These Lips" for a Rimmel advert starring Lily Cole:

The girls were also used in an NSPCC charity campaign called Full Stop. Sadly the campaign wasn't a great one because nobody cared about anything that wasn't The Spice Girls. Here you can see three of the Thunderbug girls with the Duke of York (at least I think it's him?), presumably he's a fan:

And that's about it. So to whoever received my Thunderbugs CD at last night's Popjustquiz - I hope this blog post finds you safely and I hope that you treasure your new possesion. In return I received a Vaccines CD, which is pretty good according to Johnny. Will save it for the car come Mother's Day.

And you've done well to get this far through this blog post, so let's finish on a proper song:

@jackcullenuk