Quick Crappy Review: WWE Elite Junkyard Dog and The Legion of Doom

It’s J-Y-D and the L-O-D and that ain’t no L-I-E.

Quick Crappy Review: Galaxy Wars

It's two days to Christmas but you bet i can crap out two Quick Crappy reviews, I wonder if people enjoy reading these or realise I just fall back on them when I don't have the time/energy to write other content? Hopefully both.

Songs of Christmas Past!

So I like to listen to the Purple Stuff Podcast, who wouldn’t with a title like that? It’s the official podcast for Dinosaur Dracula and The Sexy Armpit, two of the best blogs on the web, way better than this pile of shit that’s for certain. Yeah, ok, it’s not the most...focused Podcast out there but it’s just so fun to listen to two blokes talk about rubbish, the most recent rubbish was Christmas songs and unlike their Halloween Songs not a single one crossed over with my perfect Christmas Playlist that I use every year, thus I had to write the following to talk about that playlist and all the Christmas songs that are way better than Bruce fucking Springsteen (god I hate that man), so see this as the AFB Christmas Countdown show as I check off a load of Christmas Songs and write a really indulgent post because why not? So are you sitting comfortably? Then IT’S CHRIIIIIIISTMAAAAASS!!!!:   

A Look At... Star Wars: Heir to the Empire

Rounding out my Yay New Star Wars Film Celebratory Look At Posts Trilogy with, fittingly, something with Empire in the title, it’s Heir to the Empire, the first in the Thrawn Trilogy.

A Look At... Star Wars: Splinter of the Mind's Eye!

Welcome fictional friends to the second of my Yay New Star Wars Film Celebratory Look At Posts, which are fittingly a trilogy. Today’s subject is the Dark Horse Comics adaptation of Splinter of the Mind’s Eye.

A Look At... Star Wars: The Keeper's World

The internet’s gone a bit Star Wars bonkers at the moment in the lead up to The Force Awakens, the first sequel to the original trilogy and the fist Star Wars film from new owners Disney. I wish I could be all hipster, poo-poo this and spend the month talking about Doctor Who because y’know everyone knows the correct answer to ‘Star Wars vs Star Trek’ is Doctor Who but fuck that, I’m as excited as everyone else and in fact have midnight showing tickets for the 16^th. So my contribution to the internet’s celebration of a film that may or may not in fact actually be good is going to be Looking At three important Star Wars comics; The Keeper’s World, the very first original Star Wars story to see print; Splinter of the Mind’s Eye – an adaptation of the first original Star Wars novel and Heir to the Empire, the original sequel to Return of the Jedi. This is very much the equivalent of spitting into the ocean (or a Degaba swamp if you prefer). 

Quick Crappy Review: Masters of the Universe Classics Dragstor & Queen Grayskull

Heeey, hey hot rod

I’ve gotten into the habit of writing Quick Crappy Reviews – which I only do of recent releases – about the day after I get whatever’s being quickly, crappily reviewed. This generally doesn’t come across to you fictional fans because I actually post my writings whenever I feel like but that is how I do things. This has been the exception thus far, I’ve had these since last week at least and I’ve been putting things off because I just couldn’t figure out what I thought about Dragstor, I’m still not sure.

Ten Other Great Songs By... Kirsty MacColl!

I’ve been meaning to start doing these for a while now as a less ‘image intensive’ option for when I’m feeling lazy.

I know a lot about music, but I know an especially large amount about a selection of 12 or so artists (maybe even more) – I have their whole discography, books on them and so on, they’re mostly British acts you mostly haven’t heard of that you mostly wouldn’t think I’d listen to if you saw me on the street (except The Clash, and the Manic Street Preachers – you’d defiantly think I listen to the Manics if you met me) but they usually had one or two hits most people in Britain have heard, even if it’s just on an advert with the words changed to advertise microwave food or credit cards or whatever. Case in point: Kirsty MacColl who’s known for jangly guitars, Cuban influences and singing on a song by a bunch of Irishmen, not the sort of act one would expect a big Metalhead looking fellow to obsess over, but obsess I do. So I’ve decided to write these posts, where I eschew the one or two hits the act has to tell you about 10 other great songs they recorded.    

Kirsty MacColl is sadly mostly known via other people’s work – she’s the female voice on The Pogues’ Christmas hit ‘Fairytale of New York’¹ (the bells are ringing out for Christmas Day etc etc) and the writer of They Don’t Know which was a hit for Tracy Ulman (she also sung back-up on that) while two of her three biggest chart successes in the UK were cover versions – of The Kink’s Days and Billy Bragg’s A New England. To make matters worse her biggest hit was the brilliant ‘There’s A Guy Works Down the Chip Shop Swears He’s Elvis’ which got her lumped in categories like ‘novelty song’ and ‘one-hit wonder’ (she wasn’t, she had several Top 10 hits). I say ‘sadly’ and ‘it only makes matters worse’ not just because it ruins one’s credibility to be considered a covers act, a novelty act or a one-hit wonder but of those the only song that showed off her talents as a snappy lyricist is the one that everyone ignores as a joke and MacColl was capable of being a fantastic lyricist with a very English sense of humour (so swearing, sarcasm and smut then) who could do both word play and simple but effective as good as those who’ve actually become known for their lyrical prowess like Elvis Costello. She was also a very hot ginger woman, and I’m easily swayed by hot ginger women. So are you sitting comfortably? Then BAY-AY-BEEE I’ll begin:

Free World (Kite, 1989)

I can’t decide if this or Soho Square is my favourite Kirst MacColl song, I like them both and both for their emotion but while Soho Square stays squarely in the realm of simple but effective relying on delivery, Free World throws words at you like you’ve offended their mother as our girl Kirsty gives a verbal smacking down to a Thatcherite wanker who’s sold out his principals, his class and driven off his friends, family and our heroine for the materialistic 80’s lifestyle. Kirsty did this sort of lyric really well (so does her mate Billy Bragg); using a love song as a protest song, drawing attention to some kind of other injustice while also singing about some prick who clearly didn’t know he had it so good and this is the best example of it from her, she fills the song with jabs at Margaret Thatcher’s Britain from the very first line, which may well be one of my favourites “I thought of you when they closed down the school / and the hospital too / did they think that you were better / they were wrong” she could be just as easily giving shit to the late great handbag herself. I guess the song works better if you know a bit about the 1980s and how shit it was in the UK because of the conservative government and the people who bought into their ‘pull the ladder up Jack and sod the rest’ mentality but a whole chunk of it still works, I especially like the enduring line ‘the ghettos are full of Mercedes Benz’ which in a world still flooded with commercial rap is still horribly useful.