The future is past

I went to the cinema at the weekend, to see the new Star Trek film, as much out of habit as anything else (although subliminal nostalgia was also in the mix, hardly surprising when even the film poster, left, is an homage to the original crew's first big-screen outing). The new film's alright - good, not great, entertaining without being award-winning. As I sat there, sipping my Pepsi Max (bought from the village shop beforehand - I'm not made of money, after all), a few things struck me.

First off, I think the Star Trek franchise is living on borrowed time. As good as these rebooted films are (and all three have been solid), and as undoubtedly wise a move as going back to Kirk et al has been (because, let's be honest, that's what everyone really wants, however many spin-offs and other crews there have been), I don't think the franchise is winning new fans. Specifically, I don't think it is winning the hearts and minds of kids, certainly not in the same way the Star Wars franchise continues to. I'm going to be generous and say there was no-one under the age of 25 in the cinema as I sat down to watch Star Trek Beyond. Truth is, there were only one or two under 30. Most of the audience looked like long-term fans, men (mostly) of a certain age, and their perhaps long-suffering/tolerant partners. There would be a raft of teens and younger in a Star Wars film, making the next generation of fans-for-life. I don't think this is happening with Star Trek, to the extent that the law of diminishing returns probably starts to kick in now. What Kirk, Spock and McCoy really need is a Lego tie-in... but sadly it seems that is a non-starter.

Secondly... well, after my first thought, it occurred to me that some of the more hardcore Trek and Star Wars fans might be upset by me referring to their sacred texts as franchises. Now don't get me wrong, I like both, especially classic Trek, but really they are both just franchises. They're not ways of life. I'm sorry if you feel otherwise, to the extent that my comments offend. They're not meant to.

And finally, I sat through a lot of trailers, most of which left me wondering where the new ideas are. Sky Atlantic's new TV version of Westworld is coming, apparently, despite the fact that it would be difficult indeed to improve in any way on the original 70s film. A remake of The Magnificent Seven is also on its way. Now I know the Yul Brynner version was, itself, a remake of The Seven Samurai but at least that changed/updated the setting. The imminent version is just another Western - I am already not bothered, preferring Brynner, McQueen, Bronson, Coburn, Vaughan, Wallach and Dexter, much as I like Denzel Washington and Ethan Hawke. For God's sake, the new version has Vinnie Jones in - reason enough to stick with the original. And then there was a trailer for a new Jason Statham movie that appears to be an unnecessary sequel to an unnecessary remake - if you want to watch a film about an intelligent assassin for hire called The Mechanic, seek out Charles Bronson's original. It's excellent, in a way I struggle to imagine the Statham-powered version being. Oh, and then there was another trailer for another remake, this time for Ben Hur, of all things! As if that hadn't been "done" enough in the first place. I wish I was making this up.

So... remake, reboot, re-imagining, rehash... where, oh where, are the new ideas?

Maybe I should take a scriptwriting course. In the meantime, let's watch a bit of what one YouTube commenter calls "the closest Bronson ever came to making an art house flick".

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...as are visits to somewhere in Africa, somewhere in South America and maybe, Putin permitting, Russia.

Welcome Milwaukee visitors

If you're reading this blog, there's a good chance you're around my age. There's also a good chance that you grew up watching programmes like Happy Days on television and, later, Mork and Mindy. And even if you didn't catch them first time around, because the dearth of child-friendly programming led to endless repeats, you'll have seen them repeated many, many times (note: repeat, not re-run. Just like it's series, not season. That's how we do things here (and note: we do things, we don't roll. Unless pushed downhill)).

Anyway, back on track. Chances are your playground was full of boys going "Aaaayyyy" like the Fonz, maybe saying "Sit on it!" and, later, "Nanoo nanoo" and "Mork calling Orson." In later life, you may even have described something as "jumping the shark". All of these idioms have entered your life from these shows, so if you watched them, and maybe Laverne and Shirley too (which I enjoyed, even though it didn't make the trans-Atlantic crossing quite so fluently), you'll be sad to learn that the creator of all these great programmes, Garry Marshall, has died. Did you know that he also wrote for the excellent TV version of The Odd Couple? And went on to direct Julia-Roberts-powered blockbusters Pretty Woman and Runaway Bride? Learn all this and more from a fine obit, courtesy of the BBC.

All that classic TV... guess I'd better embed some videos. The obvious choice for most people blogging or tweeting about this will be something involving the Fonz and Happy Days, perhaps riffing on how this is a sad day. Or maybe some Mork and Mindy, showcasing the late lamented Robin Williams. I loved both these shows. But because I try to do different with this sorry excuse for a blog, here's the equally classic title sequence from Laverne and Shirley (ring any bells now?), followed by the excellent and affectionate parody of same from Wayne's World.

Clandestine Classic XLVII - Dover Beach

The forty-seventh post in an occasional series that is intended to highlight songs that you might not have heard that I think are excellent - clandestine classics, if you will. Maybe they'll be by bands you've never heard of. Maybe they'll be by more familiar artists, but tracks that were squirelled away on b-sides, unpopular albums, radio sessions or music magazine cover-mounted CDs. Time will, undoubtedly, tell.

Today's song was a serendipitous find for me. I bought an album on a whim because I had a massive crush on the lead singer. Don't judge me - I was in my mid-teens. But what do you think about when I say "Bangles" to you? Manic Monday, I expect. Walk Like An Egyptian, quite possibly. Eternal Flame, too. Maybe you'd trot out your Bangles pop quiz fact about Manic Monday being written for them, under an alias, by Prince. All fine, and perfectly understandable. But before all that commercial success, there was another story and another kind of band. The Bangs, formed by Susanna Hoffs and sisters Vikki and Debbi Peterson, were a spiky post-punk trio with a penchant for harmony-led Sixties music. When guitarist Michael Steele joined she brought a whole lot of crunchy guitar riffs with her, and the band changed their name to the slightly more straightforward Bangles, a name that still played on their femininity but in a less double-entendre-prone way.

Commercial success was still a little way off though. Early EPs performed unspectacularly, and their debut LP, from which today's clandestine classic is drawn, hardly fared better. Released in 1984, All Over The Place showcased the prototype Bangles sound and style perfectly, with Rickenbacker guitars chiming over four-part harmonies and just a little bit of an edge... you know, the sort of edge that later gets sanded off by record labels in the quest for mainstream success. But this LP, together with appearances on TV shows like Rock and Roll Alternative (and let's now forget, this is the kind of show that R.E.M. were also doing at the time), led to the band supporting Heart and Huey Lewis and the News, and catching Prince's eye/ear. The rest, as they say, is history.

Today's classic is a perfect example of that 1984 sound and style I was rambling about. There are big, crunchy, open chords and deceptively simple riffs, even a nice solo. And even, once, the merest trace of feedback. It's not Eternal sodding Flame, is it? Vocally, it's a case of harmonies, harmonies, harmonies. I'm trying to think of another four-piece band who all sing and whose voices mesh as well, in the same greater-than-the-sum-of-its-parts way, and I can only really think of Queen. That's high praise.

Lyrically, the song seems to me to be about lost love, specifically lost through bereavement. Witness the second verse: "Late last night you cried and I couldn't come to you. But on the other side, you and I, inseparable and walking." Okay, so it's not Morrissey, but it's not girl-band pap either. Anyway, I don't know if the ladies have been to Dover, probably not since it's hardly famous for its unremarkable beach, but since those words are not even mentioned in the lyrics, who cares? Maybe the lost love of the song chucked themselves off the rather-more-famous white cliffs. Who knows? If I ever meet Susanna, I'll ask her.

You can pick up All Over The Place on Amazon, and you really should because it's far better than you'd expect. Nothing will prise my vinyl copy away. In the meantime, here is today's clandestine classic. Enjoy.

"Thank you for reaching out with us"

I'll write about the referendum soon, when I can decide what, if anything, I can add to the existing conversation. I may write about Top Gear sometime too, and the Euros, and Wimbledon, and lots of other exciting things. Soon. Maybe. But in the meantime, let me return to the subject of live support chats on websites. I've been here before, but having tried to engage my mobile operator on the subject of a new phone at the weekend, it's time to go there again.

Backstory: I will soon qualify for a free handset upgrade. I like a smaller smartphone, because it fits in my pocket better, and have a long-standing brand preference for Sony. According to their website, my provider has just stopped selling the smaller Sony models I like. On the basis that, in years gone by, the provider has retained limited stock of discontinued models, or had open-box/refurbished handsets available, I thought I'd chance my arm. The black text is the honest-to-God transcript of the live support chat I had on my provider's website at the weekend - I've added comments in red to show you why I hate live support chats.

12:13	Info:	Thank you for choosing to chat with us. An agent will be with you shortly.
12:13	Info:	Hello, you are now chatting with Charles. How can I help?
12:13	Charles:	Hi Martin!	Easy with the exclaiming there, mate.
12:14	Charles:	How are you doing?	Fine until you used a Joey-from-Friends pick-up line on me.
12:14	Martin:	Hi. Is there any way to get either the Sony Xperia Z3 Compact or Z5 Compact from you? Other smartphones are so big and unpocketfriendly.	Admittedly, I hate myself for typing 'unpocketfriendly'. This is what trying to play the live support chat game does to me.
12:16	Charles:	Thank you for reaching out with us Martin.	WT actual F?
12:16	Charles:	The Sony Xperia Z3 is out of stock due to popular demand however we have many handsets that you might fancy of.	Hmm, I asked about the Z3 Compact, not the Z3. Let's see if I can make that clearer without being patronising.
12:17	Martin:	Indeed. However, I was specifically looking for either the Z3 Compact or Z5 Compact because they are compact.	Damn. I was patronising...
12:18	Charles:	What specification of Xperia Z3 do you love most Martin?	...but it's water off Charles's back.
12:19	Martin:	The small size. Not the Z3 but the Z3 Compact - it's a different model.	Okay, polite but clear.
12:21	Charles:	Great! Can I interest you with other mobile handset that has a small size too.	What's great? The fact that you've finally twigged the compact phone thing?
12:22	Martin:	For example?	This is me humouring Charles. If that's his real name.
12:24	Charles:	Our Apple iPhone 5s has a 4 inches screen display. How's that sound Martin?
12:25	Martin:	It's sounds appalling, I dislike Apple products in general and the iPhone in particular. Sorry Charles!	My own fault for not saying "I want another Sony." But how do you like my exclaiming?
12:27	Charles:	No problem Martin. What brand do you love aside from Xperia compact Martin?	Stop over using my name....
12:30	Charles:	Are you still there Martin?	No, I've gone, but have left the chat window open in my browser because I am a child...
12:32	Charles:	Thank you for chatting with me today. We value your feedback, please take a moment to complete our customer satisfaction survey at the end of the chat. Thanks and have a good day!	...and I really doubt you want my feedback on this.
12:32	Info:	Thank you for chatting with us.

I'll write some grown-up and interesting blog posts soon, I promise (although my fingers are crossed behind my back...)

Seven

A little European history

Before you vote, here's a nice reminder of how what you're voting on came to be.

"Facts" vs "facts in isolation"

Had a leaflet through the door last week entitled "THE UK AND THE EUROPEAN UNION: THE FACTS" (capitalisation and colouring theirs, not mine). It was not immediately obvious that it came from Vote Leave, although that is mentioned right at the end in the small print on the back.

I read it all, and recognised some of the facts though others were new to me. It was an interesting, if provocative, read.

What interested me most, however, was this leaflet's depiction of itself as the unequivocal purveyor of truth. After all, it was presenting THE FACTS, right? Not opinion, rhetoric, propaganda or flim-flam, but THE FACTS. Except, guess what, some facts are, it turns out, more factual than others.

Here's a fact from the leaflet:

"The EU costs us £350m a week. That's enough to build a new NHS hospital every week of the year. We get less than half of this money back and we have no control over the way it's spent - that's decided by politicians and officials in Brussels, rather than the people we elect here."

How many things are wrong with this so-called fact? Well for starters, the gross weekly cost to the UK of being in the EU is £361m, not £350m. But we get £115m back to support public and private sector schemes and £85m rebate (the oft-mentioned deal struck by Thatcher). So we get £200m back out of £361m, or 55.4% ... when I went to school, that was more than half, not less. And we control how the Thatcher rebate money is spent, if not everything else.

Here's another claimed "fact":

"You don't have to be a member of the EU to trade with it. Switzerland is not in the EU and it exports more per person to the EU than we do."

Yes, there are some facts here. in 2014, the Swiss exported around £16,250 worth of goods and service to the EU per capita. For the UK, it was about £3,550. Factually correct. But Vote Leave can't have it both ways. For a start, Switzerland has to contribute to the EU budget, and gets the trade deals in return. So to be like Switzerland might not cost the UK £350m per week, but it would still cost something. Oh, and Switzerland also signed up to the Schengen Agreement, allowing free movement across borders. The UK opted out of Schengen. To imagine that, after leaving the EU, the UK might continue to trade with the EU in the same way just because Switzerland does is therefore an invalid argument. It's like me saying, "If you like apples, you must like bananas because, after all, they're both fruit."

I was going to go on and point out the half-truths, logic holes, incompleteness and inaccuracy of every "truth" in the flyer but I don't have to because the BBC has already conducted a reality check, as has Full Fact. I'd read both of these if I were you, not because I have a particular political allegiance nor because I am advocating one choice or another in Thursday's referendum. No. But I am interested in the truth. Thursday's choice is so complex, ironically so for a single-issue ballot with a yes/no answer, that I find I am reluctant to bang the drum one way or the other; I will, however, continue to read as much as I can on the issue between now and when I cast my vote, and hope you will too. And I hope we can all discern the truth, wherever it lies.

To read a more balanced representation of some pertinent facts, try this. Note that this still has a bias, even if only subconscious, as it comes from pro-Remain title The Economist. At least they declare this, in the introductory paragraph.

One thing we should all agree on

Whether you're pro-Remain, pro-Brexit, in, out or shaking it all about (like me), there's one thing we should surely all agree on. And it's this:

Australian with US citizenship tells Brits to leave Europe.
I wonder why? Oh yeah.. #VoteRemain pic.twitter.com/Lk8U8bmjUY

— John Prescott (@johnprescott) 13 June 2016

Whatever your views on John Prescott, he has nailed this as sweetly as the jaw of an egg-throwing protester.

Voters of Britain, be under no illusion that Murdoch's interest in the EU referendum is for anything other than how it affects him and his commercial interests. Bear that in mind when you read or watch anything on the subject from any of his many media outlets...

There will never be another like this...

If you didn't watch it last night, Parkinson Meets Muhammad Ali is on iPlayer for another 29 days. I'd get on that, if I were you.

Yes, the contrast between 1971 Ali and 1981 Ali is sad, especially with the hindsight of knowing what was to come next (and I'm not just talking about Trevor Berbick). But Ali in 1971 ... what a man. What a character. And what a dream for Parky, in this interview.

Some might say that even the 1974 appearances burn a little less brightly, and they'd probably be right. But oh, to ever burn like this at all.

In the ring, everyone always talks about the incredible achievement of regaining the title at 32, at the Rumble In The Jungle, or the brutality and bravery of the Thriller In Manila. Maybe shaking up the world against Sonny Liston. But if you really want to see Ali box in his pomp, watch his fights with Cleveland Williams and Zora Folley.

Best heavyweight boxer ever? Maybe, maybe not. But greatest of all time? Without a doubt.