12/26/2010

Patron Saint of Blasphemy

Allo lovelies. Hope you get a holiday and hope you get to enjoy it. Here's a brand spanking new track hot off the desk. Time now for feet up, wine and biscuits.

Cheers everyone. xxx

http://soundcloud.com/mekanoset/throwing-shapes

Oh, and we also tumbl... http://themekanoset.tumblr.com/

P.S. Thanks to DJ Cruel Britannia for reminding us, the Maastricht Circle is also available @ EMUSIC.

12/07/2010

HEY BUDDY!



Maastricht Circle, the new EP, has just gone up on Spotify. http://open.spotify.com/album/2JPrdaYNAOz0cNWjLkPOeF

And at iTunes Store. Why not indulge yourself. And us. It is nearly Christmouse after all.

I should point out that this is the first release that doesn't feature any guest vocals. It's very much a homegrown affair and much more cohesive and coherent as a result. Early on we were hoping that Nigel would be able to contribute some noises but he's been tied up with Uni, and Sahara is in Paris.

What else? So I was saying to a friend again last week about how we never write any lyrics down. It's only when you say these things out loud that you realize how odd they might sound. Which is the opposite of what I think our lyrics are: the important thing is that they sound good - not how they look on paper. This isn't poetry after all.

I don't care if something is pretentious. Being pretendtious (as Jo Staples puts it) saves lives. It's not pretentiousness people have a problem with, it's newness, excess, bravery, originality.

We're braver than any macho rock band. We do our thing, our way, with our sounds. What's rebellious or rock and roll about trying to sound exactly like your heroes? I guess we're just not sexually repressed enough.

We never sit down and try to write a song 'about' something. I've tried, and it just becomes too much like hard work. It's much more fun and rewarding to just let it sort of happen by itself. Like a lot of things in life I guess.

Saturday was a lot of fun by the way. From what I can remember of it. We did a slow, Casio Keyboard drums Christmouse version of Sweets. And a new song that I'm tempted to put up online somewhere, even though it's only a demo recording.

Sorry about the web site being down by the way - we weren't notified it was due to expire. Should be back up in a day or so.

Thanks to Al at Elementary Records for getting the EP up and out into the worlds.

xxx

11/22/2010

BRIGHTON GIG


Just a quick note to say that we're going to be celebrating what we think has been our most productive year in a long time, with a party at The Albert in Brighton. Saturday 4th December, from midday to midnight.

From 2pm til 5pm there will be bands and DJ's upstairs at The Albert, then we'll see where we end up. Join us!

Merry Christmouse toiletbabies.

Have joy.
xxx

Facebook event page.

11/14/2010

PROPAGANDA


In a bar near London Bridge. Writing hate-mail. Thinking about love.

A proper weekend. Friday we played East London at the incredible Ice Father Nation. A seemingly endless maze-like collection of crumbling rooms and cellar spaces. Our set was raggedy but I feel good about it.



I forgot just how good Anarchistwood are. Totally special and really amazing people. They even got me up on stage but I bottled it pretty much instantly. Elle Revel did a tasteful dance with a sheet to catch the light of a video projector.

The A Band sneakily managed to take an hour to sound check. We didn't even get a line check. Went on stage to discover all our gear had been unplugged and our cables bastardized. Which lead to the discovery that Anarchistwood's DJ setup hadn't been plugged in properly and they were in mono. Still, a wonderful night.



A quick trip to Brighton and back to deliver a few CD's. Then spent Saturday catching up with the brilliant Rory Poppins in central London. Tube nightmares and tourist attractions. Fell asleep on the night bus. A confused cab journey that ended in the driver giving up and not charging us a penny of the huge amount of dosh he could have. Funny how a couple of pints can so easily turn into a couple of bottles of wine. Fell asleep watching Boys Don't Cry.

"I would totally turn for Hilary Swank. As a boy."



So now it's Sunday. I'm waiting for Jo Staples and a 'business lunch'. I'm over-emotional due to lack of sleep and it feels good. We'll be checking out an art space underneath London Bridge station for a possible Abstinence & Sensibility piece in December.



"FUCK YOUR BAD POETRY YOUR BAD ART AND YOUR TRIBUTE BAND"


I should say that it might be a couple more weeks before the EP is available on Spotify etc. but in the meantime if you don't want to wait you can get really high-quality downloads of the tracks right now at http://themekanoset.bandcamp.com/album/maastricht-circle

XXX


The Mekano Set

11/07/2010

NO:ID



"The A Band is an experimental music ensemlbe / Anarchistwood - is it queer punk? / The Mekano Set - The Mekano Set's sounds are made almost entirely from sweet-wrappers, mirrors, bird cages and antique machinery." NO:ID / Total Transparency.

Hello all. So next up, on Friday 12th we join Anarchistwood (free-wheeling metro-sexual Art-Punk Pranksters) and The A Band (free-improv with a vengeance) at NO:ID Gallery Vaults aka Ice Father Nation, 33-35 Commercial Road, London, E1 1LD.

Music runs between 9pm - 11.30pm. Exhibition upstairs, music and bands downstairs.


Facebook event page link.

A map - nearest tube station = Aldgate East http://www.bing.com/maps/default.aspx?v=2&mid=8100&where1=33+Commercial+Road%2C+London%2C+Greater+London%2C+E1+1LD&mkt=en-GB

anarchistwood @ myspace.

10/31/2010

I CAN LEARN




Somebody said there were more former members and part-timers in the crowd than there were on stage. The set is a blur. My playing was messy - I got so wrapped up in singing I had no idea what my hands were doing. I think I played Sweets with my eyes closed the entire time. That's got to be a first. But it was so much fun.

"This is not a poem about hating men..."

Really great to see some of the old gang it was very nearly like a family reunion. Nice to see a Mekano Set t-shirt or two in the crowd. We keep saying we're going to make some new ones. Really great to see Pat and Cat and Ruairi. The crazy micks. And Sahara and Nige (who had to introduce himself as Bert Triangle to get on the guest list).

"Boy meets girl. Girl meets girl. Who looks like the boy..."

Thanks again to Ricochet Romance for inviting us along and cheers to Unkindness of Ravens for rounding off things with a blast.

The Mekano Set

10/28/2010

SOUNDSPHERE MAGAZINE INTERVIEW




S] Where does the inspiration come to merge electronic and rock influences now in 2010?

Milk] Willful self indulgence?


A fun, rambling interview with me, Lee and Dom Smith @ Soundsphere Magazine:

www.soundspheremag.com/spotlight/56-artist/1698-spotlight-mekano-set

10/14/2010

MAARS



We are dangerously close to having an EP on our hands. We have four songs and a remix of a track from the first album.



As an appetizer for the album, to our ears at least it sounds way more consistent and a whole lot fatter. If you're curious, there are some early demos of tracks on soundcloud.



"Whatchoo loohinat?!"



Also, I'm pretty excited about playing Hope & Anchor on Saturday of Halloween weekend! Apparently it's fancy dress and there will be some added theatrics in the shape of fire-eaters, and dancers...



"Cheers!"



Well anyway, I better get back to not adding any more noises to these tracks... see you!

Milk
x

The Mekano Set

9/25/2010

NEW NOISES

A new song with vocodered guitars and other sweet noises up at Soundcloud:

Simm (Demo) by mekanoset


Also, I know we've probably already mentioned it but again, it's nice to know that 'pop' music can still do something so off-the-wall, genuine (and genuinely weird): Die Antwoord (via Adam Buxton's Bug show):


9/20/2010

HACKNEY IS ALSO WELL BUGGY


Had a fantastic time on Friday in London. Me and Pickles (the class of 2005) subdued a couple of hundred people with Revolutions.

There's something really intense about singing when you have no idea what words or sounds are going to come out until you start. An unmic'd melodika and a voice with no script.

"Sorry if that seemed like I was asking you to knit me a jumper."

Hanging out with Nige and aching all over from lugging all the gear from one bit of London to the next under the added weight of a touch of flu / sleep deprevation.

"Sleight of hand. The art of shop-lifting and card tricks and invisibility. Because too many people fall asleep on their feet."

Bit of a party at our place on Saturday nite so no chance to catch up on sleep. Ho hum. This week = video editing, a bit of work on the book and re-mixing You Make Me Feel Like a Smiths Song for the EP. Also sifting through tracks for some potential collaborations...

9/15/2010

This is England '86

Nostalgia for unpleasant times. Nice to see something not set in London or Manchester for a change though eh?

The Mekano Set

9/13/2010

ELEMENTARY




"Coats are great though aren't they? Always a pocket to keep your portable cassette player and sweets." Inspired. Elementary Recordings

9/11/2010

HOW DO YOU SPELL HOLIDAY?




Next live date = Friday 17th September @ Second Floor Cafe, Netil House, Hackney, E8 3RL. I'll be doing Revolutions with BeatnikSoup:

http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=154120287937872

After a batch of gigs we tend to take a natural breather. We've managed to do at least one live thing a month so far this years (several in some cases, plus Lee's DJ sets and my live-soundtrack sets with BeatnikSoup.

After a gig, the urge to makes noise returns after a day or so. This time it's been about three weeks of avoiding anything to do with music.




It's been good to have a proper break. I've been doing a spot of travelling (and picking up a little video footage along the way). But it's a relief that the creative urges have returned after all. I'm currently toying with a mix of a mirthful song called 'He's No Gigolo.'




We have completed a new E.P. We're just waiting on the artwork. Me and Lee have started working on a couple of new ideas. You can check soundcloud for the latest mixes: http://soundcloud.com/mekanoset/

Next gig: performing Revolutions in Hackney, Friday 17th September @ Second Floor Cafe, Netil House, E8 3RL. http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=154120287937872

Milk
xxx

8/22/2010

AND ERM



stubble = grown up yeah?


We are emerging into the light on the other side of a fun / suitably contentious batch of gigs. I'm pleased to say that it feels like I 'got my groove back' - which is to say I've started smirking and saying quite offensive things in-between songs. And also really enjoying singing all over again. And we've started doing more than one song per set again.

No confirmed dates at the moment, I'm concentrating on finishing the EP and Lee and Rollo have been discovering hidden depths in the book.

Alright then poppets. More laters.

Milkyway
x

8/16/2010

GARY V IGGY

Gary Glitter and Iggy Pop, fighting to the death on the beach over the site of sunbathing twin girls.

Iggy wins. Digs himself a hole and goes to sleep in it.

My dream life just gets more and more...


Also... you can have a look at an edit of Revolutions:



www.youtube.com/watch?v=AVnMr6mdgpA

xxx

8/14/2010

ENSONIQ



Hmmm... I reckon I'm going to have to get myself some kind of PC... a software sim of the only synth I've ever liked using. The SQ80 was a hybrid - adigital synth that had real analog filters. I got sounds out of mine that I've never been able to re-create. And I wrote Sweets and Dirty Hand Job on it.

Naturally, it's not available for Mac...


VSTi Ensoniq SQ80.

8/11/2010

MMM + HMMM



My camera made this, it should be a picture of a face.
It's broken but making its own collages?


I've spent the day making an edit of Revolutions (the latest film / live soundtrack by Milk & BeatnikSoup) with audio from the recent performances. There's some SERIOUS bass end going on.



Now that I have less distractions (my top drinking buddy Poppins has escaped the confines of Brighton in favour of London Village, as most of my fiends seem to be doing lately, and DJ Ruse isn't really speaking to me at the moment as I keep referring to him as a fauxscist) I hope that I'll get back to putting the finishing touches on the DVD and me, Rollo and Lee plan to get together soon to go through the book.



Gigwise, it was great to get people dancing on Friday. Hello and thanks again to everyone who saw our set. The place was an absolute sweatbox, coupled with the smoke machine things certainly had an atmosphere... I was obviously enjoying myself and wasn't able to contain my smirk / sarcastic comments (I won't repeat them, if you weren't there, that's another of your losses!).



DJ Sara sporting the Imercian Flag!



Every thing feels and every thing sings.




I got to go. Work to be done.

Milk
xxx

8/08/2010

PRIDE

Friday at The Hope was a lot of fun. Thank you to everyone that saw us play and cheers to Allan and Helen from Little Specks for inviting us. Just about recovered.

We made the set up as we went along. Started with a free-form thing (I can't remember what I was singing about but it was completely spontaneous and felt really good) that eventually turned into Sweets. I was feeling relaxed and comfortable.

You know we're feeling good if we get a bit sarcastic. I even explained what unpleasant things a couple of songs are about. That's a first.

Little Specks of Blood Lust Blood were really intense.

I'll write a bit more once I'm more awake.

xxx

7/25/2010

THE MISANTHROPES TEA PARTY

No posey copy-cat indie bands. No sweaty metal. No Oi bands. No fake sound-art. No posh jungle DJ's. No honky MC's. Just pure ugly beautiful music.

Electro-rock. Drum machines, dirty guitars, bass riffs, boys and girls staring each other out to find out who makes the least sense. You should probably stay at home.

This Friday, at The Hope in Brighton.

If you want to know more:

http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=141054582574971



The Mekano Set

7/23/2010

THAT'S A LITTLE TOO CLOSE





Little Specks of Blood Lust Blood
snapped by MsDee



Having spent most of the week in bed, a remix for smoldering electro-rockers Little Specks of Blood Lust Blood has finally given me reason to get up and get to work. The song is Come Closer and I'm doing a mix I'm calling 'That's A Little Bit Too Close'. Haha.

Ruse recommended them with a smile and as soon as I saw them I got it.

They're a duo. They both loop and sample themselves live. Allan has a 'tarantula-top' style haircut, (my favourite hairstyle) and Helen makes you want to use words like Smolder and Dusky Beauty. But they're not Electro, they're not Trip-Hop and they're not a studied or contrived Synth-Pop duo.

They're actually proper Rock / Metal in terms of their arrangements and rhythms, at least to my ears. Putting a serious twist on that by doing it as a duo, with live-loops and live samples (which I can say from experience is really NOT the easy option). I like what they do because they're not trying to weld it to Trip-Hop or DnB. Nice.

It's only when you see them do it live that you really appreciate what they're about. We're playing with them at The Hope in Brighton Friday 6th August. So that means smoke machines AND video projections too. Oh yes...

http://soundcloud.com/littlespecks/

7/22/2010

SMOKE MACHINES AND CARNAGE




"The band got pissed off, turned the smoke machine on full blast until you literally could not see your hand in front of your face and left after one song! Brilliant!"



"Why do the monitors sound like old detuned radios?"

Milkovitch snapped by MsDee



Nice write-up from Fokkawolfe: http://fokkawolfe.blogspot.com/

It's all true - although it was only me that got pissed off (very) at the gig he mentions. I'm proud to say we did completely flood the place with smoke (it looked amazing) and left the building in disgust after one song.

The contentiously titled Dirty Hand Job was one of the first Mekano Set songs. It was written right about the same time as Don't Eat the Sweets.

There is a version with Beth Rettig (from the band Blindness) but we never quite got the mix right and it only ever really worked live (in the sense that we enjoyed playing it and also enjoyed the fact that it always seemed to offend and confound people more than our other songs - and not because of the title, we never told anyone the title).

When our equipment was up to the job, we'd stretch it out and improvize around different sections. It often featured a 'beating up a guitar' solo or a 'Beth goes to the bar for a round of drinks' solo amongst other things.

The song is 90% snipe at the "bad dance music made by people who dance badly" EBM / Techno thing and 10% "we've got more imagination, we make more noise and say more than the snooty 'we're not goths, we're special spooky nazi robots' would ever dare."

Now You Know You Know is from this year. It's obviously about how important it is to make yourself look stupid when you're around someone you're really into.

http://soundcloud.com/mekanoset/dirty-hand-job-original-mix

http://soundcloud.com/mekanoset/now-you-know-you-know

See also FokkaWolfe's Blindness + Little Specks of Blood Lust Blood review: http://fokkawolfe.blogspot.com/2010/06/little-specks-of-blood-lust-blood-and.html

7/11/2010

GANGSTERS





Massive mixing sessions Thursday / Friday. Mastered three or four tracks. Huge leap into the world of 'nicely EQ'd mixes'. EQ nightmares.

Met up with Sahara and Nigel. Ambled about Brick Lane in the blaze. Hung out with Jo and Nigel over the weekend.






We're doing something a bit special next Sunday: me and Jo will be playing at Queen of Hoxton at the 15 Minute Factory festival. It's an all-dayer, our contribution will happen after 7pm, downstairs (video projections + live soundtrack). These things are a lot of fun -

http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=133665659978977

We've also bribed Nigel into joining the Meks for the Hope gig in Brighton on Friday 6th August with the wicked Little Specks of Blood Lust Blood! For those of you who don't know - Nigel played guitar and synth on the early recordings (those mental noises on Reel to Real are all Nigel's work).


The Mekano Set

6/25/2010

THE HEAT IS LIKE A PERVERT

The heat. It's like a pervert, staring in through your window, trying to catch a glimpse of you just in your socks and vest and pants.

The Mekano Set

EVEN STEVENS



We've obtained permission to get the video for You're The One Who Started It back online http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wGKGEL5c31s

Also, you can have a listen to a new idea we've been working on, still a work-in-progress, at http://soundcloud.com/mekanoset/ we started it with a view to making some kind of gentle, almost cheerful song but it inevitably went down the road of spiteful electro stomp. We like the fact that the baritone ended up doing the Chameleons style guitar thing.



Had a great time at Cowley Club Wednesday night. Nigel (of John Table / Reel to Real / fame and early Mekano Set instigator) came down and I basically talked his and Jo's ear off until god knows what time. Possibility of working with Nigel again in the near future is a very good thing schedules permitting and I'll hopefully drag him along to the next Wrapped in Plastic (who are now called Blindness) gig in July.



Abstinence and Sensibility did a new piece. A film / video and live soundtrack. That's sort of our 'thing'. We used accordion, melodica, bass guitar, some reverse reverb piano and I even felt brave enough to do some live looping. I did some singing and bass loops which felt really good. We're taking it up to London for the Hoxton gigs.



This week we've also done some more work on the videos for You Make Me Feel Like a Smiths Song and Don't Eat the Sweets. And I'm hopefully meeting up with nomadic troubadour Sahara Ezzi next week.

Enough for now,

Milk
xxx

The Mekano Set

6/22/2010

REVOLUTIONS




What's happening? What's occurring. It's all going on down here in Brighton. Behind the scenes...

Some live dates for the diary:

Wednesday 23rd June @ Cowley Club, Brighton (Milk & Pickles / visuals + live sountrack) with the excellent Crayola Lectern.

Sunday 18th July @ The Queen of Hoxton, London (Milk & Pickles / visuals + live sountrack): an all-dayer with bands, DJ's, performers and art over 3-floors.

Friday 6th August @ The Hope, Brighton (The Mekano Set: lineup tba) with Little Specks of Blood Lust Blood.

Tuesday 10th August @ Underbelly Hoxton, London (Milk & Pickles / visuals + live sountrack).

"That's twice today I've been accosted by drunk old men with frightening teeth."

In other noise, there's no more copies left of the last CD, well there is two left but I'm keeping them in my bag for emergencies. We're putting out some sampler CD's of material from Hahaharem (the much unanticipated second 'album').

If you've already placed an order for the CD / DVD Watershed set we'll probably chuck in a copy of Hahaharem as it seems to fit the overall groove and style of the thing. We still only intend to produce about 20 copies as the packaging will contain high quality, hand-printed lyth photography. And we're not interested in doing a bog-standard boring version, we don't buy that stuff so why would you?

As it stands, because of issues over the filming of a couple of gigs we did with Sahara Ezzi (nobody asked our permission, or hers) we had a major rethink over the contents of the DVD. The good news is, we have more material than we can fit onto the disc.

We definitely plan to include Train of Thought, the short film I put together with Jo (BeatnikSoup), and the Tyre film (actual analog film, no digital electrickery involved) we made in collaboration with CrackerDog Productions / Elementary Productions.

More later, the heat's getting to me.

Milk
xxx

The Mekano Set

6/18/2010

I'MFINE



I'mFine by The Mekano Set featuring Sahara Ezzi.


Video by Elementary Productions. Filmed by Ruse23. Miss Ezzi's wardrobe by SolventBoy. Music and words by Milk & Sahara © 2010 Elementary Recordings / DesertSpoon Discs. With thanks to Lee Christien, BeatnikSoup and Al Neilson. Reproduced with permission.

5/26/2010

A NIGHT WITH A SEA VIEW

Tonight, Wednesday 26th May, we're heading down to the sea for a night that's promising classic Indie / Post-Punk / Electro / Goth / Post-Rock / Shoegaze. DJ's and "some damn fine live bands", and us:







Tugging at your heart-strings:


The Mekano Set (music made from sweet-wrappers and cheap booze)


Little Specks of Blood Lust Blood (angry make-up sex electro-rock)


The English Standard (Gothic / Nu-Gaze / Post-Punk)


Pytron (cinematic, ambient post-rock)


Visuals and Tag-Team DJ shenanigans from Instant Mash, DJ Smogo, Contort Yourself, Fokka Wolf, Not For Resale.



Classic Indie / 80's / Electro / Oldschool Goth / Post-Rock / Industrial / Ska / Post-Punk / Grindcore / Nu-Gaze / Haunted House.

Music form 9.30pm until 2.30am. £4.



Sponsored by the shady Punk Mafiosos from Club Zygotic and Please Make Sense.






http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=100758816636897

5/10/2010

AT THE MERCY OF THE MUSIC JOURNALISTS

"This country is run by a group of fascists." Said Gene
Vincent in a 1955 US radio interview. "Sweet Gene Vincent." Sang Ian Dury.
xxxIAN-FUCKING-DURYxxx



We are on the flippin case already. Sip of Cava there... ahem...

We have a couple of unusual Brighton gigs coming up. We're playing on the sea-front at The Volks Club on Wednesday 26th March. It's going to be a top night of electro, classic indie, post-punk, oldschool goth, post-rock etc. Brilliant Electro-Rockers Little Specks of Blood Lust Blood are also on the bill plus the mysterious post-rock / free-noise outfit Pytron.



Then on Saturday 5th June the incredible Anarchistwood are back in town and we're joining them for a top mashup night at Cowley Club!!!!!

5/04/2010

A sunday in Brighton



I woke up in my living room on the sofa fully clothed and slightly hung-over. A little stretch and eye rub. Laura and nick had taken my bedroom on my insistence. After a bit of freshening up and food we headed out for a walk along the seafront ambling towards town. It was a bright misty morning and the sights, sounds and substances of the night before drifted off like the steam rising off the near heated pavement.

Did you know that there is a public right of way that leads from the promenade down through the Concorde 2 for public access to the beach? Well there is and we called for the mysterious lift. A light starved man with deep set eyes greeted us and beckoned us in with a mumble and hand gesture. We got in the lift and the lift keeper closed the doors. He had a book on the floor of the lift but I didn’t catch the title, unfortunately. I like to imagine it was something ironic like ‘a room with view’ or maybe something more esoteric like ‘The hound’ by H. P. Lovecraft. In fact the lift with its sliding iron grates, the apparent live in keeper and the dank atmosphere was closer to Lovecraft than Forster’s stifling Italianate illumination of a novel.


We emerged into the concert hall of the Concorde 2 to the odour of beery floor and sweat. We thanked our man, headed out the double doors and onto the sea front. The sun was proper up by now and the hum and buzz of the mid morning was electrifying. The usual families and folks and friends were laughing, shopping and eating. There is something magical about Brighton seafront.

Nick wanted to go on the pier. We whiled away the morning playing the machines and wining enough pier vouchers to buy a pair of binoculars from the exchange shop. 400 vouchers if you were interested. We stood beneath the rides at the very end in stunned silence as the giant rides swung people round, flung upside down 100s of meters into the air. I got vertigo just looking at those fun seeking idiots, I hid behind my sister.

Laura wanted to get some lunch so we walked to the lanes. There was a hold up at the bottom of the North Street. A murmur grew into a roar and a moment of realisation hit me. The racist fascists were marching, a couple of police vans drove by and the pavements were full of Sunday shoppers and moochers. We decided to wait and watch the marchers pass as no one was able to move anywhere. Although we could not yet see the march we could hear them. Someone was being racially abused. Then there came the chants as they came into view with a full luminous police escort;


“We want our country back”
“We want our country back”
“We want our country back”
“ Engerland… Ennnngerland… Ennngerlandah.”
“Engerland… Ennnngerland… Ennngerlandah.”
“St George in my heart”


At the front of the March were four or five little girls all wearing St Georges Flag T-shirts. Behind them I guess were their parents. Later it was clear that they were the only females in the whole procession. My heart sank as I saw a man at the front in a “Help for Heroes” T-shirt. That charity does amazing work and it felt like this person was using it to garner sympathy for something alien to what it is that this charity does. I then sensed a feeling of intimidation within myself and from those around me on the pavement. People had just heard the racial jeers a minute before they came round the corner and then the aggressive chants came. The march was stopped right in front of us at the bottom of North Street.

There were about seventy all together stood in the road flanked by the police. A quiet swept down the road. This happens on marches sometimes; an air of calm bought on by prolonged noise. They had after all no doubt screeched like nesting gulls all the way through central Brighton. Something occurred to me as I looked on at the crowd; they were all men of certain age and a certain dress, can you guess what dress it was? Bomber jackets, boots, American style shirts, shaved heads, bellies and no doubt dreadful table manners.

I bellowed at the top of my voice over the silent crowd “Why Don’t YOU go home”. A policeman turned and looked at me, his jaw dropped in mild deflation, and he must have known I had just no doubt ruined his first piece of quiet for twenty odd minutes. Behind the cop a particularly fired up bloke in his thirties pointed at me and fixed his arm in my direction like a road sign and shouted back “Why don’t YOU F%$* OFF HOME MATE”.

They are well organized and single people out for abuse. About thirty blokes turned and lurched towards me, the cop’s lurched back to stop them leaving the column. They all started jeering, my legs started to shake, blood rushed to my head from the volume of the cries.

I have always hated shouting and the force of a gang of people is honestly, well, hell. It seemed I could not move a muscle. I scanned the faces of those shouting. Spit coming out of their frothing mouths at boiling point. Some of their faces twisted with an agony and rage I have never encountered. It truly was ugly. Ugly.

They started to chant in unison “SCUM SCUM SCUMSCUM SCUM SCUM SCUM SCUM SCUM SCUM SCUMSCUM SCUM SCUM SCUM SCUM SCUM SCUM SCUM SCUMSCUM SCUM SCUM SCUM SCUM SCUM SCUM SCUMSCUM SCUM SCUM SCUM SCUM SCUM”.

There was only one thing I could think of doing. I took a bow.

A few people on the street laughed. A conga line of riot cops came running down the hill, I felt relieved. A typical Joe shopper shouted “She shouted it and pointed further down the road” to a cop who then continued running while the others got the column to move. The bloke smiled at me. My sister and nick grabbed my hand and patted me on the back and said they’d buy me lunch.

The EDL are responsible for violent racist attacks and trying to cause trouble when they march. The Mekano set did a gig with the great, Miss Halliwell in Birmingham last year and I was horrified that this racist group were rioting in the centre just outside the train station?! “Quick lets a get a cab” was the general MEK Consensus. I mean why oh why are these people allowed to march through city centres? Violent Muslim groups are (quite rightly in my opinion) banned from doing so. Why now because racist fascists have oh so cleverly apparently ditched the swastika for the ST Georges Flag are they now acceptable? They are not.

Racism and Fascism need to be ditched where they came from-the past. This is the 21st century for F***sake. I saw ‘Back to the Future', aren't we supposed to flying around on skateboards that hover or something by now? Thanks a bunch.

Well, at least music is getting better and in celebration of a future time where we ditch all that sexual repression and domination type stuff here is a play list I compiled to cheer myself, and now hopefully you, up;


1. “Magazines” by White Lung
2. “ That Boys Messing With my mind” by The Raindrops
3. “Snake” By Anarchist Wood
4. “Deception” By This Mono Glaxay
5. “If I were a Boy” by Beyonce
6. “Rude Boy” by Rihanna
7. “(Don’t worry) If there is a hell below we are all gonna go” by Curtis Mayfiled.
8. “Whats Going On” by Marvin Gaye
9. “Money Worries” by I Roy and The Maytals
10. “Regualtors” By Warren G


ps Come see us play! http://soundcloud.com/mekanoset

4/17/2010

BORING LESBIAN BOYS CLUB REUNION



Been working hard like a good boy for two weeks solid so I'm being a bit more sociable at the moment. Also enjoying people double-take when they see my current appearance.

I have been wined and dined to such an extent that I can barely move. I can feel the walls of my stomach stretching as I type.

Just returned from an evening hanging out with Jo (Beatniksoup). Vast amount of the above was required in order for me to feel even vaguely relaxed enough to have my picture taken without constantly bursting into fits of laughter and smirkage.

From day one we always wanted to document things not just in sound but with words and pictures as well. And not in the usual sense of 'we don't have any songs but check out our new photo session' / check out the fan art / join our street team kind of way. If anyone got in a fight our first reaction was always 'are you ok' quickly followed by 'shall we take some photos of your bruises?' That's why we want to do a book instead of just another CD / download.



So yes, on Monday morning I had a bit of an accident and ended up having to take it easy for a couple of days. We thought it would be useful to document my once-again painkiller-becalmed expression, scuffs, scars and bruises. Combined with a new found inability to stand up for very long without my knees giving way.

Snappy snaps. I like the fact that we ended up with a bit of a Derek Jarman vibe going on.



In other news, we are pretty close now to having enough finished tracks for a second album. We're under no obligations to actually do a second album, and there's been no pressure to. But having spoken with the scallies at Elementary, we're going to come up with something that combines audio AND something a bit off the wall physically.

The priority lately has been to get the book together. But I've been enjoying so putting tracks together so much that we have ended up with enough finished mixes.

Meantime, why not have a listen to what we've been up to lately:http://soundcloud.com/mekanoset


The Mekano Set

B&W image of Milk © Beatniksoup 2010