grumpyf1

You've got the idea now, right? By June, I was doing a few days of work here and there, but mostly still furloughed. As the lockdown started to unlock a bit, there was more opportunity to get out and about so... I mostly didn't. Sure, it was nice to be able to do so when I wanted to, but on my own? Yawwwwwwn. I'm not great company for myself. I did get a few long, solo, walks but being in a valley everything is up and I'm broadly exertion-averse, even though I really enjoy it when I'm out there. It's that initial motivation that's tricky. But you didn't come here to read about my intrinsic inability to go and do exercise did you? (Even if the prospect of getting a glimpse into the strange inner workings of my mind and understanding how I can enjoy something but not want to do it can simultaneously exist without my mind exploding is tantalizing.) So sit back, relax, and prepare to be mildly puzzle by what I read, watched and listened to in the month they...

We WILL rock you... If you have even a passing interest in the music of Queen, I implore you to get along to your local cinema and see the Bohemian Rhapsody movie. Don’t knock back a litre of cola in the first ten minutes though – at well over two hours, it’s a long watch. The good news is, it uses every one of it’s many minutes to the full. Covering the period from the band’s formation though to their appearance at Live Aid in 1985, the film focuses on charismatic front man Freddie Mercury. That’s not to say the rest of the group are ignored, but come on – Fred’s flamboyant life certainly warrants the additional screen time. Faithfully recreating the look and fashions of the various eras, the film is funny, sad, touching, poignant and exhilarating in various proportions. The family-friendly rating means Mercury’s promiscuity is alluded to, rather than writ large on the screen, but you’re given enough in the way of visual clues and implications to get the gist of what happene...

Will they do the fandango? Malik and Lee as Mercury and May, Hot Space style I don’t go to the cinema that much. For starters, there’s no way I can drink a litre of cola (which appears to be the smallest size available now) and then sit for two hours without needing to take a ‘comfort break’. Then there’s the trauma of contending with other cinema-goers, most of whom seem to have come to talk, deliberately rustle crisp packets, or be unreasonably tall and sit immediately in front of me. It looks like I’ll have to brave all that come November, when a movie about rock band Queen scaramouches it’s flamboyant way in to your local flea pit. Cunningly titled “Bohemian Rhapsody”, it charts the history of the band from their early 1970s formation through to their remarkable performance at Live Aid in ’85, which is often cited as their best on-stage performance ever. Judging from the trailer, which was released this week, the attention to period detail looks to have been dialled up to...

Thirty years ago you took O-Levels, Den was yet to serve divorce papers on Angie, you had no Neighbours and Freddie Starr was (allegedly) eating hamsters. Oh, and I went to the best gig ever. Friday, the 11th of July, 1986. I was 19, and I had big hair. I also owned a very nice grey leather jacket, which I was paying for in weekly instalments to the lady over the road with the catalogue. The world was my oyster, although fish fingers were more my level of sophistication. I had yet to try lasagne, had no idea why anyone would want a frothy coffee, and lived at home with my parents, who were distinctly unimpressed with my taste in music. Or possibly the volume. What else was a teenage lad to do? Computers barely existed (IBM were just releasing the ‘PC Convertible’, a concept so radical no-one had thought of calling it a ‘laptop’ yet), mobile phones were the size of a brick, price of a house, and only did what their name suggested, and there are only so many games of Monopoly you...

On this most spooky of nights, I feel it my duty to warn you that the ghosts of entertainment past are back to haunt us... and they’re after our cash! BOO! Now that I’ve got your attention, there’s something you need to know about long-departed musicians and TV stars... they’re coming back from beyond the grave! WoOOooo! Thirty odd years ago, a typical teenage day for me would have involved quite a lot of rocking out to Queen and Pink Floyd albums, getting on down to a spot of Michael Jackson (if I was feeling funky, obviously) and, after tea, chuckling along to an episode of Dad’s Army. Right now, I can stick the radio on and hear new tunes from Freddie & Co (including one with MJ) and get all melancholy at Pink Floyd being poignant on a track from their new album. Impressive stuff, especially when you take into account how long it is since Freddie Mercury passed away (23 years!), that’s it’s been over five years since Jacko departed, and even the Floyd’s ace keyboardist,...