Pete Doherty - The Comeback?

So the headline may be presumptuous - preposterous even to some, but when I caught a repeat of Jonathan Ross Live on Saturday night I saw a Pete Doherty that I hadn't caught sight of in some time.

When the Libertines first staggered on to the scene in London, music in England at the time was a bland and watery soup of over produced pop acts, Oasis wannabes and clapped out beat merchants. We needed a messiah...somebody to take us back to something real, exciting and from the gut. The Libertines fulfilled that role and staked their claim in UK rock n' roll history. Detractor or not, there was no denying the authenticity of the Libertine ethos. This was not posing and posturing or studied cool. This was visceral hedonism meets old-world-Englishness out on the edge of London's urban grot.

But the drugs took hold and it's a well worn story told many a time by tabloids and second rate rockumentaries. The whole notion of death and glory became deathly boring and Pete's music slipped into mediocrity. I still thought that he was one of the finest lyricists of his generation, but there was no escaping the fact that (apart from being Kate Moss' current squeeze) he was becoming redundant.

With this in mind I found Pete's performance (and subsequent interview) on Jonathan Ross something of a surprise. He was looking sharp, he's lost his drug-bloat and his eyes weren't rolling into the back of his head. The track "Lost Art of Murder" is also a definite return to form.

It's a bit early yet to claim it as a come back. We'll have to see how the next Babyshambles album turns out and whether (great or not) it can extend his appeal beyond his loyal fan base to a public who are only familiar with his tabloid caricature. Still...it's encouraging to say the least.



Part 2 of the interview continues here

Car chase fix: Ronin

Car chase scenes in films are a convergence of two major passions of mine. The point at which cars meet films can quite often be the major set-piece, the key tension builder in the story arc and - in most cases - the most expensive element of the production budget.

The cars, the location, the speeds, the crashes, the death-defying choreography, the camera angles, the explosions, the power slides and the sound of engines red-lining to the point where you think the pistons will shoot through the bonnet. All of these elements need to be woven together like the different sections of an orchestra, slowly building in intensity and tension until that final crescendo/release at the end.

When I posted about the car chase in 'Bullitt' a few months back, I possibly gave away my two other favourites - Vanishing Point and Mad Max - a little too early, but the car chase has a rich history in film and it is a deep vein for this blog to plunder.

In this first installment of the Hairybones 'Car Chase Fix' series, I thought I'd offer up a contemporary classic - Ronin. Director John Frankenheimer has serious car chase credentials having been a racing driver himself as well as being director of the 1966 classic 'Grand Prix'. John spoils the viewer with several car chase scenes in this film. One of which features the classic 6.9 litre Mercedes 450 SL and an Audi A8. As much as I love watching these two cars battling it out against the bad guys' Renaults and Citroens, I simply can't go past the final (and lengthy) chase in Paris. It's some of the best stunt driving you'll ever see at Blues Brothers proportions (they reputedly used 150 stunt drivers for this scene). It features a Beemer 5 Series pitched against De Niro in a Renault 406 and is a modern classic with incredible head-on traffic stunt driving action.

Asobi Seksu

Barrington and I went to see the Editors a few weeks back at the Melkweg here in Amsterdam. Always ones to check the support act, we arrived early and were hit by a wall of melodic feedback from the moment we entered the main room. We looked up on stage to find that most of the noise was coming from not only a frantic lead guitar (James Hanna), but also a diminutive Japanese lead singer (Yuki Chikudate) bashing away at her synth while seductively cooing into her microphone in a mixture of Japanese and English. We lit up a spliff and sipped on our beers and let Asobi Seksu (Japanese for Sex Play) take us into their ethereal dreamscape daubed across a shoegazer canvas. It is a truly beautiful noise.

It was the first gig of their first European tour as they do the rounds to promote their excellent album 'Citrus'. Full disclosure - I am an avid shoegazer fan. But Asobi Seksu and their new album amount to more to more than just the shoegazer tag. Sure there is My Bloody Valentine and Slowdive references but there's some Stone Roses and Sonic Youth in there to spice it up - and Yuki's dreamy vocals really make their offering something else entirely. James Hanna's axe work is also incredible (check the seriously intense Red Sea for unadulterated guitar abuse).

Below is the clip to their single 'Thursday' directed by So Yong Kim & Bradley Rust Gray. Buy their album or if you can - see them live.

The Antenna

My favourite design blog Drone Corp died some time back and left something of a void on my daily trawl.

So you can only imagine my excitement when they sent me some spam alerting me to its resurrection in the form of The Antenna.

It's a whole lotta design goodness

Bat For Lashes "What's a girl to do"

Check this one take wonder by Dougal Wilson for some serious Donny Darko spookiness. Dougal just keeps rolling out the genius. Whether it's commercials or video clips he's not only consistent, but oh so versatile.

I love this clip, I love this director, I love this sound and I love this girl.

There's a lot to love

Back online

After a hiatus of a few months due to stupid working hours, Hairybones is back online.

Oh and the site I shamelessly promoted below just won a Bronze Cyberlion at Cannes...so everyone is pretty stoked

Shameless promotion

So I haven't been able to hit my usual posting stride as quickly as I had hoped. I'm still pulling stupid hours, but am so used to it now that I hope to start posting each day regardless.

One of the projects I've worked on has been Ka Rah Shin. I only came in at the end of it, but even then it was a huge experience....much like the site itself.

KAH RA SHIN.