HAPPY MONDAYS
PILLS THRILLS AND BELLYACHES
In a break from tradition we will, this week, dispense with our usual warm welcome and treat you in a totally rude and vile manner.
Plop-plop, wee-wees and trumps.
That’s what you get and there’s plenty more where that came from if you carry on reading, too. Don’t worry about that! We know that if you showed us your pants there would be poo-stripes.
As you recoil in terror from our knowingly abusive invective, you are, no doubt, in perplexion, asking yourself why. Why? Well reach for your ketamine, kids, because this week we get to H. The only record beginning with H in the world is also the rudest vinyl ever to hop off the press and make a bid for freedom from the plastics factory in Piddler’s Bottom. Yes, that’s right. We’re not talking Keith Harris and Orville here (although sticking your hand up a duck is pretty darn rude), Future-Kind. Our serious scientific survey brings us to the Happy Mondays, fronted by cocky front-mancunian Shaun 'Rudeman' Ryder and his best mate Bez ‘Up Yours’ Berry
They’re gonna step on you, man, and, hey, hallelujah, they don’t give a loose fit. (shit).
Are YOU rude enough to get into the Happy Mondays? Try our Drunken Vinyls Survey to see!
THE HOW RUDE ARE YOU HAPPY MONDAYS SURVEY
- You are invited to participate in a ‘How Rude Are You Survey’. You respond by:
A) Telling the surveyor to piss off by saying ‘Piss Off!’
B) Indicating you are ‘a little pressed for time’ right now by tapping your watch pointedly.
C) Nodding, smiling and saying ‘mmmm, how nice!’ whilst getting your Parker pen out.
- You are at the Conservative Party Conference and irritating politician Theresa May angers you unnecessarily by making a garbled speech about immigrants who own cats. Do you respond by saying:
A) ‘Show me your pussy, minge bag!’
B) ‘Sorry, I don’t get on terribly well with cats.’
C) ‘Here, kitty, kitty; have some free katomeat.’
- You are in the Post Office on pension day and it’s heaving with speeding shopmobility carts out of control and blocking the aisles. There is gridlock. One cart has already knocked over the neat display of Parcel Force leaflets and a nearby stand of ‘Werther’s Originals’ whilst another is doing a three point turn in the passport photo-me booth which is, even now, beginning to belch smoke and whine in an ominous fashion. As panicking pensioners, parping on electric horns, make a desperate last bid for the exit before the inevitable explosion, one has the temerity to run over your foot. Do you respond by saying:
A) ‘What the bloody hell is going on here? Are you blind you f***ing old person? I’m going to shove that bloody shopmobility trolley up you f***ing a***. You’re lucky I don’t jump into the wire basket of your bloody dodgem car, ride you round the foyer and rip you off for your f***ing pension!’
B) ‘Oh I say. Do be careful. Lucky it wasn’t your foot that did that or I would have had a real stamp!’
C) ‘Never mind. I didn’t like that shoe anyway. Can I give you a helping push?’
- You are travelling on public transport, perhaps the bus or the tram, minding your own business and taking idle pleasure in the business of the day by flicking through the latest copy of ‘Now’ magazine when suddenly, to your intense displeasure, a yoof in a cheap red hoody, emblazoned with the legend ‘Lifeguard’ and possessing a portable microphone and speaker system, jumps out of his seat, in the deluded belief he is talented and starts ‘entertaining’ you and your fellow passengers by rapping. Badly. Do you:
A) Walk up to him and smash him repeatedly in the face with ‘Now’ magazine before decapitating him repeatedly with a handy concrete pillar, stick his microphone down his vacuous, vacant and uneducated throat, push his putrid countenance through the bus (or tram) window, vomit loudly into his hood and pull the same over what’s left of his head simultaneously tying up the material with the flex whilst saying ‘Allow me to give you a little contribution you malodorous twat!’
B) Rustle around in your bag, find some headphones and stare out of the window in studied disinterest.
C) Clap in delight like Marco off ‘Big Brother’ whilst saying ‘I say, you should go on the ‘X Factor!’
- You inadvertently switch on ITV’s Daybreak whilst getting dressed for work. Transfixed, holding your pants and hypnotised by the sheer banality of the televisual offerings in the ten minute segment between lengthy commercial breaks for nappies and washing powder, you tolerate the pukefest that is the latest appearance of an ageing Donny Osmond, stare impassively as Keith Chegwin is sent to test a cheap infomercial family holiday break to Skegness courtesy of ‘Pooplop’s Velvet Tissue’, grit your teeth as some halfwit mother dressed in jeggings complains in a high pitched whine that her daughter is getting teased at school for having bulimia, anorexia or both and bite into the toilet seat as bloody Ronan Keating turns up to duet with Donny bloody Osmond. But then, your patience is tested to its very limit when horribly confronted by the sight of weird spiky thatch-head Doctor Hilary Drones presenting a feature on piles ‘or haemorrhoids as we doctors call them’, and you finally and irrevocably snap. Do you:
A) Scream ‘I’m mad and I’m not going to take it anymore!’ wrench the television from its socket and fling it at a passing shopmobility scooter driven by a headless rapping yoof.
B) Hire a machine gun, drive to Teddington Lock and open fire screaming ‘Here’s Johnny!’
C) Get a can of lager from the fridge, smile tolerantly and put a vinyl record on.
Setting Up Time
We’re all set up here of course. The decks are out, the amp is switched on and we’ve unsleeved our vinyl from its sheathe. How rude is that, eh? Unsheathed the sleeve, sounds almost…sexual. So while you prepare to do battle with us, we’ll get a lager out of the fridge, smile tolerantly and cast a look back over our shoulder at another frantic week in Bankrupt Britain. We blame downloads, you know. Well you know we do.
Just think. Consider this. David ‘Looking for the Young Soul Rebels’ Cameron, Theresa ‘Stroke my Pussy’ May, Michael ‘Row your Boat Ashore’ Goves, George ‘Ozzy’ Osbourne’ and the other faceless politicos have just spent a week in Manchester Market Street
But mainly, mainly, they stood astride a stage, waved their arms manically and made forgettable speeches about immigrant’s cats while the United Kingdom
Now imagine if one of the gutless swine had got to their feet and demanded that the entire population of Britain
“Stand forth Great Britain
If only one of them had done this, dear reader. 26 vinyls and a deck – why that would cost at least one hundred and two pounds each! Multiply that by 60 million and, well, that’s at least…erm, well… it’s quite a lot of money anyway. That would be coinage enough to plan and build a brand new motorway called the M34 linking all of Great Britain’s slightly less well known urban centres such as Dudley, Mansfield Woodhouse and Oswestry. The second tier of English towns, if you will. The labour involved in simply building this major engineering project would provide jobs for all. A road, quite literally, to prosperity. And when it is built, the Queen herself, alongside Stefan Dennis out of Neighbours, would cut the ribbon and triumphantly open the brand spanking new petrol station and minimart ‘Twatford Gap Services’ with jobs aplenty for nearly all the unshaven unemployed of our great British Kingdom. Then there would be street parties, celebrations and go-go dancers for everybody. Hurrah!
But no. No. Not a bit of it. Let’s all just hunt the pussy, shall we?
THE HAPPY MONDAYS
PILLS, THRILLS AND BELLYACHES
WHAT’S THE STORY?
Oh it’s a terrifying story this week, full of rudeness, sun-shee-ine and slightly more rudeness in the sun-shee-ine. Strap yourselves in, Future-Kind; it’s going to be one hell of a ryde! Ryde. Shaun Ryder Get it? Oh well, please yourselves.
Pills
“Just pop down to Boots to pick up my pills, Mark, will you?” These were the words that Bez’s mum probably said to him, one day, at some point in his life when she possibly needed some pills for a headache or something like that and didn’t really fancy the walk down Deansgate. Mark ‘Bez’ Berry, had just thrown in his sticks after 52 years of drumming and dancing with the Electric Light Orchestra, completely fed up with humming along to happy crappy tunes like ‘Mr Blue Sky’ and ‘Wild West Hero’. The final straw was singing something about ‘Horace Wimp, this is your life!’ and avoiding anybody looking like Eamon Andrews. He knew he had had enough. He was looking for…
Thrills
Before he knew it, he was in the jungle being a celebrity and having to go for a shit on that unpleasant dunny swarming with flies and maggots. Basically a wooden frame atop some straw bales it was not quite the thrills he was looking for or indeed seeking. “This ain’t exactly fighting tigers with flame throwers like they promised in the TV Times,” he complained to fellow jungle internee and crap-mate Anthony Worral Thompson and later, after eating some tasty bush tucker that was basically some worms from the aforementioned dunny, he was suffering from…
Bellyaches
Doubled over with constant stomach pain and now walking along Deansgate, he remembered the pills he had bought for his mother from Boots earlier that day. Inspired, Bez, somewhat shakily, removed the child proof top at precisely the same moment as a particularly vicious stomach cramp hit him. Disaster! The pills flew everywhere and disgorged themselves all over the bustling pavement! Inadvertently, people were stepping on them, tripping over and colliding into lusty, kill crazy pensioners, wild with staring-eyed mad animal panic, who, thus distracted, drove shopmobility trolleys into shop windows in futile attempts to avoid the little white agents from hell itself. Bez jerked spasmodically, trying to avert Armageddon and dived hither and thither gathering the demon seed like some demented member of Pan’s People.
Across the road, a watching Shaun Ryder smiled tellingly and stroked his goatee. He had his man.
THE NOT QUITE TEN COMMANDMENTS OF DRUNKEN VINYLS
- Thou shalt play both sides of the record in their entirety
- Thou shalt drink one can of Fosters or its alcohol equivalent per song
- Thou shalt record ramblings as they occur to thee for the duration of the running time
- Thou shalt edit out the swearing the next day
- Thou shalt not suffer a Blueberry user to live
Are we all set up and ready? Okay, Future-kind, hoist up your skirts and off we go! Play along with us as we do:
HAPPY MONDAYS: PILLS, THRILLS AND BELLYACHES
SIDE ONE
Kinky Afro
OK – the filthiest record known to man starts with some synthesiser and jangly guitar and a fat sixties groove. We remember seeing this on ‘Top of the Pops’ or ‘Power Up’ on Super Channel with Chris Evans. They were all grooving with some awesomely chested sixties go-go chicks and this monkey bloke was prancing around like a Thunderbirds puppet – all beef jerky hands. If you did that in a disco near ours, you’d get shown the door and that’s no lie. Furthermore we like the lyric, “Dad you’re shabby, you groove around just like a baggy.” They don’t write them like that anymore. Kinky Afro sounds a bit dubious like a lad’s mag. Zoe Ball. What’s that all about, eh?
God’s Cop
I bet your fingernails are dirty. Ours are clean, yours need a scrub a dub-dub in the bath with a nail brush. This song clearly references weircopmeister James Anderton and his bid to clean up the filthy streets of Salford – something we heartily approve of. This vinyl is so filthy it’s clogging up the stylus after a mere five minutes. Anyway the music, the music – a sleazy guitar with a pounding dance beat and vocals that are murky in the mix. We approve to an extent but take issue with the satirical subject matter. Our policemen are wonderful. Did you hear about the way they selflessly busted Sir Paul McCartney’s wedding reception in St John’s
Did you check your fingernails? Bet you did.
Donovan
Bongo drums and a low key funky bass. We love it. The synthesiser is reminiscent of a harmonica playing a blues melody. Ryder’s vocals are mixed towards the back of the room and he’s alluding to ‘Sunshine Superman’ by Donovan for some reason. Oh we see, it’s called Donovan. Outside our window, the sun slowly sets on an unsuspecting England
Grandbag’s Funeral
We used to love ‘Sunshine Superman’ by Donovan, we really did. But then Magners came along and ruined by having a load of chic people, the sort that deserve a really good punch as they toe tap along to the craic – whatever the hell that is - sipping cider over ice along to it. This one is filthy. He appears to be saying “Let’s see all the family” in a shouty way – we think they might be going on holiday, but can’t be sure.
We once went around regularly saying “Oh good craic, to be sure, to be sure.” Then somebody punched us with a tambourine drum type thing in a crowded bar. It hurt. A lot.
Loose Fit
This one surely needs no introduction from us. It’s very like ‘Fool’s Gold’ by Stone Roses, strangely. Anyway they don’t need no skimmed milk in their wardrobe today or something and it sounds good to them. Sounds good to us, too. Except – well you’d put skimmed milk in the fridge, wouldn’t you? Could get a little bit noisome left in the wardrobe, you’d think. Still, on the other hand, this being the dirtiest record in the world and all that, I suppose in a strange way, it fits. Fits. Oh yes, very good.
SIDE TWO
Dennis and Lois
For a dirty record, this is very twee. A melodic opening and a reference to Bruce Forsyth, a hero here at DeeVee HQ. Congratulations on the knighthood. Knight to see you, to see you, knight! Sorry scraping bottom of barrel with that one. Still, returning to the music we think this would sit nicely on any episode of ‘Wish You were Here’ the travel show staring our very own Keith Chegwin.
Bobs Yer Uncle
The Mondays have been playing their Sergio Mendes Brazil
Step On
Now, come on, Future-Kind, you’ve stomped along in a disco to this one, haven’t you? Let’s all ‘twist our melons, man’. One of us admits to working in a huge nightclub in Plymouth Mayflower Street
Famously covered by Madonna in 1984, in fact her first real hit….oh, shit, sorry, now that it’s started we see that it’s a completely different song, starting with a Beatlesesque ‘Back in the USSR’ airplane and some funky singers straight out of ‘The Gap Band’ or ‘Chic’ or ‘Sheila and B Devotion’ – this is so seventies it’s practically oozing sleeze and wearing flares. This, we should point out, is a damn good thing. Mighty fine.
Harmony
Sneaky segue there which we didn’t see coming and it’s into Primal Scream ‘Screamadelica’ country, coming down, presumably in the same way as the jet did in the last song. Shaun wants a beautiful cooking pot in this one – which could be a reference to – drugs. Something we never approve of but strangely in keeping with the tone of this vinyl. We got to say that Side 2 knocks spots off Side 1 again. A bit ‘Blue Mink’ which we can’t reference without being taken to court for racism these days – and then? Silence. Oh - that’s nicked from Abbey Road
We enjoyed that, did you?
WHAT HAVE WE LEARNT TONIGHT?
Like school, or church, or – indeed ‘Diff’rent Strokes’, we like to reflect on any life lessons learnt whilst playing our historical vinyl. What did ‘H’ have to say to us this week? Well, for a start, it would be easier to visit Manchester if the frigging Government put their hands in their pockets to invest in the M34 – a motorway that would, we feel, be as apathetic as they are, meandering its way around the by-ways of Britain
I still love my Monday's LP. Good review you!
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