SCREEN SHOT - The Creator (2023)

 

Gareth Edwards has made his name writing and directing sci -fi action films. His breakthrough film Monsters (2010) was a low budget marvel. Since then, giving him larger blockbuster level budgets has produced very mixed results. The best having been Rogue One, the worst a Godzilla movie which was quite undistinguished, testing, boring, pick your adjective. So I came to The Creator wondering quite which side of the fence opinions would fall this time.

The films basic premise is a future world is at war over AI robotics. America having almost been destroyed by it, has become evangelical in its desire to eradicate it from the world. Whilst New Asia (by which it really means China) has gone hell for leather in developing it. For those looking for contemporary relevance Trump and China have adopted similar political- economic orientations of late.  In the film, there is intelligence that an AI creator called Nirmata has developed an AI hack that is designed specifically to destroy NOMAD a brutally destructive weapon that the US is employing to devastating effect. If this happens then the war will be over, and New Asia will have won. Joshua Taylor (John David Washington) is an undercover agent living with his pregnant wife Maya ( Gemma Chan) when a NOMAD destruction mission blows his cover and his abducted wife is caught in an explosion. His mission, however, remains to locate Nirmata and to destroy whatever it is they have created.

For all its highly developed and certainly impressive visuals, The Creator suffers from two cripplingly deficient qualities that are unfortunately intrinsically entwined - a lack of credibility - and underdeveloped characterisation and flimsy mise-en-scene. The genuineness of the love affair between Joshua and Maya gets insufficient time to develop depth before the first action sequence barges into it. The dubious nature of this covert operations 'love affair', that makes Maya angry when the truth is revealed, exposes a moral quandary that is never adequately accounted for. This fundamentally undermines the subsequent crestfallen intensity of his eternally smitten love for Maya, that apparently propels him throughout the movie. Making one of the prime emotional axises of the entire movie, an almighty plot hole down which our investment is continually swallowed.

That New Asia is populated by AI robots dressed as though they're ordinary peasants, or worse still Tibetan Monks.This requires more context to make this idiosyncrasy seem understanable. at all Otherwise we simply assume this world is occupied by every Asian trope and cliche a white screenwriter could come up with. Though it has plenty of large scale spectacle in its action sequences, its importance all feels terribly over egged. The sense of peril perishing under the sheer invincible avalanche and massiveness of its tank onslaughts. Hence, I found I was never really engaged with the apparent jeopardy everyone was supposedly in, under heavy handed US military hegemony. 

The movie sort of happened, it was sort of predictable where it would go, it sort of went there and we sort of did not care that it went there, it sort of had scenes of love and redemption and still we sort of did not care. Because it sort of hadn't really put in enough work to make us sort of want to root for it. It felt sort of...shit. With an empty heart emoji, and a shrug.

CARROT REVIEW - 3/8

MY MOST LOVED ALBUMS - Live At Dublin National Stadium - Alan Stivell - 1975

 

A feature of the early seventies was folk music suddenly becoming cutting edge, shifting heavily into folk-rock-fusion territory and cross fertilising a few tropes. This was a delayed repercussion, of Bob Dylan going electric ten years previously. A European pioneer of this fusion was Alan Stivell. Who had almost single handedly salvaged Breton folk music and introduced us to the romanticism of the Celtic Harp and the Breton Pipes. And having done all that hurled them both into the centre of progressive rock music. He moved from folk purist to folk rock star, then later on, to world and new age music. You get the feeling Alan Stivell is one of life's explorers, a musical enthusiast and boundary crosser, always able to respond positively to the possibilities of fresh musical terrain. 

This live album, in folk rock circles has become something of a revered classic. It captures the feeling, the stirring spiritual power of what, in his prime, Stivell could achieve. Because he is also in possession of a lyrically beautiful voice, with solid wide range and a unique sensitivity. Give him an old Breton folk song and he'll bewitch you with its simple uncut beauty. This is 1975, so Stivell has long dark hair and a beard, in his early thirties, and is a handsome man. You can hear as he performs an almost messianic magnetism, a magical charm that entrances through the music.

Many decades later, I cannot recall quite how I first came across this album. His was certainly a name frequently mentioned in the music papers of the time. Most likely my buying of this album was the result of one of my 'take a gamble' trips.  A strategy I increasingly used during the seventies and eighties. I'd go down to the local record store or HMV and collect a handful of records, tapes, or later CD's I'd never heard of before, but caught my interest, and buy them just on the off chance they might be good. I discovered all sorts of brilliant stuff this way. 

These days you can just cruise Spotify or You Tube if you want to know what a group or singer sounds like, and don't have to commit to purchasing at all. The algorithm guides you towards stuff it thinks you might like. But there was something a bit more random and likely to challenge your personal tastes about what I used to do. Yes, it was wasteful on finances and resources, because not everything I bought as 'a gamble' I found interesting. Other things I slowly grew to love. Those duff purchases, when I lived in London, went straight down to the record and tape exchange in Camden.  

Live in Dublin, still packs a punch today, and doesn't feel that dated either. Over the years I've re-purchased it in different playing formats, which I guess is as good an indication as any, just how much I still love and value it.

FINISHED READING - On Mysticism by Simon Critchley

You know, I can usually tell early on if I'm going to get along fine with a book. But this one On Mysticism, it tricked me, by starting off very well, just the sort of over view I thought I was looking for, an interesting chapter on Eckhart. And then it gradually started to grind my engagement into dust, with chapters on Anne Dillard, Anne Carson, Julian of Norwich, TS Eliot. Now, it maybe that this is all just me. I do appear to repeatedly find Christian explanations of their theology and approach to practice, more than a tad incomprehensible. I am looking to grasp hold of something, or better still someone with a clear head to guide me through it. But my mental synapses keep finding it turns into mush and suffocates my psycho-physical being under its philosophical goop. I keep thinking, this really should not be that difficult to understand, surely? Study, if it holds any function, should not obscure, but further enlighten and open out ones understanding. 

If one encounters complicated multi-layered explanations, there is always the potential to become lost very very easily, particularly if you can't follow the logic, if indeed there is any. Then imagine trying to explain Christian Mysticism, which is very far from following any conventional route of practice, at the best of times. My understanding of mystics, Christian or otherwise, is that very little in their approach will be useful to other people. The mystic approach to religious practice appears, in my reading of it at least, to be the very definition of a one off non-transferable experience. 

Religious experience generally seems to be like that. Other people's brush with God, or Enlightenment experience, though encouraging, doesn't necessarily help others to follow in detail their example, to obtain the same result. The Buddha thought initially he'd be wasting his time trying to communicate his Enlightenment experience, and he was right. He was convinced to teach anyway, and spent the next fifty years trying out all sorts of different approaches, none of which were a guaranteed foolproof method. Two and a half thousand years of Buddhism continued this search. Because, fundamentally, although the Buddhist teachings have pointers and practices, which are certainly helpful, you still needed to discover what the way forward was like - for yourself. This was inescapable.

With that contextual qualification now given a voice. I will express a general opinion about this book. Somewhere in the middle of this huge blancmange of ideas, there is a fine book on mysticism fighting to be liberated from its opaque metaphors and obfuscating language. Undoubtedly Simon Critchley knows and has thought about this subject matter a lot, but a clear seamless exposition this is not. It lacks one coherent over arching vein of thought or theme, one that keeps resurfacing to bind all this multiplicity of ideas and disparate sources together. It reads, more often than not, as a whole lot of tangential flailing for meaning.

By the end he is rambling onwards about the modern mystical muses within music. Specifically Krautrock, and their influence on punk and post punk, Julian Cope and Nick Cave. Whilst this is not necessarily an unreasonable thing to assert, there might even be something in this. A whole book exploring this could prove insightful. But in the context of this book, it does feels like he's desperately throwing a few last remaining subjective ideas at a wall and seeing if any of them will stick. 

CARROT REVIEW - 

RISING UP MY BOOK PILE - October 2025

Fractured - Jon Yates 
I saw Jon Yates being interviewed on The Sacred podcast, and the guy has a decent assessment of what is happening to our society and how we might mend its parlous state.
A Birthday Present
Currently Reading

The Less Dead - Denise Mina
One of the Scottish noir writers of detective fiction. Having read Conviction, I can tell you Denise Mina is probably one of the best such writers around. Looking forward to reading this one.
Bought from a Charity Shop

Alice Roberts - Domination ( NEW )

I've read her previous books on ancestry and burial practices. Like her TV presenting, her books are approachable, informative and immensely relatable. This one is about how the end of the Roman Empire coincided with the rise of Christianity.
Bought from The Whitby Bookshop

Zombies In Western Culture - Vervaeke, Mastropietro & Miscevic

A slim volume of what I suspect is more an academic outline than a fully fledged book. But I've heard John Vervaeke talking about this subject and its seems a more useful analogy than you might think. That the dominant presence of zombies in our popular movies is a reflection of our cultures unease with the loss of meaning. 
A Birthday Present
Currently Reading

The Mystical Thought Of Master Eckhart - Bernard McGinn
In my reading of Christian history and literature  I've been meaning to investigate the mystic apophatic tradition, of which Eckhart seems pretty central. This book has a favourable reputation as a broad introduction to his thought.
A Birthday Present

Migration.- W S Merwin 
Its a compendium of Merwin's poetry who is almost unknown in the UK, but a much lauded man of US literature. His poetry varied in quality and length over his lifetime, sometimes it is a real blissful joy, other times not so much. Presently it is peerless. I'm reading a couple of poems a day, but at over five hundred pages it might be a while before I finish it. I'm currently nearing half way.
Ordered from Holt Bookshop
Currently Reading

Beliefism by Paul Dolan ( NEW)

An apparently helpful book about how to avoid becoming polarised in our beliefs, and unable to hear opinions that don't accord with our own. A somewhat timely book. I believe I need a little help in this area myself, so lets see what this has to offer.

Bought from Book Hive Aylsham 

Poetic Diction - Owen Barfield
Subtitled -A Study In Meaning, Barfield was one of the 'Inklings' along with Tolkein & Lewis. An influential thinker whose ideas and theories about poetry and language are probably more wide ranging in their influence than I realise. I want to read this to see if I can get a grasp on what the fuss is about. Wish me luck, cos I think I might need it.
A Birthday Present

The Devil You Know by Dr Gwen Adshead & Eileen Horne
Again someone I've seen being interviewed on The Sacred podcast.  I'm always fascinated by people whose job is to interact with darker vile and unacceptable people in our society. Adshead is a forensic Psychiatrist whose patients are serial killers, arsonists, stalkers. Basicly the sort of folk the tabloids would label 'monsters'.
A Birthday Present

On Mysticism - Simon Critchley
A general introduction to mysticism as a phenomena. All part of my intention this year to read more about this area. 

Bought from Book Hive, Aylsham
Currently Reading ( Ooops just finished it -read the review )

On Friendship by Andrew O'Hagan ( NEW)

I could read the Yellow Pages if it was written by this chap. But also his reflections on friendship is a subject I am interested in his experience of. So win win.

Bought from Book Hive, Aylsham

BOOKSHOPS

Book Hive, Norwich

Book Hive, Aylsham

Holt Bookshop

The Whitby Bookshop

WATCHED - The English ( Series from 2022)

 

Another fine series from Writer & Director - Hugo Blick ( The Honourable Woman, Black Earth Rising, The Shadow Line ). This has all the usual gorgeous stylistic polish and uniqueness of his productions. Set in 1890's mid western America, with all the background of mythic pioneering and entrepreneurial ventures one finds in stories set in this era. The English, however, takes you on a very unusual journey through it.

Eli Whipp (Chaske Spencer) has ceased being a scout for the army. He hopes that he now can buy a homestead and land, to be left to live the rest of his life how he wishes. There is pain in his background, civil war atrocities, the loss of his wife and son. Realistically, no whiteman would ever let him own anything, nor leave him alone to live out his dream. But, still he has hope.

Cornelia Locke (Emily Blunt) is an Englishwoman, initially a bit out of her depth in the mid west. She is searching for her former boyfriend Thomas Trafford (Tom Hughes), who is out here running his own cattle ranch. She knows him to be in some danger from David Melmont (Timothy Spall) his former business partner. Cornelia, however, has her own pain that she carries with her, the locket of hair from her recently deceased son. A talisman that only gains in significance.

Cornelia and Eli hook up with each other, because each finds themselves without a home to go back to. But somehow this unlikely pairing of Indian Scout with an English Lady brings out the fighting spirit in both of them. As the series progresses the real reason why she is here in the free wheeling mid west looking for Melmont emerges, and the emotional bond with Eli grows ever deeper. As both their past histories converge on the same place and the same man.

This series holds it's hidden secrets tightly to its chest, that are then allowed to arise slowly into awareness. It is a compelling watch. I don't think I've seen Emily Blunt act better, as she gradually blossoms out of her inhibited crushing loss into this fully fledged vengeful vigilante. Chaske Spencer plays Eli with aloof mystery, amid this regret filled life history that weighs so heavily down upon him. The real delightful surprise was Timothy Spall, so often cast as the genial lightweight, here gives us a truly monstrous creation in Melmont, about whom nothing good could ever be said. Without giving anything away, the ending of The English, is just truly gut wrenchingly tragic.

CARROT REVIEW - 6/8

Available on BBC I Player & Amazon Prime.

FEATURE - It's Never Too Early For Singing Christmas Reindeer

 

Those who know me, will know I'm not big on Christmas happening too early. But wandering around Aylsham Garden Centre we encountered these, which were a complete hoot. The staff must be driven towards madness by hearing it over and over again, that or become completely brain dead. But that's retail for you!

MY MOST LOVED ALBUMS - Blue by Joni Mitchell - 1971

 

Though released in 1971 I arrived late to the Joni Mitchell party, fifty years late in fact. Tail end of the sixties singer songwriters, well these were just not my bag in the seventies. It was all progressive or glam rock, or punk, post punk, or whatever music trend I was briefly affiliating myself with at the time. I would say the guiding star of Joni Mitchell's career, is that she rarely fully embodies the ethos or zeitgeist of any time or era. She wrote the song that encapsulated the spirit of Woodstock, a festival she was never to perform at.  Always doing entirely her own thing, continuing to write these idiosyncratic personal songs that stretched the envelope of how and what she could express or encompass. Pushing herself forward, when even her fans wanted her to stay put exactly where she'd just been, for a little while longer.

Always the first in many aspects, the first of her generation to coruscatingly bare her soul through her songwriting. The first woman of her generation to resolutely forge her own career path in music, beholden to no one. And then there is the purity and ever expanding reach of what that remarkable voice could express. As free as a bird, going wherever it felt was right, in whatever manner that was right. Her work continues to sound totally unique as a consequence. In terms of longer term cross generational impact there are few from her era to match or keep up with her. You underestimate the importance, life force and reach of Joni Mitchell's recorded work at your peril. 

Her first few albums were for whatever reason, the production or Joni still finding her feet as an artist, appeared to waver in their level of confidence and assuredness.  On Blue, finally everything comes together to create one perfectly heart rending album.  And boom she was right there, and never appears to lose total grasp of it. Listening to Blue, I'm amazed people were so taken aback and annoyed by Joni exploring Jazz quite so thoroughly later in her career. The inflections and scat are all in essence there on Blue, in the way she vocally skips and scampers across her lyrical landscapes.

Now I guess everyone who listens to Blue will be struck by different tracks for often quite disparate reasons. But I would be completely in love with any album, if it contained one love song as good as A Case of You.  'I can drink a case of you, and still be on my feet' she sings. Expressing both her intoxication with the lost love object, whilst also stating she's still upright and capable of being fully herself. She is not subsumed into submissiveness or contrition by her continuing desire for this persons love. Its complicated, and I guess that is why this still rings so true.

MY OWN WALKING - October Journal 2025

 

In an online talk by American Zen Buddhist teacher Jisho Sara Siebart, she remarked that we shouldn't always be - ' looking for drama to keep our minds active' - that - 'if things are not in alignment with the true Dharma, then we should pivot - and can we do that?'  As a person whose not been averse to indulging in a bit of self stoked melodrama over my life, these comments struck an embarrassing chord. I'm finding it useful to checkout my motivations with this question - Is this Dharma or Drama? 

There are categories of personal drama, each with a varying intensity. There's the Historical Drama, the Melodrama and the Psycho-drama. All dramas, regardless of our level of investment in them, are founded on some very common elements of pleasure or pain, gain or loss, fame or infamy, praise or blame. The Buddha designated them as Worldly Winds, that would buffet you around like a ship on a storm tossed sea, if you let them. These are the sort of elements present in all novels, theatrical plays, movies and TV Soaps which thrive on exploiting there dramatic potential. 

Due to there always being a degree of fictionalising, of scene setting involved, in how we recount our personal dramas. We are mostly retro-fitting our present experience into this readymade semi-fictional tale. One through which we tell ourselves who we think we are, what we are capable of, what we can and cannot do, what we believe the world is like, why other people are behaving in the way they do towards us, etc. You can spot these because they usually begin with - This is how it always is with me - I never get (this that or the other) - I seem destined to be (this that or the other). Basically, an element of fatalism is present.

This is what I'm labelling Historical Drama. Explaining every new experience through the narrow optics of a much rehearsed personal history.  Its an ongoing reinforcement, of a usually detrimental self view. There was a period when I would regularly experience a sense of being trapped in a situation. And that was rarely actually the case. I was more often than not feeling imprisoned by me. There were options, ways out, but I'd not take them because I didn't think I could pull them off or was actively risk averse towards, or scared of the consequences. 

At other times I'd feel a sense of meaninglessness or lack of direction, usually because I was resisting making a clear commitment to an action, and the entropy summoned up, just dragged my mood downwards into a pit of despondency. And that despair completed a self reinforcing negative cycle from meaninglessness to despair and back round again.  Whether I overcame any obstacle I encountered came down to how much initiative, confidence or esteem I believed I had. Even my recounting and attempts to reframe them here, is a form of re-fictionalising, re-editing and re-fixing the story. Tweeking it to show a certain level of retrospective self awareness

There is a difference between Historical Drama and Melodrama and it comes down to how long you are prepared to actively wallow in this state of squandering your time. To intensify the self dramatics and allow yourself to passively flounder and flail. Whenever I've experienced my susceptibility to melodramatics, its been executed as a clearly conscious act. In the fading embers of a love affair, whether the love was reciprocated or not, the tendency to play the tune of 'woe is me' proves irresistible. 

I remember living in my one room bedsit on the Great North Road in East Finchley in the 1980's, donning my headphones and listening loudly to The Smiths - Please Please Please Let Me Get What I Want This Time. There was nothing like a melancholy Morrissey lyric to turn up the self pity to tearfulness, in this gay man's romanticised pose. You desire company when you wallow. So lacking a friend, a bit of fellow feeling coming at you through the music deck, makes you feel less completely alone with it. Cranking up the music and the lyrical poetry, would often fulfill that need for me. But, you get my drift, melodrama does require you to over act, to ham it up, to indulge in the melancholy, and to do so with all the self conscious languor you can muster. It delays or conceals any personal necessity to snap out of it, under a comforting duvet of mushy emotionality.

Up to this point all the Historical Drama and Melodrama has largely been an internal conversation within oneself. One that affects one's outer life to a degree. We think certain things, but at the same time we know this is just us, and will prove to have little to no substance if exposed to reality. The Psycho-Drama, however, starts to believe in the reality of those internal misconceptions. Becoming obsessed with the Worldly Winds to an exaggerated extent. Fixating on perhaps one of these - pleasure or pain, gain or loss, fame or infamy, praise or blame, and begin to lose a grip on sanity through it. I personally have no experience of this. Though I guess like many of us, we can sense, even in our internal small talk, the seeds of something unhealthy, that if given too much credence and belief could potentially unhinge you. We, might instinctively back away, but some sadly tip right over into it. 

Then it comes to the concluding part of Jisho Sara Seibert's comment -'if things are not in alignment with the true Dharma, then we should pivot, and can we do that?'  In the 1980's when I found myself in trough's of despondency, I'd eventually tire of myself being in this state, with its incessant wallowing and pivot out of it. Usually I found a new direction to move in, beginning some new project or pursuing a fresh interest, but it could sometimes be simply changing the furniture around in my flat, or more dramatically moving to a new town, or starting a new job. 

At some point I came to realise any nihilistic tendency only went so far before an equal and opposite force kicked in. That somewhere inside of me I had hope, a confidence in the possibility of things becoming better. The nihilism never fully accords with my core beliefs. This positive resilience, a faith in the good, though hard to hold onto is worth reminding oneself of. It does not permanently solve anything, you will undoubted have further dark nights of the soul, you're human after all. I personally have found practicing Buddhism has helped me immensely, in moving away from becoming too involved in internalised Historical Dramas and unhelpful worldly concerns. And I imagine other faiths may provide a similar direction for someone to reorient themselves towards. Learning how to pivot towards whatever is positive and real, is a life skill worth acquiring.

WATCHED - Alien Earth

 

Noah Hawley, as a writer and director has developed a reputation, for taking a popular film and making a TV version of them  Successfully adapting the Coen Brothers classic Fargo, which ran for five series. So you can understand Disney, when they wanted to create an Alien series, would make him their first port of call. Since the first Alien film the sequels/prequels have been very patchy affairs, that even Ridley Scott has not always pulled off successfully. An Alien series might then prove to be a tricky beast to manage. It has to an extent to pay homage to its predecessors, to some, but not all, the elements of the story lineage. But simply making it about a xenomorph that runs havoc in a situation, would run out of steam pretty quickly. A series brings an opportunity to really open out the franchise, give it fresh air and impetus. With an intriguing new story arc, with a breadth, depth of character development and themes, that a two hour movie really cannot achieve. Oh, and it also has to please, and not greatly upset, the die hard fans. So, no pressure.

When you watch Alien Earth, you realise just how clever Hawley has been in its placement within the frequently wandering infidelity of the Alien storyline. Setting it in a period two years before the first movie. So it can absorb all the period details of sets etc and the not fully fleshed out nature Wayland -Yutani and those troublesome synthetics. Earth, is now effectively run by a small number of high tech companies. Of which Wayland-Yutani is a major player, another one is Prodigy  

Prodigy, founded by Boy Cavalier (Samuel Blenkin),, has pioneered a new form of synthetic human that has the consciousness of a prepubescent child downloaded into it. Boy Cavalier is a self confessed genius, an eternally youthful Peter Pan to his synthetic creations -Wendy ( Sydney Chandler) & the Lost Boys & Girls. Always hoping to meet someone else as clever as himself, so he can at last have a decent conversation. His narcissistic self conceit makes him a poor judge of the morality of what he does, seeing himself as somewhat above such considerations.

A Wayland-Yutani ship crash lands back on Earth. Colliding into a skyscraper owned by Prodigy. In charge of the ship is Morrow, a human- augmented cyborg. It contains a long voyage's collection of alien species, of which our beloved xenomorph is only one. As this bizarre range of aliens escape, we learn what each of their special predilections are. Boy Cavalier decides to send his new synthetic creations into the crashed ship, as a sort of road test for how they will cope in real live situations. And so the scene is set for the rest of the series.  

Alien Earth brilliantly explores the contentious issue of what makes anything human. Morrow (Babou Cessay) is an augmented cyborg, Kirsh (Timothy Olyphant) is a full synth, Wendy, throughout the drama is compelled by her encounters with the world, to dwell on what exactly she is. Her makers treat her like a slave that they own, Yet she can outthink and outperform any human, she is almost indestructible. Is she better or worse off for thinking herself human or synthetic? And all the synthetic and semi-synthetic creations exhibit differing responses to that question. Kirsh observes the synth/human hybrids with some curiosity. He is analogous to the synthetics in the first Alien film, a coolly dispassionate creation who has his job to perform, and does so with a certain logical efficiency. We are also led to consider what sort of level of intelligence do some of these alien species have.

Alien Earth employed all the tension and unexpected twists one might expect, and a great deal more. With thoughtfulness given to its narrative engagement, purpose and structure, than the film's now cliched format. Disney, with Alien Earth and Andor has produced not just two of the best reinventions of science fiction classics, but the two best dramas of 2025. They're on a bit of a successful roll at the moment, long may it continue.

CARROT REVIEW - 7/8

SHERINGHAM DIARY No 131 - Raging At The Gibbous Moon

Sleep, is not long, nor restfully at ease at the moment. We've just passed the Full Moon. A Harvest Moon because, so they say, the moon is sat at its lowest angle, so country folk could continue to harvest under the clear strong light. Now whether you believe that possible or desirable (surely they'd get plastered in the pub of an evening ) well, this matters not to me. I suspect its just another modern fiction invented to make moon gazing a bit more sexily romantic and folksy. Like applying a christian name to each succeeding Winter storm.  I just want the big bright blighter to bugger off, to quickly wane away to nothing. Mainly so it doesn't beam directly through the slats of our bedroom blinds like a searchlight, in imitation of the early dawn. Waking me up, and thinking its time to rise and shine to greet the oncoming day. Only to discover its actually only 1.30 AM.  I want my bloody pitch black darkness back - Right Now! 

Robert Generic, the stereotypical Tory politician on the make, has been let out on walk about again. Passing through Handsworth and calling it a slum. Saying he did not see another white face, other than his own that is.  Ah, this chap really doesn't get out enough. Never realising this is how poor folks have to live these days. He was, so he bleated, not stoking racist tropes, but was concerned about the lack of cohesion and integration, in there not being any white people there. Its a problem that needs airing, so he said. I wonder, when he goes to other towns he notices when there are only caucasian faces, and wonders why they are living in such a privileged bubble. Why are there no non white faces in this town?  Does he see that also, as a problem? 

We had a lampshade order to drop off at Seagulls Gallery in Blakeney this morning. Though we've heard reports of how the high the High Tides are in Blakeney these days, nothing quite prepares you for the actual experience. 

As you can see from this short video it was right over the harbour dock, covering the entirety of the car park. It was quite alarming how close it was to the Blakeney Hotel., and a barely few yards away from Seagulls Gallery too. It wouldn't take much. Our old friend the full Harvest Moon has undoubtedly something to do with it being so high. Along with the gradually building affect of climate change making these once freak high tides, a more and more regular experience.

When you come back from holiday, one tends ever so briefly to see one's home with fresh eyes. The carpet in our lounge has indeed been getting gradually grubbier. Only on our recent return did it strike us anew, that we really needed to do something about it. We went out an bought ourselves a carpet cleaner, because this job was going to take more than a weekend scrub up, and moving furniture around our bijou residence is not exactly straightforward. Also I can see we'd most likely have to shampoo it regularly to keep it up to scratch. The cleaner is really effective. Only in the grubbiest areas does it take a few goings over to really make an impact. But slowly I am getting there, and hopefully by this weekend the lounge carpet will finally pass muster. We found out, years ago that this beige embossed swirl of a carpet that came with the rental, is called California Dreaming. Though I can't for the life of me imagine what exactly was in the mind of the manufacturer, what picture exactly did they want to conjure up. A rather muddy sand bank in an estuary perhaps.

FINISHED READING - Rood Screens by Richard Hayman

 

I know this is niche, and probably only for 'church larking' nerds like myself. This is a slim volume but very informative book about the development and relevance of medieval rood screens. Since the early days of temple worship there has always been a chamber, at some remove from the general temple concourse. Its often referred to, and treated as if it is, a Holy of Holies. A place where the god resides or can be summoned by semi-secret rituals that take place, often behind closed curtains. 

In medieval church architecture, we initially have a basic nave and a chancel structure. This then develops side aisles specifically to house separate shrines and create a processional route around the church for figures of Christ, The Virgin Mary or dedicated saint figures to be processed around it. These statuary were often housed in the chancel, as were all the accessories for communion, close by or on the high altar. The chancel was, in this sense, symbolically representing the Holy of Holies. 

The chancel also enshrined a medieval social division by class, between common folk who gathered informally in the nave, and the choir where the great and the good of local dignitaries and religious officiators would be seated. This cordoning off of the sacred space, incorporating those who had social status and power, required the further construction of a fixed delineating boundary. Hence the development of the rood screen and its loft, which served both a religious and secular elie purpose.

Victorian gothic recreation of a Rood

The rood screen with its loft, has roughly three levels. The lower dado, which contains painted panels featuring internationally known and local saints, portraits of figures from the bible. Above this a sequence of elaborately carved arches with pierced tracery so those in the nave can see through to the high altar and view any ritual taking place. This holds up the rood loft, which often has a pelmet or balcony where statuary and candles could be displayed, or act as a pulpitum from where sermons and bible readings could be read to the worshippers in the nave. This loft would often house a timpanium which was a painted representation of Jesus on the cross supported by John the Baptist and the Virgin Mary, or a three dimensional carved representations of the same, known as the the Rood. 

This Rood Screen was an extremely elaborate constructions, beautifully executed usually in wood which has been richly carved, painted and gilded. It became one of the visual artistic glories of the medieval church The making of a rood was financed through public patronage, usually under the auspices of one wealthy local family. A rood screen could take several years to be constructed. Paintings had to be left for several months to fully dry, and then they required varnishing and gilding. So this was never going to be a short term financial commitment. The death of a patron, or the outbreak of war or pestilence, could seriously delay the completion of a rood screen by decades

Its commonly misunderstood that rood screens were completely destroyed or removed during the Reformation. this was actually very rare. The accusations of idolatry, were mainly focused on specific imagery. The Rood carving itself, or more commonly on manufactured pilgrimage sites, and the money being extracted through the veneration of saints and their relics. When you see faces of figures scratched out on a rood screen, this is more likely a consequence of later post civil war puritan iconoclasm during Cromwell's Republic. Rood Screens simply went out of fashion for a while, when imagery and ostentatious symbolic rituals were replaced by the written word, and literacy had become more widespread. 

There were regional variations in how much the religious climate deterred the presence or preserved Rood Screens. Norfolk, being always a bit of a cultural backwater, still has the highest numbers of medieval rood screens surviving in England, either complete or in part. So I am quite fortunate in living in a county where there are very rich pickings to be found in even the smallest most insignificant church. If you want to know more about Rood screens, then this is a very handy introduction to the subject. Its very well illustrated by photographs of some of the best examples to be found in England. and provides a handy list at the back of where they can be found, and further reading.

CARROT REVIEW - 6/8

LISTENING TO - Madder! EP by Sparks

 

In the long and illustrious career of Sparks, this is their first EP.  Whilst I found Mad! variable as a collection, the songs on this Madder! EP do possess a cohesive quality, as if they are somehow soulmates. This is then, not a tacked on release of slightly substandard extra tracks. They are distinct songs, possessing all the qualities of note one expects of Sparks. One song in particular I'd say is a classic, an example of Ron Mael's lyrical ambiguity.

Porcupine, that opens the EP, is a song describing a person, who may or may not be their girlfriend. The girlfriend, it seems, is a bit rough around the edges, a prickly individual whose prone to flying off the handles. This is something the friend/boyfriend perversely finds relatable and attractive.

'I'm not saying everything is smooth
Truth be told it's almost never smooth
She is gruffer than the folks in France
But I know her in the ways you can't'

This is followed by Fantasize, an superb example of Sparks at their minimalist best. Opening with the word No endlessly repeated times before you even get to first the verse. On the surface it's about a chap who can do nothing but fantasize about one person. But there is something about all the repeated No chorus that indicates that this is not remotely a healthy obsession. All the negative repetitions echoing his torn and distraught state.

'No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no (no, no)
No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no (no, no)
No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no (no, no)
No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no (no, no)

How can I make you understand
The world I've built where we're hand in hand
Walking through, walking through, walking through
Walking through, walking through, walking through'

Mess Up rollacks along at a lolloping pace, reminding me of an eccentric children's cartoon like Rhubatb. Musically it created a feeling of this odd mash up of The Residents with Blur. Lyrically it concerns a chap whose life does indeed appear to be one sort of mess up after another. Someone, who despite all their efforts to be otherwise, just never seems to get a break, or pull things together properly.

'Phoning in sick 'cause you're laid up
Boss sees you racing your Ram truck
Now you're laid off, what a mess up
Mess up
Too eager in your acquainting
Boyfriend of hers has you fainting
Heavy right fist, now you're messed up
Messed up

Run far away, run and hide
Know that in time shame subsides'

The EP closes with what is my personal favourite -They. This song could be interpreted in different ways. It's written from a dance performers point of view, where despite all their energy and effort they never seem to please their audience. I can imagine it describing the sort of audience who comes to a Burlesque or pole dancing club, where the dance is perhaps not the only thing on the audiences mind, in what they expect from them as dancers. The anonymity of Them and the audience to They. The sense of meaninglessness to the performers lives, encapsulated in that their desire to entertain is never satisfied. This ambiguous song has a soulless quality that ultimately exudes a sadly seedy, yet wistfully melancholic air. This is understated brilliance..  

They
Came to see you Shimmy for them all right
And They
Came to see you Hully Gully all right
And They
Came to see a bit of pure entertainment
But never were happy
And They weren't satisfied
And They weren't satisfied

MY MOST LOVED ALBUMS - Clear Spot by Captain Beefheart & The Magic Band - 1972

  

I picked up Clear Spot in a cassette sale. Back in the seventies when a local independent record store was a common thing. I'd heard Captain Beefheart on John Peel, in the Trout Mask Replica era, and that was definitely a taste challenging to acquire. Clear Spot doesn't particularly turn down the wackiness, more redirects it, by changing the musical sources it draws upon. For this is one hell of a strident amalgam of a Rhythm & Blues - Bluegrass mash up with Captain Beefheart's uniquely surreal imagination. On the albums title track Clear Spot it works hard at straddling the border between experimental and mainstream. This album probably marks the high point of Beefheart's most accessible period of music making.

Captain Beefheart shares a similar musical ethos to Frank Zappa, with whom he once worked. Part Dadaist absurdity, counter cultural drug influenced fantasy and in Beefheart's case one hell of a howling wolf of a raucous blues voice. Rough edged, wailing and plunging the depths, it grabs your attention through its over committed delivery. And on Clear Spot he develops a tenderness and soulful intonation, on tracks like Too Much Time, with its Stax horn section, or on Her Eyes Are A Blue Million Miles and My Head Is My Only House Unless It Rains where both have this fondness for and an unabashed sense of love.  

But by and large Clear Spot is most remarkable for the power of its blues inflected shuffling stompers. Such as Circumstances and Long Necked Bottles, or the immortally title of Nowadays A Woman's Gotta Hit A Man, which concludes with 'to make him know she's there.' A lot of the time there is a pumped up male braggadocio going on here too. 'Some of my woman have tears in their eyes when you ask them about me I swear.' which, because it will often be accompanied by some absurdist wit, it makes  questionable if this is meant to be taken completely at bare faced value.

Beefheart is at his characteristically most unhinged and preacherly on Sun Zoom Spark, and is a wack job out of his head on smack on  Low Yo Yo Stuff - Golden Birdies - Big Eyed Beans From Venus. But these are so full of brilliantly evocative imaginative associations and word puzzles they are enjoyable bits of linguistic playfulness. There are the moments here where childish glee is injected into the rich mix of this album. Its what makes this so utterly loveable. 

 

RANDOM SNIPPETS - No 3 - Worshipping At The Temple Of Me

'Paradoxically, a running commentary actually distracts me from a deeper engagement with myself and the environment I am in. Whenever I am talking about myself, I am not being myself, I am re-membering then performatively re- presenting myself. I cannot be listening and commenting at the same time. When I am talking about anything, I cannot hear other people, understand other people, relate better with other people. 

When I am worshipping at the temple of me I cannot even sense, let alone respond to the presence of the true nature of reality, that is all around and unacknowledged within me. I drown it in a deluge of chatter, shallow observations, the grubby carapace of useless comment and vacuous analysis. Even though I might aspire to being a Buddhist, I talk far too much about the theory, the practice, the outcome or the lack of it, the goal or the non-goal, the moment or the non moment. Far more than I actually put the theory into action. 

Life is similar to a fleeting and ever moving feast. But if I live as though its a series of endless courses of junk food, that needs consuming quickly before the next one comes along. Then I will find no value in the rich flavour of the wind and the enlivening taste of dawn rising. Ending up so busy compiling a review in my head for my blog, to really notice what is actually there in front of me.' 

An edited and further adapted extract from my Morning Journal
Originally written 23rd September 2025