I have seen the future, and it is fucking terrifying...

Last week, I saw the future... and it was:

Funny

Weird

Complicated

Morally ambiguous

Absolutely fucking terrifying

Let me explain...

Last Wednesday I saw Future Bodies, a theatre collaboration between Unlimited and RashDash which is partway through it's run at Manchester's HOME.

The show runs until 13 October so, with any luck, if you are in the Manchester area between now and then, you might be able to get a ticket for it. You can read my review for The F-Word here.

Image of the Unlimited/RashDash theatre production of Future Bodies for HOME courtesy of Mike Barnett at HOME. Used with thanks. 

Hot Brown Honey

The week before Christmas I had a particularly full on and hectic run of late nights, to the extent that I took a day off from my day job to recover. There's only so many meetings you can yawn through and I knew that my increasingly bog eyed state was likely to become increasingly apparent to colleagues as the week went on.

The first of those late nights was the show Hot Brown Honey at HOME in Manchester, a theatre show like no other.

Other shows have discussed racial stereotypes, colonialism and feminism, but not like this... It is at times hilarious, at other times moving and ultimately always thought provoking. A provocative and exciting piece of contemporary theatre that transcends genres as easily as it crosses boundaries.

My review of the show went up on The F-Word last week, and I was pleased by how well it came out.

The show had a fairly short run at HOME but I very much doubt that this is the last you will hear of the Honey's and, if you do get the chance to see the show, do. It is brilliant.

This Face This Name

This song has been good to me these last few years.

Melanie Garside is someone who has been there, done it, and got the proverbial t-shirt.

Back in the mid 1990s she was in Tabitha Zu, later just Zu, and possessed of a mop of multi coloured hair braids. She turned up later playing bass in Queen Adreena, and was in the Mediaeval Baebes for a bit, appearing on their Miribilis album.

'This Face This Name' is the closing track on her second album Home, from 2008, a melange of folk and indie rock.

Maple Bee was the name she used as a Mediaeval Baebe, and she's still out there, both as Maple Bee and Melanie Garside.

Lost in France trailer - special screening and reunion gig 21 February l...

Aaaahhhhh!

It's like one massive flashback to my fanzine writer years.

To that time in the mid-late 1990s when ALL the best bands were from:

A) Glasgow
B) Newcastle
C) Lanarkshire in the wider sense
D) The North East in the wider sense

End of.

Lost In France will be showing in Manchester on Tuesday 21 February at 20:15 at Home as part of a live satellite broadcast from Glasgow Film Festival. As it should be!

Chemikal Underground had such a massive impact on the Glasgow music scene and it's great to see that someone has documented that.

Note: I know I spelled Chemikal Underground right, but autocorrect corrected it, so I've now corrected it back again