The Beat Goes On




The embers of the year that was have finally spluttered out.



It seemed fitting to gather together a compendium of general dropthebeatonit crap that went down over the course of 2012, for two reasons. Firstly to remind the ardent fanbase about all the time they waste reading this bullshit, and secondly to inform the bums who never read it at all what they miss. 




So here goes..



*



The year kicked off with two incredible videos from America.



First off a 4 year old proclaiming his speech writing credentials for the 2053 US presidential election, with enough wisdom and inspiration to last you the whole year.








And another hit of youtube gold, a bug flying straight into the mouth of a homeboy news presenter.








Back in London i was starting 2012 as i meant to proceed, dry-cleaning my sheets n shit for the ladies:



This is Eddie, the legend who works in the local dry cleaners up on Hackney Road.



I spotted this safe tat on his forearm the other day and asked him what it meant.






He said it was Arabic for 'prisoner to music'.






I struggled hard to act surprised. With the amount of Celine and Britney that man pumps out of his speakers on the daily, i'd say prisoner to music is about spot-on. Hey if Mick Hucknall plans a comeback anytime soon, i'd say it's odds-on Eddie's headed straight to solitary.




January was also the month when i finally clocked who Keira Knightly models her look on.























February kicked off with a visit to M&M world, ten months later the wounds are still fresh.








To start with this man tried to murder me with his eyes.








Truthfully the visit did little more than rain down benjamins into my therapist's bank account.








You can read up on the whole thing here




It was a big setback, but I just about recovered in time for March to wish my brother a happy 30th:



Today is a very special day.



Today i'd like to toast three decades worth of repressed homosexuality and wish my beloved brother Miguel the happiest of happy birthdays! He has filled my life with physical pain, but on a day like today and with an AK pressed to my temple i'll happily admit all this is water under the bridge. Apparently blood runs thicker.






How can i describe him best. Unpredictable? Irrational? Violent?



He is none of those things when he's getting lucky. But somewhere along the line shit went a little snafu in my brother's lovelife. Truth be told ladies no longer react. These days even his Don Juan banjo routine doesn't batt an eyelid.








But are the girls really to blame when he rocks this kinda shit.








It's not like the rest of his garms pass the acid test either.








My mother has recently started alluding to her grannny credentials. But manz can't bring themselves to tell her that the closest Miguel is getting to having a kid at the moment..








is perving the crap out of them buttnaked in public parks.







We've all had our dry-runs, but as he prepares for yet another month of drudgery wandering the planes of the Gobi desert, it strikes me that even the Prince of Dryness Westwood would be lost for words.







So let's all make it better and raise mad beers to broheim








B I G U P brotherman



(he actually has a girlfriend now)








Having severed ties with my brother, it seemed right to follow suit with my girlfriend.



Enter the furore of the Dog House.






The Dog House post sparked some serious debate and clocked up 900 views in a single day.



You can check it here.




Turned out the act of publicising a private email didn't go down very well with a few people. 



And it was interesting how the reaction from opposing sexes differed so radically.












As i was fielding heat from the above, my sleeplessness was being remedied in no way whatsoever by the fact my flatmate had just nailed down a new chick: 



No, there is nothing half so sweet in life as love's young dream..



said someone once.






This is all well and good, but when love's young dream is playing itself out right next door to your melon in a flat with paper thin walls and wakes you up twice at night and once again in the morning, you start to question just how sweet it is.



This guy has the right idea.



In fact it might be the best thing i've ever seen on youtube.








Nevertheless at last April arrived, spring was in the air and sun-sapped englishmen were started to get over excited. It was at precisely this moment in time when dropthebeatonit officially became God and making Nostradamus look like Mystic Meg, hit this shit clean out of the park:



Yesterday was hot. The flip-flop count this morning was high. Good Vibes are in the air.


Here is England's weather told through the medium of bicycles.


The bike equivalent of the past two months.






The bike equivalent of what England thinks the next two months will be like.






The bike equivalent of what the next two months will be like.







Money.








Bicycles also formed the basis for my first (and to date only) street art adventure.












Rolling into May i got on a Venga Airways flight to San Antonio and just like the previous year..








i came back a changed man once again.






And of course back from beefa the weather over here was still awesome.







But as all who face hard times know well, that is the reason shit like this gets made.









The Diamond Jubilee weekend went down in the rain, Tibbs ripped up the script:




Best Jubilee garb eva, period.







My ex-barber on the other hand did not:



Why is it that to drive a car you need a license, to be a neuroscientist you have to be the brains, and to be homeless you should probably get hold of a dog, but any old flaming retard is allowed to cut your hair, decimate your self-esteem and ruin your social life.



If you see this place in Soho never ever go inside. 







If the weather in this country wasn't so fucking shit i'd feel more self-conscious about wearing a beanie for the entire remainder of the summer.








Come late June shit was looking bad. My hair was a joke, i was still in the dog house, and apparently i still had a nose ring.



So i got the fuck out:







is saying







for  5 WEEKS 



to go








but not before finding out that someone on my Graphic Design course was called..








C o o o o l





I spent the next 6 weeks chugging around Argentina on my bicycle.








Cycling very straight roads.










Doing loads of uncut Bolivian strewn all over the roadside.








And partaking in a non stop 75km free-wheel.








You can read what i wrote about the trip here




When i got to London in late August it was still raining.



I felt the place was in need of some








so i got back to blogging mere essentials.








Becks seemed to have the right idea:



Stylist: David, i think you need a questionable new style



David:  E a s y









As the year shuffled reluctantly towards autumn, i moved out of my flat, and one evening of September through no fault of my own got caught slightly short:




Being homeless is not much fun. 







I'm not that homeless, but when you're between moves, pissed off with your parents, and your girlfriend is in the throes of those sorts of issues of temperament that come about roughly once a month and subtly infer you should get the hell out of her face, that pretty much qualifies you as without home. And like i said it's not much fun.




Until now.




Enter the HOTEL IBIS EXCEL LONDON DOCKLANDS 








A stone's throw from the delightful Canning Town roundabout and only accessible by four lane motorway, the location leaves everything to be desired. But with three hours notice it remained the only place with a vacancy in east London, and weighing up the situ seemed a superior option to hitting the streets or braving the lair of the aforementioned fire-breathing dragon. And let's be honest Ibis has a classy ring to it.








Two hour's bike ride along motorway towpaths cutting through weird parts of London i didn't even know existed got me to my destination. I breezed through the double doors and hit up reception with the nonchalance of somebody checking into a hotel, on his own, in his hometown, for no real reason. The place didn't exactly ooze atmosphere, but i could tell things were just warming up.








The elevator stopped at the 8th floor, i stepped out, hooked a left and saw this.








DEJA-VU motherfucker




  




Shit just got freaky.







I Usained it to my door and fumbling around with the keycard like a girl for two minutes i calmed down, summoned a milligram of coordination and finally got inside. There is nothing quite like the feeling of opening a door to a hotel room that you have booked, for yourself alone, in your own hometown, for no real reason. 









All the mod-cons yo. Bathroom capsule with power-shower, tv with up-to-date adult movie selection, high-speed internet, sick mood lighting, no view whatsoever. My night was licked. I spent the next two hours doing all that lame shit you could never justify in a million years doing within the confines of your own home, but feels like the only shit you could possibly get up to within the environs of a hotel room.



When that got repetitive I spruced the fuck up and hit the hotel bar downstairs.




*



Things had not warmed up. Not even remotely. 








I was certain the man left of centre in the blue shirt was either made of plastic or in rigor mortis. In the time it took me to work my way casually through two jars, he didn't move once.





Still, when in Rome.









As the cold gold inched its way slowly towards my dome it dawned on me that a lack of atmosphere that acute was severely endangering my health, and it suddenly made sense that the only guy in there was either dead or made of plastic. So i got up, checked that the guy was actually plastic - he was dead - and braving the freaky corridor arrived back to the sanctity of my double-room. I spent the rest of my night nonchalantly watching the paralympics from the comfort of my polyester sheets.









Lincoln once said that


good decisions make you feel good, while bad decisions make you feel bad



Absolute no-brainer. The next morning, superbly well-rested and with a disturbingly wholesome spring in my step i bounded out of there feeling like the motherfucking King Of The World. I can't quite put my finger on what brought about this elation, but something tells me it's that indefinable X-factor that is just simply trademark Ibis, the very same thing that made that place more than just a hotel, that made it a home away from home, and more than anything a home for the homeless.




The questionnaire says more than words ever could.











Ibis you'll be in my heart always.










Next stop, motherfucking loyalty card.










Despite a great stay, the non-atmosphere of the Ibis must have taken its toll after all, since the following week i joined the club manned by these fools and woke up one morning to find i was nursing a similar affliction.
















Having the mumps is the 'look' equivalent of doing this.










But during my convalescence i found the greatest twitter account of all time.



Sorry, Alain.








It was this guy.
















You can follow his shit by clicking here.



Whilst ill i also learnt how to rip cool shit from youtube, and put together a video which i'm actually quite proud of but which absolutely nobody has seen.










And kept busy formulating a new ad campaign featuring my man Johnny for Shockwaves from Wella.



His social life has since gone loco









here's the link.




Winter was now upon us, and while Becks was perving the shit out of people he shouldn't



















People were perving the shit out of Bikes they should.











Across the pond, the big boss man got voted in for a second term.



Classic.











And after 28 years of deliberation I finally voted in my all time top 5, saving the best til last.




Cotillard





Sossamon








Weisz







Olsen






Stancliffe








On the subject of mother's, some tips from the top:




Ever received some serious heat from you mother?



I don't mean that in a rank way you twisted fucks, I mean those times when you find yourself in a predicament when you can't do a single thing right without her removing an enormous can of whoopass from the cupboard, opening it, microwaving that shit and serving it up on a pre heated plate atop some lightly toasted crostini, all in one movement.









Well thank me later because i have the key to the secret.



Locate an important, but not absolutely vital item of your mother's daily inventory. Take for instance a glasses case. And before leaving the house in the morning, surreptitiously pluck and reposition the object pretty fucking far away from those areas your mother's track record suggests she tends to leave her stuff. Give her a morning to stew on the whereabouts, and at the moment where hope is beginning to fade send a perfectly timed text recalling you possibly having seen it, you could be imagining this of course, very near the exact spot where it was expertly placed before your exodus.



Kick back and wait... bingo.








Now you move in for the kill and mention an old Sicilian sausage pasta recipe you're especially fond of, the ingredients of which just so happen to be staring back at you across the counter of a high class Italian delicatessen in Soho. And despite having cooked for your parents about once in the past decade, insist that the new series of Masterchef has got you all inspired and you feel the need to work some magic in the kitchen that evening.









The rest is history.



As usual throughout all of this crap Calvin & Hobbes was maintaining its status as the greatest thing ever written.









In early November i tried my hand at writing something vaguely serious for a magazine called The Angle explaining why smartphones are turning us into morons.







Which you can read here



Nobody ever did read it, so you'd be the first. In fact i often get asked why i call this dropthebeatonit at all, seeing as all i ever do i write meaningless crap about nothing instead of doing what my name might suggest and talk about music.



Well this is my tune of the year.



Jasmine by Jai Paul.








At the beginning of December me and two fool hardy homeys packed our bikes onto a train and went out to the Brecon Beacons for a long weekend to cycle. It was radical and life-affirming.









Here's the film.







In the meantime someone had made a tumblr dedicated entirely to people ballsing up high fives.



Uh-oh









Shitloads more if you click here




And i came across the freshest dedication to second hand clothes i ever saw. 



By the legend Macklemore


 40 million hits & counting.







The start of the festive season also marked the denouement of another incredible series of Masterchef, and hence the absence of the Godfather of Profiteroles Gregg Wallace from all our television screens for another six months.


Here he is reacting to the mention of various puddings from the hands of the budding chefs.



Calvados parfait with mocha tuile






Vodka and buttermilk panna cotta with seasonal berries






Chocolate fondant with green olive and coconut merangue melt






Black treacle tart with spiced ice cream and roasted crab apples






Shitloads of snickers bars dipped in maple syrup








After all the fuss the Mayan apocalypse felt a tad anti-climactic, as their twitter feed attested to the following morning.









For my part, abandoned on my own as i was in London over Christmas, a lack of company finally took its toll and led me to make some questionable decisions. But with nobody around of course there was no-one to hear me scream. Because there wasn't anybody around. So i got away with this.


























In case you were wondering, Christmas for one kicks off.








And Christmas meals for one kick off.








And Christmas Day for one kicks off.



























... which pretty much brings me up to speed on all that was 2012.




*



If you got through this entire thing then you're a fucking loser, but i'm very flattered.





No comments:

Post a Comment