Thursday 16 February 2012

Falmouth Unpackaged.2 for 5 Hit Rap Magazine


Almost everything in the papers these days is about money, or more precisely, the lack of it. We’re supposed to applaud this Stephen Hester guy for setting precedent and refusing his £1 million bonus from the RBS despite the fact that he’s still getting the £100,000 a month or so in his salary (from the taxpayers!). He only did it because of the overwhelming amount of political and media pressure placed on him, have you seen how much he looks like a severely depressed, post-accident Humpty Dumpty since he did it? I’d give him an I’m-not-actually-a-twat badge if he could survive just one week in London on a student’s allowance. As if the MPs have the right to preach about the value of money as well? Those out of touch, often-sweaty politicians were all too happy working out how much it would cost in expenses to stage a swimsuit contest with the Middleton sisters in the House of Commons, just a few months ago.
Carrying on with the theme from last issue (comparing the ‘real’ news in the mass media, to the beautifully meaningless stories that can be found in the Falmouth Packet) I want to use this section to comment upon how ridiculously irrelevant the mass media has become, how farcical this zeitgeist of fear actually is, and how there’s so much in the world to enjoy if you just use those little, beady things attached to your face and look around. It’s a salute to those stories that really, actually matter, to the stories that touch you on a positive emotional level and not just a we’re-going-to-mind-fuck-you-because-you-can-read one, because that’s just not what it’s about.
I chose this story because, contrary to journalist law, it immediately made me smile. As I’m sure it will do to most of you. Except maybe first year students. And sober people. The headline: A year after being devastated by fire, the final touches are being made at The Pandora Inn before the historic pub opens its doors once more. Like a phoenix, seemingly mirroring those iconic images of burning shops in the London Riots, the Pandora rises triumphantly from the ashes. Even amidst this ‘debilitating’ recession, a little Cornish pub in Mylor can dust off and pull itself back to its feet - meaningless in the greater scheme of things, but totally more relevant to you than an obese guy at the bank. Isn’t it? Tell me your not going to get out to The Pandora the first chance you get? Yes things may be tight, and yes, maybe you don’t have the cash to get that sweet flat overlooking the harbor, but at least you’re in Cornwall, and at least you got a couple of pennies to have a Sunday Roast in a truly beautiful spot.

Breton Interview - Spindle

http://spindlemagazine.com/breton/

Wednesday 1 February 2012

Falmouth Unpackaged - Article for Falmouth based 5 Hit Rap magazine


It seems now more than ever that the media are adamant to portray themselves as dishonest, bloodsucking parasites with a thirst for human misery. Whether it’s the perpetually printed stories of nursery related gang stabbings, constant news reports reminding us that the Eurozone crisis has fucked our collective bank accounts, or just that Old Rupert Murdoch is masturbating to your sexy phone calls, they want to shock you into buying newspapers and scare the public into mental submission.

The evil mass media!

The closer you get to London the more horrifying the stories become, as if the capital were some sort of rapey black-hole that sucks all innocent life into a parallel universe of corruption and vice. And the thing is London isn’t that bad, England isn’t that bad, the world really isn’t that bad. It’s when you look to smaller, local newspapers that you actually realise that England isn’t on the brink of anarchy, it’s as dull as looking at David Cameron’s face. So I asked to write a regular section in 5 Hit Rap Magazine that looks at that most prestigious of Cornish publications, The Falmouth Packet, to show the world that England isn’t a cess pit full to the brim of racist, knife-wielding peadophiles, it can actually be quite a regular place with mundane day-to-day goings on and a hoard of amusing cultural oddities.

I’m just going to jump straight in with an article I found a couple of days ago to highlight this exact point - bearing in mind this is news, in an actual newspaper.

The headline read as follows: A girl was forced to call 999 after getting her foot stuck in a railing in Falmouth this afternoon. I mean isn’t that just beautiful. You’d think that was some sort of ironic joke if you saw it in the Metro or the Evening Standard. The poor girl; had to be rescued by the fire brigade, cut out with specialist equipment, obviously humiliated by the ordeal, so what do The Packet do? They tell the whole fucking town! It’s unbelievable.

Who remembers when the gas tank blew up on the docks last year? That was massive Packet news, the whole of Cornwall went mad, people were evacuated, there were explosions and smoke and fire and people crying. Sounds pretty dramatic right? Well, with all that in mind one of my friends lived next door to the docks, Railway Cottages, didn’t even wake up, she literally slept through the biggest Cornish news of the year.    

Whichever way you look at it the big papers have to fabricate and exaggerate to sell, whereas local papers just inform you about what’s been going on around you. I think what I’m trying to point out is that you can buy into all the media hype, you can fear for your pension and you can constantly look over your shoulder for that bespectacled psychopath with a dildo and a machete, or you can just find humor in the subtle things and try to enjoy what you see rather than worrying about what you read.