So here we are then. This morning, Adam and Joe announced the winner of their Video Wars competition I so recently boo-hooed about. I have made it through a ten-hour shift at work without looking up the result, watching the minutes tick by, gradually realising there probably isn't going to be a "totally" "unexpected" last-minute phone call - "Hey, big jokes all round! You weren't disqualified really, and you've completely won! Here, come and meet us and we'll let you in our secret gang of really cool funny people what are cool and funny!" Ten hours of sly YouTube checkage - still no comments, hit rate still disastrously low, doctor, we're losing her! - all so I could come home and crank up the iPlayer and listen to the whole show, intact, and blog the resultant head trauma. Join me, won't you?
0:01 GAH! What the hell's that? Oh yeah, music. That's what usually happens on radio shows, isn't it? Damn podcasting. I'd forgotten about the concept of music. OK, while we sit through the new Verve single (God help me, this may be a long night) let me set the scene. I'm on my own, the young fella-me-do hundreds of miles away enjoying a rock climbing stag weekend, preposterously. I have around me a bottle of 2nd-cheapest Shiraz, Doritos'n'dip, 11 Marlboro lights, an emergency scratch card for when things get desperate, and no dinner. Conditions are perfect.
0:05 There they are. Some nice talking is happening. They are being charming and funny on and around the subject of the X-Factor. I'm already angry and upset. Right, I should probably crack open the wine.
0:09 It is probably heretical to say this, either that or insanely obvious, but The Doors singer who I was just about to call Jim Davidson in an HILARIOUS illustration of just how uncool I am...oh god, what's his name? Morrisey, that's it...sounds remarkably similar to the singer from Editors. It's probably the other way round, actually. I'd like to think if J-Mo did have some kind of vocal prescience, or an indie-rock time machine, he would choose to sound not like the Editors guy, but like Daniel Bedingfield. That guy can belt it.
0:16 I TOTALLY HAVE THIS WILCO TRACK. Heady joy that an obscure 6music choice is reflected on my iPod! It turns out all this time I was so far ahead of the game, I was almost lapping the game, hence the appearance of being slightly behind the game.
0:20 Yeah, what's with this damn bigfoot thing? I mean, I know it's silly season, but it's not like there's an enormous sporting event or a simmering world war for our globe's press to concentrate on. I was under the impression that 90% of the reporters in the world were in Beijing anyway, according to embittered, snipy reports written by the other 10%. Who's covering this thing? Maybe it's self-sustaining, like that story on the BBC news website about a man marrying a goat that was most popular story for 300 years.
0:26 I've only had one glass of wine. Why have the lights on my wireless router started flickering in time to the music? Does it have inherent rhythm? Can I somehow hook it up to my Guitar Hero guitar to get through Muse on hard? Doritos where?
0:28 Hells. A Doritos salsa-jar-won't-open-no-men-around emergency was imminent, and then it popped open its own damn self. I think it looked at me, and understood. It understood.
0:32 I wonder if Adam and Joe ever get annoyed that they have a body of work stretching nigh-on ten years behind them, but (I imagine) they get constantly accosted by teenagers demanding the Footie Song, despite the fact they were about 7 when it was on TV? Just one of the questions I would have been far, far, far too timid to ask if I had gotten the opportunity to meet them.
0:41 Oh apparently, I only have to wait another 45 minutes for some kind of Video Wars announcement. I must work quickly if I am to be incoherent with rage by then. Although I must protest strongly, how I am supposed to jimmy myself up into frothy-mouthedness when I am reminded quite how much I adore the Divine Comedy? I wonder if the hamsters running endlessly in their wheels inside my ancient computer could cope with it if I opened iTunes at the same time as the iPlayer?
0:46 Hamster II (Hamster Boogaloo) has just passed out. He's all stretched out and stiff. He seemed to have been storing some kind of hazelnut in his pouch, which has rolled out above him. He looks...he looks like an i...
0:48 That image x extreme melancholy version of Footloose x flashback of Wellard's death last night = quick rush to remove sharp objects from the immediate locale to be secreted in the place least likely to be visited tonight. Organic veg box? No, sudden potassium lull may require banana-ing. Inside Bed. Perfect. There are two, count 'em, sofas between here and The Bed. The Bed will not be visited tonight.
0:54 No, no, I'm sorry. I refuse to believe that there is not an Army Of Lauren Laverne Clones, Marching Through Broadcasting Both Popular And Highbrow, Spreading Late-Twenties Dry Wit Wherever They Shalt Tread. The girl. Is. Everywhere. And if you think about it, she's got it completely sewn up - how can someone co-present with both Miquita Oliver and Mark Kermode? Those two meet, it's end of the universe stuff. Lauren Laverne is clearly some kind of quasi-dimensional-inner-space-balance daemon, keeping the world in a unified state by upholding the T4-Newsnight Review karmic quotient level. I have no choice but to salute her.
0:56 I'm dancing, and singing, # They must be Out! Of their Brilliant! Minds! # It's a song completely unsuited to dancing and singing. It feels like the high before the crashing low.
0:59 Oh shit.
1:04 They were talking about videos, you see, but no specifics as yet. I know I'm TOTALLY DISQUALIFIED and all, but there is still a small bit of burning hope. Christ! I'm a fucking optimist! This fact has taken me completely by surprise! This paragraph has taken six attempts to type!
1:09 TEXT THE NATION! TEXT! TEXT! TEXT! I really cannot hear that jingle enough. It's just struck me that this whole thing is completely nonsensical to anyone who has not listened to Adam and Joe before on 6music, or indeed, is not listening to this exact show. First, I must heartily congratulate you for reaching this far down the post. I can absolutely stone-cold guarantee you that you are the only person that has done so. In fact, mention these codewords in the comments, and I'll send you actual folding money. Even if you know me. The words are "fucking moth divebombing my dip". FYI - don't ever google that. Just...just don't. Second, get thee to the BBC and subscribe to the Adam and Joe podcast, and life will be nice.
1:20 Oh no. Oh no. I can't tell whether the optimism has mutated into dread, or if the optimism is still there, and there is a secondary dread virus lying dormant, throwing clots of dread into my general thought-stream. All I know is it's prompted the second bathroom break in ten minutes, and I'm having to venture from my cosy computer-hole into my cold, dead flat again. No, this is ridiculous. The optimism must be excised. The evidence is staring me in the face. I will not even be mentioned. I'm scared.
1:48 An extended lying on the floor break there. And I now feel rather incredibly stupid because they have announced the runners up and they were all mentally, mentally, mentally good. The No Surprises guy was a runner up, which is kinda good cos I loved that one, and also this animation which I saw when I'd done mine and Rocked. My. World. But who won? I vote lego guy...
1:52 Yup, Lego Guy got it. Richly deserved, really. Not going to stop me doing videos though. To be honest, it's not as painful as I thought it was going to be because I was hopelessly outclassed. And oh my god, this guy is so brilliantly nice! Hooray! I'm so glad.
2:00 Balls! Where's the anger? Don't tell me I'm going to discover I'm actually not a completely embittered sociopath and I am capable of admiration and positivity? Wait...my android limbs are...turning into flexible tissue and skin...!
2:11 No, wait, it's just the wine. And the Raphael Saadiq track which is currently chilling me the Hell-Ass Out.
2:13 I may have just left a lot of unwise comments on YouTube.
2:15 Probably best if I called it a night here, and went and put my Adam and Joe DVD on, wallowed a little bit, and then fell into a deep and dreamless sleep, ready to get up, go to work, and get on with my life. Yes. Must head eventually to bed.
2:20 Knew I'd end up on the sofa. Night-night, everyone. Night-night.
2 comments:
Hello, lego guy here. I actually went through a lot of what you seem to have gone through, only live, while the show was being broadcast. I didn't have the foresight to blog my impressions though. I thought your video was really good and, if it was my choice, would have shortlisted it. Although, obviously, I would still have made myself the winner.
Also, "fucking moth divebombing my dip". :)
OK, I see that you were shortlisted but were somehow in league with the knights of the big british castle and were thus disqualified. I probably still would have made an exception. Good blog, btw. Some funny stuff in here.
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