I’m bored. I’m the chairman of the bored/board.

What does one do when boredom strikes? 

How do we combat the cloud of ennui that occasionally descends upon us without a whisper of warning..

Do you too find yourself experiencing deep pangs of anxiety? 

You see, boredom is not a discerning tormentor.  Do not think, for one moment, that it selects its victims like Beelzebub might select a group of criminals for Hell’s inner sanctum.  There is no criteria; there is no particular CV that boredom favours.  It does not exclusively target the couch-potatoes or the benefit cheats; i.e. those people who deserve boredom’s fury in all its horror.  In truth, it has all the fastidiousness of a dung beetle choosing its next meal.

Permit me, if I may, to list the chief symptoms of this dilapidating condition:

Shallow breathing

Perspiring palms

Bouncing Limbs

Claustrophobia

A burgeoning sense of one’s own insanity

Indeed, inactivity can be a form of torture so unbearable that many would prefer a swift death than its perpetuation.

I’m certainly no ologist but I would warrant that boredom is a silent and widely unknown killer.

Let’s not become undone.

If you haven’t got any style then you had better pray for some substance.

It has been a heady month for Kites.

Our stages have been strewn with the sweet sweat of our idols. 

We have supported members of New Order, Pulp, Erasure and the Happy Mondays, to name but a few.

Have these juxtapositions inflated our egos or alerted us to the fact that we might be amateurs masquerading as professional musicians?  Well, perhaps. 

I suspect that the majority of successful creatives never quite recover from the feeling that they have fraudulently hit the big-time. Either that or they succumb to the warm seduction of their own hype, never to return to a little planet called reality. 

Mind you, who was ever interested in reality?  It’s a grim, unimaginative sort of a place.  Personally, I have no desire to ever set up a permanent residence there.*

In any case, despite protestations to the contrary, my head has not grown any larger and my sense of entitlement remains sober.  Kites have a long way to go, that much is true.

Our latest shows have provided a window into a world where alternative music can be popular, where charisma trumps musicality, where tight red vests and Thai-dye jeans are somehow acceptable.  I won’t name and shame anyone in particular, suffice it to say that the 80’s was not a decade that was synonymous with sartorial modesty.  It was the age of the shoulder-pad, the puffball skirt, and the dourly attired Margaret Thatcher. 

Fashion faux pas’ aside, Kites have had a lesson in showmanship and song craft.

I observed each show with the kind of concentration usually reserved for heart transplants.  I’m hoping that some of the magic might eventually sink in.  Do you believe in miracles?

*N.B. Yes, I realise that “I, personally” is a tautology and that I also split the infinitive. There are those who have bad grammar and don’t know any better, and there are others who use bad grammar and don’t give a damn.  I hope to be the latter.

Episode 2 - Pathetic Fallacy

A Very English Kind Of Butchery

Everyone I know has at least one horror story involving a scissor-happy hairdresser and an ill-considered makeover. Before now, I would listen to these tales with mock sympathy until proclaiming, rather bombastically, that there was not a salon in Christendom that could despoil my locks.  As with every tragedy that one hears about, we never, for one nano-second, believe that they will befall us.  We think that we are somehow exempt; that our brightly conditioned hair will escape the wrath of a blind Edward Scissorhands.  

Like every pig-headed dullard, I was proven to be spectacularly wrong.  It mattered not that my stylist was a thoroughly likable chap with a moist Italian charm and an enviable selection of teas and biscuits.  What mattered was that we spoke different languages. 

When I tried to explain, with tedious meticulousness, the haircut of my dreams, my new chum looked on with innocent incomprehension.  I doubt most native English speakers would have understood much of my florid gibberish but, for my unfortunate coiffer, it must have been like hearing Anglo-Saxon for the very first time.

My suspicions of a communication breakdown were first aroused when my hair was shaved with an alacrity that would have alarmed a well-seasoned sheep.  At that moment, I realised that a butchering was very likely.  But when my well-intentioned ‘Delilah’ began muttering about Brad Pitt in ‘Inglourious Basterds’ [sic], I knew that my doom was sealed.  Who, apart from the most misguided wretch, would make a conscious decision to look like a Nazi?

So, how do you imagine I reacted when this aggressive topiary was underway?  Well, I did what any self-respecting Englishman would have done when faced with such circumstances: I grinned politely throughout the thirty minute ordeal, tipped him generously, and left cursing my own pathetic uselessness. 

When will we English learn that keeping silent is an act of supreme stupidity?

Like Samson, let’s just hope I can regain enough strength for Kites’ show on Saturday at Scala.

The boy who is most definitely playing with fire in this latest polemic

Am I alone in bemoaning the literary condition of London’s public transport community?

As I sit in the carriage of my local tube I can’t help musing that we resemble an army of cloned bibliophiles.  It’s like taking a pew in an English class where each student grasps replica set-texts except that, in this case, the material is far less erudite.  Familiar editions of Stieg Larsson, Dan Brown and  the latest Vampire-inspired trilogy glare at me mockingly from nearly every seat.  I’m ashamed to admit that, when didactic adverts on the windows order me to be more sympathetic to my fellow passengers, I find myself scorning them instead. 

It’s not that I fundamentally bear a grudge against any of the authors who grace our bestsellers lists.  It’s not even that I think they’re particularly bad books.  What I object to is the fact that we all seem to be consuming exactly the same material.  How can we possibly hope to form a truly original thought in this kind of environment?  We’re not living in a Big Brother autocracy.  We have the free will to infuse our imaginations with whatever brain candy we desire.

Here’s a basic list for some light inspiration:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/datablog/2011/mar/14/information-beautiful-books-read-100#zoomed-picture

Anyway, my intention was not to vent pet peeves but to publicise Kites’ latest show.  Unfortunately, I fear I have created many enemies during this bigoted outburst.

If you don’t yet hate me please come and watch Kites perform at the Underbelly on Hoxton Square this Saturday. 

Be advised: those who clutch copies of Twilight will be turned away at the door.

This is a joke by the way.  Or is it?

Episode 1 - The Voyage of The James Caird

Kites - Video Blog

Episode 1

'The Voyage of The James Caird'

The Folly of Conceit

A Dedicated Follower Of Death: a tale of mindless stupidity

I write this entry as a witless nincompoop, unworthy of sympathy or misguided admiration. This is a confessional story and all those who lampoon me for the events I shall presently narrate are right to do so.

Last week I boarded a train at Farringdon station in central London. As I fumbled in my inside breast pocket for my entangled headphones, I put so much strain on my overcoat that the top button came free of the lapel. I looked on aghast as my dislodged button first tumbled onto the platform and then dropped onto the tracks.

I fear that the more astute among you will be able to predict what I did next. Crouching down on my belly, I proceeded to flay my arms impotently towards the errant button that had settled between two sleepers and was now far beyond the reach of my T-Rex-like arms. Thankfully, before I could make anymore woefully futile rescue attempts, a tube roared into the station and forced me to admit defeat.

At this juncture, most rational human beings would have gone home, shouted at their lovers, and momentarily wept at their own carelessness. The rest would have scheduled a visit to their local haberdashery. But not Matthew Phillips. I returned home only to formulate a strategy that would rectify this gross personal injustice. Crafting an implement out of a wooden pole and a tea-spoon, I could barely contain my own sense of petty pride as I caressed my new invention.

I know what you all must be thinking. What kind of petulant chump goes to so much trouble for a button? Escapees of Colditz Castle would have viewed my creation as an ingenious shovel that could be easily dismantled into innocent crockery the moment a guard approached. But no, I’m ashamed to say that I clearly had no such cause to justify the existence of my home-made gadget.

Anyway, let me get back to my tedious anecdote. When I returned to Farringdon the next day, all that stood between me and my button was a piece of metal and 660 volts of electricity. Being the idiot that I have already demonstrated, you will not be surprised to learn that I refused to acknowledge this fact. Once I had waited for a sufficient interval between two approaching trains, I extracted my button with a skill and dexterity that would baffle anyone who knows me. Although surgeons and detectives alike would have delighted in my untapped talent, their offers of employment would have quickly rescinded when they discovered what triviality had sparked my sudden gift.

If I thought, for one naive nano-second, that my act of indiscretion had gone unnoticed, I was wrong. As I hastily made to exit the terminus, I was soundly tapped on the shoulder by an unimpressed tube attendant who’d seen the whole sordid thing on CCTV. I looked up at her like a guilty schoolboy and gulped nervously when she exclaimed:

"You risked life and limb for a button?"

At that very moment, I suddenly grasped the absurdity of my situation. There I was, clutching a button in one hand and a child’s incarnation of Gandalf’s staff in the other. I looked ridiculous and I have the photo evidence to prove it. All I could do was mumble an apology and slump home with a posture reminiscent of the Hunchback of Notre Dame. I felt no enormous sense of well-being after my little triumph. I felt unspeakably foolish. 

Don’t try this at home kids.

PS: Did I mention that the button was plastic?