Ladytron - Live at The Stiff Kitten, Belfast

If they had been around back in the early 1980s, Ladytron would have been the kind of band you would have fallen in love with on watching them perform their latest hit on Top of the Pops, sandwiched between The Human League and Adam and the Ants.

With their infectious blend of electro-pop and fuzzy post-punk, Ladytron exist in the tradition of those few bands that are best characterised by a string of glittering and perfect pop singles. It’s therefore a shame that none of their songs have so far been able to make any significant impact on the pop charts.

Looking as if they had been styled by a Teutonic Mary Quant, Mira Aroyo and Helen Marnie appeared on the Stiff Kitten stage like parallel universe versions of Agnetha Fältskog and Anni-Frid Lyngstad. The hausfrau image sat perfectly alongside the bubbling electronics and squalling guitar. The on-stage roving spotlight that settled on one band member before gliding away to gaze on another cemented the Nuremberg-chic.

We were informed that Mira had broken her ankle that morning, and so remained seated at her keyboard, looking at times as if she was weeping. There would be no blank-faced, Abba-esque back-to-back singing then, which is how I imagined Ladytron would present themselves to a live audience.

Opening with Black Cat the set list mainly concentrated on songs from the last two albums, including Ghosts, Season of Illusions, High Rise, Soft Power, International Dateline, Seventeen and current single, Runaway. The four-members of the band were supplemented by two others, including a live drummer, who provided added punch to the sequenced percussion. At times, the vocals seemed too far back in the mix and much of the top-end sounds were lost amid the thundering bass. It was as if My Bloody Valentine had descended on the sound desk.

Fighting in Built up Areas, with Mira intoning in Bulgarian and Helen on breathy backing vocals, demanded to be immortalised in a stylish horror film, in much the same way that Bauhaus had electrified the opening scenes of Tony Scott’s The Hunger. The spotlight was replaced by a flickering strobe, which sparkled like a million flashbulbs over the attentive audience.

Due, I imagine, to the broken ankle, there was no encore. The performance ended with Ladytron’s best-known single, Destroy Everything You Touch. It’s the sort of song that should have gone to number one and stayed there for weeks; yet, in a world where Top of the Pops has been replaced by the mucky horrors of X-factor song contests, such crimes are to be expected.

Advertising Standards Authority vs Free Presbyterian Church

The Advertising Standards Authority has this week ruled that The Belfast News Letter was in breach of The Committee of Advertising Practice Code Clause 5.1 in publishing a full-page advertisement from Sandown Free Presbyterian Church.

The advertisement, published on 1st August 2008 and headlined 'The Word of God Against Sodomy' was timed to coincide with Belfast's annual gay pride festival and parade. It voiced its disapproval of homosexuality in typical Biblical vitriol.

Seven people complained to the ASA, who initially recommended that the complaints should not be upheld, although noted that a final decision would be taken by its Council.

The Council this week ruled out any consideration that the News Letter or Sandown Free Presbyterian Church acted to incite hatred but instead upheld complaints on the basis of CAP Code Clause 5.1, which notes that "Marketing communications should contain nothing that is likely to cause serious or widespread offence," and "Particular care should be taken to avoid causing offence on the grounds of race, religion, sex, sexual orientation or disability."

Commenting on the advertisement, Sandown Free Presbyterian Church quoted "God's truth," to mask its homophobia, while the Belfast News Letter noted it felt it appropriate "to express relevant views surrounding the issue, despite the fact that those views may be abhorrent to some," and that a refusal to publish the advertisement would have been "an infringement of freedom of expression on a matter of public interest."

The ASA has recommended that the advert should not appear again in its current form. The ASA has also informed Sandown Free Presbyterian Church to "take more care in future," to avoid causing offence and advised the church to seek a view from the CAP Copy Advice team before publishing future marketing material.

Since the ASA doesn't impose fines and holds no direct powers of legal censure, it seems likely that the Free Presbyterian Church will take little notice of its ruling. However CAP Code 61.8 notes that persistent offenders may be required to have some or all of their marketing communications vetted by the CAP Copy Advice team until the ASA and CAP are satisfied that future communications will comply with the Code.

CAP Code 61.10 goes further. It notes that if marketing communications continue to appear after the ASA Council has ruled against them, the ASA can refer the matter to The Office for Fair Trading for action under the Consumer Protection from Unfair Trading Regulations 2008 and the Business Protection from Misleading Marketing Regulations 2008. The OFT can seek an undertaking that the marketing will be stopped from anyone responsible for commissioning, preparing or disseminating it. If that is not given or is not honoured, the OFT can seek an injunction from the Court to prevent its further appearance. Anyone not complying can be found to be in contempt of court and is liable to be penalised accordingly.

This suggests that any further homophobic pamphleteering by Sandown Free Presbyterian Church could be directed back to the ASA, with the possibility of the church ending up in court.

At the very least, a warning shot has been fired. However, one wonders what happened to all those complaints to the police earlier this year, regarding Iris Robinson MLA's outspoken views on lesbian and gay people.

I recently attended a performance of DV8 Physical Theatre's 'To Be Straight With You' at London's National Theatre. During one scene, Robinson's homophobic ranting was played to barn-yard music, while performers in animal heads trotted around the stage. The audience hooted with laughter at the narrow provincialism described by the piece.

Such provincialism is the preserve of the Belfast News Letter. A newspaper of integrity would not have carried such an offensive full-page advertisement. Rather than engage in any significant journalism, the Belfast News Letter colludes with the rhetoric of fundamentalist loathing and echoes the spirit of a faded empire. I see nothing within the pages of that newspaper to convince me otherwise, although I hope it sees fit to print a full-page apology in one of this week's editions, along with a copy of the ASA's final adjudication.

To access the text of the full-page advertisement, as it appeared in the Belfast News Letter, click the image above.

Moron Moments - Corn Market Upgrade

The modernisation work on Belfast city centre's tired pavements is well underway. In the main, the results are impressive.

Yet, I'm surprised that no one thought to relocate the electricity box that stood beside the old bandstand in Corn Market.

Now that the bandstand is gone, the electricity box stands alone and incongrous in the middle of Corn Market, at the approach to the new Victoria Centre.

It would appear that amid the hysteria that surrounded the development of Belfast's flagship shopping centre, someone forgot about the little details.

Lou Reed's Berlin - Belfast Waterfront Hall

The last time I went to the Waterfront Hall in Belfast, I was greeted by a very lacklustre effort from Sinead O’Connor. Although I had higher hopes for Lou Reed, who brought his Berlin tour to the venue last night, I left disappointed by an average performance and bewildered by the audience’s hysterical reaction.

My main gripe was Reed’s tendency to sing the songs according to whatever lyrical phrasing that pleases him. Okay, they’re his songs and he can do what he likes with them, but I’d have preferred them to sound more like they do on the record. Surely that’s the point of presenting an album in its totality, live on stage. Reed’s delivery is generally conversational but I thought his ambling, talking style ruined The Kids and Caroline Says II.

The Berlin album runs for just under fifty minutes. Reed and his band compensated for this by ensuring the closing bars of nearly every song repeated over and over, while Reed and his guitarist engaged in over-bloated guitar jamming.

The mood improved towards the close of the album. The Bed and Sad Song translated beautifully and Reed sang in time to the music, although the refrain of the latter song seemed to go on for an age.

The encore consisted of near-unrecognisable versions of Rock and Roll and Satellite of Love. Reed’s boredom must have been complete by this point, as he didn’t even bother singing most of the words, leaving these duties to his bass player, backing singer and child-choir. Unfortunately, the final song The Power of the Heart was marred by Reed’s guitar sounding distinctly out of tune with the rest of the band, although Reed seemed aware of this, judging by his perplexed scrutiny of said guitar as he continued to play.

It seems standing ovations are commonplace in the Waterfront Hall. Like O’Connor last month, Reed’s audience was quickly on its feet and clapping like mad. Maybe they were on strong drugs, or something. The people in the row in front of me were waving their arms and whooping. I didn’t quite get it, although the sight of middle aged men dancing in the aisle and supplicating themselves, hands outstretched to their hero was somewhat bemusing.

Maybe I was just spoilt by an excellent Leonard Cohen performance in Dublin the week before.

Two Minutes Hate - Iris Robinson

On looking at pictures of the DUP's new ministerial team, I was reminded of Gore Vidal’s assertion that “Politics is show-business for ugly people.” Never has such a horror-show image assailed my eyes.

Absent from said pictures is MP MLA Iris Robinson, who has recently exhibited herself as ugliest of all, with her uncompromising views on lesbian and gay people.

It all started last week, when Mrs Robinson appeared on BBC’s Nolan radio show to praise the efforts of one-time moral crusader, Mary Whitehouse. It wasn’t long before she connected with the DUP homophobic mainframe and used her Christian beliefs to attack the morals – or lack thereof – of lesbian and gay people, although Mrs Robinson used the rather outmoded term, ‘homosexual.’ She spoke with a kind of smug superiority and even chuckled, as if she was sharing a joke.

There was nothing sophisticated or socially responsible about Mrs Robinson’s comments or tone. She seemed unaware of the impact of her words and denied she was fueling the sort of violence that was visited on Stephen Scott, a 27 year-old gay man who was attacked in Newtownabbey the previous evening.

She noted: “I have a lovely psychiatrist who works with me in my offices. I have met people who have turned around and become heterosexual, so it does work. This is a long process. The gentleman, who is a psychiatrist, but more importantly is a born again Christian, has links right across the world. I’m happy to pass on any names to him!”

The “lovely psychiatrist,” is Dr Paul Miller, an honorary clinical lecturer at Queen's University Belfast and senior health advisor to Mrs Robinson. He also came onto the Nolan show to talk about how he was able to turn gays straight. He said he felt compelled to undertake such work after one of his patients, who was struggling with his sexuality, died by suicide. This statement was delivered without insight or irony.

Dr Miller’s views have since been dismissed by the Royal Society of Psychiatrists, whose statement noted: "Such treatments do not work and can actually cause quite a lot of harm. Homosexuality is a state and a sexual orientation and is not a question of behaviour."

You would think that would be the end of the affair, but Mrs Robinson was not to be gagged. A couple of days later, she reappeared on the Nolan show to continue her tirade against lesbian and gay people. One notable exchange focussed on the Oxford English Dictionary's definition of the word ‘Abomination’:

Nolan: Do you think, for example, that homosexuality is disgusting?

Robinson: Absolutely.

Nolan: Do you think that homosexuality should be loathed?

Robinson: Absolutely.

Nolan: Do you think it is right for people to have a physical disgust towards homosexuality?

Robinson: Absolutely.

Nolan: Does it make you nauseous?

Robinson: Yes.

Nolan: Do you think that it is something that is shamefully wicked and vile?

Robinson: Yes, of course it is. It’s an abomination.

Mrs Robinson is now under investigation by the PSNI, following complaints.

You would think that would bring the matter to a close. Not so. Mrs Robinson reappeared soon after, and equated gays with murderers:

"Just as a murderer can be redeemed by the blood of Christ, so can a homosexual. And that’s the message and it’s the word of God and if anyone takes issue they are taking issue with the word of God."

There have been cries from many quarters for Mrs Robinson to apologise, which she refuses to do, and to resign from her post as chair of the Assembly Health Committee. There’s even a Make Iris Robinson History campaign on Bebo.

It will be interesting to see if police action is forthcoming. Article 9 of the Public Order (NI) Order 1987, notes:

"A person who uses threatening, abusive or insulting words or behaviour, or displays any written material which is threatening, abusive or insulting, is guilty of an offence if :

• (a) he intends thereby to stir up hatred or arouse fear; or
• (b) having regard to all the circumstances hatred is likely to be stirred up or fear is likely to be aroused thereby."

Whatever happens, I can’t help but feel that Mrs Robinson’s current media profile may be related to her husband’s elevation to the post of First Minister of the Northern Ireland Assembly last week. She either has a strong competitive streak and seeks to claim her own place in the limelight, or wishes to somehow undermine her husband’s recent achievement.

However, in considering the religious fundamentalism of Mrs Robinson and her followers, I’m reminded of a speech about the Party’s sexual puritanism, in George Orwell’s 1984:

“Sexual privation induced hysteria, which was desirable because it could be transformed into war-fever and leader-worship… There was a direct intimate connection between chastity and political orthodoxy. For how could the fear, the hatred and the lunatic credulity which the Party needed in its members be kept at the right pitch, except by bottling down some powerful instinct and using it as a driving force?”

Sinead O'Connor vs The Ulster Orchestra

I wasn’t a fan of Sinead O’Connor before going to see her performance at Belfast’s Waterfront Hall on Monday night, but I was prepared to be won over. After all, the union of a seasoned artist of some notoriety with the Ulster Orchestra would surely be something special. Sadly, it wasn’t.

The orchestra performed splendidly in reinterpreting a selection of O’Connor’s songs. The only problem was the singer herself. For the entire performance, she remained moored within a three-foot radius at one end of the stage, shuffling lazily back and forth with no attempt at communication with the audience. Such was her detachment, that I felt she might as well have situated herself behind one of those plastic noise-reduction screens that stood across the stage.

Towards the end of the performance, O'Connor stated she hadn’t talked because this wasn’t just her gig, but everyone’s. Yeah, but we came to see you Sinead, even if it was for free. Maybe you have to pay to get a glimpse of the energy that tore up the Pope’s picture, riled against imperialism and converted to the priesthood. You could be forgiven for thinking an impostor had been wheeled on stage. At one point, I couldn’t work out if O’Connor was nervous, bewildered, bored or embarrassed. Maybe, she was all of these things.

As for that voice… Well, where was it? She whispered her way through Don’t Cry For Me Argentina and croaked through Nothing Compares 2 U with the occasional yelp echoing former glories.

Yet, perhaps as a testament to O’Connor’s lack of prowess, both these songs were the strongest of the set. The Emperor’s New Clothes seemed to act as an unwitting sub-title to the tone of the evening. Her own material seemed to just amble along, although the reggae influenced Lamb’s Book of Life acted to lift the torpor towards the end of the set. I couldn’t believe she got a standing ovation. I remained firmly rooted in my seat.

“Oh, but she’s all grown up now and has three or four kids,” said an equally nonplussed friend afterwards, seeking to excuse Sinead’s lack of vitality.

Yeah, but so has Madonna, and she was writhing away like a mad thing on the TV the other night.

That’s entertainment!

In The Penal Colony

Last night, BBC Northern Ireland exceeded its usual banal standards and served up a programme entitled 'NI WAGs'.

Narrated by a worryingly over-enthusiastic Christine Bleakley, we were presented with Northern Ireland’s WAGs. WAG is shorthand for Wives And Girlfriends and is a term normally attributed to the android-like empty-heads wedded to premier league footballers. In the Northern Irish sphere, I wasn’t quite sure who these WAGs were associated with, although a couple of lump-faced dopes in fashionable clothes were paraded across the screen to stamp these twittering fools with some sort of questionable credibility.

This peek at the aristocracy of emptiness was delivered without irony and with the apparent aim of showing just how transformed, glam and cosmopolitan the Wee Province has become. I found myself wishing the war would come back as one vapid empty vessel after another squeaked about the importance of hair or style as they shopped on the Lisburn Road, which was laughably described as both “Millionaire’s Mile,” and “Northern Ireland’s Bond Street.” Who were they trying to kid?

“I’ve got shoes in Hollywood and shoes in Dublin,” gushed one of the WAGs in a chiding mill voice.

“A girl’s gotta do what a girl’s gotta do,” cheeped another rather ordinary-looking twit. Referring to an associate, she continued, “Lisa has everything. She’s totally high maintenance!”

The camera crew, obviously burdened with more money than sense, followed the faux creatures on a shopping trip to Las Vegas and back to a dull looking awards ceremony at Belfast’s Café Vaudeville. Here was the pinnacle of local WAG life.

“Anyone who’s anyone in Northern Ireland is here tonight,” gasped the breathless Christine Bleakley as the camera roved over a parade of dressed-up nobodies.

I was reminded of Kafka’s In the Penal Colony where criminals are assaulted by a horrendous torture machine that carves the names of their crimes and sentences onto their backs. I feel that such a device should be permanently installed in Café Vaudeville, with the WAGs the first to be thrown onto it, followed by the production team at Waddell Media, who birthed this vile programme, and the shallow dolts at BBC Northern Ireland, who think this kind of nonsense passes for good TV.

Squintergate

Strange, censorious things have been afoot in the publishing houses of West Belfast this week. I’m reminded of an episode of Doctor Who, where a villainous fiend travelled back in time to rewrite history, so that what you think you remembered never actually happened.

It all started with the recent death of Frank ‘Bap’ McGreevy, a former republican activist who was terrorised and killed by children outside his Lower Falls home. Soon afterwards, The usually loyal Andersonstown News published a harsh attack on Sinn Fein and Gerry Adams in particular, blaming him for failing to take any responsibility for the lawless state of a constituency where much of his electorate live in fear of anti-social elements. The author of the piece, Squinter (AKA Andersonstown News editor, Robin Livingstone) asserted that Adams had failed as a leader and dismissed Sinn Fein as having abandoned the people of the lower Falls “who now fear the night a million times more than they ever feared the Brits or the loyalists.” Strong words.

The article was repeated on Squinter’s website, but don’t go looking for it as it has mysteriously disappeared. And if you take a look at this week’s Andersonstown News, you’ll notice that Squinter’s weekly column has also disappeared.

It would appear that Squinter touched a nerve in vocalising what many in West Belfast have been talking about in private. Instead of treating the matter with any degree of seriousness, Gerry Adams issued a rather wet complaint in which he outlined his disapproval at the tone and timing of the piece before attempting to rally his community to act as one to help secure jobs and make the Falls a better place to live.

The Andersonstown News replied with a sycophantic apology, which is all the more bizarre in that the author of the article in question issued it. Thus, Mr Livingstone has demonstrated himself to be a journalist of little worth, while illustrating that the Andersonstown News is nothing other than a propaganda sheet for Sinn Fein. So much for free speech. It appears that the party once censored by government is now quite happy to censor any voice of dissent emerging from within its former fan base.

Thankfully, Squinter’s article has been preserved over on Slugger O’Toole. However, the dissenting comments from West Belfast residents, which accompanied its original online version, have been wiped away forever. They made interesting reading. One came from a Sinn Fein activist, embarrassed by the truths contained in Squinter’s missive. Another reinterpreted Bobby Sand’s quote “Our revenge will be the laughter of our children,” as an ironic statement on the wayward youth of the lower Falls. Many scorned Sinn Fein for abandoning the likes of Ross Road, the site of Mr McGreevy’s death, for their holiday homes in Donegal.

In publishing his attack on Adams, Squinter had given permission for those in West Belfast who have had enough of Sinn Fein to speak out, which is what makes the disappearance of the article and all accompanying comments, deeply sinister. It’s like locking the stable door after the horse has bolted. Stalin would be proud.

As if to add insult to injury, the headline sitting aside Adam’s complaint on the front page of this week’s Andersonstown News cries: “We Want Bap’s Home Levelled.” It would appear that it’s not enough to blame the police, the Housing Executive, Uncle Tom Cobbley and all. You see, it was the flat that was to blame for all this nonsense and to demolish it will ensure that all anti-social behaviour will also vanish.

There’s a picture of MLA Fra McCann, with a stern faced companion. She’s wearing Reebok and glares at the camera, as if willing the very site of the murder out of existence. Only then will the whitewash be complete, for there will be nothing to remind us that anything actually happened.

Such is the nature of the distraction wheeled out by the party machine as the cracks begin to appear across its once-confident façade.

Pop Britannia

According to Episode Three of BBC4’s Pop Britannia, which I managed to endure most of last night, it was the glamour of Adam Ant and Visage’s Fade to Grey that heralded the arrival of the New Wave scene of the early 1980s.

Perhaps producer Ben Whalley failed to notice that prior to Adam and the Ants’ first chart hit in 1980 and Fade to Grey reaching top-ten status the following year, a whole raft of talent had already laid claim to the post punk scene, although the likes of Depeche Mode, Japan, Ultravox, The Associates and Simple Minds failed to get a mention.

Instead, we got the same weary and well-worn checklist of received wisdom, which this programme acted to reinforce. It went something like this: Glam rock. Check. Rick Wakeman is rubbish. Check. Sex Pistols. Check. Duran Duran on a boat. Check. Frankie gets banned. Check, etc.

Even when trumpeting the ‘British Invasion of America’ in the early 1980s, Soft Cell’s Tainted Love – which topped the charts in 17 countries and stayed in the US charts for a record breaking 43 weeks – was nowhere to be seen. Gary Numan, who was a couple of years ahead of Visage, with Are Friends Electric and Cars – was also absent.

Suddenly, we were transported to the mid-eighties, but we got Mel and Kim instead of The Smiths and The Cure. I managed to switch over, while Thatcher’s poster-boy, Pete Waterman was in mid-flow and before the clichéd Blur vs. Oasis Brit-Pop snooze-a-thon appeared.

Speaking of the series, Whalley said: “The BBC, due to its unique position, is perhaps one of the few places in the world that can attempt to create content of this scope.”

This roughly translates as: “We’ve got all the footage and we can string it together any way we please, to make another facile, dumbed-down clip show to go out on Friday night.”

John Luke Mural Mentioned in Assembly

While looking through the Northern Ireland Assembly's Written Answers to Questions of Friday 30 November 2007, I noticed that the matter of Belfast's lost John Luke Mural made a welcome appearance.

Nelson McCausland MLA asked the Minister for Employment and Learning to provide the date the John Luke Mural was removed from the Belfast Institute of Further and Higher Education complex at Millfield and the current location and ownership of the mural.

The minister, Sir Reg Empey MLA replied: "The John Luke Mural was removed from the Belfast Metropolitan College’s Millfield site on 2 February 2003. It is owned by John Eastwood and Sons Ltd and is currently in storage at Walter Graham Haulage Ltd, Airport Road West, Belfast."

Mr McCausland's motive in raising this issue is unclear. The Great Wee Azoo awaits developments with interest.

The story of how the famous mural fell into private hands can be found here.

Enormous Turnip Awards - Clapham Junction

Clapham Junction, written by Kevin Elyot and broadcast last night on Channel 4 as part of it's Gay Season, should perhaps have been subtitled 'One Ring to Bind Them All' since its narrative centred around the meanderings of a civil partnership wedding band through the lives of a group of gay men in London.

The opening scene indicated that we were to be presented with something very different to what gay drama had offered up in the past. Delivered entirely without irony, it saw a TV commissioner rejecting a gay-themed script because he felt the whole "gay thing" had passed its sell-by date. If only Mr Elyot had listened to his scripted avowal. Rather than illuminating the prevalence of homophobic violence in today's society, Clapham Junction laid bare the writer's internal homophobia. What followed had little to say about the lives of gay men in 2007.

The gay lives portrayed here were, for the most part, brutish and without redemption. Sexual couplings were drug-fuelled, violent and often took place in public toilets, where heads were banged off walls and cocks thrust through cubical partitions. We had the usual array of queer stereotypes, including the married man who gets a bit in the toilets on the way home from work, the self-loathing psycho who loves his Nan but commits acts of random violence against other gay men, the frustrated schoolboy and the alcohol-swigging predator, who can't keep it in his pants, even on his wedding - sorry, civil partnership - day. And most startling of all, there was a man who was "inside for interfering with youngsters." Quite what a paedophile was doing in a drama which announced itself to be the story of 36 hours in the lives of a group of gay men is anyone's guess. Lesbian characters were wholly absent.

"I like the Third Reich," said the 14 year-old history student, as he made sexual approaches to the sex offender, conjuring up hackneyed images of merry queers in Nazi uniforms, mincing about to Liza Minnelli records. "Perhaps we enjoy sniffing around in dark places," said another character at an oh-so-polite, middle class dinner party which vainly attempted to contextualise the queer zeitgeist in a stream of clumsy dialogue.

Later, one of the awfully polite women at said dinner party goes all funny because the sex offender lives close to her. She's so affronted that she has to run home lest the vile paedo interferes with her son. Rushing to her son's room, she discovers he's gone. But what's this she sees across the street? It's her boy, framed in the sulphurous light emanating from the window of the paedo's lair. She rushes over and an unlikely confrontation ensues. Meanwhile, our cute-faced psycho gets a taste of his own violence and ends up trying to touch up the gay doctor, even though he's stretched out, bashed and bloody, on a hospital stretcher. Wouldn't you? You see, the doctor notices that the psycho has The Ring, which actually belongs to the doctor's partner, who gave the ring to the waiter after he had sex with him. The waiter then got murdered on the common and was discovered by the psycho, who had actually met him earlier in a club. They all lined up and with a big heave-ho, the enormous turnip was pulled up out of the ground.

Clapham Junction was TV drama trapped in a self-loathing, 1980s timewarp. It was like witnessing a piece of right-wing propaganda emerge from a parallel universe where Russell T. Davies' Queer as Folk, with all of its pathos and exuberance, never happened.

Clapham Junction, step up to the podium and accept your turnip.

Bad Art - Kieran Doherty Wall

Oh, my eyes! Just look at this thing I discovered on a gable wall in West Belfast.

It's not exactly a mural but a painting on boards, which have been joined together and framed.

The subject of this art atrocity is republican hunger striker, Kieran Doherty, who died in 1981 after 73 days without food.

I've no idea who the 'artist' of this piece is, but he or she should be stopped from inflicting such art crimes on the general public.

I'm particularly taken with Mr Doherty's mutant arms, one of which reaches forward to rest awkwardly on his leg while the other hangs limp, as if broken. Observe the breast pocket and those little creases on the right sleeve and bellow with laughter.

Public art should surely do something to lift the tone of an area and imbue its residents with a sense of community pride and identity. This dreadfully inept painting just makes me want to turn my gaze away to hide my embarrassment.

Somebody, please take it down and get an artist who actually knows how to paint to design a replacement.

Bad Art - Johnny Adair Book Cover

While walking through Easons the other day, my eyes were assailed by this laughably posed image of Johnny Adair on the cover of a book about him.





















The book, 'Mad Dog' is ghostwritten by a Scottish News of the World journalist and is published by John Blake Publishing. A blurb on the back cover announces that Johnny is "Dedicated to achieving lasting peace." Quite.

I would suggest that John Blake Publishing is guilty of elevating this horrendous creature to the status of vapid celebrity with this ludicrous image. Its crass composition and lack of subtlety plumbs the depths of celebrity porn. What's worse is that its placement among equally irrelevant books by Victoria Beckham, Jordan and Jeremy Clarkson reframes the crimes of Adair as subjects of mindless gossip to be unit-shifted to equally mindless consumers.

'Mad Dog' will either end up in the bargain bin or be turned into a film, with Adair as its script editor. We are surely living in the End of Days.

The Dismal Twelfth

During yesterday's TV broadcasts, BBC Northern Ireland seemed to be doing its best to dress up the annual Belfast Twelfth of July parade as a fun-filled carnival. Presenters, Joe McKee and Clifford Smyth wittered inanely as fat, tattooed, corner boys swung their drums and beer bellies along the wet Belfast streets to the whining strain of flutes. Lord Mayor, Jim Rogers was there, spouting delusional rhetoric about how Catholics and ethnic minority people could enjoy the parade. As if to underline his foolishness, the Ulster Special Constabulary Lodge marched by.

The Ulster Defence Regiment was also represented. One banner displayed an army checkpoint. Others showed images of churches and unionist political leaders and announced their adherents as 'Bible and Crown Defenders' from various regions. Vans draped in union flags crawled by, sheltering geriatrics. "There's a great atmosphere here," said Clifford Smyth, attempting to convince himself that his trite comments had any bearing on reality.

Impartial BBC reporter, Helen Mark, talked to bystanders about how it's all wonderful for Northern Ireland. A DUP counsellor spoke of the parade as one of Europe's best folk festivals. Tourists from various nations were paraded before the camera to impart positive sound-bytes, although this tactic backfired somewhat when a man from Slovakia said that it all reminded him of the communist parades of his youth.

To listen to the voice of the BBC, you could be forgiven for thinking that the whole spectacle was akin to a Notting Hill style knees-up. All rational and objective analysis went out the window.

It was much the same over on UTV where, amid last year's recycled, cost-cutting graphics, tourists were similarly thrust before cameras and children danced on bouncy castles. "What's really nice is that for the first time in Hollywood, King Billy is leading the parade," said the announcer as a portly gentleman in a wig and period dress perched himself atop a white horse.

Back on BBC One, Sarah Travers strutted out onto a virtual, techno-set to preside over a montage of lobotomised reportage. The tone was jovial, light-hearted and filled with cliche.

"At times it seemed more like Glastonbury," said one BBC commentator, as the camera roved across a field hosting predictable, political speeches from the backs of lorries while church bands played from beneath rain-blasted tents. Here is a world where balding, municipal officials, draped in sashes, mouth Biblical platitudes while women with bad haircuts make the sandwiches and praise The Lord.

At the heart of this empty spectacle, the Orange Order was reconfigured as a family-friendly, tourist interest with the local, broadcast media as its unquestioning cheerleaders. The emperor wasn't wearing any clothes but no one on TV was prepared to admit it.

Comparing Pavements

I'm just back from an excursion to the Iberian Peninsula and I've brought back some lovely pictures of the pavements of Portugal and Spain.

Cast your eyes at the well-maintained pavements below and compare them to the dreadful pavements of Belfast city centre.

First, the Spanish and Portuguese pavements:




















Now, brace yourself for an assault by the Belfast pavements:




















I gather plans are afoot to regenerate Belfast city centre. Whether the money will be used to give these disgraceful pavements a much-needed makeover remains to be seen.

Pavement Hieroglyphs

Strange, multi-coloured hieroglyphs have appeared on the streets of downtown Belfast.

Most of this street-art is centred around the Ugliest Street in Belfast, making me wonder if the ugliest street is about to get a whole lot uglier.

As I photographed the offending graffiti, I noticed that many of the brick pavements have been further marred by fresh fillings of black tarmac. Such is the policy of the Northern Ireland Roads Service.

I'm unable to decipher the meaning behind the pavement scrawlings, but since many are grouped around manhole covers and other street furniture, I'm speculating that Roads Service is about to dig things up and fill in the resulting holes with more unsightly tarmac.

However, I'm prepared to be proved wrong. Perhaps Roads Service has seen the errors of its penny-pinching ways and is about to embark on a major pavement improvement scheme.

The Great Wee Azoo will keep you updated.

Bog Meadows and Baby Graves

On Sunday, I went for a trip to the Bog Meadows Nature Reserve, the largest stretch of untamed marshland in Belfast and home to much wildlife. The site is managed by the Ulster Wildlife Trust and is the recipient of a UNESCO award.

Had UNESCO visited at the weekend, it might have been disappointed by the apparent lack of conservation assigned to the area. I counted at least five shopping trolleys, either cast into the canals or dumped amid the foam upholstery of a discarded chair and the rusted frame of a old bicycle. A possible sixth shopping trolley seemed to have biodegraded into the wet earth, with only a single remaining wheel betraying its presence.

There was something upsetting at witnessing a mother duck and her cute brood of ducklings attempting to negotiate their way around an array of detritus dumped in the stream.

Things were no better down at the pond. Signs which once provided information on the habitat had been torn away. A man and two children were throwing bread to the wildfowl, while drinking from fizzy drinks cans. Once the picnic was finished, the cans and associated rubbish were thrown into the reeds to join the other litter dumped there.

I went looking for the bird hide, which was advertised on a map of the area but I couldn't find it. Eventually, I meandered into a stretch of mucky forest before tumbling over a fence into the baby graves of Milltown Cemetery.

The baby graves, displaying stone teddy bears, sleeping angels and faded flowers, looked like the kinds of graves children might design for themselves, if they had the chance. They are small and bright and clustered together beneath the knotted weeds at the most salient edge of the Cemetery.

Although I'm not an expert on the history of Catholic burial, I'm aware that the church forbade babies who were stillborn or who died prior to baptism a place in their Heaven - or to put it in church lingo, the babies were denied communion with the Beatific Vision. Instead they were interred in unconsecrated ground and condemned to inhabit the Limbo of Children, a kind of netherworld between Heaven and Hell.

On examining the gravestones in the plot, I couldn't see one that extended beyond 1979. Many were dated in the 1950s and 1960s. I've since discovered that it was 1970 before the church introduced a funeral rite for unbaptised infants and 1992 before the Catechism of the Catholic Church noted that babies who died unbaptised might still be saved.

However, on 20 April 2007, the Catholic Church's International Theological Commission published a document entitled "The Hope of Salvation for Infants Who Die Without Being Baptised", which notes that the Limbo of Children remains a "Possible theological opinion," but indicates there are "Serious theological and liturgical grounds for hope that unbaptised infants who die will be saved and enjoy the Beatific Vision." It also states that "These are reasons for prayerful hope, rather than grounds for sure knowledge," and concludes: "It must be clearly acknowledged that the church does not have sure knowledge about the salvation of unbaptised infants who die."

It must also be acknowledged that publications issued by the International Theological Commission are not recognised as authoritative church teaching. The musings contained in the document suggest that the Catholic Church doesn't really believe in Limbo but isn't going to officially endorse its banning or issue any apology to the parents of generations of dead babies. Such is the compassion of the Vatican.

In researching this post, I came across this article which tells the story of eighty year old Mary Salmon from Letterfrack, Co. Galway, who, in 1994, finally witnessed the Catholic Church blessing her two dead children and many others, who were refused a Christian burial sixty years ago.

Speaking of the stillbirth of her children, Mrs Salmon said: "I didn't even get to see the baby. My husband had the child in a little box and took it to the seashore two miles away. Then I lost another baby and it was buried there as well. Hundreds of babies are buried here. We were told they were in Limbo and could not be let into consecrated ground."

Mrs Salmon has raised a memorial stone to all of the dead children buried in the unconsecrated plot at Letterfrack. Her actions are not unprecedented. In opposition to the church, John Tohill, once Bishop of Down and Connor, who died in 1914, chose to be buried in the unconsecrated plot at Milltown Cemetery, so that the blessings bestowed on him would extend to the entire plot.

More recently at Milltown, the Catholic Church has erected a rather ugly monument to na leanaí (the children) although there's no information display to indicate the reason for this structure's existence. It's even surrounded by a metal cage, probably to deter teenage drinkers from inhabiting the space, although said drinkers couldn't do any worse damage to the memory of the dead babies than the damage already done by the Catholic Church.

By the way, I eventually found the bird hide, although it was hidden behind a locked gate at the other end of the cemetery.

Separated at Birth - Chaney and Dodds

Northwin and PFI in Northern Ireland

On examining the impact of the Private Finance Initiative in Northern Ireland, it becomes clear that one consortium towers above all others: Northwin.

The Northwin Consortium comprises some of Northern Ireland's leading construction companies, including Farrans Limited, Braidwater Enterprises Limited and John Graham (Dromore) Limited. It has been involved in the construction of a number of educational facilities in Northern Ireland.

In Belfast, Northwin was involved in the construction and operation of Wellington College and Balmoral High School. These projects cost around £18m.

Wellington College was originally to be a thirty-six acre site but ended up with only eleven acres. The rest of the land was used by Northwin to build 350 houses, which they then sold at a large profit.

Speaking at the launch of the Wellington Square housing development in June 2002, Sir Reg Empey, representing Belfast City Council, said:

"The Council have been encouraging redevelopment of existing land within Belfast, which helps to reduce traffic difficulties on approach roads and continues the reinvigoration of the city.”

However, once the tenants took possession of their new properties, they discovered that their bedrooms were not as big as they should have been. An advertising brochure noted the rooms should have measured 10' 2" x 8' 7", instead of the existing 8' 8" x 8' 7" - a difference in excess of 12 square feet.

Northwin was fined under the Property Misdescriptions Act 1991, after admitting falsely describing the size of the bedrooms.

On 21 May 2002, a month prior to Sir Reg’s ringing endorsement of the Northwin’s scheme, Monica McWilliams MLA, addressed the Northern Ireland Assembly:

“To date, my experience of public-private partnerships has not been healthy. I want to give an example of something that occurred in my constituency, South Belfast. There were rugby and hockey pitches on the site of Wellington College. Northwin Ltd moved in to develop the site. I understand that the school was built on a much smaller scale than was initially thought to be required, leaving no room for expansion. The development benefited from public land. I attended a public inquiry at which those responsible for planning control were in dispute with the Department of Education over what should have happened to that public land. As we all know, developers win such disputes. What was a piece of green land and open space is now gone.”

Yet the warning signs had been flagged up years before, in the Northern Ireland Forum for Political Dialogue report: ‘The Implications of Public/Private Partnerships for Education Services in Northern Ireland’ (5 December 1997). It noted:

“Third party revenue proposals could involve conflicts of interest over incompatible alternative uses of spare school lands or facilities. Both Wellington College, Belfast and the North West Institute, Londonderry have valuable surplus lands which could be developed for non-educational purposes. The public sector needs to be sure that the true value of surplus assets is reflected in the level of repayments so that a fair share of the benefits goes to the public purse. Commercial attractiveness will lead to “cherry picking” of school projects and the danger of skewing development away from education priorities and running foul of the government’s own policies on equity.”

The Belfast Education and Library Board (BELB) should have paid heed to that report. It might have avoided the PFI disaster associated with Balmoral High School.

In 2000, the BELB signed a PFI agreement with Northwin to construct a new building for Balmoral High School.

However, the completed building was twice the size than that which was required. The school began to witness dwindling enrolment figures and ended up only 40% full.

Yet under the PFI deal, the BELB is contractually obliged to keep making payments to Northwin for the next twenty years. The consortium has already been paid between £800,000 and £850,000 per year for the provision of Balmoral High School and has received land worth £3.28m as part of the PFI deal.

The BELB has decided that closing the school in August 2007 is its best option.

In 2004, the Audit Office examined five early PFI projects for schools and colleges in Northern Ireland and noted that almost all of them were of a lower design quality than schools built through the traditional public funding route.

On 24 April 2001, Price Waterhouse Coopers (PWC) presented a written analysis of the use of public/private partnerships to the Committee for Finance and Personnel. The report notes:

“There are also many misconceptions associated with Public Private Partnerships. It is important that misconceptions are identified, defined and overcome so that Public Private Partnerships become an accepted and standard form of public procurement… There has been very little use of the Private Finance Initiative in the water and sewerage, roads and public transport sectors. However, there is a need for substantial capital investment in these sectors, and international experience suggests that projects in these sectors are suited to the Public Private Partnership approach.”

With the restoration of the Northern Ireland Assembly, one anticipates that the new Committee for Finance and Personnel may well reach for PPP/PFI as a solution to the postponed water rates. Doubtless, Northwin will be waiting in the wings.

John Luke Mural Falls into Private Hands

In July 2000, the Belfast Institute of Further and Higher Education (BIFHE) signed a contract with Northwin Limited, to enable Northwin to provide a replacement college building on the old Millfield campus site.

The project would cost around £20m.

The Northwin Consortium is the leading educational Private Finance Initiative provider in Northern Ireland and comprises some of Northern Ireland's leading construction companies, including Farrans Limited, Braidwater Enterprises Limited and John Graham (Dromore) Limited.

After the old college buildings were demolished, all that stood on the site was a single section of wall, 9 x 6 meters, heavily wrapped in protective coverings. It eventually disappeared and work began on building the replacement college.

The new campus became operational in September 2002, with Graham Facilities Management providing the on-site catering, cleaning, porterage, security and the day nursery in addition to building and engineering maintenance over the next 25 years.

I often wondered what became of that last remaining section of wall at the old college site. Painted on it was a mural depicting Belfast’s industrial past, by celebrated local artist, John Luke (1906 – 1975). Luke began work on the mural in 1961 and worked on it intermittently for ten years, but never finished it.

Although known as a traditional easel-painter, Luke turned to mural painting in 1950 when he was commissioned to paint a mural in Belfast City Hall to mark the 1951 Festival of Britain. Another mural by Luke can be found in Rosemary Street Masonic Hall.

Under a Freedom of Information request, I contacted BIFHE to inquire after the mural and discovered that the Institute made an application to the Heritage Lottery Fund for £44,500 funding to remove the mural from the old Millfield site and donate it to the Ulster Folk and Transport Museum. However, according to BIFHE, the Ulster Folk and Transport Museum was unable to give any guarantees about when the mural might be placed on public display (a condition for funding imposed by the Heritage Lottery Fund) and the funding was withdrawn in February 2007.

Meanwhile, John Eastwood and Sons Ltd stepped into the picture and claimed the mural under a salvage clause in a demolition contract they had with Northwin. BIFHE initially defended Eastwood’s legal challenge. However, following protracted negotiations and legal advice the institute reluctantly conceded ownership.

The mural, once a public asset and part of Belfast's artistic heritage, is thought to be worth around £250,000 in the right location. I've no information on who was responsible for allowing the mural to fall into private hands, or if anyone at BIFHE was disciplined over the matter.

BIFHE is currently in discussions with Northwin on a project involving the replacement of existing accommodation at campuses in Brunswick Street and College Square East. The capital value is approximately £42 million.

Image: The Old Callan Bridge, Armagh 1945 by John Luke