tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-51769507844815404592024-02-23T05:44:29.547+13:00JetsamJet Simianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00393803864740299439noreply@blogger.comBlogger507125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5176950784481540459.post-18787819289362440082023-12-25T06:00:00.081+13:002023-12-25T06:00:00.126+13:00Merry X-Mash Everybody<p> The season of Yule has come around for us all in the Monkeyhouse - and Y'all out there, too. We hope you're able to celebrate it with people and animal friends you love and that you have a cracker or two throughout the day.</p><p>Christmas is, of course, the classic mash-up. its origins in several European pagan festivals, usurped by the Christians, moulded into many of its modern trappings by the Victorians - both British and Germanic thanks to Victoria and Albert, and then the new world of the United States and then and then... there's folklore, Christian and Jewish elements and a jolly good old dose of commercial salts through it these days. You get the drift. It's become its own weird thing, forever winter wherever you are, a compulsory feast and with familiar trappings rooted in obscure saints, unnamed angels and a bioluminescent reindeer borrowed from a novelty 45.</p><p>So this year's Xmas delivery is a mashup.</p><p>There are plenty to choose from. I like a good mashup, and really dig Bill McLintock's inventive blends of unlikely bedfellows (<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3MRx4LpYbQ4">Huey Lewis and Metallica</a>, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YEfIRWf6Zlc">Donna Summer and Ozzy Osbourne</a>, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hLNjVvJAiCw">Deep Purple and the BeeGees</a>.) This year's solstice combo brings Bon Scott's AC/DC into the world of Peggy Lee with <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bM10A86drpI">Dirty Deeds Around the Christmas Tree</a>. It's fine, it's fun... but it's not really all that Christmassy until Peg get to join in, naturally. So I've looked farther afield.</p><p>And what did I spy, making his way through the snow like some weird English King bossing a peasant to fetch him firewood, but DJ Cummerbund combining Billy Idol (I'm interested already), Jose Feliciano (...okay...), Rob Zombie and er, Rush. Sure, he also interrupts proceedings with a Christmas message but LEAVE DJ CUMMERBUND ALONE AND LET HIM DO HIS TRUMPET SOLO - HE WORKED HARD ON THIS. JEEZ!</p><p>It's <i>Feliz Navidad</i> as you may never hear it again. Enjoy:</p><p><iframe allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/WR6fJRwIo_U?si=cl01LSWTe7v8F1y5" title="YouTube video player" width="560"></iframe><br /></p><p><br /></p>Jet Simianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00393803864740299439noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5176950784481540459.post-28424385075522889802023-10-31T22:18:00.000+13:002023-10-31T22:18:17.588+13:00Pumped Up Kicks<p> Halloween seems to approach with ever increasing speed these days - although being in the Southern half of the globe, the attendant threat of winter's chill and non-renewal of Summer's lease is reversed. Pumpkin time means more of the day's golden orb in the summer to come.</p><p>That's quite enough romanticism, folks, because it distresses me to report that the price for your actual crown pumpkin these days is an eye-watering $18 - a clear tenner more than back in the day, not so long ago. And so, the Wizard of Austerity demanded a more modest offering a smaller, buttercup pumpkin - green-skinned Bogie is our model of the year:</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhM1qDllX6objHwiNZmC3WX7K4zFnUlgz4keELdloltBJFP0TtIhF2yAjNCNpaXkNxdbEMz6tvCjtXK9NhUFw9xVWJWNZ3hovHXRsfMXUUN1NI-h_70gV1JTJyJUbBrr3SYZO2q052C2FRZzLIVluDuLgGc4lj9hyTH_WCW8kEklWCDwcuuSZ0QpnYD7LQ/s4032/IMG_E2468%5B1%5D.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhM1qDllX6objHwiNZmC3WX7K4zFnUlgz4keELdloltBJFP0TtIhF2yAjNCNpaXkNxdbEMz6tvCjtXK9NhUFw9xVWJWNZ3hovHXRsfMXUUN1NI-h_70gV1JTJyJUbBrr3SYZO2q052C2FRZzLIVluDuLgGc4lj9hyTH_WCW8kEklWCDwcuuSZ0QpnYD7LQ/s320/IMG_E2468%5B1%5D.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><br /><p>The flesh of the buttercup is a little more powdery but darker and sweeter. It might make for an interesting curry, but Bogie's gift to us was a really interesting pumpkin nacho bowl - it goes nicely with cumin, garlic and feta, with lime crisps of course. Here's looking at you, Bogie. And rest assured, seeds have been planted for 2024. Green and grey ones. Happy Halloween, friends.</p>Jet Simianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00393803864740299439noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5176950784481540459.post-17621341245481161422023-09-11T14:43:00.005+12:002023-09-12T17:12:13.737+12:00A Load of old Tosche<p> When I was a nipper and watched that <i>Star Wars </i>the character I identified with most readily was Luke Skywalker. He had blonde hair like me (at the time) and a strong sense of moral justice. "It's not fair" he'd plead, pleasingly for a hero destined to be The One. As years went by I finally switched onto his brunette mate, who had the lines, the charm, the spaceship, the gun-slinging skills, the bravado, the hairier friend and got the girl in the end - although knowing how that turned out you can forgive young "Wormy" for dodging that particular competition.<br /><br />Where I did still identify with young Master Luke is in his interest in Tosche Station, where the power converters come from. My eye was always drawn to the background. The sky, the liver-coloured mountains of Tatooine, the strange fluting and Morse Code-like lighting or whatever they were behind Moff Tarkin's meeting on the Death Star, the grimy walls of the trash compactor, the endless stars, and the sky again. That blue, seemingly endless expanse that promised so much but hemmed Luke in. Against that the promise of Anchorhead and Tosche Station did sound exotic and interesting. Whatever could it be like?</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiULvZ4QVfs62kIMcD-m_B-T4u6W1HH9vqyDNQzAOld0Wj5rJsfHTZQU1gDPKI-tGTXfsnk2YfjE-jJmwtxN8YWYLKv5YbFyp2-rETji4P_40pV5RRiKDgr3vdBd3ZbSO6wAKBU_CV_7oYlOrycoR7ovon396JiESuuKRKV4XSzGS9szYjaXFBPezQ9" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="342" data-original-width="600" height="182" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiULvZ4QVfs62kIMcD-m_B-T4u6W1HH9vqyDNQzAOld0Wj5rJsfHTZQU1gDPKI-tGTXfsnk2YfjE-jJmwtxN8YWYLKv5YbFyp2-rETji4P_40pV5RRiKDgr3vdBd3ZbSO6wAKBU_CV_7oYlOrycoR7ovon396JiESuuKRKV4XSzGS9szYjaXFBPezQ9" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">Turns out, much more of the same. Another set in Tunisia (I knew that much about the location even back in the day, despite me calling Luke's home planet "Tattoonie" for probably a good year). We get to see the location, meet some of Luke's friends (well, Biggs we meet again later, the rest are perhaps more fairweather chums) and learn that young Skywalker has a nickname! That didn't last</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEimxsHond2dK1_aULO-HiQMpqXrbAYlNSVqs-tdM0LJIP9jN31289VmRNRxvzdi5Qutjahdxk2XSlHKe8dMsPYTBeO3o5WQDHQa5hR4stjcmRBHTbeZ8Lp4l8AIsRv1BwQ-ItPk-MBtmHJwbXTgunTo_uS6PTtwJRhLlk234wtKtQEVHu0kqBUcBNka" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="197" data-original-width="456" height="138" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEimxsHond2dK1_aULO-HiQMpqXrbAYlNSVqs-tdM0LJIP9jN31289VmRNRxvzdi5Qutjahdxk2XSlHKe8dMsPYTBeO3o5WQDHQa5hR4stjcmRBHTbeZ8Lp4l8AIsRv1BwQ-ItPk-MBtmHJwbXTgunTo_uS6PTtwJRhLlk234wtKtQEVHu0kqBUcBNka" width="320" /></a></div><p>Perhaps the scene is too long and in the wrong place, but I love it for its blue sky, new scenery, worldbuilding (we finally meet those friends Uncle Owen griped about!) and a bit more of gauche Luke before the whole Rebellion and later Jedi-dom proves such a buzzkill. And Biggs has a sweet space-cape. </p><p>So far, no reinstatement, despite upwards of four revisions of the original by Lucasfilm. Nor any clean-ups or restorations - this scene is D.E.D ded, I guess. Except for fans; so among the considerable number of remounts, remakes and repairs, here's something that blends the missing from the might-have-been to bide us over. Now, about those power converters...<br /><iframe allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/BBp6PEHV_MU?si=lrRkB4vIWavZzT-w" title="YouTube video player" width="560"></iframe></p><br /><br /><p></p>Jet Simianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00393803864740299439noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5176950784481540459.post-71096174583815155702023-09-06T21:01:00.001+12:002023-09-10T22:18:42.010+12:00A Call to [Needles in] Arms<p><b> 'Defence Against Invasion'</b> (Jack King, 1943)</p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgkOzru1wMLXMjNKjue-83x7HFneRZ0316UdeoeBnVZzMdRlN1U3Xh-S0J9LgUMvHZel7i_RZ4ZwUkRwWs1jiy_jFUKc-eMnSaTLvmKBlxTChMQk8KvkKRKiM6MDU4eWLsVyyxoj6qQmKWRrbtgpJXOqsRQwtSeqG18L7a18xsPTZJ8Znninw9bfVVMcwI/s764/DefenceAgainstInvasion.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="764" data-original-width="518" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgkOzru1wMLXMjNKjue-83x7HFneRZ0316UdeoeBnVZzMdRlN1U3Xh-S0J9LgUMvHZel7i_RZ4ZwUkRwWs1jiy_jFUKc-eMnSaTLvmKBlxTChMQk8KvkKRKiM6MDU4eWLsVyyxoj6qQmKWRrbtgpJXOqsRQwtSeqG18L7a18xsPTZJ8Znninw9bfVVMcwI/s320/DefenceAgainstInvasion.JPG" width="217" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Not anatomically correct: Disney's vintage vax reel</td></tr></tbody></table><br />My mention this week of Grieg's 'In The Hall of the Mountain King'has made me try to think of where I may have heard the music beforehand. I know it didn't appear on the double Classical Music LP that my parents owned and which I'd listen to for hours as a young Simian, so perhaps it was at school? In an assembly hall, darkened with blackout curtains for the Very Serious Business of health education?<br /><br /><i>Defense Against Invasion</i> was one of a small handful of educational films I and my class were subjected to in Intermediate years, alongside one or two <i>I am Joe's</i>, surely, and one particularly horrifying one about a fire breaking out in a hospital laundry. It was British, of course. <i>DIA</i> was not British, nor horrifying, but it was gripping, and it made a big impression on me, being cheered on when it came up for a repeat viewing some months later. I've looked for it under an abbreviated title for years, and finally found it. never knew it was Disney - makes sense now. never knew it was THAT old - although content-wise there's some sense to that, too. <div><br /></div><div>So what is <i>Defense Against Invasion</i>? Why, a short film about vaccination, employing the metaphor of the human body in a war-footing to bolster its, well, defences against infection. Or contagion. It's a bit murky, but just go with it. Because it's a charming little slice of wartime Americana, a sort of <i>Why We Fight</i> set in a doctor's surgery, and then in an imagined bloodstream and body styled in a 1940s Fleisher-like complex resembling a city with roads, bridges, factories (you have to have factories) and defensive ramparts. The heroes of the story are red blood cells (er...), and their horrific enemy "bacteria" (um...) taking ghastly arachnid form and animated superbly with near featureless fluidity. Ooh they're awful - massing in vast number, dividing and increasing appalling surety. It's only the introduction of a weaker strain of foe that readies our plucky red shirts to WAR, to boost their armoury, increase their arsenal, and knock this enemy from their borders with ruthless readiness. It's stirring stuff, and given the year is 1943, the parallels couldn't have been more obvious to a child of my age back then - whereas in the early 80s it seemed quaint, but still a little unsettling. <br /><br />So here it is in its short glory. I found it and played in on our telly, bringing Mrs Simian into the room knocked sideways by the reawakening of a very dim memory. Because like good antibiotic resistance, it does stay with you.</div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div> <br /><br /><p><br /></p><p> </p></div><iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/ICnSpLsiDzI?si=P5wHExQ52N_Dkf1E" title="YouTube video player" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" allowfullscreen></iframe>Jet Simianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00393803864740299439noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5176950784481540459.post-30589955584377388812023-09-05T21:01:00.001+12:002023-09-10T22:19:04.209+12:00In the Thrall of the Mountain KIng<p> Substitute teachers - where do they come from? Where do they go? What's their story?</p><p>In my school years I endured a small number of substitute teachers - usually one-offs, but some lasted a little bit longer. In fact, in my fourth form year in particular, it's probably fairer to say they endured <i>us</i>, precocious little brats that we were. I don't remember many of them now, but one struck a chord with me.</p><p>I was in the third form, Year Zero for my <i>Dungeons and Dragons</i> experience, and my knowledge of the game and its fantastic worlds is new to me - still developing with every impression and suggestion that I encounter. It's a time I find myself drawn back to increasingly, before the codification and regulation by the rulebooks, magazines and artwork I'd encounter not long afterwards. But at this time there was none of that; my imagination was in the driver's seat, my mind was open, and my senses were alert to this fantastic new world and something - <i>anything </i>that would feed it further.</p><p>Mr R was a local part-time teacher, and we had him for a day - maybe two, tops. What subject he covered I don't know, but the subject he brought to us on one of those days was fantastical - music and literature in Grieg's <i>Peer Gynt</i> and in particular its most famous and fantastic chapter <i>The Hall of the Mountain King.</i></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjHCUJDry2v2FiXMJDwR2oP0X7XV6C0rEmJ0UawuVaBwdE6x-lnHKvN1fJfojHoJgfoe5zQXoJMgnUeiwt8oTmgH_TWdGJ04e4JhduYLUKGWv0GR4CC1xubr1fYjcAbFhVbU13lecmNnP1ohB-4xaLyksD3iYcaOI0dZH2qcvFi8VOc_BXixn0hG-osZmU/s480/Hall%20Mountain%20King.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="360" data-original-width="480" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjHCUJDry2v2FiXMJDwR2oP0X7XV6C0rEmJ0UawuVaBwdE6x-lnHKvN1fJfojHoJgfoe5zQXoJMgnUeiwt8oTmgH_TWdGJ04e4JhduYLUKGWv0GR4CC1xubr1fYjcAbFhVbU13lecmNnP1ohB-4xaLyksD3iYcaOI0dZH2qcvFi8VOc_BXixn0hG-osZmU/s320/Hall%20Mountain%20King.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><i><br /></i><p></p><p>Edvard Grieg's building, thunderous piece is well known enough - I was sure to have heard it before that day, but I wasn't aware of its story, which our sub dutifully filled in, of the hero Gynt and his wandering into the titular hall to be discovered by the monstrous gathering attending the great Mountain King within. There were even lyrics - we were challenged to find the "Slay Him! Hack Him!" in the one-two of the finale, and, hands splayed as if casting long fingers of firelit shadow against cave walls, our teacher roused us to picture the scene as the music played. Well, it worked for me at least.I was there, in that Hall, running for my life mere months before any would-be hero I could conceive in a roleplaying game would get the chance to.<br /><br />I met Mr R a few weeks later in the local library while I was photocopying the fold-out maps from some hardback Tolkiens, destined to be stuck together an displayed on my wall. The end of the year was coming, and with it my first proper foray. I don't remember much of our conversation, but I do recall him looking over my evening's work and encouraging me to continue using my imagination, perhaps to make stories of my own. And so I did, to the best of my ability. Stories with ogres and caves and bellowing hordes lurking in stone catacombs with great shadows hunched and grasping behind them. Vast, brutal and sluglike chiefs at their head, ordering nasty ends to any interlopers in his domain. They were basic ideas, soon to be overwritten by 'authoritative' and 'official' creature descriptions and depictions, but their primal origins haven't been forgotten. They're still be best versions of those monsters, for me</p><p><i><br /></i></p>Jet Simianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00393803864740299439noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5176950784481540459.post-89574052354930680832023-09-04T06:49:00.006+12:002023-09-04T06:50:32.420+12:00The Primal Screen<p> A couple of days ago I posted this photo from 1938, curious for its incongruity to me. In the foreground, a row of council workmen mowing the municipal lawns of Oamaru's Severn Street, scythes at the ready or already being put to use. In the background, the familiar arch of the portico of The Majestic Theatre, the town's only cinema for as long as I lived there. The lawns endure, but a different manner of traffic now breezes up the hill in the middle distance, the oaks have increased their girth, and the Majestic has long since shut off its projector amps, turning into an Elim Church.</p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgwMsLn-60Z_HgsfVoe2Tcr_R-JiwLNrfN_ZET7ShNSElH0lCiIIsiBBGiaLz25IPeGHvtt2IsIr7eJFvX2iJl4UHrKZwJxry8Q9c1lMYw5Cbc8I5rLjglxPv92DzRlslY9OfNHuTpzwihFwmMAtIs1A3nRQPV9lciBzKP0x3U5J0juwEbetzOxCuuFrI8/s1153/Majestic%2086.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="853" data-original-width="1153" height="237" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgwMsLn-60Z_HgsfVoe2Tcr_R-JiwLNrfN_ZET7ShNSElH0lCiIIsiBBGiaLz25IPeGHvtt2IsIr7eJFvX2iJl4UHrKZwJxry8Q9c1lMYw5Cbc8I5rLjglxPv92DzRlslY9OfNHuTpzwihFwmMAtIs1A3nRQPV9lciBzKP0x3U5J0juwEbetzOxCuuFrI8/s320/Majestic%2086.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">"She may not look like much, kid, (etc) The Majestic 1985-86</td></tr></tbody></table><br /><p>There have been several attempts to bring the flicks back to Oamaru - and currently there is indeed a theatre in the main street. But I'm sure I'm not alone on my generation and those before who miss the old theatre, modest as it was, with its front foyer, two-tier seating and single screen. From a rerun of <i>Dumbo</i> to Tim Burton's <i>Batman</i> it was, bar one or two holiday visitations, the only movie theatre I knew, and the one in which I thrilled to animated Disney classics, was traumatised by the likes of <i>Watership Down</i>, <i>The Black Hole</i> and <i>The Mouse and his Child</i> (yes indeedy) got turned away weeks before my 13th birthday attempting (rather weakly) to get past the front door to see <i>Blade Runner</i>, hooted with my friends to the brilliant near-mid 80s run of <i>Ghostbusters</i>, <i>Gremlins</i> and <i>Back to the Future</i>, was blown away by <i>Star Wars</i> and <i>The Terminator</i>, and, of course, saw in my first proper date - the details of which can stay in my memory, thankyou very much.</p><p>As do many of the details of the theatre insides. I wish I could remember more , even as it does occasionally appear in my dreams, its back wall and screen strangely open to the blinding outside world, into which we would surely emerge from a reliably good matinee. You'd hope it was good, being from my end of town, as the bike ride there and back was at least forty minutes either way. Like much of my childhood and teenage entertainment, some planning was required. That, of course, was one of the essentials of the experience, confirmed by at least one instance of me mowing my nan's front lawn and mutely witnessing a troupe of schoolfriends wheeling their way past, surely (definitely) to see <i>Flash Gordon</i>. At that age moviegoing was a purely social experience to be recounted the next school day, so that was that. No videos, to VHS boom for a few years of course, and <i>no toilet breaks</i>. You never timed those well.<br /><br />it was, of course, video that killed the local cinema's star. The not-small number of choices on offer, the possibility of two - even three movies to watch in an evening, then rewind and watch again. The power of the pause button... a Pentecostal fate seemed the only salvation to our beleaguered movie house, and so it was. <br /><br />Ah, but they burn into your mind, those early projections, and if I could borrow a time machine I'd surely take a trip to 2pm on a Saturday afternoon and pay a visit to those dim aisles on squeaky crocodile-jawed chairs. And I'd be faithful and true - staying seated right through to the end, bladder be damned. Or at least the intermission.<br /><br /></p>Jet Simianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00393803864740299439noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5176950784481540459.post-4895791382327927722023-09-03T20:36:00.003+12:002023-09-03T20:36:26.518+12:00Second Birth<p> Well break out the fancy glasses and hold the ice - guess what's finally coming to the party?<br /><br />Yes, thirty-six years late is better than never, for The Chills' <i>Brave Words</i> remaster - long dreamed for by its chief architect, is finally being realised in a matter of weeks.<br /><br />I have a long attachment to this album; bought two years after its release, it was one of a few of avid purchases (most of them from the Flying Nun stable) that paved the way to my leaving home and second identity as a 'Scarfie', a 'muso', and a fan. Even then, reading in interviews the disappointment of Martin Phillipps in the production and engineering of the band's first full album, I was pretty happy with my lot. Sure, the sound is muffled and distant, coming across as though recorded beneath a duvet - but so what? The Dunedin Sound was never known for its high fidelity, and this muted, compressed version issuing from my turntable was the perfect soundtrack to what I expected and got in the southern city - damp, dim, disconsolate and dreaming of better things. Little wonder The Chills were the ideal I latched onto in my own musical efforts for a year or so.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhqFNesvv0nU73zWW8YeqhbOaqG80E4DflUuf29kc6VMIpctILHXYySK2diGDlvpt3PMXmzNdtJASGWJcFJl1qZEkBqNZRUNfW5-n1VX0dVqvs-Zj1WdLA7NWTPJiDksMyQykbwIawZLbtUFHzOzTF8Y4ufeXc9rNVc-v5aQK4ZAgE-Wft8KZZhl9Gv-jk/s316/ChillsBravewords.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="316" data-original-width="316" height="316" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhqFNesvv0nU73zWW8YeqhbOaqG80E4DflUuf29kc6VMIpctILHXYySK2diGDlvpt3PMXmzNdtJASGWJcFJl1qZEkBqNZRUNfW5-n1VX0dVqvs-Zj1WdLA7NWTPJiDksMyQykbwIawZLbtUFHzOzTF8Y4ufeXc9rNVc-v5aQK4ZAgE-Wft8KZZhl9Gv-jk/s1600/ChillsBravewords.jpg" width="316" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Still, Phillipps was insistent, and critics agreed; Mayo Thompson's production lacked the sparkle of The Chills live, and what I'd taken for hushed intimacy was read as lacking the immediacy of the real thing. Years passed, the band and its leader grew older, changed and courted several untimely demises - and then this, and something of a return to form, critical reappraisal, National Treasure status, and... </div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjrL77w82CJZ56KwU2v7HtUfhXvHd-DG6bTXDt-yYOwcoH9EVK03WFp2FvSxjwAj27IgNq_3gpQ4VwKIatX7xTiBuzBHsJB0DJcc6PI3qaFA5mjpDyqaAWy4IjkW33LI092zeDyJuxf9cS6cGMphz3tB7rJQ0ov2FosEVaa_DO-C7uIKaEpuBuG8ODvRcw/s700/ChillsSpokenBravely.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="700" data-original-width="700" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjrL77w82CJZ56KwU2v7HtUfhXvHd-DG6bTXDt-yYOwcoH9EVK03WFp2FvSxjwAj27IgNq_3gpQ4VwKIatX7xTiBuzBHsJB0DJcc6PI3qaFA5mjpDyqaAWy4IjkW33LI092zeDyJuxf9cS6cGMphz3tB7rJQ0ov2FosEVaa_DO-C7uIKaEpuBuG8ODvRcw/s320/ChillsSpokenBravely.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br /><p>So, next month, then. <i>Spoken Bravely, the Remix </i>promises the original album reinvented, remastered and complemented by a bevy of bonus tracks, including the <i>House With a Hundred Rooms EP</i> (a European release which I never managed to track down) and 'I Think I Thought I'd Nothing Else to Think About', B-Side to 'Wet Blanket', the album's one single. Possibly enough to get me to fork over my readies. But I've also heard the aforementioned B-Side and <i>House</i>'s 'Party In My Heart' and been won over. More to come when the album drops, as the kids say, but I can't wait to hear a refreshed 'Night of Chill Blue' and 'Dark Carnival'. <br /><br />Cheers, Chills.</p><p><br /></p>Jet Simianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00393803864740299439noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5176950784481540459.post-32288613166548098472023-09-01T22:51:00.003+12:002023-09-01T22:52:05.264+12:00The Majestic Levellers<p> File under: Things I Never Thought I'd See From The Old Home Town:<br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgGi_DLPkT2lAcIjasyzkVomzCdc7oywhrzDRGPh6EXbYI86JyFH62t9HScxaan7qVxph8KPkBXbe1H-2uhK_dR57Mgjz7yTe3XdfUErBuHlkVHzltwpNUPCXXXgTirW4BU_6XA7VvH0tnfly_Z5J7phiizYYxFABc3Xi41Qk6xkNNfzrBSrdAdD3fJL3s/s1200/culture_waitaki_100875_0.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="856" data-original-width="1200" height="228" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgGi_DLPkT2lAcIjasyzkVomzCdc7oywhrzDRGPh6EXbYI86JyFH62t9HScxaan7qVxph8KPkBXbe1H-2uhK_dR57Mgjz7yTe3XdfUErBuHlkVHzltwpNUPCXXXgTirW4BU_6XA7VvH0tnfly_Z5J7phiizYYxFABc3Xi41Qk6xkNNfzrBSrdAdD3fJL3s/s320/culture_waitaki_100875_0.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br />Jet Simianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00393803864740299439noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5176950784481540459.post-24359520444773222002023-05-04T22:23:00.001+12:002023-05-04T22:23:12.896+12:00World Warp One! <p> Star Warps Day, everyone - and peace and goodwill to all, man.<br /><br />Now, we All Love Star Warps, but I must confess I'm a bit lazy with my adulation and tend to stick to the OG Seventies threesome. That was until I discovered that there was a PREQUEL TRILOGY shot in the 1950s! "ZOMG!" As that blue robot Zomg always says. </p><p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjvUdk-Aa50pjGLbn-AlVcOwLWKc5yH3O_b5QrxMQVNNlHthM-nQ35FRn66Yt-cvIjewVu6zuv42Zu52NBoxoZxxy3HWjEFhOh0Xf2Wh0bG7lwt7IxnQZkHZGn8WXjWIENn3Kh8wdv4_Htq0kWv_e5LSmLCRKFluaYiCPsdUtD6Iop1bvQZE49LrHb4" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="" data-original-height="1073" data-original-width="829" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjvUdk-Aa50pjGLbn-AlVcOwLWKc5yH3O_b5QrxMQVNNlHthM-nQ35FRn66Yt-cvIjewVu6zuv42Zu52NBoxoZxxy3HWjEFhOh0Xf2Wh0bG7lwt7IxnQZkHZGn8WXjWIENn3Kh8wdv4_Htq0kWv_e5LSmLCRKFluaYiCPsdUtD6Iop1bvQZE49LrHb4" width="185" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">"Zomg!"</td></tr></tbody></table><br />Anyway, where were we? Oh yes, the 1950s. And I have to tell you, Fifties Star Warps is the BEST. taking us twenty or so years back to when Opie Benobie was young and discovered the origin of Luke Sandhater's father Unkind Sandhater, years before he fell for the Darkside of the Warps and became Dark Vapor. </p><p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhrb02KUbWL6MgOkYqdQ5nBu1TPr1G-XxYt3Vt5vB8xUnRXkRVcWvwxcA9SK9_Cblua_Lhp1MYXgzQN1rrIIvsl9HG8VWGw8AwE1_eYypd5Vux5NfzR_i2QqJ9mSxQm8aAlaNwnMyDrW4n2DZJzoq4rmk68G22utQAWAR5Ccw3Bc_Sn_S-Fp4zf0ZM9" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="" data-original-height="171" data-original-width="295" height="185" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhrb02KUbWL6MgOkYqdQ5nBu1TPr1G-XxYt3Vt5vB8xUnRXkRVcWvwxcA9SK9_Cblua_Lhp1MYXgzQN1rrIIvsl9HG8VWGw8AwE1_eYypd5Vux5NfzR_i2QqJ9mSxQm8aAlaNwnMyDrW4n2DZJzoq4rmk68G22utQAWAR5Ccw3Bc_Sn_S-Fp4zf0ZM9" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">"It's coarse and gets everywhere - it's all Opie-One's fault!"</td></tr></tbody></table></p><br /> Fifties Star Warps is great because even though it's a new story with different things, you're never far from the great Warps characters of the future - like Yoder, See-thru Peyote (C-thru PO), and his diminutive robot chum Artie Detour (RTD-tour) - old, but new, but old again. It's quite something. <br /><br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhc2PcsvJRfrxXkXvAf02BVpf1jyI4bvBmaI8hve5Q6Yul5f62lLA0bkOszMwTzvdZu32Kq-C6aNyzsTZAglGcnOZ7XDOJP_eM3C3GscuyOgb227_v-I0VVpiflMxOCEDQF3A-kw0thgKemDJUyw-FQDTgR_Iig9-cX4OHQJN5s2iAieSYQwLRPb2IP" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="" data-original-height="600" data-original-width="435" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhc2PcsvJRfrxXkXvAf02BVpf1jyI4bvBmaI8hve5Q6Yul5f62lLA0bkOszMwTzvdZu32Kq-C6aNyzsTZAglGcnOZ7XDOJP_eM3C3GscuyOgb227_v-I0VVpiflMxOCEDQF3A-kw0thgKemDJUyw-FQDTgR_Iig9-cX4OHQJN5s2iAieSYQwLRPb2IP" width="174" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">"Blibdoolpoolp!"<br /></td></tr></tbody></table><p></p><p>But it's the new characters that we remember now, like the Emporio's goon, Dark Moll<br /><br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgejoB993ZNFnL-3sLCSLhQRCfytTdms_nc47pALF2CYUBZDejKBCrdUQg-3s8uyeHmnVdPACkOjADHaFWjfGmHBzBOcMLxttFWa7Jh2usPJFom1iIaLeN_VeCpdyBIgU9hM3X0bvmbXIWjvoWmxbhCMMIdEyvgnib6PtVDMLZ30V-D20g6XlV_eKx0" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="323" data-original-width="460" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgejoB993ZNFnL-3sLCSLhQRCfytTdms_nc47pALF2CYUBZDejKBCrdUQg-3s8uyeHmnVdPACkOjADHaFWjfGmHBzBOcMLxttFWa7Jh2usPJFom1iIaLeN_VeCpdyBIgU9hM3X0bvmbXIWjvoWmxbhCMMIdEyvgnib6PtVDMLZ30V-D20g6XlV_eKx0" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><div style="text-align: left;">and lovable gudgeon Jo-Jo Blinks: </div></div><div><p></p><div style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhWTlY09UDjlg5WsedeBpmP0v6FR0NQ7Nzqauj64x2Ysyi7fgAnUpmzGPAPgkK0phIDe1S7_25cVpAm9lgS932zF5r_mof4654N0R0Hyn4HbyeI8pU1oipB8dMJgBdfUOLPPnfIyj86HTzf4JN9iM3u1o6Qp0lO9ewxXb5fOftowefbIRzAvwUC-UBf" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhWTlY09UDjlg5WsedeBpmP0v6FR0NQ7Nzqauj64x2Ysyi7fgAnUpmzGPAPgkK0phIDe1S7_25cVpAm9lgS932zF5r_mof4654N0R0Hyn4HbyeI8pU1oipB8dMJgBdfUOLPPnfIyj86HTzf4JN9iM3u1o6Qp0lO9ewxXb5fOftowefbIRzAvwUC-UBf" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="" data-original-height="500" data-original-width="500" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhWTlY09UDjlg5WsedeBpmP0v6FR0NQ7Nzqauj64x2Ysyi7fgAnUpmzGPAPgkK0phIDe1S7_25cVpAm9lgS932zF5r_mof4654N0R0Hyn4HbyeI8pU1oipB8dMJgBdfUOLPPnfIyj86HTzf4JN9iM3u1o6Qp0lO9ewxXb5fOftowefbIRzAvwUC-UBf" width="240" /></a></div></div><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">"Me-so good boy!"</td></tr></tbody></table><br /><div>Star Warps. The older, the better!</div>Jet Simianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00393803864740299439noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5176950784481540459.post-58169311007330468852023-01-01T08:55:00.001+13:002023-01-19T19:17:18.021+13:00Fill In<p> It is 2023. Happy new year, reader. Yes, you. And may I say that is quite the shirt you're wearing. A bold choice.</p><p>I have made a resolution, gentle reader. A new years one that involves this blog. And, as you're one if the few left reading it, I'm going to share it with you now. Oh, don't worry, I'm just going to wrap up the blog, that's all.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhDwH4hmqR14CFufStd1bo28vtXzoeroZ1Yxl6geVRNqIA4htizaA15yh5O9Eebhgvp3YRfF09ghH7JvaBjPcwMFM1uLyEhJW_lwlmQrHKsWV6eYyxiycdK2rSzD0s8mHxoF3fqHFyg6uIo4i34nr4Xpm2lRwImut22bAI7Nyp-6-Z5iEPH5p3OXt4E/s384/1579188576973.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="216" data-original-width="384" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhDwH4hmqR14CFufStd1bo28vtXzoeroZ1Yxl6geVRNqIA4htizaA15yh5O9Eebhgvp3YRfF09ghH7JvaBjPcwMFM1uLyEhJW_lwlmQrHKsWV6eYyxiycdK2rSzD0s8mHxoF3fqHFyg6uIo4i34nr4Xpm2lRwImut22bAI7Nyp-6-Z5iEPH5p3OXt4E/s320/1579188576973.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br /><p><br /></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="text-align: left;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="text-align: left;">So, with 12 months and 365 days ahead, let's have some fun. Jetsam is a time machine, often rooted in the past by design, but sometimes sneakily revisionary. A blogger reserves the right to change dates, edit entries and link forwards and backwards in time. As it happens, I have a lot of unfinished monkey business lying around on Jetsam, so the remaining days if this year will be some closure, occasional updates and some new stuff, too. And then, in a years time, we'll be all done. Nice.</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="text-align: left;"><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="text-align: left;">Join me! Let's trash this place. Happy new year.</span></div>Jet Simianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00393803864740299439noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5176950784481540459.post-9653614583953585262022-12-25T07:30:00.001+13:002022-12-25T07:30:00.151+13:00Yule Love Alone Is Not Enough (et cetera)<p>And so to the Day In Question, the main event, the big kahuna. Christmas. </p><p>Let Chaos Reign!</p><p>Christmas is a special time for me. A close to the year, a time for food and family, the stuff of memory building - and, indeed, memory revisiting. Nostalgia feeds our annual year-end feast, whether it's an imagined Victoria experience of snowdrifts, sleigh-bells, and red-breasted robins roasting over a crackling Yule log, or something more intimate and local. For me it's the memory of past family gatherings, the larger Simian whanau coming from Dunedin and Christchurch to share Christmas with us, the rolling maul of big dinners, eked out into leftover cold servings and, yes, barbeques. The last Christmases together, before one or more of us left our home, or left the embrace of our family. I lost a cousin two weeks ago; as one ages, Christmas mingles happy memories and sad, the most bittersweet of anniversaries.</p><p>But to a kid in the Seventies Christmas was huge. Toys, holidays, long summers, trifles and jelly, cousins and play mates. My family's Christmases are an unashamed attempt to recapture some of that for our kids and ourselves. A riot of colour, activity, smells, tastes and noises. You're pooped by the end of it all - eyes glazed with TV specials, belly groaning from rich multiple servings, ears ringing from the long hours and laughter. Enough nostalgia, though. Or... not...?</p><p></p><div style="text-align: center;"><i><span class="style-scope yt-formatted-string" dir="auto" face="Roboto, Arial, sans-serif" style="background: rgb(255, 255, 255); border: 0px; color: #0f0f0f; font-size: 14px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; white-space: pre-wrap;">Christmas day, stuck in the seventies</span></i></div><i><div style="text-align: center;"><i><span class="style-scope yt-formatted-string" dir="auto" face="Roboto, Arial, sans-serif" style="background: rgb(255, 255, 255); border: 0px; color: #0f0f0f; font-size: 14px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; white-space: pre-wrap;">Play all day with your Scalectrics</span></i></div><span class="style-scope yt-formatted-string" dir="auto" face="Roboto, Arial, sans-serif" style="background: rgb(255, 255, 255); border: 0px; color: #0f0f0f; font-size: 14px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><div style="text-align: center;"><i style="background-color: transparent;"><span class="style-scope yt-formatted-string" dir="auto" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; border: 0px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">Oh my god, I got a tomahawk</span></i></div></span><span class="style-scope yt-formatted-string" dir="auto" face="Roboto, Arial, sans-serif" style="background: rgb(255, 255, 255); border: 0px; color: #0f0f0f; font-size: 14px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><div style="text-align: center;"><i style="background-color: transparent;"><span class="style-scope yt-formatted-string" dir="auto" style="background-attachment: initial; background-clip: initial; background-image: initial; background-origin: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-size: initial; border: 0px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">How sweet life can be</span></i></div></span></i><p></p><p>Manic Street Preachers' <i>Send Away the Tigers</i> was an improbable hit. A chart-topper that delivered a righteous hit in Nina Persson duet, but delivered thin servings thereafter. Far from the experimental Lifeblood before it, or the divisive and cut-down double <i>Know Your Enemy</i> before it, <i>Tigers</i> is a wry re-run of past victories and crowd-pleasers, lacking only a needle to push. However, it did delivery some good B-Sides, including this particular burst of UK Christmas nostalgia - an unashamed mash of memberberries. It is, in the words of What Is Music podcast a right banger. </p><p>Best of all for 2022 is Manics re-releasing Know Your Enemy in as close to its original intended form as possible. A real surprise and a Christmas treat to be sure. </p><p>Merry Christmas, Everybody! </p>
<iframe allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/TrLxtUitGTM" title="YouTube video player" width="560"></iframe>Jet Simianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00393803864740299439noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5176950784481540459.post-76173800438966882282022-12-24T20:27:00.002+13:002022-12-24T20:27:32.566+13:00Christmas Eve in the Valleys<p> 'Christmas Eve' by R.S. Turner, music by Manic Street Preachers (2021)</p>
<iframe allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/PtmnGvwRfV0" title="YouTube video player" width="560"></iframe> <div><br /></div><div> It's Christmas Eve in the Monkey House, usually a time of slightly frazzled repose before the perpetual motion machine that is Christmas Morning to Christmas Lunch to Christmas Afternoon (brief pause for the King's Message) and then the likely-to-be-barbequed Christmas Dinner. It's a hectic time, the most ex-haust-ing time of the year, in fact. Christmas Day is the main event; the night before barely gets a word in, much less in songs (unless you happen to be in a New York drunk tank, of course)</div><div><br /></div><div> So spare a thought for this liminal pause, then. The moment of quiet betwixt the end of the Shouting Boxing Day Sale reminders of TV and the internets, and the blinking awakening of The Day in Question. To my mind, the commercialism has dominated Christmas Eve - one last, frantic exhortation of the nation's retailers to us to fill the tills emptied months before in anticipation, and reward the faith months of loss-leading have born witness to.</div><div><br /></div><div>Bah, humbug.</div><div><br /></div><div>And so to noted poetic Grinch, R.S Thomas, whose The Furies was once quoted in the liner notes to fellow countrymen Manic Street Preachers'; melancholic, none-more-Welsh peak This Is My Truth, Tell Me Yours. In the same work Thomas dedicates four short poems to the winter holiday, and it's this one, Christmas Eve, a contemplation of the commercialism of the season with the coming of 'the child' triumphant and soundless, 'like radiation' - brief and full of mystery.</div><div><br /></div><div>The music works, provided as usual by twin composers James Dean Bradfield and Sean Moore, who likely provides the trumpet for this piece. This is not a release proper, but is just a year old, a contribution to Michael Sheen's Christmas Day show for Radio Wales. I like it a lot, and I hope you do, too.</div><div><br /></div><div>More Manic, more Christmas - tomorrow.</div>Jet Simianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00393803864740299439noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5176950784481540459.post-18982545894769348892022-10-31T21:30:00.001+13:002022-10-31T21:30:58.554+13:00Happy Halloween, Punks!<p> It's the most WOUNDERFUL time of the year - Halloween again! And this year the Simian Samhain has taken place a little more quietly, but with the usual guests in tow...</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj8kBCFDS9Nk61H1ypURSB_hBiG9jkqpRjGzTDaP5Yfk5SZikDiotzJDKq_gK9ae5GQKEhsBnAjhssKp3acWt5f6UWp3k489-oisEAOaaRcpzXNosu7gqur8HSletg7IIu2auw7BulgF5Rn4mgsoAXNcbAn-5Q77rLIC9YM2HGnhxG1VyGX1_TqRfTE/s4032/IMG_1728.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj8kBCFDS9Nk61H1ypURSB_hBiG9jkqpRjGzTDaP5Yfk5SZikDiotzJDKq_gK9ae5GQKEhsBnAjhssKp3acWt5f6UWp3k489-oisEAOaaRcpzXNosu7gqur8HSletg7IIu2auw7BulgF5Rn4mgsoAXNcbAn-5Q77rLIC9YM2HGnhxG1VyGX1_TqRfTE/s320/IMG_1728.JPG" width="240" /></a></div><p>Jet Junior is now into his teens, and so the allure of Halloween is a changing thing. No more trick or treating for him, instead the decision tree that is creating the Perfect Halloween Playlist. His tastes are changing - perhaps next year it'll be a proper teenage Halloween Party for him? Who knows? But in the mean-time, father and son have shared yet another Halloween tradition: the designing and carving of the yearly Jack O' Lanterns...</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhv-CWnDXBK0hbd1Dtd2idV88UF8HAhpZYu6eoT1RF0kvlDXFB2YLLpeW-rLV4UA4N0O4uRF20ucs55umETuyqwm1Zx__rX-atclWYBtzVSdwAPJt-RoNI3CSsMX5wpHyqQWP24KFot8Dh32DvPLrttkQuIQ7HIP2IzOuavpwP5_8OPLfvtQ3Y-EaB1/s4032/IMG_1729.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="4032" data-original-width="3024" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhv-CWnDXBK0hbd1Dtd2idV88UF8HAhpZYu6eoT1RF0kvlDXFB2YLLpeW-rLV4UA4N0O4uRF20ucs55umETuyqwm1Zx__rX-atclWYBtzVSdwAPJt-RoNI3CSsMX5wpHyqQWP24KFot8Dh32DvPLrttkQuIQ7HIP2IzOuavpwP5_8OPLfvtQ3Y-EaB1/s320/IMG_1729.JPG" width="240" /></a></div><p>Last year's seeds didn't take in time for April/May, so instead we used the tried and tested garden centre vines on the home pumpkin ladder. I thought we had one good looking fruit survive the season, but when I went to pull out the exhausted vine, another almost perfectly-formed fruit appeared, peeking out from behind some protective lavender. Given the number of ants in the garden it's a Halloween miracle that they made it, made it through the winter in the garage, and through to their de-BOO. </p><p>Introducing Scary and Eerie, designed by me and Jet Jr:</p><p><br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgZmXVS9pkxNJ9lFLURoKkYzZPZielJn69HiSQ3OC51ww_E-mOpr2njdCIQRcDvLue__DU7K7nDqe87xkk1p7pTllcbjyb8fGFRZsUTTmpjExBm5Ti9yzs6twgJAfaVcCdWlskNLuwqvaYEgPfeEYclGZSFTO2AD5G21oUAvae4EqvmlbfkSwrQ9QuR/s3024/IMG_1725.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="3024" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgZmXVS9pkxNJ9lFLURoKkYzZPZielJn69HiSQ3OC51ww_E-mOpr2njdCIQRcDvLue__DU7K7nDqe87xkk1p7pTllcbjyb8fGFRZsUTTmpjExBm5Ti9yzs6twgJAfaVcCdWlskNLuwqvaYEgPfeEYclGZSFTO2AD5G21oUAvae4EqvmlbfkSwrQ9QuR/s320/IMG_1725.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi61qt55ghQZvd7jK_GU9R4-pC17_NE1i6ot_8cd9itppAAejFr4h47eWx2s9Ji6bNbQAqBmaBD8xjUXrNsdMw8csVOJdO0t0qm_H3bT2lXy2nA33z9s3dvLRiUWUnhLc6UhsuWiYd3yjlJmywb4R24yh40FQA7cUBKBB9Ek_D-qcdEfDVeowgM8fHx/s4032/IMG_1727.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3024" data-original-width="4032" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi61qt55ghQZvd7jK_GU9R4-pC17_NE1i6ot_8cd9itppAAejFr4h47eWx2s9Ji6bNbQAqBmaBD8xjUXrNsdMw8csVOJdO0t0qm_H3bT2lXy2nA33z9s3dvLRiUWUnhLc6UhsuWiYd3yjlJmywb4R24yh40FQA7cUBKBB9Ek_D-qcdEfDVeowgM8fHx/s320/IMG_1727.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><br /><p>EVIL- er, I mean Eagle-eyed readers may notice a cold sweat on old Scary. That's because he was first to be carved and spent the night in the cooler (well, the fridge). He's got a candle to keep him warm now, though. They even had some neighbourhood kids visiting and pointing out their toothy maws. Smiles all-round. Job done. </p><p>Happy Halloween, everyone! </p><p><br /></p>Jet Simianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00393803864740299439noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5176950784481540459.post-26390669736386964182022-05-04T06:00:00.002+12:002022-05-04T19:57:52.682+12:00The Empire Runs Back Again!<p> Holy cow - it's the ides of May again? You know what that means - <i>Star Warps</i> Day!</p><p>Usually I do something silly for <i>Star Warps</i> Day and really stick it to the OG Fifties trilogy, but I rarely go past the original <i>Star Warps</i>. It's the one that sticks most in my mind, like the after-image of an exploding Deadstar. </p><p>But you know, in this day and age of steaming Disney+ TV series and movies spun off from the universe and on everyone's lips, like the new prequel trilogy, and <i>El Landolorian</i> and <i>Booger-Bobber Fett</i>, it's easy to forget the second <i>Star Warps</i> movie, the downbeat and complicated <i>The Empire Strikes!</i> So here are some of my favourite images from that one.</p><p>Here's Luke and Layer (left) talking to robot C-thru-PO in the chilly caves of the ice planet Hot:</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj4Gvu-gMwjwYQd4-cti-oxkLjnxaUdW3a0EMCbAH9hnXS6IOIUD4GeXRTI9kf1KOS5SrG-wBCNQiaZPCEFHES6ewzizgacTHH3Ku8bYyZjJ1G5aYhlBbwGLRKClQd09ER6vdzSYcm5HY-mu37qiJFJBbiVuK8nhHW5VpYV44sJ2WeltvgszV6tBUiE/s560/Star%20Warps%2022.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="200" data-original-width="560" height="114" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj4Gvu-gMwjwYQd4-cti-oxkLjnxaUdW3a0EMCbAH9hnXS6IOIUD4GeXRTI9kf1KOS5SrG-wBCNQiaZPCEFHES6ewzizgacTHH3Ku8bYyZjJ1G5aYhlBbwGLRKClQd09ER6vdzSYcm5HY-mu37qiJFJBbiVuK8nhHW5VpYV44sJ2WeltvgszV6tBUiE/s320/Star%20Warps%2022.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br />"I thought you smelled bad <i>outside!</i>"</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">This installment also introduced us to a galaxy of fantastic new locations and characters, like the dashing gambler and mayor of Clown City, Lango. Is he friend or foe? Watch your back, Hank Solo!</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjLItFc9VRaFeb6Qtf8MbYMIcSXFwA-nDvoJ1bbsIW-8ahbkddEBsVudUa0woVEgXu2j2Xv9ODMyNXnKSYs9YDQ1Nl743vfE6TdCRzumw6EwKtX0P__PZYdmPooNBAAAVzwFdH3IVnZ2EuOCQhAbw38jMhXC36lYPrShThAL-ipQMP220b93eJOwkyQ/s480/Star%20Warps%2022-1.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="240" data-original-width="480" height="160" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjLItFc9VRaFeb6Qtf8MbYMIcSXFwA-nDvoJ1bbsIW-8ahbkddEBsVudUa0woVEgXu2j2Xv9ODMyNXnKSYs9YDQ1Nl743vfE6TdCRzumw6EwKtX0P__PZYdmPooNBAAAVzwFdH3IVnZ2EuOCQhAbw38jMhXC36lYPrShThAL-ipQMP220b93eJOwkyQ/s320/Star%20Warps%2022-1.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">"You've got a lot of guts here!"</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Speaking of that roguish Hank, my mind was blown when it was revealed that he was Layer's sister after all (spoilers!), and here he is with Opie "Ken" Benobi and one of the many many glamourous and powerful women of the original <i>Star Warps</i> trilogy, just before he got frozen and taken back to Jabber:</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2YVUiY1JyGCJVrTuK1MAttNIMzrVkrd54doxKOP-5v8ZdAsy2zYwIkBi_qartFjWcfnajPHsYVuqJgkap_C20PRodieHZwpio0adV3GemEurL93j2V2DLp-HeGaZpRFCyTYQtZwtjkgwZbrZlxSZG5zHRKYiruOyaKyQ-76fWofo0cj1ousy_BjAr/s800/Star%20Warps%2022-2.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="483" data-original-width="800" height="193" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2YVUiY1JyGCJVrTuK1MAttNIMzrVkrd54doxKOP-5v8ZdAsy2zYwIkBi_qartFjWcfnajPHsYVuqJgkap_C20PRodieHZwpio0adV3GemEurL93j2V2DLp-HeGaZpRFCyTYQtZwtjkgwZbrZlxSZG5zHRKYiruOyaKyQ-76fWofo0cj1ousy_BjAr/s320/Star%20Warps%2022-2.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">"I love you!" "You know it"</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Happy <i>Star Warps</i> Day! The Warps will be with you. All ways.</div>Jet Simianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00393803864740299439noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5176950784481540459.post-7609669734613629512021-12-25T22:27:00.004+13:002021-12-25T22:27:39.828+13:00A Gnome for Christmas<p> A Northern Hemisphere winter is the popular version in fantasy RPGs and the 'traditional' setting for Christmas. It is a time of snow, darkness and shelter for remote human populations against the figurative and literal wolves of the leanest season. The harvest may be in, and an opportunity for feasting available to mark midwinter's passing, but in all it is a harsh season, and an isolated homestead might appreciate help - any help, from friendly beings.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhnI5Af9gPEGpiZseR9-dFKQ9tEcSESZRr7-m_WvPI-9K4zCVxdoG14WlmTJdhpHKNSPEdNCwDdkMIT5le7QFXBTKwmHqOw7TIxRuKoeiUh2CjjJKLW-ZoUNv_6kjvlAS1Y4wus8ESU4sBhYwi24Ae9cN80WrrlUdyGTpcq79FMXQxibbYOWEcb_Bai=s1219" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1219" data-original-width="894" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhnI5Af9gPEGpiZseR9-dFKQ9tEcSESZRr7-m_WvPI-9K4zCVxdoG14WlmTJdhpHKNSPEdNCwDdkMIT5le7QFXBTKwmHqOw7TIxRuKoeiUh2CjjJKLW-ZoUNv_6kjvlAS1Y4wus8ESU4sBhYwi24Ae9cN80WrrlUdyGTpcq79FMXQxibbYOWEcb_Bai=s320" width="235" /></a></div><p>In Scandinavian folklore this is the Nisse or Tomte, a small humanoid creature who lives alongside countryfolk, helping (usually) invisibly as a quiet labourer, mender, and guardian of the homestead. They are, in that regard, akin to Brownies or Leprechauns, or perhaps the fairy tale elves from The Elves and the Cobbler; to be respected and occasionally appeased (but not flattered) lest that helping hand turn into a harmful one. </p><p>The equation is obviously closer to those aforementioned domestic helpers, but interestingly, by description the Tomte is very close to the Gnome: tall, pointed hat, long beard, very small, and seemingly able to either disappear or blend into the background at will. A useful natural talent to have - perhaps mechanically close to a Thief's Hide in Shadows skill. Might be useful to appropriate . The Tomte also gives the Gnome that essential niche of straddling the worlds of nature and civilisation: domestic without being domesticated, civilised without being a part of human civilisation. </p><p>In the Christmas lore of Scandinavia, the Tomte has been enhanced as a representative of midwinter or, in particular, Christmas. In its male appearance (and they are very usually male) it resembles Santa Claus, and is credited with gift giving, charity and the goodwill of strangers for the harshest season. As capricious as the Tomte or Nisse may be, this can embody much of the civil nature of the Gnome, giving the Gnome an additional 'hook' in his RPG identity - and a sense of time and location in a fantasy human world. </p>Jet Simianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00393803864740299439noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5176950784481540459.post-41643432064105494552021-12-25T07:00:00.068+13:002021-12-25T07:00:00.148+13:00Generation X(mas)<p> There's been a bit of an Idol Renaissance in the Simian household this year, spurred on by a little nostalgia. Jet Jr is about to start high school next year, bringing out all my feels as well as the music I was listening to at the time. That's for another post, but the works of the man born William Broad, plus his lead gunslinger Steve Stevens is on pretty high rotate. That's helped also by a pretty decent return to form this year with some studio TV appearances to boost sales of his new <i>Roadside EP</i>, the first single of which, 'Bitter Taste' I liked a lot.</p><p>Old (Rebel) Yeller Billy Idol has aged well, his voice acquiring a Johnny-Cash-like rumble, and he was always a lover of the classics of rock and roll, so it should be no surprise that he had a Christmas song in him. In fact, he's had several through the years, including the bittersweet family memoir 'Yelling at the Christmas Tree' from 2005 album <i>Devil's Playground</i> - but that has to have been beaten this year with an entire album, ladies and gentlemen, of Christmas standards. Read that list and weep, because the man is committed to the form, and he doesn't disappoint. </p><p>But it's not all covers. This is his (presumably original) 'On Christmas Day', an epic, sweeping statement of redemption and amends, of a family reunited on a specific day dedicated so often to the concept of family. Here's Billy Idol, family man On Christmas Day, born to run wildly back to his 'child' (interpretations open, which is clever) And it's another cracker!</p>
<div><br /></div><iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/wUVON2W8wzo" title="YouTube video player" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe><div><br /></div><div>We can forgive Mr Broad for missing the obvious 'Dancing With My Elf' this time, but he's on notice.</div><div><br /></div><div>Merry Christmas, one and all, and rock on! Have a safe and happy family holiday, whatever and wherever your family may be.</div>Jet Simianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00393803864740299439noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5176950784481540459.post-78870852309804824972021-11-18T21:07:00.016+13:002021-11-21T21:17:37.168+13:00Gnome Detention<p> Gentle reader, I have a rather full dance card for the next week with Real Life(tm) and Other Projects(r) hanging around, so there may be Gnomes posted with not many comments accompanying. Oh, there's plenty more to write, but not the time to put it onscreen just yet. bear with, and I'll be back in a bit with more Gnowledge </p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiDK6e73Et9D8zUecROBMqc79q8kVC-At1Q0WNCI4GSEaxkn1DrqZZERyweB1s20XkBcXLHGDHInHK1i4hbJY8Xk_MF48ZInT5Tw-03pVBoliIIySJZYkkJEWW0s4eTZ1KTkwNL8uSU9aE/s503/gnome_07aweb.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="503" data-original-width="393" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiDK6e73Et9D8zUecROBMqc79q8kVC-At1Q0WNCI4GSEaxkn1DrqZZERyweB1s20XkBcXLHGDHInHK1i4hbJY8Xk_MF48ZInT5Tw-03pVBoliIIySJZYkkJEWW0s4eTZ1KTkwNL8uSU9aE/s320/gnome_07aweb.jpg" width="250" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Gnome from a distant land</td></tr></tbody></table><br /><p><br /></p><p><br /></p>Jet Simianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00393803864740299439noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5176950784481540459.post-9804812175229640852021-11-17T22:28:00.197+13:002021-11-21T22:58:49.980+13:00The Troublesome Gnome<p>Dungeons and Dragons changed their Gnome several times over until we got the version we have today, leagues from where the creature began, as <a href="https://www.faena.com/aleph/the-four-elemental-beings-of-earth-according-to-paracelsus">Paracelsus' embodiment of the element of Earth</a>. It's notable that it wasn't just the adventure profession that changed or 'evolved' over its history - they also changed appearance and motivation.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgUpiwoGtAw_4bezbYG6XQkb6PpbIVKIoehWxeTDhaBnBKh__dfpZrbhyphenhyphen5c7Umb4yHcS0EpVV-6ZmQtaUI7re6U9Xs9w-TCnkwKAqd485ubtzU7j1YVdPobDw-rKCB-5TTyfW0YBqC1l2Y/s501/img0002.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="501" data-original-width="452" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgUpiwoGtAw_4bezbYG6XQkb6PpbIVKIoehWxeTDhaBnBKh__dfpZrbhyphenhyphen5c7Umb4yHcS0EpVV-6ZmQtaUI7re6U9Xs9w-TCnkwKAqd485ubtzU7j1YVdPobDw-rKCB-5TTyfW0YBqC1l2Y/s320/img0002.jpg" width="289" /></a></div><p><br />"Gnomes are excellent metalsmiths and miners. They love gold and gems and have been known to make bad decisions just to obtain them [...] Gnomes like most dwarves, but war with goblins and kobolds who steal their precious gold." <i>Dungeons & Dragons </i>Mentzer edition, Dungeon Master's Guide.</p><p>The traditional Gnome has stuck to the same template for over a hundred years. Everyone can describe a Gnome, probably without too much effort: short, hat, beard, nose, maybe a belly, maybe stone, maybe the woods, maybe the mines. The Dwarf association in Gnomes is strong and must be acknowledged, because their evolutions are shared. The rare appearance of the Gnome in its own right takes some time to assert the figure beyond a blending of the stock little person type (Paracelsus borrows from the 'pygmies' of the Iliad, which is transferred into English literature through Pope's The Rape of the Lock, which sets them up in a war with the more elfin Sylphs.) Thus Gnomes become earth-tied through the alchemical version by Paracelsus, then become embittered in Pope's parody. </p><p>Gnomes appear as a treasure hoarder and equally capricious in the collected tales of the Brothers Grimm (<i><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Gnome_(fairy_tale)">The Gnome</a></i>) by which time their function as an antagonist is wrapped up with the equally greedy and subterranean Dwarf and Goblin. The Grimms of course also collected Snow White, whose absorption into popular culture through Disney and later (but unconnectedly) Tolkien not only redeemed the Dwarf, but made them accessible as humourous and sympathetic characters. The Gnome of course found some salvation as a garden totem - and perhaps it's the link with the green, growing world of nature which preserved the Gnome for more recent writers.</p><p>Further reading:</p><p>Folklore Thursday: 'On Gnomes: From Alchemical Theory to a Fairy Tale Staple [https://folklorethursday.com/folktales/on-gnomes-from-alchemical-theory-to-a-fairy-tale-staple/] </p><p>THE SEMIOSPHERES OF
PREJUDICE IN THE FANTASTIC
ARTS
THE INHERITED RACISM OF IRREALIA
AND THEIR TRANSLATION
MIKA LOPONEN (2019, University of Helsinki. Dissertation, Department of Modern languages [https://tuhat.helsinki.fi/ws/portalfiles/portal/124871175/PhD_Dissertation_Mika_Loponen_e_text_version_1.65.pdf]</p>Jet Simianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00393803864740299439noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5176950784481540459.post-62613973477347458652021-11-17T21:53:00.005+13:002021-11-21T22:27:29.513+13:00Gnomes, Dwarfs and Dwarves<p> I find myself returning to the books of B.B and Wil Huygen for my Gnome treatises because they (largely) agree with each other, and both stick to a pretty reliable and recognisable depiction of the overland version - the one I prefer.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjj_IB45tdaY5LHeV8Rx5v4BFRyoPeHh7G6_c1D27IPIb4_WcTFHJwRFEU2siKzNwb0ciOsIjg6otyIcLHlmDTvIsbgmRHURnHOOeBvIfbiWHKBaZ87BiB4Fhu52JJClBAsNCjFg-np-vY/s270/gnome_05a.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="270" data-original-width="194" height="270" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjj_IB45tdaY5LHeV8Rx5v4BFRyoPeHh7G6_c1D27IPIb4_WcTFHJwRFEU2siKzNwb0ciOsIjg6otyIcLHlmDTvIsbgmRHURnHOOeBvIfbiWHKBaZ87BiB4Fhu52JJClBAsNCjFg-np-vY/s0/gnome_05a.jpg" width="194" /></a></div><br /><p>D&D of course had a booted foot in both camps, where early Gnomes could be the 'woodland' variety (see above) or a subterranean version, at the time hewing less to the <u>very</u> deep underground Svirfneblin (which translates to 'svirf' (unknown?) and 'neblin', connected etymologically to the Old Norse 'nifl', meaning mist or fog. No gnomes is Norse mythology - just elves, trolls and dwarfs). The subterranean Gnomes were miners, ever seeking precious gemstones and valuable metals. B.B's Forest of Boland gnomes are also miners - but for practical metals, using them for constructions like their railroad. The Gygaxian Gnome on the other hand is mostly a creature of the underground, seeking treasures and trophies of their craft. In a way, this makes them more natural dungeon crawlers than a protector of the woodland, and the 80s introduction (by Gygax again) of the Deep Gnome simply drives them further underground - to the extent where <a href="https://dnd.wizards.com/articles/features/diversity-and-dnd">Wizards of the Coast recently addressed what they perceived to be negative racial stereotypes</a> tied to the dark-skinned Underdark peoples including the Drow, the Svirfneblin, and the more common Orc, among others.</p><p>There's no obvious evidence that the Gnome changed over thirty years beyond the early style because of a perceived racial association, but the aforementioned 'look' of the Gnome and the linking with underground treasures is where the D&D Gnome begins, and both definitively disappear in favour of the version you can see today. Could there be a connection?</p>Jet Simianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00393803864740299439noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5176950784481540459.post-4525977832160840032021-11-15T21:23:00.066+13:002021-11-21T22:59:56.789+13:00Hats, Noses, Beards and the Gnome Caricature<p> The early D&D Gnome stuck doggedly to form, thanks in part to the roster of artists who drew them, and in part with the insistence of of the then contemporary 'look' of the Gnome, most frequently seen in the Huygen books. That said, Huygen's book doesn't really go to town with big noses, and certainly not with LONG noses. Their ears are human-like and round, not pointed. Their beards are full and their hats are large, pointed and usually red - just like a garden gnome statute, of course. </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjaZr2zOxnct-C-3vNPqEsfqDmDv3jEOc-_whrXC0JJrBkxrY5cxGtK4ijbRjb533eTVJmllDJy_zpFeaPx7Q1j-bR2FUImikmDuEuO539w-x2arSo1fiE5gmqRlw_Ks19WAHKoHZOEx88/s650/gnome_09web.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="650" data-original-width="403" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjaZr2zOxnct-C-3vNPqEsfqDmDv3jEOc-_whrXC0JJrBkxrY5cxGtK4ijbRjb533eTVJmllDJy_zpFeaPx7Q1j-bR2FUImikmDuEuO539w-x2arSo1fiE5gmqRlw_Ks19WAHKoHZOEx88/s320/gnome_09web.jpg" width="198" /></a></div><p>The garden gnome has no less a complicated history, going back at least as far as Anatolia (now modern Turkey) and travelling through Europe to Germany and of course the United Kingdom by the Nineteenth Century. The cap is Phrygian in shape and likely origin, the beard perhaps as old. The nose and ears? A rounded button and large Enid-Blytonesque ears with no points. Curious. </p><p>Fairy creatures have long been drawn or portrayed with exaggerated features, and Gnomes and Dwarfs haven't been immune. Pixie or Elfin ears are usually pointed, Dwarfs often have large noses - but not necessarily long ones, or hooked ones. Only when we look past the Disney 'Snow White' Dwarfs with their friendly bulbous hooters does the profile change. </p><p>So where did Gygax, Sutherland and others get their Gnome characteristics - pointedly the pointed ones, from?</p>Jet Simianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00393803864740299439noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5176950784481540459.post-23919903018316382282021-11-14T22:29:00.004+13:002021-11-15T08:21:58.689+13:00A Brief History of the D&D Gnome<p> If I had trouble establishing for myself the 'perfect' Gnome, then at least it was my own battle and it only lasted around fifteen years. TSR (and I suppose Wizards of the Coast/Hasbro after them) took something closer to a generation. In fairness, it wasn't a well-defined race to begin with, and it wasn't a playable race until AD&D; a lot of things were in play, and in the ensuing years and later editions of the game a good many things would be revised. The Gnome would be one of them. </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2QpZJgK4_j3zrjqYnTRLsxCE_ZhYQVqlJjZFJrSh9isbs45Kf1pg-Q-wcXOfZWd-5pay7Jonu1QnuCS45bLWnphz1ZkG4X4AZ6HGBTdlEOmqr-_h2gKRpSiFSHOi9YwdNbIW7VkeDpb0/s632/img0001.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="632" data-original-width="327" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2QpZJgK4_j3zrjqYnTRLsxCE_ZhYQVqlJjZFJrSh9isbs45Kf1pg-Q-wcXOfZWd-5pay7Jonu1QnuCS45bLWnphz1ZkG4X4AZ6HGBTdlEOmqr-_h2gKRpSiFSHOi9YwdNbIW7VkeDpb0/s320/img0001.jpg" width="166" /></a></div><p>It seems likely that Gary Gygax's original model for the fighter Gnome of D&D/AD&D is Hugi the Gnome in Poul Anderson's <i>Three Hearts and Three Lions</i>. Hugi is woods-homed, a doughty fighter and something of a braggart, but otherwise not much different from a fantasy Dwarf. In AD&D some magic is added in the form of Illusionist spells, and this class preference persists in succeeding editions, past the introduction of the 'Deep Gnome' or Svirfneblin in the 1e <i>Unearthed Arcana</i> and its assumption as a playable class for 2e. The Dragonlance novels and AD&D setting then incorporated that world's Tinker Gnome as a character type, and subsequent editions married the fey magic element with an artificer's skill (though often with hazardous results). Meanwhile, in Basic D&D Gnomes have burst with reinvention as an NPC race in exclamation-mark-bearing madcap flying city adventure supplements (<i>Top Ballista!</i>) and mecha modules (<i>Earthshaker!</i>). The woodland Gnome of old has by now disappeared, as has its appearance, replaced in the wider game by a slimmer, more fey figure with wild hair, less facial hair and elfin eyes. It's a divisive reinvention, to say the least, but the whimsical Steampunk Gnome type endures in <i>World of Warcraft</i>. By D&D's 5e the favoured class of the Gnome has become Bard. </p><p>So much for the in-game Gnome, in the history of the Gnome in popular culture, the character has also undergone an evolution...</p>Jet Simianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00393803864740299439noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5176950784481540459.post-44439443645406194792021-11-13T20:30:00.117+13:002021-11-13T20:30:26.188+13:00Making Room for the Gnome<p> Believe it or do not, but the road to the Redcastle Gnome took a great many twists and turns before I found the ingredient I was looking for in the books of B.B.</p><p>I honestly don't even remember first setting out on it - though it would have been at least fifteen years ago. I rolled a Gnome character (Wrangfauld Orpin, a Thief/Illusionist, if memory serves) who never got used in my heady AD&D days, and even started on a large-scale adventure storyline that would eventually be resurrected around 2005 to become the Dwarven minecrawl <i><a href="http://jamasenright.blogspot.com/search?q=barbigazl">Barbigazl</a></i>.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiWBIzPEb4kvp04cl0foQ3XKvoY-X9U9Tjbh0dszSd7uwOw1RfK7-uKmeOwzuKfr9JkdSj5qI93Ir3PmtC4H6f8THuiAzIPrgpArxts8kMWsjDkF6RKBVeGT43vEs6FRvpbsa09HU02Yo4/s587/gnome_02web.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="587" data-original-width="395" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiWBIzPEb4kvp04cl0foQ3XKvoY-X9U9Tjbh0dszSd7uwOw1RfK7-uKmeOwzuKfr9JkdSj5qI93Ir3PmtC4H6f8THuiAzIPrgpArxts8kMWsjDkF6RKBVeGT43vEs6FRvpbsa09HU02Yo4/s320/gnome_02web.jpg" width="215" /></a></div><p>The Gnomes that featured in <i>Barbigazl</i> were where I thought I would take the class if a regular gaming group had spun off: a largely subterranean culture with woodland roots who were devoted to exploration. Their paragons were the Delvers, who dared to go farther and deeper than those before them in search of the secrets of the earth. They would be spellcasters, after a fashion, with their requisite staff/rod analogue being a highly practical and desirable crozier or 'crook'. I allowed them options for invention and professions as 'tinkerers', themselves drawn to creating the most miraculous and fanciful of machines to serve Gnomekind. They would trade with Dwarves, war with kobolds, and build great and unfathomable subterranean cities incorporating fungi, giant arthropods and diminutive architecture.</p><p>It doesn't look too bad on paper, but it was probably too complicated, relied on too much buy-in to meet the rather necessary worldbuilding... and unless there were whole campaigns built around this sort of thing, who could be bothered? So it was abandoned.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhLf1sx2iK-D54CSdAwNoZ6oj1evAYfh9bNRzolW-jKFhDzI5IC9d0pWvWr852XlsF38atS89wE05fQkke-1SC7MwtN7f7S-yEruxvzOsfJfd-OVhxjgo5wJ-BBPkcgsoocR6OEHn8i9I4/s413/gnome_10web.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="413" data-original-width="377" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhLf1sx2iK-D54CSdAwNoZ6oj1evAYfh9bNRzolW-jKFhDzI5IC9d0pWvWr852XlsF38atS89wE05fQkke-1SC7MwtN7f7S-yEruxvzOsfJfd-OVhxjgo5wJ-BBPkcgsoocR6OEHn8i9I4/s320/gnome_10web.jpg" width="292" /></a></div><p>Nearly ten years later I read the little grey men books, and my mind was re-sparked, and everything seemed to fall into place - a new race-as-class option for Basic D&D games (the <a href="http://jetsimian.blogspot.com/2021/11/the-spiritual-gnome.html">Gnome as Druid</a>) emerged, and there was enough cultural integrity to ensure that this player character option was recognisable, believable, and relatable. And if in the Barbigazl days I was at risk of reinventing the Deep Gnome or Tinker Gnome, I was later at risk of just reinventing the Forest Gnome, then whatever. The Druid spells papered over the gaps the ratification exposed.</p><p>Could I have made a similar problem for the Gnome in declaring them a woodland creature as the original game had in having them encroach across the Dwarf template? Maybe. But in my Redcastle world, that's a largely empty ecological niche, Elves being more widespread than just the green bits on the map, and most definitely not flower-wearing earth warriors. Instead, I move the Elves out of the forest; up mountains, in elaborately-excavated hill fortresses and under the sea. The woods no longer ring with their noble song, and have become more wild, dangerous and full of ancient mystery. </p><p>And there, in the tangled roots and fallen trunks of ancient trees, under the bends of whispering brooks and between to fissures of weathered cliffs, the Gnomes live, and watch the outside world. </p><p> </p>Jet Simianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00393803864740299439noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5176950784481540459.post-38462108494776099342021-11-12T22:10:00.002+13:002023-02-01T21:50:18.047+13:00The Spiritual Gnome<p> It may seem counterintuitive to think of a Gnome worshipping a deity - at least as much as those other early demi-humans. Back in D&D's early days it was assumed clerics - that practical way to restore hit points and get rid of undead, were particular to all races, but only the human (or half-orc in AD&D) peoples would allow their clergy to also kit up and go a-dungeon-crawling.</p><p>In the case of Gnomes in early D&D the lines were drawn even thicker. Gnomes, it could be inferred, were not spiritual, they were <i>magical; </i>creatures adept in illusion and sleight of hand, it jibed with the theory, aligning with other diminutive tricksters of the fairy world. Who cares if the ability to cast great illusions seemed strange in a dark old mine? Their sworn enemies, the kobolds, were also underground dwellers and tricksy. Otherwise, it went some way to justifying the Illusionist class spell list if it could be used in more than one player character type. Woodland Gnomes weren't much different, and unless you are prepared to go back to the Brothers Grimm (it's complicated) , they're not especially magical.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhMTOEzZLqRynh0lupULIkfYH-Y0tZt1JN9OttaB_lTWZCweLaNU_WECv7W-vC7d1xHh4_s-nITc8EiPz6DjxjAdOCQvcRAsSvCG4eKFzX219A9HRRzDbjVEEAuxykrKfKPRUsPJ7WD6Eo/s701/gnome_23web+%25282%2529.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="701" data-original-width="417" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhMTOEzZLqRynh0lupULIkfYH-Y0tZt1JN9OttaB_lTWZCweLaNU_WECv7W-vC7d1xHh4_s-nITc8EiPz6DjxjAdOCQvcRAsSvCG4eKFzX219A9HRRzDbjVEEAuxykrKfKPRUsPJ7WD6Eo/w238-h400/gnome_23web+%25282%2529.jpg" width="238" /></a></div><p>Unless...</p><p>Unless the woodland Gnome were taken to specialise in woodland magic, and employ natural components in their spells, supplicating to gods personifying wild nature. This is what B.B offers in <i>The Little Grey Men</i>, with the older Dodder praying and ultimately summoning Pan, whose presence is felt throughout the rest of their story. I like the aspect of Pan: in line with the gods, actually a god, but not entirely godly, being very earthly, somewhat feral and (maybe) a bit horny as well. Of the Roman gods he's the most animalistic, and that works, too. I'm not saying Gnomes should worship Pan, but other gods are available: Silvanus, Gaia, Abnoba, Cernunnos, Phaunus, Leshy - and so on. </p><p>Woodland magic, the worship of nature deities satisfies the Druid role in AD&D, and so my ideal race-as-class Gnome PC is just that: a Druid.</p>Jet Simianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00393803864740299439noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5176950784481540459.post-47051880441150122021-11-11T06:32:00.000+13:002021-11-12T06:32:32.875+13:00Gnomes and Beasts<p> Having covered Gnomes from a floral aspect for a couple of episodes now, it's time to turn to fauna - the beasts of the Gnomes' world.</p><p>I'm going to assume an archetypal D&D fantasy woodland and its animals - that is to say, Northern Hemisphere, European, and temperate, with defined seasons. The variety of animals (excluding invertebrates) run the range of fish, reptiles and amphibians, birds (waterfowl, passerine and non-passerine, raptors) and mammals. In the works of B.B and Wil Huygen the largest animals are generally badgers, foxes, domesticated dogs and polecats, but a fantasy woodland might also incorporate bears, boars, wildcats and wolves. Below that size are the other common woodland creatures: otters, squirrels, moles, bats, mice, rats, voles, rabbits, hedgehogs, weasels and stoats. The Cook Expert D&D Set of course includes giant ferrets as guard animals for a sample Gnome lair - but the aforementioned works, strictly sticking to their favoured Gnome dimensions (roughly a handspan), has no need of them. </p><p>Size notwithstanding, it's the relationship which counts. Gnomes are the guardians of the woodland, friend to most animals, and sometimes fellow residents (B.B's little grey men share a tree with a couple of owls, Hugyen's foster infant mammals). Reptiles are at best tolerated - in <i>Down the Bright Stream</i> an adder is as capricious and sinister as the serpent of Eden, and fish are equally food and predator, depending on their size (minnow and a pike, respectively.) The underlying philosophy is that the Gnomes share their woodland home with animals. They rarely eat flesh, save for fish (it's okay, they don't have any feelings), and steal bird eggs, but don't seem to hunt fowl or rabbits. This extends to their craft - of which more in another post.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjonEKVv0nMaMiwMbjI_YALKvJjUODLjEGtzY43LmSHZV0nUlyBAGuzdd114xaZwjeXlbADSTTyqp-pwCDasUvjpKLjw-53A4uH57AWeG-rIU34LBdAXEM76grVl4M51mnT1sAoxoqUqDs/s533/BBSquirrelGnome.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="507" data-original-width="533" height="304" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjonEKVv0nMaMiwMbjI_YALKvJjUODLjEGtzY43LmSHZV0nUlyBAGuzdd114xaZwjeXlbADSTTyqp-pwCDasUvjpKLjw-53A4uH57AWeG-rIU34LBdAXEM76grVl4M51mnT1sAoxoqUqDs/s320/BBSquirrelGnome.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br /><p>Above: Gnome with Squirrel, after B.B</p><p>Gnomes share a language with the animals, being able to converse with (seemingly) all mammals, most birds, and the aforementioned adder, and they rely on the strength, skills (burrowing by moles, hunting by otters, flight by the owls) and knowledge of these creatures. In exchange they ply their crafts, invention and dexterity to help their animal friends. In short, Gnomes are a woodland creature among others - notably in the <i><a href="https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/19942/Tales-From-The-Wood" target="_blank">Tales from the Wood</a></i> RPG inspired by <i>Watership Down</i> and the books of BB, Gnomes are simply another player type alongside the rabbits, badgers, squirrels and other creatures.</p><p>To the adventuring Gnome such relationships and skills are significant. The ability to naturally Speak With Animals (certain kinds) and rely on them for intelligence and local lore could be very handy. the ability to summon those creatures at a time of peril could be a life saver.</p><p>Best left there for now. Suffice it to say the animal/Gnome relationship is essential to the character class and not to be sniffed at. There's more to add, but there we drift into the mystical. And that's best for another post... </p>Jet Simianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00393803864740299439noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5176950784481540459.post-54557385704884017322021-11-10T22:29:00.089+13:002021-11-10T22:36:14.609+13:00Names and Gnomenclature.<p> There is a lot of codification in the names of fantasy characters. George Martin employed consonant shifts and an almost phonetic approach in adapting common names for his characters in his <i>Song of Ice and Fire</i> novels ('Eddard', 'Podrick', 'Sersei'). Tolkien took hi from Old Norse and Anglo Saxon histories, depending on the culture of his people - and when it came to Hobbits, he mixed the old with the contemporary, adding evocative descriptors and alliteration to give them their own distinctive sounds: Bilbo, Frodo, Samwise, Odo, Bungo, Meriadoc, Gerontius, Belladonna.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhrG7zrOmTDeXnPSzcy9AiSmQxLJEg_6WnF14CiIiSu2em-dkPDHHEFln6msq_0BX_pt9vPMxYBcYOFcIvBs1xwj_PmNbqeNq_wNPcXEgzGgR8rD389kWlYe-S5SyLzb4Uegc5nWHki4r0/s281/gnome_08b.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="272" data-original-width="281" height="272" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhrG7zrOmTDeXnPSzcy9AiSmQxLJEg_6WnF14CiIiSu2em-dkPDHHEFln6msq_0BX_pt9vPMxYBcYOFcIvBs1xwj_PmNbqeNq_wNPcXEgzGgR8rD389kWlYe-S5SyLzb4Uegc5nWHki4r0/s0/gnome_08b.jpg" width="281" /></a></div><p>The last name - that of Bilbo's ill-fated mother, is of course a botanical name, and it's the names of wild flowers that B.B. uses for his little grey men: Dodder is a vine-like weed, Baldmoney an aromatic mountain plant, Cloudberry a raspberry-like fruit, and Sneezewort a hardy wildflower. Some of these are edible, some have medicinal properties, others known for their toughness or resilience, and yet others for their beauty.</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjabpmAqbcuHSpjDmMCZWC9IIMalWJ_SolRemEP2KZuPA1o8-sBN_d4s3tR2QS2Smh9lAw2jURXDUIhcI_AogUTtQEWXPJiymyQoIjEdw1RO9h9nlqWUENR0WB7Ma4hIyIIOeLbZwrwnnU/s279/gnome_06b.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="279" data-original-width="232" height="279" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjabpmAqbcuHSpjDmMCZWC9IIMalWJ_SolRemEP2KZuPA1o8-sBN_d4s3tR2QS2Smh9lAw2jURXDUIhcI_AogUTtQEWXPJiymyQoIjEdw1RO9h9nlqWUENR0WB7Ma4hIyIIOeLbZwrwnnU/s0/gnome_06b.jpg" width="232" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">I like the convention of botanical names for Gnomes. They divorce themselves from the human and cleave instead to the natural world. There are dozens of names for some plants, and hundreds of varieties; some names are almost lost , or so regional as to be obscure, and if Gnomes are not numerous, in a fantasy setting they needn't have linear surnames to distinguish themselves - in fact, I'd recommend against the convention. But to make it slightly codified, I've taken to using tree or weed names for males, and floral or herbal names for females. It'll do for now.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Above: Houndstongue and Primula. <br /><br /></div>Recommended sourcebook: <i>Culpeper's Complete Herbal</i> (1653), via <a href="https://www.gutenberg.org/files/49513/49513-h/49513-h.htm">Project Gutenberg</a><br /> <p></p>Jet Simianhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00393803864740299439noreply@blogger.com0