Saturday, June 14, 2008
yacketayakking screaming vomiting whispering facts and memories and anecdotes and eyeball kicks and shocks of hospitals and jails and wars
I'm getting kinda tired of the whole killer-guy-from-Twin Peaks-look schtick. It's been a number of months since my project reached fruition and I've done nothing about it and I'm now thinking of something new. In fact, after a comment from a friend a few weeks ago likening me to Allen Ginsberg (R.I.P.) and then seeing the brilliant fantasy scene featuring Ginsberg and Bob Dylan in I'm Not There, I think I will look in that direction.
Of course that's David Cross playing Ginsberg in the film, not the man himself. I probably can't manage that degree of hirsuteness; I may have to go for a more senior Ginsberg a la his 1985 self-portrait (right, via the Village Voice).
I feel I will also have to lose a bit of weight to get there.
It's Saturday today. Last night at a Mexican restaurant I realised that there is still a lot of very nice tequila about that I haven't yet had the pleasure of drinking. I immediately resolved to rectify this situation. Hopefully this pursuit does not turn out to be mutually exclusive with the Ginsberg project. More soon...
New album out recently from Wiley. It's called Grime Wave.
Of course that's David Cross playing Ginsberg in the film, not the man himself. I probably can't manage that degree of hirsuteness; I may have to go for a more senior Ginsberg a la his 1985 self-portrait (right, via the Village Voice).I feel I will also have to lose a bit of weight to get there.
o o o
It's Saturday today. Last night at a Mexican restaurant I realised that there is still a lot of very nice tequila about that I haven't yet had the pleasure of drinking. I immediately resolved to rectify this situation. Hopefully this pursuit does not turn out to be mutually exclusive with the Ginsberg project. More soon...
o o o
New album out recently from Wiley. It's called Grime Wave.
Wiley - Local Lad (1.84 MB mp3: right-click and Save As to download; play using the handy little embedded player below)The sound is STRONG, yo.
Thursday, July 26, 2007
We went a-drinking
Oh yes we did. We sure did.
Friday night it was raining and I was running late. I ran into Noizy in Taranaki St as he was leaving and then had this weird flashback as I rounded the corner to the entrance to Vintage (scroll down). When was the last time I was here? Was it still Monkey Bar then? Was I thrown out? Was I experiencing deja vu of from another place/space/time/parallel existence? Or a movie of the same? Was I really interrogated by the Stazi in East Berlin for several days in a stone building with an arched gate? Were there bright spotlights and guard towers? And dogs? My god, I really need a drink.
Vintage was nice, but for some reason I had to keep telling the barstaff to serve my beer (Monteiths Black) in a glass. Tom and Hadyn enjoyed their absinthe, though, as did I my tequila (Herradura Antiguo; thanks for asking). At least the barstaff didn't give me funny looks when I said I didn't want it in a shot-glass with lemon and salt; points off for offering though.
Five or six rounds later Jo, Martha and I were the last left after many present had departed to either watch Che learn how to cook a lamb leg-roast, or to gawk at the out-of-towners at the Mandatory 10th birthday party. So we're hoofing it down Courtenay Place in the rain and I was struck by how far it actually is to Hawthorn Lounge when it's actually raining and you're actually getting quite wet. Luckily ol' HT wasn't packed to the gunnels like it usually is later on of an evening, and nor was it sweltering, like it usually is later on of an evening; the fire was going, though, and it was nice.
I like Hawthorn Lounge and I don't like Hawthorn Lounge. I like that the bartender remembers you and which gin you prefer; and that he was happy to mix a Dirty Martini (only it's not bloody olive juice, Drinksmixer.com -- it's brine) for me with the sometimes too-strong-and-"big"-to-be-classic Tanqueray 10 (47.3% a.b.v.), though it was against his better instincts. I don't like how hard it is to actually get to the bar, how hot it gets in there, how crowded, that they are apparently -- in the top-shelf spirits analogue to a "brewery-bar", I suppose -- a "42 Below" bar, and how their cocktails are so little.
I mean they're really little.
I mean, they're so little that you'd want to be careful breathing too near your glass, in case you inadvertently inhale the lot.
Nevertheless we had negronis (with mandarin-infused gin, no less), and martinis, and Jo had wine and that violet spirit the name of which I knew I'd never remember and sure enough I don't. Then in dribs and drabs we made our ways to Boulot.
Which is a wonderful place. Could be said to be everything that Hawthorn Lounge is not, including generously-sized cocktails, and (possibly) the best pizza in town. Jo and I finished off our night scoffing a Quattro Formagi which I accompanied with a big glass of random Spanish red wine from the bottle that M.G. abandoned when he left. (Fucken nice, it was, too -- thanks Michael.)
Drinks tally for the evening:
Monteiths Black (4)
Tequila (double, 2)
Negronis (3)
Dirty Martinis (2)
Classic Martinis (1)
1951 Martinis (1)
glasses of random Spanish red wine courtesy M.G. (1)
Home by 11. How very civilised. Viva la Wellingtonista!
Next time I'm determined we'll pace ourselves and make it out past the witching hour.
...
NP: Neurosis -- Given To The Rising (Spin)
Friday night it was raining and I was running late. I ran into Noizy in Taranaki St as he was leaving and then had this weird flashback as I rounded the corner to the entrance to Vintage (scroll down). When was the last time I was here? Was it still Monkey Bar then? Was I thrown out? Was I experiencing deja vu of from another place/space/time/parallel existence? Or a movie of the same? Was I really interrogated by the Stazi in East Berlin for several days in a stone building with an arched gate? Were there bright spotlights and guard towers? And dogs? My god, I really need a drink.
Vintage was nice, but for some reason I had to keep telling the barstaff to serve my beer (Monteiths Black) in a glass. Tom and Hadyn enjoyed their absinthe, though, as did I my tequila (Herradura Antiguo; thanks for asking). At least the barstaff didn't give me funny looks when I said I didn't want it in a shot-glass with lemon and salt; points off for offering though.Five or six rounds later Jo, Martha and I were the last left after many present had departed to either watch Che learn how to cook a lamb leg-roast, or to gawk at the out-of-towners at the Mandatory 10th birthday party. So we're hoofing it down Courtenay Place in the rain and I was struck by how far it actually is to Hawthorn Lounge when it's actually raining and you're actually getting quite wet. Luckily ol' HT wasn't packed to the gunnels like it usually is later on of an evening, and nor was it sweltering, like it usually is later on of an evening; the fire was going, though, and it was nice.
I like Hawthorn Lounge and I don't like Hawthorn Lounge. I like that the bartender remembers you and which gin you prefer; and that he was happy to mix a Dirty Martini (only it's not bloody olive juice, Drinksmixer.com -- it's brine) for me with the sometimes too-strong-and-"big"-to-be-classic Tanqueray 10 (47.3% a.b.v.), though it was against his better instincts. I don't like how hard it is to actually get to the bar, how hot it gets in there, how crowded, that they are apparently -- in the top-shelf spirits analogue to a "brewery-bar", I suppose -- a "42 Below" bar, and how their cocktails are so little.
I mean they're really little.I mean, they're so little that you'd want to be careful breathing too near your glass, in case you inadvertently inhale the lot.
Nevertheless we had negronis (with mandarin-infused gin, no less), and martinis, and Jo had wine and that violet spirit the name of which I knew I'd never remember and sure enough I don't. Then in dribs and drabs we made our ways to Boulot.
Which is a wonderful place. Could be said to be everything that Hawthorn Lounge is not, including generously-sized cocktails, and (possibly) the best pizza in town. Jo and I finished off our night scoffing a Quattro Formagi which I accompanied with a big glass of random Spanish red wine from the bottle that M.G. abandoned when he left. (Fucken nice, it was, too -- thanks Michael.)
Drinks tally for the evening:
Monteiths Black (4)
Tequila (double, 2)
Negronis (3)
Dirty Martinis (2)
Classic Martinis (1)
1951 Martinis (1)
glasses of random Spanish red wine courtesy M.G. (1)
Home by 11. How very civilised. Viva la Wellingtonista!
Next time I'm determined we'll pace ourselves and make it out past the witching hour.
...
NP: Neurosis -- Given To The Rising (Spin)
..Track after track, pretenders to the throne are slashed and burned with detailed dynamics, elephantine riffs, and actual grooves.......
Now Hear This:
Neurosis - "Water is Not Enough" DOWNLOAD MP3
Now Watch This:
Neurosis - "Given to the Rising"
Labels: debauchery, music, tequila
Tuesday, September 05, 2006
Tequila: the beginning of a journey
I think it was only about a year ago that I discovered that I liked tequila (Wiki) a lot. Well, ok, let's be honest. It wasn't just that; but that I like it much, much more than whisky, which was until this point my late-night like-to-pretend-I'm-a-classy-fucker drink. In fact, it's worse than even that. I think I'm in love.
I love the lush bouquet of tequila, and the complex, aromatic, almost botanical notes that drift across your tongue as you hold a mouthful. I like the lack of bite'n'burn as it hits your throat, and the lack of acidity as it traverses your gullet. I adore the absence of any of the cloying saccharin of whisky; instead the delightful promise of sweetness on the nose is delivered in a measured, flat, dry way just like the best Martini. I actually love that it is brewed from a specially grown, tended, and harvested cactus in the arid desert-heat of Mexico, instead of from mashed-up bird seed in some god-awful rainy bog in Scotland.
Up until this point, my conception of tequila was some shitty drink which you consumed with the direct aim of getting wasted. And that in order to be able to actually just accept the stuff in your mouth, you needed salt and lemon juice. And you gagged when you swallowed it. And sometimes you climbed up on the bar and let someone pour it down your throat. And you invariably drank far too much of it and did stupid things and got yourself into compromising situations (Tequila Suicide here). And let's not for a minute pretend that that is not still true of low-cost muck like Jose Cuervo*.
Occasionally you meet somebody who changes your life; sometimes you have sex with them, sometimes you don't, sometimes you spend years wishing you had, or hadn't, or whatever. Sometimes you just talk to them for an hour or two. Most recently it was the Turkish guy who kept laughing uproariously and saying "You New Zealanders, you're crazy! You invaded my country! What were you thinking?" over and over.
But I digress. It was Carlo the Mexican who set me on the righteous path of true tequila appreciation. One drunken night he suddenly turned to me and with a grin said something along the lines of "you New Zealanders, you don't know anything about tequila". He produced a bottle of Herradura (mythology), furnished me with a measure, and that was me. Done. Sold to the gentleman trying not to spill his Negroni, trying not to slide off The Sifter's chaise lounge.
We will continue my Tequila Odyssey soon.
* and the exact same could be said of a poor-quality blended Scotch like Clan MacGregor, or Grants.
...
NP: Sleep - Dopesmoker (allmusic)
I love the lush bouquet of tequila, and the complex, aromatic, almost botanical notes that drift across your tongue as you hold a mouthful. I like the lack of bite'n'burn as it hits your throat, and the lack of acidity as it traverses your gullet. I adore the absence of any of the cloying saccharin of whisky; instead the delightful promise of sweetness on the nose is delivered in a measured, flat, dry way just like the best Martini. I actually love that it is brewed from a specially grown, tended, and harvested cactus in the arid desert-heat of Mexico, instead of from mashed-up bird seed in some god-awful rainy bog in Scotland.
Up until this point, my conception of tequila was some shitty drink which you consumed with the direct aim of getting wasted. And that in order to be able to actually just accept the stuff in your mouth, you needed salt and lemon juice. And you gagged when you swallowed it. And sometimes you climbed up on the bar and let someone pour it down your throat. And you invariably drank far too much of it and did stupid things and got yourself into compromising situations (Tequila Suicide here). And let's not for a minute pretend that that is not still true of low-cost muck like Jose Cuervo*.
Occasionally you meet somebody who changes your life; sometimes you have sex with them, sometimes you don't, sometimes you spend years wishing you had, or hadn't, or whatever. Sometimes you just talk to them for an hour or two. Most recently it was the Turkish guy who kept laughing uproariously and saying "You New Zealanders, you're crazy! You invaded my country! What were you thinking?" over and over.But I digress. It was Carlo the Mexican who set me on the righteous path of true tequila appreciation. One drunken night he suddenly turned to me and with a grin said something along the lines of "you New Zealanders, you don't know anything about tequila". He produced a bottle of Herradura (mythology), furnished me with a measure, and that was me. Done. Sold to the gentleman trying not to spill his Negroni, trying not to slide off The Sifter's chaise lounge.
We will continue my Tequila Odyssey soon.
* and the exact same could be said of a poor-quality blended Scotch like Clan MacGregor, or Grants.
...
NP: Sleep - Dopesmoker (allmusic)
Labels: debauchery, tequila
Thursday, September 29, 2005
Bling of a Saturday night
While not even remotely in the league of the $1600 bottle of Hennessey cognac I spotted coming through duty-free recently, my $90 bottle of Herradura on Saturday night was by far the single-most expensive alcoholic beverage I've ever bought.And, like the Islay single-malts it occupies this kinda price-bracket with, it's utterly delicious, and worth every cent. And in this writer's humble opinion, the nicest tequila around.
Labels: tequila
