Dedication to the max

Love love loved that tacky record cover my Dollegue put up here a couple of days ago! Well last week I found quite a unique sleeve myself while I was charity shopping in London (in a completely different genre though):Being a big Morrissey and The Smiths fan myself, my heart started to melt when I spotted this embodiment of pure Mozzer dedication. This fan just couldn't stand having this great single sitting in a dull, plain white sleeve! I love the back cover even more. The His Masters Voice dog is there (twice), plus production and photo credits ("Smash Hits" - haha). Too bad there are no credits for the artwork!


I already own a copy of the 7", but I was happy to pay 50p for this amazing piece of teenage cut-and-past-work. Plus it is a truly great single. Suedehead is nothing short of brilliant, but I Know Very Well How I Got My Name on the flip side is so beautiful it makes me cry.


A. Morrissey - Suedehead. Get it here (YSI).


B. Morrissey - I Know Very Well How I Got My Name.
Get it here (YSI).

let's get physical.. critical...

I've been ranting about cycling in the UK before on this blog, and today I'm going to do it again. I'm afraid I became a bit of a bike fanatic since I moved here. A classic case of 'you don't know what you've got until it's gone', I guess... Cycling is so good, in so many ways and I can't stand it that I get ridiculed for riding my bike!

So last weekend the time had come to put words into action: I joined the Critical Mass bike ride here in Cardiff. Now I might need to explain the phenomenon of the Critical Mass to our Dutch readers here, since in Holland there is no such thing.

The first Critical Mass ride took place in San Francisco in 1992 with the idea of drawing attention to how unfriendly the city was to cyclists. Cyclists will be wearing signs and banners and make lots of noise by ringing their bells. The rides can take on truly massive proportions, with thousands of people taking part in the London and New York rides for example. Unfortunately things can get aggressive. Car drivers get impatient. As it's important that the group stays together roads might get blocked off and traffic lights ignored. (But I always found it's fascinating what happens once people step into their motorized cookie jar on wheels. They suddenly think they're invincible (and invisible - ever noticed how many people are picking their nose while waiting for a traffic light?!).

But in Cardiff things weren't that extreme. I thought it was good fun. It was so nice to be riding together. I felt even more like being in that Smiths video! So I gathered some more music videos featuring people cycling in herds (them being decent songs was another criterion). Enjoy the ride hehe..

The Cardiff Critical Mass takes place every first Saturday of the month. They meet at 11.00 in front of the museum on Park Place. Join their Facebook group!

Salford Ladettes Club

This year I really got spoiled with birthday presents... Ghetto gold AND my lovely boyfriend treated me to a weekend trip to Manchester. He knew how much I wanted to visit this city, home of my favorite band ever: The Smiths (and many other great bands). I've been a die hard fan since I was 16, so his gift was a dream come true! Highlight of my pilgrimage was traveling to this gritty neighborhood in Salford (next to Manchester) to have my picture taken in front of the Salford Lads Club. The place became an icon because of the famous picture by Stephen Wright, which was used for the inner sleeve of The Smiths' The Queen is Dead album. It also appears in the video I posted earlier here. I can die now and heaven will know I'm not miserable.

Saturday we spent the day strolling through the Northern Quarter, which is packed with 2nd hand stores, crafty markets, independent boutiques, cute eateries, great bars and clubs. And there are some excellent record shops as well. One, Beatin' Rhythm, stocks nothing but cds and 45s of girl groups, doo wop and northern soul. I probably could have completed my collections of songs about dances there instantly, but my budget forced me to stick to just a few cds.

It was also in this store that I saw a poster... The poster said Toddla T, the boy wonder from Sheffield, was DJ'ing that night in Manchester!! Another dream come true! His set didn't disappoint. He played some of my favorite tracks, like Too Many Men and The Migrain Skank (blogged about here and here)! My boy and I were the only ones who knew how to do the Migraine Skank, so we got props from the MC haha!

Manchester isn't the most beautiful city on earth, but I kind of like cities that are a little rough and in transition. It has an interesting (musical) history and nowadays it's a great city for shopping, drinking beer (go to The Knott for some real ales) and parteeeeee! MADCHESTER!!!

and if a double-decker bus crashes into us

You all know how Dutchies love their bikes. So when I moved to the UK my bike remained my principal mode of transportation. Of course! But riding a bicycle is something most people here don't even consider. No wonder with the facilities here (hardly any - though the council is working on it). So as a cyclist you're somewhat of a curiosity. I get frequently cheered and yelled at... Especially when riding my bonanza bike (a chopper)! Thing is with the chopper that it's like riding a kiddie bike. You have to pedal like craaaazy and even the slightest hill feels like climbing a mountain. I felt like a sitting duck with all these cars, 10 ton trucks and double-decker buses speeding beside me. So I recently bought another bike on eBay. It's a really nice 40+ years old 'Dutch style' bike. But it's not Dutch, it's a Raleigh, and it feels definitely different from a real Dutch bike. You know what it feels like? It feels like being in this video by The Smiths (which happens to be my favourite band EVER). When I'm riding the streets of Cardiff, with that little basket in front of me, I can't help thinking of riding along with Mozzer in There's A Light That Never Goes Out: