MENSWEAR La La La.

It's hard to believe that no-one is really into Menswear anymore.
Everyone loved Menswear in 1995.
If you Google 'Menswear' now, the band isn't even mentioned until the 25th entry.

I was into Gene and Marion in 1995.
I had Menswear's album, but I preferred the Morrissey-like dulcet tones of Martin Rossiter, and the Johnny Marr-infused rock of Macclesfield's finest.
It's hard to believe that no-one is really into Marion or Gene anymore.

My girlfriend at the time was into Candyskins.
The two Cope lads' dad was Kenneth Cope from 'Randall & Hopkirk (Deceased)', 'Corrie', 'Brookside' and both 'Carry On Matron' & 'Carry On At Your Convenience'.
I went to see Candyskins at The Water Rats in London, and stood next to the bloke from The Fast Show.
It's hard to believe that no-one is really into Candyskins anymore.

Menswear went on to have 5 hit singles including 'Sleeping In', 'Daydreamer' and 'Being Brave'.
Their single 'Stardust' appeared on 'Shine 3', a various artists' showcase of Britpop talent, featuring singles by Marion, Gene, Cast and Echobelly.
The Boo Radleys were also on 'Shine 3'.
It's hard to believe that no-one is really into Cast or Echobelly anymore.

Candyskins didn't feature until 'Shine 8', the fourth of the double Shine albums, that included Bennet, Whitetown, Monaco and Sleeper.
Whitetown was from Norwich.
I met him a few times.
I also met Louise Wener from Sleeper at the first ever Port Eliot Festival.
She writes books now.
It's hard to believe that no-one is really into Bennet, Whitetown, Monaco or Sleeper anymore.

After 'Shine 10' there was a Best of Shine album released in 1996.
It pretty much featured everyone mentioned above, except Marion, Gene, Candyskins, Sleeper, Echobelly and rather surprisingly Menswear.
Luckily new bands like Seahorses, Embrace, Mansun & Republica had come along to replace the ageing Britpop originals.
It's hard to believe that no-one is really into Seahorses, Mansun or Republica anymore.

Total Breakdown

My vacuum-cleaner broke today.

For those of you who know me (and I now have 5 'followers', one of whom is me, and one of whom may know me, but without a photo or biog, is just a name) you will know that my vacuum-cleaner is my life.
It's difficult to refer anthropomorphically to a household cleaning object, but my hoover is the nearest thing I have to a wife. We spend everyday together, sometimes for long periods. I care for her over & above the level of care I administer to dishcloths, or the washing-machine. Her bags are regularly emptied with nothing but a sense of duty on my part. I have searched high & low for replacement bags that compliment her foreign nozzle, and have immortalised her in verse in my last show "Yanny Mac -Domestic Goddess". And, despite being a cheap cylinder option from Argos with a wet/dry function that has never been utilised, I love her unconditionally.
As a team we suck.
Everyday, without fail, we wade through (and dispose of) the waste-products from a duo of houserabbits (litter-trained, but clumsy), a trio of degus (possibly the dirtiest bunch of shit-flinging rodents ever to bear the names of BBC regency period drama queens), a very white kitten called Richard, and a hamster with a penchant for kicking-up sawdust (probably as way of impressing the degus, but more likely just to piss me off).
At least an hour & a half of our day is spent tackling animal mess, and that's before we engage with the everyday dust & detritus produced by a rural Victorian property with a constant throughflow of horse-lovers, builders & children.

My hoover broke down today.
And with it, I broke down too.

Now let's deal with the semantics here. A hoover is the infinitive verb of vacuum-cleaner. Like Google, Xerox, Velcro & Kleenex, Hoover should always really have a capital H. I was brought up to say "doing the vacuuming", but this was soon kicked out of me at boarding-school, along with the short, harsh A's in my baths, glass & grasses.

"What do you intend to vacuum McKenzie?
The space in your empty head!?! Ha-huh-ha ha!
Now clean my shoes"

I have since learnt that it is grammatically correct to vacuum-clean, but not to do the vacuuming.
In a world full of LOLs, LMFAOs, kids that can't spell 'definitely' and mass confusion over the words their, they're & there, I make no apology for using all forms of reference to a machine that sucks proficiently.
Until now.

We have no money. The thought of having disposable-income to buy a new hoover leaves me with a giddy-sick nosebleed.
I go through the checklist.
Everything else works in the room. The fish are bubbling, the man from Classic FM is desperately trying to be heard in between adverts for Tena Lady confidence and obese-dog insurance. The washing-machine hums an assurance that my net-curtains will be sparkling clean before the rain comes to spoil our day-glo garden party.
I open the lid.
The lid covers the mechanics that none of us understand, yet men pretend & women pay good money not to comprehend. The kitten gets inside the cylinder and reconnects with her winter coat. I think I hear her scoff at my inability to fix the useless piece of mass-produced, mass-marketed, built-in obsolescent, foreign shite, and I find myself explaining that I left school in the 80s, just before compulsory Computer Studies, and just after compulsory Latin. I can spell y'know!
And I once made my mum a jewellery-box in woodwork!

And I don't lick my own bum!
Richard! Stop it!
And get out of there!

I make a coffee, tug on a lungbusting cigarette, and decide to change the fuse in the plug.
The vacuum-cleaner starts up first time, and literally scares the shit out of the kitten!


Tomorrow we dust with feathers................