WHY
"FUCK FOREVER" BY BABYSHAMBLES
WILL MAKE THE DUKE BLIND
"FUCK FOREVER" BY BABYSHAMBLES
WILL MAKE THE DUKE BLIND
Note – The following was written according to rules dictated by The
Duke, that each word had to scar the screen in accordance with the
beat of "Fuck Forever" by Babyshambles, being the best song with
"Fuck" in the title since "Nazi Punks Fuck Off".
Sweet Johnny Cash and the whores of Slough, I dare say a man needs
to take a moment for to breathe, yes, grab hold a fistful a the
all-around and drag the bastard right down to the nuts of the
lungs, let those chemical bubbles pop gainst the guts till maybe
the colour comes back to the skull, till maybe the eyes can focus
afresh. Maybe the ringing in the ears stops for a time, yes, and
when that clanging mania subsides, a voice cutting through the
mire, the voice of a cherub done sneaked into God’s own crack-
stash, ends up busking for the price of a Regal King Size on a
bench beside the river, hoarse and defiant and revelling in
glistening grot.
That cherub, that Doherty lad, got the kinda hat on the bonce could
drive a heterofilthual to the kindsa thoughts Warhol’d surely cum
himself in two to grab a hold of.
What’s he singing? What’s that all about, anyhow?
“Fuck forever, if you don’t mind.”
What the hell’s this mean? What the hell’s all this noise in aid of
anyhow? All those folks coughing soup cross the tabloids. So this
is what this fucker does, is it, this fella with the crack and the
Kate Moss on the arm, this slack-eye skeletal phantom careering
back and fourth from the Entertainment Section to the Front Page
and back again, three times a week, I’d wager, this is what he
does, it all comes to light eventually, well fuck my balls, it
hasn't even got a tune!
Daman Albarn wittering away in some garden shed with a scrotum-
fulla ideas regarding that cartoon group a his, he’s a big name is
Albarn, was in that band that time, had that song about “woo hoo”.
The one from the trailers, except now it’s sat outside the DHSS
cursing that fucker out Coldplay, the one getting all the big
pictures nowadays.
Albarn waxing on and off; “Make Doherty History”, he said. “Not
worth the hype”, he said.
And the rest of us, we chortle at that new Gorillaz single, the one
that has Shaun Ryder. There’s an irony someplace in there but ain’t
nobody got a second to worry about it, since we’re all flinging the
skulls rhythmically to the left every time those flick-knife chords
pierce the soundways.
We all got those Libertines records on repeat, two stereos, the
debut playing to the left, the follow-up to the right, a man
spunkin out the eye-holes, and here in front, Babyshambles, the
lurching, fag-stained, dope-sick Nowadays.
“ARGGGGHHHHHHHH” he’s screaming, “ARRRGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!”
Is he in pain? No, no don’t you dare for a second even assume that
right there, it’s a defiant roar, he’s barking half his kidneys out
his face and dear God, if there’s a more glorious sound to be found
anywhere this side a Shane MacGowan’s screamed “Come on you
bastard!!” in Bottle Of Smoke then I ain’t ever heard the fucker.
“I severed my ties!”
Yes! Sever the fuckers, but wait, what ties are these? The
Libertines, we can safely assume, since yeah, pretty much the
majority of Pete’s Babyshambles venom seems to be reserved for Carl
and the lads.
What about that reunion a while back, though, that hug at the Shane
MacGowan concert, what about the tears and the conversations
stinking of chat along the lines of “Don’t tell nobody, but I been
thinking for a while now that I might be that bit more hopeful
about a third Libertines record one of these years.”
“Don’t tell nobody”, she says, leaning cross the bed, “I been
thinking that too.”
“Can we fuck forever?”
But whether or not he’s singing to Carl or The Man or somebody used
to pay him a couple quid for to steal the milk out next door’s
fridge, no matter never mind, it’s one of those universal things,
is what it is.
“Purgatory and happy families…
One and the same, one and the same
No! It’s not the same!
It’s not supposed to be the same!”
What the fuck is he talking about? Who the hell cares, two seconds
later it’s the drunken bray of the bridge…
“But what about that waaaaaaayyyyyyyyyyy?
The way they make you paaaaaaaayyyyyyyyyyy?
And!
The way!
The way they make you tow the line!”
Jesus, that beat, like the throb in the back-bone bent cross a
worktop catching glimpses of God in the calm between the thrusts.
Can you believe I didn’t like it the first few times I heard it?
Can you possibly for a second understand that The Duke chanced upon
Zane Lowe preaching Gabba & Punk out the speakers one evening, just
in time for the premier of the new single from Babyshambles, “gonna
be huge!” Zane assured me, who was I to argue?
Maybe it’s cause first time Zane spun that fucker it was a censored
version, so 90% of the hook got tossed out the BBC buildings to
crawl home in the midst of a PCP frenzy. Maybe so, I can hardly
consider it now, since I’m battering the keys to the rhythm, to the
swell of that chorus, of the angelic “laaaa… la la la la” in the
background, the guitar line like a shota hellfire to the prostate.
Write to the swing of Pete’s mic-chord, yes, that’s the thing, my
back hurts, it’s hard keeping up, the damn thing’s been on repeat
seventeen times, chances are my vertebrae ain’t ever gonna speak to
me again outside of maybe a chance encounter one lonely night by a
bolted tavern door, but ain’t no amount of discomfort can quiet the
hormones and the giddy-glands hopped to the eyes on the whiskey-
smacks skitting back and fourth gainst the rib-cage.
Who can listen to this without seeing themselves stood snake-hipped
at the bus-stop with a torn jacket hung round banshee shoulders,
chewing the nicotine from the last cigarette?
All those weeks spent worrying; would the damn thing ever see the
light of an Official Release, what with all the falling-out and the
sacking-bands and the no-shows at Important Dates and the getting
flung off the Oasis tour and the ending up staggering round France
instead, who knew Babyshambles would ever follow-up Kilamangiro?
Who wasn’t scared that, at the end of the day, all we’d have would
be those reams and reams of sketches captured on MP3 from the
bowels of some narcotic stupor, those heartbreakingly beautiful,
vulnerable renditions of Music When The Lights Go Out, or, god in
heaven, of Albion. . .
“Down in Albion
They’re black and blue
But we don’t talk about that. . .”
All those anxieties pushed that bit further south a the brain-
sauce. We don’t got an album yet, but we got this, we got this and
it’s fucking colouring my every rancid thought in shades of
gorgeous optimistic abandon.
What does it mean? Who knows?
Lester Bangs wrote one time about Wild Thing, how it was pure, how
it had no pretensions, how it was the feeling one sometimes gets in
the filth-limbs or caverns somehow invoked via the medium of Rockin
The Fuck Out.
Four minutes and five seconds into Fuck Forever, Pete’s yelling;
“They’ll never play this on the radio!”
He says it twice, then coughs / yells / pukes into the mic three or
four times, a sound that hits a fella in the back of the psyche
where “meaning” and shit like that aren’t especially welcome, where
it’s what it feels like that matters, that “Blarggghhhhh!!!”,
that's what Fuck Forever’s about.
Defiance! Beautiful abandon! Hats! Euphoria!
It feels like a wank, it’s an intensely personal affair but you
know damn well most everyone else engaged in the act at this time,
wherever they are, they know exactly what you’re feeling, on the
inside if not necessarily on the outside, you filthy voyeuristic
fucker.
It’s not wank like Yes is wank, no, it’s a wank like The Buzzcocks
are a wank. Adolescent, a cluster of filth and hope and beautiful
determination, pushing up gainst the very flesh, reaching out the
chest like in Freddy 1 when he leans down over the bed for a
second, stretching out the walls.
“Fuck forever, if you don’t mind.”
Divinely vulgar, and yet oddly mannerly about it all.
God almighty, an album’s worth a this and my legs’ll bust from the
inside out, knee flying every which way, sinew and tissue hanging
from the light-fixtures, and bitter Daman Albarn, that bitterness
stinging like a fresh fag-burn on the tip a the sex, but it’s ok,
cheer up, sing along, no sense building rivalries when a man’s got
such a life-affirming tune in the eardrum-holes.
Can I bother you for a dance? Just I dig the way you were nodding
along just now, it’s my favourite song at the minute, and earlier I
saw you were weeping along with Connor when he was busy going on
about “I believe that lovers should be chained together. . .”, and
yeah, that was my favourite song last week, and truth be told I
think that even though I’m sober and you’re reeling in vodka,
chances are we’re both as deliciously fucked as each other, so
yeah, what say we just tie the DJ up someplace where he can still
enjoy the vibes, what say we just hit repeat and maybe we’ll pass
out sometime before the dawn, I’m not sure, I haven’t figured that
out yet.
“Fuck forever, if you don’t mind
Oh, I’m so clever, but I’m not very wise.”
Thanks folks.
Fling The Duke An Email or Sign The Mondo Guestbook
Duke, that each word had to scar the screen in accordance with the
beat of "Fuck Forever" by Babyshambles, being the best song with
"Fuck" in the title since "Nazi Punks Fuck Off".
Sweet Johnny Cash and the whores of Slough, I dare say a man needs
to take a moment for to breathe, yes, grab hold a fistful a the
all-around and drag the bastard right down to the nuts of the
lungs, let those chemical bubbles pop gainst the guts till maybe
the colour comes back to the skull, till maybe the eyes can focus
afresh. Maybe the ringing in the ears stops for a time, yes, and
when that clanging mania subsides, a voice cutting through the
mire, the voice of a cherub done sneaked into God’s own crack-
stash, ends up busking for the price of a Regal King Size on a
bench beside the river, hoarse and defiant and revelling in
glistening grot.
That cherub, that Doherty lad, got the kinda hat on the bonce could
drive a heterofilthual to the kindsa thoughts Warhol’d surely cum
himself in two to grab a hold of.
What’s he singing? What’s that all about, anyhow?
“Fuck forever, if you don’t mind.”
What the hell’s this mean? What the hell’s all this noise in aid of
anyhow? All those folks coughing soup cross the tabloids. So this
is what this fucker does, is it, this fella with the crack and the
Kate Moss on the arm, this slack-eye skeletal phantom careering
back and fourth from the Entertainment Section to the Front Page
and back again, three times a week, I’d wager, this is what he
does, it all comes to light eventually, well fuck my balls, it
hasn't even got a tune!
Daman Albarn wittering away in some garden shed with a scrotum-
fulla ideas regarding that cartoon group a his, he’s a big name is
Albarn, was in that band that time, had that song about “woo hoo”.
The one from the trailers, except now it’s sat outside the DHSS
cursing that fucker out Coldplay, the one getting all the big
pictures nowadays.
Albarn waxing on and off; “Make Doherty History”, he said. “Not
worth the hype”, he said.
And the rest of us, we chortle at that new Gorillaz single, the one
that has Shaun Ryder. There’s an irony someplace in there but ain’t
nobody got a second to worry about it, since we’re all flinging the
skulls rhythmically to the left every time those flick-knife chords
pierce the soundways.
We all got those Libertines records on repeat, two stereos, the
debut playing to the left, the follow-up to the right, a man
spunkin out the eye-holes, and here in front, Babyshambles, the
lurching, fag-stained, dope-sick Nowadays.
“ARGGGGHHHHHHHH” he’s screaming, “ARRRGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!”
Is he in pain? No, no don’t you dare for a second even assume that
right there, it’s a defiant roar, he’s barking half his kidneys out
his face and dear God, if there’s a more glorious sound to be found
anywhere this side a Shane MacGowan’s screamed “Come on you
bastard!!” in Bottle Of Smoke then I ain’t ever heard the fucker.
“I severed my ties!”
Yes! Sever the fuckers, but wait, what ties are these? The
Libertines, we can safely assume, since yeah, pretty much the
majority of Pete’s Babyshambles venom seems to be reserved for Carl
and the lads.
What about that reunion a while back, though, that hug at the Shane
MacGowan concert, what about the tears and the conversations
stinking of chat along the lines of “Don’t tell nobody, but I been
thinking for a while now that I might be that bit more hopeful
about a third Libertines record one of these years.”
“Don’t tell nobody”, she says, leaning cross the bed, “I been
thinking that too.”
“Can we fuck forever?”
But whether or not he’s singing to Carl or The Man or somebody used
to pay him a couple quid for to steal the milk out next door’s
fridge, no matter never mind, it’s one of those universal things,
is what it is.
“Purgatory and happy families…
One and the same, one and the same
No! It’s not the same!
It’s not supposed to be the same!”
What the fuck is he talking about? Who the hell cares, two seconds
later it’s the drunken bray of the bridge…
“But what about that waaaaaaayyyyyyyyyyy?
The way they make you paaaaaaaayyyyyyyyyyy?
And!
The way!
The way they make you tow the line!”
Jesus, that beat, like the throb in the back-bone bent cross a
worktop catching glimpses of God in the calm between the thrusts.
Can you believe I didn’t like it the first few times I heard it?
Can you possibly for a second understand that The Duke chanced upon
Zane Lowe preaching Gabba & Punk out the speakers one evening, just
in time for the premier of the new single from Babyshambles, “gonna
be huge!” Zane assured me, who was I to argue?
Maybe it’s cause first time Zane spun that fucker it was a censored
version, so 90% of the hook got tossed out the BBC buildings to
crawl home in the midst of a PCP frenzy. Maybe so, I can hardly
consider it now, since I’m battering the keys to the rhythm, to the
swell of that chorus, of the angelic “laaaa… la la la la” in the
background, the guitar line like a shota hellfire to the prostate.
Write to the swing of Pete’s mic-chord, yes, that’s the thing, my
back hurts, it’s hard keeping up, the damn thing’s been on repeat
seventeen times, chances are my vertebrae ain’t ever gonna speak to
me again outside of maybe a chance encounter one lonely night by a
bolted tavern door, but ain’t no amount of discomfort can quiet the
hormones and the giddy-glands hopped to the eyes on the whiskey-
smacks skitting back and fourth gainst the rib-cage.
Who can listen to this without seeing themselves stood snake-hipped
at the bus-stop with a torn jacket hung round banshee shoulders,
chewing the nicotine from the last cigarette?
All those weeks spent worrying; would the damn thing ever see the
light of an Official Release, what with all the falling-out and the
sacking-bands and the no-shows at Important Dates and the getting
flung off the Oasis tour and the ending up staggering round France
instead, who knew Babyshambles would ever follow-up Kilamangiro?
Who wasn’t scared that, at the end of the day, all we’d have would
be those reams and reams of sketches captured on MP3 from the
bowels of some narcotic stupor, those heartbreakingly beautiful,
vulnerable renditions of Music When The Lights Go Out, or, god in
heaven, of Albion. . .
“Down in Albion
They’re black and blue
But we don’t talk about that. . .”
All those anxieties pushed that bit further south a the brain-
sauce. We don’t got an album yet, but we got this, we got this and
it’s fucking colouring my every rancid thought in shades of
gorgeous optimistic abandon.
What does it mean? Who knows?
Lester Bangs wrote one time about Wild Thing, how it was pure, how
it had no pretensions, how it was the feeling one sometimes gets in
the filth-limbs or caverns somehow invoked via the medium of Rockin
The Fuck Out.
Four minutes and five seconds into Fuck Forever, Pete’s yelling;
“They’ll never play this on the radio!”
He says it twice, then coughs / yells / pukes into the mic three or
four times, a sound that hits a fella in the back of the psyche
where “meaning” and shit like that aren’t especially welcome, where
it’s what it feels like that matters, that “Blarggghhhhh!!!”,
that's what Fuck Forever’s about.
Defiance! Beautiful abandon! Hats! Euphoria!
It feels like a wank, it’s an intensely personal affair but you
know damn well most everyone else engaged in the act at this time,
wherever they are, they know exactly what you’re feeling, on the
inside if not necessarily on the outside, you filthy voyeuristic
fucker.
It’s not wank like Yes is wank, no, it’s a wank like The Buzzcocks
are a wank. Adolescent, a cluster of filth and hope and beautiful
determination, pushing up gainst the very flesh, reaching out the
chest like in Freddy 1 when he leans down over the bed for a
second, stretching out the walls.
“Fuck forever, if you don’t mind.”
Divinely vulgar, and yet oddly mannerly about it all.
God almighty, an album’s worth a this and my legs’ll bust from the
inside out, knee flying every which way, sinew and tissue hanging
from the light-fixtures, and bitter Daman Albarn, that bitterness
stinging like a fresh fag-burn on the tip a the sex, but it’s ok,
cheer up, sing along, no sense building rivalries when a man’s got
such a life-affirming tune in the eardrum-holes.
Can I bother you for a dance? Just I dig the way you were nodding
along just now, it’s my favourite song at the minute, and earlier I
saw you were weeping along with Connor when he was busy going on
about “I believe that lovers should be chained together. . .”, and
yeah, that was my favourite song last week, and truth be told I
think that even though I’m sober and you’re reeling in vodka,
chances are we’re both as deliciously fucked as each other, so
yeah, what say we just tie the DJ up someplace where he can still
enjoy the vibes, what say we just hit repeat and maybe we’ll pass
out sometime before the dawn, I’m not sure, I haven’t figured that
out yet.
“Fuck forever, if you don’t mind
Oh, I’m so clever, but I’m not very wise.”
Thanks folks.
Fling The Duke An Email or Sign The Mondo Guestbook
