Who Took the Merry Out of Christmas?

Sallying forth from the ivied portals of Stoned Holy HQ, which even yet are  adorned with the last flaming nasturtium blooms, I  didn't need to see the falling mercury trapped within the chamber to know it was a bit parky. Winter was, once again, tightening its iron grip and asserting its right to hold dominion over these northerly quarters. Momentarily I fell into pleasing thoughts of sadness regarding the Death of Summer and the passing of time without end. I mused, however briefly, on how uneventful it must be to live on the Equator and not know the myriad ways in which the tilt in the Earth's axis can, not only, conjure beauties & delights for eyes open enough to see but lift hearts, transcendent, into the firmament! I was wrenched out of these meteorological musings when I noticed the twinkling of fairy lights! My heaven-bound-heart plummeted quicker than a 707 with all engines out! It was, alas, beginning to look a lot like fukn Christmas!!

 Later, when I repaired to the blessed sanctuary afforded by the mighty StonedHolyRamparts, I switched on the televator only to be affronted by The Staple Singers being co-opted by the Soul-Sucking Forces of Capital! An advert for some or other High Street purveyor of Hollowed Out Materialism, using The Staple Singers' 1970 classic 'Who Took the Merry Out of Christmas?'  to tempt the Consumerdrones into the shining Consumerdromes! Hark now, hear the registers ring? See you now the Ghost of Christmas Present open wide it's mouth, demanding to be fed?  But it's all just
novelty sweaters and tartan slippers  for those who already have them to the
S t O n E d H O L y B L O g g e R !

But, Oh, the invidious, dark art of Advertising! See how it hoovers up culture and shackles it to the Profit Motive. But, hear me now, all you Suckers of Satan's Stinking, Scaly Cock, all you Slurpers of Auld Clootie's Sour, Sordid, Brown Jism ; know ye not that Death awaits all who number in the Legions of Darkness? Of course, strictly speaking, Death awaits us all, regardless of whether we're in the Hordes of Hell or not, but what else can a Chrimbo weary and reverent  S T o N E d h o l Y B l o G G e r do but take up his metaphorical snakes. For all those unavailed of a Bible Belt Tub to thump or Pentecostal Pulpit to arraign & castigate from let me be clear who it is we mean by Legions of Darkness. Readers, we speak of Advertising Executives! Let eternal damnation be the accursed fate of all the lickspittles and bell-end polishers who serve on bended knee at the sordid glory holes of Mammon! Perchance it is, you may counter, you only made the tea and served the sushi. But silence, ye Equivocators & Dissemblers, the sentence of the Stoned Holy Court of All That is Righteous & Upstanding is non-negotiable ; Death! I call down a pox on all your houses! May all your issue be barren and your lineages wither like vines in a frost! Let me here inform all concerned who it was that 'took the merry out of Christmas'.....it was YOU! You people!

The s t O n e d H O L y B L O g G e R is confident that Pop Staples would join him in calling out all the craven homogenizers, the backsliders, the soulless mercenaries and unscrupulous ones, all those who would pervert, who wait at Money's beck & call. Ever ready to taint and despoil that which is heartfelt for a lousy buck!

And to close, a message of redemption for those guilty of the crime of taking the Merry outta Christmas - "Lay Not Up For Yourselves Treasures Upon Earth, Where Moth & Rust Doth Corrupt, and Where Thieves Break Through & Steal. But Lay Up For Yourselves Treasures In Heaven" Amen, to that! Roughly translated into the vernacular as 'Peace & Goodwill to all.....except the wankers that work in advertising!!'

Have a guid yin, Pop Pickers!

Staple Singers 'Who took the Merry outta Christmas

Missing in Action - A.W.O.L - Vamoosed!

Another protracted absence from these virtual walls! And what excuses are to be offered this time for the s T o n E D h o L y B L o G G e R  posting AWOL? What are to be the mitigating circumstances that shall absolve this latest dereliction of my blogging duty?

Gouranga, my arse!

I could have, like Muddy Waters before me, found religion : only to lose it again after these few short months of handclaps and fingerbells as I ambled, sandal-shod, with my happy cohort of robe wearing fellow-believers, along a host of miserable and financially exhausted British High Streets. Could anything else, I ask you, scotch the fires of religious devotion and dampen the spirits of proselytising zeal more quickly than trudging through the rain soaked, pedestrianised main drags of 'Broken Britain' - filled, as they are, with fat people in sportswear eating hamburgers and tangerine coloured young ladies clutching Primark bags! Indeed, what other salutary lesson could convince you that it was, indeed, exactly how the Black Atheists have been saying all along - a Vast Godless Universe! Oh, such such humdrum emptiness! Or, perhaps, it occurs to me, that if a Supreme Creator was to be conceded, he could in no way be counted as benevolent! It could be contested that the Supreme Transmuter of Air into Dust & Fire into Water had simply forgotten all about us. Perhaps we were one of his early works, created in his world forming apprenticeship, wholly lacking the finesse and elegance of later worlds he called forth from the cosmic maelstrom! Sadly, it's not ours to know...but meanwhile the smell of chicken goujons and the promise of a few moments more of diversion tempts many a wearisome shopper to dig into their pockets and put such considerations to the back of their spongy uninformed minds!

Hup 2-3-4...you 'orrible bunch of poofters!

Perhaps it is I could have enlisted. Popped the flamboyant Stoned Holy Autograph (which, if there was but a scrap of justice in this Pop Slop World, I should have been scrawling on the eagerly presented, heaving bosoms of Divine Pop Poppettes) on the dotted line and took the King's Shilling!  As you mugs have laboured long these past months at your soul sapping job or frittered away precious hours buffing the bonnets and endlessly valeting the interiors of your little metal boxes on rubber wheels, I have been forging bonds, real bonds, manly bonds, with my tattooed bunch of Boneheads, Bruisers, Blockheads & Bampots!!  We have yomped together. Crawled through shit together. We have pulled latrine duty together. We have stuck out our chests and pretended we were hard men. We have lied about the birds we have been with. To plug the want of a meaningful or rewarding relationship in our lives, we have substituted the emotionally stunted world of the playground bully and banter, liberally laced with epithets belittling men & denigrating women! We have marched as one up then down then round the parade square as the R.S.M called us a bunch of Cock-Guzzling Sissies & Mummy's Boys! We have retreated to the barracks to polish things that were already shining brightly. And later we have consumed shit lager till we puked and then drank some more! If you have dreamed recently of breaking free of computer porn, endless hours of 'Call of Duty' and eating cold pizza for breakfast whilst watching 'Homes Under the Hammer', and this litany of stunted macho pretence appeals, then the s t O n E D H o L y b L O g g E R says get your wobbling bubble butt out of that reclining armchair and haul it down to the nearest recruiting office! But look not for the S T O n E d H O L y b L O G G e R , for, verily, he shall not be there. Not today. Not Never!
For the  S T o N e D h o l Y B l o g G E r is still a snarling Punk Rock Dog who remembers well the febrile energy of Crass at the Sheffield Leadmill shouting 'Fight War, Not Wars' and The Plastic Ono Band saying 'I Don't Wanna Be A Soldier, Mama. I Don't Wanna Die'. So enjoy yir 'Hup-2-3-4' but count me out!

So, perchance it is that I have joined the Freemasons and eschewed social interactions with any but my apron wearing brethren. Improbable, yes, yet l have stood like a total fukn eejit with my left nipple exposed and one trouser leg rolled up listening to pseudo-religious gibberish and reciting mumbo-jumbo just so l can enjoy a subsidised bar bill and intimate conversations with my bank manager. To be fair, l have now skirted the periphery of several conversations involving members of the Royal Family and some senior coppers! I now know who allowed the cigar puffing, shell-suited Golem that was Jimmy fukn Saville to podger his way through several hospital wards and spend the occasional hour or two entertaining himself in the morgue! And, oh yes, I also now know the whereabouts of Geoffrey Dickens' Paedophile Dossier that was, oops, mislaid by top Thatcherite bumsniffer Leon Britten! On the other hand, those tete-a-tetes with my bank manager mentioned earlier are as dull as dirty dish water...and I don't really care for golf! And so, though the appeal of wearing a sash, an apron and white gloves whilst you fuck goats is obvious, I have not passed through the delphic portals of the Lodge. Nor have I stuck my todger in a dead pig's mouth. But, hey....never say never!

such a colourful bunch of characters!

No, friends, the real reason l have been remiss in posting on these Virtual Walls is 'ah couldnae really be fussed.' I have been compelled to issue forth from the House of Worship that is StonedHolyHQ to earn a crust by means of brain & brawn and returned to drink porter and watch Scandi-Noir. The scant days have fallen like grains of granulated sugar through the pudgy fingers of an overweight diabetic. Or, if you prefer, like time-worn parchment in the witless and brutish hands of a future race of proto-simians which shall rise from the shitpile of civilisation as we know it, once we've allowed the A-Grade morons who control us to finally flush us all down the stinking toiletbowl of history!

Hell, I know it's only Rawk n Roll

...but I like it! 

See yuz soon, you miserable lot! 

This Train Aint Bound For Glory!

Seeing as ahv no pounded the keyboard for some time - not as a consequence of me feelin' like a Broke Down Engine, nor me contemplating the utter pointlessness o ma Tinternet scrivenings, y'understand -  I thought I'd rectify matters for the want of something more fulfilling to do with these very beat moments I find myself in. How better to fill some of my wasted n defeated minutes than with the temporary distraction that tapping oot this bloviating bluster can afford a poor, put-upon Pop Slopper! So, my virtual readers, on with the blow!

'This Train Aint Bound For Glory!

Seeing as Saint Theresa of Mayhem, current hollow mouthpiece of the venal & warped preservers of all that is outdated, joyless & dull-as-dishwater, (known to you and I as the Conservative & Unionist Party of Great Britain) has called a snap election for June and it's Easter time anyways, why not write about Resurrections methought.....political or otherwise!

This Train Ain't Bound For Glory!

As an avowed scoffer & skeptic the S t O N e d H O L y B L O g G e r couldn't be seen to have faith in much but, when it comes to the rolling away of stones and unpowered flight up into the heavens, I do have faith in the scientific approach to such matters ; consequently yi can sum up my thoughts on the possibility of an Essene mystic up n aboot and showing off the holes in his wrists n feet tae doubters just days after everybody seen him die a horrible death at the hands of the Roman Army of Occupation by use of the word 'Bollocks'. And though talk of metaphors or symbols is perfectly admissible let's agree tae leave the Theosophy for another time and another dander doon Desolation Row.

This Train Ain't Bound For Glory!

So then, closer to home, what of the mooted resurrection of the United Kingdom? Free of the banana-straightening clutches of Johnny Foreigner at last. The People have spoken, seemingly. Unfortunately what they have said turns out to be wilfully ignorant, misinformed, xenophobic, petty-minded shit! But Westminster loves a pantomime so on with the circus and let's hear all the phoney talk of how fabulous it's gonna be now 'we've got our country back'! Let's, for the want of a real democracy participated in by an informed and engaged populace, pretend Britain will be Great again.

This Train Ain't Bound For Glory!

 The s T O n e d h O L y B L o G g e R says 'No chance!' Not least because of the notion that we can, as one, return to some fanciful time when British industry fashioned everything the world wanted and British commerce ruled the waves is risible horseshit! Would that be the time, one wonders, when infant mortality rates were the highest they've ever been and we sent small boys up chimneys to clean them? Would that be the time when urban squalor was a breeding ground for diseases like cholera and smallpox? Would that be the time when British bayonets let British business grow fat & wealthy on stolen resources? Let's get this straight people, Britain has never been 'great'! Not even when the Arch Imperialist and hideously self-entitled, Churchill was giving speeches about fighting them on the beaches!

This Train Ain't Bound For Glory!

So even as new life and promise is emerging from the greening earth all around us, the Disunited Kingdom is busy sticking its head back into the shitpile of ignorance and dreaming of a golden age that never was. A 'resurrection'? Jesus returning to Albion and blessing this green & pleasant land is more likely! Though May and her hit squad of millionaires are undoubtedly riding the Gravy Train, the chances of either you or I or any Little Englander driving around in his white van, waving his union jack and tugging on the leash of his pitbull terrier called 'Damage' hoppin' aboard and getting a seat in the dining car are negligible...if not downright impossible! For this Train ain't Bound for Glory people - the Empire is over! This Train ain't Bound for Glory, people - British exceptionalism is a self-harming fantasy!  The Little England Express will be calling in at Austerity,  
Low Wages, No Rights, No Housing, Rachman Rents, Zero Hour Contracts, Racism, Xenophobia, Terrorism and Perpetual Rule by Tory Oligarchs sworn to nothing but filling their own pockets....where this service will terminate! Please collect your belongings before alighting from this train and, please, mind the pay gap!

Please Mind the Gap!

 

Birlin' In The Boneyard!

Well, Readers, it's January 25th n yi ken whit that means? It means Mr. Robert Burns, late of Alloway, Ayrshire, is, right noo, furiously birlin' in his grave!! It's noo that his eternal rest is disturbed year after year as 10 million haggises are piped in to be cut up wi 'ready slight' and the formulaic Burns' supper is enacted in every corner o the globe.

"warm, reekin, rich!"

He would've hated it, I'm sure! Just think of aw them folks that he would gladly have seen on the end o a bayonet toastin' his guid name and his work! Arch-Tories, Monarchists, Ministers o Kirk n State and No-Voting Bastards aw lining up tae sing his praises noo that he's deid! The mouth that would've damned them aw tae hell is stopped up wi clay! Words that coulda descried and mocked, mute!

Burns in the Boneyard is a lot safer and sanitised than the flesh & blood swagger o the real thing. Gone are the resentments and indignation that he would've hurled to aw the Holy Willies and their ilk whae made him sit on the penitent's stool. Gone the profane banter o the drinking dens as the yill took hold. Gone the bawdy bonhomie and licentious celebration of the Crochallan Fencibles. Gone the Republican sentiments and egalitarian outbursts o the howff.

And if Burns thought the 28 bankrupt posh-boys whae signed Scotland away  tae English gowd were a 'parcel o rogues', what would he have made of and what fury would he have reserved for those who voted 'No' to Scottish Independence for worries about money! It's just as well the poor bastard's deid, my friends, 'cause the shock of September 19th 2014 would've finished him off, for sure!!

Noo he's dust, the Establishment toadies who would've hated him with a vengeance if he were still around, can toast his memory and stick him on tins o shortie! Maybeez that's the fate o aw rebels ; absorbed, claimed, made safe and explained.
The S T O n e d H O L y b L O G g e r has every confidence in his assertion that Burns would've loathed it all.

Or mebbe no. Burns, after all, never got the chance o growing old n comfortable, pegging oot young, as he did. He just missed oot on that high ranking position wi the Excise doon Leith that would've seen him back in Auld Reekie's boozers n parlours conversing wi the best o Edinburgh's 'enlightenment' and flirtin' wi both the mistress o the hoose and the scullery maid! It could've aw been so different if he'd made it back tae Edinburgh wi' siller jinglin' in his pockets! If only those damned debtors had held off for a year or two more....maybeez then, the s T O n e d h O L y B L O g g e R wouldn't be here in the garret o Stoned Holy HQ hammerin' oot this crap. What would Burns' reputation be if, instead o fizzling oot in Dumfries at the age o 37, he'd lived tae 87, old n well off in his big, fancy hoose in Edinburgh's New Town.

Aye, but these are but idle flights o fancy for Burns didnae make it ; And so' is forever fixed the rebel outsider. As a consequence of this he belongs tae the rebels & outsiders ; the dissidents & rabble-rousers; the firebrands & malcontents.

So, gentle readers, bollocks tae Burns Night and January 25th.....but if yi find yirsel on either bank o the sweet Afton as it flows gently on its way tae the Solway Firth, much as it did twa hunnert year ago when the glowin' een o Robbie the Ranter gazed doon upon its glassy waters, raise a glass or doff yir bunnet tae Scotland's ploughman poet and Auld Lang Syne....a more fitting tribute, ahm sure, and one he would've appreciated.


Ladies n Gentleman, Louns n Quines, please be upstanding... I give you Mister Robert Burns, late of Alloway, Ayrshire!

Robin Wiz A Rovin Boy

On New Year's Resolutions!

And so, with a million fireworks bombing their shimmering brilliance out upon a dark, winter's sky, we slid through the portals of 2017. And with half of January already drained away, the sands of time are slip-slip-slipping away through our clutching fingers! And our life energies alongside them!

But we shall not trouble deaf heaven with our bootless cries here. For January is a month for Resolution. No doubt many have already wavered or cracked regarding what they promised themselves on January 1st but, even as I write, there is, no doubt, some smug bastard foregoing the, admittedly ephemeral, pleasures afforded by a pistachio macaroon or coffee mousse encased in a velvety chocolate shell. Some other steely-hearted individual is, right now, making the most of his new gym membership and sweating profusely on some apparatus akin to a medieval instrument of torture. I will be fitter. I will be slimmer. I shall succeed - These are the mantras oft repeated as we stare at ourselves in January's unforgiving mirror. The S T o n E d H o L Y B L o G G e r , however, when countenancing his blasted features, says bollocks to faux asceticism, bollocks to ersatz sackcloth & ashes and bollocks too to counterfeit self denial and sham stoicism!

Ours is an age of bogus Puritanism as product. Buy the self help manual, buy the work-out DVD, buy into the latest fad dieting regimen. Fear envelops our lives. If it's not fear of obesity or ill health then it's fear of losing our jobs, our homes, our sanity that eats up the precious seconds of living. Is this why we meekly accept the austerity programme administered to us by our great elected leaders? So now, even as our waistlines expand due to our addiction to junk food, even as we're sent the credit cards enabling us to consume, we are told to tighten our belts!

It is against this backdrop we can discern one of the major problems facing humanity today - Joylessness! Why are there so many joyless turds ; mostly, it must be noted, skulking along the corridors of power. Those people we let away with 'running' the whole sorry charade are, indeed, a weird little coterie of dreary, joyless cunts, devoid of imagination....and don't they take it all so seriously.

Isn't that the reason we find ourselves in the 21st Century but still, weighing us down and holding us back are the stunted scrag ends and ossified remains, the accumulated nefarious junk of ages past with all the ridiculous prejudices, snobberies and hierarchies, all the outdated injustices and all the obsolete delineations of class & caste like links in a heavy chain being dragged behind us as we advance at a snail's pace into the future, consigning yet more generations to lives of unending toil, misery and want!....and Joylessness!

Why after 10,000 years of something laughingly called civilisation isn't there free food in the streets? Why aren't there giant psychedelic lollipops in all our public parks and green spaces? Why aren't their trees and shrubs and flowers of every description all around us, enthralling & entrancing us, binding us to Nature within our own urban environments? Why aren't our cities home to, not only us, but a myriad of our fellow creatures? Why isn't there free art on every wall in every city? Why are there, STILL, hungry, homeless, illiterate people in this world??? Do you seriously think that the world as is is the best we can do?!?!

Who is responsible? I charge the pragmatists and their dreary concerns! I indict the serious-minded who ponder and pontificate! I accuse the humourless who reduce all to monetary value! I impeach the broken & jaded whose heart isn't in it! I revile the pusillanimous drones sweating on their treadmills and little wheels! I curse the cowardly and resigned ones for their practicality!

But surely, one could counter, only chaos could result if the world was left in the hands of idlers and dreamers such as the S t O n E d h O L y B L O g g e R ? But look you now upon this globe of ours and you must see the irony - Chaos Reins Regardless!!

So, no to those who deny pleasure. No to the prudent and their judicious orthodoxies ; No to the conservative fussbudgets; No to the bourgeois fuddy-duddies; No to the straight-laced and stolid stuffed shirts.....and no, no, no, a thousand times NO, to New Year's Resolutions!!