What's wrong with book publishing?

I made my debut on the Guardian books blog yesterday with a piece about Daniel Davies' excellent debut novel The Isle of Dogs. The article looked at how such a great piece of work has managed to get so little coverage and compared the problems publishing is going through now with what magazines went through seven or eight years ago. You can read it here.

Iron Maiden's Going To Get You

My account of Iron Maiden's North American tour ran in yesterday's Guardian Guide as the cover story. Pictured are two absolute legends who were at the Seattle gig and still had the banner they made when they saw the band 20 years ago. Pretty neat handiwork.

Read the piece here

Why puppets are funnier than humans

MTV's new series FUR TV revives the idea of the puppet sitcom. My piece in this week's Guardian Guide looks at why felt animals being stupid works so well, taking in everything from Zig & Zag and the Muppet Show to Dustin The Turkey and Triumph The Insult Comic Dog. You can read it here.

Kenneth Williams RIP

20 years after his 'possibly a suicide' death, my piece commemorating Kenneth Williams is on the Guardian arts blog. You can read it here

Scott King in The Guardian

My piece on graphic design legend Scott King was in yesterday's Guardian, promoting his semi-retrospective MARXIST DISCO (cancelled) show in Munich. You can read the piece here.

Help the blind

I'm sure when I was a kid there were different variations on these - Twickenham High Street used to have one collecting for polio, complete with callipers. With hindsight, the fact that polio had been nigh-on eradicated in the first world by 1980 makes me a bit suspicious as to where the money was going.

Still, as this photo shows - there is a corner of Marylebone where the residents don't give a fuck about mocking the tiny blind. Personally, I'd have given him a labrador and really gone for the 'cute sympathy' vote.

When Daley hit the Lucozade

Finally showing up on YouTube is the seminal Daley Thompson/Lucozade/Phantom of The Opera advert.

Word to Thompson, the original GOAT. Young cats like that cheating scum Dwayne Chambers need to recognise what you could do with only Lucozade, Iron Maiden and a pair of Adidas. Peace out, Daley!

Welcome to Syria…

With Imad Mughniyeh's assasination, Syria suddenly looks like a more exciting/dangerous place again… Clerk and Teller's excellent travel blog has just been there. It's got coffee, revolving restaurants, proper biblical architecture, and more military hardware on display than you can imagine. What else do you need?

Fatties are in danger

My piece on the heart attacks, strokes and other obesity-related dangers facing rappers is in today's Guardian Guide. You can read it here.

If you're out tonight, pour some on the ground for Big Pun. Couldn't nobody maul the Statue of Liberty's tits like he could.

The Balearic Revival in today's Guardian

My lengthy piece on 'The Balearic Revival' is in today's Guardian. The piece includes interviews with Balearic Mike, the Balearic Brothers, Mo Morris from Mountain Of One and Boy's Own affiliate Cymon Eckel (pictured above right, showing the new jacks how it was done, way back when at a Boy's Own party in 1989). You can read it here.

The Hard Sell in The Guardian

I took over the Guardian Guide's Hard Sell column last week, reviewing the Christmas adverts generally and in particular The Mastercard ad which I found surprisingly moving. Must be getting soft in my old age…

You can read it here

Our Balearic game was strong

Last Friday's inaugural The Beach was an unqualified success. We packed out Life on Old St, the crowd dressed in everything from white jeans and pastel cashmere to powder blue all-in-one ski suits, and the DJs absolutely tore the fucking roof off the place. Especially me. The free Cornettos were a good move as well.

The only down sides were accidentally breaking my copy of Steve Miller's 'Macho City' in half and that creepy Italian fuck who was caught masturbating in an alcove towards the other night. Honestly, these people.

There are photos here (of the party, not the creepy Italian).

Nuclear wasteland photography

Drifting slightly off the English vibe for once, but highly recommend this photographic study of the ruins of Chernobyl, and the nearby town, Pripyat. Incredible shots, courtesy of high-end terrace menswear dons Clerk & Teller. Particularly feeling this one (above) of the ruined fairground.

Q. Why shouldn't you wear Russian underpants?
A. Because Chernobyl fall out.

That one doesn't really work written down.

The ITV Comedy Awards

I was there on Wednesday night. Here are some thoughts...

1. Being in ITV Centre really is like being in an episode of Filthy, Rich & Catflap. All the framed photos of the c-listers really brings out one's inner 'desperate out of work actor'.
2. The food was fucking awful, consisting solely of crudites, houmous that had been out for so long it had a crust, and crisps. Oh, and some Bombay Mix. I know times are hard and everyone in the media's screwed, but it was a v. poor show.
3. Chris Langham jokes are not well received by the light entertainment industry.
4. Jonathan Ross died on his arse. Which is strange, given how much of this stuff he does.
5. Fern Britton cracked one of the few good jokes of the night, when she referred to Mark Wallinger's bear as 'Muhammad'.
6. JK Rowling and Simon Pegg were both very polite to us.
7. That bloke who now hosts Soccer AM - and is like a 'broken biscuits' Tim Lovejoy – has a very loud, attention-seeking voice when you're stuck in a lift with him.

Little Harvey is not to be mocked

Much hand-wringing in the world of gossip magazines, after Heat gave away a sticker poking fun at Jordan's son, Little Harv The Legend last week. Word of their callous behaviour spread around the internets in seconds - mainly thanks to the women at mumsweb and their ilk - and Heat were fucked.

All of which talk of the little fella reminds me of a piece I wrote in The Guardian last year, where I managed to crack a joke about Harv playing the kettle drums and compare his vile mother to keen amateur pilot/repressed homosexual Mohammad Atta and didn't get any complaints. Which just goes to show that if you use a few long words, you can basically get away with anything.

Still, I stand by what I've always said about Harv - that whatever his disabilities, on the family's TV show he seems to function as a particularly harsh Greek chorus to his idiot parents' lives. Whether putting his fingers in his ears while being paraded up the red carpet at some crappy premiere, or telling Peter to 'fuck off' when he's going into some pompous tirade, Harv's the only one to emerge from the programme with a shred of dignity. Fair play to him.

Cheap pop promos

In a band? Skint? Need a video making?

If so, then contact Mrs EFTE via this site. She's a veritable one-woman filming-&-editing machine, and here's the video she made for Canadian madwoman Dandi Wind last time she was in East London. Hell of a mover.

The Young Ones: 25 years on

So, the 25th anniversary of The Young Ones is upon us. Was it actually any good with hindsight? And did it 'change comedy forever' as is sometimes claimed? 'Kind of' and 'no' are the short answers. For the longer answers, check my article in last Saturday's Guardian…

The best cafe in London?

First in a semi-regular series of updates addressing the important subject of 'places you can get some peace and quiet, read the paper and wolf down a sandwich'. Setting the bar particularly high is Paul Rothe & Son at 34 Marylebone Lane, W1. This original 1940s cafe/grocer has been pretty much untouched since it first opened and scores particularly highly for the following: Sixties fold-down padded vinyl seats; tea in proper Wedgewood china; shelves packed with a vast selection of chutney, marmalade etc; staff in proper old-school white coats; general buttoned-down austerity vibe; brie and cranberry sauce sandwiches.
Overall, highly recommended.

Once a tone-deaf yuppie prick, always a tone-deaf yuppie prick

Just seen this month's GQ magazine, which is even more conformist and self-congratulatory than usual. For some reason there's a piece on Duran Duran who almost look as bad as they sound these days. Anyway, all this hatred of Simon Le Bon reminded me of a piece I wrote for the Guardian a few years back reassessing the original Live Aid.