happy birthday johnny borrell

Before I took a three-hour-long nap this evening, I had been awake for 34 hours straight. I'm still very tired and I suspect I will take it very easy tomorrow so as to recover.

I'm not going to recount everything that happened in Manchester. I will say I got lost once but that was just while getting my bearings after having to exit from Piccadilly Station rather than Oxford Road. I heard at Cornerhouse, where I saw The Namesake (2006), that there was a bomb threat/scare. This troubled me because I recalled the Arndale IRA bombing of 1996. Yesterday was the first time in the UK I ever felt worried about where I was. I didn't feel well watching a movie in a basement.

I went to Manchester to see Razorlight in concert, as you know. I am not very familiar with their music, but I do have their first record. The concert was at MEN Arena and I hadn't been to an arena-scale concert in forever. It reminded me of the very first concert I ever went to: Bush. (Don't ask.)

Last night was filled with contradictions. I enjoyed the concert very much; I finally had some fun! We didn't know how many supporting acts there would be or just who they were even, so it really was quite exciting to see it unfold in front of us. Mohair was the first band but I wasn't too crazy about them. Then Pull Tiger Tail came on, and I much preferred them (they were also sexier). I should look up each band's music because I am of the persuasion that believes that seeing a band in concert does not mean that I'll like the recording. I mean, when the vocals are not equal to the instruments' noise, you cannot really hear the vocals. The singer may sound "annoying," and this would only be obvious on the album. Anyway, will look them up. I suggest you do, too. Especially Pull Tiger Tail (what a ridiculous name).

I had grown tired halfway through Razorlight's set. It didn't help that I was also holding my bladder. But once I relieved that upon leaving the venue with thousands of other people, I became hyper and obnoxious. Leaving, we actually passed members of the first two bands signing merchandise. I was so wound-up that I said "hi!" to the lead singer of Mohair as he walked past. He didn't hear me because I probably wasn't loud enough. I should have said, "Your set just kept getting better and better!" This is not untrue; it just leaves out the fact that it wasn't very good at the start.

Then I sat in the kitchen with my friends Lisa and Denise, chitchatting away until 1.45 am. On the way back to the hostel, Lisa had bought a copy of Q Magazine with Razorlight frontman Johnny Borrell on the cover, topless and looking a bit like Mick Jagger and Jim Morrison. We found out from Q that today, the 4th, is his 27th birthday. And he didn't even mention it to us. Surprising because he is sooo into himself.

In any case, I put my head down at 2.10 am but never lost consciousness. People were already asleep by the time I got into bed, so I'm not exactly sure to whom I can attribute each strange behavior. You see, I could never get to sleep because of these weird noises. One guy was snoring AND moaning. It was a sort of hybrid. Another (or it could be the same guy, and I think it was) spurted out trios of farts every so often. Two others had your run-of-the-mill snores. Another spontaneously woke himself up now and again, saying something in a language I could not readily identify. I slept on the top bunk, above some guy who reeked of smoke and B.O. when he got in at 3 am. And he snored. It was terribly unpleasant. Especially since I otherwise really liked this hostel. It was VERY clean, very quiet, and very well-situated. (Although I must say I did not like the showers as you could see right through them and there was no area to change.)

In summation about most of the nine other people I shared a room with last night, I thought: "These people should never sleep in public." I don't understand how some--such as my friend Lisa (who, I might add, never made a peep!)--could sleep through it!

At 6.40 am, I finally stopped rolling around. I got dressed and watched "Breakfast" on BBC 1 where I witnessed firsthand Lee Ingleby's sexiness. He was promoting the BBC 1 drama "George Gently" with co-star Martin Shaw. Other than this nice blip, I really just heard all the top news stories over and over for a few hours. Then I headed out to Urbis. Learned some new things thanks to a private tour (a bored docent walked straight up to me, Denise, and Denise's friend who met us at the hostel just before, and asked if she could lead us around). Learned more about how the building/site relates to that part of downtown. Also more about the architecture and architect himself, Ian Simpson, who clearly has democratic ideals in mind while designing but likes to hole up in the poshest parts of his designs like any pure elitist.

I was afraid there wasn't anything new since the last time I went there. But this was fortunately untrue. "Play" was pretty damn cool even if kids were fooling around with the interactive exhibits. It was basically about people reclaiming urban spaces and subverting practices and prejudices that are so closely regulated. For instance, there were playful uses of irony in temporary graffiti art that was, in some cases, quite inspirational. In the snow, one artist had inscribed something to the effect of "My mum told me to stay at home. Did I listen? Hell no!" and "Listen kids, graffiti destroyed my life." There's guerrilla gardening in some parts of the world, too, where people meet up late at night and plant flowers and such in public areas. This reminded me of Joe's Apartment (1996). Despite looking like something for kids (with a title like that...), it was really rather good.

Also good was the exhibit on Hong Kong's contemporary art trying to reconcile some historical and cultural issues within and outside itself. The exhibit is an event to help mark the 10-year anniversary of Hong Kong's switching over from British to Chinese control. This exhibit was there the last time I was at Urbis, but I didn't get to see it because we ran out of time.

Unfortunately, Urbis will have two exhibits starting in the summer that I will miss: "The Best of Manchester" and "The Hacienda." That pisses me right off.

Next I went to the Manchester Art Gallery and was utterly underwhelmed. The wonderful space that had once housed the Joe Colombo exhibit that had amused me so much I wrote a paper about him was now sparingly decorated for an exhibit about contemporary international artists' use of Cold War sci-fi themes to make statements about race and difference. Almost absolutely no (con)text. And there really wasn't much of an emphasis on a/an (inter)national context, but they showed movie posters of American films in local languages such as Polish and Italian. They looked the same as the American posters for the same films. What does this say? The curators don't even attempt to answer this question. Will say that I loved the richly painted orange walls. So was "Alien Nation."

And then I went home.