Goldie's Fab Four #6

My cultural highlights of the week

John Motson RIP

The death of John Motson isn’t a highlight of course, but his untimely death (aged just 77) allowed us a moment to celebrate his commentating genius as well as reflect on an altogether different era of sport.

“Motty” was undoubtedly a nerd, never short of a stat or three, but also had the unerring ability to capture the true fan’s moment of orgiastic excitement.

In a period when football was only broadcast on two channels, commentators assumed an outsize importance and none more so than Motson. The avalanche of tributes after his demise show how much he was loved.

(Pic: Everton FC)

Boiling Point (Netflix)

Only just caught up with this intense 2021 restaurant drama – but it’s great.  Stephen Graham stars as a chef spinning too many plates in his personal and professional life until the night when tensions among his colleagues – like the pots on the stove – finally boil over.

The entire 92 minutes are shot in a single take, which is an audacious technical feat by director Phillip Barantini and cinematographer Matthew Lewis, creating an air of claustrophobic urgency. As someone who was made films and worked in telly, I can assure you it’s difficult to under-estimate the difficulty of doing this at all - never mind doing it so well.

There’s apparently a second helping in the offing, too - in the shape of a BBC series with Graham, co-stars Vinette Robinson and Hannah Walters, alongside Barantini and his screenwriter James Cummings.

Shocking (BBC Sounds)

Those of us reared on ‘One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest’ will have vivid memories of Jack Nicholson’s rebellious psychiatric ward inmate McMurphy being forced into submission by the evil Nurse Ratched who uses Electro Convulsive Therapy as a vicious form of control.

This Radio 4/BBC Sounds documentary offers a long overdue corrective, featuring the accounts of those helped by ECT, including Dr Tania Gergel, Director of Research at Bipolar UK, who credits the treatment with saving her life.

Produced by Fiona Hill, the revelations in this sober, heartening documentary come as the best kind of shock.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m001jc56

Luke Haines and Peter Buck (Hare and Hounds, Birmingham)

(Pic: Paul Samuels)

It’s been a good few months for bona fide rock legends at the Hare and Hounds.  After Chrissie Hynde in October, now Peter Buck treads the boards of Brum’s finest indie pub.

Alongside former Auteurs/Black Box recorder vocalist Luke Haines, Buck is still identifiably the guitarist whose ringing arpeggios defined REM’s sound but there’s a more psychedelic feel here than in his partnership with Michael Stipe.

Haines lyrics definitely have a hint of 60’s lysergic excess – witness titles like ‘The British Army On LSD’ and ‘The Skies Are Full Of Insane Manchines’ from new album ‘All The Kids Are Super Bummed Out’.

Who next at The Hare?  Bruce Springsteen, anyone?