There is no more hunger
There is no more slavery
But in the souls
Of the people of the Earth
There is war, hunger and slavery
It is only your religion
That can
Bring that peace
Feed that hunger
Free those bonds
It is your calling to go out into the world
Use whatever powers you can harness
And make this happen
Chodak closes the book.
Chodak puts the book back in his bag.
Chodak stands up.
Chodak slips the sword back into its sheath.
Chodak returns his sheath to its place under his saffron robe.
Chodak walks through the parting throng.
Chodak heads West towards the setting sun.
Chodak completes his mantra:
Big Mac With Fries
Big Mac With Fries
Big Mac With Fries
Big Mac With Fries
Big Mac With Fries
Big Mac With Fries
Big Mac With Fries
Big Mac With Fries
Big Mac With Fries
Big Mac With Fries
Big Mac With Fries
Big Mac With Fries
Cindy is on her gap year.
Cindy is from Australia.
Cindy saw it all.
Cindy filmed it all on her iPhone23.
Cindy uploads.
This was not art as Will Gompertz might know it.
This was not art as Winnie and Yoko might know it.
This was not the quote that Spock never said: ‘It’s art, Jim, but not as we know it.’
This was now.
This was at teatime today.
If we lived in different times, would Chodak’s visage be on one million T-shirts, ten million posters, one hundred million screen savers by teatime tomorrow?
Subcomandante Marcos does not stand a chance when there are young men like Chodak stalking the Earth.
There seemed to be a smile on Ronald McDonald’s painted face as it lay there in the gutter.
Or was it a grimace?
*
Big Mac With Fries to go. Yeah, and a Coke as well, please.
My life’s a masquerade
A world of let’s pretend
7: EARLY DOORS
18:03 Monday 24 April 2023
There are three pint glasses on a round Formica-top table.
In the pint glasses is Phipps Ale, the local brew.
The table is in the snug of a village pub near Northampton.
Around the table and sipping the pints are Jimmy Cauty, Bill Drummond and Alan Moore. The original and only line-up of Extreme Noise Terror.
‘Well, I think we did ourselves proud.’
‘Yeah, but my lead kept coming out.’
‘I thought that was part of the act.’
‘I wonder who will turn up.’
‘Do you think anybody gives a shit these days about what we did?’
‘We are a major part of the rich tapestry—’
‘Yeah, but who the fuck knows what a tapestry is, let alone a rich one?’
‘Didn’t you learn about the Bayeux Tapestry at school?’
‘What, like “Born on the Bayou” by Creedence Clearwater?’
‘Are you taking the piss?’
‘No.’
‘Like the Bayeux Tapestry in France, the Norman Conquest, 1066 and all that.’
This is Cauty & Drummond bickering. Alan Moore is saying nothing, just picking up his pint and taking the odd sip. Until … ‘It’s all very well us playing The Black Room, but it is so obvious. Yeah, people will want to hear it, but I think we should be doing something new.’
‘Like what?’ ask Cauty & Drummond simultaneously.
‘Like, I have an idea for a new concept album,’ responds Alan Moore.
‘Concept album?’ Cauty.
‘We’re not prog.’ Drummond.
‘Never were.’ Cauty.
‘Never will be.’ Drummond.
‘Just listen.’
‘We’re listening.’ Cauty & Drummond.
‘It is a dystopian story, but not set in the future, set in the past. In 1984, so like it is a play on Nineteen Eighty-Four by George Orwell …’
‘Dystopian?’ Drummond.
‘A story set in a bleak and fucked-up future.’ Alan Moore.
‘What, like all your comics?’ Cauty.
‘Yes, but this one is set in the past, on an island off the West Coast of Scotland. To be more precise, on the Isle of Jura, exactly when you two met each other and that batty old novelist you told us about, who got killed on her motorbike.’
‘So it is about us?’ Drummond.
‘No, but you might get bit parts in it, if you are unlucky.’
‘So what is it about?’ Cauty.
‘The Cold War gets hot. The bomb gets dropped. Then it’s all out. Then everybody is dead, except 23 people who were in a bunker in a cave at the top end of the Isle of Jura.’
‘But why Jura?’ Cauty.
‘Because it has got to be set somewhere, and you two are always going on about it. Can I continue?’ Alan Moore.
‘Feel free.’ Drummond.
‘There are only 23 survivors, twenty men and three women. The women include Margaret Thatcher, Yoko Ono and a little local girl called Wee Katie Morag. The men include Ronald Reagan, Leonid Brezhnev …’
‘Brezhnev was dead by then.’ Drummond.
‘Don’t be so fuckin’ pedantic, this is fiction, not a history lesson. Anyway, there is a bunch of Hasidic Jews, a Buddhist Monk, an African King, a South American revolutionary, a milkman, two members of an English Civil War re-enactment society – one a Roundhead and one a Cavalier – a skinhead, a washed-up child actor, a biker, a three-piece power-rock trio—’
‘Is that us?’ Drummond.
‘Maybe.’ Alan Moore.
‘Can I have a Marshall Stack and an SG?’ Cauty.
‘For fuck’s sake, what is it with the pair of you? Just hear me out. The Pope and two locals who have converted to Islam—’
‘That sounds like more than twenty blokes.’ Drummond.
‘Well, we can sort it out, maybe get rid of the biker and the skinhead.’
‘What kind of bike would he be riding? British or Jap?’ Cauty.
‘British, of course, but that is irrelevant. It is the story that counts. I say we get the songs written and recorded and put the whole show on at the O2 Arena on Christmas Eve.’
‘What about The Black Room tour of the former Eastern Europe?’ Drummond.
‘Fuck all that, the world has moved on. There are bands like Tangerine NiteMare at the moment, that is where things are at …’
‘You mean Tangerine Dream?’ Drummond.
‘No, I don’t mean Tangerine Dream, I mean Tangerine NiteMare. You must have heard of them? They got these stage names, Killer Queen, the Crow, Dead Squirrel and John Lennon – and no, not that John Lennon. They do a sort of industrial ambient with beats. They are doing a gig tonight at the London Aquarium for the fish, totally conceptual, like more art than music. Some people actually think they really are a killer whale in the sea, a regular proper crow, a dead squirrel lying on the road and this post-hipster down in Hackney Wake who has been murdered by his girlfriend, or that is what it seems if you read their Twitter feed.’
‘Sounds like rubbish.’ Drummond.
‘Yeah, whatever, but we have to think bigger than just playing our old stuff to a few ageing—’ Alan Moore.
‘Okay, we get the point. So how do you see this working as a stage show?’ Cauty.
‘I was thinking full-on rock opera, with M’Lady GaGa playing Margaret Thatcher, Yoko Ono playing herself, Drums of Death to play the Pope and we get Azealia Vaults to play Wee Katie Morag—’ Alan Moore.
‘Hang on a minute, Azealia who?’ Drummond.
‘Azea
lia Vaults, you must have heard of her? She is the teenage R&B sensation of the moment. Total in-your-face, says it how it is, confrontational. Everyone hates her, but she is genius. You must have heard about the biopic that was made? No one will release it.’ Alan Moore.
‘Why?’ Cauty & Drummond.
‘The title.’ Alan Moore.
‘Yeah?’ Drummond.
‘Does My Clit Look Big in This? It just about breaks every feminist, racist, homophobic, anti-Semitic taboo going.’ Alan Moore.
‘And you want her in our musical, playing a young Scottish girl on the Isle of Jura?’ Cauty.
‘It is our job as artists to push the boundaries. And no one pushes the boundaries like Azealia Vaults.’ Alan Moore.
‘Okay, you have made your point. Who else?’ Drummond.
‘I don’t know yet, but I do know I want a choir of Hasidic Jewish men, done up in all their drag.’ Alan Moore.
‘And the story – what happens in this cave on Jura in 1984 in this post-nuclear-war wasteland world?’ Cauty.
‘I don’t know yet. Either a baby gets born, or the girl gets her boy, or they all die. Or maybe all of these options. What do you think, are you up for it?’ Alan Moore.
‘All right.’ Drummond.
‘But only if we can get to play The Black Room from beginning to end as our encore.’ Cauty.
‘Oh yeah, and they have to burn money to keep warm.’ Alan Moore.
Silence falls.
Cauty, Drummond and Alan Moore drink their pints in deep thought. Each of them looking in different directions.
The kraa of a lone crow can be heard in the distance.
18:17
There are a couple of cans of Asonga Lager on a wicker table on the veranda of a shack. The shack is on the island of Fernando Pó, tucked into the Gulf of Guinea off the coast of Africa.
A twenty-something son is sitting facing his sixty-something father. The son takes a sip from one of the cans of Asonga and then says:
‘But, Dad, you are just so embarrassing.’
‘That is just a cliché. Every child is embarrassed about their father.’
‘Yeah, but since Mum left you, you have just gone further and further out into some weird territory. It’s like you are trying to prove something to someone, and all you are proving is what an idiot you are, and it is becoming more and more obvious why Mum left you. Every time I come round here I am worried about what I am going to find or what you are up to.’
‘So what is your problem? I keep things together. Feed myself. Do my own laundry regularly. Sweep the place. Get a regular shave at the local Moroccan barber’s. Even went to the dentist last week. Okay, my specs are held together with tape, but I will get that done. And I am sure if I wanted another woman, there would be a queue around the block.’
‘No, Dad, it’s none of that. It is all this black magic, witch-doctor stuff you have got into.’
‘And?’
‘And it’s not the 1960s any more, when it was okay for Granddad to be a witch doctor. I guess back then it was a respectable position to have in society, but now the world is different. There is no excuse for believing in all this mumbo-jumbo. It’s like you are playing to the preconceptions the rest of the modern world still has about Africa.’
‘But we are Africans. We should be proud of that and our heritage and what we have given the world.’
‘Well, I for one am pleased we on this island have finally accepted the modern world and, yes, have finally been accepted by the rest of the modern world. It feels like all the time you want to drag it back to voodoo and spells and all that witch-doctory stuff you get up to. We may have some catching up to do and I hope in the next few years we will have done that. But you seem intent on dragging us back. I mean, what are those five straw dolls doing on your table?’
‘Those five dolls, as you call them, are the five leaders of the five companies that rule the world.’
‘What?’
‘This one is Celine Hagbard of GoogleByte; this one, Florence “the Princess of” Wales of WikiTube; this, Jessie Bezos of AmaZaba; this, Stevie Dobbs of AppleTree; this, Melinda Gates of MircroSoft; and, lastly, this is Marcia Zuckerberg of FaceLife.’
‘And what are you intending on doing with them?’
‘I am sticking this bamboo needle through them at intervals through the day.’
‘To what end?’
‘And each time I push the needle through one, they, the real one, drops dead.’
‘Dad, this is a prime example of why I have every right to be embarrassed about you. You have to stop doing things like this. Everyone will be laughing at you. Even your oldest friends, like Sam Funai. Was that his name?’
‘Yes, but have you not heard the news today? Celine Hagbard is dead; it was all over NokiaNet.’
‘Dad, that is just it. You are still on NokiaNet. Nobody has used NokiaNet since 2018. But, anyway, that is beside the point. And, yes, I did hear about Celine Hagbard having a heart attack in a street in New York, but that had nothing to do with you sticking a piece of bamboo through a corn dolly in your shack on this island off the coast of Africa. You probably heard the news first and then stuck the needle in. Get a grip, Dad.’
‘Now, son, you listen to me. I have not only stuck this needle through Celine Hagbard, I have done the same to Stevie Dobbs and Jessie Bezos. As far as I am concerned, they are now both dead. That leaves only Marcia Zuckerberg and Florence “the Princess of” Wales, and they will both be dead by midnight.’
‘Dad, if both Stevie Dobbs and Jessie Bezos were dead, the world would know about it. Look at my screen. I am on the iJaz app right now; there is nothing. The only story they are running with is about the Unknown Artist thing.’
‘Whatever. You wait. They are obviously just too scared to run the story yet.’
‘Okay, Dad, just to entertain you: just say you are right and they are all dropping dead because of your five straw dolls and this piece of cane. Why are you doing it? What is there to be gained? The world, and you are part of that world, has every reason to be grateful to these five women, for sorting out the mess several million years of men made of the world.’
‘The point, son, is this is all wrong. This is not how it should be. All this bland peace and happiness. The human spirit needs darkness. It needs fear of the unknown. It needs hunger. It needs Earthquakes and tidal floods and pestilence—’
‘Hang on a minute, Dad, what exactly is “pestilence”?’
‘I don’t know, but it is one of the things we need. Since they cured AIDS and Ebola, we in Africa have hardly had anything to—’
‘Dad, this is not only way stupid, it is downright evil thinking. The cure for AIDS and Ebola were two of the best things that ever happened for Africa.’
‘Life has become meaningless. I am going to bring back Meaning to the people of Africa.’
‘The people of Africa? You are talking like you are some sort of a leader as well.’
‘Well, as it happens, this morning I took the final step on what I have been working towards all of my life.’
‘And?’
‘And I had a little private coronation ceremony where I crowned myself King Francisco Malabo Beosá the Twenty-Third.’
‘Look, Dad, this just gets crazier and crazier. I think I better get a doctor or something for you. I’m sure there will be some sort of medication you could be taking. Where are you getting these ideas from in the first place?’
‘Yesterday morning I got this book in the post – Grapefruit Are Not the Only Bombs. I know it is a stupid title. And if you were to flick through it, it would not make much sense. But then I got to this page, which is in Bube, and even if you have steadfastly refused to speak it, it is our mother tongue. And seeing as you have probably forgotten how to read it, I will read it out to you:
It is your duty to save not only your people
But all the people of Africa
But for this to be done
Five have to di
e
Thus
Make Five dolls out of straw
Dress the dolls in rags
Make a sharp needle from bamboo cane
Imagine each doll to represent
The Kings or Queens of the Five States
Over a period of 23 hours
Sink a needle through the straw flesh
Of each of the Five dolls
The Kings or Queens of the Five States will die
A Child will be born
She will be the One
Build a pyramid in Her honour
‘Do you understand?’
‘Yes, Dad, I understand this is way beyond foolishness and into the land of total madness. It has to stop.’
‘Nothing will stop me.’
‘Look, Dad, I may have to get you certified, before you cause yourself or somebody else some real harm. Is there anything else you should tell me first?’
‘Okay, there is something else, and even I am not too sure about this. I have been having these dreams where I am telling all of these stories to a white woman living on some island. I think it might be near England, or maybe Scotland. And she is writing everything down I tell her. But she is living many years ago. Maybe thirty or forty years ago. Maybe even a hundred years ago. And what I am telling her, which she is writing, is going to be in a book. And the book will warn the people of the world about the things that will come to pass. And maybe the people of the world will be able to stop those things coming to pass before they do—’
‘Dad, look, I can cope with this bit, as you are telling me it is just a dream. Maybe the rest of what you think you are doing is coming from dreams. You have to tell the difference between dreams and reality. Maybe you have been living on your own for too long. Would you like to come and live with me and Zeina for a while? She would be more than pleased to have you. And you could spend time with your grandchildren.’
‘I have not finished yet. By my reckoning this Baby is going to born in about nine months’ time, and seeing as this book was posted from London in England, I plan to start work on the pyramid as of tomorrow, and then towards the end of the year head for London to find out where the Baby is to be born, so that I can pay my respects.’
‘And where and with whom will you stay when you make this visit to London?’
‘Well, I thought as now I am a King, I would stay with the Queen of England.’
2023: a trilogy (Justified Ancients of Mu Mu) Page 18
