The grotesque (and after the gramme) Henry Forrest consults the TV (Total Victory) listings…
6.00pm – 7.00pm – Flowers in My Hair
(New Series)
Episode 1 of 30
New ground literally and metaphorically is being dug as our early evening audience is invited to meditate on the passing of time as one family’s centuries long struggle against famine, disease and social upheaval starts. It is advised to watch this at full volume. Stars Michael Jayston as the doomed head of the family. (A Lawyer’s Note: The title of this programme is in no way derived from Sandi Thom’s forgettable ‘I wish I was a Punk Rocker – with Flowers in My Hair’)
7.30pm – 8.00pm – Rightward Drift
Episode 116 of 365
Where would we be without our sardonic daily lifestyle guide? Our host Matthew Leonard will gleefully direct those desperate for artificial change in the right direction. As he points out in tonight’s show; “A better postcode for a better school”. The accumulative addiction to this programme will make you trade in happiness altogether just so you can fit in!
8.30pm – 9.00pm –Tongue in My Eye
Series 1: Episode 6 of 6
The ophthalmic sitcom ends. Our hero finds out what has been preventing him from sleeping and crying and comes to terms with life after the extraction. Though sadness still prevails, as the leitmotif of the bittersweet series is the complicated dynamics of romantic entanglements (Spin off series Finger in my Skull is available on our catch-up service)
9.30pm – 11.30 – Oldham Loop
(New Series)
Next Episode depending on ratings of the first.
Documentary series as we look at the relationship that exists between Taxi Drivers and their passengers as they cruise through the Oldham districts of Failsworth, Shaw, Sholver, Glodwick, Longsight and other places. Conceived as a night time travelogue for which will put the unfamiliar at the heart of the landscape via the pulsating soundscapes. The movie Drive as if it were filmed in Royton.
11.30pm – 00.00am – T.I.M.E (King James Version)
Everything you had seen before in Tongue in My Eye, but more plaintive and stripped down.
00.00am – 00.30am – Total Victory Live In Rennes
Everyone’s favourite Northern powerhouse satirists and destructors of identity play a sensational live set full of classic songs packed with literature landmarks.
Lockdown excessive repeats of favourites to fill schedule.
End of night’s programming. A Test Card of ‘Total Victory’ posing in moody northerner gang stance outside Atherton’s ‘Ena Mill’ Retail centre until programming resumes at 6am.
The soundtrack to tonights programming is available on CD via mail order. All works composed by Brian Oh-no.
Flowers in My Hair: Thunderous collapsing Tom – Tom drumming, indecently discordant Fuzz guitars, unrepentantly sinister basslines and a WD40 lubricated falsetto.
Rightward Drift: A Prozac gargled wistful lead vocal accompanied by a beautiful mournful sounding band -playing as if from the inside of recently bombed out Church.
Tongue in My Eye: Brushed drums, rockabilly strummed guitars, melt your heart piano tinkering and a voice we’d all have if not afraid to honestly sing.
Oldham Loop: Sampled musical recognition convos involving residents from the OL1 postcode. Slow building heavy basslines and guitar notes, menacingly divine drumming.
— Henry Forrest
Set Controls For The Heart Of The Pendle is available on vinyl and the entire Total Victory digital back catalogue is a snip at £18.
https://totalvictory.bandcamp.com/album/set-controls-for-the-heart-of-the-pendle-ep
Read this full, if hyperbolic review of English Martyrs
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