can i wipe your bum with my halo?

June 26, 2007 6:45 AM

Bored of her (award-nominated) years as the glamourpuss of "Family Affairs", thanks to a chance encounter with Rat Scabies, Ebony's found her new calling as the Grace Jones of nu clash, a figurehead for blavers, M.I.A.-meets-Lil Kim-meets-Peaches, "Harry Potter with a vagina". For all those reared on Esg, Bow Wow Wow, Nina Hagen and Delta 5 who weren't able to catch her headlining the Flaming Love Palace at Glastonbury this past weekend: have a read, a look and a listen to the as-yet unsigned Ebony Bones (no, not these). Personal favorites: Don't Fart On My Heart (video) - I'm Ur Future X Wife remix - No Blacks, No Irish, No Dogs at 3:08 of Don't Dance So Fast.
posted by progosk (31 comments total)

bow wow's missing a wow. oops.
posted by progosk at 6:47 AM on June 26, 2007

London

Like Hollywood films about Hollywood/LA/The Business, London spawns alot of media artifacts that are of utmost importance to those within the scene and of little relevance to anyone outside it. There is enough self-importance and money within the scene to keep a constant supply of such things going.

Having said that, best wishes to Ebony Bones, she has at least as much to offer us as Lily Allen or Corinne baily Rae, IMHO.

[NOT LONDONIST]
posted by asok at 7:06 AM on June 26, 2007

Also reminds me of DJ Fee or Crazy Girl on Tummy Touch, amongst others.
posted by asok at 7:14 AM on June 26, 2007

Is your Shift key broken?
posted by Optamystic at 7:22 AM on June 26, 2007 [1 favorite]

What? Capital letters, pls.
posted by beaucoupkevin at 7:52 AM on June 26, 2007

Can you say astroturf?
posted by zemblamatic at 8:07 AM on June 26, 2007

thankfully this ain't germany...

Bored of her (award-nominated) years as the glamourpuss of "Family Affairs", thanks to a chance encounter with Rat Scabies, Ebony's found her new calling as the Grace Jones of nu clash, a figurehead for blavers, M.I.A.-meets-Lil Kim-meets-Peaches, "Harry Potter with a vagina".
For all those reared on Esg, Bow Wow Wow, Nina Hagen and Delta 5 who weren't able to catch her headlining the Flaming Love Palace at Glastonbury this past weekend: have a read, a look and a listen to the as-yet unsigned Ebony Bones (no, not these).
Personal favorites: Don't Fart On My Heart (video) - I'm Ur Future X Wife remix - No Blacks, No Irish, No Dogs at 3:08 of Don't Dance So Fast.

posted by progosk at 8:08 AM on June 26, 2007

Seriously, shift key, please.
posted by dead_ at 8:12 AM on June 26, 2007

Well I like it, even if it only lasts for the summer. That sort of stuff was always fun, including when The Delta 5 did it. Let's hope she presses some 7" 45s with quirky picture covers ...
posted by carter at 8:41 AM on June 26, 2007

Not a snark: I was completely unable to understand the FPP, even after a second slow read. Just a cultural thing, I guess. It was interesting in an anthropological way. Again, not a snark.

hmmmmm
posted by sidereal at 8:51 AM on June 26, 2007 [1 favorite]

I was completely unable to understand the FPP, even after a second slow read.

Me too.

London spawns alot of media artifacts that are of utmost importance to those within the scene and of little relevance to anyone outside it.

Nail. Hammer. Bang. I'm not a part of this London scene. So the post flew right over my head.
posted by jason's_planet at 9:04 AM on June 26, 2007

Not a snark: I was completely unable to understand the FPP, even after a second slow read. Just a cultural thing, I guess. It was interesting in an anthropological way. Again, not a snark.

Yeah, I could *not* understand what this post was about.
posted by KokuRyu at 9:05 AM on June 26, 2007

She said fart.
posted by GuyZero at 9:08 AM on June 26, 2007

That's not what he said. He distinctly said "to blave." And, as we all know, "to blave" means "to bluff." So you were probably playing cards, and he cheated --
posted by Floydd at 9:19 AM on June 26, 2007 [2 favorites]

Now I get it.
posted by KokuRyu at 9:21 AM on June 26, 2007

Has she always been a chick? It's important that I know.
posted by deeper red at 9:26 AM on June 26, 2007

[replaced the fpp with the one with caps.]
posted by jessamyn at 9:41 AM on June 26, 2007

There seems to be an incomprehensible Brit-Filter post every morning now. I'm not complaining, they're sort of fascinating even though I don't usually understand a word. They do make me wonder if USA culture is as completely impenetrable to outsiders as this post is to this North American.
posted by octothorpe at 9:53 AM on June 26, 2007

Odd about people finding this impenetrable. Tags are pretty straightforward. Is it the referenced music is too obscure (shurely not...)? Or because her name's a noun? Or is this to do with marketing niches again?

Oh and: no turfing intended - I was just struck; she seems like a sign of the times to me (I wouldn't be surprised if she chose to stay unsigned).

thx jess for the switch (just sorry that makes the complaints jut out so).
posted by progosk at 10:15 AM on June 26, 2007

I clicked for comments to understand the meaning of this post. I still do not get it. Oh well.
posted by b_thinky at 10:34 AM on June 26, 2007

progosk writes "Odd about people finding this impenetrable. Tags are pretty straightforward. Is it the referenced music is too obscure (shurely not...)? Or because her name's a noun? Or is this to do with marketing niches again?"

I understood it on the 2nd read through, but here are the nouns and phrases that I'd never heard of:

Family Affairs
Rat Scabies
Ebony
nu clash
blavers
M.I.A.-meets-Lil Kim-meets-Peaches
"Harry Potter with a vagina"
Esg
Delta 5
Flaming Love Palace

There's a certain threshold of unfamiliar words at which the brain just gives up, which is probably what happened here. If they're all "lumped" (for example, the part "Esg, Bow Wow Wow, Nina Hagen and Delta 5"), that's less confusing, because your mind processes it as one item. So you could have a post with a ton of unfamiliar terms that's unclear:

"Underwear Catastrophe's Bob Blorbson took a break from BLARGH! due to a contract dispute. Will he stop Fucking His Cat? Tour mates Yes, I am Fucking Your Cat say it's stress from a falling out with Wilting Underwater Houseplants. But what about Widows with Widows Peaks? Will The Daily Saturday News go the same way, as Bob hob-nobs with Crash Bandicooter?"

Or clear:

"Bob Blorbson, actor on such favourites as Underwear Catastrophe, Fucking His Cat, BLARGH!, Widows with Widows Peaks, and The Daily Saturday News, is taking a break from acting, and has released his first album. He will be touring with bands Crash Bandicooter, The Wilting Underwatered Houseplants, and Yes, I am Fucking Your Cat."

(I'm not saying you could have written your post clearer (maybe yes, maybe no), just that unfamiliar nouns and phrases, ungrouped, can reach a point where you stop trying to understand them if there are many, and that may be what happened here).
posted by Bugbread at 10:49 AM on June 26, 2007 [4 favorites]

I see your point. Perhaps the simple operators actress, singer, band, songs, and other such might have done the job. (I may also have overstuffed the stocking.)

I'm so resisting a Metafilter: ... with my own title... must.... perdure...
posted by progosk at 10:57 AM on June 26, 2007

b_thinky writes "I clicked for comments to understand the meaning of this post. I still do not get it. Oh well."

Ok, let me give it a shot (no, progosk, I'm not saying you should write it like this, because it's amazingly dry, but just writing for extra clarity for the confused folks):

Ebony Thomas, bored of her award-nominated role as Yasmin Green on the soap opera "Family Affairs", happened to meet Rat Scabies (former drummer in the band The Damned). The two have started making music together, with Thomas taking on the stage name "Ebony Bones", and she has become a figurehead for black ravers, being described as "the Grace Jones of nu-clash", "MIA-meets-Lil-Kim-meets-Peaches", and "Harry Potter with a vagina". She is an unsigned artist, but headlined in the Flaming Love Palace stage last weekend at the Glastonbury Festival. If you were raised with the music of Esg, Bow Wow Wow, Nina Hagen, and Delta 5, but didn't get to see Ebony Jones at Glastonbury, you can read about her, see her, and hear her with these links. My personal favorites are Don't Fart On My Heart (video) - I'm Ur Future X Wife remix - No Blacks, No Irish, No Dogs at 3:08 of Don't Dance So Fast.
posted by Bugbread at 11:02 AM on June 26, 2007 [1 favorite]

The song "Don't Fart On My Heart" was not worth the endless wait while firefox spun the decoder wheel on the myspace's gibberish html, I closed the window before the chorus. HOWEVER, the song title will live inside my heart until the final trump and shout, forever and ever, amen.
posted by Divine_Wino at 11:31 AM on June 26, 2007

Divine_Wino: that track also plays (a little more readily) at the harry potter link. (or else there's the video.)
posted by progosk at 1:50 PM on June 26, 2007

I hear Nathan Barley is a HUGE fan of Ebony Bones...
posted by Ian A.T. at 3:02 PM on June 26, 2007

Derivative to the point of pastiche, obviously, but not bad. Maybe even not unentertaining!

I can't help but be a mite suspicious of someone who does 'Shanty House' by numbers one minute (ImUrFutureXWife) and DIY/post-punk tributes the next (Wolf Who Cried Boy). That trend-humping chameleon business does have a whiff of the self-perpetuating media node about it, as Ian A.T. suggests. Still, I'd probably have a wee bop if one of her songs came on in a nightclub.

Could be an enormous pisstake, though? The fact that cod post-punk is so desperately late-1990s, making this an ironic revival of a revival, and that she has a gig at a skate park in Carmathen and one on Guernsey listed in amongst all the de rigeur nitespots makes me wonder. Cauty & Drummond have been pretty quiet of late, after all, and this does sound like something straight out of a revised version of The Manual for 2007.

can i wipe your bum with my halo?

I now wish it were possible to favourite post titles.
posted by jack_mo at 6:09 PM on June 26, 2007

There's a certain threshold of unfamiliar words at which the brain just gives up

Welcome to the modern world!

I hadn't realised how difficult it is for North Americans to cope with unfamiliar jargon. Room for a study of some sort here!

How do you cope with song lyrics, rap, colloquialisms and comedy from unfamiliar areas? Cultural parochialism in the globalised media sphere.

How do you cope with business meetings? Replete as they are with TLAs and business speak claptrap. I believe that this language is used precisely because no one really knows what they are talking about, or what anyone else is talking about. Thus everyone has plausible deniablility.

ntk and popbitch must be indecipherable!

But that's part of the fun, surely? I have lost track of the number of times people have written into ntk to say something along the lines of, 'I have no idea what you are writing about, but I like it'.
posted by asok at 3:04 AM on June 27, 2007

Metafilter: Yes, I am fucking your cat.
posted by jonp72 at 6:13 AM on June 27, 2007

asok writes "I hadn't realised how difficult it is for North Americans to cope with unfamiliar jargon. Room for a study of some sort here!"

It's true for everyone, though, isn't it? I haven't found folks from other countries more capable of coping with unfamiliar jargon. At best, I've found that people have lots more experience with American jargon, due to so much damn entertainment export from America. So I've seen Americans get totally lost when talking to Brits because of all the unfamiliar terminology, while the reverse doesn't happen, because the Brits know all the American terminology. But that doesn't mean the Brits are better at coping with the unfamiliar jargon, because then some hardcore Aussie will start talking and the Brit gets lost.

asok writes "How do you cope with song lyrics, rap, colloquialisms and comedy from unfamiliar areas?"

How do I "cope"? Well, I don't like song lyrics, so I ignore them, likewise with rap. Colloquialisms from unfamiliar areas? Not a problem. After all, like I said, the problem is the quantity. Or, rather, the ratio of "what does that mean" to "I understand that". Comedy? Likewise, not a problem.

asok writes "Cultural parochialism in the globalised media sphere."

Oh, come now. I haven't even lived in the US for over 11 years now. I may not be the World's Best Globetrotter, but I hardly think you can call me culturally parochial.

asok writes "How do you cope with business meetings?"

I don't have them. However, I do have to translate Japanese business documents into English, and while I disagree that the cause is plausible deniability, I do agree that the terminology is used because people don't know what they're on about. Makes it hell to translate ("I can't translate it into English - First, it doesn't mean anything, and second, despite the fact that English has a mountain of meaningless business terminology, there's no equivalent meaningless English for this particular meaning Japanese business term")

asok writes "ntk and popbitch must be indecipherable!"

Popbitch is blocked by work filter. A quick scan of ntk shows no particular problems.

The types of articles that trip me up the absolute most are celebrity / gossip columns (not the national ones, which are straightforward ("Tom Cruise marries Nicole Kidman's brother, dresses him like L. Ron Hubbard, and shoots firebolts from fingertips!"), but the local ones ("Guess who had the ta-ta on L Frou's bom-carpache this weekend? It wasn't Brath, who was filking a little nonny-pow of his own, but this little tinkle smells something starting with 'R"!"))
posted by Bugbread at 11:11 AM on June 27, 2007

i would have thought that people who are used to decifering new jargon would be used to it. I was commenting on the large number of posters who took the time to comment that they could not comprehend the FPP. Don't take it personally.

I am glad that you can cope with the crazy changing world of jargon in which we find ourselves.

ntk is written in a chummy, in-crowd, geek language. So not that different to metafilter, perhaps.
posted by asok at 4:43 AM on June 28, 2007