There is a small but active cabal here at Americana-UK Towers who are vociferous supporters of a little known genre of music which we term ‘Cowboy-grime-hop’. This musical back alley is chiefly notable for its heady mix of slap bass, drum machine aesthetic and steel guitars. Lyrically it is an acquired taste espousing as it does such ‘virtues’ as homophobia, sexism and a nostalgia for apartheid type politics. On the plus side some of the harmonies are great.
When questioned the adherents of this genre tell us that Americana – being the broad church that it is – should make room in its voluminous bag for their preference and that their views should be ‘sucked up’ lest we be accused of some sort of ‘-ism’. Or something. At least I think that’s what they said. Anyway The Editor, being an occasionally fair minded kind of guy, saw fit to have the Chief Cowboy-Grime-Hopper into his office just to see where the land lay and to work out some way forward. The problem was that The Cowboy-Grime-Hoppers were under the impression that their beloved music was being dissed by the rest of the hoi poloi on the staff and that this being the case they were an oppressed minority. The meeting, according to those ‘close to The Editor’ (or at least those who got close enough to ear-wig at the door), was a convivial affair in that The Editor resisted the temptation to point-blank fire the fuckers on the spot and the Chief Cowboy-Grime-Hopper only chewed some of the carpet.
We thought that all was said and done until some days later we were contacted by the local rag – the snappily titled “The People’s Republic of Liverpudlia’s Daily Tribune Herald Star” – for a comment. “Comment on what?” we naively asked. Silly us. We were then informed that The Chief Cowboy-Grime-Hopper had been ‘wired-up’ and that the world would be made aware of the ensuing recording which would shut us and our organisation ‘the fuck up for good’ and that ‘you fucking paedos are fucking fucked’. Actually it might have said ‘speedos’ – the phone line wasn’t terribly good. Anyhow we politely thanked them for their interest and asked, if at all possible, they would like to say how they had acquired their information. Again the phone line wasn’t great but we ‘think’ that it was from someone called Cowboy Bodges. Since we are always bodging things here that wasn’t terribly helpful. We were a little sad that a private meeting had been recorded and that even though the said meeting had come up with nothing more than The Editor’s cast iron assurance that all was in hand and would be addressed ‘soon as’ we were still being accused of wearing speedos.
To end we should point out that we are not the suspicious types and would never record private conversations as a ‘safeguard’ (principally because we don’t want to fall flat on our faces in pursuit of a good headline…although now you mention it…here is covert surveillance of the meeting in question. Note The Editor’s very kissable lips and wonky hip)
