… and so what? It’s not the most amazing skill in the word ever. I don’t think it’s better than, say, being able to do brain surgery or stopping a killer dog in its tracks just by looking at it in a funny way. They’re proper skills. Most people tend to agree that the ability to do the cube is a bit clever but no big deal. I say ‘most’ as there are some people who think I should it should be trumpeted to the rest of the world. They fall into two categories: and the first should be discounted – jugglers. Jugglers can do a skill that is also difficult, but unlike people who can do the Rubik’s cube they believe that the rest of the world ought to know about their ‘astounding’ ability and should be treated to the sight of it at every available opportunity. Preferably enhanced while wearing a stupid hat. They juggle in public, expecting people to bow down to them as if they were messiahs… some take their stupid hat off and expect people to pay for the privilege of walking past them. Some even have two stupid hats – one to wear and one to collect money from what they mistakenly believe to be the amazed public. But the people who pay people for juggling are not amazed, they are generally simple charitable types who contribute because they believe it’s better than putting jugglers in a home. They are wrong of course. But their hearts are in the right place. So jugglers can be discounted because they are wankers… but there is also another category of people in awe of Rubik’s cubers and, as unbelievable as it may sound, they are possibly even bigger wankers than jugglers: eighties revivalists.

The eighties revival is everywhere and it’s rubbish. I’ve just seen an advert for a 3CD abomination that was called Now That’s What I Call Greatest The Hits of the Eighties Ever or something. Every single track featured was shit. Every single one. Everyone knows that the eighties were when the charts and good music parted company. Early in the decade the discrepancy between number ones and music you can actually stand listening to wasn’t quite so obvious but to make it simple, the law stated that good ones had to began with the letter G. This was until around 1983 when the alphabet was de-regulated and letter choice was introduced. But even so, for every number one like Ghost Town, Going Underground (*) or Geno there were five hundred shit tracks by shit artists that sold shit-loads. And before you start throwing examples of decent music from the eighties at your screen, I do know that the entire work of The Smiths existed in the eighties… but they weren’t really hits and you’re missing my point. Deliberately. Just to spite me. The great bands of the eighties actually prove my point because like all great art they were a reaction against the mainstream, and as the mainstream in the eighties was the worst ever in the history of popular culture it stands to reason that those who kicked against it produced great art. Or something. I haven’t thought it through but anyway there is great eighties music just not eighties music as in the sort of eighties music that they feature in these post-modern, re-interpretation-of-the-facts-style compilations that people seem to want to shove down our throats. And don’t come the guilty pleasure defence with me.  Not even war criminals bother with that one…  I do not recognise the legitimacy of this court as the judge isn’t wearing day-glo robes with shoulder pads… and anyway I killed them ironically... I’m not equating people who like bad eighties music with mass murderers… necessarily.

Some of the best singles of all time were released in the eighties. I’ll happily bob in to whatever they call record shops nowadays and have a look at the track-listing of that compilation and if it features Love Will Tear Us Apart (*) or one track from What The World Is Waiting For/ Fool’s Gold 9’53″ I’ll take it all back but I won’t have to, as it’s are bound to feature tracks by… er… you know… that idiot… and the ones with the hair… I do actually remember all of their stupid names but I am deliberately not naming them as I’ll have to tag them and I’ll get unwanted visits from Eighties Fans who are disappointed not to find tracks with that crappy synth sound where the band look like geography teachers wearing make-up in a way they believe makes them look interesting and sexy and androgynous, but actually makes them look like geography teachers wearing make-up, which just looks creepy.

What is it with people? The shops are awash with eighties fashion. Youths are wearing the sort of clothes that were deemed too eighties even in the eighties. For fuck’s sake. But I can put up with youths looking like twats – that is their job after all. I can just about tolerate pointless A-Team and Karate Kid remakes and maybe just maybe I can get through a royal wedding without going postal but only because I’m banking on Kate Middleton to blow all of the fuckers to smithereens. She’s the only one going into that wedding full of assorted traitors to these isles that security daren’t frisk, and as such is the only one able to get explosives in undetected. The bigger the dress the bigger the bang. And we even get a day off work to celebrate. That Katie Watie is a revolutionary or an Al-Qaeda operative is maybe just wishful thinking partly derived from the fact she seems slightly too attractive to be marrying into that bunch of inbreds. But when I mentioned this to a friend he pointed out that she, like Diana, she was probably just there for the photos and Harry has probably got an ‘ugly’ on the side. Just like his Dad… but a boy can dream… and you’re getting me off the point… hang on… let me think…

… yes… so far you might agree or disagree with my eighties revival-based prejudices but the unforgivable part of the eighties revival is that the people in their infinite idiocy have somehow decided to bring back the very worst aspect of the eighties: the eighties government. The tories. You might remember them. They were bastards. Every single one of them. But I won’t go on about them. I’m scared I’ll throw my macbook at the wall. Hate eats you up from the inside, so here’s a happy tune to send you on your way while I go into a darkened room and think about fluffy clouds:

The Day That Thatcher Dies – Darren Hayman & Jack Hayter

(* Yes, they were both originally recorded in 1979 but weren’t released until 1980, so they count as eighties in my book. Mind you, my book is strewn with ridiculous biases, appaling errors and a blatant disregard of inconvenient facts that get in the way of my ranting.)