Sunday, September 09, 2007

TAM Commandments: 10. Taboo is a dirty word

If you're just joining us, this weekend we've been illustrating These Animal Men's ten commandments with appropriate videos. This is the last one, but you can read the full list and access all the videos via the introductory post.

Taboo? There are still taboos, although someone will push at every one. Perhaps the most-rigidly adhered to taboo is the one about treating child disappearance with kid gloves, and trying to pretend they never happened as soon as the kid is back home, or the bodies buried. Here's Luke Haines, doing Unsolved Child Murder, at a European Festival this summer:


2 comments:

Anonymous said...

The thing about These Animal Men, and NWONW in general, is that - for a few weeks - everyone seemed to be talking about them (they even did TOTP, I'm pretty sure, which in a worlds-collide moment was still hosted by Bruno Brookes). And then the whole thing just finished, disappeared off the radar, at the exact same moment that John Smith died, Blair emerged as leader-in-waiting, and the rules of the game changed forever, as at no other moment in my pop life. When "(I Want To) Kill Somebody" hit the Top 40 in July, it already seemed played-out. (Of course, "Parklife" / "Supersonic" / the first issue of Loaded had all cross-fertilised in April, but they needed Smith dying and Blair emerging to really become what they were.)

That's just how I remember it. It was there, then all its ideals and principles were suddenly seen as laughably outmoded, as if two months ago was ten years ago. It's not as if NWONW was ever any good - it was hopelessly confused and futile, and did not succeed in turning that into any kind of virtue - but such is my loathing for the destructive potency of the Blair personality cult that I can even feel regret for its near-instant fading.

Unknown said...

Why is it that Luke Haines never got that big breakthrough hit, again?

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