Notes from the Engine Room XXI
Meta Letta
The gods of writing are really capricious little goblins; they'll punish hubris as much as humility, only to then reward them on a whim, bestowing bountiful boons. They're quite partial to a bit of false hubris, perhaps the fictitious fake-it-until-you-make-it attitude amuses their little goblin hearts.
But what they cannot abide is false humility. You want to play down what you've got in the tank, to playfully make light of middling inspiration, like I did last week? Then your brutal punishment will be an object lesson in what a lack of inspiration truly looks like.
Creativity is such a fickle beast, whatever form it takes. It is so dependent on that curious cocktail of inspiration and perspiration, and that alchemy can easily be disrupted. That's one of the reasons why mixers and networking events, while absolutely necessary in my opinion, can be just as capricious as the aforementioned goblins.
Meeting your peers, forming relationships and alliances, these are really important in the creative industries. But, you know, it's been quite the year. I'm not sure right now I can face the inevitable questions:
"So, what have you been working on for the last 16 months?"
"Not really anything you'd be interested in, to be honest."
Or
"So, what are you working on next, what's your project?"
"I have no idea. Maybe nothing?"
And since many people I know have had to move away from London, or are similarly creatively crippled, I can't even hide from awkward questions by hiding within alliances of season past. It's not time yet.
"Some seasons are for creating; other seasons are for becoming the person who will create in a future season" - Glennon Doyle
In My Ears
Music news this week finds festival favourites British Sea Power discussing their identity. The band's name was meant ironically, but apparently it was one lost on some people. They didn't feel comfortable with either people who didn't understand what their song Waving Flags was about, nor with the mantle of jingoism in general. They will henceforth be known merely as Sea Power.
I don't think I need to paint you a picture of how the comments section on Facebook received this news. "Traitors" who should "knob off to Europe, if they love it so much" and preferably "kill themselves". And, my personal favourite whenever any pop culture entity is mentioned, "I've never even heard of them".
Their new single, appropriately titled Two Fingers, will not feature on this week's playlist. This week I needed a new running playlist, and so I created a new one centred around noughties pop music. The first Run To The Engine Room is obviously still available.
On My Screen
You don't want to know what I've been watching this week, the shame would kill me so dead, not even a good witch could resurrect me. After Lupin, nothing seemed worth investing myself in, subtitled or not.
Speaking of subtitles, Apple's recent movie acquisition CODA will apparently be the first movie to include burned in subtitles in all theaters. Typically, members of the deaf community who want to watch movies at cinemas must attend screenings that support wearing special glasses in order to see the subtitle tracks over the top of the movie. Unfortunately, this equipment is often broken. CODA will simply include the subtitles in the main film reel.
CODA, short for Children of Deaf Adults, follows the story of Ruby (Emilia Jones) as the only hearing member of her family as she looks to break away from the family’s fishing business in order to pursue a passion for singing. The movie is an English remake of a French-language film La Famille Bélier.
You want to know what my secret movie weakness is? Female assassin movies. From La Femme Nikita to Atomic Blonde via The Long Kiss Goodnight, there are some real crackers in the genre. Sure, there are some terrible examples: Luc Besson seemed to have truly lost his way with 2019's boring Anna. I still watched it though.
For that reason, I was thrilled to see the trailer for Netflix's Kate, starring Mary Elizabeth Winstead as an assassin with only 14 hours left to live. It seems Atomic Blonde has made as strong a visual impact on this genre as The Bourne Identity made on the look and feel of spy thrillers. Kate is due out September 10th.
In The World
So, something a bit different for this section this week.
Next month my fiancé Cate be taking part in the Thames Bridges Trek, in aid of Solving Kids' Cancer. It's in memory of Jossie, a little girl who died aged just six years old, after a two year battle with neuroblastoma.
So if you would like to, she'd love it if you could sponsor her, in Jossie's memory, and to help ensure there are less cases like that in future.
As a sweetener, Cate is raffling off the first of the new leather handbags that she has designed. Any donation in excess of £20 will be entered into a draw, for a chance to win this exclusive item, ahead of a launch later this year.
Denouement
Last week I was hoping to phone in the podcast, record a brief 1 minute intro and then just segue straight into the covers playlist. Sadly, a further downside of such a tightly controlled distribution medium as Anchor is the fact that they can have fairly arbitrary rules. One of those is that the spoken word portion of a podcast submission must be "substantial". So, it looks like I'm going to have to do this week's podcast episode properly. Maybe.
Well well well, looks like we've come to an end of another thrill-ride of a newsletter. Have I ever told you how much I appreciate you reading these? Because I do. And I appreciate you.
Be careful out there.