Still - there's no doubting his talent for grasp of the English language. He was very funny. And he also did an incredible piece in the aftermath of the Columbine Massacre and how Marilyn Manson et. al. were not to blame... He was a great writer but his talents passed me by due to his need to shock rather than inform. Fair enough...
Although it's interesting looking at how bland NME is now compared to when he was writing for them. Despite the fact I often put the paper down thinking he was a bit of a knob, at least he was entertaining. NME was good in the 90's. You had the decent writing of Kitty Empire, Stevie Chick, Sarah Dempster, Victoria Segal et. al. offset with his bile. Made it a good read on balance!
However the one thing I cannot mourn his passing for is his continued Morrissey bating and his incessant need to try and prove that he was a racist at whenever the moment arose. He should've dropped that shit a long time ago but instead EVERY moment he could he was slipping in some nonsense about Morrissey and racism... 6 YEARS after everyone stopped giving a shit about it! He went too far with that, much to the detriment of him as a respectable journalist if you ask me...
Still - he did well for himself. He entertained and, also... he WAS genuinely funny. Brooker-esque sometimes in his ability to form hilarious sentences. And plus he gave us all something to talk about which, really, is all that he set out to do. And he achieved that.
I wasn't a big fan of his but he's died too young of a horrible illness. Anyone who defies a lymphoma in such fashion, continues to produce work and succombs to it bravely and humbly deserves to be remembered well simply by virtue of that. A sad way to go...Statistics: Posted by Westie — Thu Jun 25, 2009 1:46 pm
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