Since the disappointment of Monday’s weight in I’ve been pretty healthy.  Home made soup for lunch all week and fairly healthy evening meals.  Well, the evening meals could have been a bit healthier (I made a lasagne last night and used a whole pot of cream in the béchamel sauce…), so there’s still room for improvement.

Tomorrow I’m at a wedding all day, but I’ll try not to get too drunk and I’ll try not to eat too much.  Chances are I won’t eat anything, I’ll drink far too much, and my girlfriend will find me asleep in my own vomit under a hedge at about eight o’clock.

A few words on Happy Ending: I’m not sure it works posting little snippets of it as blog entries.  A novel isn’t the type of thing you read in 500-word bursts, so publishing 500-word extracts of it on a blog isn’t likely to stir up much interest.  That’s what I’m telling myself, anyway.  It may well just be that what I’ve written is shit. 

But regardless, I will keep on writing it, and will occasionally post bits of it.  They’ll probably be slightly bigger chunks than the last couple of instalments, and I’ll try to make sure they’re chunks of which I’m particularly proud.

Be good.

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            WHITE NOISE

            I go to see Ray because he calls and asks me to meet him.  He says he’s had a meeting with the record company and they want to call the album White Noise, which I tell him I like.  Ray shows me potential covers for the album, and the one we both agree on is of a white-coloured white noise sound-wave on a black background, with WHITE NOISE written in lower case red lettering on the cover.  JACK SMITH is written in very, very dark grey at the bottom of the cover, which I like because it’s understated.  Ray says he knew I’d say that.

            We then move on the subject of the CD single artwork, and after some heated debate I just tell him to do what he wants.  He says that’s convenient because the finished design has already been sent out.  As I’m leaving he simply winks and says “Sex sells”.  When I get home I just pace around the house for no reason at all other than I can’t relax.  I check my e-mails and notice straight away I’ve got one from Samantha saying she loves the album.  I hear her soft voice in my head as I read every word of her e-mail, as she reviews every single track.  She says her favourite three songs are—in no order—Happy Ending, Everyone Knows You’ve Been Screwing Around (Except Me) and White Noise (probably my top three as well, in that order).  She says she loves “the anger” in those songs, and says she nearly cried during Wish You Were Dead.  She says the album is bound to be a huge hit.  I smile as I read it but I wonder how honest she’s being.  I’ve heard it all before.

            It takes me nearly two hours to reply—I deliberate over every single word in the e-mail and wonder how she might construe it, and if it sounds good, or if it sounds stupid, and I wonder why I care so much.  I type her name into Google and look at some pictures of her.  Then I make sure to delete my history and temporary internet files.  Kate has to work late, and when she gets home I’m asleep on the sofa.

LAST week we gave you the exclusive news that stunner SAMANTHA LOUISE was to star in the new Jack Smith music video, Plastic Woman.  Our snapper was on hand to catch an exclusive shot of the couple leaving a posh London bar on Monday night. 

An onlooker said, “There was definitely a spark between the two.  Samantha looked gorgeous, and Jack—well, he’s a lucky guy!”  He sure is.

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Last week I found I’d gained two pounds, which after the excesses of Oktoberfest (did I mention I’d been to Oktoberfest?) was actually not a bad result.

Erm, that’s it really.  Just a quick blog to say I’m still here and I’ll post a bit more of Happy Ending this week.  This time I promise I will.

Also, if anyone knows how to change or get rid of the grey box with a 5 in it in the top right hand corner of the blog, please let me know as it’s driving me crazy.

P.S. today’s blog title is a shameless rip off of David Ford’s A Short Song of Apology, in case you wondered.

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HOW THINGS WORK

Ray calls me at ten thirty the next morning, which is first thing for him.

“Jack.”

“Ray.”

“You made the Daily Mail, but nothing else.”

“Thank God for that.  No-one who reads The Mail will have heard of me.  I’ve not lost any would-be album-buyers there.”

“Jack, that’s bad.  I hoped you might at least make one of the red-tops, but someone marginally more famous than you vomited outside an AA meeting yesterday and the gossip pages are all preoccupied with that.”

“Good.  I’m pleased they deemed someone else’s faux pas more newsworthy than mine.”

“Jack, an appearance in The Sun today would have given your career a very nice little boost.  They told me they’d print your story as well.”

“Hang on a minute—you spoke to The Sun about this?”

“Of course.  I want to see your name in the papers, because your name in the papers will sell records.  I tried all the tabloids.”

“Did you ring them?”

“Yeah of course I did.”

“Fucking hell Ray.  I can’t tell you what yesterday was like.  I didn’t sleep last night.  I thought I’d be woken up by gangs of rabid, placard-waving lunatics burning effigies of me outside the flat.”

“You need to chill out a bit, chap.  I don’t think you understand, do you?  As your manager, part of my job is to get you maximum exposure so people will go out and buy your records.  You’re not going to get plastered all over the papers for being a bloody nice bloke, are you?  You’re going to get in the papers for being a bad boy.  Although the media pretend not to like them, they love bad boys.  Good news doesn’t sell newspapers.  Fact.”

“Ray—”

“Jack, this is how things work.  Trust me.”

“Can’t I just release a good first single and a great album without too much unnecessary fuss and hope it sells because it’s a quality product?”

Ray sighs, theatrically.  “I wish it were that simple, I really do.”

“Whatever.  What was it you said yesterday about a video?”

“Ah, yes.  Let’s talk business.  I spoke to the record company guy and he says they’re willing to throw some cash at a video.”

“Which single do they like?  Everyone Knows?”

“It’s a moot point.”

“So they haven’t decided.”

“That’s a moot point.”

“Ray…”

REIGNING FHM High Street Honey SAMANTHA LOUISE is to star in the SEXIEST MUSIC VIDEO EVER, a source close to the stunner said. 

The video for the single PLASTIC WOMAN, by singer-songwriter JACK SMITH, will include the gorgeous Sam and two other lovelies dancing around in not very much at all.

To be filmed next week, Plastic Woman will overheat TV screens everywhere when it first airs next month.

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I’ve been told that losing more than 2lbs a week isn’t sustainable and perhaps more importantly isn’t healthy.  I also found out to my cost that losing a lot of weight in a short space of time gets you drunk much more easily that usual.  Saturday I got really embarrassingly drunk, really embarrassingly quickly.  At a wedding.  Take yourself back to the hotel at 9 o’clock, wake up fully-clothed, mysterious liquid all over the bathroom floor type of drunk.  And yes, I’m completely and unreservedly blaming the weight loss for my drunkenness. 

The following day someone played me an answerphone message I’d left them which consisted of three minutes of me trying to talk cricket tactics in French and announcing my undying love for a waitress I was convinced was eyeing me up.

Sunday night I had two pints of Guinness and half a pizza to celebrate getting Sandiacre Town Cricket Club’s second team promoted after a workmanlike victory in our final game.  Then last night my girlfriend treated me to a curry at Kerala in Nottingham, an absolute brilliant restaurant which I highly recommend.  As far as curries go I’d say it was a fairly healthy one, but still, I’ll make a real effort to be healthy for the rest of the week.  Then at the weekend I’m going to Oktoberfest where, I’m told, there’s nothing to do except sit and drink beer all day.  Could be an early night again…

And later today or tomorrow — you lucky, lucky people — I will post for your viewing pleasure, the next chapter or so of Happy Ending.

            CHARMING AND AFFABLE BUT SLIGHTLY CONTROVERSIAL

            It was Ray’s idea.  “Be charming and affable,” he said, “but say something amusing and slightly controversial, just to get the readers’ attention.  But not too controversial.  We don’t want people to not like you.”  How was I to know the magazine would hit the shelves the same day some fool in America burst into a school and shot sixteen seven year olds before putting a live grenade in his mouth and blowing his head clean off his shoulders?

            The editor of B-Minor music magazine—Britain’s biggest magazine for fans of alternative music—is an old friend of Ray’s who owed him a favour.  I’m a virtual unknown in the music industry and the release of my second album is a couple of months away (my first album, as we say in the industry, tanked).  Ray, my manager, thinks the interview will help raise my profile before the release of the first single and the album, a month later.  He says, If you throw enough shit, some sticks.

A Minute with Jack Smith

 

It’s been over a year since you released your critically acclaimed debut album Where Do All The Dirty People Go?, what have you been up to?

I’ve been doing a lot of touring and I’ve been working on my new album which will hopefully be out in March.

 

What can we expect from the new album?

It’s eight tracks long, but we haven’t decided on the title yet.  The record company want to use White Noise, which is one of the tracks.  I’d prefer something like No Happy Endings.  I didn’t mean it, but the album is kind of a story — like a suicide note.  It’s pretty dark — much more so than the first album — and I think No Happy Endings as a title reflects that.  But it’s the record company’s money, so it’ll probably end up being White Noise, which I still like.

 

You say the new album is darker — in what other ways is it different to the first?

I made it all myself, which I really enjoyed.  I wasn’t signed to a record company, so there was never anyone interfering, suggesting I make songs more ‘poppy’ so we can release them as singles, or telling me to trim them down so they’re suitable for radio play.  That really drove me on and made me want to make a great record.  Everything on the record is as I intended it to be.

 

You recorded the new album without a record deal?

I didn’t have much choice.  After Dirty People flopped, the record company dropped me.  So I started writing and recording a few songs.  One day I realised I had this great album, and somehow it ended up on someone’s desk at Objective [Record Company].  Nobody heard the album until it was completely finished, so it’s very special to me in that sense.

 

What would you be doing now if you weren’t doing this?

I’d probably be back in my old accountant’s job, bored out of my fucking mind.

 

What is more important to you—commercial success or critical acclaim?

I always say critical acclaim, but critical acclaim doesn’t pay the bills, does it?  I’d like both, obviously, but if I’m honest, I’d rather people loved my music and didn’t buy it, as opposed to being commercially successful but loathed.

 

How do you hope people perceive you as an artist?

I honestly don’t really care.  Obviously I’d rather not be hated, but I don’t intend to pander for popularity either.  I’m not doing this because I want to be popular or famous or feel important — I’m doing it because I love doing it and it’s more interesting than sitting in an office tapping numbers into spreadsheets.  I don’t crave adulation or try to write songs that make a statement.  I’m not trying to be clever and I don’t have any further agendas — I’ll just keep doing this as long as I’m making enough money to get by.  It’s a job.  A great job — and I’m very grateful to be doing it — but it’s a job nonetheless. 

 

If you died tomorrow, how would you like to be remembered?

I don’t know — I’m not really one for legacies.  If I had to be remembered then maybe it could be for something infamous, like a maniac who got hold of some firearms and ran amok in public.

 

If you had a million pounds that you had to spend by the end of today, what would you buy?

Firearms.

 

Who would your ideal date be, and where would you go?

My girlfriend, Kate, obviously.  But in case she doesn’t read this I’ll say Kate Beckinsale.  I’d probably take her to an all-you-can-eat buffet.  Somewhere not too cheap but not too fancy.  Like me.

 

If you could change one thing about yourself, what would it be?

My teeth.  I hate my teeth.  They’re crooked and I always get food stuck in them which can be embarrassing.  I’m not a vain person but I really hate my teeth.  Oh, and I’d have a couple of inches taken off my penis.  Ms Beckinsale, if you’re reading, call me.

 

Finally, what’s the best advice you’ve ever received?

Never fight naked — unless you’re in prison.

 

Jane Sergeant

            Until early afternoon I sat grinning, holding January’s B-Minor music magazine, proudly reading over my affable, slightly controversial—but hopefully amusing—replies.  Kate even called to say she liked the interview (although she said she hoped I was joking about Kate Beckinsale) and everyone in her office liked it too.  Now I’m sitting watching news report after news report on some Iraq War veteran shooting a class of school children then killing himself.  I look back at the interview:

If I had to be remembered then maybe it could be for something infamous, like a maniac who got hold of some firearms and ran amok in public.

            Why did I try to be funny?  Why did I listen to Ray?  I look back at the TV.  Crying children, crying parents, crying teachers.  Everyone’s crying except the news reporters, who speak in slow, low voices from long, serious faces.  Anyone who reads this magazine article after two o’clock this afternoon is going to think I’m a sick, sick fuck.

            Ray rings up.  I tell him to turn on the news.  He says So what?  I tell him to read the magazine article again.  Ray says Oh Christ.  I say I know.

            “Bloody perfect timing, Jack.”

            “I know, I know.  God, I’m so stupid.”

            “Stupid like a genius,” Ray says.  “You can’t buy publicity like this.”

            “Bigger picture, Ray—”

            “Jack, no publicity is bad publicity.  In fact, bad publicity is better than good publicity.”

            “That doesn’t make any sense, Ray.”

            “All that matters is being in the public eye, OK?  It worked for the Rolling Stones.  I’ve got to go anyway.  I’ve had an idea for the first video.  I’m talking to the record company this afternoon.”

            “I get to make a video?”

            Earlier on in the week I told Ray I wanted the first single to be Everyone Knows You’ve Been Screwing Around (Except Me) but he was quick to disagree, saying he’d spoken to the record company and they didn’t see it as commercially viable enough for a lead single (which is a polite way of them saying No fucking way are we going to release THAT).  The single will be released about a month before the album, so it needs to be a great song that makes people want to buy the album.  Ray says that the choice of first single is a massively important decision, and he tells me, over and over again and in no uncertain terms that I should probably leave the decision-making to him and the record company.  Ray says my skills are writing and performing, while his skill is separating the wheat from the chaff.  I say I hope he isn’t referring to any of my songs as chaff.  He says that artists like me are passionate individuals, and sometimes that passion can cloud judgement.  I wish he’d just be honest and say it’s a purely economical decision, based on market trends and demographics and all that nonsense, and that the record company’s A&R guy will simply pick the song he thinks will make the record company the most money.

            Kate calls and asks if I’ve seen what’s happened in Bumfuck, Alabama (or wherever it was).  I tell her I regret my maniac with firearms comment—she tells me not to think about it.

            “But this was my first ever magazine interview and I’ve put my foot in it completely.  Anyone who reads that now is going to hate me.”

            “Forget about it—it’s done now.  Jack, I’m sorry, I’ve got to go.  I just wanted to say that I’m going to be late home tonight.  Like, really late.  Don’t wait up—that kind of late.  This due diligence report is booked in for review first thing tomorrow and it’s about ten percent completed.  Don’t worry about the interview.  It was weeks ago—people will realise that.  How were you to know this would happen?”

DAILY MAIL, JAN 3RD 2008

SINGER SMITH’S SICK SHOOTING JIBE

Little-known British singer-songwriter Jack Smith has been criticised for comments in an interview with music magazine B-Minor in the wake of yesterday’s shooting in Alabama. 

Asked how he’d like to be remembered, Smith replied, “a maniac who gets hold of some firearms and runs amok in public.”

Although Smith’s comments were made in an interview BEFORE the Alabama shooting, they have still angered readers, who are demanding that the magazine publish an apology in their next issue.

More to follow…

So motivated in fact that last night I made myself chicken with orange and avocado salsa, which was very tasty and very healthy (even with a side serving of rice). 

(Sorry the pictures are a bit shit.)  Tonight I made fish pie, and this week I’ve been taking soup to work for lunch instead of sandwiches.  Fingers crossed for next week’s weigh in.

We took Poppet (the surviving rabbit) to the vets yesterday, to get her checked out and vaccinated.  We told the vet that Malcolm had died and explained the grizzly details of what had happened.  The vet’s guess was that it was probably a bacterial infection in his respiratory tract (he mentioned Pasteurella — a bacteria that lives inside many rabbits, but doesn’t necessarily affect them).  

He said rabbits tend not to show any ailments they may have — in the wild showing signs of illness/weakness makes predators more likely to attack (think lions on Wildlife On One picking on young or lame wildebeests).  Malcolm could have been ill for a few weeks but his natural instincts were not to give it away.  Obviously by the time he became so ill we could notice, it was too late.

But enough about lost weight and lost rabbits.  This week I’ll post the first bit of Happy Ending.  No really, I will this time.  Honest.

As I hit ‘publish’ after writing my last blog entry, I realised something. I had described myself, with somewhat reckless abandon, as a bitter 28 year-old trapped in a career I’m not entirely happy with.

Instantly my thoughts turned to the ideas I’d already had for my next blog, where, I’d decided, I would describe the idea for my novel and specifically the main character and narrator; 27 year-old singer-songwriter and former accountant Jack Smith, who within the first three thousand words meets a beautiful glamour model who changes his life.

At this point I assumed the reader would arrive at the opinion that my ‘novel’ was in fact the life story I wished I could tell. This isn’t the case. No, really — it isn’t.

The novel is tentatively titled ‘Happy Ending’ (by “tentatively titled” I pretty much mean that if a publisher wanted me to rename it “I’m A Big Stupid Goat” then I wouldn’t put up too much of a fight). It’s worth pointing out here that this is my first attempt at any kind of synopsis. Obviously I don’t want to give too much of the plot away, so it’s an attempt at one of those teasing back-cover blurbs. (Writing synopses is an art in itself, so I’m fully aware of how bad my first attempt will be.)

Here goes:

Jack Smith sees himself as the “caffeine-free Diet Coke” of rock stars. He generally does what he’s told, doesn’t hell-raise, smoke or take drugs, and lives in a modest flat with his long-term girlfriend. About to release his stunning second album, Jack isn’t in it for the celebrity lifestyle. He wants to be critically acclaimed but virtually unknown, and will be happy selling just enough records to prevent him having to go back to his former career as an accountant.

Jack’s record company don’t share his agenda. They release his least favourite track as the album’s lead single and film a tacky video starring three topless models, one of whom is Britain’s most popular glamour model Samantha Louise. Jack hates the video until it pushes him to the top of the charts, and while he’s initially horrified at tabloid speculation that he’s having an affair with Samantha, he quickly learns to embrace life as the media’s flavour of the month.

Consumed by a relentless desire to be recognised as a great songwriter, Jack takes on the media, the music industry and the British public in a fight he can’t hope to win. He tells himself there are no happy endings in life, but can he battle his personal demons and prove to the world that talent and hard work can still triumph over style, marketing budgets and publicity campaigns?

It’s kind of cheesy, I admit, and I’m not altogether happy with it, but as a first gambit, it’ll do (a “first gambit” that took a week of agonising writing, re-writing, editing and tweaking). I’ll post the first chapter or so at some point soon. If you have any comments, if you like the idea, don’t like it, want to read more or think “For God’s sake man that sounds awful — please stop!” then pop a comment below. I’ll try not to get offended. Honest.