Fifteen years old and still utterly true

Blobby, Mr Blobby, if only you could make us understand
Blobby, Mr Blobby, your influence will spread throughout the land

His philosophy of life will steer him through
And as far as he can see
He's the same as you and me
There's nothing in the world he cannot do.

No hill too high, no desert too dry
No road too long, no tide too strong
No bridge too far, he's got a car
No slope to steep, no thought too deep
No star too bright, no squeeze too tight
No tale too tall, no cat too cool
No bass too low, he'll give it a go
No end to his talents, no sense of balance

Blobby, Mr Blobby, when disaster strikes you never get depressed
Blobby, Mr Blobby, you'll always prove that Blobby is the best

Although he's unconventional in hue
His philosophy of life will steer him through
And despite the limitation
Of his poor co-ordination
He knows he'll show the world a thing or two

(Blobby, blobby, blobby)

Blobby, Mr Blobby, you're the guy who puts the do in do or die
Blobby, Mr Blobby, your deeds are guaranteed to stupefy

No ride too rough, no test too tough
No act too slick, no race too quick
No shot too hot, he'll hit the spot
No style too chic, no joke too weak
No chance too slim, no fate too grim
No foe too strong, no odds too long
No price too high, he's put some by
No dodge, no doubt, no backing out

Blobby, Mr Blobby, if humanity's a question of degree
Blobby, Mr Blobby, stay loyal to your Blobby pedigree
Blobby, Mr Blobby, you're the one who bears the pink and yellow crest
Blobby, Mr Blobby, you'll always prove that Blobby is the best.

Cracking

Asterisk, over on A Blog About Nowt, has posted about Doris Salcedo's Tate Modern artwork, Shibboleth. Or "the crack" as it's inevitably become known.

It seems to be a requirement that the Turbine Hall installations can be summed up with a single noun - the slides (Carston Holler's Test Site), the boxes (Rachael Whiteread's Embankment), the sun (Olarur Eliasson's The Weather Project).

Anyway, from ground level I wasn't overawed, though it did make me smile. But going up a level or two and looking down was more interesting - you could see people trying to make sense of the crack by walking its length, peering in and straddling it. At this stage, the work seemed to gain profundity: the puzzled spectators become part of the work, and its message - if there can be such a thing - is the world's reaction to it. So in the end, I was well up for the crack.

An imaginary conversation

"Hey, who's that girl? She looks really familiar."
"Which one?"
"That one, with the straight black hair and flowery dress."
"We don't know her, you idiot – everyone looks like that now."
"But, it's just…"
"You're so fucking out of touch I can't believe it. I bet you haven't even heard the new Kate Nash album."
"Er, actually I have, some of it."
"Well fucking done. And?"
"Well, I suppose it sounds a bit familiar, all that chatting nursery rhymes innit sort of stuff, but otherwise it's all right, I guess."
"You dick – everything sounds like that now. Anyway, you're wrong. It's shit. God, you really are a twat, aren't you?"
"Hold on, that's a bit harsh…"
"It doesn't matter anyway, shit's the new good."
"Isn't that a Nathan Barley quote?"
"No. I never quote fictional characters."
"You've quoted Kate Nash before."
"No: I just used the word 'foundations' in a sentence once. That so doesn't count. Wait, are you saying Kate Nash is fictional?"
"Good point, I'm not quite sure where that came from."
"Because you're right, she is."
"Erm, what?"
"'Kate Nash' is just a construct. It's obvious. Just look at this article, right: 'Nash slams Spice Girls'."
"Why'd's that make her…?"
"Shut up, I'm not finished. You know what she actually said about the Spice Girls? She said, 'They're all older now so to kind of still wanna be the Spice Girls is just, I dunno… just grow up.' That's a direct quote. It's the kind of stupid thing anyone could say – and they've kept the 'um' words in, so you can hear her rooting around for something vaguely interesting to say. They type up the quote, add some other paragraphs – I dunno, 'The 19-year-old, whose album is out today blah blah fucking whatever' – then they stick it next to a picture of the individual called Kate Nash, and hey presto, you've got a story."
"But surely that means it's the story that artificial, not Nash herself?"
"God, free your mind, man. I know a guy who works at her record label. They have to fucking get her out of a box every morning and put her together. There's actually a guy at the label whose job it is to assemble Kate Nash. He's signed a confidentiality agreement so he can't talk about it. But this shit gets out. Why dyou think her album's called Made of Bricks? Answer that one."
"What happens when the guy's ill? Who assembles Nash then?"
"God, what kind of dickhead question is that? The fucking work experience boy, I don't know. But it's the same for all of them, you have to do it with all that fucking lot."
"What? What do you mean, which lot?"
"Penate, Allen, T, Nash. What did you think Torn on the Platform was about? They're all in little fucking mannequin pieces when they arrive. Most of them are left over from the 1930s or whatever – that's why the birds have those fucking old-fashioned dresses and the blokes look like they've just stepped out of Les fucking Miserables."
"Arrive? Arrive from where?"
"They just get shat out the back tube of MySpace straight into the fucking Barfly. You think Westlife's manufactured? This lot make Westlife look like fucking Motörhead. Ever see Terminator 2?"
"Yeah. Classic."
"It's okay. But it got one thing right - that's exactly how the planet's gonna look in 2029, except instead of those wiry metallic robots, the place'll be overrun by fucking Kate Nash clones, shooting the shit out of everything with their big laser arms. Think that girl we just saw looks familiar? You ain't seen nothing yet, fuckwit."

Five cultural disappointments of the year

If you came here thirsty for lists, prepare to be quenched...

Mighty Boosh, Brixton Academy
'Surreal', 'culty' and 'outsider' boxes were lazily ticked. Everyone laughed before the self-styled wacky duo had even done anything. Annoying.

Closure of The Queen pub, Bellefields Road
One of my favourite pubs ever. And they didn't just close it – they knocked the fucker down. Relive the pain here.

Broken Boy Soldiers, The Raconteurs
It was supposed to be the next Nevermind, for Jack's sake! Instead, it was just a bit average and featured way too much whigging out. Has slightly spoiled Brendan Benson for me.

Our Freeview box breaking
Luckily it was a two-in-one thing and the DVD player still works. But we still had to buy a new box. Hang your head in shame, Wharfdale.

The West Wing ends
Okay, it was never as good after Aaron Sorkin and Rob Lowe left. But I still wept salt tears.

Five cultural events of the year

... the end-of-year lists continue...

Blackbird, Albery Theatre
Dark and overwrought, which is what you want from the theatre really. Plus, Catherine Tate sat in front of us when we went. Bovvered.

Cansei De Ser Sexy, Scala
Gig of the year. Made me realise that most other concerts aren't actually that fun.

Gervais, Pilkington and Merchant podcasts
These actually dropped in quality for the third series, but only a dead horse would be able to keep a straight face when Karl started moaning about his kidney stone operation.

Krapp's Last Tape, Barbican
Existentialism! Surrealism! Bananas! Fifteen minutes of quality acting from the Hurtmeister [John Hurt].

Carsten Holler, Tate Modern Turbine Hall
Aka "the slides". Most asked question of the year: "Have you been on the slides yet?" Answer: "Yes I have, and they're fucking ace."

Dan pan

Things for you to say about the new James Bond, Daniel Craig:

"I preferred his early, arty stuff."

"He was far better in Our Friends in the North."

"For me, Enduring Love was his peak."

"His performance in Lara Croft: Tomb Raider was sublime, far better than this 'Bond' nonsense."

Chop of the Pops

Laters, Top of the Pops. Last night was the last ever episode of the long-running BBC music show (except that some cynical 'creative' will doubtless try to resurrect it in a few years time and it'll all have been a fuss about nothing).

The final episode featured clips from performances over the years, most of which will be familiar to many from the endless nostalgia programmes – classics like Bowie sharing the mic with Mick Jones during Starman, Nirvana mauling Smells Like Teen Spirit, Sonny and Cher's excellent Dylan rip-off dronefest I Got You Babe, The Small Faces playing football onstage while John Peel ineffectually tries to pretend he’s doing a mandolin solo, Slade.

Why did the programme die? Received wisdom says that it all went to hell after they moved it to Friday nights because all the hipsters were out on the town getting smashed. I like to think it’s because people want to see live music instead of studio miming. But that wouldn’t explain the success of CD:UK.

The miming was always something that bothered me quite a lot. When I was into the TOTP back in the day (early to mid-late 90s), I'd spend most of the programme trying to work out which acts were miming (most) and which were actually singing / playing (few). A spanner was usually thrown into the works every programme when an American rapper would appear and go "Lemme hearya make sum nauze, Tapp ah tha Papps!" before launching into an exact replica of the studio version of their song. Did the producers turn the mics on at the start for some rabble-rousing, and then switch them off so artists could mime? Now I'll never know.

I'd also watch the programme with the Ceefax subtitles turned on to find out the words to the songs. No internet back then, remember, meaning you couldn’t get hold of lyrics by clicking a cyberfinger. A particular highlight I remember was when The Prodigy's Wind It Up came on accompanied by the subtitle "Fast electronic beeping noises". I imagine the deaf found that very helpful.

"It's something to tell your grandchildren isn't it – that you were the last ever number 1 on Top of the Pops?" says Dave Lee Travis to co-presenter Edith Bowman, or someone, as the final show draws to its inevitable close. And who claims that prestigious record? "It's Shakira featuring Wyclef!" Do they really think Shakira featuring Wyclef even know that Top of the Pops is finishing? No matter; the last ever number 1 on TOTP seems an appropriately mediocre ending for this once vital show.

Freak show

Like every good Goldsmiths student, I went through a photography stage, reading Susan Sontag's On Photography, then spending about, hmmm, a week poring over pictures by Andreas Gursky, Walker Evans and Diane Arbus. Then I got bored and moved onto, I dunno, skateboarding, or something.

Anyway, those Arbus pics really stuck in my head, so I was quite excited about going to the exhibition of her work at the V&A last night. And it was very good, spanning 15 years (1956-71) of her portraits - of ugly women, New York, transvestites, women who look like men, circus freaks, celebrities, the disabled and old nudist couples. It had bits of her writing too (she was amazingly eloquent, in an oblique poetic kind of way) and memorabilia (less interesting - though it's quite exciting to peer into the lens of one of her old cameras). I also managed to resist the temptation to piss everyone off by pointing at photos and exclaiming in exaggerated American accent, "Dude, look that one! What a totally gross freak!"

It's hard to say anything about the photos. Sometimes when you try to analyse great photography or beautiful poetry, pull out the meaning, it gets so frustrating. You just want to give up and shout, "It doesn't mean this, or say this! There is no better way of saying it than the thing itself!" Perhaps that's what Arbus meant when she said, "A photograph is a secret about a secret. The more it tells you the less you know." But probably not.