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or The London Sinister Exaggerator

“The dev i l m o o n to o k m e o u t o f S o h o . . . U p t o

four feathers from Miss Deepool’s hat, positively identified by her per-sonal milliner, were found floating a few yards from the Fleet outflow by mudlark, Diggory Doggerel.

Then on Friday, a freshly cut fingernail matching Delicia’s DNA was discovered on the floor of Fenchurch Street Station concourse around 8am by riverpsychleaner Ian Riparian.

It has now been a month since

Miss Deepool was last seen in public, after leaving a morning rehearsal for new West End musi-cal, It Ain’t Wot You Do It’s The Fings How You Do it To Me Guv.

In an effort to intensify the hunt and add weight to the investiga-tion, team leader, Detective Chief Inspector Adobikrea Atif-Swett will be joined by Chief Super-intendent, F E Bull. DCI Atif-Swett told us today, “We are most fortunate to have the unformidable brain of CS Bull on board. He may not be a maverick or a wild card, nor ever even have hunches. He may be teetotal and live in hap-py congress with his wife and fam-ily. He may always play by the rules and he may never get results – but by Gusherati’s righteous fingernails he’s a top hole detective.”

Stray ScrapS of Song from missing, soprano soloist, Delicia Deepool, wafted around the capi-tal earlier this week. First hearings were at Spitalfields at 5am last Thursday as costermongers set up stalls. Strains of Ennui by the Sea, Tra-la-la, Tra-la-lee were heard by a total of 12 traders for about half an hour before the song moved through the market to Bethnal Green. By 11am it had arrived outside Tesco Express in StokeNewington before

disappearing shortly afterwards down a nearby drain.

Said a police spokesman today, “Although we cannot ascertain

from whence the music came, whether it was her, and if

ere long it will return again, o slender

hope is fain.” In a sepa-

rate incident last Monday

Illustration by artist in transference, Eric Ravenous ( )

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A feather like

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olds constantly selecting and arranging words purely for the entertainment of mankind

“i’m at the end of my tether, well brassic, with a future as bright as a Toc H lamp”, says Henry Hook, fiance of shang-haied triller, Delicia Deepool. “Two months ago we were talking of wedding bells but now I’m being kicked out of her drum”, continues Henry, an executive project coordinator for a website development agency. “Dilly was my rock but now it’s all dust. They want the rent but it ain’t my flat. It’s bang out of order and well harsh to boot.”

“our beloved, loSt liSSy will we hope, be in the thoughts of all those attending next weekend”, said Duty Deepool, eldest sister of diva disparue, Delicia. She and her seven sisters are busy spreading the news of forthcoming Lissteria – a small festival to keep their sibling in the public eye, to be held in Marylebone Gardens.

Lissteria’s promoter, Johnny Trussler, well known broad-caster, columnist and Chaplain to the Poultry Comptor, promises many attractions, including amongst the stalls and sideshows, pugilist James Figg who will, “Fucking punch some memory into anyone as wants it.” There will also be an enactment of Delicia’s last moments seen in public, per-formed by Mother Whippam’s troupe of hind leg walking dogs and rats, resplendent in their wigs and finery.

Other attractions include music from the illustrious, Ful-ham Philharmonic, fireworkation by Morel Torré, and a chance in the refreshment tent, to nibble upon the famous, gastronomic titbit known to all and sundry, as Mrs Trussler’s Sticky Parkin. Rule Britannia will be sung to close by Lissy’s friend and mentor, fellow soloist, Dame Ka Sheng En.

Finally, a plea from Delicia’s youngest sister Dippi. “Please come everybody. It’s abs vital that this generates enough publicity to make the next event we do for poor, dear Lissy even bigger and better.”

Miss ing

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“a Saucepan, a brick, a bat, a stick, a stoat (stuffed), a stickle-back, fluff, a bedpost, an old leg of mutton freshly roast, and a liberal spreading of Pepperton’s Concentrated Ox Paste Relish on conservatively buttered toast, were all seen simultaneously hov-ering above the head of mother of AWoL warbler, Delicia Deepool at a seance in Sydenham on Sun-day. This special, spiritual session conducted by medium, Madame Inesta Confabulous was convened to cast light upon the mysteri-ous desistance of Mrs Deepool’s daughter. Upon the seance’s ces-sation Madame Confabulous ex-claimed excitedly to all and sun-dry, “This explains everything.”

to help publiciSe the search for stray, soloist Delicia Deepool, The Chameleoplane was due to turn her favou-rite colour of cornflower blue on Saturday. Sadly, the yellow filter broke and it has since become a washed out cyan.

the fog that has covered the west of the city for the last two weeks, moved yesterday, a quarter of a mile north-east.

poultryman, Shaman and water div iner, Geof frey ‘Glib’ Gibbet will attempt to find misplaced prima donna Miss Delicia Deepool with the help of just two, slender handled twigs. Sung Glib earlier, “Though she be well out of view, my wily willow will woo.”

ow nothing but names, the gates of Ald and Alders, New, Moor, Bishops, Cripple and Lud are all extinct. Through those portals no longer can the popu-lace pass. The inconvenient avenues from whence they perched have widened, and off have buggered all the beggars they benevolently berthed. And so dear reader, I start my walk today where Newgate isn’t. My trip this time; The Old Bailey to Marble Arch. Or in another age, from Newgate Prison to The Tyburn Tree. The lonely track from jug to scaff.

Along this route for centuries, London’s condemned took one last ride to the city’s unique, triangular gallows. To meet their maker some dressed in nightshirts, some in wedding clothes, and some, (the big, bad boy, stars amongst them) sported in their tricorns that bygone, token of bravado, the white cockade.

To tie in with this year’s Tybo Fest, the Venerable Ed thought I too should take that trek. He half expected me I’m sure, to become embroiled in some poor unfortu-nate’s procession from times past. Swirled up in some sad and sorry drama of paste-faced youth in horse drawn cart with executioner, priest and coffin as companions. But that’s not me. I’m a glimpser not a big picture man. I savvy stuff for sure, but often for the life of me, I can’t work out the where, when and who - never mind the what, why and how.

Defend the Children of the Poor & Punish the Wrongdoer is where I take my leave. Out onto Holborn Viaduct and up to Holborn Circus. Then past Sains-bury’s HQ, and for a Monday a very busy Gamages. Up High Holborn to the tube. Then across Kingsway, ever west to the Triple Tree. I’m so far feeling nothing. No vibrations. Numb. Cold as hell too. Eventually High Holborn turns into St Giles High Street. That’s a hoot - there’s no high street left. The shape’s the same as Tyburn days but it’s all chopped up by over nourished roads and crossings. Any buildings witness to the regu-lar death processions (including the grog hole where the guilty had a halfway drink) have been erased. All except St Giles Church, now facing-off for the moment, new apartment blocks of gaudy orange, green and blue.

St Giles Circus, and into the narrow, dark end of the Oxen Ford Road for the final stretch. Still unmoved by environs - only the time and distance of my journey con-nect me to that Tyburn ride. Up to Oxford Circus. Then ever deathwards as the road funnels out to the lighter, richer, airier end. Finally, after dodging all the gorm-less faces, miles of shops stop. And where the Edge-ware Road meets Marble Arch, I reach the site of The Triple Tree - now just a concrete circle, marooned on a traffic island, with an X in its middle marking the spot. Though still untouched, I stand, stare down and think upon the dead. Audience and entertainers now all gone, with only the names of the murdered remembered. I say The City Prayer then walk north up Edgeware Road, taking first right and left into Seymour Place, where a pub called The Masons Arms was last port of call for the soon to die. A last chance to anaesthetise and take a final piss. The Masons Arms is no longer there (the Victorian rebuild recently gastromorphing into The Port-man) but The Carpenters Arms is. I nip in for a gin. It’s Monday-lunch-time-full but I grab a stool, and as one large one turns to two, my thoughts take on that unique profundity that only the booze can fuel. Feeling empathy at last, I make a silent toast to The Tree’s strange fruit.

Livener over, I leave on a high and stick on the iPod, switching to shuffle. First song up, I rag you not, is Better off Dead from Ice Cube’s critically acclaimed, 1990 clas-sic, Amerikkka’s Most Wanted. Though only really a spo-ken preamble, it concerns the gangsta rapper as condemned man, making the walk to Old Sparky. “Any last words?”, the executioner asks after Ice is finally all strapped in. “Fuck all y’all”, retorts the white cockaded Cube.

The next song comes up - Tore Up by Tommy La Beff. Indisputably the best song in the world. 555 plays on the iPod so far, 222 more than any other. By Gusherati and his watery hosts, there is always hope for our great city - forever flowing in and out...

promenadin’ with

olds constantly selecting and arranging words purely for the entertainment of mankind

“a number of dedicated, heavily armed, snatch squads are to be deployed by The Public Department of Safety and Health in a counter measure to the current, ongoing, missing songstress scenario”, said Rob Spiers, its spokesman, ear-lier today. “Special, untrained teams will burst into random homes at random times”, he continued, “to seize anyone they can for intensive questioning. The modus operandi is that eventu-ally everybody in the capital will be arrested and questioned. For until we find the guilty, all citizens will be under suspicion”. To finish, Rob gave encouragement, “Please enjoy your interrogation when sooner or later your time comes. Terror is only justice.”

c l a i r v o y a n t liZZie limpiD has found at the bot-tom of her purse, what she believes to be an eyelash from the left eye of absent triller, Delicia Deepool. She claims she con-tacted the police but they have not yet taken a state-ment. Asked by The Wen why she knew the eyelash belonged to Deli-cia, Lizzie replied, “I just do.”

t h e S h i r e o f Surrey has this day stated it will secede from control of the cen-tral government next Thursday at 8.30am. Leader of the breakaway shire, Dave Jeffries said from its newly declared capital, Richmond Upon Thames, “We just want to do our own thing and that’s it really.”

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Simpleton, Si durr was today bound over to keep the peace, after admitting killing and evis-cerating a cow bound for Smithfield that he be-lieved was harbouring the remains of obfuscated aria-basher-outer, Miss Delicia Deepool.

Carefully cut out, then Cow Gum or Copydex onto sti

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Attach a safety pin to the back, et voila – a lapel badge or b

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career criminal Xavier Handpull-Tudders of no fixed abode will this eve at eight, be hanged within the precincts of Kullthistle Gristle, for, according to its Governor, “Possibly having something to do with this aw-ful Delicia Dee-pool business.”

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minute addition, Silly Cyril Apecoat and Lambeth local hero, Little Wretch.

Course if you’re squeamo about rope danc-ing there’s lots more ento on offer to take your pretty minds off the nasty stuff – like the Beastaramarena on the festival south side where there’s bear, boar ’n’ badger baiting.

Or tickle your funny bones at Komedy Kavalcade Korner – this year featuring Bold Jimmy Maclaine, fest regular, Big Fucking Bastard Pete, and from TV’s hilarious panel game show, Shout ’n’ Swear Shithouse, funnyman, Max Rudeshouter and even funnier funnyman, Rex Ruder-loudershouter.

And a pox ’pon us if we don’t catch spe-cial acoustic tent guests and biggest buzz in town, Macheath and Sons not to mention the ever pleasing, pulchry Polly Peachum.

Drearo fringe offerings to avoid this year include a Mastiff Meditation Workshop in the Chillout Zone’s Reality Shelter and Puppet Wrestling in the Bratz Bivouac.

As for slebs – word has it there’s gonna be a turnout of garganche proporche. Usual susps are fest perennials, Drummond sis-ters Daff and Dystopia, Spaniels of Des-tiny’s Hunki Spunki, Old Wonky and fashion’s Sincrum Dufflet! (No really, the Plum Duff will be in the area!) Word has it too that Lobby Lud will be mingling. We also hear society are fielding their first eleven. Bonky Doofer will be attending along with cohort Laird Hamish McBeamish and new squeeze Lanugo Knee-Knockington.

So lots of bands, stands and hangs. And finally, if you’re coming, don’t forget to give a very warm hand to The Cranmers who’ll be finishing their final, farewell tour at TYBO with a special, one-off set, on the special, one-off Wicca Stage.

uckle up your gaiters and wax that old sou’wester! St Lucy’s Day cometh and TYBO time is almost ’pon us. O yea, the 20th Tyburn Festival starts next Monday with a stunning,

all-star line-up. And it gets a new look this year too. Fret not ye worriers the pyra-mid gibbet prevails, but in a bold move by promoters, Ketchcorp, Swinging Sunday is dropped. Now bands and hanged are gonna mingle. “It’s all about surprises”, said events co-ordinator Sam Bush. “The last thing we want is TYBO getting stale”. Other innos this year are an urchin’s creche, licenced pickpockets and a dance of death-off.

Lucky Jack Sheppard, Perky War-beck and Johnny Austen may be the Triple Tree headliners (with the usual will he or won’t he worries about a Jackie S turnout) but G L A d R A G s will be found hanging out most nights in the So Insignificant We Can’t Be Bothered To Tell You Their Names Tent. Join the cognos and checkout Miasma, Frightful Hedgehogs, Hop Pick Fuck, Crazy Joe Cola, A Master A, Crazy World of Arthur Rimbaud, Johnny Moped, Unsympathetically Matched Hotel Annexe, Barkis is Chillin’, Beg-garstaff Sisters, Stud (featuring ex Taste rhythm section Richie McCracken and John Wilson), E5 Axe Clan, Sophistical Rhetorician, Crushed By Wheels, Kent Crims, Can These Dry Bones Live?, Seven Dials Angels, Glorious Kittens and The Sadistic Mica Band ... they’ll all be there.

As for the hangers, we’re sure the big droppers won’t disappoint. But we’ve got a few up ’n’ comers we’re backing to go out in style, including Holy Hackman, last

Lucy in the sky with light squibs new single Donny and th

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Being the Twentieth Triple Tree festival of singing and hanging

In the acoustic tent 16 String Jack Polly Peachum Sandy Denny Big Bad Bodoni Good Maid of Kent The Humphrey Arundell Experience

C lowns jugglers pickpockets lavender applEs acid . j a c k a n a p e s h a s h c a k e s c h e s t n u t s s h r o o m s . d e a t h t h e b r i d e l i f e t h e g r o o m M y r r h i s m i n e i t s b i TTe r perfume . B r e e d s a l i f e o f g a t h e r i n g g l o o m.. Sorrowing sighing bleeding dying Se a led in the stone c o ld t omb

Oh yes he ’s t he Great Pretender. . .

“ I h a v e a s o r t o f h o r r i d e a g e r n e s s t o b e t h e r e . ”

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Adventurer Fuckley Mcdivot tells eFFrA Peck-neckinger About his dAy And other stuFF

Adventurer Fuckley Mcdivot tells eFFrA Peck-neckinger About his dAy And other stuFF

akey wakey could be anytime and brekkie anything. As an adventurer one assimilates into one’s given environs and adapts continually. That said, if I’m at home I have kedgeree. I’m usu-ally up at five to jig across Hyde Park with Young Dog Tray for a bollock blueing dip in the Serpentine. Then it’s back for a bath, some bangers, the aforementioned kedge and a big pot of rosehip at six o’clock prompt.

Time in London is either spent recu-perating from one expedition or plan-ning the next. As one might expect

from the most travelled man in town, motion is in my blood – better that than blood in the motion, as dear Pa was ever prone to quip. Fa-ther was Captain of the North Kent Steam Packet and would some-times take me aboard on trips. By the time I was ten I’d been as far afield as Margate. I remember on voyages looking out at isolated trad-ing posts and musing that when I grew older, I’d stop at one to beat a path beyond its mists, way into the interior.

From those early days I never looked back, traveling in every di-rection outside the city. From Hatfield in the north to Croydon in the south. East as far as Broadstairs, right through to Oxen Ford and even a tad beyond in the wild and wicked west.

I was consultant to the planning committee of the much lauded Oxen Ford Highway – the newly constructed, 53 mile road from Lon-don to the west. I’d traveled that way, many years earlier, with the very first Oxen Ford settlers. Believe me, and may Gusherati be my witness, it may be dangerous now but then it was considerably more so. One of the main reasons the road runs as it does is down to tribal boundaries. Its shape dictated by the edges of two tribe’s territories – those of the Atrebates and the Catuvellauni. As I speak many dialects of both tribes’ languages I was involved in negotiations regarding the positioning of the route – negotiations which took over two years of tact, barter, frustration, diligence, diplomacy and a hundredweight of beads. One can say quite unequivocally however, that both parties are not to be trusted – especially the wily Catuvellauni.

Young Dog Tray has been a faithful cohort on all my expeditions. When in town, on 2 o’clock’s dot we’ll accompany one another on a constitutional to Holland Park. Though firm companions, when walk-ing we slip into our separate reveries – Young Dog’s of fat, lame fen-necs, mine of future finds. One day I dream of striking out (mists and miasmas permitting) south-west beyond the Oxen Ford and delving deep into Durotriges territory, perhaps to find the legendary Woad-road. To uncover that long lost track, leading to the portal of the oft deliberated upon Tin Route would be the icing on my mintcake.

One takes tea at three alone. It can be a solitary life both here and on expedition, where everyone from man-on-point to tail-end Charlie will rely upon one’s wile, guile, plans and plain experience. Tea and parkin on the terrace seems so far from life in forest, fen or plain, where four missed meals can make a lame dog stew enticing.

After the Evening Standard crossword or a noodle on the iPad I’ll sometimes pootle into town for dinner at the Venturer’s Club, where one discusses the latest finds, theories, routes and rumours with fellow wanderers over a tot or two. I like to leave at 11, as I know I’ll be home to YDT at 12. One walks of course. Some say the city’s un-safe after eight but I’ll have none of it. No cutpurse can engender the fear one feels when creeping way beyond The Chilterns, through the Durotriges’ hilly lands where one senses scrutinising eyes in every bit of undergrowth, whilst oppidum signals silently to oppidum with evil, unfathomable curls of smoke.

Before sleep at one, I pray (nothing elaborate, just the City Prayer and the Water Prayer). I write my diary and clean my teeth with haw-thorn – a trick learned from the Catuvellauni. Then I turn in – though seldom to sleep straightaway due to thoughts of forthoing jaunts. In this case it’s in May, when I plan to forge a passage directly south to the Southern Sea. A trip through heavy wealded, hostile land towards a place some call the Brightness. What lies undiscovered excites me now as much as when I was a shaver. And though I’ll leave my mark on car-tographic history I would rather be remembered as an unfettered spirit. One who saw opportunity and ex-citement in every new horizon – not mainly as the man who discovered Maidstone.

W

threadS?Love clothes, hate fash -- though my enduring designers have to be, Boss, Glut, Hess, Toss, Barmi, and of course Armani. If something’s well designed it’s timeless -- I still wear shirts I bought over a year ago.

oilS? Anything by Turner -- the big ship’s biscuit of Seascapiana.

fave word? Life!

inSpiration? Wife! (a very special person)

guiding light? My family. No matter how im-portant work seems, my wife and the twins are everything. They can really ground you -- treating you for who you are, not what you are. I never skimp on that precious time we all have together. It’s very important for me to get it right third time around.

fave hol deSt?Summers in Highgate. Winter, we ski at Epsom or Box Hill

fave all-time entertainer?Love all the predominaters; Gervais, Forsyth, Kaye, Miles, Green. But the big daddy has to be Fearnley-Whittingstall -- just one big, effortless, made for TV, multitalenter -- not to men-tion those cheeky good looks! (and actually a couple of inches taller than you think he’d be, when you get to know him in real life.)

but luckily I made a few key decisions in my life that took me somewhere I wanted to be.

hIll? Any hill will do - but I only walk up!

muSic? Anything impactful - Cold-play, U2, Radiohead. Love that Cranberries one where she sings like a donkey - they’re al-ways playing it on Absolute. mayor for a day... I’d architect a meaningful and financially snug environment for all the talented, young film-makers we have in this amazing city of ours -- something that resonates with a real sustain-ability. I’d also hang all traffic wardens.

StarbuckS or SlaughterS? Starbucks rocks.

next big thing? Diff to crystal-ball which way things are trending. That said, once the glitches are ironed, Virtual DeathTM will go well viral.

firSt london mem? Simply Red at Tremendascreech with my folks. Eight years old. Blew me away.

buSy? I’m always busy -- but not in a nine to five way. I’ve got new ideas buzzing round my head 24/7. They can come at any time -- in the bath, on the loo, in the middle of the night. That’s why I make sure I’ve always got an intern around to jot them down.

fave tv perSonality? Ramsay, Jamie, Beeny, Mc-Cloudy -- all greats, all masters of the thing going wrong in the middle and then going right again at the end.

fave fIlm? Anything with Brigitte Bardot -- absolute legend.

book? The Catcher In The Rye -- I’ve actually read it 500 times. That guy! That guy Holden is so me

NiNNiaN

Ninnian is Chief Visionary at hugely successful production company paTrONIzE -

specialists in making programmes where a chef/house renovator opens/does up a new restaurant/wreck,

things go wrong halfway through, and then come good in the end

. 0524

papped outSide Chiswick’s High Road House, where he’d had one too many sherberts, a worse-for-wear Hogie lurches towards our lensman whilst offering to perform an impromptu (and we think procedurally impossible) operation with the rather warped brush perched in his right hand. Spurning our efforts to find him a cab, we eventually point him in the right direction home. As I bid him adieu and warn him to be wary of footpads in the underpass, he suddenly exhibits an agitated concern towards his great rival, the polymath and co-architect of Chiswick House, Sir Will I Am Kent, staggering off down Devonshire Road calling out that particular gentleman’s surname shrilly into the night.

’tiS true. Green eyed temptress Fi-Lay is set to star in Reynolds Pictures remake of the Michael Winner remake of Wicked Lady, alongside Vic Venus, Ty Burn, Teddy Watercarrier and Lone Roc. Running title I’m told is Whip, Tit ’n’ Gibbet.

BEgUIlINg BEaUTY Bunny Bunsen how thou doth bewitch. How those eyes entrance, that generous smile enthralls. That manner does so mesmerise and those attitudes transfix. I’m so captured o hyp-notic, hexy siren of the night!ww

Anyone wishing to share my enchantment will find Bunny every evening except Sunday casting her spell downstairs at Crowley’s, Frith Street.

fa n ta S t i c four piece, Give This wired to tell me of the shock start to their Margate Steam Packet residency yester-day. Message read: BAD START TO TOUR STOp GRA-HAMY FELL OVERBOARD STOp DROWNED STOp NOW THREE PIECE STOp RE-AR-RANGING HARMONIES STOp SHOW MUST GO ON STOp What absolute top hole storming troopers!

bump into H y p n o t i -cus in Beak Street. Go to his show. Go to his show. Go to his show. Go to his show. Go to his show. Go to his show. Go to his show. Go to his show. Go

www.thegreatwen.co.ukcontact@thegreatwen.co.uk

“The one duty we owe to history is to reignite it”