‘darkness and decay and the red death held illimitable dominion over all’

over the weekend horsemouth  watched roger corman’s masque of the red death - american independent pictures and samuel z. arkoff production, starring vincent price (all the marks of quality right there).

‘darkness and decay and the red death held illimitable dominion over all’

wolfgang (mr. ‘the secret is to have but few needs and thus time to live your own life’ ) in hans fallada’s wolf among wolves makes his money by gambling. pawning his property, betting short, with small stakes, making enough to live and then getting out fast. fallada takes us into the almost silent gambling dens of weimar era berlin held in the rented for the night parlours of respectable bourgeois families - a kind of dr. mabuse der spieler. 

mid-morning of the day after wolfgang wants coffee - but his landlady doesn’t want to give him any because the exchange rate versus the dollar is about to come out and the replacement coffee will almost certainly cost her more.

 wolfgang bemoans inflation; ‘this is an ingenious, entirely post-war, invention; they rob you of one half of the money in your pocket without touching the pocket or the money.’  

over the weekend horsemouth went to make music (maybe) - himself and howard would have been working  on marrying up denise ishaque’s vocals on sliabh (recorded in her kitchen in carrigaline sounds like) with the backing track they made in howard’s bedroom in hackney. but they were too knackered and didn't want to risk making important decisions while tired.

horsemouth thinks the result will be a stunner - some elements of the guitar will have to go he thinks (there’s been some tune wandering over the years on horsemouth’s part).