Rockist Git Frank Turner and the horror of the live version of "I Still Believe"

Browsing on a music messageboard earlier today, I came across a thread devoted to Frank Turner, which linked to an interview he gave last year.

haha

Yeah. Last time I linked to something on ILX in public there was an anguished debate about whether this was what the world needed, though. So this time I kept it to "a music messageboard".

Was asked to write the blog by an editor, after the Twitter stuff all day. Was a little reluctant, cos it's old news, but I've never seen this stuff picked up in the mainstream before; took the MP tweeting about it for it to be worth bringing up on a blog, really. Someone from the Independent tweeted that they'd got rightwing stuff from him in an interview, but it was nothing like as extreme as the stuff in those interviews I took from. Took care to quote at length precisely so people couldn't say I was taking him out of context.

Expecting to be unable to look at my Twitter for a couple of days once the fanbase mobilise.

also paul weller was in the jam and this fuckstain is some kinda prep school fake working class Sir Punklesworth Cougar Mellencamp III who writes godawful music

ahh i didn't know it was you!

xp

countdown to a duet with Nicki Minaj starts now

Wiki reckons Turner went to Eton on a scholarship. Even though his father was an investment banker and his grandfather was chairman of British Home Stores. Which suggests he might not have needed a scholarship.

depends, maybe his father was a terrible banker

Like that matters

american libertarians are at least explicable within that country's history & tradition of anti-federalism etc, so within certain limits deserve pity as much derision

libertarians from countries other than america are peculiarly hateful

idk if i'm willing to buy that distinction but it is interesting

let's take over the thread on this useless cunt to talk about the old right

a paleoconservative congressman from idaho vomitting all over their shoes in the restroom of a hooters has more dignity than frank turner could ever even aspire to

jeez ithappens give credit where it's due, what this board needs is dozens of frank turner acolytes.

this guy is a remarkable all-time tool.

If they turn up even the most mild-mannered posters would be zinging them.

For example, the BNP are a hard left party. For example, the BNP are a hard left party. For example, the BNP are a hard left party. For example, the BNP are a hard left party.

Norman Tebbit tried a few times in the past few years to promote that line.

They should lock this guy and Bobby Gillespie in a room with a shitload of booze and record what happens.

and MIA

And Nicki Minaj.

And Hinder

frank turner would probably try to sodomize bobby gillespie with a vodka bottle

You say that like it's a bad thing.

Turner replies: http://frank-turner.com/blog/2012/09/schmolitics/

Checking his "following" list was quite good fun, BTW. James Delingpole! Toby Young! Guido Fawkes!

Turner replies: http://frank-turner.com/blog/2012/09/schmolitics/

"I don’t consider myself “right wing” either."

Right, yeah, no idea where people got this idea from, apart from you saying "I consider myself to be pretty right wing" in an interview that one time.

today has fucking sucked, actually

i cried a little bit

I wonder about people who pick up the BNP policy document and say "yes yes all that, but what are their economic policies like?", I mean, who cares?

also:

http://images.45cat.com/shakin-stevens-cry-just-a-little-bit-epic-2.jpg

Chris T-T is friends with this douche? Many sadfaces.

labelmates and I think sometimes bandmates as well

Likewise it confounds me that someone like Billy Bragg would want to associate with this guy....

It's one thing to be outspoken about politics as a musician or minor figure. Also to explicitly incorporate that message into your music under the guise of a ragged "man of the people" despite this image representing roughly the antithesis of what you're all about. It's another thing entirely to write a butthurt missive that backtracks on a number of points with the excuse that you were "running your mouth" off.

Like it or not, if your name is synonymous with political music*, and you go around posing as a grassroots freedom-fighting philanthropist**, and then you start spouting idiotic nonsense explicitly denoting your neolibertarian rightwing allegiances (whilst hypocritically slagging off Blair's regime which has more in common with your fucked up viewpoint than you seem to give it credit for)***, don't expect any sympathy from anyone who might have once thought you were actually a decent, well informed, benevolent chap who makes decent music****. Crying it off and saying your music isn't supposed to be political and you aren't rightwing and you weren't thinking properly when you said that stuff about the BNP is an even bigger load of toss.

*which it is
**which you do
***which you did
****which you aren't and never have been.

tbf it took dedicated shit-talkers who sit on the internet all day nearly three years to discover a smoking gun wrt this guy's political leanings, so I'm not sure what intimate knowledge you expect Billy Bragg to have

also I kind of feel like this kind of under the guise of a ragged "man of the people" and posing as a grassroots freedom-fighting philanthropist rhetoric is p unhelpful if you're trying to construct a serious point and not just doing drive-by zings

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-K2LtSuD5VDQ/TfxE_YOzMbI/AAAAAAAACxo/4w0Du7SMrfg/s1600/bobrobertscover.jpg

JoshuaHelmer

5 September 2012 2:23PM
Response to brian68, 5 September 2012 1:59PM

This might not mean a huge amount as its anecdotal but about 5 years ago my friend interviewed him for university radio and I sat in the room and listened in. He turned up in a battered van with just his band mates in tow (so quite obviously wasn't drawing from his priveleged background) and proceeded to have a very open and honest discussion with my friend for about 45 mins.

I can safely say that Frank Turner is the most intimidatingly intelligent man I have personally ever met. He's completely humble and down to earth too and has worked his butt off to get where he is today. He is literally one of the hardest working musicians in the world

I can safely say that Frank Turner is the most intimidatingly intelligent man I have personally ever met.

Perhaps more accurate than he knows.

literally working really, really hard on his terrible, terrible records.

I dream of owning a battered van. And having mates.

but will he ever live like, um..

i know my use of "Git" was controversial, me being american and all, but i feel vindicated

Turner's bass player is one Tarrant Anderson, from Oxford. One Tarrant Anderson won 343 votes as the Conservative party candidate for Headlington ward in the 2004 Oxford City Council elections. I do not know if they are the same person.

i was gonna ask how many tarrant andersons could there be, but then...

also paul weller was in the jam and this fuckstain is some kinda prep school fake working class Sir Punklesworth Cougar Mellencamp III who writes godawful music

^ enjoyed this

Based in Oxfordshire? Could be 'closely related' but apart from that:

re:Tarrant Anderson
He is also a director of the tour bus hire company Vans For Bands Ltd

Battered Vans a speciality...

i know my use of "Git" was controversial, me being american and all, but i feel vindicated

― Jandek at the Disco (upper mississippi sh@kedown),

I think it should be changed from git to cunt, me being Scottish and all, but I feel it will be vindicated.

Twitter exchange after Steven Adams of Broken Family Band/Singing Adams asked Tarrant Anderson if he was the former Tory candidate.

@singingadams yup I stood as a paper candidate while researching a thesis on party organisational reform. What of it?

@_sleepingsouls oh I get it, you weren't a serious conservative party candidate, it was for a homework project.

@singingadams MPhil in Politics thesis. In the Bodlian Library in Oxford if you want something to send you to sleep

that doesn't sound like complete bullshit at all

i'm sure he did get a thesis out of it. but paper candidates are still put up by the actual party. i suspect they don't invite people doing theses to just fill the slots.

Did I ever tell you about the time my Dad stood as a paper candidate for Labour and accidentally served 2 terms?

Yeah, you have to be a party member to stand, and also be "in" with local party organisation. Standing in the first place hardly something that happens to you by chance.

What I don't understand is why these gits are being so evasive about it. Being a Tory or a Libertarian nitwit is not a crime (yet) but I guess evading and dissembling are good old fashioned Tory values they are intent on emulating.