Reminds me of the Dr No Soundtrack. 'Three Blind Mice' and 'Under the Mango Tree'.
well, I suppose "Dr No" was supposed to be set in the Caribbean ...
{ you can probably skip the next block of text }
my parents had a first edition of the Ian Fleming book, Dr No, which I now have possession of, but although they can sell for thousands ( big collector market ) I was disappointed to find out that my copy is lacking a slipcase, a fact I only found out when I visited Bletchley Park a few years ago and, by chance, one of the little nissan huts contained a temporary Ian Fleming exhibition with some James Bond 1st editions on display, and my heart sank when I saw the glass case containing Dr No in a pristine slipcase - I had no idea up to that point that such a thing existed and my dreams of making it big in the bibliophile world were crushed, but not to worry... however, Bletchley, a town which before I had only ever passed through on a high speed train turned out to be true to its name... like someone dry heaving, comprising of a shoddy excuse of a shopping centre ( a chemist and that video game chainstore that smells of stale BO - although, fair dues, I bought a playstation game from there for a pound ) and a decrepit high street consisting of a couple of charity shops and a Costa Coffee where I was able to have a piss...
[ resume reading ]
but, the point I wanted to make is... John Cooper Clarke's autobiography makes some points about the James Bond novels being one of the first introductions in the UK to "brand loyalty":
The deceitful opulence of Bond's lifestyle, with its early stirrings of label snobbery and brand loyalty, instilled in me a desire for a degree of international sophistication. Bond only wore Sea Island cotton shirts; his suits, made by Benson, Perry & Whitely of Mayfair, came with a full chest ( not applicable in my case ), gently suppressed waist and, round the back, a centre vent ( side vents not being an option on a single-breasted coat ), Roped sleeve heads and gauntlet cuffs also featured. Even his cigarettes were bespoke, a Macedonian blend of Balkan and Turkish tobaccos from Morelands, lit with an oxidised Ronson lighter. He washed his hair with Pinaud's 'Elixier' - 'that Prince of shampoos' - and drank strong black coffee from De Bry in New Oxford Street, Mention is also made of Floris, although the use of cologne is not entirely approved of.
[ Brett Easton Ellis, eat your heart out ]
His ( John Cooper Clarke ) autobiography was notable to me as it contains an entire chapter ( or two ) slagging off a woman who was part of our raving crew, contains details that maybe I did not want to know...but..while I'm feeling nostalgic.. at the end of a night at the Hacienda hosted by some of the Eton space cadets that were in our orbit ( on the guest list, "we're from Hulme and we don't pay!" was our mantra [1] ), she turned to me and said "that was very 'tracky'" after hours and hours of bleep and bass, a night where I collapsed into a wall after huffing a bottle of amyl nitrate, like falling into a fluffy cloud, and when I went to get some fresh air near the front doors, who walks in but Ice-T, surrounded by guys with the thickest necks I have ever seen, so much for his "I keep it real, I don't need security" boasts, next thing I see is he's in a corner with one of the dealers from our crew, scoring some White Doves...
[1] any area in Manchester and environs has the same refrain, I was once on a tram where some scallies were proudly telling me, "why buy a ticket - we're from Salford and we don't pay" just before the ticket inspector turned up and got the transport police to arrest them, but it's the thought that counts...