HALLOWEEN 
IDEAS
(HOW TO SORT OF SPOIL IT A BIT)


  • Prank all of your work colleagues by running out of the toilets in tears and frantically telling everyone that you've just been raped by a man in a mask.
  • Go to a fancy dress party dressed as your own genitals and choose this as the night to propose to your partner.
  • Soak your next door neighbour's pumpkin in petrol overnight so that they blow their hands off when they try and light the bugger. (Also, rob their house whilst they're at the hospital if you're feeling particularly cheeky)
  • Go to the police station and confess to a bunch of murders that you didn't commit. Write the word paedophile on your head in lipstick and see how much trouble you get into. A terrifying night guaranteed.
  • Sellotape bits of soil to your face and spend the evening sat on the toilet listening to Aswad
  • Dig up grandad
  • Paint the names of famous serial killers onto the side of stray dogs and hurl them into your local Pizza Express 
  • Go to a fancy dress party dressed as a dog's vagina. 
  • Tell your 7 year old son that his dad died in a car accident on the way home from work and his ghost lives in the basement now
  • Empty the contents of your Hoover into a bowl and offer the contents to 'trick-or-treaters'. (Answer the door in tears and waving a gun about) 
  • Break into an old people's home and whisper ghost stories to the senile residents when the nurses aren't looking
HURRICANE 
ST JUDE 
IN PICTURES
Terrifying Scenes: A puddle almost 2 metres in length engulfs a field in Kent

A Tragic Waste: This piece of patio furniture has certainly seen better days. The clean-up operation on this veranda will have to wait until things blow over.
Photo courtesy of Gary Dunn (age 9) 

Gale Force 12: In some parts of the country the wind was so strong it actually managed to blow this plastic bag up into a tree.

Bent: Locals from Saffron Waldon estimate that the damage could stretch to as much as 30 or 40 pounds

Flower Power: The future of the Chelsea Flower Show hangs in the balance after pot plants all over the country take a battering.

Slugs: Will slugs thrive in the wet conditions following the great storm and take over the country? Experts think 'probably not'.
SOME OF MY FAVOURITE MAGAZINES
BIN FANATIC
Released: Monthly
Regular Features: It's got a regular feature called 'Bin Memories' where celebrities tell their favourite bin related stories. Last week Anne Robinson told a fascinating anecdote about the time she found a dead pheasant behind a bottle bank.
It also has a weekly column about pedal action kitchen bins written by David Mitchell and often comes with pull out posters (last month's issue came with a picture of the new 120 litre Sulo wheelie bin. Exciting)


OWL FETISH
Released: Daily
Regular Features: Basically just lots of sexy pictures of owls wearing leather trousers. I bought it today and there's a picture of a Mottled Hawk Owl sucking his own penis in wheelbarrow. Doesn't get much better than that. There's also a cryptic crossword and a quiz about famous owls who work in the sex industry.


FAMILY BATTLE SWAN
Released: Weekly
Regular Features: Features all the latest helmets and weapons so that you can keep your Battle Swan fighting fit. Also features a Q&A and masterclass. This week how to teach your Family Battle Swan the art of jujitsu. Each edition comes with a collectible sticker of famous Battle Swans from history including Gavin 'The Neck' Pelmet and Terry 'The Shithead' Reeves.

INTERNATIONAL DOG RAPIST
Released: Bi-Annual
Regular Features: A beautifully produced coffee table magazine designed for the sophisticated gent who enjoys bumming dogs. Regular features include;
  • 'Caught in the Act' - Hilarious reader's stories
  • The Dog Rapist Style Guide - 'What to Wear'
  • An Agony Aunt column hosted by Davina McCall 
  • A masterclass called 'How to Avoid Winding up in The Big House'.


FROG WORSHIPPER 
Released: Week days
Regular Features: The magazine for anyone who believes that a frog created the world and rules it from a space-station on the other side of the solar system. 
Mostly hymns. 



TWIGS UK
Released: Monthly
Regular Features: This month's issue features
  • Twig recipes
  • The Thorny issue: What's the difference between twigs and sticks?
  • Extreme twig-collectiing with Dane Bowers
  • Twigs: The musical
  • Twigology: Twig predictions and horoscopes 
  • Kindling: Do we really need to use twigs?
  • Classifieds: Buying and selling twigs
  • 'How to have great sex with twigs' with Zoe Ball

"I guess there's a little bit of Gus in all of us. That's why I decided to get him inked onto the old guns" - Pierce Morgan, 2013


*I saw this happen and it gave me an erection.

ALTERNATIVE ALBUM COVERS 
NIRVANA - NEVERMIND
The Nevermind album cover shows a circumcised baby boy, alone underwater with a US dollar bill on a fishhook just out of his reach. According to Kurt Cobain, he conceived the idea while watching a television program on water births withth drummer Dave Grohl. Cobain mentioned it to Geffen's art director Robert Fisher. Fisher found some stock footage of underwater births but they were too graphic for the record company so he mocked up an alternative version featuring Ainsley Harriott reaching out to grab a bag of Uncle Ben's Express Egg Fried Rice. Cobain apparently liked it but argued with the record company in favour of his original idea. 
After the record's release Cobain instantly regretted his decision and committed suicide three years later.


DR. DRE - THE CHRONIC
In 1992 Dr. Dre came to the UK on holiday with his nanna. All of his mates had told him that he needed to go and check out the emerging hip hop scene in Brixton but Dre fucked up and found himself staying in the delightful seaside town of Brixham in South Devon. 
Dre described the holiday as the "best time of his life", citing his trip to see the replica of Frances Drake' s ship, The Golden Hind, as a particular highlight. Dr. Dre also became addicted to Devon Cream Teas and apparently put on a whopping 4 stone during his two week visit. Dre insisted on putting a photograph that his nanna had taken of a "particularly fucking tasty" cream tea on the sleeve of his new album 'The Chronic'. The front cover also featured a picture of 'Pinchy Stephen', a crab that Dr. Dre had "fallen in love with" on a day trip to Torquay.
When Dre returned to Los Angeles he decided to remove the homage to the West Country from the album's artwork.


COLDPLAY - A RUSH OF BLOOD TO THE HEAD
Coldplay's bizarre idea for their 2002 album 'A Rush Of Blood To The Head', originally featured an image of Rick Wakeman, keyboard player from progressive rock band YES, leaning out from between the Twin Towers as they billowed with flames during the 9/11 terrorist attacks. The artwork was banned before it hit the shelves.
When asked why the band had decided to pursue such a controversial and out-of-character concept for their packaging, lead singer, Chris Martin claimed that he had no idea that the September 11th attacks were real and that the previous year's news coverage of the event had just "sort of passed him by" - "I didn't really watch much TV in 2001 because I was learning how to play the piano".


THE SMITHS - THE QUEEN IS DEAD
During the recording of 'The Queen Is Dead', lead singer, Morissey, was suffering from terrible 'night terrors' about a lawnmower with human arms. Morrissey became obsessed and insisted that the petrol powered demon make an appearance on the front cover of their new record. Morrissey started writing books about the beast and even spent several months hunting for it in Shenandoah National Park. Guitarist, Johnny Marr, claims that this new fascination with the lawnmower was the beginning of the end for The Smiths and even claimed that Morrissey had started writing a 'rock opera' about the four wheeled mutant. 
The artwork was eventually changed behind Morrissey's back, causing further friction between the band members.


THE BEATLES - SGT PEPPER'S LONELY HEARTS CLUB BAND
Design agency 'Walters and Dean' were offered the job of designing The Beatle's eagerly anticipated, eighth, studio album in 1967 but left it to the last minute , panicked and submitted a low res jpeg of a clipart tap. Producer, George Martin was said to be furious and allegedly had Walters and Dean assassinated.
The Grammy Award-winning album packaging was eventually art-directed by Robert Fraser and designed by Peter Blake.

DOLLY PARTON - JOLENE
Art director, Gavin Slice was given the job of designing the artwork for Dolly Parton's single 'Jolene' ,and, due to a communications error with the record label, thought that 'Dolly Parton' was a heavy metal band, despite the fact that heavy metal didn't even really exist as a genre for another 6 years. 
His concept for the single's artwork featured an alligator fighting some kind of prehistoric pig/eagle surrounded by pterodactyls fishing for trouts. The typeface, designed by Slice, is now synonymous with British heavy metal outfit, Iron Maiden, despite originally being created for Parton. Not a lot of people know that. 
Despite the fact that the artwork was never used, Dolly Parton herself thought that it was so "fucking awesome" that she had it tattooed onto her back, replacing the word 'Jolene' with the word ' M E G A C U N T '


PINK FLOYD - DARK SIDE OF THE MOON
It's difficult to imagine Pink Floyd's seminal masterpiece 'Dark Side Of The Moon' being quite so iconic if the original artwork had been chosen over Storm Thorgerson's evocative prism design.
This piece, depicting a fat nudist with his dick out in front of a mountain, however, was the brainchild of frontman, David Gilmour who claimed - "this is what I had in mind when I was writing the album".
Gilmour was said to be bitterly disappointed with the final design and still believes the album would have sold even more copies if he hadn't been overruled by the rest of the band. 
Gilmour refuses to have any copies of the official version in his house, only acknowledging this as the official packaging for the album.


ENYA - WATERMARK
Enya insisted on featuring a Bosch GSS23 AE Orbital Sander on the front cover of her sophomore album, Watermark, but was eventually talked out of it by her management who feared that it wasn't in keeping with her image. She eventually managed to talk them round into producing a limited edition, Japanese pressing, of 'Orinoco Flow' featuring a Makita GA4530 115mm Angle Grinder.
These copies can be worth a lot of money.


METALLICA - THE BLACK ALBUM
"The Black Album' is not only one of Metallica's finest records, it's without doubt one of the greatest records of the heavy metal genre. The album's artwork had to do this epic, leviathan of a recording justice, and Drummer, Lars Ulrich has stated that the band had much discussion on what direction to take the front cover
Apparently lead singer, James Hetfield insisted, for several weeks, that he wanted the packaging to depict a beagle looking through some sort of perspex dome in the side of a fence. At one point he actually talked the entire band round and the sleeve was sent off to the printers. It was halted the following day due to guitarist, Kirk Hammett's "reservations" and the band eventually opted for a cover featuring the band's logo, angled against the upper left corner, and a coiled snake (derived from the Gadsden flag) on the bottom right corner. All in black.

The Sad Tale of Ian Pin

Oddie and the Pig


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