Picture Northern Ireland’s most senior police officer, George Hamilton, settling down to watch the film No Stone Unturned. It must have left him worried, angry and possibly betrayed. It certainly landed a big decision in his lap. The documentary feature, made by Oscar-winner Alex Gibney, and originally a BBC co-production, […]
Watching BBC’s Informer last night a snatch of music unearthed deeply buried memories. The song was ‘We’re From Bradford’ by The Negatives – a band who were together for less than a year, never performed outside Yorkshire and who released one single in a 500-copy pressing. It did not feature ‘We’re […]
A memory of Billy Graham on the occasion of his demise in his 100th year. A version of this piece originally appeared in Nearly Reach The Sky by Brian Williams My one visit to Upton Park left me with a single overwhelming conviction: there is no God. I travelled to […]
June 1976 What I enjoyed about ‘Peanuts’ is hard now to say. Charles Shultz’ strip cartoon appeared in The Observer’s colour magazine, which my parents bought on Sundays, and each week, I devoured the four-panel tale. Snoopy’s fantasy’s life as a pilot, Peppermint Pattie’s obdurate athleticism, and Charlie Brown’s fruitless […]
With nearly eighty bicycles on display, in the Design Museum’s Cycle Revolution exhibition, enormous variety is the initial impression. Even among those created with a single purpose in mind – going very fast around a track for a short space of time – design technology has moved in leaps and […]
Article first appeared in Amateur Photographer 8 April 2017 WITH A COUPLE OF HOURS between meetings one afternoon last summer, I walked the perimeter of BMW’s Oxford plant. My hope was to take a photograph that somehow conveyed the idea of a contemporary car factory. It was not easy. A […]
This article first appeared in Amateur Photographer in December 2017 WHEN MY BROTHER DIED unexpectedly at the age of 40, my family was distraught. Like others struck by grief, we flapped around searching for ways to celebrate a life cut short. A faded newspaper cutting celebrating his non-stop bicycle ride […]
A tribute to Pete Burns, and many others Late ‘70s Leeds was monochrome, hacked apart by urban motorways, choked with disused factories and fringed with bleak system-built housing. It was a metropolis of lost purpose – at least in my recollection. Nevertheless, every Saturday, my bus ground into the centre, […]
Much of the time, Trades Union Congress’ annual get-together is reminiscent of a revivalist meeting – true believers gathered in the certainty of salvation. Nearly every motion is endorsed by unanimous acclaim, the General Council’s opinion on each proposition is received with earnest appreciation, and every speaker is generously applauded. […]
“To know better your enemies is to better chances of your eventual victory”, wrote Sun Tzu in the Art Of War. So an eyeball-to-eyeball encounter with one of the European Union’s competition tzars provided provided a rare chance to understand the frustrations placed in the way of unions working on […]