Dante's Inferno

Major movie studios often seem to be labouring under the impression that a big budget equates to a quality film, but money does not always buy success and thankfully the opposite is sometimes true. One of the funniest American movies of the 90s, Clerks, is the proof that you can produce a great film with the most meagre of resources. Director Kevin Smith somehow funded the unbelievably low budget of $27,000 by selling his comic books collection, maxing out his credit cards and using part of the savings his parents had set aside for his college education.

Shot in grainy black and white, the resulting film is resolutely low budget, featuring shaky camera work, a few sound glitches and a cast of amateurish (first time) actors. Although the production is as raw as its language, making the movie on a shoestring only adds to the film’s desperate charm, as it spins its tale of twentysomething ennui in suburban New Jersey. Indeed, the movie was quickly picked up by infamous Miramax chief Harvey Weinstein, who overlooked the perceived handicap of the dodgy cinematic quality, because he recognised the vitality and humour in its dazzling script and uncompromising dialogue. Though Clerks is awfully rough around the edges, it is not difficult to see why the film has become a cult classic in the years since its release in 1994.

"Over the counter culture"

Clerks is an outrageous, foul-mouthed comedy about Dante and Randal, two potty-mouthed cashiers set in a New Jersey convenience store. While Quentin Tarantino has a famous background as a video store clerk who found his muse by watching all the videos there, Kevin Smith went one better by setting his directorial debut in the convenience store where he actually worked with the owner letting him shoot scenes after the shutters came down in the evening. As Smith has said, “I didn’t know what I was doing. I just had to get it made any way I could”. There is some irony in the fact that Smith strived so hard to make a film about slackers with absolutely no motivation. It is one thing to dream about making a movie of your life experiences, but quite another to follow that up with the perseverance (and talent) displayed by Smith.

The story is thin, basically a contrivance that allowed Smith to make use of his place of work as a setting, but it also allows him to showcase his dry wit and wonderful sense of the absurd. Although Smith himself under-played his efforts, “I’m not a very original or creative person. I just crib from my life”, Clerks did have something all of its own – a looseness and informality, epitomised by Smith’s profanely funny dialogue and primitive technique. It may well have been the world’s first warm-hearted bad taste comedy.

"Why's my company called View Askew?"

By Smith’s own admission, there’s hardly any plot, only a loose framework for a series of bizarre scenes, most of which just feature a couple of guys sitting around talking. Convenience store clerk Dante (Brian O’Halloran) and his best friend Randal (Jeff Anderson) don’t do anything terribly interesting, but that’s actually the point, as their lives are going nowhere – and they know it. All they are good at is putting the world to rights, while wasting their own potential, though it has to be said that their counter-culture diatribes are in turn screamingly funny and wincingly accurate – albeit not for those of a sensitive nature. Rather than do anything to escape their predicament on the wrong side of the till, these slackers prefer to chat about any subject that will keep them from dying of boredom, including the sexual escapades of Dante’s girlfriends, the merits of hermaphrodite porn, the infinite stupidity of their customers and the moral dilemmas inherent in the Star Wars trilogy.

"Empire" had the better ending. I mean, Luke gets his hand cut off, finds out Vader's his father, Han gets frozen and taken away by Boba Fett. It ends on such a down note. I mean, that's what life is, a series of down endings. All "Jedi" had was a bunch of Muppets.

These endless, rambling conversations amuse and offend in equal measure, but the palpable charm of the protagonists ultimately proves impossible to resist.

"36 ... no, 37"

Dante is an affable college dropout in his early twenties, working at the Quick Stop convenience store, his own inner circle of (job) hell. An under-achieving clever man, he wastes his time fretting about life, but he’s a friendly, accommodating guy, so he agrees to help his boss by filling in on his day off, only to set himself up for frequent customer abuse and relationship issues. He is shocked to discover his girlfriend’s taste (sorry) for fellatio after she admits that she has sucked “something like … 36” dicks, before correcting herself to 37, including Dante. That’s a hell of a way to end a relationship, "Hey, Veronica, try not to suck any dick on the way through the parking lot!" If you think that’s bad, spare a thought for his ex-girlfriend Caitlin, who has sex with a corpse in a darkened bathroom, mistakenly believing him to be Dante. The man had died earlier from a heart attack induced by an untimely masturbation session, if you’re wondering. Dante neatly summarises his day from hell, purgatory at the very least:

Dante: I'm stuck in this pit, working for less than slave wages. Working on my day off, the goddamn steel shutters are closed, I deal with every backward ass fuck on the planet. I smell like shoe polish. My ex-girlfriend is catatonic after fucking a dead guy. And my present girlfriend has sucked 36 dicks.

Randal: 37.

His travails are all the more bitter, because, as he keeps complaining, “I’m not even supposed to be here today!”

"Let me explain"

While Dante attempts to get through his unrewarding non-career with as much patience, politeness and dignity as he can muster, his friend Randal is openly abusive to his customers. Randal ostensibly works at the neighbouring video store, but he spends almost the entire day at the Quick Stop. He does whatever he feels like, even closing the video store where he works, so that he can rent movies from a better shop. Cynical and caustic, he’s the opposite of Dante, insulting and offending any potential renter, though he does have his own dark, nihilistic integrity and is protective of his pal, "In light of this lurid tale, I don't even see how you can romanticise your relationship with Caitlin. She broke your heart and inadvertently drove men to deviant lifestyles".

The two characters bicker non-stop, working off each other brilliantly, especially when dealing with the steady stream of mindless oddballs that dare to cross the threshold. Randal declares that “this job would be great if it wasn’t for the fucking customers”. Given that he has clients who ask questions like, “Do you have that one with that guy who was in that movie last year?”, his attitude is a bit more understandable. Anybody who has ever worked in a shop, which is almost everybody, will surely sympathise. However, the film does confirm the suspicions some older folk have about the young punks serving them – they really don’t like you. Even an innocuous customer is vulnerable to Randal’s biting sarcasm:

Customer: Cute cat. What's its name?

Randal: Annoying customer.

"I hate guys. I LOVE WOMEN!"

Outside the store, Jay and Silent Bob take up residence every morning. These bored, aimless losers form a "Geek" chorus that comically echoes the clerks’ plight. Jay (Jason Mewes) is a skinny drug dealer, who cannot stand still or be quiet for a moment, but spends his time spewing out a never-ending torrent of profanities. His partner in crime, Silent Bob, is almost the exact opposite: he hardly moves or speaks, maintaining the epitome of (fat) cool. This near-mute character is played by Kevin Smith himself, despite his renowned loquaciousness in real life, though he is allowed a couple of lines of wisdom, “You know, there’s a million fine-looking women in the world, dude. But they don’t all bring you lasagna at work. Most of ‘em just cheat on you”.

Chock-full of quotable dialogue, Clerks is an extremely funny film but it is very, very rude. Although it was released in the same year as Four Weddings and a Funeral, the humour is very different and this film is not for the easily offended. The comedy runs the whole spectrum from off-colour to truly tasteless, but its willingness to flaunt just about every cinematic taboo is one of the reasons why it’s such an unqualified success.

"Food fight!"

If there’s one moment which captures the outrageous humour of Clerks, it would be just after Dante and Randal have finished a highly detailed discussion of live sex shows, obviously offending a nearby customer. While Dante is apologetic, Randal responds by shoving a porno mag in the customer’s face, “Well, if you think that’s offensive, check this out!” Not far behind is the scene when Randal telephones the distributor to order around twenty porn videos with the most graphic titles, while a mother and young daughter stand nearby patiently waiting for their copy of “Happy Scrappy Hero Pup”. Clearly, this store has little in common with the gentle humour of Are You Being Served?, but what Clerks lacks in subtlety, it more than makes up for in laughs. It’s funny throughout and even clever in parts:

Veronica: You’re making a broad generalisation.

Dante: No, I’m making a generalisation about broads.

Crammed with witty social observations, movie references and spot-on asides, the brilliant dialogue is reminiscent of Tarantino, though Smith has a more natural feel for comedy. Dante and Randal can be charged with having strong opinions about things of no consequence, but these crude Jersey boys cannot be accused of a limited vocabulary or offering no insights among the insults. As Randal says to Dante, “That seems to be the leitmotif of your life, ever backing down”. On occasions, obscenity will even make way for some homespun philosophy:

Dante Hicks: You hate people!

Randal Graves: But I love gatherings. Isn't it ironic?

There’s also a warmth beneath all the profanity. Under his dour, hard-edged layer, Dante is basically a gentleman and an old-fashioned romantic. Even the nasty Randal is obviously devoted to his friend Dante, warning his ex-girlfriend, “Oh, hey Caitlin, break his heart again this time, and I'll kill ya. Nothing personal”.

"Find some balls!"

Cheap as chips, Clerks is the ultimate cinematic tribute to slackers and remains popular with disenfranchised youngsters (and shop workers) everywhere. Kevin Smith described it as a “vulgar, thinking man’s film”, but said that he did not intend it to make any cogent observations about society. Nevertheless, it’s clear that a theme about the world-weariness of today’s youth slipped in anyway. Even though a lot gets packed into one day, you still get the feeling that nothing is really going to change with these guys and they don’t have a clue what’s “in store” for them. On one level, it’s a hilarious comedy about everything and nothing, but it also looks at that awkward stage of your life when you have to make the best of a poor hand without knowing which cards will be dealt to you next.

Kevin Smith has typically under-played Clerks, “It was just dudes talking about sex and Star Wars”, but it launched him on a prolific film career, though this has been a mixture of the good (Chasing Amy, Mallrats), the bad (Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back) and the ugly (Jersey Girl). Dante and Randal’s laissez-faire approach to life is a reflection of his own lack of ambition; “I’m a dude who likes to set the bar real low. I like to put it on the floor and step over it. I like to have people regard me as the retarded kid who just learned to tie his shoes, That way people will always be pleasantly surprised”. With Clerks, we weren’t just surprised – we were astonished.

Something To Crow About

There are many aspiring authors, but not many achieve success. Even fewer writers are capable of gaining success in two genres, but the Scottish novelist Iain Banks has managed that rare feat, writing “mainstream” fiction under his birth name and high-concept science fiction as Iain M. Banks, including the initial of his unofficial middle name, Menzies, to differentiate between the two styles. His publishers, Abacus, used to further distinguish his books by using black and white covers for the mainstream novels, while printing the science fiction jackets in colour, though I’m not sure whether this branding was important, as Banks has walked confidently in both worlds throughout his career.

According to Time Out, Banks is “one of the most able, energetic and stimulating writers we have in the UK”. Although his “mainstream” fiction is, by definition, less vividly imagined than the science fiction, he still mixes flights of gothic fantasy with a wealth of straight social realism. When you see Banks interviewed, with his irrepressibly curly hair, impatient eyebrows and glinting eyes, you can sense that he is a bit of a rebel, which is revealed in his books through attacks on contemporary politics, big business and technology.

"Happy talk"

Perhaps the most accessible and certainly most likeable of Banks’ books is The Crow Road, which was first published in 1992. Banks himself described it as a “happier novel”, but it still contains enough menace and dark humour to please fans of his first book, the macabre The Wasp Factory, as can be seen with the incendiary first few lines:

It was the day my grandmother exploded. I sat in the crematorium, listening to my Uncle Hamish quietly snoring in harmony to Bach's Mass in B Minor, and I reflected that it always seemed to be death that drew me back to Gallanach.

This is a black comedy with plenty of dry wit, but excludes the violent imagery of some of Banks’ other work, so is arguably his funniest book. There is usually a deft splash of humour to lighten the tone of any dramatic, sinister scenes, though not so intrusive as to trivialise the seriousness of the situation. In this way any sense of melancholy arising from the main character’s seemingly doomed love life is balanced with the hilarity ensuing from the protagonists’ numerous eccentricities. The Crow Road is a long, intense tale, but the pace is never allowed to flag, due to its hip, droll humour.

"In the shadowplay"

Banks told an interviewer that The Crow Road was about “death, sex, faith, cars, Scotland and drink” and it’s true that the novel considers all of these themes in depth, but it’s also a story about the attempts of a young man, Prentice McHoan, to discover the secrets of his unusual family, while trying to cope with the problems and pressures of growing up.

Uncle Rory disappears while writing a book (called The Crow Road) and Prentice is tasked by his grandmother to solve the mystery of what happened to him: is he dead or alive? If he is dead, was he killed or did he take his own life? If he is alive, where the hell is he? During this quest, Prentice seeks to gain a better understanding of his wealthy and eccentric family, especially his parents' tragic and complicated generation. This becomes particularly important to him after his father Kenneth, a committed atheist, is killed by lightning while climbing a church tower, trying to settle an argument about the existence of God (told you about the dark humour).

However, Prentice’s focus does not simply revolve around looking for Rory, as he is struggling with all the difficulties that normal life throws at a student: university studies, friends, lovers, enemies and financial hardship. Like any young man, he is trying to work out who he is, how he came to be that way and what he wants to become. He seeks help through the usual channels of drink, sex, drugs and rock ‘n’ roll, but is equally preoccupied with death and religion, so much so that he is not talking with his father, following a huge argument over the existence of God. His soul is not comforted by physical love, as he has an unrequited adolescent crush on his cousin Verity.

"The Player of Games"

In many ways, Prentice is a deeply flawed individual. Self-absorbed, selfish and stubborn, he is disengaged from his studies, meandering through his day-to-day existence with his head in the clouds. Exhibiting all of the arrogance, immaturity and uncertainty of youth, he is disastrous at relationships, but at the same time he’s clever, witty, charismatic and occasionally charming. However, all of Banks’ central characters ultimately possess an agreeable nature, however disturbing the background, and Prentice is no exception. He knows when he’s being sulky or acting like an idiot, and berates himself for behaving so badly. Although he’s packed with faults and foibles, you find yourself identifying with him, as he’s just like any other flawed real person. He’s a character that you shouldn’t really like, but you cannot help but feel affection for this hapless hero. Like a more grounded Holden Caulfield, his youthful tone can be woeful and even depressive, but his sense of humour habitually rescues him.

It’s not that easy to categorise The Crow Road. Ostensibly an old-fashioned mystery, it can also be viewed as a coming of age tale, though you could equally detect elements of a romance, a thriller and even/especially a comic novel. It is to Banks’ credit that he manages to orchestrate the shifts between humour, pathos, tragedy and suspense so well without the narrative jarring. His subtle skill in balancing all these themes is admirable, though he has said that he is “not a particularly analytical writer. If it works, it works. It’s almost a superstition: if you look into it too much, you might destroy the magic”.

"In search of the perfect dram"

This is also Banks’ version of the family saga, being a tale of three families, which are linked through marriages crossing the class divide. It’s not quite Trollope, as there’s a lot more sex and swearing in Banks’ rendition, but there is a strong sense of time and place – and the family secrets are eventually unravelled. Prentice’s key relationship is probably the one he has (or more accurately doesn’t have) with his father, Kenneth, though others are more amusing:

Right, now this isn’t as bad as it sounds, but … I was in bed with my Aunt Janice.

Indeed, the book contains a fascinating set of strongly drawn characters. Each one is memorable and distinctive without resorting to caricature, even though Prentice clearly feels somewhat lost and confused in his tangled family history. Many years later Banks returned to the family theme with The Steep Approach to Garbadale, but argued that it was worthwhile revisiting old territory: “Families are just such fertile ground. We’ve all got one and they’re all a bit mad”.

"No, I said Matter - not meter."

The novel charts Prentice’s rite of passage. At first it describes that confusing period in your early twenties when everything seems to collapse at once, but it also speaks of the need to move on and mature. Prentice’s journey is as much about discovering himself and there’s a strong sense of growing up as his seemingly aimless, drunken walk through life takes a turn for the thoughtful and sober. His struggles to belong (within family, community and society) are eased, when he realises that he is not as inferior as he had believed:

People can be teachers and idiots; they can be philosophers and idiots; they can be politicians and idiots…in fact I think they have to be…a genius can be an idiot. The world is largely run for and by idiots. It is no great handicap in life and in certain areas is actually a distinct advantage and even a prerequisite for advancement.

However, this is also obviously a novel about death and its lingering effects on the living. The McHoans have a history of early, unexpected deaths in the family – and they tend to die in odd ways. The Crow Road itself, apart from being a real location in Glasgow, is a Scottish expression for death, as in: “He’s away the Crow Road”. The appropriateness of this title is immediately apparent, as the book begins with a funeral and many more meet an untimely end along the way. In some ways, this is a funny book - with a lot of death in it.

"You talking to me, Jimmy?"

One of the major topics is the quest for truth as the narrator searches for the answers to the great questions of life, including religious truth. Prentice’s father is an atheist who has brought his children up to question everything and make their own decisions. He is therefore extremely disappointed when his son, perhaps in a fit of childhood rebellion, tells him that he believes in some form of higher power.

Fairness is something we made up. It’s an idea. The universe isn’t fair or unfair. It works by mathematics, physics, chemistry, and biochemistry. Things happen. It takes a mind to come along and call them fair or not.

The story takes place in Scotland and captures the atmosphere of the country perfectly from the stunning imagery of mountains, lochs, valley and cairns to the mundane details of everyday life. Oh, and there’s some drinking too - actually an awful lot of drinking with a variety of consequences, including a painfully funny account of an almighty Hogmanay hangover.

One of the stylistic features in Banks’ writing is frequently switching back and forth in time, even having flashbacks within flashbacks. While this confuses some (primarily those of a limited attention span), for me this non-linear narrative is handled very well. Banks only introduces background knowledge when it is relevant, for example helping to create more depth to a character. As the novel progresses, we discover that all the insignificant and apparently random movements in time contribute to the main plot. Moreover, this is exactly how our minds work in real life with memories being sparked by other events and then cascading to form a whole. Far from being a gimmick, this results in a more natural way of looking at things.

Another writing trait is the use of multiple voices and points of view, switching the narrative between Prentice and his father. Thus, we get a more balanced view than most books with a teenage protagonist, as we can also understand the father and his motivations. It is interesting to see the reasons for Kenneth’s actions as well as the reactions they provoke in his son. Given the multi-layered narrative, the quality of the dialogue is particularly impressive.

Prentice, have you been reading crime novels instead of your history books?

No. The worst crimes are always in the history books, anyway.

Speaking of history, the story is very precisely set in the early 90s with its references to the first Gulf War, the Thatcher government, the Poll Tax and, er, Lloyd Cole. The book gives a very specific snapshot of young people, their clothes and their music from that time (“when I started to understand the lyrics of a Cocteau Twins song, I knew I was wrecked”). In a way, it’s starting to feel like a period piece, but the book remains as sharp and witty as ever.

"Stone the crows"

The book has been adapted for a television series of the same name, starring Joseph McFadden as Prentice; Dougray Scott as his smart-alec, elder brother Lewis; and a young Peter Capaldi (the superb Malcolm Tucker in The Thick of It) as uncle Rory. Unlike many similar adaptations, this one was a high class, delicate and engaging production with Banks sending the producers a letter thanking them for “looking after my baby”.

The Crow Road may be Banks at his most bankable, but it’s also an extraordinary tale rendered so carefully that it feels universal. It has entertaining characters and situations, realistic relationships and problems with a solid and enthralling plot. Banks has said that he “wanted to write something big and a bit untidy, a bit scruffy in itself”. He’s done much more than that, but as a great man once said, “creative minds are rarely tidy”.

Stephen! Just Coming!

Although summer might be drawing to a close, some things still bring a smile to my face – like the return of Adam and Joe to their 6 Music show on Saturday morning, or more specifically in my case, their wonderfully funny podcast, which is a one hour collection of the best bits. The only problem is the choice of where I listen to it, as there have been too many times when I have suddenly burst out laughing in public, leaving anybody near me convinced that they are in the presence of some kind of nutter.

Adam and Joe are Adam Buxton and Joe Cornish, a pair of polite, well-educated, slightly posh (late) thirtysomethings. They are two genuinely likeable personalities, whose humour is gentle, slightly zany and extraordinarily engaging. This double act exhibits an unforced charm, intellect and wit that few other performers possess. Their comedy is innovative, offbeat, sharp and deliciously subversive, even though there is no malice – naughty and nice. In short, Adam and Joe are just plain funny.

"Nobody mention the Hairy Cornflake"

Friends since school days, they have a terrific chemistry and are clearly comfortable in each other’s company. It’s clearly the Adam and Joe show – there are no ego trips. Although they sound disconcertingly similar, both being articulate, amusing and self-deprecating, there are obviously differences: Adam is shorter, sillier and sometimes has a beard; Joe is taller (a “man-giraffe”), drier and slightly forbidding. Theirs is an innocent world and they often talk about childhood memories or look at the world with the artlessness (and mischief) of youth.

After a period away from the limelight, last year they broke into the Big British Castle (BBC) to triumphantly re-emerge with the perfect Saturday morning show, which has the unique quality of Saturday mornings when you were a kid, capturing the excitement at being off school and the many possibilities offered by the weekend. The show is a pleasing mix of casual chat, silly voices, observations on pop culture and juvenile toilet humour and has been likened to listening in on a pub conversation between two extremely witty, frivolous and literate mates. It’s difficult to sum up, but essentially they talk rubbish about life, TV, films and music. Fun for all teenagers manqués and indeed manky teenagers, it’s the sound of men who should really know better, which will explain why it’s a source of constant joy and stupidity and makes the show addictive listening.

"A couple of prongs"

Some of their chats are pant-wettingly hilarious. When Joe spoke about the new series of Skins, he superbly summarised how in the first five minutes the director had tried to cram in every possible thing that might lure an irresponsible teenager to watch: “digital, skateboard, turd, spliff, text, trilby, swearing, indie rock, community police, ponce, pub, lady”. Equally good was his impression of Jools Holland, when he imagined him at home in the morning: “Wonderful bacon and eggs. Over here’s the cooker. You also have the toaster. This is my wife. Here’s my wife. My children. Get in the car. Brilliant. The car. Round of applause for the car”. They should also be applauded for coining terms like “idiothole” and “airborne toxic event” (take a guess).

The show has a couple of regular features, including Text the Nation, where our heroes choose a topic from their own experiences and get the listeners to, er, text in their anecdotes or ideas:

Text the nation, text, text the nation.

But I’m using e-mail. Is that a problem?

It doesn’t matter – TEXT!

Rather than aiming to provoke an angry reaction from the public, they prefer to encourage people to look at the quirky aspects of life. Recent themes have included bad interviews/auditions, strange things you do to cover up public embarrassment, t-shirt slogans that you would never see (“Home honey, I’m high”) and domestic annoyances. The podcast has added Retro Text the Nation, which recaps the previous week’s theme to allow listeners to the podcast to also contribute to the discussion:

I like to listen to Adam and Joe, but I listen to the podcast not the live show.

I used to feel acute frustration, cos’ I couldn't join in with Text the Nation.

But now my problems have disappeared, cos’ Retro Text the Nation's here.

And now my letter might be read out instead of thrown in the trash and forgotten about.

"Come on, it's not that bad"

Another recurring feature is Song Wars, where they use the Garageband application to write competing songs on the same subject, then invite the public to decide which one wins:

It's time for Song Wars, the war of the songs.

A couple of tunes by a couple of prongs.

Which will you vote for, which one is the best?

We're putting our songs to the listener test.

So check it out.

Normally, such comedy songs would stink out the place, but their compositions are so good that you can even purchase a compilation of the best ones on iTunes. The themes have included family-friendly erotica, revisited TV theme tunes, Kate Nash parodies, Quantum of Solace, internet piracy, Grazia magazine and, best of all, Adam’s Middle Class Festival Song with its razor-sharp dissection of the green welly brigade (“Load up the 4x4, it’s festival time/We’re stuffing the chill bag with nibbles and wine”). In the beginning, Joe won week after week, which seemed to genuinely upset Adam, but now the roles seem to have reversed. In fact, the show’s excellent jingles are mainly written by Adam.

Unlike most radio shows, they rarely have any celebrity guests plugging their latest product and indulging in banal, pointless conversations (step forward, Chris Moyles). Actually, the only celebrity I can remember making an appearance is Sir Roger Moore, which resulted in Joe corpsing on air, struck dumb by the presence of a living legend. The one famous artist they would dearly want on the show is David Bowie, but as that seems unlikely, they make do with a regular impression of the thin white duke (though it’s more like the laughing gnome).

"Adam is only half the man he used to be"

As with all great radio performers, they create a little world where the listener feels included and at home. Their knack is for building a sense of comradeship among their fans, like a club with a particularly loyal following. They make us feel better about our own weird little obsessions and self-delusions. Indeed, people who listen to the show live between 9 and 9.30 are known as “Black Squadron” in recognition of their ability to rise so early on a Saturday morning.

This also means there are lots of running gags, most notably the minor social phenomenon known as “Stephenage”, whereby listeners shout out “Stephen!” in a public place, hoping to identify other listeners who will reply “Just coming!” The origins of this nonsense lie in one of the Text the Nation stories on the juvenilia theme, when a listener recounted his youthful creation of a self-referential magazine depicting him as a superhero with the unlikely name of Stephen. The recounting of this story is among the funniest things I’ve ever heard.

Adam and Joe are improbable media darlings after their only shot at mainstream success, The Adam and Joe Show on Channel 4, fizzled out almost ten years ago, despite being one of the funniest things on television, stuffing more ideas and jokes into half-an-hour than most programmes do during their entire run. At a time when new laddism was almost inescapable, amongst other things they used to spoof Hollywood movies using soft toys. One other very humorous sketch involved Adam going to a supermarket, selecting products that had 20% free written on the packets, consuming just the “free” amount and then returning the packet to the shelf.

"Which one is the best? It's Joe"

Other TV appearances have included some excellent guest slots at Glastonbury, proving that not all presenters there are contractually obliged to annoy the hell out of the viewers like the clueless Reggie Yates, the fawning Zane Lowe and the insufferable Edith Bowman. However, these days they are better known for their work on the airwaves, having produced consistently astonishing radio ever since they started on XFM in 2005. Nobody could forget the riotous re-cap of R. Kelly’s mind-boggling “Trapped in the Closet” mini soap opera.

Incredibly, Adam and Joe are still as fresh and inventive as they were ten years ago. In fact, I think that they’ve actually got funnier as they’ve got older. Listening to their podcast, they are without doubt at the peak of their form, maybe because they are most comfortable in that medium. Radio suits them well, as they are given space to talk about whatever they want, so they can be a lot more relaxed and things can be more spontaneous and therefore funnier. Their brand of humour certainly works extremely well in that format, which may explain why they are more popular now than during their first flush of fame. As Joe said, “the thing we seem to get rewarded for is just when we’re being lazy and talking rubbish to each other”.

"Of course we can do zany"

Some may think that it’s a shame that television does not give more prominence to a couple of comics who speak eloquently and hilariously on pretty much any topic, but Adam and Joe’s original, intuitive whimsy is almost certainly beyond the intelligence of today’s commissioning editors, who are incapable of recognising comedy unless it’s accompanied by a fatuous catchphrase. As the great Stewart Lee said, “TV is run by twenty or thirty people who are insensitive to beauty, truth or thought in any form”. Sure, they deserve a bigger audience, but then they might be obliged to change in order to toe the corporate line. At the moment, they shoot the breeze without putting each other down, are not vicious and laugh as if they mean it. I for one would not want them to become a less amiable, charmless, more frantic version of themselves in order to fit in with the moron-fest on BBC3.

Adam and Joe have provided some of the funniest radio ever broadcast. In terms of podcasts, it doesn’t get any better than this. Their show is essential listening and will have you in stitches. Just don’t listen to it on the train or bus - unless you like people pointing at you.

That Joke Isn't Funny Anymore

"He's not the Messiah. He's a very naughty boy!"

Arsenal’s exciting start to the new season came to a crashing halt at Old Trafford as they contrived to somehow lose a match where they had played Manchester United off the park. A needless penalty (and yes, it was a penalty, even though Wayne Rooney went down like a particularly unattractive sack of potatoes) and the most comical own goal you will ever see was not so much the proverbial case of shooting yourself in the foot as taking an AK-47 and blasting off both legs. However, even though the young guns were defeated, the quality of their football was highly encouraging.

What was disappointing about this match was Arsène Wenger yet again having to endure thousands of imbecilic Manchester United fans singing, “Sit down, you paedophile”. I have been in two minds as to whether to comment on this, as I have no desire to give these cretins the oxygen of any publicity and it could be argued that making a big deal of the chant is only going to encourage them. Wenger himself has never raised the issue, partly because it's palpably untrue, partly because these morons are not worth worrying about, but presumably also because he fears that the chant might then be sung at every ground. This is a legitimate concern, but on the other hand not even Spurs and Chelsea fans (our main London rivals) have stooped so low as to repeat it, while United fans have been bellowing it out for over ten years.

"Please don't feed the animals"

No, it seems to be a uniquely United phenomenon and we’re not talking about a small, mindless minority here. Large sections of the crowd, thousands upon thousands of them, welcome Wenger to the “theatre of dreams” every year by directing this vile chant at him. It is a hideous song when aimed at anyone, but when targeting a man with a daughter now old enough to understand what it means, it beggars belief and is totally beyond the pale. Every time Arsenal’s manager dares to stand up at Old Trafford, you can hear people screaming this unacceptable bile, often in front of their own children.

As if that were not bad enough, referee Mike Dean took time off from deputising for Rio Ferdinand in the United defence in order to send Wenger to the stands for the heinous crime of kicking a water bottle. With just thirty seconds remaining, what sort of idiot thinks that it would be a good idea to present the baying masses with the target of their hatred? With nowhere to go, Wenger was forced to stand among the fans that had been roundly abusing him throughout the match. Why not go the whole hog and place Wenger in the stocks while providing the loathsome mob with rotten vegetables to throw at him? Fortunately, Wenger is a classy individual, who did not lose his cool.

"You're once, twice, three times an idiot"

Obviously every football crowd will sing against the opposition and it’s good fun to rile the fans of other teams, but there has to be a limit, a line that shouldn’t be crossed. I remember many years ago standing on the North Bank at Highbury, when the legendary Peter Shilton was playing for Nottingham Forest, the day after he had been caught playing away with a girl called Tina, and heartily chanting “T-i-i-i-n-a” and ”Does your Mrs. know you’re here?” throughout the game in an attempt to put him off, but that’s not in the same league as the vitriol chanted at Wenger. Even the “sit down” chant can be amusing, when it is adapted to something less contemptible, such as when rival fans sung “Sit down, Pinocchio” to the large-nosed Phil Thompson.

Unless he’s deaf, United’s manager “Sir” Alex Ferguson must be aware of this filthy chant, especially as he loudly complained in the media last year about the treatment he had received at The Emirates, but that was really nothing compared to the abuse heaped on his Arsenal counter-part. The United fans have rightly criticised the sick chants sung by some of their northern rivals about the Munich air crash, but seem blissfully unaware of their double standards. The next time I watch those fans fall silent to commemorate their dead, I will be wondering whether the same people will be chanting despicable abuse just a few weeks later.

"Red faced with embarrassment?"

It is high time that United did something to stop this chant. Everyone associated with the club should be embarrassed when it rings around Old Trafford and ashamed at their failure to deal with it. The least that they could do is to offer an apology. Their inaction is truly unbecoming of a club of their stature and tradition. With the presence of CCTV cameras in every part of the ground, it would be very easy to identify the main perpetrators, ban them from the ground and send them back to Surrey. A few tough examples would quickly deter the masses, but for some reason they haven’t done a damn thing.

When Tottenham fans abused Portsmouth’s Sol Campbell, the clubs helped the police to identify those responsible by releasing video images. As the court said when sentencing those meatheads, “We find that the words used were in extremely bad taste, they were inappropriate, shocking and disgusting, and as such they were indecent." Precisely – it’s a question of basic decency. From that perspective, there’s surely no difference between gay slurs and calling someone a paedophile - except that the latter insult is unquestionably worse.

Something that should be stopped right now is the sale of an album of Manchester United songs that unbelievably includes the “sit down” chant, which is freely available on Amazon. What next? How about commemorative Munich air crash plane seats? Or authentic Hillsborough stretchers? Just when you think that people couldn’t sink any lower …

"Young United fan protected from Wenger chant"

Another question worth asking is why the Football Association allows this chant to be swept under the carpet. They could easily warn United that they will be fined or even have points deducted if their fans sing the offensive chant again. The FA has rightly long campaigned against racism and homophobia in the game, but for some reason has turned a blind eye to this behaviour. The FA’s core values include a commitment to making football a family friendly sport and it is justifiably proud of its efforts to stamp out racist nonsense, but it hasn’t lifted a finger to remove this stain from our game.

The media is equally guilty in my eyes, as they seem to have collectively decided to gloss over the abuse dished out by the United faithful. Shame on television and the press for blatantly ignoring this ugly bullying. It’s not as if they are unaware of this disgraceful chant. When watching Sky’s live coverage of the game, you could clearly hear the singing, but later that day on the BBC’s Match of the Day highlights it was evident that they deliberately tried to quieten the sound. OK, I understand why they would do that, but can’t they press United on the issue? Obviously, they couldn’t put the point directly to Lord Demento of Ferguson, as he is allowed to get away with not communicating to the club’s fans via the nation’s prime TV channel, but please devote some airtime to the issue, for the love of God.

I don’t really believe in media conspiracies, but you have to ask yourself if there isn’t some sort of concerted attempt to ignore as far as possible any really unsavoury incidents in the “best league in the world” (© Richard Keys). In the last week we witnessed some truly horrific scenes in and around Upton Park as West Ham and Millwall fans fought running battles, invaded the pitch on numerous occasions and left a father of two stabbed. The following night we saw a player, Eduardo, pilloried for diving to win a penalty. Two questions for you: (1) in the wider scheme of things, which incident would you consider to be more serious? (2) which incident do you think received more media coverage over the next few days? Right, and right again.