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Book Review: Confessions of a Bangkok Private Eye

by Lang Reid

Hot off the press in Singapore comes Confessions of a Bangkok Private Eye (ISBN 981-05-4832-X, Monsoon Books) written by an ex-Bangkok PI named Warren Olson. However, the blurb that came with the book from the publishers stated that Stephen Leather (Cold Kill reviewed recently, Private Dancer reviewed last year) came on board to fictionalize the case histories and “inject with a wicked sense of humor”. In the meantime author Olson has apparently returned to his native New Zealand.
The book is a series of case histories (around 25 in all, but I gave up counting) recounting Olson’s cases while he was in Bangkok for almost a decade, having re-invented himself as a private detective. Prior to this he had been a horse-trader (sorry, horse trainer) in New Zealand, and not averse to swinging the odds in his (horse’s) direction with a well administered injection or two. However, this did not come as a great shock, as I have always found that the horse racing industry was more than slightly tainted. I am sure there are honest people in the game, I just haven’t found him yet.
The vast majority of the cases involve foreigners wanting their girlfriends found, followed or fricasseed. This Olson does, papering his way into official details by the usual under the table methods. He claims to be sorry for the client, knowing before he begins just what he is likely to find. If it’s infidelity, Olson was your man, even to sleeping with the errant girlfriend to prove just how untrustworthy some of these Thai girls can be. And incidentally, just how untrustworthy some of the ethical private investigators can be.
Some of the cases are true scams, such as girls who are locked up at the airport and need 150,000 baht to get out, but most are just examples of the usual avaricious bar girl who moves on after the fun goes out of the relationship.
The book can be found in most bookstores, though Monsoon Books did not inform me just how much it will retail for in the shops. I have to admit I did not read all the case histories, as I had already found most of them boring and repetitive. They probably are true, however, and are more than somewhat reminiscent of the calls for help that go out to our redoubtable Ms. Hillary, who can dispense advice much cheaper than Olson’s going rate. Ms. Hillary also does not sleep with the women in question either.
Quite frankly, I found it to be a rather sad book, but then perhaps I am not enough of a voyeur to be excited by such cases. Surely everyone knows by now that the women who work in bars are not doing it to improve their English? But apparently not. There are those who cite as evidence some very successful marriages between bar girls and foreigners. Good luck to them, they certainly did not need to hire a PI. I was also surprised that an author of the caliber of Stephen Leather would agree to being involved in this book.

  Mott’s CD review: nocover

Forget

 Written by Mott The Dog The right keys pressed by Meow the Cat
5 Stars *****
Intriguing album this. Intriguing for many reasons, first the spelling of the band’s name: two words jumbled into one, and no capital letters. nocover. Second they are not really a band, nocover is basically the solo work of George ‘Shadowman’ Skelly with help from Marc Soucy who polishes up the music, adds a certain presence, programs, mixes, and adds some other space style keyboard solos ranging from Zawinul like solos on the album’s track ‘They want Me’ to the moody horns on ‘Favor’.
Marc is a very talented musician who has been playing the keyboards since he was the age of three! He has also been partnering other musicians writing his own songs, and programming synths and midi’s with other songwriters and artists for many years. He also owns his own record company on which last year he released his own album, under the banner of ‘El Kapitain’ called ‘Retroscape’ which was reviewed by Mott The Dog last October 2005. It’s Pink Floydish undertones the reason for the interest in this album.
There are also some sampled vocals on this album all done with great effect, primarily by Patty Barkas who is best known in the Boston studio scene, whose throat has added some startling special substance to this album, especially on tracks ‘ooh baby’ and the title track. (The non-use of capital letters is that of the artists.)
The third reason for a little intrigue here is that at first I was horrified that I was listening to music that at first I thought was some form of hybrid disco music, and nearly turned the disc into another ugly silver ashtray.
But fortunately, having been so taken with ‘El Kaptain’s’ work on the ‘Retro’ album, I decided to at least give it a chance, and without quite understanding why went back to play it again and again, and most intriguingly now love the music, and having such blinkered vision of just hard rock quite a revelation.
But first a little background on ‘nocover’: the moniker was conceived by George Skelley about six years ago. It was a means to merge all genres of music into one, if you like, to break down the barriers that people (including myself) put up between each sort of music. Not just slapping one on top of another, but experimenting with what can be laid down next to one another.
Skelley is a multi-instrumentalist; originally a lead guitarist in a fusion and dance band outside New York, who taught himself keyboards, bass, percussion, and how to figure out the latest methods of sampling, computers, and racks of high end studio toys. Therefore allowing himself to become a one man band, getting the exact sound he wanted.
After first listening to a couple of tracks on ‘Forget’ it is very hard to exactly pinpoint whether this is hard rock based or disco based. The sound has many facets, all of which have plenty of power, whilst retaining a subtle edge. The music glides between many surfaces whilst not lingering on one to long.
There is none of the numbing repetition of the club music, but at the same time that feeling of the beat driving away at your consciousness remains in you head long after the music has stopped. The lyrics are also often repeated, but with a different nuance each time as if listening to instructions in a consequential dream. The words often hover in ambiguity, and bits of phrases morph from one partial hinted meaning to another. Like “Forget”, “What”, “That’s It”, “Because I Want To”, “Because I want to Forget” as in the title song of the album. Often it takes time to get what the author is trying to get across, so repeated listening to nocover albums often bear their own reward, as the music and lyrics combine as if in some kinetic structure.
Even the sounds that are so key to techno, dance, ambient music, are given new roles. All artists have their influences, the whole techno dance scene is very apparent here, but that is not all - such artists as far back as ‘Devo’, ‘Tangerine Dream’, ‘The Ozric Tentacles’ and of course the Godfather of all that comes under the ambient umbrella ‘Hawkwind’. One example is the gut pounding bass, as melodic an instrument that is always required to keep a beat going, that swoops in and out of the music to keep the beat pounding along. Similarities can be drawn from ‘Paranoia’ from Hawkwind’s first album. In Hawkwind’s case holding one song together, in nocover’s case holding a whole album together.
Today, Skelly still plays occasionally in clubs around Boston as the lead six stringer in a local rock band. Scratch any musician deep enough and a blues band will appear.
Contrarily, although the band is called nocover, great pains have been taken for the cover work, and general packaging. Every nuance has been given the utmost thought. At first glance the cover is visually striking, but give it a second glance and you will be pulled into the cleverness of it all. On the artwork is a slightly abstracted guy and girl sat 90 degrees apart in two different dimensions, at a four dimensional impossible tri—bar, inside a pub called ‘The Nowhere’. After several looks, just like the music, you are not exactly sure of who is looking at who, and who is sitting where? The artwork is by the very talented Rob Zamarchi, whilst the bizarre liner notes, which suit the album perfectly, are by Ray Sawhill.
This is the third album to come out under the uncover banner, the first being ‘Spoken’ (2000), then ‘Way’ (2003), but ‘Forget’ is by far the most complete package, and may there be many more to come.
In August 2003 Keyboard Magazine voted uncover and ‘Spoken’ as unsigned (to a major label) Artist of the Month. These guys always know what they are talking about.
Musicians
George Skelly: Every sort of keyboard you can think of
Marc Soucy: Mainly production and programming, with just that little bit of sparkle
Patty Barkas: The most amazing vocals
Songs
The Nowhere
Ooh Baby
Everybody Shakedown
Forget
Too Cool
Glide
Over the Top
Want Me
Favor
Strange Planet
The Nowhere (Remix)

To contact Mott the Dog email: [email protected]
Website: http://www.mott-the-dog.com

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