ITWPT: the exit interview

Now this is pretty self-indulgent, but fuck it, it's a blog, they're self-indulgent by definition. Having just stuck a fork in the final episode of In The Worst Possible Taste - the rambling, swaggering first-person tale of Andy 'Angus' Young, bedraggled 2IC axe/vox of a washed-up Strayan rock band - I figured on telling some of the backstory of writing the ignormous heaving bastard of a thing, which I appear to have been doing since sometime in 2005. The decision to serialize it online was taken about two years ago, and some 111 eps and over 620,000 words later - well over three times the length of my PhD thesis, though just as majority-fiction in content - the end has finally been happened upon and staggered across. For those of you who've been there since the start, or near offer, cheers for taking part. For those who haven't, but want to get onto it, it'll still be up for a bit before I either take it down or (more likely) put it behind a login/registration wall. And probably stop reading this now as there may be spoiler-riffic revelations in the following, which is why we're having this convo here at Bollock World rather than across the way at flangegasket.blogspot.com.



So why did I write ITWPT? Couple of reasons. Boredom, since I was working a dull job at the time. Missing friends, having moved to NZ - since it is, in essence, a story about the nature of friendship, and obliquely, a tribute to mine - some of whom have been readers since the first ep (and long before, of course). Growing up, approaching/surpassing 30 and wanting to transcribe some of the tall tales and true from my youth. ITWPT inspirations are probably fairly self-explanatory. John Birmingham's Felafel/Tassie Babes diptych hit a chord, being the first time the story of every twenty-something sharehouse bunny had been told. Still Crazy, the British movie about another washed up rock band on the comeback trail, was both a trigger and a torment, trying to avoid recapitulating similar plot points re mentally ill former rock stars and potential resurgences thereof. But more than either, co-writing credits have to go to the rock festivals, dishevelled parties, sharehouse stupidity and above all the magnificent bastards who found their way into the story, mildly finessed from reality. I'm not Angus Young, but I think we know a lot of the same people. If you recognise yourself, kids, do take it as a compliment.

The basic idea of Flange Gasket The Band, with all the dubious album covers and song titles came from something I wrote years ago, the final installment in the Captain Stupidity Chronicles, a heroically terrible comic superhero series. In that final ep, the dodgy pub covers band of crimefighting idiot savant (more the former than the latter) and part-time drummer Captain Stupidity and friends (including his long-suffering, heavy-drinking offsider Dr Yobbo) somehow stumbles over international chart success following the accidental Triple J release of a rockabilly-thrash version of Accidentally Kelly Street by Frente. As you do. Reworking that final CS ep into a full novel, placed within an ostensibly recognisable society (rather than the rather Python-munted netherworld of Captain Stupidity) followed later.

But I could go on talking bollocks all evening. Would rather throw it over to the folks who read the series, and ask the question - what did you think? Part of the plan by serialising the thing was to get some honest feedback at the end of the story on how it read and what sort of percussive maintenance it needed to be betterer. In particular would love to hear
(a) questions about stuff in the series that confused or needed clarification
(b) obvious continuity errors or other plot fuck-ups I missed
(c) shit I should have left out for brevity to prevent it being longer than the Wheel of Fucking Time
(d) appropriate plot-points to introduce MOAR EXPLOSHUNS
(e) or MOAR GRATUITOUS ROOTING
(f) and probably most of interest of all, discussion of your fave character/location/song/invented swear word on behalf of Mad Mick 'Cunt my ringhole' Martin etc.

Comments section is below. GO.

Oh by the way... yes there will be Something Else after ITWPT. Not the same bunch of wankers, and not the same Implausible Length - particularly as the next project is tidying up last year's NaNoWriMo piece which topped out well under a tenth of the size of ITWPT. But that won't be too far away, in either leadtime or stylistic considerations.

The Doctor is OUT.