*Track 1

Everything Must Go (A Matter of Emphasis) - 10th August 2017

Stuart had, he knew, wasted a disproportionate slice of his morning contemplating fruitcake.

In his defence this was no commonplace confectionery. The report he’d heard earlier revealed the cake was over a hundred years old and yet, cutting to the story’s core ingredient, an Antarctic authority had claimed it still, “looks and smells almost edible.” It had been those last two words, the unlikely image they created, that had prompted Stuart’s lengthy, unjustifiable, scrutiny.

The fruitcake in question, wrapped in paper and stored inside a rusted tin, had recently been found by conservationists in a hut on Cape Adare, believed to be the South Pole’s oldest building. Crucially, explaining the discovery’s newsworthiness, it was believed this uneaten snack had belonged to Robert Falcon Scott, Scott of the Antarctic, a staple item on any British child’s educational diet. This supposed ownership had been attributed to the ‘fact’, one Stuart must have forgotten from school, that the cake was manufactured by Huntley & Palmers, whose produce had, apparently, been, “known to be Scott’s favourite.”

This had been no more than a two-minute story on Five Live, sandwiched between the travel bulletin (which thankfully he no longer cared about) and last night’s Carabao Cup reports, but it had proved more than enough, in the hours since, to send Stuart down a maze of reflective rabbit warrens.

On what basis could this cake, 106 years old now he’d researched it further, possibly be considered, “almost edible.”? Even accepting the durability of its high fat, high sugar content, that conditions (in the coldest, windiest, and driest place on earth) may have proven uniquely conducive to preservation, and that all this had taken place well before ‘best by’ food warnings, Stuart still felt the polar expert must have been over egging its edibility. He’d noted there was no accompanying claim that Scott’s fruit loaf was still likely to taste, “almost edible.”

Following a parallel strand of thought, what of Huntley & Palmers? According to Wikipedia, its information digested with an appropriate pinch of salt, the firm had been established in an easily pre-Scott 1822. Formed by Quakers (who he guessed must have been big in all things oaty) the firm grew to become the biggest, most famous biscuit manufacturer in the world, its reputation built on variety tins and ginger nuts, though Stuart couldn’t help recalling a youthful fondness for their iced gems. It had been another of those iconic brands lost in the ‘70s, subsumed into a less snappy Associated Biscuits, but pleasingly Huntley & Palmers appeared to have risen again since as an independent company. A genuine phoenix from the crumbs.

Maybe this whole episode, Stuart had then speculated, could have been one of the earliest identifiable instances of product placement? Scott’s infamous expedition likely qualified him as a pop star of his day, so how much would Huntley & Palmers have needed to fork out to promote their wares as, “the cake no Antarctic explorer should leave home without.” Had Amundsen’s rival expedition been similarly sponsored, by the leading Norwegian producer of fermented trout perhaps?

Conscious of the danger of entering a fruitcake zone of his own, Stuart had finally pondered how pivotal it may have proven, to the course of history, that Scott’s cake had never been eaten? Could it otherwise have provided the extra sustenance required, the marginal gain in today’s lingo, to secure polar victory? Captain Oates might have become famous instead for an entirely different, less tragic quote: “I’m just going outside, I’ll fetch the cake.”

It had taken Stuart a good part of the year since his retirement (did he really need to add ‘early’ every time?) to understand the extra headspace this had freed for such flights of fancy, and even longer to fathom how preferable he found it to a mind clogged by corporate concerns. Rising naturally now around 8am, no longer woken by that 5.30 alarm, faced with a diary-less day to make his own felt both liberating and invigorating. He still had to face down frequent queries from those, sadly in Stuart’s eyes, who clung to careers defining their worth about, “how do you fill your day?” He’d almost given up expecting any understanding of the true answer, that this was both infinitely variable and, crucially, totally within his own control. Today’s honest reply for example would be, “rereading Dickens, walking in the Peaks, listening to the Manics, and fussing over fossilised fruitcake.”

Music, always a feature somewhere on each day’s itinerary, mattered massively to Stuart. It always had. His treasured increase in leisure capacity having fortuitously corresponded with an explosion in streamed musical choice had, unsurprisingly, done nothing but reinforce this obsession. Today, from within his own collection (833 CDs, 339 vinyl options, or a choice of 12,207 songs on iTunes), he was revisiting ‘Know Your Enemy’, the Manic Street Preachers’ third post-Richey album. Arguably not their strongest, but Stuart always felt an empathetic tug on hearing ‘Ocean Spray’, James’ debut lyrical outing on a song prompted by his mother’s untimely death from cancer, its simple words so effective in portraying a deep sense of grief. The song’s poignant, raw emotion was also beautifully framed by a gorgeous trumpet solo. Not, Stuart mused, a rock critique often heard.

As the CD ticked over to ‘Intravenous Agnostic’ (an album should after all be listened to as an album), a great title but a messy song, Stuart’s skittish attention jumped again, like a needle from a scratched groove, settling on the great ‘elephant in the studio’ problem he’d always had with the Manic Street Preachers. An unresolved matter of emphasis. Just why did everybody mispronounce their name and, more to the point, why had it only ever been him that seemed to agonise over this?

Naming their high school band, aiming you would assume for something to reinforce their cherished outsider status, Richey and Nicky (surely the ones in charge of such matters) must have intended, with emphasis firmly placed on the first word, to style themselves as Street Preachers of a Manic persuasion. A hugely powerful image. Instead, the band had forever become monikered, through collectively misplaced stress on the final word, not simply as Preachers, which alone might make sense, but as a preaching community who had chosen to locate themselves on Manic Street, which together very clearly doesn’t.

As annoying as Stuart still found this emphasistical anomaly, it had never proven one he’d managed to move beyond a one-man crusade. His wife Anne disparagingly dismissed the issue as, “just bloody semantics,” while their son Joe, with the certainty of youth, simply observed, “who cares anyway Dad?” He’d even failed miserably to engage his fellow music loving mates Ed and Charlie on the issue. “I can see where you’re coming from,” Charlie had once conciliatorily conceded, before shooting down Stuart’s concern (and agreeing with Joe) by concluding, “but there must be bigger things to worry about.”

He’d even once plugged Manic Street into Google Maps, just to make sure it wasn’t some obscure Blackwood byway (“that’s taking it too far,” Ed had commented, “even for you!”), but the only example he’d found, anywhere in the world, was a back street in the city of Chaguanas (pop 83,489), just south of Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago, with no attributable evidence this had ever been a hotbed for holy men of any creed. Stuart supposed this mass misdemeanour of mispronunciation, by now seemingly irreversible, must explain why everybody just called them the Manics!

A reluctant conversationalist at the best of times, one of Stuart’s least favourite questions to field had always been, “what kind of music do you like?” How could you ever expect to answer such a complex question within the confines of the succinct response the casual enquirer expected? A five hundred words essay might, just about, allow Stuart to do the subject justice, but restricted to a simple phrase where would he even start? Pop music, discordant rhythms, provocative lyrics, and jangly guitars would likely all, dependent on his mood, feature prominently. But even part way through such a list, Stuart understood, his audience would be lost. Instead, he had come up with a stock short-form answer, one that for him said it all. “I like maverick music,” he’d reply, the inherent truth of his assertion made all the sharper by the confused look it typically provoked.

In Stuart’s musical universe Richey Edwards would always remain one such maverick. The true heart and soul of the Manics, not just before his disappearance but, intriguingly, still so in spirit afterwards. The three surviving band members, devastated by the loss of their friend (however it had happened) continued to make great music, not despite their tragedy, it seemed to Stuart, but by consciously using it to inform and inspire everything they had done since.

It wasn’t just the space reserved stage left when they performed, their long-maintained split of royalties four ways, or the occasional use of Richey’s unmistakable, poetically obtuse, unused lyrics; it was more the way they had managed to retain, even into middle age, the same youthful anger at injustice that had driven Richey, once described by John Robb as, “a walking, talking manifesto.” Right from Nicky’s post-disappearance lyrical admission, on ‘Everything Must Go’, that he feared a diminished future, the band had seemed propelled forward again, seemingly Richey fuelled. Preaching forever, albeit mistakenly anchored on Manic Street.

Stuart had always believed he could find common ground to explore with the Manics. Unlikely perhaps, on the face of it, given his long career working for one of the organisations they had mercilessly vilified on ‘NatWest-Barclays-Midlands-Lloyds’ (with credit compared to death no less!), but if they could just get past the financial crash Stuart felt they would be able to bond over a mutual love of ‘80s post-punk. Nicky Wire, after all, came over in interviews as a similarly obsessive music fan, openly conceding the inspiration he had drawn from bands like Joy Division and The Cure, other notable mavericks never far from Stuart’s turntable. This Manics’ fandom didn’t end at simply acknowledging such influences either, they often went further, paying direct homage by covering some of their favourite songs.

Stuart loved a good cover version. He’d often thought there ought to be a law requiring every band to cover at least one song in each live set (with a crack squad of ‘undercover cover cops’ in place to police it!)

He also loved making, and constantly honing, musical lists. “The best live performance you’ve ever seen,” for example, had long been a regular beer-driven debate with Ed and Charlie at the gigs they still attended. But there were a multitude of other categories to choose from. Having finally managed to mentally regurgitate Scott’s fruitcake, Stuart became free to plough his full attention instead into revising his top five cover versions list. He had several key criteria; it must be a markedly different take (no room here for pastiche), prove capable of redefining a song you already loved, and cause you to think of it differently afterwards. It only took him half an hour or so to come up with a new ‘covers’ list, in a traditional reverse order:

5) ‘Umbrella’ – a Rihanna cover by the Manic Street Preachers. A great pop song transformed by James’ sweeping vocals.  A welcome window into the band’s underappreciated playful side.

4) ‘Just Like Heaven’ – a Cure cover by Katie Melua. Ed’s daughter Rose had sung at Stuart’s 50th party, meeting the only rule he’d set her, “to include at least one Cure song,” by covering this cover.

3) ‘Jack the Ripper’ – a Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds cover by Japandroids. A driven, noise laden version by an obscure Canadian band which, unbelievably, manages to out doom the original.

2) ‘Running Up That Hill’ – a Kate Bush cover by Placebo. Anne had used this as the alarm on her phone for ages now, permanently imprinting it on Stuart’s brain. Especially the first five seconds.

1) ‘Hurt’ – a Nine Inch Nails cover by Johnny Cash. The highlight of his great American Recordings renaissance, a stunning stripped back vocal enhanced for eternity by the world’s best, ever, video.

A great list, Stuart concluded, whilst acknowledging a host of other contenders bubbling just below that could easily force their way on next time.

Having made a conscious effort to bin as much business baggage as he could over the last year, literally so with his work shoes the day after leaving (symbolically akin to burning your schoolbooks), Stuart had to concede one corporate compulsion remained that he had singularly failed to break. He still felt obliged to micro-manage his e-mail inbox, suffering a familiar anxiety if the number of unresolved messages spilled onto a second page. Given the antiquity of his personal webmail provider this only allowed him a capacity of thirty live messages to work with. Stuart suspected this fixation, especially if logged alongside his list making, would probably see him diagnosed today as operating on the lower reaches of the autistic spectrum. In his youth though the only Spectrum anyone would have recognised was a dodgy computer developed by a batty, balding, battery car driving boffin called Sinclair!

Just as he had found at work, copious crap still seemed to flow into Stuart’s personal inbox, including (a cynical corporate observation perhaps) an equal number of people attempting to con him daily. How many flights did EasyJet and Ryanair think he could take in one year? and however sad it was he’d become part of the target audience did anybody really take out funeral insurance? Despite his morning having been irretrievably lost though, much of it in a cake-fed haze, the afternoon had at least brought one intriguing new email which Stuart had left to be consumed last, much like he used to do with the best bit of his dinners as a child (the sausages maybe?). Being honest, he still did the same thing today.

The message’s sender was listed as ‘Challenge 69’, which meant nothing to Stuart, and its subject line read, “an invitation to win a unique prize,” which screamed out scam, followed by a plea of, “please don’t delete, this is not a scam,” which probably just confirmed it was. Hovering over the delivery address revealed little more, just noreply@Challenge69.com, so Stuart finally took the plunge and opened the email. If nothing else he was always interested to find out what innovative new methods fraudsters had devised to get people to click on their virus infected attachments, or to freely cough up their banking details. The message’s content was brief, not obviously fraudulent, employed an unusual font, and, while not entirely grammatically correct, read:

The weblink took Stuart through to a simple one-page site with much the same messaging, though it expanded a little on the registration process. The page repeated the warning that potential entrants could only successfully log on by using the same email address their targeted invitation had been received on and stressed that from midnight tonight the site would become password protected, locked to new recruits. Once registered, it explained, entrants would become part of a closed ‘Challenge 69’ community, with a first ‘clue’ due to be released via the site at 10am tomorrow.

Stuart couldn’t help being intrigued, particularly by the openly cavalier stance taken on data protection, but he remained healthily sceptical. A quick Google search of ‘Challenge 69’ came up with three partial hits; a question posed on a peer-to-peer support forum for a Californian software company, issue number 69 of ‘Challenge – The Magazine of Science Fiction Gaming’ (being sold online by a shop in Cornwall), and a fitness training centre (with the exact same name) located in Breda, a city in the south of The Netherlands. None of these seemed to have any recognisable link to Stuart’s unsolicited offer, with its curiously worded proclamation of uniqueness.

Even operating under his ruthless, self-dictated, inbox management rule this was only live message number twenty-three (giving him seven more to play with), so Stuart allowed himself the luxury of temporarily closing but not deleting the ‘Challenge 69’ email. He could think it over further, he reasoned, while walking the dog. Subconsciously though Stuart accepted he’d been reeled in, having already pre-calculated how much time he had left before the invitation’s midnight deadline.

He paid less attention than usual today to the stunning Peak scenery, finding it obscured by a fog of questions running through his mind; what the hell was ‘Challenge 69’? what could a prize described as, “a one-off copy with no likeness,” be? what kind of online database might he have been recruited from? and how, anyway, could you legitimately claim to have, “carefully chosen,” 107,683 recipients?

In the short time it took Oscar to wolf down his keenly anticipated post walk treat, Stuart, showing a similarly animalistic tendency, had already logged back on to the ‘Challenge 69’ website. He entered his registration details (with thankfully no financial information required) and pressed send to be taken to a new page:

It was obvious from the unexpectedly high ‘Challenger’ count that Stuart hadn’t been the only one who had bitten. If he had just foolishly volunteered as a mark for some elaborate con trick, then at least he wasn’t alone. Any normal marketing campaign would kill for the 4.8% registration rate that ‘Challenge 69’ (whoever they were) appeared to have achieved in just a few hours. Stuart also reasoned this development would provide him with a novel new answer to Anne’s regular, slightly condemnatory, enquiry about, “what’ve you been up to today then?” when she got back from work shortly. Explaining it would provide a welcome distraction as there were still, he found himself gauging, almost eighteen hours left to wait until tomorrow’s 10am first clue deadline.

Anne, predictably, had proved largely unimpressed by Stuart’s ‘Challenge 69’ saga as he’d outlined it over tea, “it’s got to be a scam,” being her final word on the subject. On the positive side though she had seemed to find his Scott fruitcake story mildly amusing. Surreptitiously, Stuart managed to log back onto the site a few more times later under the pretence of checking on the football scores, a cover story that owed its efficacy to Anne being unaware there were rarely any big games on a Thursday.

No further Challenge information was forthcoming, but the site did have a constantly updating registration count. This number continued to rise steadily through the evening, reaching five figures shortly after 7pm and racing quickly through the teens. Whatever undisclosed, quite possibly illegal, method of targeting had been employed it was working. Finally, after he’d endured some typically tedious Brexit dominated editions of ‘Question Time’ and ‘This Week’, as the time ticked past midnight, a new ‘Challenge 69’ front-page message finally appeared replacing the already familiar login boxes:

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Despite an uncharacteristically fitful night’s sleep Stuart was prepared. A 10am deadline, particularly on a Friday morning, was not unfamiliar to him as this always seemed to be the time tickets went on sale for recently announced tours. Little he wanted to see normally sold out with Glastonbury like speed, yet another indicator his tastes fell more to the obscure that Stuart acknowledged with a certain pride, but there were occasions (Nick Cave for example) when a ten minute delay could at worst leave you ticketless, or even at best stuck with seats on a remote row with a warning, “this ticket may have an obstructed view of the stage,” a phrase invoking the concert goer’s equivalent of a rail traveller’s dread at hearing, “this train has been replaced by a bus service.”

At 10am precisely, on Friday 11th August 2017, with Anne once again out at work, it took Stuart just seconds to log back on to the ‘Challenge 69’ website and receive the following brief message:

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(To be continued, at 10am tomorrow. Can you solve ‘Challenge 2’ in the meantime? Please message me if you think you’ve got the answer!)