Being a record of the ruminations, ramblings and obsessions of a Hound of the noblest breed (or so His Lordship claims, anyway). The focus being on dark music and culture, style, spirituality and - naturally – Basset Hounds.
Welcome to the chronicles of Lord Bassington-Bassington, coming to you from Little Storping in the Swuff – a quaint place located somewhere between England’s Lake District and the outskirts of the Norwegian capital.
This is intended as a log of His explorations of music, books, films and so on. I, your humble chronicler, is merely His Lordship’s secretary.
For more information on Lord Bassington-Bassington, please confer this blog’s opening post. Contacts can be directed to neofolk@zog.no.
Because Lord Bassington-Bassington's Myrninerest records arrived in the mail today. And because His Lordship likes to hang around ancient cultic spots, and has a real thing for stone circles.
‘Would you like to hear the story about Too-ticky who made a great winter bonfire?’
‘By all means,’ replied Moomintroll, good-naturedly.
And Too-ticky started at once to stamp around slowly in the snow, while she sang as follows:
Here come the dumb,
The lonely and the rum,
The wild and quiet.
Thud goes the drum.
Crackle goes the bonfire
Glowing in the white snow,
Swish go the tails,
Swinging through the light snow.
Thud goes the drumming
In the black, black night.
‘I’ve got enough of your snow and night,’ cried the Moomintroll. ‘No, I won’t hear the refrain. I’m cold! I’m lonely! I want the sun back again!’
‘But that’s exactly why we burn up the great winter bonfire tonight,’ said Too-ticky. ‘You’ll get your sun back tomorrow.’
‘My sun,’ repeated Moomintroll in a trembling voice.
Let's face it, sometimes undershirts are not only practical, but necessary. And the shirt above has been one of Lord Bassington-Bassington's favourite garments for leisurely activity since it was purchased on a trip to Brighton a while back. So in a fit of inspiration, His Lordship started looking for more basset-themed undershirts.
This design has an obvious appeal, based on none other than the "Red Baron" von Richthofen.
This design should need no further comment. After all, it contains a monocle!
But one thing easily leads to another. After all, Lord Bassington-Bassington isn't that fond of wearing undershirts in public, so a quick Google search brought the item below to light.
When trying to express the inexpressible, one often turns to spiritual teachers. So while trying to find an appropriate term for the sort of stylistic challenges and paradoxes that increasingly afflict Lord Bassington-Bassington, His Lordship first tried first to turn to Zen Buddhism, where the Koan aptly captures the paradoxical. But to little avail, it simply didn't fit for something as (let's admit it) prosaic as clothes.
Lord Bassington-Bassington also called upon something closer to his own heart, namely Sufism, where the Sufi masters are also good at capturing such matter. But while you can say a lot about the virtues of the wandering dervish, they are not particularly noted for their style. The Christian mystics were not much help either.
So in despair, Lord Bassington-Bassington turned to the font of all true philosophy.
So in keeping with the wisdom of the barbarians of the North, The Lord Bassington-Bassington Chronicles is pleased to present a new series called "The riddles of style".
It seems that His Lordship has gone the grades when it comes to the bow tie. At first, of course, they are hard to tie. And it really doesn't help that most of the tutorials available seem to be intended for men who used to know how to tie bows, but need a quick refresher course. And while tying the bow comes easy after a a bit of practice, it can take a while to figure out how to use the architecture of the tie to your advantage.
Lord Bassington-Bassington's first bow tie, a lovely number from New & Lingwood, was simply ruined by His Lordship's clumsy paws. And after somehow getting the hang of it, the always restless Lord Bassington-Bassington progressed to the diamond tip, and had to learn to tie all over again.
The trick of tying a bow, of course, is that it's not supposed to be too well tied, for then it looks like it is (shudder!) pre-tied. And what individual with an interest in clothes would wear a pre-tied bow?
Now, apparently, His Lordship is at the level where the following situation might present itself:
You find yourself at a party, and someone implies that the bow you're wearing - one of your favourites from Favourbrook - is pre-tied.
Is this an insult, implying that you would stoop to wearing a pre-tied bow (What next? clip-on ties? Velcro brogues?!) or is it a compliment, an acknowledgment that you are now some sort of black belt in bow tying, so adept that you have to make an effort to get the bow slightly askew?
It's a always nice when one's friends start some sort of exciting project. And when it is in a field dear to the heart of Lord Bassington-Bassington, such as small press publishing, it is especially thrilling.
So His Lordship would like to help, in whatever small way, promote the new publishing venture of his dear friends that he just likes to refer to as the Somersetians.
(Austin Osman Spare)
Based in England (but recently moved away from Somerset), ZOAS Press specializes in Polish-language editions of rare, esoteric books. So far, ZOAS has produced one title by artist Austin Osman Spare, a towering figure in modern magic(k) and occulture, and one by the considerably more obscure occult poet Boleslaw Wójcicki. The books are truly amazing to behold, real works of art and passion.
If you can read Polish, or if you area collector of the esoteric or just appreciate beautiful books, you owe it to yourself to cruise by their website.
Despite Lord Bassington-Bassington's skepticism regarding big international fashion houses, His Lordship has to admit that these adverts from Tommy Hilfiger feature some stunning looks. What textures! What colour combinations! What flair!
"I should describe mine own nature as tripartite, my interests consisting of three parallel and dissociated groups – (a) Love of the strange and the fantastic. (b) Love of abstract truth and of scientific logic. (c) Love of the ancient and permanent. Sundry combination of these three strains will probably account for all my odd tastes and eccentricities".
Lord Bassington-Bassington needs to learn to dress down now and then. Because you know you're in trouble when you move in circles where t-shirts, jeans and hoodies are worn for most occasions, and your own idea about casual dress is to use pocket hankies, ties and bows of cotton or wool...
Well, let's face it, His Lordship will never quite fit into the modern world. But he found these pictures from Drake's Fall/Winter 2012 lookbook to be particularly inspiring.
