Issue62 by Jack Swan

Issue #62

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Editorial 3 Games Alan Tate Mr Alan Tate 20 Words from H Tates Best Eleven Andrew Mumford on Tatey History quiz Pics of Last month Jokes of the month Mind puzzles Picture Quiz 30 Minute Challenge Short Breakfast Review God Slot Swanning Around the Universe Name the Pub Jack Sounds 70% of Welsh support terrorists Shit you should know Your Local Trades Quiz Answers

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I remember writing last issue (cracking memory me!!) that we will know a lot more about our American owners by the time this issue goes to print..............

I’m not really sure that we do in reality. I don’t think anyone really expected (or really wanted) us to go out and splash mega bucks in the way that Everton have and you’d have to say that our transfer spending has been cautious as yet but I’m personally no closer to being able to make my mind up on the ambition of our new owners than I was a month ago. The deals which we have made so far appear to be ‘good business’ and very typical of Huw Jenkins. I hate to ever say I’m ‘pleased’ to see a good man leave the club but I was in the case of Jack Cork (and he is a good man but £10 million is very good business) and picking up Mesa for an extra million quid seems like it is an impressively cheap upgrade. I say that with caution though, as I (probably like every other Swans fan) have never seen him play 90 minutes. I know we are linked with his central midfield partner as a possible replacement for Siggy and this brings added caution to me if I’m honest. La Palmas finished 14th in La Liga last season. It is generally regarded that the top of La Liga is superior to the Premier League but as you get further down the list then the Premier League is the better standard; on this reckoning then 14th in La Liga would be a Play-off Championship side and I don’t feel there would be too much excitement if we signed 2 midfielders from Sheffield Wednesday for not much short of £40 million...... hence my caution.

We are still light in places and in massive danger of being exceptionally light with proven goal scorers should Siggy and Llorente leave. It is no good having £80 million in the bank but nobody who can put the ball in the back of the net........... Sometimes you say things and then re-read it... not sure I agree with that? £80 million in the bank??? Go on then!! Mad world. Mad money. Mad times. What do the Supporters Trust do? Take the money? Rainy day fund? Who knows????? With talk of mad football and what to do with £80 million, it is really important that we remember proper football and proper footballers and it is timely that this issue is devoted to the legend that is Alan Tate. He’s finally getting his testimonial and it should be a day that we all forget about the ludicrous salaries and attitudes of ‘superstar’ footballers and celebrate a genuine, honest career that had a fairytale within it as well. From being an integral part in us staying in the football league to leading us out as captain in our first ever match in the Premier League, the man is still as ‘common as muck’ as he was the day he strutted around the mud in the Vetch field. Brilliant player, brilliant career and a really brilliant bloke!!

Cheers

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Obviously time will tell, we may not be interested in his former colleague and I have no doubt that Clement and those making the decisions know far more about the players and La Liga than you or I. It is funny though how we tend to get excited about big money foreign signings and a ‘best of’ youtube video put together by some twelve year old..............We all do it and we do it every Summer!

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ALAN TATE TESTIMONIAL

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3 games that made Tate a legend

The Hull Match 20 years old. Central defender playing in the biggest game of a clubs career, we spoke last issue about Leon in that game and I certainly don’t want to take anything away from Brits but it is one thing playing out on the wing in a game of that magnitude but you are only going to be the hero or get substituted in reality. This is potentially ‘mental break down’ territory if you’re the centre half who kills the club! He didn’t! He was a man at 20 and he went through the game pretty unnoticed which is always a huge compliment to anyone playing in that position. He thought then it was his last ever game for us but it was merely the beginning!! Swansea 1 – 0 Cardiff The Jordi Gomez deflected free-kick. I’ve not been more nervous about a game in years, it had seemed like an age since we’d played those inbred bunch up the road and there is no sweeter feeling than getting one over them but no worse feeling than them fluking a win. These games are always heated and there are always moments where you just want to get on the field yourself and kick someone and on this occasion I just wanted to go through Bothroyd. He’d been giving it ‘all that’ and getting niggly and the whole Liberty just wanted to wipe that smile of his face and Mr Tate did. You could see that he knew what the fans wanted and he wanted to give what the fans wanted, for a five or ten minute spell Tatey terrorised the asshole and it made the victory all the sweeter!! Man city 4 – 0 Swansea I am a huge fan of Garry Monk, there are sections of fans who aren’t and I’ve never understood it and I would have been really happy to see him lead the club out in our first ever Premier League game. I was even happier that it was Alan Tate. It was fitting and he played the game as he’d played every game for us, heart of sleeve; was he up to being able to stop Aguero from scoring? Is anyone? But him having the armband said who we are, it said where we had come from, the journey that we (and he) had made. He describes it as the proudest moment of his career and it was undoubtedly one of the proudest moments of every Swans fans ‘career’.

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Mr Alan Tate

In this special issue, I met up with Alan Tate to talk about his career at the club. It is well known that you came to us from United and we can all imagine the difference between the two clubs back then but exactly how much of a shock was it? The first day I got here, I came from the academy which we’d only been at a year and a half or something and so it was state of the art, brand new and everything, multi million pound training complex, the first in the country really. I was sat outside in the Jacuzzi and Ryan Giggs came down and I thought that was unusual and he said Bryan Flynn wanted to talk to me upstairs. I was like ‘who is Bryan Flynn?’ and he said he’s the Swansea manager. I jumped up and got changed and Giggsy took me upstairs and me and him both sat down with Flynn and he said that he had spoken to Alex and he wanted to take me on loan and I thought it was a great chance to play for a professional club and went for it. I went home, checked on sky sports where they were; bottom of the whole league by 6 points, I’m like ’f%cking hell, that’s a job like’. I arrive down there and the assistant manager Kev Reeves has put me in the Ramada Jarvis hotel with Matt Richards who also joined that day, I met him that night. Next day he took me to training because I couldn’t drive at the time. Get to training and we arrive at the vetch, I think ‘where is the training ground?’ no training ground! Our first training session was at the Vetch, we finished and the boys said that we’d go out for dinner now, I was like ‘alright’; we went to Tesco for an all day breakfast. I think it was me, Michael Howard, Kris O’Leary, Lee Jenkins, Mumf (Andrew Mumford) and so we all went over there for a full English which was massively different from United.

So the facilities weren’t as good as you were used to but what about the players? I think it was harder playing in training with the lads there as against united. I grew up with the boys at united and made the transition through the ages and then I was playing against better players but not as physical. I think coming down it was a step up, more competitive, people were playing for their mortgages for their kids and different things like that and so I did find it more physical like that. I remember your early games for the club well and you looked like a player who came from United, there were

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Mr Alan Tate through the years

a few occasions where you looked like you could easily run through their whole team and had a few moments where you did: Did you feel that you were better than that level? Probably yeah, I have always been confident in myself. I think the difference with United is that you get taught to play a lot more with the ball; you are encouraged as a centre half to get the ball and pass it forward and follow it forward and someone would fill in for you. I remember my first game against Scunthorpe, Kev Reeves said to a couple of the midfield lads ‘ look, he will want the ball and he will want it back’ and that always sticks out, it was just a part of the game I was used to at a footballing club. While we are on the subject of your first game; Mumf told me for this magazine that he remembers your first game and you coming to get the ball short off big Roger Freestone in goal and Rog turning to you and saying ‘F*ck off up there, you’re not playing for United now!’, did it take a while to realise that difference? Yeah, I dropped to the edge of the box and I asked for the ball and he just said ‘no, f*ck off upfield’, he just launched it over my head and then their big centre half would win the header and then we would and it was just ping pong. I don’t think there was much football being played in that league. I’m guessing that there are different skills needed in different leagues and although you were technically superior perhaps you needed to improve your physical strength and maybe mental toughness too? Yeah, I think mentally it was harder than anything else. Physically, although i was 19 and still growing I felt pretty comfortable, obviously I’d get knocked about a bit but on the whole I was still fairly confident, I was comfortable with the ball in the air, I could jump but I think mentally it was hard as you go from playing on a Thursday night in front of a few people in the reserves to going Saturday to Tuesday then Saturday to Tuesday and you do feel tired but more mentally tired. The more you get used to it you’re not thinking about it mentally.

When did you fully commit yourself to the relegation scrap? Was there a moment where it took over? I imagine when you first turned up you were just playing football? Yeah, you are just playing football at the start before you get a feel for the club. It was probably Rushden and Diamonds away. We drew one all and they were flying at the time. We had a goal wrongly disallowed, then we scored first and they equalised and we were hanging on at the end and it was a good point and i remember all of us at the end; I think it was the moment where we felt that we could still stay up. So yeah, I’d say Rushden and Diamonds away which I think was about January time. I’m guessing that was the first feeling that you would have had like that in your whole career? Yes definitely. I had a loan at Antwerp before that but again, that was just playing games. The first couple of months were the same, I was playing and getting used to games but Rushden and Diamonds was when I probably started getting my first feelings for the club. Do you remember the morning before the Hull game? At the time it would have been the biggest game of

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Mr Alan Tate through the years

your career, as it was for every player really. Were you nervous? Not to start with, I got up, had breakfast, absolutely p*ssing down it was. Mam, dad and my girlfriend at the time were down and we were all staying in the flat the club got me down the marina. At about half tenish I basically kicked them out and said ‘look you do what you want to do’ and I watched Rocky 4, got my suit and that on, Micky Howard picked me up as he was living across the road from me; took me to ground, I remember getting to the ground and wondering if the game would be on as the weather was that bad. Me and Leon came out first, you knew straight away that there were more people in the ground than there had been all season and then once the game kicked off then all the nerves were gone but yeah, I would say that I was a bit nervous yeah. I think I have watched that game more than I have any other in my life, obviously going 1-0 up and then 2-1 down and then winning 4-2 but i wouldn’t say that there was a moment in the actual game where I felt too nervous. No? Did you feel like we were going to win? Yeah I think I probably did, I think there was a feeling in the air that day that we would do it, there was a little worry when we were 2-1 down but I never thought that we wouldn’t do it. What angle did you have for James Thomas’s lob? I was right behind him, I was playing left side centre half and Coatsy won the ball in midfield and you could see that Tommo was through on goal and you could see what he was doing and I was just going ‘f%ck off Tommo, f$ck off!’and then as I’m shouting the second ‘F5ck off ’ it drops in and it changes to ecstasy. I did exactly the same, I turned away to the north bank in disgust and then saw them go up celebrating I imagine a lot of people did, I imagine there were a fair few f%ck offs in there! Honestly, did you think that was your last game for the club? Yeah of course yeah, obviously my loan was up, there was nothing more you could do then. I knew that Brian wanted me to stay but I was still ambitious myself and wanted to go back and see if I could get into the united team. So yeah I did think it would be my last game. You came back on loan for a second time, was that an easy decision? Yeah, really easy. Because I went back obviously and had hopes that I could get into the united first team. I started pre-season in the first team and I had two games for the first team in pre-season, done well in one, not well in the other and I then started the season in the reserves. I didn’t want to be there, as soon as I knew that I was in t

he reserves, when I was playing reserve friendlies and then the reserve season I knew straight away that I didn’t want to be there. I wanted to go and play football and it was always, for some reason Swansea that I wanted to go to. When did you realise (and I ask this cautiously) that you wasn’t good enough to play for Man United? I don’t think there was ever a feeling that I wasn’t good enough. They brought Rio Ferdinand in and they had Wes Brown, John O’shea; there were a lot of people ahead of me and that was just one of those things. Obviously looking back now you realise that you wasn’t good enough but there wasn’t one moment where I thought that I wasn’t. Probably my only one regret in football is that I didn’t get to play a first team game, an official first team game. You say that quite blasé there that you weren’t good enough. Were you definitely not? Does a party of you think that if you were given that chance, thrown in the deep end alongside those quality players that maybe you could have been? It’s one of those things that you will never know but obviously not! I obviously wasn’t good enough to make the grade there at the first team level but just because you’re not good enough there doesn’t mean that you can’t have a good career away from it. A lot of people have the feeling that when they leave a big club that they are not good enough to play football which is bollocks really. You signed for the club on a permanent basis. Were there other options? Yeah, Coventry being the main one. Coventry were in the championship at that time but I wanted to go somewhere where I knew the manager, I knew the place, I knew the lads and I wanted to feel comfortable and that is what I did and obviously now it was a good choice. And that decision there, was that you yourself or you

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Mr Alan Tate through the years

and the family? Myself, it was a strange one I joined in the February but at the back end of January when I went in to see the manager of united and said ‘look what’s the situation?’ and he said he would let me go. My Mam and Dad came down and we were at the Trafford centre and we got there it was covered in snow. We came out and the bit behind the car in the Trafford centre was the only bit that didn’t have snow on it and there was a key ring on the floor and you couldn’t see what it was and my dad went down to pick up the key ring and it was a Swansea kit. And you’re thinking, how the f&ck has that happened? it could be anywhere and I’ve parked in a massive shopping centre, parked here and there is a Swansea key ring right under my car, it was just weird. I don’t believe in fate and all that but it’s just weird And it was Kenny Jacket who signed you on a permanent basis, I forget this, I thought it was Flynn. No it was Flynny, And that is why I should never actually take this job seriously and research anything; I thought so, whatever i looked at on the internet earlier said otherwise. Should have trusted my memory I signed full time in the February and flynny went in the march So what was that like when he left? I was gutted, he was the one who brought me in, he brought me in on loan twice, he was the one who gave me first team football so for me he gave me a two and a half year contract when not many people did in that league and I was gutted, I still remember the day that he got sacked. From what I gather, Jacket was a lot more demanding, training wise and is arguably the unsung hero in our rise and rise of, is that fair? Yeah, he was what we needed at the time. I think it was well documented that me and him didn’t get on at the

time because I was young, think I was 20 when I joined the club. I didn’t really know the game, I thought my loyalties lay with Brian and the first time I met Kenny he shook my hand and I didn’t stand up, I sat down which he wasn’t happy with and I was in and out of the team that year; the year that we got promoted obviously me and him didn’t see eye to eye. If Brian hadn’t given me a two and a half year deal then come the end of the season Kenny would have released me, I know he would have. Even with a year left on contract he gave me the chance to go to oxford and he said that I’d be second choice centre half or right back and that it was up to me, I could fight for my place or go on a free contract to oxford. I said that I’d stay. So why did you stay? Something in me that I wouldn’t quit. I wanted to prove people wrong Could you see the club progressing? I don’t for one minute think you’d have believed we could be where we are now but did you think the club was on the up? You could see the progression off the pitch with the new stadium being built and that was about it really. When

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Mr Alan Tate through the years

Kenny came in, he got us promoted and I felt that league one would suit me better being a better footballer. Leon as well, he was in and out of the team that year too, think me and Leon spoke quite a bit there and I always felt that me and him would do better in a higher league but you obviously couldn’t see the progression to the premier league, nobody could see that We got promoted in your first full season, a big difference to the previous years. How did that feel, compared to the hull game? Not as intense, I got left out of the squad at Bury. I was up there but Kenny left me out of the squad, obviously after the game you are chuffed for the lads, your pissed off that you weren’t involved but the guys took priority and they went out and got the result. It just wasn’t as intense though really, there was no big 24 hours printed in the evening post, saying that it’s all about the Swans destiny. Win lose or draw that game, it was never going to cost us because it wasn’t in our hands was it? We were forth going into last game? I don’t think so, it was never as intense because the consequence of losing that game wasn’t as big. The hull game is and always will be the biggest game this club will ever, ever play because the consequence of losing it was not worth thinking about. What happened with Big Willy up at Bury? You must have some stories of then? I remember him being on the stand above a little roof and I know gig lane pretty well because I used to play reserve games there and there is a glass kind of box and a stand above it and I remember Willy standing on top of a roof and a copper going ‘get back, get back’ and Willy saying something back to him and the copper saying something back and then Willy saying something and then you could see a few coppers going to arrest him and none of them could get hand cuffs on him because his hands were so big but they got it on him in the end and led him downstairs and Kenny is chasing them trying to get him back but they are having none if it and stick him in the car and take him to police station. We are in changing rooms, celebrating, drinking and getting our gear together to head back to Swansea and we get back on the bus and Kenny says we have to pick Willy up and the boys are going ‘f&ck Willy, he shouldn’t have got arrested’ because we wanted to get back and get on the piss but we went to Tesco, got a load of drinks and waited for him and got wasted on way back instead. He took it well which is unusual for him because he’s a miserable bugger.

Did you know that at the end of that season you were 21 and had already played 83 games for the club? Leon Britton was also 21 and played 108! No I didn’t know that. Leon signed earlier for me but yeah that’s a good amount of games for that age yeah. The following season was when we started signing to you that ‘we all dream of a team of Alan Tates’ as you spent a lot of it in centre midfield: how did that come about? I think it come about because I don’t think that Kenny really fancied Roberto for whatever reason, I don’t know. I started the season at right back and then ended up centre mid, right back and centre half. I think he probably liked that I didn’t mind putting myself about, I enjoyed getting stuck in and a tackle, I would give it easy to Robbo or johns who would do something with the ball. By this point my relationship with Kenny had started getting a lot better, he sort of trusted me and I grew to trust him and it was one of them where I enjoyed playing centre mid, I was young, I was fit, I enjoyed getting stuck in. And did you hurt your neck back then? Watching balls going over your head It wasn’t too bad in the new stadium, we started to pass the ball a bit more, I got player of the year and so I must have got something right. I remember the gulf between the lower two leagues from the John Hollins days and I thought that we would really struggle this time too; can you remember what the aim was in that first season in League One? It hasn’t ever been just to stay up, I think that no matter what league we have been in the aim has always been to threaten the play-offs and that was our aim in our first season in league one and that is what we did. It was a brilliant season for you personally; winning clubs player of the year! And winning the Autoglass Trophy, is that something which you are proud of to

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Mr Alan Tate through the years

this day? yeah, any trophy which you get playing professional football, it was the biggest cup competition that realistically we could win at the time and obviously any player of the year awards which you get is amazing. I’m lucky that I have had two with Swansea, one at united and so it’s one of them where you just love winning trophy’s and so anyone which you win is great. And are you proud of the flag you waved afterwards? Yeah, I think I have to be. It’s part of the story down here and I am really proud of everything down here. It is something which happened, I got arrested for it but I’m proud of everything which I did for the club. It’s a part of folk law isn’t it, it is there now I think it was the most bought photo for a while I think. What was all that like? It got quite serious didn’t it? Yeah it blew up massively. I remember being at the Morgan’s hotel for the party afterwards and Martin called me over and said that I was going to be arrested on Tuesday and the game was on the Sunday and so this was Sunday night, they obviously knew where we were Monday and so me and lee have to sign ourselves into Cardiff police station on Tuesday if not they would come and arrest us. So we trained Tuesday and then went straight up to Cardiff to hand ourselves in So what was that like entering the danger zone of Cardiff the two of you, you were public enemy’s number one and two at this moment? It wasn’t right in the middle of Cardiff, it was a little police station in the outskirts but on the way up we heard that there were fans waiting outside and all that but we got there and I don’t think anyone knew where it was. We battered Barnsley in the play-off final. I recall you nearly pinching the winner right at the death? Do you remember that? Yeah I do. Never been a good finisher but it was one of

them, I think about that more than I think of the penalty to be honest, not that it really crosses my mind now but that summer it did. How hard was not winning promotion to League one to get over? Especially after being so close and deserving to? it was very hard, I went away and to Fuerteventura and I was walking down the street semi-conscious and there is a big TV and it has my penalty on the screen, obviously showing highlights but like I said, the miss I thought about more than the penalty because a lot better players than me have missed penalties but the one in normal time would have been a great one to score. We were never going to win that game on penalties, whenever you batter a side that much and don’t win then the penalties are only going one way To be fair, their penalties were quality, we were never getting anywhere near them. The next season wasn’t as successful and Kenny lost his job, did you feel it was the right decision at the time? Again it is hard because at that time then. Me and

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Mr Alan Tate through the years

Kenny had grew to like each other and trust each other. Results weren’t great, looking back it probably was the right time, it was the right time for Kenny and for the club, Kenny was getting stick even when we were winning games and so you are struggling: where do you go from there? if you win one-nil at home and you are getting booed off. So yeah I think it probably was the right time and looking back now, Kenny has gone onto bigger and better things and so has the club. How hard is it for a young player to see a manager go? I imagine that when your 30 and you’ve had 5 or 6 managers then it’s not such a big issue but when your career is on the up and then a big change like this happens then I guess it is a worry? It s hard especially when it is the manager that has brought you in. Someone like Darren Pratley, he’d brought him in at a young age and it was tough for him as he was only a kid at the time. For me it wasn’t as tough as with Brian because me and Kenny didn’t get off to a great start but as I said, we trusted each other at the end but it is one of those things which happen in football and you just have to get on with it. The rest is history though as Martinez got the post, how well did you know him then? Again, I know you played with him but you’d have been a teenager and I assume you wouldn’t have been that close back then? Yeah we were, we were all close to Rob. Obviously me and Leon were there (when he was there as a player) and we all lived quite close to each other, none of our girlfriends had moved down and so we sort of lived in each other’s pockets, we’d go out for food, see each other regularly. Leon used to room with Rob and so we all knew Rob quite well and so when he took over, the first thing he said to us when we played Yeovil was ‘it’s a bad thing for you that I know you better than any other person would’ and so straight away we were like right, we better knuckle down here. He knew us and we knew him. Was it more like the United way? Going right back to when big Rog told you to ‘f*ck off upfield’ you were now being told to take the ball off the keeper again? I think in that sense it was yeah, Rob knew how good we could be and he knew the players who could play football and he knew who couldn’t and he still has that philosophy today. The club have a lot to thank Roberto for as he was a massive influence, I think the club owe Roberto a lot. I regularly bang on about Leon Britton and I think that he played a huge role in our progression as not many people could do what he did and allow us to play the way we did in those leagues. Do you agree with that or do you think that Martinez could have just picked someone else? Could he have picked another one? I don’t know because

he never needed to. Obviously we had Joe Allen coming through but he was only 16 at the time but whether he could have gone out and picked someone else? He picked Ferrie and so..... I imagine that he probably could have yeah. For me Ferrie was a Premier league player playing in league one, his ability was ridiculous, he is probably one of the best midfielders which I have ever played with. On his day and when his head was right then he was brilliant. How nobody else had spotted him I have no idea, he could pick, a pass, control a game, score a goal, he wasn’t afraid to put a tackle in, he had a nasty side; Ferrie could have been a Premier league player for years, it baffled me that nobody had spotted him before and it was a league one club coming in for him. We just missed out on the play-offs that season after losing the final game 6-3 at home to Blackpool. Many of us fans will remember that game for one thing and one reason only; Joe Allen. Do you remember that? Were you aware of how good he was before that game? Yeah, I remember because I didn’t play. I’d been kicked in the eye in Carlisle away and they said that I needed four weeks because something had come away from the inside of my eye and they said that it needed to heal and I remember obviously watching the game and Joe coming on and we trained with him and knew he was a good player but he come on, the top looked way too big for him but he done ok yeah. Did you realise how good we were over the summer under Martinez? I’m looking back at the squad and it is seriously special.

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Mr Alan Tate through the years

I think we were a good squad for that league. Didn’t really think about it over the Summer, you start thinking about it in pre-season and obviously Ferrie had come in, Dorus had come in, Angel, I think Orland maybe come in and when pre-season got going and we went to Holland and beat decent teams there and had a good pre-season here. Obviously the first game of the season we lost to Oldham but we played well and we sort of knew that we were going to be right up there. Jason Scotland!! He had come in too, Trundle had gone and Jason came in. And Angel Rangel, what were your first impressions of him? He won’t last!! Didn’t speak a word of English and obviously when you play in that league and you see a lot of foreigners then you obviously think that people are going to go through him, didn’t speak the language at all. Any little contact in training and he would roll around and all that; when he first come in then he was quite bad at that but obviously Roberto must have had a word with him because he picked things up. Ability wise he was fine but I just thought that he was too soft but he obviously picked up the language and the rest is history as they say because he has done really well for the club. Because it is easily forgotten (to us) but he took your place and you spent a lot of that season on the sidelines. What was that like? That would have been your first time in your career? Yeah, he come in, not so much that he took my place., I got injured in the third game, I fractured my knee cap in the league cup against Walsall. I started the season at centre half, done okay in the first two games, Monks was coming back from his injury and so he’s playing centre half against Walsall and I ended up playing right back. Gone into a challenge with about ten minutes to go, cracked my knee cap and carried on for the rest of the game and then we were supposed to play Forest on the Saturday, I trained on the Friday and couldn’t get through it and so I went for a scan and found out that I had cracked my knee cap and then struggled to get back in because Rangel had done well, Monks had done well, he got player of the year that year and so it was hard to get back in. I managed to at the end of the season and done okay then. Was there ever a time where you wanted out? No, I can honestly say that there hasn’t been one time when off my own back that I have wanted out. We dominated the league in 07-08 winning by ten points. How much of that was down to the manager? He’s credited a lot with it, sometimes too much in my opinion, what do you think? A lot, he set us up better than any league one club had ever seen. He set us up differently, he set us up better, changed a lot of things off the field with how we train, how we’d eat

all different things like that. Our training schedule, instead of having your standard Sunday and Wednesday off then he’d be in and if there was ever a full week off then he’d then give basically three days in a row off instead of having the odd days off throughout the season. The club owes Roberto a lot and I think it is fair to say that Roberto owes the club a lot as well. Was that trust in you then? Three days off in a row? Trusting you to look after yourself? Were you allowed to go home and get wrecked or what have you? No you wasn’t, that is the one thing I would say about Rob is that he didn’t treat you like an adult at the time and he wanted you to live his life and obviously for someone like me who is obviously from a different culture to someone like Rob then it becomes a bit difficult and obviously we would clash now and then about me being in Wine street or stuff like that. But that is the kind of culture that I am from. After that promotion, did you feel that we could stay up? Again it seemed insane to me. The aim was never to stay up. The aim externally might have been but internally it was the play-offs. And we nearly did Yeah we nearly did. Think we finished 8th didn’t we? Because I didn’t start the season, I was coming back from a couple of holidays overweight and Rob wasn’t happy. First game of the season was against QPR and the game after someone got injured and I ended up going in and then the same the game after, the same thing happened and I ended up going on after that and then I played the rest of the season as left back. You were back playing again, at the highest level that you had played at, how did you find the Championship? Did you feel comfortable with the level?

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Mr Alan Tate through the years

Yeah, always found it ok. Because you are playing with better players as well, we had brought better players in and always found it easier, especially the way that we were playing, passing it instead of booting it down the line and trying to sort of get near their box to get a cross in; found it a lot easier yeah. How difficult was it not knowing where you were playing each week? You played left back, right back and centre back? I always thought of myself as tactically good and so it was never really a problem, I always saw it as a positive and sort of more strings to your bows as against nailing down one position and only being able to do one thing. Always been a team player and wanted what was best for the team and not just for me.

Erm, no. I think that he had a good season with us and you felt that it might take him one more good season before he would leave and so no, I don’t think that it ever crossed my mind really. How did you find out? Me and Monk were in Vegas actually and he had a text through and I had a text through and that was how we found out.

Because some people say that you’re better off having one fixed position. Would you say that it was beneficial to your career being able to play in more than one position? 100% yeah. Especially down here. Like I said, it was always about the team rather than myself and whether I was playing left back, right back, centre defence, centre midfield or in goal then it didn’t make a difference to me As you said, you also played in goal that season; what was that like? Did you enjoy it? Yeah I didn’t mind it. It was the second time that I had played in goal as I played away at Hartlepool when Rodge done his back in and so it was the second time that I had played in goal and yeah I enjoyed it!! Think I’m the only keeper in the world with a 50% clean sheet record! Conceded one at Hartlepool and none at QPR That is decent that. Although Rangel has a 100% clean sheet record! Don’t count one game!!! haha When did you realise that it was down to you? I’ve always known. I’ve always known that I would be sub keeper. If we didn’t have a keeper then I always knew that I was going in. Did you ever practice? Yeah, I used to mess about at the end of training having the lads take shots at me so yeah, it was always going through my head yeah. I remember sitting in the pub with a few mates the day that Martinez was linked to the Wigan job and he was also touted for the Celtic job too and I remember saying that he had said that ‘he was pushed out as a player and would need to be pushed out as a manager too’; did you sense that he was going to leave?

From Robbie? No, from different people. I think mine might have been from my mates. Was that a bad way of finding out? Erm, no because Rob rang us when we got back because he was still having his wedding in Swansea and me, Monks and Leon went to the wedding and it was all fine. It left a really bitter taste in my mouth that; I could even go as far as saying that I haven’t enjoyed football as much since that day; I felt genuine love for the guy, genuine belief in what he was doing for the club, the philosophy, I bought into everything; how much of a come down was it in the dressing room? It must have been enormous Not really no because there was a few of us that had been around and seen managers come and go before. I think what left a bitter taste was that he said those words about ‘I was pushed out as a player and I will have to be pushed out as a manager’. I think that when you start saying things like that and the fans buy into it then

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Mr Alan Tate through the years

you’re making a rod for your own back. If you don’t mean it then don’t say it. Agree 100%. Brendan left and I never had a problem with that, Martinez left and it was different. Did you feel angry yourself? No, not at all. Was there anyone in the dressing room who felt that? Yeah there would have been. Especially the foreign lads. Like I said before, when you get brought in by a manager then you expect them to stay for a while but me personally; no. I had got used to different managers coming in and going so I was fine. And then the fascinating Paolo Sousa, a Champions League winner; what do you think it was like for him, to go from what he was used to to Swansea City? A lot easier than it would have been a couple of years earlier. He was brilliant he was, he used to join in in training, he was unbelievable, kept the ball so well. He taught Joe Allen a great deal, especially when he would join in in training. He would read Joes passes, you could see Joe getting angry that he was reading him. Joe picked up a lot from Paolo, he improved massively that season. I think that you saw a difference between how Juventus was run and how Swansea was run but he come in and he done his job, he done well. Monk was out a lot that season and so you played centre back and captained the side for most of it; how did you enjoy that campaign? I loved it, another one that I got player of the year. Another one which I enjoyed. I settled more into centre half because Monks was injured, I only played a handful of games at left back, me and Ash had a good partnership at centre half, we kept a record number of clean sheets that the club has had and so yeah, I really enjoyed. I don’t think that there has been a season at the club that I haven’t enjoyed really, apart from the injuries but that is part and parcel of the job. Is it enjoyable being a defender and having a manager who prioritises a clean sheet or is there in some way more pressure because you know we aren’t going to score many? To be honest, you don’t really think about it because my priority is a clean sheet anyway. I remember that season and the wingers were basically full backs Oh, if we went 1-0 up then we knew that we were going to win the game. Obviously the flip side of that is that if we went 1-0 down then how are we going to get into the game but fortunately enough, we went 1-0 up more than we went down. It’s not something I ever thought about really, whether to prioritise this or that, as a defender then I always

prioritised defending and clean sheets. Cheers for Tatey for this. We got the next few years lined up but out of room for this special issue. Think this interview gives a great insight to how important a player he’s been to the club but also what a

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Tates Best eleven

Caught Up with Tate to ask him who the best eleven players he’d played with at the Swans: Goalkeeper: Dorus All round good keeper, holed the clean sheet record for the club, great with feet. You could trust him with the ball and know that he could keep it and you’d get it back. Great keeper. Angel His record for the club speaks for itself doesn’t it. 10k I think he cost the club and he is still there and going and it is a huge testament to him. Great ability, great going forward, he’s been amazing for the club really. Monk One of my best friends in football, captained in every division. A massive part in our rise, he’s a real leader on and off the pitch and a great defender and organiser. Ash Best defender I’ve played with. Consistent strong, worst players after pre-season, he was absolutely shocking, easily the most unfit player in pre-seasons but by match day he was always on it from the word go. Ben Davies He was an unusual one, wasn’t on the radar for anyone within the club as a youngster to look out for or anything and then he got his chance and took it and grew and became so consistent at an early age and got his big move to Spurs. Britts Speaks for himself, come in about 2 weeks after me. Totally different player to what you see today. He is a real leader now. Always consistent, always able to keeps the ball. Not the best individual player to play for the club but is 100% the most important player in modern history of the club.

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Tates Best eleven

Joe Again someone who outgrew the club. His ability was there for all to see from an early age. He improved year on year and then he got into the Olympic squad and you could see that he’d got better over that Summer and you knew he’d leave. Gilffy So much ability. What a player! He basically single handily kept us up last year and for that reason alone then he has to be in the team, anyone with that much ability, whether it be scoring or getting assists that keeps a side in the Premier League. Dyer Work rate was unbelievable and he got important goals for the club. His work rate was really quality which was always appreciated when he’d be playing in front of you. He played a big part in getting promoted. Scott Brought goals, got 25-30 the year we got promoted, obviously the goals at Wembley will always be remembered. When we played that season we just knew that in the final third then he’d get you goals. Fabio Obviously Fabs came in towards the end of the season and I think if we’d have had him all season then we’d have won the league not just the play-offs. We’d have got ahead of QPR and Norwich. If it wasn’t Scott then Dobbie would go on a spell where he’d score qa few and then dry up but nobody else was really chopping in with enough goals and if Fabio was there then we’d have got enough goals to win the league I think. Missing Out: Bodde Unlukcy to miss out, he missed so many games but he was such a talent. Cheers again to Mr Tate. Quality players there as you’d expect! We all dream of a team of Alan Tates!!!

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Andrew Mumford on Tate

On his debut, think it was Scunthorpe away, playing at the back and I remember him going to get the ball off Roger Freestone in goal and his exact words were ‘what the fuck are you doing now? You’re not playing for Man United, get out!!’ I was playing centre half with him that day and I’ve never laughed so much during a game. I think he knew from that moment on that we didn’t play much football down at that level!!! Another one where he got dragged out of the casino but I won’t go into that one.... To be fair, he fitted in straight away, you can tell that by the way he is now. Think they tried to put him in the Sea havan hotel with Mel Nurse but he was too ‘big time’ for that so they put him down the Marina, don’t think it was somewhere that impressed someone who had came from Man Utd. I’d certainly say that Tatey got to grips with League 2 and the club quicker than Leon Britton did initially. It was probably easier for him as he was a big boy anyway and he like a bit of banter and all that. He was one of the boys right from the start. He enjoyed having less pressure. When he came back over the Summer overweight the boys were laughing... I think it was Tatey anyway. He certainly enjoyed his summers, as much as he was a good pro, he was old schooll as well, obviously the higher up you go then you have to be more stringent and he clearly did. I nicknamed him Megane-ass, because I thought he looked like the new megane with his ass sticking out. I know Coatsy was trying to do a Mr Whoopy in his jeans, that was standard for him to shit in a new players jeans pocket but I don’t think he got Tatey. As a player he was outstanding, can’t say much more than that. Great lad and you can see that by how he’s still so involved with the club. Andrew Mumford

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1) Baston cost the Swans over £28,000 per minute played (547 minutes) based on his £15.5 million transfer fee but which Premier League player signing from last summer cost more per minute than any other in the last campaign? 2) Who am i? Crystal Palace 1990-92, Southend 92-93, Notts Forrest 1993-1995, Liverpool 1995-97, Aston Villa 1997-2000, Fulham (loan) 1999, Leicester 2000, Bradford 2001-02, Real Oviedo 2001. Should be easy that but may get stuck on it….. 3) Who has never lost in the 47 games that he has scored in the Premier League? A record. 4) Only three players born after the Premier League began (August 1992) have scored Premier League hattricks. Who are they? 5) Who is the only player born before 1960 to score a Premier League hattrick? Great fact: David (x14) & James (x11) were the most common first names in the Premier League in 2010/11 yet it was the first season in which David James did not appear And another one: David (x14) & James (x11) were the most common first names in the Premier League in 2010/11 - yet it was the first season in which David James did not appear 6) Who has played a combined 12 Premier League games for Arsenal (12) and Man City (0)… and has two title medals? 7) Last season Hull City became only the third Premier League team to do what? Previously done by Charlton 98/99 and Bolton 11/12. Good question, be a great one to get right!! 8) Only 2 players have ever scored a Premier League hattrick of headers. Name them? 9) Cesar Azpilicueta (2016/17), Wes Morgan (2015/16), John Terry (2014/15) and Gary Pallister (1992/93) are the only outfield players to do what? 10) Whose one2eleven is this? player chosing best eleven that they played with.

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Fabianski Whether you are chasing the title or chasing seventeenth, you cannot overestimate the importance of a steady and trusted goalkeeper. Our pole has kept us in games this season already and will be vital to us amassing the desired number of points required (for whatever your optimistic goal is). He seeks to domto have no obvious weekness and if he can maintain his reliability then it will certainly give us piece of mind as the season continues. Great start. Fer He’s an odd player is our Leroy. It’s quite hard to pin-point what he wants to do. He was awful against ally was or be a third central defender; he just seemed like he’d never played football before. Since then

and play the game as he sees it and it has been great to see. He doesn’t seem to be blessed with the ability to tackle but that hasn’t stopped him from attempting to, he’s quick in that area of the pitch which is always and advantage (look at Kante). He’s winning me over and scoring 3 goals in 5 matched from the middle of the park is always a nice bonus. Fernandez His awareness is absolutely outstanding. He took a bit of a gamble against Southampton with his slide against Shane Long (where the fecker dived) but his understanding of the situation and where the anger was was brilliant. He just gets on with his business in a generally calm and unnoticed fashion which is that line at the back at the moment, whether he’s the man for that job or not only time will tell but based on his personal performances then I’ve been fairly happy with how our Argentinean is playing at present. Special mention: Kingsley slotted into the Premier League with no issue at all. Nobody here at SA1. He’s probably been our biggest positive over the last 6-8 months.

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As Swansea aims for the cultural capital of Britain 2020, I’m still perplexed and annoyed at how under-explored our magical region is; both by ‘outsiders’ and… ‘insiders’ (not sure that’s the right word there). There is no better place in the British Isles! no ‘micro-region’ that offers the vast geological beauty and differences than what we have on our doorstep. We need to appreciate it and tell the world because any Londoner flying over Swansea at 20,000 feet to Ireland is spending their money in the wrong place! I’m going to explore our unique region (all within 30 mins drive of the Liberty Stadium) and hope to encourage locals to do likewise and to spread the word because we are massively underachieving our tourism here and a big part of that is that we don’t appreciate what we have ourselves! Region: UPPER Swansea Valley I have a genuine love for the A4067. The journey it takes from the Liberty Stadium to the foot of the Brecon Beacons (and beyond) is a perfect example of what our region offers. From a retail park (and Premier League stadium) it bypasses Morriston, Clydach, Pontardawe, Ystalyfera and Ystradgynlais and the scenery changes almost with every mile. Mountains get higher as the river gets narrower, supermarket chains have flooded the valley flood plain but the bulk of the valley remains unchanged and there are too many pubs to mention, all with their own unrivalled character. Within 30 minutes of leaving the stadium, you find yourself in the Beacons; Craig Y Nos, Ynyswen, Pen Y Cae, Abercrave; if you haven’t spent a day out in these parts then it is massively overdue!

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Somewhere you should have been: There cannot be a better example of how spoilt we are in these parts than Dan Y Ogof Caves. Here we have the largest caving network in Europe and there are masses of ‘local people’ who have never visited or don’t even know it exists. Imagine holidaying in the South of France for a week and there being the ‘largest caving network in Europe’; showcaves just half hour away; you will be very likely to make an effort to check it out! The word ‘caving’ scares people, I did some ‘proper’ caving as a late teenager (and I’m far too sensible for that these days) but this is simply ‘show caves’ and an introduction to the ‘feel’ of a cave. Completely accessible for all ages, although buggies can’t get round it too easily. The feel of getting deeper and deeper into a cave, the change of temperature, the sound, the water and the sheer understanding that these have been naturally occurring over millions of years and have at one time been discovered is a magical feeling and one which everyone should at least make the effort to see if they enjoy.

In recent years, they have added a small petting farm and an indoor play bit and its got the coffee shop and all that jazz so it is a day-out but ultimately; we’ve got the largest caving network in Europe on our doorstep!!! If you haven’t; have a good excuse not to explore it! Somewhere you wouldn’t have been: There are loads of amazing mountain walks around these parts. The mountain in front of and behind Craig Y Nos castle are amazing, the castle itself is magical, the country park (which was once Madam Patti’s garden) is beautiful, especially with the rhododendrons in bloom but I recently got shown a hidden gem. Accessibility is awful! Opposite the Ancient Britton, up towards Craig Y nos a few hundred yards and throw a right, fight the brambles… there is a path of sorts and then jump the 3 or 4 foot at the end of it and you will be at the side of the river…… worth it!!! It probably isn’t too bad if you aren’t wrestling with kayaks and kids but the cliff at the side of the river is breath-taking itself. The river then opens up into a large, deep pool after some more dodgy, health and safety disaster trekking

30 Minute Challenge

further down the river stones (slippery as f&Ck!). There is nothing overwhelmingly spectacular about the whole place but the fact it is so hidden away and undiscovered adds to its appeal; if you fancy a ramble then check it out! Somewhere to stay: There are some really awesome and unique places to stay around here (and a few amazing pubs too so it’s a good idea to leave the car and crash somewhere!!). Craig Y Nos castle is as unique as you get, haunted? I’m sceptical about anything like that but fill your boots and it’s a beautiful place! The Abercrave Inn has rooms and an amazing breakfast from memory but I stayed in the Ancient Britton when venturing up there recently. It does have rooms upstairs but also camping and caravan with showerblock and all that jazz and is within stumbling distance of the pub. Somewhere to drink: I have a rule which is that ‘you need to have a very good reason to pass the Ancient Britton and not to stop for a pint!!!’. It is an absolutely brilliant pub! One of those places where you can go on your own and chat to anyone and lose a whole day and places like that are always good with me. The best choice of Real Ales in the valley and a really, really well-run pub. The Abercrave Inn and Pen Y Cae are more food places but the Copper Beach in Abercrave is a genuine drinkers pub and a ‘local’ valley one to.

THE

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30 Minute Challenge

Somewhere to eat: Abercrave Inn has recently been taken over by the people who have the George in Cwmtwrch and so the food there will be undoubtedly brilliant. The Pen Y Cae Inn is probably the most ‘posh’ restaurant in the area, serving food which needs to be translated for me…. But always very good when I’ve been!! The Ancient Britton itself does really good pub food! Changing Seasons restaurant in Craig Y Nos country park does great lunchtime deals and an impressive pie! The Castle itself does do food when they haven’t got a wedding on; always worth a check! Go there! If this region was a couple of hours away then you’d not think twice about spending a weekend there. It is magic and I look forward to seeing you there soon!!! Next stop on our 30 minute challenge is down the Gower. 29 Minutes from the Liberty stadium is three cliffs Bay..... (according to google maps)

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Short Breakfast Review Kings Head: Treboeth

If running a food pub was as easy as they make it look in the Kings Head then we’d all be doing it! They just seem to have it nailed and their breakfasts are always quality, quick in coming and they are always busy (which I believe is a very good sign of a good place). All their breakfasts are named after different kings (I have no idea if any research has gone into what king preferred what kind of breakfast; a question for my next visit) but it is one of the few places I go to where I actually look at the breakfast options and don’t simply go for the biggest on offer; do I fancy more bacon or sausages today? Bubble and squeak you say? Why on earth not! I’ve introduced the place for breakfast to a few people now and always impressed and I have no doubt that it will impress you to!!

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68 God Slot The Apostle Paul played a leading role in the spreading of Christianity. Indeed most of the narrative of the Biblical book of Acts chronicles this. But behind every major character, there is always a host of supporting characters. These are the foot soldiers that work quietly and almost invisibly in the background. They are seldom noted, easily overlooked and almost never remembered. Their names are often forgotten or never mentioned. To how many nameless heroes and heroines does the club owe its success? How many forgotten souls have sacrificed and selflessly intervened on the clubs behalf to save it from doom? We could so easily forget them and believe that the clubâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s recent good fortunes have made solely by players, or managers etc. But the truth is that without the pivotal contributions of the unsung heroes of the club, it would not be. As we approach another season, full of hope and anticipation, let us remember to appreciate the nameless ones. God Bless Rev Lewis Rees

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SWANNING AROUND THE UNIVERSE Finding Alien Planets I've previously mentioned NASA's Kepler space programme. A telescope launched in March 2009 to hunt for alien “Exoplanets”. An “Exoplanet” or “Extrasolar Planet” is a planet outside of our Solar System that orbits a star that may be capable of supporting life. The mission has been a spectacular success, researchers say, flagging around 3000 potential alien planets thus far. And this number will grow as the data relayed from the telescope will be studied for years to come. Here are some of Kepler's greatest hits to date. Kepler-10b: The First Unquestionably Rocky Alien Planet Kepler-10b is the first "unquestionably rocky" exoplanet, scientists say. This scorched world, which is about 1.4 times the size of Earth, lies about 560 light-years away. Kepler-16b: The First 'Twin Sun Planet' The gas giant Kepler-16b is the first exoplanet ever found with two suns in its sky. Kepler-16b orbits a pair of stars rather than a single star like our own sun. Kepler-20e: The First Alien World Smaller than Earth Kepler-20e is the first alien world ever found smaller than Earth; it's about 90% the size of our planet. Kepler-20e and its sibling Kepler-20f, which is 103% the size of Earth. Kepler-37b: The Smallest Alien Planet The tiny alien planet Kepler-37b, is slightly larger than Earth's moon and orbits its host star every 13 days. It likely has a surface temperature in excess of 400 degrees Celsius. Kepler-62e and f: Possibly Life-Supporting Planets Kepler-62e and 62f are perhaps the most promising life-hosting planets yet found beyond our solar system. The planets, which are 160% and 140% times the size of Earth respectively, may both be water worlds whose global oceans are teeming with life researchers say. The Big Picture on Exoplanets So as I've insinuated before we are looking to jump ship. We're looking for a planet that could sustain the human race beyond the Earth. Space and time is being mapped. The final frontier is being tamed. Will mankind prevail in the infinity of possibility versus the chaos of the Universe. What a challenge… good luck Kepler… good luck Earthlings. Paddy Stradlin

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Jack Sounds

INTRODUCTION: “GET UP OFF A-THAT THING! HUH!”

Croeso. Welcome to Jack Sounds, friends and neighbours. Pleased to meet you – hope you guess my name; I’ll give you a clue: I was born in a crossfire hurricane, and now I’m down at the end of lonely street with the Memphis blues again. Woah, Mama. Is this REALLY the end? My only friend, the end?

children of earth?” And then I think about Katie Hopkins advocating machine-gunning boats full of refugees, and then I light another jazz-fag, refill my glass, check the dried food supplies in the bunker and try to remember, once again, who it was that said “I fear for the fate of my country when I consider that God is just.”

And that’s enough of all that. So, tell me: How goes it? Tidy? Half tidy? I sure hope so (one of the two). May blessings rain upon your household from a great height, may your loins be full of fruit and may the clothes on your washing line remain safe from the grasping hands of those thieving, shed-burgling, hedge-hopping bastards that make suburban summer afternoons such a hoot. This month I want to start things off by talking (pontificating, really) about two things upon which the whole of the music business relies – along with every other industry that shills humanity’s artistic endeavours for cash-money. Namely: enthusiasm and curiosity. I think sometimes we forget that merely creating something worthwhile is not enough on its own; a piece of art/music/literature cannot exist in a vacuum; any merit it might possess is contingent on other human beings’ continual desire to experience new things. Without this urge the entire cultural output of the world would be like being strapped to a trolley with UKTV Gold being projected into your eyeballs by means of some kind of invasive device. Enthusiasm, to be fair though, is undoubtedly one of our better attributes: an insatiable urge to seek out the new and the different and the captivating. We have other, less appealing characteristics, and over the last few years of political madness, terrorism, soap-boxing and some of the very worst examples of humanity being elevated to positions of improbable power, I’ve often stopped to think to myself, “Jeezum crow, Jack – are we totally past redemption now, or is there still hope for us poor

Was it Abraham Lincoln or Yosemite Sam? Spiderman? Poirot? Captain Mainwaring? God, was it me? I doubt it, somehow. No silly jokes in that little nugget of world-weary fury; just a brutal truth shoved right in your eyes. It’s a funny thing though, enthusiasm; at its most basic level it’s one of the fundamental, driving forces behind humanity that – alongside greed, lust, laziness and the desire for greasy, cheesebased snacks – helped to drag humanity down from the trees and into an exciting new world of opposable thumbs and venereal diseases.

Jack Sounds

On the other hand, unchecked enthusiasm is only a hop, skip and a double-vodka-and-red-bull away from hubris, which is largely responsible for some of humanity’s grossest fallacies – such as, for example, Hitler’s Wermacht attempting to storm Stalingrad in the middle of the Russian winter, or – to give another, loosely connected example – the musical stylings of John McEnroe and Steven Seagal. Enthusiasm can get out of hand, is what I’m saying – like that story about when The Beatles were touring America in the old days, and the staff at the concert halls they played in would find they had to change every seat and mop out all the aisles after the gig, basically because the Beatles’ audience of (predominantly) teenage girls had a tendency to lavishly and extravagantly piss themselves with excitement when their heroes came out on stage. Sorry, is that too vulgar? It’s true, though. Enthusiasm and curiosity have propelled us far. Our ancient ancestors once adjusted their loincloths, had a good scratch and then looked wonderingly up at the verdant, green hills that bordered what for them was the entire world, and asked aloud, “Oh, John. Do you reckon they get a better mobile signal over there? Mine’s fucked and I want to watch Game of Thrones. I heard Ed Sheeran’s going to be on there and I want to slag him off on twitter.” Curiosity about the fundamental questions of life also led to things like language, cooperation,

aqueducts, ringtones and the idea of a 39th premier league game – as well as being ultimately responsible for the formation and spread of a number of passive-aggressive belief systems where eternal suffering and damnation are the ultimate punishments for questioning unconditional love and forgiveness. Right? Right. But enthusiasm, curiosity, joie de vivre – call it what you want – is also one of those things you only really notice when it’s gone. It quietly exists in the background of your mind, buzzing happily away like a fridge or a detuned radio, steadily reinforcing your existing tastes while propelling you gently but insistently towards new experiences and discoveries like a flitting bumblebee chasing pollen…but there is a limit, kids; one day you might wake up and find the enthusiasm cupboard is as empty as the yawning chasm in the middle of Jeremy Hunts’ body where Jeremy Hunts’ soul once resided, back in the days before “the arrangement”. And when that happens you crawl back into your bed, empty and bereft of energy, wondering what the hell happened, dead to stimuli and wrapped up in a blanket of mundanity and the familiar. This happened to me recently, and – I’ll be honest – It came as a bit of a shock, because I’m usually as about as enthusiastic as a kids’ TV presenter – as well as being twice as annoying and equally garishly dressed. But, nonetheless, I awoke one morning recently and thought, “You know what: I simply cannot be fucking bothered”; I’m going to listen to The Beach Boys with the curtains drawn and sleep till the evening

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78 Jack Sounds every day. Then, when everyone else is sleeping, I’ll go wandering around the city with my headphones in, listening to ambient tracks I’ve heard a million times before, taking comfort in the familiar and never looking for anything new. It’s just pointless, man. Everything’s been done before and there’s nothing new under the sun. You might as well call it day, just walk away. They never liked you round here anyway. This was followed by much moping around and listening to The Smiths. I’m not proud. Eventually, though – and mercifully for my colleagues and loved ones – I soon came to another conclusion, which for some reason I imagined in the voice of an old teacher of mine called G.L. Jones, a man with a range of arresting verbal idiosyncrasies, a habit of smoking cigarettes in class and a seemingly endless supply of whatever element it takes in your soul to summon up sudden, unexpected, wild furies. “Enthusiasms and curiosity are like blind faiths, good boy”, he said (in my head) “and sometimes they need to be filled up with new faiths; and, if the process of discarding what you have always considered to be cast-iron certainties is painful for you, take solace in the knowledge that you know it’s working”. Cheers, Jonesy. And lo the veil was lifted! And the sun came out, and all the little animals came snuffling out of their burrows and setts and earths, the youngsters all gambolling around full of joy…and all the adults wer holding hands and dancing and singing show tunes, and a baby elephant flew past playing the

trumpet while pursued by a gang of racist crows waving passports and screeching about “quotas”, and then another voice says “I’m not sure you’ve got that right, Jack. Are you folding narratives again?”, and I say “Yes, probably”. And then I woke up back in Kansas. What I’m saying is: don’t be afraid of the unfamiliar. Embrace the unexpected. If it’s hard to understand, it’s probably worth it, but remember that some things are not MEANT to be fully understood. The ambiguity is part of the lesson, and the questions you ask yourself are a necessary part of the process that leads you to a state of happily not understanding. Or something. Ultimately, curiosity is something that needs to be tended; it’s a muscle that needs to be exercised, and ignoring it will eventually lead to an overwhelming dull ache that never goes away. So, avoid that; go out in Swansea this week and seek out something you haven’t experienced before; a pub, a gallery, a restaurant, a band, a path going somewhere deep into the woods…or maybe a group of loonies burning furniture on the beach and dancing around it to Portishead tunes while babbling about Ru Paul and the importance of community organising. Find something to fall in love with, friends and neighbours, because it’s never too late – and if you think curiosity killed the cat, just remember at all times that you are not a cat. JS

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80 Little Interview HE LITTLE INTERVIEW: HYWEL GRIFFITHS (GREENMAILER, KING GOON) Hywel Griffiths is the man-behind-the-kit for hard-rockers Greenmailer and ska lunatics King Goon. Greenmailer are currently hard at work on new material, holed up in their secret lockup somewhere in the depths of Burryport, while King Goon are warming up to play a gig in front of thousands of people without their lead singer at the “Twin Town 20th Anniversary Screening”, which is being held at Singleton Park on August 3rd. Tickets available online, folks. JFGI.

and has stuck with me over the years are bands like Soundgarden, Kyuss, Pearl Jam, Q.O.T.S.A. Bands like Nirvana had a big influence on me early on. What’s your favourite song/track? Now, that’s a really difficult one to narrow down to just one song…it’s something that changes a lot – depending on my mood or the weather, or even something as simple as what I’m doing that day. I guess I’ll pick one for happy reasons and say “If it takes all night”, by Frank Black and The Catholics, from the album “Dog in the Sand”, which is a

A relaxed and relentlessly positive man, Hywel can often be found gazing serenely at his crystal collection or hand-stitching a dream catcher to order. I’m joking, of course. He’ll fucking have you if you mess with him. Joking again. Hywel is a dreamy vision in shorts, t-shirt and flipflops, and is never knowingly without a bottle-opener. A Morriston boy with an occasionally terrible thirst and an overwhelming fondness for beating skins, Mr. Griffiths is a man of strong opinions and strong vision, who one day will surely rule over us all as a benevolent but unforgiving overlord. Who are your favourite bands/ musicians? There’s quite a few. I guess the stuff that had most musical impact on me

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82 Little Interview great album and is always guaranteed to put me in a better mood. What’s your favourite album? Favourite album is a tricky one as well. A friend of mine once said that the sign of a truly great album is one where every song on it has been your favourite song (at some point) and for me there have only been a couple of those. Whilst there’s obviously some great albums out there that don’t follow that rule, I’m gonna say that “Superunknown” by Soundgarden is the one that comes to mind first, because there isn’t a bad song on that album. If you could play any instrument in any band, alive/dead, what would you choose? Now the real issue with this is that the vast majority of bands I’d want to play in already have great drummers that are far better than me! I’m gonna say it would be pretty cool to be in on one of the “Desert Sessions” – a side project of Josh Homme and various other musicians from that desert rock “stoner” scene – mostly because it would be cool to be in the Rancho De La Luna studio out in the desert jamming with all those guys. What’s your favourite gig/event you’ve been to

see in Swansea in the last year or so? Well, there’s been loads of really good local bands I’ve seen in the last year or so, but quite a few of them have been at gigs I’ve been playing, so rather than sounding like an arrogant twat I’m gonna pick one I didn’t play at and say the “Felix Subway” Album launch gig at Cinema & Co – great venue by the way – [what I liked was] it was just something different, and a well put-together night of great local musicians doing what they do best, topped off with a great headline set of some interesting music from Alfie and co in Felix Subway. Would you rather fight 25 ducks that were clones of Brian Blessed OR a single, Brian-Blessed-size duck? My gut instinct says “25 duck-sized clones of Brian Blessed” – as I reckon they’d be a lot easier to deal with – although obviously I’m stealing one to keep as a pet. Tell me a joke. Two whales walk into a bar. The first one says, “Weeeeeooooouuuhhhh.” The next whale says, “Shut up, Steve. You’re drunk.”

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86 Sh!t you SHOULD KNOW Those North Koreans are quite funny aren’t they; crazy mother fuckers; deluded with an insane leader who is obsessed with bombs and guns and power; paranoid, delusional, propaganda fed idiots; the lot of them! And remember that we aren’t in any way misled by our own media or government!! And that is why I’m sure you will all know about North Korea before it went incredibly……. Let’s say ‘insular’. The Destruction and Reconstruction of North Korea, 1950 - 1960 The American Air War and the Destruction of North Korea The Korean War, a “limited war” for the US and UN forces, was for Koreans a total war. The human and material resources of North and South Korea were used to their utmost. The physical destruction and loss of life on both sides was almost beyond comprehension, but the North suffered the greater damage, due to American saturation bombing and the scorched-earth policy of the retreating UN forces. The US Air Force estimated that North Korea’s destruction was proportionately greater than that of Japan in the Second World War, where the US had turned 64 major cities to rubble and used the atomic bomb to destroy two others. American planes dropped 635,000 tons of bombs on Korea -- that is, essentially on North Korea --including 32,557 tons of napalm, compared to 503,000 tons of bombs dropped in the entire Pacific theatre of World War II. The number of Korean dead, injured or missing by war’s end approached three million, ten percent of the overall population. The majority of those killed were in the North, which had half of the population of the South; although the DPRK does not have official figures, possibly twelve to fifteen percent of the population was killed in the war, a figure close to or surpassing the proportion of Soviet citizens killed in World War II. The act which inflicted the greatest loss of civilian life in the Korean War by far, one which the North Koreans have claimed ever since was America’s greatest war crime, was the aerial bombardment of North Korean population centers. American control of the skies over Korea was overwhelming. Soviet MIGs, flown by Soviet, Chinese, and North Korean pilots, were sometimes effective against American air power. But under Stalin’s orders, the Soviet fighter planes were strictly limited in number and in the range they were allowed to fly, lest US-Soviet air battles lead to a larger war. And in any case, Soviet air support did not come until the end of 1950. During the summer and fall, North Korean air defenses were virtually non-existent. Lightly armed, local self-defense units in occupied South Korea could only watch and suffer as their towns and villages were obliterated from the air. By the end of the war, North Korea claimed that only two modern buildings remained standing in Pyongyang. Pyongyang, 1953 For the Americans, strategic bombing made perfect sense, giving advantage to American technological prowess against the enemy’s numerical superiority. The American command dismissed British concerns that mass bombardment would turn world opinion against them, insisting that air attacks were accurate and civilian casualties limited. Russian accusations of indiscriminate attacks on civilian targets did not

register with the Americans at all. But for the North Koreans, living in fear of B-29 attacks for nearly three years, including the possibility of atomic bombs, the American air war left a deep and lasting impression. The DPRK government never forgot the lesson of North Korea’s vulnerability to American air attack, and for half a century after the Armistice continued to strengthen anti-aircraft defenses, build underground installations, and eventually develop nuclear weapons to ensure that North Korea would not find itself in such a position again. The long-term psychological effect of the war on the whole of North Korean society cannot be overestimated. The war against the United States, more than any other single factor, gave North Koreans a collective sense of anxiety and fear of outside threats that would continue long after the war’s end. North Korea’s considerable economic achievements since liberation were all but completely wiped out by the war. By 1949, after two years of a planned economy, North Korea had recovery from the post-liberation chaos, and economic output had reached the level of the colonial period. Plans for 1950 were to increase output again by a third in the North, and the DPRK leadership had expected further economic gains following integration with the agriculturally more productive South after unification. According to DPRK figures, the war destroyed some 8,700 factories, 5,000 schools, 1,000 hospitals and 600,000 homes. Most of the destruction occurred in 1950 and 1951. To escape the bombing, entire factories were moved underground, along with schools, hospitals, government offices, and much of the population. Agriculture was devastated, and famine loomed. Peasants hid underground during the day and came out to farm at night. Destruction of livestock, shortages of seed, farm tools, and fertilizer, and loss of manpower reduced agricultural production to the level of bare subsistence at best. The Nodong Sinmun newspaper referred to 1951 as “the year of unbearable trials,” a phrase revived in the famine years of the 1990s. Worse was yet to come. By the fall of 1952, there were no effective targets left for US planes to hit. Every significant town, city and industrial area in North Korea had already been bombed. In the spring of 1953, the Air Force targeted irrigation dams on the Yalu River, both to destroy the North Korean rice crop and to pressure the Chinese, who would have to supply more food aid to the North. Five reservoirs were hit, flooding thousands of acres of farmland, inundating whole towns and laying waste to the essential food source for millions of North Koreans. Only emergency assistance from China, the USSR, and other socialist countries prevented widespread famine. It is weird how often bombing the fuck out of a country makes those people angry and scared!!! You’d think they’d love us!!!

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98 Quiz Answers History Quiz

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