Renfield's Afoot by Half Man Half Biscuit (2018) discussed...
Another song which was previewed at occasional gigs long before the album saw the light of day, Renfield’s Afoot has since been described by a couple of commenters here as a spiritual successor to Vatican Broadside, most probably because it will allow a bunch of people to shout “fuckin’ ‘ell” at the tops of their voices at gigs. Did we get the lyrics right or do you have other ideas? Any observations about the song in general? Over to you.
See lyrics to Renfield's Afoot
GOK WAN ACOLYTE
Looking at early track listings, I assume there should be an apostrophe in Renfield’s Afoot?
1 March 2018
dr desperate
I suspect the missing apostrophe in RA will turn out to be another typo. We shall see. Meanwhile, here’s what I posted about the unfortunate Renfield last year:
(R M) Renfield, the zoophagous maniac obsessed with the vampire in Stoker’s ‘Dracula’ (whose abilities include control over bats, though presumably not walks). He has been played on screen by Klaus Kinski and Tom Waits, and gives his name to a syndrome of clinical vampirism. In the novel, after interviewing him Dr Seward exclaims, “Merciful God! The Count has been to him, and there is some new scheme of terror afoot!”
1 March 2018
Carrie anne
Should be ‘although’ booking was essential
19 May 2018
Mrs outinroundone
Whom or what is Bollock-O ?
19 May 2018
Two fAt feet
Glad I heard Bollock-O right (on the third listen). Not a term I’m familiar with but I’m presuming it derives from ‘stark bollock naked’.
19 May 2018
Comedy hypnotist
I think Bollock-O is a bit similar to ‘laddo’. Intended as an insult.
19 May 2018
Hoylake Gebrselassie
The Urban Dictionary has it as “bollocko” (without the hyphen) – and who am I to argue with that distinguished journal? – but otherwise that definition seems to be about right.
19 May 2018
EXXO
Yeah, common slang amongst slangy men in our region – I changed that from ‘young working class males’ when i realises how many arlarses I’ve heard use it – deriving from “bollock-naked”. It’s one word, so personally I’d write ‘Bollocko”.
19 May 2018
EXXO
It’s definitely an adjective, describing a state of nudity. Not in any way an insult.
19 May 2018
Mrs outinroundone
I was on a very wrong path then with Bollock-O, which, without this site, had me drawn toward bolaco. http://www.boloco.com
19 May 2018
EXXO
In the novel, Renfield escapes naked to Carfax Abbey to call on Dracula to use him as he pleases … has to be naked to show the animalistic thing, prototype for all the half-human, rat-and-insect-eating gollums of fantasy that have followed…
19 May 2018
Dr Desperate
Residents of (or visitors to) Liverpool will have the opportunity next month to visit The Everyman and see a reimagining of Ibsen’s ‘Peer Gynt’ called ‘The Big I Am’.
https://www.everymanplayhouse.com/whats-on/the-big-i-am
19 May 2018
Ghost of kirkuS
I’d assumed it was bollock o, like being told to f o…
19 May 2018
Nick Walters
It’s
“Who the fuck are you, trying to govern everybody’s dog walks”
and
So don’t go trying to organise my dog walks
Cos the protagonist is irked by the No Dogs rule.
19 May 2018
Nick Walters
I am wrong.
Sorry
As you were
19 May 2018
dAWLISHIAN
It’s £3.50 now. Booking still essential. Still no dogs
https://tockify.com/wirralview/detail/1190/1529177400000
19 May 2018
dEEPTHOUGHT
Bollocko. A word used around this way to descibe a state of undress for as long as I can remember
20 May 2018
The harbinger of norra lot
@CtSO, if anyone sings “fuckin’ ‘ell” at the top of their voice to this one, they will get some quizzical looks, as they will have got the words all wrong.
Although they will be forgiven if they are found to be standing next to a certain ex-England cricketer!
(Fair point! Although getting the words all wrong is a pretty standard thing for some people – CtSO)
20 May 2018
EXXO
Hey Ghost of Kirkus (comment 11)! Come back! We’re stuck! H-E-L-P!
20 May 2018
Dr Desperate
Excellent nom de biscuit there, @GoK, helping to make one of the as-yet-unposted songs a liitle less diff.
20 May 2018
EXXO
@Dr. Johnny B. – Good one. I’d say it was still Hard Severe and it takes a good climbing buddy (and a lift in his Transit van – thanks) for the uninitiated to attain its summit. But it’s all relative – there a very few routes on ‘Cloggy’ that are within the beginner’s scale described by the title – it’s all off the scale – and I suppose that’s the point really.
https://www.ukclimbing.com/logbook/crag.php?id=457
As far as relationships are concerned, I think it took me 45 years to learn about being stuck on off-the-scale routes, way below peaks I could never attain.
20 May 2018
ghost of kirkus
Worth pointing out I have precisely none of the ability on the rock that my nom de biscuit had. In fact the list of routes I have bailed off by abseil is probably greater than the number attained, thereby breaking the deathbed pronunciation of my teenage bride.
20 May 2018
Dagenham daVe
Having asked my Scouse partner she confirms that ‘bollocko’ is an insult although she hasn’t heard it used for a while. It reminded her of another similar one, ‘bollock chops’ 🙂
21 May 2018
jeff dreadnought
I’m puzzled by the idea that the last word of the song might be interpreted as a term of abuse. I understand the last – superb, succinct – line to mean: “Rather than follow your injunction to undertake my bat walk at 7.30 am on Friday and your recommendation to dress in warm, waterproof clothing, I shall, if I so choose, undertake the walk at 2.30 a.m. on Tuesday, stark bollock naked.” In which case the term “bollocko” (of which I was not previously aware) would have to be, as Exxo says, an adjective describing a state of nudity and not in any way an insult.
21 May 2018
EXXO
@DD if it can be used as an insult (which I’ve never heard in 55 years of Merseyside life) then it is very much a less common meaning than simply a comedy word for “naked” (which I’ve heard hundreds and hundreds of times), and is most definitely not the meaning here.
21 May 2018
Transit full of keith
Cambridge offers ranger-led bat safaris in a punt. Warm kecks recommended. Strictly no axe.
21 May 2018
paul f
100% – bollocko means the same as stark bollock naked. Hence why he goes out at 2am.
23 May 2018
paul f
It’s also in deliberate contravention of the recommendation to wear warm clothing.
23 May 2018
Comedy Hypnotist
I concede that my interpretation of Bollocko was erroneous. Naked it is. Makes sense!
24 May 2018
RoCkforD
Bollocko is colloquial for being naked. Anyone up for a bat walk at roydon Park Frankby sat 16th June? Ranger led. Free. Booking essential. No dogs allowed.
25 May 2018
Paul f
@NW much earlier (“dog walks”). That’s what I thought.
28 May 2018
Idiots and pigeons
I am somewhat surprised that there is debate regarding the meaning of “bollocko”. I automatically assumed that it related to the inequitable decree concerning “warm, waterproof clothing”.
30 May 2018
Kevin p
I agree, it’s an instruction. Ironically Renfield seems happy to organise other’s bat walks.
6 June 2018
Mick M
If anyone found themselves standing next to Fred Titmus any time since 23rd March 2011, they probably shouldn’t have got on the 71 bus.
23 June 2018
Paddy macaroon
I thought it was ‘trying to COME the big I-am’ rather than ‘BE’, which isn’t much different but somehow seems funnier.
21 July 2018
Toxteth
The next batwalk btw is 16th August (booking essential)
I wonder though if Nigel himself is now barred from Royden Park, or if he has been sent complimentary tickets to the bat walks?
31 July 2018
Renfield
Just got that this should be viewed from Renfield’s point of view rather than Nigel’s. Makes sense in a different way. Flasks wouldn’t be top of your list on a vampire hunt
29 September 2018
Simon Boswell
Whilst I accept Bollock-O I initially heard Full O’Coke which I like to think might have lead to the state of undress.
9 October 2018
Renfield
Renfield is a character in Dracula who is in an asylum. Part of his condition is that he wants to eat live creatures top be like Dracula, and would go on “batwalks” to get them. Its understandable that he is a bit annoyed at the council moving in on his turf.
13 October 2018
EXXO
Quite.
Incidentally this time of year on high river banks facing south or west in steep woodland, when the sun has gone behind the hill at the end of a sunny day, you can often see beautiful Daubenton’s bats hunting in what seems to us like broad daylight. Often they’ll turn within inches of you, repeatedly giving you superb close-ups of their structure and colouration. I was privileged to be watching one over the Wye on Wednesday night, while a stag was snorting atmospherically, as the rut gets under way.
Otherwise you’re gonna need an ultrasound bat detector for your live species ID. They’re not that expensive. I’d like to borrow one sometime while I’m sitting waiting for a bite.
13 October 2018
kittymc
A bat flew into my bathroom last year, through a tiny window that’s about 2 foot long and only opens about half a foot wide. I didn’t see it, though, because I was asleep.
My mum, keeping Renfield hours, as is the wont (and well deserved right) of the retired, was visiting and went to the loo in the middle of the night. She said she thought it was a very big moth at first, before realising it was a very small bat. Didn’t throw her in the slightest (she’s from Wythenshawe). We concluded it had flown in from Heaton Park, and was clearly very confused. Amusingly, the bathroom is at the back of the flat, which overlooks the garages where they valet and park the hearses from the funeral parlour close by.
Wouldn’t want to organise anyone’s batwalks or anything, but I keep the bathroom window open, hope springing eternal. They are wonderful things. One of my mates works in Paisley and says there were so many bats in the offices she works in that they had to get the local Saxondale in to slaughter them all. She just thinks they’re vermin.
“Ah, my happy childhood in the Carpathian mountains…”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N7yAe2MBIpE
17 October 2018