“You do not agree with THOU SHALT NOT KILL because it is old fashioned?”

This ice cream cone is not relevant to this blog

Yesterday’s blog was about a radio show I took part in for London Hott Radio, which is based in a cafe in Streatham.

Some people have asked me for more details about a reference I made to a sculptor.

An audio recording of that edition of  The Anti-Duhring Battalion Radio Show has now been posted on YouTube (it is 1 hour 42 minutes long).

Below is an extract from the recording.

The show was hosted by performer the Anti-Duhring Battalion. I was a guest on the show with stand-up comedy act President Obonjo Obonjo and musician Mark Meller. Also on the show – via a phone-in line – was a ‘real’ person called Matt. He was not and is not a performer.

This extract starts with the Anti-Duhring Battalion talking to President Obonjo Obonjo…

Anti-Duhring Battalion – One of the reasons we have you on the show is you are one of those people who sticks by his word – you’re a Christian – but you do not agree with the Thou Shall Not Kill commandment because, as we discussed last week and as Pastor Femi agreed, it is old-fashioned and out-dated.

Matt – I’d like to say I agree with that as well. That was not a very good judgment on God’s part.

Anti-Duhring Battalion – Thou shalt not kill? Of course, because you’re an artist, Matt. You make sculptures, don’t you?

Matt – Well, everything I do is based on killing, so…

Anti-Duhring Battalion – Can you just explain a little bit of that? It obviously sounds a little bit odd, doesn’t it? Let me just say…

President Obonjo Obonjo – I’m not laughing. I actually agree with him. I want him in my Cabinet.

Anti-Duhring Battalion – That’s interesting because, since Matt’s been taking Largactil, he’s become much more coherent in his ideas. Matt, are you still doing your live sculptures? – Well, they’re no longer live, are they, when you’ve finished putting them together…?

Matt – I don’t have access to (Pause) the materials I require at the moment. I’m hoping that I will break free of these restraints.

Anti-Duhring Battalion – Good. But you’re saying you’re no longer able to get hold of the same amount of rodents and things like that for your sculptures at the moment, where you are.

John Fleming – What do you sculpt?

Anti-Duhring Battalion – I think it’s more of a sewing-together, isn’t it?

President Obonjo Obonjo – Can you sculpt a pie?

Anti-Duhring Battalion – Could you sculpt a pie out of those animals do you think, Matt?… (Pause) Do you think you could?

Matt – I could sculpt anything.

Anti-Duhring Battalion – You were going to send us one of your sculptures through the post, I remember. Is that right? And they wouldn’t let you send it.

Matt – I sent it.

Anti-Duhring Battalion – You sent it?

Matt – It must have been…

Mark Meller – Eaten on the way?

Matt – Caught in the post.

Anti-Duhring Battalion – Well, we didn’t see it, but I’m sure it was a very, very interesting sculpture. The thing is a lot of the world is not ready for your work and that’s a sad thing, Matt. I’m sure we will be.

John Fleming – What was it a sculpture of?

Anti-Duhring Battalion – What was it, Matt?… (Pause) Just describe it to us.

Matt – There was… It’s… It’s not…

Anti-Duhring Battalion – Take your time.

Matt – …It’s not what was involved that’s important. It’s… It’s what it stands for.

Anti-Duhring Battalion – Take your time… take your time… Just explain a little bit what it was, Matt.

Matt – Sorry?

Anti-Duhring Battalion – Just explain what it was… Just say what it was… It’s OK… It’s OK.

Matt – It was a goat attached to a virgin…

Anti-Duhring Battalion – Yeah… Go ahead… It was animals… Was it animals, Matt?

Matt – …and an IKEA sign…

Anti-Duhring Battalion – OK.

Matt – …tattooed across the fur.

Anti-Duhring Battalion – Across the fur… and… OK… And you sent that to us, Matt?

Matt – Sorry?

Anti-Duhring Battalion – You sent it through the post?

Matt – I did.

Anti-Duhring Battalion – We didn’t receive it, Matt.

President Obonjo Obonjo – You can’t trust postmen.

Anti-Duhring Battalion – It was around about this time that you did become incarcerated, so I don’t know if that was kinda related, but go ahead…

Matt – When I get free, I’ll make you another one.

Anti-Duhring Battalion – Great… That sounds great.

My radio encounter yesterday with the President and a late Nigerian pastor

President Obonjo yesterday in Streatham cafe

Yesterday, I was asked to be on the Anti-Duhring Battalion’s show on London Hott Radio

The radio station is also a cafe just off Streatham High Street in London.

The show featured President Obonjo Obonjo of the Lafta Republic (a UK circuit comedian for the last three years) and religious cult leader Pastor Femi.

I mistakenly believed Pastor Femi was a character act too, but he turned out to be a genuine Senior Pastor in the City of Light Evangelical Ministries.

Their website proclaims:

“The Mandate of the Ministry was received on the 27th of May 2013 and the Word received was Bring Light back into every City through the preaching of the undiluted Word of God by releasing the Light in the Gospel into every sector via businessmen/ women, students, athletes, footballers, singles and married, politicians etc.”

It might have been interesting to talk to the pastor at some length about God’s very specific mention of footballers, but the radio show over-ran somewhat and I had to go home, partly to preserve what little sanity I had left.

The radio show was due to start at 5.00pm and end at 6.00pm. The pastor had not arrived by 5.00pm so – somewhat oddly I thought – we waited for him.

The Anti-Duhring Battalion (man, right, in stripes) supervised the live radio show yesterday at its Streatham cafe home base

When he had not appeared by 6.10pm (he was still apparently on the A3 into London) we started the show.

He arrived at 7.30pm. The show was still on air (or, more correctly, in cyberspace).

The show finished at 7.55.

Somewhere during the course of the three hours, President Obonjo Obonjo observed: “We seem to be working on Nigerian time.”

He is allowed to say that.

He was born in Liverpool. Moved to Nigeria when he was 5. Moved to London when he was 20.

The radio show seemed to mostly involve discussing pies, which took me a little by surprise. I was introduced as a famous author and religious expert. Which took me a little by surprise. And there was a phone-in from a man who sculpted things. Living things. Well, dead living things. Furry animals, it seemed. He had apparently posted one to the radio show by Royal Mail – a sculpted blend of dead furry animal and IKEA sign, it seemed… but it had somehow got lost in the post.

Pastor Femi (in purple) is admonished for his timekeeping

By this time – halfway through the show – I was not surprised.

As I travelled back home in a train with President Obonjo Obonjo (me to Elstree; he to St Albans), he said to me:

“What just happened there?”

I had no answer.