Hello. My name is Billy The Fish and this is my website, where I moan loudly and constantly about loads of different things, from the state of our country to the Wolves back four. It's nothing special; just the usual 'blog-type drivel - ineffectual rantings of a bitter forty-something professional trapped in London by necessity (I like the money.) and idleness (I can't be arsed to look for another job.) Ho hum.

Sadly, there are no witty flash animations or audio clips, but I'm not going to pay for any more bandwidth to entertain you monkeys when you can't even be bothered to drop me a line on the Guestbook anymore, you ungrateful swine.

Anyway, If you've never been here before, this all about me venting my spleen. (I have a particulary enormous spleen and it requires regular venting.) Back in 2003 when I set it up this site, there was no wanky 'blogging, and 'Facebook' was merely a twinkle in some arsehole's eyes. The only way one could let off steam was to shell out for one's own website, hence this place. The reason behind it was that I'd reached that stage in my life (mid Thirties, pissed off with life in general and utterly sick of London in particular) and my only outlet was to go for a few ales after work. Obviously, this used to be hell on both the liver and the wallet and it wasn't doing the sick leave record much good either. These days, if anything gets on my tits (and, believe me, an awful lot does), I just write about it here and ping it out into cyberspace, which is both cheaper and immensely cathartic.

Billythefish.com has been up and running for six years now and has had over 40,000 hits. Not exactly iTunes figures, but hey, I'm not complaining. Occasionally, some nice, interesting new person will leave a message on the Guestbook for me. Not like the regulars. Bunch of miserable bleeders...

   So thanks for dropping by and cheers for the hit. Have a wander round and lose yourselves in the pointless musings of a low-watt luminary. You can leave a message for me too, if that sort of thing floats your boat. I'm reachable via billy@billythefish.com should you feel the urge, though remember that this address is in the public domain, so you may want to type your name in CAPITALS or something that'll make you stand out from all the offers for cheap software and penis enlargers that I usually get.

   Or, like I said, there's always the Guestbook. Go on, you know you want to...

   If anything in my humble domain amuses you and puts a smile on your undoubtedly gorgeous face, please feel free to spread the word. Frankly, I could do with the hits. Shitbag 'researchers' at certain tabloids (which shall remain nameless) - please don't nick anything you read here again without asking. If you want to use my words, drop me a line at the address above. I'm nothing if not cheap.

   Finally, if any Londoners out there have read through this intro and suddenly realised that you too feel the same and could do with some guidance, please click on my picture above - I think I can help give your lives some direction...

  Billy x

Allow me to introduce you to my new hero, Old Holborn; a man who has opened my eyes in the short time since I discovered his 'blog. Who is he? No idea. What is he? Imagine what I'd be like if I didn't play this site for shits and giggles and decided to say what I actually thought in greater detail and with much more venom. Sadly, given who I work for and how long my job would last, I don't have that luxury, but OH does. No, he's not a Far Right fruitcake nor is he a Communist. As far as I can tell, he hates all politicians equally, advocating, as he does, the concept of 'Libertarianism'. Not sure what I make of this yet, but I shall read and digest every morsel of information that Old Holborn imparts from now on, especially when he delivers it in such a vicious and amusing manner. Whatever your political persuasion, find a spare hour, make a cup of tea, get comfortable and click on the link opposite. Awesome.

Well, what can I say? It was touch and go there for a while for the Wolves, back in the Premier League for the first time since 2004. A while? Hell, it was half the season until Mick McCarthy finally realised that Ebanks-Blake couldn't score in a Thai brothel with a 1000 Baht note tied to his cock. Once we reverted to a 4-5-1 formation with Doyle up front, things were much more solid and settled and here we are, survivors, eagerly looking forward to pushing on into mid-table next season. There's some spending money in the pot, zero debt, and a rock-solid fan-base for the best damn manager in thirty years. All is well at Molineux. God bless you, Super Mick! See you next season! Until then, bring on the puppies.  He-e-re's Lucy!

Keep your eye on this one, as it's not quite ready yet. When it is, you're going to love the ongoing antics of Jeremy the Annoying Horse (by Freshwater Mole), as they are easily one of the highlights of he mighty 'b3ta' website. It's a cartoon strip about an extremely irritating horse who appears to have the personality of a spoiled, ADD eight-year-old public school boy. Very loud and no social graces. The kind of thing destined for cult-hood. Click on the picture regularly.

Consistently one of the funniest sites on the whole interweb thingy is the mighty 'B3ta' (pronounced 'beta'), which is home to some of the most amusing pictures, stories and spoofs you'll ever come across. Visit this site while you're at work and that's it - you won't get anything done. Check out the Photoshop caption competitions and look out for some of the flash games, too. The legendary 'Buffy's Swearing Keyboard' is a scream!

Look, it's really very simple. If you download your music from iTunes, you're being ripped off. They're charging you 79p for a crappy 128kbps download, which is sheer extortion. Click on the pic opposite for much cheaper downloads at much better quality - 192kbps mostly, and many as high as 320kbps! Or, you can simply stay in love with the Apple brand and carry on wasting your cash. Mug.

Those of you who were around in the very early days of the site may remember this one. Yes, it's the long-awaited return of the awesome 'Walk Home Drunk' game! Click on the image and move your mouse from side to side in the opposite direction from the one our little rat-arsed friend is leaning to and see how long you can keep him upright and awake. I've got him to one hundred and seventeen metres so far, which, incidentally, is about as far as I myself can make it before the kebab fairy starts whispering in my ear...

Name a decent magazine dedicated to Heavy Metal. You're thinking Kerrang!, aren't you? Wrong. Back in the Eighties, maybe, but the last time I looked, they had the The Killers on the cover, which is frankly embarrassing. For a taste of the sort of stuff I listen to, pop over to the boys opposite. Cutting edge stuff from the real world of Metal. Industrial, Hardcore, Doom, Grind - it's all here. Fill your boots.

You know how it is, you have some great mates when you're younger, then you settle down (or they do) or you move on (or they do) and, though you swear to stay in touch, somehow it never quite happens. So here's where I try and track down some faces from years gone by. If anyone knows where to find Kevin 'Boog' Barnes (last seen in Bristol), Steve 'Eugene' Atherton (from Barnsley) or Anthony Whittaker (who ran off to Brighton with a girl called Nell), be a hero and direct them to this site, willya? Thanx! (And before the clever bastards start; no, they're not on Facebook.)

After years of denial, I have finally given in and joined the Facebook revolution. Partly because everyone I know and like is already on it (along with quite a few I don't), but mostly because MySpace has turned into a corporate shop window and, frankly, I'm not really interested in learning all about Florence and her 'machine' (wasn't that 'The Magic Roundabout'?) and I couldn't care less what Pixie Lott is 'into'. Who the fuck is Pixie Lott? Where did she come from? When is she going? Anyway, if you know my 'real' name, look me up and say hello...

Trolling is easily my new favourite pastime! If you've never checked out the movie gossip site, 'AICN', then it's about time you did. Lots of inside info from all the upcoming Hollywood fare. Best of all, if you sign up, you get to post your own thoughts and opinions. Or, like me, be a git and tune up the fanboys. Give it a go, and if you see any posts by 'BiggusDickus'...well, he's a hero, isn't he?

Next time you're in London, why not pop into the 'new' Intrepid Fox and have an ale or two whilst being serenaded by some choice Rock n' Metal? Ok, so it ain't got the charm of the old gaff on Wardour Street, but it's bigger and more friendly and there's loads of room to mingle over the two large floors. Simply head for Tottenham Court Road tube station, come out and walk towards Centre Point. The Fox is almost directly below it. See you there!

London is not the only city with a rock scene, Birmingham has it's moments too. Check out the spiffing two-floor brilliance of 'Scruffy's' if you're ever in town. Top floor for contemporary and nu-metal, downstairs for old skool rock and ska-punk. The beer's a bit shabby, but the tunes are spot-on. Get in!

Well, it's here! As threatened for so long, the new album from the divine 'Antiproduct' is finally amongst us - and what an album it is! Ten stonking slices of musical mayhem and madness produced by the legendary Sylvia Massy. It's easily Alex and Co's finest work and includes the killer songs 'Best Day Of Your Life' and their awesome take on the mighty Beach Boys classic 'Good Vibrations'. Head on over to their MySpace page and order your copy now. It'll give your ears something to do now that bloody 'X-Factor' is back...

There were a couple of things I initially noticed about Veronica Freeman (fnarr, fnarr!) The first thing was that she was the lead singer of a female-fronted 'rock' band that actually played rock and the second thing was that, oh my God, can she sing! There are no girly Evanescence-type Disney-metal vocals here. 'V' (as she likes to be called) sounds like a butch version of Bruce Dickinson from Iron Maiden. Her band have only released two albums so far, but both are crammed with pounding tunes and killer riffs. They're called Benedictum and if you click on her picture, you can check out just how amazing V's voice is. (Oh, and she's got great tits, too.)

Those of you who work for a living and are forced to rely on public transport may well be familiar with the delightful young lady opposite. Meet Nemi, the star of the daily free 'Metro' newspaper. You know, the one that everyone picks up as they go through the turnstyles on the underground when they've been to cheap to buy a real paper. Anyway, for those of you unfamiliar with her, Nemi is a Goth chick who spends her life drinking, shirking and having weird, surreal and sometimes downright evil thoughts. She's written and illustrated by a Norwegian artist named Lise Mhyre, who's the spitting image of her creation. Click the link opposite and have a read of some of the Metro's old strips. I think I'm in lurve!

And finally a blatant plug. Here's a link to my mate Rob's page at the Saatchi Gallery. Rob's a damn good photographer and a Photoshop guru who likes playing around with images of dark and twisted landscapes. A lot of his stuff ought to be on album covers in my opinion, but amazingly, he hasn't been approached to do one yet. So if you're a Goth or Metal band looking for a really sexy image for your next CD, give the man a buzz!

Another plug! Check out Homer's band, The Picture. This is what happens when a few schoolfriends in the '70's got together and formed a band, then lost contact with each other for thirty years before finally meeting up again to jam regularly in a Black Country studio with the aid of copious amounts of Bathams Bitter. Clicking on the piccy takes you to their MySpace page, where you can listen to their stonking tunes! Just sit quietly, close your eyes and magically relive the era of Raleigh Choppers and Olde English Spangles. Marvellous!

One always likes to open oneself to new experiences, and the latest 'limited edition' Tropicana Orange Juice with Watermelon sounded like a pretty safe bet here at Fish Towers...only I'd forgotten that, with the best will in the world, watermelons taste of precisely fuck-all. Lovely. There's an extra twenty pence wasted...

According to Amazon, both series of 'Space 1999' have been digitally remastered from the original film masters and will be released on Blu-Ray in a month or two. Given that they were never put onto DVD, I'm intrigued to see if they're still as good as I thought they were when I was nine years old. I suspect they will have lost some of the magic in the ensuing thirty-odd years, though the thought of a spandex-clad shape-changing alien princess still puts a big old smile on my face!

I'm getting bored with the layout of this site. I've been using this particular template for three years now, so it might be time for a change. Watch this space. If I suddenly disappear for a week, you'll know I've fucked the HTML code up again...