King Fore!

There's recently been a lot of fuss over a certain game of golf between two well-known poker players - Britain's Ram Vaswani and the USA's Phil Ivey. For weeks this was one of the most heavily debated topics on internet poker forums. Even Daniel Negreanu took time out of namedropping in his blog to voice his opinion.

I am not a golfer, despite my Granddad's best efforts to turn me into one when I was younger. I'm something of a blunt instrument at ball games - I can hit a ball quite far, but when it comes to hitting it in the right direction I'm useless (that also applies to football and pool). So I'll have to explain what happened in non-golfer terms.

Actually, let me turn you over to Victoria Coren, who put it better than anyone (I wish women like Vicky existed in real life and not just on TV and on the internet):

'Phil said he hadn't been playing, when in fact he'd been playing a lot and got much better and could now make the ball go in the hole after hitting it a lot less times than he did before. So they played for a couple of days and he won loads of money.'

Victoria Coren, a true gem in the coalface of British Poker

As a result of all this, Ram refused to pay up, feeling that he'd been deceived by Phil. Phil argued that he'd not lied about his handicap at all.

Personally, I don't understand the problem. After all, surely betting on golf is all about misrepresenting your skill level, and hustling your opponents out of their cash that way? Imagine if loveable rogue Amarillo Slim had made the bet. Would there be so much fuss?

Apparently, yes. I've been reliably informed by golf playing friends that lying about your handicap is a serious breach of golf etiquette. So the question really is whether Phil had lied or not.

I realise the irony considering I am about to discuss this on the internet, but I think it's a shame that this was made public. I don't understand the celebrity culture that is invading the poker world at the moment. What's next - a poker version of Heat magazine? I can just imagine the pictures - Lucy Rokach getting clumsily out of a limousine, Doyle Brunson's beach pictures, how to dress like Barry Greenstein, Rhowena Colclough shows off her new boyfriend.

Quite frankly, I am not qualified to make a judgement about Phil Ivey or Ram Vaswani. I don't know either of them - I've not even spoken to them. But literally hundreds of people on the internet forums, who are in the same position of ignorance as me, have called into question the character of both players. It's absolutely sickening.

I don't care who is right and who is wrong. Like many arguments, it's probably a question of perception, and both players may well be telling the truth as to their take on the situation. It's absolutely none of my business anyway - it's a private matter between Phil and Ram that they should have been allowed to settle behind closed doors - and it's none of your business either.

Poker and Martial Arts

I'm a blue belt in Wado-Ryu Karate, and I've thought often about the similarities between Poker and Martial Arts.

Four typical Karate Students

A wise martial artist once said that the most dangerous belt to be was blue belt. At that stage in your career, you knew just enough to get yourself into trouble, and not enough to get out.

I think that also applies to poker. A lot of people learn just a little bit about the game, and think they know everything. Then, they get themselves into trouble by taking on tough opponents or playing higher stakes than they can afford. Before they know it, they're broke.

You see these people a lot - whining about a 'bad beat' they took that cost them a huge pot, or complaining that they never pick up a hand. But most of the time, if you really listen to what they say, you'll find that there is a flaw in their understanding of the game, and that's what's costing them money.

If you are one of these players - take time to evaluate yourself before you complain. You might just be a blue belt playing in a black belt game.

Another wise martial artist once said 'It's like a finger pointing to the moon. Don't concentrate on the finger, or you'll miss all the heavenly glory' (that person is Bruce Lee, in Enter the Dragon, by the way).

I believe that advice is good for beginners, who tend to focus on their own cards while paying little or no attention to the game itself or the other players at the table. In some situations, your own cards are definitely the most important thing. For example, if it's the end stages of a turbo SNG, you're in all-in or fold mode, and it makes very little difference what you think your opponent might have. You're just waiting for a reasonable hand to stick in all your chips with.

However, in a more typical game of poker, what you think your opponent has, and what he thinks you have, are much more important than your actual holding. Reading hands is the real key to winning at poker against tough opposition, and if you can master it you'll be rewarded beyond your wildest dreams.

Some say that in poker, it's best to be a tight, aggressive player. That means you don't play many hands, but when you do, you play them hard.

Some styles of martial arts are the same. You wait patiently for an opening - for your opponent to drop his guard or make a mistake - then you strike with all your force, taking maximum advantage of your opponent's mistakes.

However, some would argue that a loose, aggressive style is better in many situations. Indeed, in martial arts a fighter who comes out with his arms swinging wildly will sometimes score a huge knockout very quickly, and fighters who are tight - waiting for that perfect opportunity to strike - may find themselves unconscious before that opportunity arises. Other times, the loose aggressive fighter may slip up early, and lose quickly to a patient, skilled opponent.

The truth is that in poker and martial arts, it's best to have no fixed style - to be like water, flowing from one style to the next, adapting to your opponent's strengths and weaknesses. There are times to be loose, times to be tight, times to be aggressive, and times to be passive. Recognising when to apply each style is the hallmark of a top player, and what separates the 'lucky' from the 'unlucky'.

In Defence of Rock's Good Name

My taste in music is the strangest thing about me. In my music collection I have Reggae, Lounge, Electronica, Indie, Rock, Metal, Bhangra, Classical, Opera - and when you walk into my flat, you never know what you're going to hear. However, if you were a betting man (or woman*), you would say metal.

I recently got into a 'discussion' with friends about metal after I shared a death metal version of Britney Spears' Hit Me Baby One More Time** with them.

There are some real misconceptions about metal, and here are some of them:

'It's Just Noise'

No it's not, but it is intense, and often there's a lot going on at once. It takes a somewhat educated ear to appreciate some types of metal, just as it would with extreme forms of any music.

Take Radiohead for example. Their later material is quite experimental in nature, and there's no way it would have sold well if it weren't for their earlier success. Radiohead fans 'learned' to appreciate their more progressive tracks. I think it's unlikely that anybody who had been living in a Chinese Room their whole life would like it on the first listen.

The same is true of metal. Nobody just falls in love with Napalm Death or Deicide on the first listen. They start with more accessible metal, and as they become accustomed to it they move on to heavier stuff. It's a bit like a drug I suppose - you look for harder material, a more extreme hit.

Music that you discover this way and that is constantly revealing more and more complexity and detail has much more longevity. Very few metal bands are one-hit wonders.

'There's No Skill In It'

Oh yes there is. Some of the most skilful musicians in the world are in rock or metal bands. Take Joe Satriani, John Petrucci, Tony Iommi, Geddy Lee, John Myung, Steve Vai, Jeff Waters, Flea, and Kirk Hammett for instance. These guys are so good that they release instructional videos - something that dull, watered-down, produced-in-a-garage bands like the Arctic Chefs or the Kaiser Monkeys will never do.

Playing metal music takes a lot of technical ability and stamina, as anybody who plays guitar, bass or drums knows. A lot of metal is based on traditional scales, jazz and blues - that was Led Zeppelin and Black Sabbath's influence on the genre.

'They all sound like they're being sung by the cookie monster'

Amusingly enough, the heavy vocals in metal are really called 'Cookie Monster Vocals'.

In metal, the tune is usually carried by the guitars and bass. It's best to think of the cookie monster vocals in metal as a percussion instrument, limited in dynamic range just like a drum would be. It takes a certain amount of talent to do heavy vocals well - perhaps not as much as it would to sing opera, but still talent.

Which brings me onto my next point - not all metal music has that type of singing. Some metal bands have classical or opera singers as lead vocalists, like Nightwish, Evanescence, and Within Temptation. Some have rappers (Hed Planet Earth, Rage Against the Machine, One Minute Silence). Some have reggae toasters (Skindred). Some scream (Dimmu Borgir, Cradle of Filth, Enslaved), some grunt (Deicide, Obituary, Cannibal Corpse), some shout (Clawfinger, Biohazard, Hatebreed) and some sing in a mainstream style (Life of Agony, Audioslave, Nickelback, Dream Theater, Rush, and so on).

Metal music is more widely varied than any other genre on earth. There is Black Metal, Classic Metal, Death Metal, Doom Metal, Extreme Metal, Flamenco Metal, Funk Metal, Gothic Metal, Grindcore Metal, Hardcore Metal, Heavy Metal, Industrial Metal, Mathcore Metal, Nu Metal, Power Metal, Progressive Metal, Progressive Death Metal, Punk Metal, Rap Metal, Reggae Metal, Speed Metal, Stoner Metal, Thrash Metal, Viking Metal, Wank Metal and Zombie Metal.

There are even metal bands who play cellos instead of guitars, for Christ's sake! I very much doubt that there is another genre on earth that is so rich and varied.

Music taste is a very personal thing, and some people just aren't ever going to like metal music. But liking rock and metal doesn't mean you have 'bad taste'. Perhaps it's the other way round!

*Not that women ever come to my flat these days.
** I don't actually like this song, but I do like death metal.

Politics

Tomorrow is the elections for the Scottish parliament, and I've been considering who to vote for. Until recently, I've been a Lib Dem voter. Years ago, I was watching a politics show on TV in which Charles Kennedy was being interviewed. He kept a cool head and gave some common sense answers to the questions he was being asked, and I found that his opinions coincided with mine much more often than anyone else's. So I voted for him.

However in the last few weeks, we've been getting propaganda through the letterbox every day from the various parties, and it's put me off somewhat. The Lib Dems have sunk to quite a low, and their approach is actually a bit offensive, treating the voter like an idiot.

First was propaganda disguised as a newspaper, the 'Edinburgh Central News'. The main focus is on the election being 'too close to call' between Labour and the Lib Dems. There are pictures of both candidates - with the Lib Dem candidate Siobhan Mathers looking proud, happy and noble. It's a head and shoulders pic because in real life, she has a big fat arse. The picture of the Labour candidate (who is captioned 'Tony Blair's Labour Choice', and not by name) is a low quality picture of her between expressions, looking like a fool, inset by a picture of Tony Blair. It's a really cheap trick.

Below this is a graph, showing the results of the 2003 election. Labour and Lib Dems are shown as being much higher than the competing parties, with only a small gap between them - all this despite the difference being 9%. Conversely the gap between Lib Dem and SNP is shown as very large, even though the difference of 5% is significantly lower. There are more examples of this throughout the paper - it's propaganda at it's most condescending.

The Liberal Democrats are also in my bad books for wanting to increase income tax. I already pay over £1000 each month in income tax, national insurance, and council tax, and quite frankly I resent it. I find it hard to support a party who is going to take more money from me, without giving me real input into where it is spent.

So who can I vote for? The Conservatives are out of the question obviously, as are the BNP (racist fools), Socialists (hippies), UKIP (wants to withdraw from Europe), Christian Party (I'm agnostic) and the Witchery Tour Party (wants to appear at Holyrood with a white face, wearing a cloak). That leaves the Greens, Labour, Lib Dems, and the SNP.

The Greens are just too unlikely to make a difference, even though I agree with some of their ideas. They may get second or third preference though as it would be good to have some representation from the party, and under the new voting system this isn't insignificant.

Labour are the party that helped send thousands of people to Iraq and Afghanistan to kill and to die. Apart from that, I don't think Labour have been a particularly bad government. They introduced the Gambling Commission, which has its flaws but is at least on the right track. They legalised hardcore porn, they banned smoking in public places (in Scotland, at least), and they haven't really screwed up to a huge degree except with the Middle East. That's a big exception though. I don't think I could vote for a party that supported the war.

The Lib Dems have pissed me off with their propaganda and income tax plans but I still agree with many of their ideas. They've set unachieveable targets on green issues, like 75% recycling and 100% of Scotland's energy coming from renewable sources. Any progress in those areas must be good, but these are just promises they can't keep.

I think the SNP is getting my vote. They want to scrap council tax (hallelujah!), plans for ID cards, student loans and prescription charges. While I think of myself as British rather than Scottish or English (I am half of each), I don't think a local government focused entirely on Scottish concerns would be a bad thing, and I do think that giving Scots the opportunity to vote for further devolution is a good thing. I've made my mind up. I'm putting my X in the yellow box.