#gun runner part 4 spray and pray

[forensicated]

Smiffina Episodes: Gun Runner Part 4 -Spray And Pray (4/5)

Max and Terry are in place to watch the workshop where Smithy will be recommissioning the guns as part of his undercover job. However they have to set up the cameras first. One appears to be faulty but they don't have much time as Cutler and Smithy are on the way back.

Just in time the expert manages to make the sound and vision clear and he and Max. It's very tight and they can't drive away without being seen, so Max has to cover and pretend to be a security camera salesman. "We're in the area today offering top of the range security monitoring." Mwahaha. He gets away with it and leaves.

Neil and Heaton update/remind us uniform on what Smithy has found out so far. Cutler has gotten his hands on pistols and Mach 10's and wants to sell them to the street gangs. As long as he gets his money he doesn't care whose hands they fall into.

Wallace arrives with Tommy Rose, an enforcer for the SE1 Gang, to the workshop.Rose is returning a gun he leased - £200 to rent it. £500 if it's been fired. Wallace suggests he's heard that "Jay" got shot. Rose threatens Wallace who seems intimidated. Smithy has to tell Wallace to stop playing with the gun and takes it to look it over. On inspection, Smithy agrees that it's been fired. Rose tries to make out it hasn't and Smithy squares up to him as Cutler arrives and tells them to calm down. Faced with Smithy and Cutler, Rose stumps up the full £500 and then takes Cutler for a private chat about meeting up with a Bob Gatting, the SE1 Boss. Smithy counts the money and hands it to Wallace, asking him to try find out when the guns might be arriving. With Wallace putting the money in the safe, Smithy shows the gun Rose brought back to the CCTV. Terry and Max mutter about it having to come in for forensics as they watch.

Neil asks Kezia to trawl MET records for gun crimes in the last 24 hours and to get search CRIMINT for anyone called Jay or similar who could have dealings with the SE1 gang. Cutler is splitting the risk to himself, using the SE1's funds and muscle in the deal.

Stevie attends the workshop to meet up with Smithy and to get the gun. She kisses his cheek in greeting but he tells her no one is around. Smithy says she can have the gun but they have to get it back sharpish. The door starts rattling Stevie grabs Smithy and kisses him as cover when Wallace appears. Wallace makes a cheeky search of Stevie and she complies to show she has nothing to hide. Stevie is cheeky and forward, teasing Wallace on his soft touch. Smithy joins in to help the banter distract him and stop him checking her bag (seriously - you'd think he'd check the bag more than Stevie!) and discovering the gun and envelope the cash arrived in from Rose. He winds him up about not having a girlfriend. "See you later, darlin'." she calls back as she leaves. "And you, Smithy."

Callum tells Neil that they've found a possible scene of the shooting with blood, 2 case shells, a bullet and drag and tyre marks at a building site on Barton St's patch. A neighbour reported hearing two bangs at 2.15am too but thought it was kids and firework.

Cutler arrives and pays Smithy for his time and tells him to take the afternoon off. Smithy mentions taking Stevie away that weekend as a way of trying to find more information out about deliveries and Cutler tells him he can't as they're in the middle of a deal. Smithy says he's only doing bits and pieces at the moment and it's not worth waiting round - unless the shooters are arriving that weekend. Cutler admits he's not sure. Smithy uses that to question him about who is really running the show. He admits that they're using SE1 as insurance. Cutler threatens Smithy's life if he 'has to terminate his employment' and tells him he'll give him a time and place when he's ready and that the guns are in London and there's a meeting that night about it.

There's no one in London hospitals with a bullet wound that fits and noone has been linked to be 'Jay' through the police intelligence at the moment. Eventually the blood comes back to a Sean Seaton. They tell his wife they're searching for him, she gives them the numbers of likely friends who might know where he is. The phone is still moving - or someone else has his phone. Jo rings it when it stops and they track it to the back of a skip lorry. Jo has a look inside and teases Roger over a plunger... and then finds Seaton's body.

Stevie tells Smithy that Max is pressing to find out the time of the delivery. He tells her he's been trying but Cutler won't talk. The gun isn't back from forensics yet. Smithy asks her to arrange a meeting with Max. At the Workshop, Cutler's supplier "Demitri" turns up. He's ready to do the deal whenever they are. Max tells Smithy this when they meet and that the gun still isn't back as it's been linked to a likely murder and they'll just have to hope it's not asked for. Smithy is NOT happy - understandably!

Smithy meets up with Cutler, Bob Gatting and Tommy Rose at The Boat Inn. Gatting asks Smithy what brought him into being an armourer. "I used to be in the army." Cutler reassures him Smithy is trustworthy and explains he got him out without being caught by the police the other week (at the football game). They toast to the job.

Now Seaton's body has been found, forensics are holding the gun as key evidence in a murder trial. Poor Smithy! The driver picked the skip up from the building site and had no idea about the body. There's a mobile message from a man who calls himself Jay. It says 'they need to sit down and sort things'. Jay is George Jacobs and Sean took the wrap for him fencing goods for the SE1 crew. He's shocked Seaton has died but isn't surprised. He claims Sean had a habit of finding trouble and was in a state when he last saw him 2 days ago because 'someone was squeezing him for money'. He admits leaving a message that morning and says he hasn't seen Julie - Sean's wife - for months. He agrees to come down to the station but goes to phone his lawyer first. As he does, Kezia tells Neil that Sean's wife said she didn't know anyone called Jay.

Wallace helps Smithy cleaning out gun barrels. As they chat, Smithy tells Wallace he was in the army for 5 years and did a couple of tours in Northern Ireland after being in Sunday Cadets as a kid. Wallace says he wanted to join the army and was in the cadets too. He admits Cutler is his uncle and he offered him more money to work for him than the army would pay. Cutler appears and sends Wallace off to clean his windscreen again so he can talk about the guns with Smithy. They're meeting the next day and Demitri will be bringing a sample of the mach 10's so Smithy is needed to check it before they pay. Cutler doesn't know when so sends Smithy home to rest.

Forensics have found fingerprints inside the gun and matched them to George Jacobs. However if they reveal this to Jacob's solicitor then they'll know they have the gun and put Smithy at risk. They also can't give it back to Smithy incase Cutler destroys it. Kezia has found pictures on Sean's phone of his wife with Jacobs. Jacob's alibi is that he was at a club at the time of the murder but the keyholder of the club is proving impossible to get hold of. Neil suggests he brings up the potential affair to show his lie and use that to keep and question him instead. Jacob's insists he isn't having an affair with Sean's wife and that he'll be on the CCTV of the club when the murder was supposed to have happened. He spots Julie when he's being returned to his cell and they lock eyes but neither say a word.

Smithy worries if word gets out Jacob's has been arrested for murder, Cutler will want the gun destroyed. Stevie suggests subbing it for a different gun but Smithy says it won't work because it's too distinctive and besides, Max promised him he was getting it sorted. He leaves to meet Cutler and Gatting with a warning to tell Max to get it sorted or he is stuffed.

Heaton says he's going to pull Smithy out and keep the gun for the murder case. Max worries that they're so close to seizing a huge amount of arms and suggests returning the gun but reclaiming it in a stop and search if Smithy can plant the gun. Gina thinks it's risky and worries for Smithy but says Callum can manage it. If it works they'll keep Smithy in but if not they'll have to pull Smithy out.

Smithy's concerns come home to roost as Cutler finds out that Jay has been arrested. He and Bob want the gun to disappear. Smithy goes to the loo and tells Max they have minutes to get the gun in place or it's all over. Max tells him Stevie is already at the workshop and is putting the gun back. All he has to do is plant it with Wallace and disappear whilst Callum and Roger pull him over. Stevie struggles opening the safe. A few minutes later, Smithy opens it with Wallace right behind him, praying the entire time that it's in there.

Smithy causes a delay by dropping a box of bullets and asking Wallace to pick them up and box 50 for him to deliver. The camera pans to reveal Stevie crouched behind some boxes. Smithy goes outside and hides the gun in the glovebox of Wallace's car and then smashes the brake light. Smithy goes to fake a delivery whilst Callum and Roger stop Wallace and question him about the broken brake light. They do an index check and Roger asks him if he has any documents. Wallace doesn't know and Roger goes to look - 'finding' the gun in the glovebox. He tries to run away but Callum rugby tackles him and brings him down, arresting him.

Julie's reaction to finding out her husband has died is not very believable. It seems he left the club at 1.15am and was dead within the next hour. Now Kieran Wallace has been arrested, the gun is brought into the interview where he's told his fingerprints are on it. Neil says he has enough to charge him but the solicitor produces the CCTV they'd been struggling to obtain showing Jay at the club as he'd said. They check the neighbour again to see if she is really sure that the time was 2.15am. They haven't questioned Julie about lying about knowing Jay because 'she was too upset about Sean'. She admits she and Jay were having an affair and claims things were over with her husband. Her husband however wouldn't accept it. Neil tells her that there are Jay's fingerprints on the gun and she stammers that it's her fault. Kezia tells her that Sean mistreating her and making her fall in love with another man doesn't make his death her fault. She misses the fact that it DOES make it her fault if she's the one who shot him though! And yep. She is. She shot him in self defence when he tried to kill her. Jay came and put the body int he skip before taking her home again. Neil arrests her for the murder as she admits that she took the gun with the idea of using it.

Max and Terry watch Smithy and Cutler rowing about Wallace getting arrested on the CCTV. Smithy tells him he doesn't know why he was arrested - he just came out of the pub to see him with police. "You left the gun with Wallace? That muppet?!*" He growls at Smithy. He then tells him has to square the gun getting found with Gatting because Jay is part of the SE1 crew. Smithy scoffs and says he doesn't, after all he's the one putting it on the line as Cutler's suppliers could be 'rip and run merchants' who dump him in a ditch somewhere. Cutler pulls a gun on Smithy and warns him to toe the line, not question him and that he warned him already people do not walk away from him - especially not when involved in something as dangerous as this. "So what? You're going to shoot me. So? Shoot me." He growls back. THIS FUCKING MAN! I wish they'd stop doing that 😂 Cutler eventually lowers the gun and walks off. Smithy shouts that he's sick of getting half the story and turns and walks out, telling him to ring him when he's ready to deal properly.

Max finally releases a breath and tells Terry to arrange a meeting with Smithy because they're too close for it to explode now. Smithy arrives to meet Stevie and Max soon after and he admits he doesn't know if he can hack it any longer because he can feel his entire life running down the back of his neck when he's with Cutler. Stevie and Max offer him the chance to walk away if it's become too much. Max reassures him that he's playing a blinder and that they're a team. He reminds him that he's doing it for the Carly Samuel's of the world and tells him that he - Max - is doing it because in CO19 one of his colleagues was murdered by a mach10 held by a kid. Smithy assures them both he's still in - whatever it takes. He pulls his hood up, gets out the car and walks off.

*This is a strong area where they were let down by having lots of different writers on multipart stories, This episodes Wallace is quite likeable, sympathetic and behaves like a teenage boy who loves his mum (he was going to be heading to his mums birthday party after the gun drop off) lead astray from the path of good - the army - by his big bad uncle who treats him like a loser. He's repeatedly (sometimes the same task several times in the same day) made to do menial tasks like washing his car windscreen just to get rid of him so the real men can talk. He's easily intimidated - like he was by Rose earlier and easily embarrassed - Smithy saying to Stevie that the closest Kieran'd gotten to sex was having his pocket picked when he was searching her to distract him and make him want to get Stevie away quicker so he didn't check her handbag. He's nothing like this big feared gangster with a bad history that he was made out to be in the first set up!

[deadcactuswalking]

REVIEWING THE CHARTS: 20th January 2019

So, uh, I‘ve been listening to a lot of Aminé recently.

FEATURED SINGLE #2 – “BLACKJACK” – Aminé

This is our second Featured Single, and I’ve decided this will be before the chart so feel free to skip this if you don’t want something beyond the charts to check out. This recently got a hilarious video, with ridiculous attention-to-detail and impressive... “choreography”. That counts as a single for me, and God, do I love this one. There’s this maddening melody that immediately gets pounded by an intense bass thud, with Aminé rapping monotonously initially, but gradually getting as excited as his ad-libs, with his quick flow accentuating both his loveable voice cracks and some of the funniest lyrics I’ve heard from the guy, including those four lines in the second verse, which he spends just praising and appreciating Jack Black?

Rockin’ and rollin’ like Jack Black / Schoolin’ you n****s like Jack Black (Yeah!) / How could you not like Jack Black? (How?) / I put that on my momma, n****, no cap

That second verse is great, by the way, there’s something so charismatic and enthusiastic about Aminé’s pointlessly specific pop culture references that can either breeze by so you don’t notice them or, as shown above, essentially be a rake joke.

Said she wants a spot on my list (Please) / I told her, “Go pray to your God” (I need to go to Church)

Yeah, that last part’s an ad-lib – more people should be doing back-and-forth exchanges in their ad-libs, 21 Savage’s done it in “10 Freaky Girls” and so has, uh... Cal Chuchesta? Anyway, this is literally a minute and 57 seconds long, so it doesn’t waste your time. Check it out if you like stuff by KYLE or enjoyed Aminé’s one hit, “Caroline”, although this isn’t really in the same range.

Top 10

Pretty busy week, let’s get into it quickly, because there’s not a lot to care about. “Sweet but Psycho” by Ava Max is still at the top spot and has been for about five or six weeks now. “7 rings” by Ariana Grande’ll take this spot next week, although we do have competition.

These next three songs are the competition, including “Nothing Breaks like a Heart” by Mark Ronson and Miley Cyrus up one spot to the runner-up space, number-two.

Post Malone’s “Wow.” is also up one spot to number-three – good for it, this is a great song and I’d love it to hit #1.

Now, our first top 10 debut this week, “Dancing with a Stranger” by Sam Smith and Normani, arriving at number-four. This is Smith’s 17th Top 40 hit in the UK, and his 11th Top 10, whilst this is Normani’s second Top 40 hit and first Top 10 hit, so congratulations, I suppose, even though this isn’t including Fifth Harmony, who were hitmakers in their own right. We’ll talk more about this later.

“Sunflower” by Post Malone and Swae Lee from Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse isn’t moving at number-five.

Collapsing down five spots to number-six is “thank u, next” by Ariana Grande.

Our second top 10 single that debuted in this spot is “Giant”, by Calvin Harris and Rag ‘n’ Bone Man, at number-seven. This is Harris’ 34th or 35th Top 40 hit and 24th Top 10, and Rag ‘n’ Bone Man’s 3rd Top 40 hit and 2nd Top 10 hit after his smash “Human”. We’ll talk more about this one later as well.

“Play” by Jax Jones featuring Years & Years is up three places to number-eight, becoming Jones’ 4th Top 10 hit and Years & Years’ 5th.

Once again, we have a debut in the top 10, this time at number-nine, as Gesaffelstein and the Weeknd collaborate once again for “Lost in the Fire”. This is Abel’s 17th Top 40 hit and 7th Top 10, while it’s Gesaffelstein’s first charting song as a credited solo artist ever, so congratulations. We’ll talk about this one more a bit later.

Finally, “Without Me” by Halsey is at #10, and it hasn’t moved from last week.

Climbers

We have two UK hip-hop songs gaining pretty highly here, one being pretty good - “Options” by NSG featuring Tion Wayne, up 11 spots to #14 – and the other being awful – “Gun Lean” by Russ splash is up five spaces to #34, but that’s it.

Fallers

These are a different story, however. “18HUNNA” by Headie One and Dave is down five to #11, “Rewrite the Stars” by James Arthur and Anne-Marie is down eight to #15, “Lost Without You” by Freya Ridings is down seven to #16, “Ruin My Life” by Zara Larsson is down five to #17, “ZEZE” by Kodak Black featuring Travis Scott and Offset is down six to #19, “Undecided” by Chris Brown is down six to #21, as is “Shotgun” by George Ezra to #22, and “Baby” by Clean Bandit, Marina and Luis Fonsi to #23, with the space of #24 being taken by “Thursday” by Jess Glynne, down five spaces since last week... but that’s not all. “Shallow” by Lady Gaga and Bradley Cooper is down six to #27, “This is Me” by Keala Settle and the Greatest Showman Ensemble is down eight to #31, “imagine” by Ariana Grande is down 13 to #33, “A Million Dreams” by P!nk is down 11 to #35, “Eastside” by benny blanco, Halsey and Khalid is down eight to #39 and finally “Woman Like Me” by Little Mix featuring Nicki Minaj is down 12 to #40.

Dropouts

“Let You Love Me” by Rita Ora is out from #28, “SICKO MODE” by Travis Scott featuring Drake and Swae Lee is out from #36, “2002” by Anne-Marie is out from #37, “KIKA” by 6ix9ine featuring Tory Lanez is out from #32, “Happier” by Marshmello and Bastille is out from #35, “I’ll be There” by Jess Glynne is out from #40, “Grace” by Lewis Capaldi is out from #33 and “The Greatest Show” by Hugh Jackman, Keala Settle, Zac Efron, Zendaya and the Greatest Showman Ensemble is out from #38. That’s all, and there’s no returning entries, so let’s get straight to the main attraction.

NEW ARRIVALS

Yup, there’s eight of them. Let’s just blast through them as quickly as possible.

#38 – “Saturday Nights” – Khalid

Khalid is a great singer, and I’ve liked a lot of what he’s put out, but a full project from him would put me to sleep, hence I didn’t check out his EP he released last October titled Suncity. Thankfully, thanks to a remix with... Kane Brown of all people, it’s here for us to review, and as Khalid’s ninth top 40 hit, I can’t say it really stands up to his others. I think the guitar strumming has gotten a little too cliché in chill-pop, and I think Khalid was above following trends to a T, but he doesn’t really add anything except his sultry voice to what is essentially anyone’s instrumental, with off-kilter trap percussion and deep 808s, high-pitched vocal samples and again, that damn guitar. For some reason that guitar infuriates me so much, maybe it’s just because it’s so slick and runs through the entire song? This is entirely too polished and aggravatingly boring in that respect. Yeah, this is Khalid’s worst one yet. It’s exhaustingly overproduced, and not even his voice can save it.

#36 – “Leave Me Alone” – Flipp Dinero

...Is this post-trap?

Okay, so Flipp Dinero has been on the rise, and this is his first top 40 hit in the UK... and I honestly love it. We have this cutesy piano lead that’s so twinky it almost forgives the awfully cliché lyricism. In fact, everything here forgives that. Flipp Dinero’s raspy voice is a great contrast, and the trap beat here actually works because of how he flows over this, as it barely keeps up with him to the point that it has to add the producer tag and the “oh!” used in songs such as Nelly’s “Dilemma” and Travis Scott’s “3500” just to remind us it’s there. Flipp Dinero is freaking fantastic on this, and every “yuh” ad-lib is like an injection of happiness. There’s that flute you don’t even realise until Flipp stops (and no, he doesn’t do this often at all), and I haven’t even got into the hook. Not only is it insanely catchy, but it’s hilarious as Flipp sprays his heart out, with so much passion put into being mildly inconvenienced by a woman who wants to spend some time with him after they broke up. This is beautiful, and that’s not even sarcastic. This won’t be to everyone’s taste, but to me, this is so much fun. Better than the Michael Jackson song, though? Don’t even attempt the comparison.

#29 – “Someone You Loved” – Lewis Capaldi

God, this guy’s boring, and he doesn’t understand how music works. See, the vocals on the song are supposed to make sense relative to the instrumental, and if they don’t, there has to be justification or purposeful juxtaposition (see: “Leave Me Alone”). On “Grace”, he sounded out of place, and on his 2nd Top 40 hit, he sounds bored over a repetitive, droning piano melody. Lewis Capaldi strains his voice to James Arthur levels of undeserved intensity, and while Capaldi is definitely a better singer than Arthur, he’s just as lacking in any compelling content, delivery or personality. Does anyone actually care about Lewis Capaldi and what he has to say? No. No one does, because he’s Lewis Capaldi. We only found out we existed in England, and we’ve quite literally made his songs interchangeable, as his last hit dropped out this week. God, this guy is a bore in three minutes and two seconds. Leave me alone.

#25 – “Longshot” – Catfish and the Bottlemen

If I was still an indie/alternative rock-head like I used to be, I would be able to tell you all about Catfish and the Bottlemen because from what I heard, they were pretty damn good, actually. I’ve liked “7” and I heard their first album, it was okay, but I always knew there was a lack of a real hook to the band, that could blow them up, and I assume they’ve just found it, because this is their first top 40 hit in the UK, and, yeah, it’s pretty good. I like the intense build-up of that one guitar pluck until it just drops into a light pop-rock instrumental with enough power and distortion on the guitars and vocals to make it unique. There’s this ticking sound in the chorus that annoys me, but otherwise, it’s definitely a nice, catchy sing-a-long hook. Whilst I’ve never been all too fond on Van McCann’s somewhat nasal voice, I definitely think it works in the context of these poppier bangers, and like he says in the chorus, the little things do make me smile, as this instrumental is very intricately-layered without being cluttered. I love the passion in McCann’s “woo!” followed by a couple guitar strokes, I just think that’s a great moment you couldn’t exactly replicate with non-live instruments, as that chemistry between vocalist and band is important. This song overall? Yeah, I’m definitely getting back into these guys because this was fantastic. I love the mic feedback at the end and I’m actually really intrigued to what that leads up to on the album.

#13 – “Hello My Love” – Westlife

Why was this performed on the National Television Awards? Guys, you’re Westlife, you’re a music group. Talking about outrageous trivia, can you believe this, Westlife’s 28th Top 40 hit is literally just three minutes of nothing? It’s insane how popular these guys are yet they can get away with stuff like this when they reform for their first song in nearly a decade.

#9 – “Lost in the Fire” – Gesaffelstein and the Weeknd

The lyrical content on this one sucks. This is “Lost in the Fire”, and there are a few lines that are just really creepy, if anything, and really play up Bella Hadid’s sexuality for what seems like cheap views, because there’s really nothing else these dudes haven’t done that doesn’t sound exactly like this. They didn’t even make cover art, that’s how lazy these guys are. The groove’s semi-decent, I suppose, but there’s little to no build up and I feel like it really doesn’t have much of interest to talk about, which shouldn’t be true for a Weeknd song. The personality of Abel is obvious in other songs and albums, and his portrayal of this character is what makes him so intriguing. So where is he here? Is a Drake diss what the Weeknd would do, or what Abel would do? Now that is the question. Oh, yeah, and the synths here don’t exist. This song is boring as hell.

#7 – “Giant” – Calvin Harris and Rag ‘n’ Bone Man

Now, I like Rag ‘n’ Bone Man. Like Ed Sheeran, although I don’t like all – actually, a lot – of his music doesn’t mean I don’t like how genuine he is. He’s a normal, average guy who’s been releasing EPs, found a label and had the break-out hit written for him, so now he’s famous. There’s no nepotism, no cheap industry plant tactics, just pure talent getting him this far, and I respect that. So this sucks so much, like, wow, Rag ‘n’ Bone Man goes way too hard on this basic, lightweight synth-funk-inflected deep house beat. The trumpet drop is so pathetic it would make J Balvin and OMI laugh Harris off as an amateur. That shouldn’t be happening for someone 15 years and nearly 15 #1s into their career. I won’t be too mean on Rag ‘n’ Bone Man, though, he did his best, and he probably didn’t even hear the beat prior. What’s with the chanting at the end, though? That’s just odd.

#4 – “Dancing with a Stranger” – Sam Smith and Normani

So, some finger-snaps, Sam Smith humming seductively, and then that house beat kicks in and we get to pleasure our ears with a nice Sam Smith house track, because we totally need more of his entirely unfitting voice over slick, incredibly well-produced beats. Normani sounds absolutely amazing, and that subtle guitar in this beat is a nice touch, so nice it may just be essential to actually try and enjoy this song, because it’s not like these guys have chemistry (I mean, apart from the obvious reasons they wouldn’t have chemistry, guys, at least pretend this could happen).I guess this is okay, but its existence just tires me. Who wanted another one of these, really?

Conclusion

Since “Blackjack” is not applicable, we have eight to choose from (wow), and Best of the Week should be obvious, as it’s going to Flipp Dinero for “Leave Me Alone”. Yup, that’s right, that song’s a banger and a half. Catfish and the Bottlemen were damn close though, so they do get the Honourable Mention for “Longshot”. Worst of the Week goes to Gesaffelstein and the Weeknd for “Lost in the Fire”. Man, that just reeks of wasted potential. Dishonourable Mention? It could be a toss-up between any one of these guys. Pick your poison. Choose your fighter. See ya!