Wow! Risk Capital Partners, the private equity group founded by Luke Johnson and Ben Redmond, has managed to scrape £75 million together for a new fund. £50 million of that has come from institutional investors. How is RCP going to spend all the money? Is this a once in a lifetime opportunity? Is the group looking for bargains thrown up by the credit crisis?
Er, no. I have been speaking to my dear friend Luke Johnson, and this is what the crazy cat told me: 'Mikey, man, we're heading for the desert, and we will be burning all this money in an elaborate ceremony - just like the one that Alexandre Mouradian was planning. But this time it will go ahead. (Hang on a minute, Luke, mate, you told some newspaper that you would be investing the money in various companies. And that is what your investors are expecting you to do.) Well, Mike, always do the unexpected. That's my motto. Always do the unexpected. Bobby is all for it. (Bobby Diamond?) No, Bobby Hashemi. He said to me: Let's do it, Luke. We can do it, Luke. Anyone can do it, Luke. Let's burn with money in the desert, Luke. (I thought you were joining the French Foreign Legion.) Nah, Mikey. (Why not?) I don't wanna talk about it. Those guys are too rough. (Okay. But you still love the desert, yeah?) Oh yeah, man, I still love the desert. I can't get enough of the desert.'
Well, that was Luke speaking to me earlier this morning. And I am 100 per cent behind him.
O Luke, burning burning burning, a great burning is coming for you, coming for me, coming for all the mystical children in the desert. We love to burn! We love to love! We love to love the burning. Beyond the cities, none of the fools will see us. Far from the prying eyes of envious socialists, we shall burn - physically burn - £75 million in the desert of our dreams. A burning in the desert, physical and astral, astral and physical, metaphysical motherfuckers loving the desert wind as it rushes into the flames and the ashes of the banknotes get caught in our mouths, flecks in our eyes, breathing money into our lungs.
O Luke, I love everything that burns. Burn for us, burn within us, burn without us, but burn! Big Herb will be there. Ganesh the elephant god will be there. The ghosts of the dead financiers will be shimmering, in and out of the fire. Fire and snakes, in our hearts, our minds, burning our eyes to fuck, golden desert angels in ecstasy, bleeding all over, the sand will take the blood, swallow up all the money, the ashes of our skins and joyful tears burnt with money from institutional investors who have no idea of the burning but wish us all the best all the same. And the financiers who believe? Let's invite them all. Let's invite everyone who cares for it, the mystic love. Bobby Diamond! Bobby Diamond will be there. Bobby Hashemi as well. One astral Bobby on the desert wind, singing ancient songs. Another Bobby in the fire, scooping up more money and whirling around in those flames. It will be so beautiful. It will.
O Luke, it will be so very beautiful. Prepare for a burning. In the depths of your endless night reach out for something that will end the credit crisis. Touch the fire! Crunch the crunch! Yes, crunch the crunch, and be happy, be righteous, be pure in the desert, the cosmos, be pure in everything. And you shall be saved. We shall all be saved.
