#BrownCarGuy – News, Views & Reviews!
Imagine being fined £160 – not for speeding, not for parking on double yellows, not even for driving in a bus lane – but for doing absolutely nothing more than being in the wrong bit of yellow paint for a few seconds. Welcome to Kingston Road, South-West London – home of Britain’s most expensive yellow box junction. Or as locals call it: the cash cow!
Japanese car companies have always been on the leading edge of engineering. Innovating, developing, breaking new ground – surging ahead of the crowd in surprising new ways. And Suzuki’s latest new car… doesn’t conform to any of that. Well, apart from the ‘surprising’ bit.
Because the new E Vitara isn’t truly Japanese at all. It’s more like a takeaway tikka delivered by a samurai. And given how much Brits love a good curry, Suzuki’s first fully electric car – designed and built by Maruti Suzuki in Gujarat, India – rolling off the boats onto our roads at barely believable prices, is surely going to go down a treat. You won’t even need the Alka-Seltzer for this one.
Somewhere between haunted roads, electric cars, and the eternal fight between influencers and journalists, a very honest discussion broke out. In the latest BrownCarGuy Therapy Session Podcast, I was joined by Jeff Bailey – long-time motoring writer, serial car buyer, and author – and Imthishan Giado, my partner-in-crime from our Car Middle East and Motoring Middle East days. We didn’t plan to solve the mysteries of the universe, but somewhere between the nostalgia and the banter, we might just have done that – or something…
Cardiff Council has approved a policy that introduces higher parking permit charges for larger and heavier vehicles, starting with those over 2,400kg – and soon expanding to 2,000kg for non-electric cars. The Council claims the aim isn’t to punish, but to “gently encourage behaviour change,” arguing that bigger cars take up more space, cause more road wear, and are a greater danger to pedestrians.
They say never meet your heroes – but what about driving them? In this week’s BrownCarGuy Therapy Podcast, I sit down with three of the most gloriously opinionated car nuts I know – Sy Ali (Drivers Union), Adnan Mallick (Landbeasts Automobile Classica), and Imthishan Giado (Motoring Middle East co-founder and Dubai Car Culture icon) – to unpack the messy, emotional, and hilarious world of modern car culture.
We’re talking ugly Ferraris, movie car nostalgia, the freefalling classic car market, and whether we’ve all secretly become Jay Leno-style hoarders. Strap in – this one’s pure petrolhead therapy.
Have you noticed it lately? The roads feel slower, the signs look stricter, and the cameras are multiplying like roadside mushrooms after a rainstorm. Suddenly, even the most careful motorists are finding themselves on the wrong side of the law – or rather, the lens.
Mazda’s flirted with electrification before – remember the MX-30? Stylish, well-built, and charmingly unconventional, but with a range so short you’d start worrying halfway to the shops. Even Mazda later admitted it needed work, adding a rotary range-extender to make it more usable.
The intriguingly-named Mad Bison is a London-based remixer who works with a variety of music genres, but I was particularly interested to come across a great car-inspired track by his protege, a rapper going by the moniker of Pigbosher. This track, ‘Street Heat’ is lifted from his album, ‘Urban Swamp’ – a rousing mix of social commentary spotlighting the grittier side of life. Mr Pigbosher is one angry chap, it seems. But back to the chase – the video accompanying Street Heat is a blast of raw angst and heavy metal car action – well worth three minutes of anyone’s time!
Rumour has it the Chancellor, Rachel Reeves, is preparing to scrap the 40-year tax exemption for classic cars – and if true, it could be one of the daftest economic moves in decades. Because make no mistake – if this goes ahead, you won’t just be taxing old motors. You’ll be taxing passion, history, and an £18-billion-a-year industry that already contributes around £3 billion in taxes annually to the Treasury.
That’s right. The same government that loves to preach about “protecting heritage” might soon be taxing it to death.
I get a truck and I’m a kid with a Tonka Toy again. Okay, I won’t bash it into the table leg or drop it from the kitchen counter, but I still want to drive it with a big grin on my face. So when Isuzu asks if I would like to review the 2025 Isuzu D-Max V-Cross, despite the fact that I reviewed this generation of the pickup twice just a few years ago… I found myself struggling to decline.
Full transparency, I didn’t so much want to review it, as I just wanted to rock around in it! And when it turned up, I wasn’t disappointed, because they sent their Instagram special. A D-Max that had driven into the accessories warehouse and come out wearing EVERYTHING! More on that in a bit.
