So I went to the Record of the Day site to vote for my favourite writers and sites, and saw my name is on there for this category. I know! I’m just as shocked as you. So, er, gimme your vote, and I’ll get David Cameron to resign.
Click the logo to go to the site or just click here.
Thank you. x
I’ve already been asked to submit my top records of 2010 for one publication, and there were 40 of them. 40. That’s not even a long list. So, I thought I’d wait until the end of November before making a final decision for the blog, and then publish 10 or so at a time each week, with a little blurb on every one. It’s been impossible to review every record I’ve been sent by PR people this year (thank you for sending me the good records, no thanks for the crap ones – and there were lots), and there have been better writers covering records in areas that I’ve just been getting to grips with.
So, I will attempt a mixtape, but I honestly can’t see it being particularly cohesive in any way. I might not bother, actually. 2010 has been a fab year for that music stuff, so that bodes well for the forthcoming decade. The Tories can’t claim responsibility, though. Neither can MTV, Radio 1 or any other of them other heinous channels of tripe.
Oh, and Radiohead are still due an album aren’t they?
Well it’s hardly the most adventurous title for Batman 3, is it?
Batman Begins. (Two words).
The Dark Knight. (Three words).
The Dark Knight Returns. (Four words).
I hate to be pedantic (I don’t, I like it a lot), but let’s hope the height of adventurism of the film’s content isn’t reflected by its lazy title.
Some suggested alternative titles:
Batman Wars.
The Batman Strikes Back.
Return of the Batmani.
You can have them for free, Mr Nolan.
I’m not really into long-winded blog pieces, fascinated by the arbritary and commonplace. Last night I was out to dinner and surrounded by teenagers howling into their empty plates while taking pictures of each other continually. Last weekend, I spoke to a 21-year-old who commented on having access to the internet since he was six. Last night, I watched a boy who couldn’t have been more than 10 say to a security guard, “You’re a total wasteman, you know that? You’re really begninning to piss me off.”
When I was 14, and at school, we had Computer Studies: it was a class that involved creating a fucking Ceefax page on a BBC Micro computer. In 2010, there is more tech on a phone than one of those beasts. It’s possible to surf the net, watch videos, store music – well…you know what they can do because you probably own one of them HTC or iPhone thingies. You flash git.
But what’s happened to working towards a goal? So much is instantaneous now. I want an iPod, so I’ll put it on credit, along with the rest of my debt. I want to go to New York. Done! The dream is attainable. It’s an oblique lifestyle, and not one that I want any part of. I know, this sounds like a total whinge doesn’t it?
With this particular festival beginning late in the afternoon, Supersonicees are free to recover from the night before, or explore the heady materialistic delights of Birmingham’s Bull Ring. But, after Sunday lunch, it’s time for the charming acoustic fingerwork of Peter Broderick. And, by that, I mean not just the guitar: this hugely gifted 23-year-old plays piano, violin, and the saw – all while singing beautifully. Thanks to loop technology, he’s practically a one-man Grizzly Bear (though he was once part of Efterklang). The audience is suitably quiet (rapt in awe I suspect), and the incessant gas click from the bar makes for an unwelcome percussive addition. I have to say that the song he says his ‘Dad used play’ was so affecting, it actually broke my heart a little.
Saturday afternoon, and I arrive in time to hear the musical thrall of Robert Lowe’s ( from TVOTR amongst others) Lichens. ‘Kirlian Auras’’ gorgeous meandering drone drips from the speakers in the Old Library. The sounds are supplemented by a mesmerizing, continuous, kaleidoscopic series of blotches on the screen that resemble a trip through the sky. So…like an aeroplane, then. But as the drone subtly shifts and extra melodies are added, the visuals run thick with psychedelic colour. One man with fabulous hair and a synth becomes the best thing of the festival thus far.
(Covered for MusicOMH)
Freaks! Hipsters! Hipster haters! Sonic warriors! Aural artists! All these groups and many more gather at Birmingham’s Custard Factory to get thick and gooey to the noise and activities offered by Capsule’s Supersonic Festival.
Starting on a cold, dark Friday night in downtown Digbeth, there is a queue stretching all along Gibb Street leading on to site. There’s a good mix of people here, with a range of ages across both genders – though it is absolutely fair to say that this is a festival dominated by the presence of men. The site is not huge, and sound does spill across areas such as from the Outside Stage into the Theatre.
