Obama

Guantanamo closed in a year
End to military trials
End to waterboarding and other forms of torture
Closure of overseas 'ghost prisons' and end to rendition
George Mitchell sent to the middle east.
End of the ban of funding for NGOs that provide information on abortion.

Not a bad first four days. And to think that some people think all politicians are cut from the same cloth. Give me a break.

Spotify

Just signed up to this.... and just how good is it? Very!


I think anyone can sign up now, without an invite, as it seems to be past its Beta stage.

Here's a little playlist from me for other spotifyers:

http://open.spotify.com/user/palefox/pl ... n3w5K7x23e

My God! It even has Luxembourg on it!

Hello 2009!

Yes, yes, I know its been a while.  But here I am again. What do you want, blood?

I've been prompted to update this by having just moved over to Flock as my browser of choice.  Everything is just right there, where you need it with Flock, and its integrated blogging tool clearly makes it easier to just click straight in from the browser and do it.  Yes, I know it wasn't that hard to start with, but this makes it easier, okay?!

Blogged with the Flock Browser

The Maybes

Saw these guys supporting Brakes at the 100 Club last night, and they were fantastic. Really quite mesmerising, with a fantastic lead singer who was full of cheeky Scouse stage presence. They finished with one of the most amazing things I've heard from an 'indie' guitar band - a ten minute sun-drenched ibiza house instrumental. Looking around at the time, there were very few people without big grins on their faces during it.

http://www.myspace.com/themaybesliverpool

They have the potential to be huge.

The greatest band in the world are .... SPARKS!

And I say this with complete conviction. What other band has created 21 of the most exciting, innovative, and beautiful albums over a 37 year period, never falling back on a popular or well-proven musical template at the cost of exploring new sonic possibilities? What other band with anything like such an extensive back catalogue would undertake to play each album sequentially, over 21 nights in a four week period? That's 264 songs, requiring four solid months of rehearsals. And before you think that all the music may simply be programmed and delivered by computer, its not. They are doing this with a full band. And to think that we sometimes get excited when our other favourite bands throw in an old song they haven't done for a while!

Which brings me to Saturday night's performance of Plagiarism. This was their 1997 Sparks 'Tribute' album, which saw the band returning to some of their own favourite Sparks songs and reinventing them with new time codes, full orchestation etc. Listening to the album again yesterday morning, I worried that they may simply not be able to do it live, so musically complex was it, but boy! how wrong I was! For this 'one night only' gig they had drafted in and fully rehearsed a string and brass section from Trinity College of Music. Just imagine reheasing a 12 piece orchestra whilst also yourself rehearsing 264 songs worth of material. Mindboggling.

And you would perhaps think that performing so many albums, night after night, might render the performances a little rough around the edges, lacklustre or even a bit slapdash? But this is absolutely not the case. Each of the four albums I have seen so far (Music You Can Dance To, Gratuitous Sax and Senseless Violins, Plagiarism, and Balls) have been performed with utter professionalism, verve and exuberance.

There are still a few albums to go this week. If you are able, I would highly recommend you try to catch as many as you can. These gigs are very special indeed.

Ancient voice, caught in soot

I think this is magical, and all the more so for the fact that the recording was made but with no way of playing it back until now.... so it feels like it was recorded as a message to the future.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/7318180.stm

All of which reminds me of something I got in a box of Ready Brek when I was quite a young child - no more than six years old. It was a thin plastic strip, probably about 12 inches long and no more than a centimetre wide (you can see how my age means I continue to mix up imperial and metric!). The strip had little ridges along its length, and, when it was pulled through a slot cut in the side of the cereal box, the ridges created vibration, which carried the voice of Churchill saying 'We Shall Fight Them on the Beaches.' I really wish I still had it, as I have never come across anything similar since.

Chris Garneau

Having just discovered Chris Garneau (think Sufjan Stevens meets Will Young - and I say that in a good way), I am a bit miffed to learn that, not only did he play London a few weeks ago and I missed him, but he'll be playing again in May - when we are on holiday in Romania. Bah!

I've ordered his album, 'Music for Tourists', so at least have that to look forward to. You can watch the video for a greta track called 'Relief' here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3VHoYBvmTsg .