Happy Christmas

Best wishes, and a very Merry Christmas to everyone who finds this blog

Here’s a slightly different version of one of my favourite Christmas songs.  Greg Lake’s “I Believe in Father Christmas” performed by the enigmatic Toyah Wilcox on the David Essex Christmas Special in 1982!

I’m proud of the BBC, and Mitch Benn

As an expat there are many things you’ll not miss, the high fuel prices, the speed cameras, the invasions of privacy of the Blair/Brown years, but then there are some things I think every expat can agree on because there is always something about the BBC that we loved.  I took a DVD of Bagpuss into the office a few weeks ago, and every Brit there got a misty look in their eyes, and the DVDs been out on loan since then.

So it takes the brilliance of Mitch Benn (yes, him on The Now Show) to list a whole litany of reasons that no matter where we go there are a few things we all hold in common.  So take it away Mr Benn:

Now if like me you listened to that, then listened again, then thought “Wow, that is hilarious, and brilliant!” there are two things you must do:

1. Buy the single when it comes out on November 1st.  Go on, prove there is more to life than X-factor trash and urban (c)rap.
2. Buy the  t-shirt of the song.  I just ordered mine!

On a serious note, it isn’t until you live somewhere where the only television choice is commercial (even the Public Broadcast Station which I am often told is America’s BBC has commercial breaks) and ratings rule forever that you start to truly value the gift that is Auntie Beeb.  Even with the wealth of digital cable channels at my disposal it is hard to find a BBC2 (and now BBC4), in fact most networks just resort to block scheduling and repeats, some even showing the same sequence of episodes every 6-8hrs for days on end!

So defend the BBC, you might not always choose it, but right now at least you have a choice!  Once it is gone it won’t be coming back…

Glastonbury 2010

This is 40 years of the Glastonbury Festival, and my has the folk/pop festival of 1970 grown.

I’m sat in northern Virginia watching highlights of this years festival.  Currently Damon is reminding us of his genius while Gorillaz has us fondly remembering Blur and the anthems of our youth.  Earlier La Roux performed Fascination with Glenn Gregory of Heaven 17 putting in a guest appearance and making this the best cover of an eighties classic I’ve heard in a long time.

It makes me laugh that I’m sat in my basement in northern Virginia watching this, as a teenager I lived within 10miles of arguably the largest dance music festival in Europe, the legendary Phoenix Festival, but I never went… although I confess to driving aroudn the back end of Long Marston to park on the verge and watch Bowie’s light show make the clouds glow on the drive back from Idlicote.  Looking at the huge crowds it still isn’t my idea of fun to camp in a messy field, and share toilet facilities with 100,000 of my newest friends, but I am enjoying the live sound (or at least the live sound as delivered via the highlights of the concert).  I blame my connection to the brilliant Crooked Crow for igniting this new interest in live music.  They’re playing Allentown, PA tonight and have a new CD out next week.

So I’m going to sit back, relax, and chill out to my sanitized Glastonbury experience.  No dodgy food, lousy toilets, dirt and crowds for me, just a comfy sofa, a flat screen, and a suitablely chilled beverage.

So join me at the civilised festival, and enjoy Gorillaz “Stylo” courtesy of the BBC.

The de-evolution of music

Saw this cartoon on SlipperyBrick and thought it captures my love of vinyl and my enjoyment but annoyance with MP3/digital formats perfectly.

Slippery Brick - Brick Pic - I love my records...

A few firsts

Continuing the musical theme from my last post we’re onto another music list.  In the last days of the naughties my MP3 player died, so while waiting for the replacement to arrive I’ve been listening to a variety of old tapes on my daily commute (The car was built in 1989 and still has the original radio/cassette deck in good working order).  Listening to mix-tapes painstakingly recorded from the radio in 1991 made me think about the various firsts in music I’ve experienced over the years… so for your entertainment, and potentially my own humiliation.

• First Music Purchase – The Smurf Song – Father Abraham and the Smurfs
  • What can I say, it was 1977 and I was young!  I’ve still got the single though, and it is still playable.
• First Cassette – Kings of the Wild Frontier – Adam & The Ants
  • There were possibly others before this, but this is the first one I really remember buying. It was post punk new romantics with huge drum beats and screamed lyrics so what more could you ask for?  Stand & Deliver is still one of my all time favourite songs.
• First CD  – Unforgettable…with love – Natalie Cole
  • I’d heard about this album on the radio, and wanted it enough that I bought the CD 3  days before I bought a CD player.
• First Dodgy Download – 6 Underground – The Sneaker Pimps
  • Trip hop and the Bristol sound appealed to me as I entered my twenties, the realisation I could try out a song before buying it appealed to my fickle tastes then as now, and after a few days of listening I went and bought a legitimate copy of this track.
• First Online Purchase – Reasons to be Cheerful (The best of) – Ian Dury and the Blockheads
  • Ian Dury had lost his battle with liver cancer 27 March 2000.  I’d heard his music throughout my childhood and had bought  Mr Lovepants after seeing him with The Blockheads on Jools Holland’s “Later…”.  Having watched a retrospective of his life I wanted some of the earlier works and Amazon.co.uk was there to deliver.
• First payed for MP3 Download – Godfodder – Ned’s Atomic Dustbin
  • Early 2008 and I’m living in the US of A.  I’ve been going through my musical youth and revisiting artists I’d liked on the radio but never purchased a whole lot of.  Having rediscovered my love for Kate Bush, Peter Gabriel, and Blur, I came across The Wonderstuff and Ned’s Atomic Dustbin.  I’d got an MP3 player for playing tunes (via cassette adapter) in the car, so why not buy the MP3.  My dislike of Apple’s monopoly steered me clear of iTunes, and so AmazonMP3.com gave me my first two purchases, the first was GodFodder and the second was the ‘Stuffies “What if the Beatles had read Hunter…The Singles”