Listening to a website

I read a post called my internet a few months ago that made me think a lot.  Made me think a lot and get a little bit more  annoyed at bad user design and information architecture that I would have done ordinarily.  

So what is my internet?  My internet is one that doesn’t blast me with music when I land on a website.  It’s also one that let’s me choose my own pA33woRd, and never ever resizes my browser.  There’s lots more my internet is and isn’t – and each person’s internet is different.  I find talking to IAs such as the brilliantly prolix John Gibbard is the best way of getting tips of how I can improve my internet.  Try it… go look at someone else’s internet and see what you find out.

But back to listening to a website.  I hate websites, flash websites especially, that have a soundtrack that automatically plays and plays loud.  You know the ones: edgy, sports or lifestyle bollocks.  One that cost 1million pounds and has no intrinsic use what so ever to anyone except to look pretty, load slowly, and annoy most of it’s visitors.   However, I have been listening to a website all morning.  Glade.  Their soundtrack is awesome. Hardly surprising given they’re a dance music festival.

Anyone else found a nice website to listen to?

This song saved my life

It’s nearly two years to the day that I heard this song for the first time. It saved my tiny life in so many ways, some too dark to say out loud.  I will probably never meet the man who wrote it, so he’ll probably never know how something he created affected me so profoundly.  It was one of those quiet moments when you realise that you could have gone your entire life never knowing of its existence and you would have been poorer for it.  In my case, much poorer.

Why all the seriousness?  I’ve started writing again. Song writing. I’ve actually written something that I’m proud of. I might even take them for a spin once my fingers have stopped hurting from my bad guitar playing.

Nothing is funnier than swearing and stereotyping

Let’s face it, in these bleak times of crunchy credit,  Monbiot sticking two big sweaty thumbs up for nuclear, and Paris Hilton doing politics in a bikini that gets on Channel 4 news no less (I mean, that’s real news right?) we need some delight in our lives.  Delight such as a list of swearwords that the BBC deem unacceptable.  <unt, 3rse, c o k, and every 15 year old permutation inbetween.  How wonderous. Discovered because they didn’t encript their expletive database for their olympic monkey widget.  The monkey widget is of course the 2.0 sporn from the new BBC summer olympic ident done by Gorillaz artist Jamie Hewlett.  It’s a pretty mixture of shameless promotion for his new opera (called, ‘monkey’) coupled with sweeping cultural stereotypes.  I love (read hate) that when the big sporting summer event of the year arrives, the sponsors and their respective agencies loose all bottle and imagination.  This time round planners and creatives up and down the land have essentially been given the same brief: sell our product but do it ‘Eastern’.  Cue Karate, Noodles, Chopsticks, Dragons, Pointy Hats, Women with funny makeup, and other such obviousnesses.  Every second ad on the telly window features some sort of nod to the orient.  How tedious.  Or am I just exposing my ingrained western prejudices by getting annoyed at what I think is stereotyping and a fundamental lack of imagination or realism?  Or should I just enjoy my ‘taste of the orient’ burger from McDonald’s and be done with it?

 

Why the FIA president is so offensive I’ll never know.  Answers in the comments below.

Rack and Ruin

My friend set up an internet record label in the Netherlands called Rack & Ruin records. They’re progressive folk in those parts and the label champions new artists. All the records can be downloaded for free. The whole idea behind the label is just to put things that he likes up there free for download. This will hopefully lead to the artists getting listened to by more people. This will get them shows and eventually get them some money. A brilliant idea.

They’ve just released an album of their artists covering songs by more famous people. A lovely mix of Regina Spektor, Bob Dylan, Radiohead, Tricky, and Blink 182.

Fantastic.

Track Listing

1. The Khmer Rouge Killing Machine – On The Radio [Regina Spektor] (3:52)
2. Jason the Swamp – Van Helsing Boombox [Man Man] (2:59)
3. Moon Runners – Bennington [John Maus] (3:03)
4. Sam Golden Sings! – Gemini (Birthday Song) [WHY?] (2:29)
5. Gnouli Monsters – Stand By Me [Ben E King] (2:17)
6. These Are Words – Blister In The Sun [Violent Femmes] (2:58)
7. Deskktop – Pacifico [Ugly Cassanova] (2:24)
8. Fire! We Must Go – A Wolf At The Door (It Girl. Rag Doll) [Radiohead] (3:22)
9. Your Terrible Daughter – Animals [Devendra Banhart] (1:15)
10. Gnomefoam – Hell Is Around The Corner [Tricky] (2:16)
11. Megazord – Couleurs [M83] (2:43)
12. Tyson Brinacombe – Say You’ll Be There [Spice Girls] (4:08)
13. Moon River – Buckets Of Rain [Bob Dylan] (3:43)
14. Gnouli Monsters & Dessktop – Feathers [Man Man] (2:05)
15. beep boop beep boop – Pure Unevil [Liars] (2:32)
16. Roger Haddad – Hands Away [Interpol] (3:02)
17. Picayunes – Dont Leave Me [Blink 182] (2:34)
18. Attacking Plaque & Friends*! – Thunder And Lightning [The Unicorns] (3:38)

*Featuring Vocals By; Jason The Swamp, Jessi Lively, Sam Golden, Gnomefoam, Megazord & Your Terrible Daughter

Download for free here: http://www.rackandruinrecords.com/albums/rrr046.zip

NO NO NO NO NO NO NO. No.

The new Martha Wainwright album is out: I know you’re married but I’ve got feelings too.

I bought it today on Amazon. You can too if you like here. I don’t have a fully formed opinion about it yet other than I’m very excited to hear it in its entirety.

However, she’s been playing the songs live now for a good few months and I managed to catch a couple of her gigs: once at last year’s Glastonbury (a welcome relief from the tedium and the mud); and once at a free gig at the South Bank centre.

One particular song I love is The George Song, written about an ex who killed himself. It’s dark haunting and beautiful and whenever I’ve heard it, it’s just her and her guitar. Perfect.

On the album it is dreadful.

Dreadful.

I’m really not pleased. It’s got a hideous backing track and it’s the wrong bleedin rhythm almost jolly and dancy. No NO No NO NO NO NO NO NO NO. No.

This has upset me. And the only live version I can find is a dodgy youtube mobile phone video. I normally despise people for mobile videoing during a gig. But just this once I’m glad. All I’m hoping is that she releases a live album because I don’t know whether I can cope with this watered down dance remix.

Listen to the most of the tracks on her myspace.

And the pant wetting Guardian review is at the bottom courtesy of Zemanta this new blogging prettier helper thinger.

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I don’t need a nanny thanks, I’m 27.

People moan about the nanny state, etc. Me? I don’t really mind that much being told how much veg I have to eat to stay alive, how much salt will kill me, to look both ways before I’m run over, but this is the final straw.

My iPod has colluded with my headphones for no other reason than to make me almost loose it on a crowded train. If I want to deafen myself with thumpy drums and Thom Yorke’s wailing then I should bloody well be allowed to do it right? Wrong. My favourite loud track didn’t even get loud enough to drown out that bloody patronising train lady telling me where I’m going, to mind the gap, and to watch out for unattended packages every 30 seconds . A far as I remember the last package that exploded on public transport was very much attended. Anyway I digress.

I tapped the + sign in frustration but it refused to budge louder than dinner party ambiance. Then I tried to trick it by turning it down and then up again slowly. No such luck the smug bastard. I contemplated hurling it out of the window but thought better of it – I paid 70 quid for those Bose headphones and this is how they repay me? They think they’re doing this for my own good? For the good of my hearing? Bollocks. They’re doing it to piss me off.

Trouble is they seem enforce their fascist volume control policy totally at random so the next track nearly did deafen me as Beck’s timebomb exploded in my ear canal.

Go fuck ya headphones!

What’s in the box? A radio head obviously.

I love mashups. I also love mash potato but that’s for a different post.

I think you’ve really made it when someone chooses to create something new out of your work. Or you help someone create a mashup of your own work. You follow?

Take for example Radiohead’s 15 steps: playing brilliantly on the hoo har of the stupendously expensive double vinyl box set and the excitement of their zillions of fans about receiving it.
Radiohead are a progressive band embracing the interwebs for all it’s 2.0 loveiness. Facecrack and youtube aren’t new or progressive I hear you say. However, Radiohead are massive. They have about 91 million plays on last.fm prompting some cynics to say that users have been deliberately playing Radiohead on loop to get them higher than The Beatles. Radiohead don’t have to muck about with myspades or facebook or anything like that, people will still buy their records whatever they do. What’s so charming about this, is it gives Radiohead a real D.I.Y feel to them. They regularly update their website with random musings on what they’re up to. They spew out facebook updates and have stuff on their youtube channel. Thom Yorke is a self-professed internet addict so it really is him writing the content giving a real inroad into his strange mind making you feel more connected to him. Man.

Shuffling Along

Last month my iPod died. I morned for about a week and contemplated my mp3 fate. Should I fork out for a new iPod? But I don’t have an Apple computer of my own – this may pose a problem. Should I get a different mp3 player just to tide me over until I get my new Mac? Should I go retro and carry CDs and a diskman? (LOL)

Then in my grief I wandered into the Apple store on Regents Street and looked with longing at the pretties and stroked those iPod touches. Then a tiny purple shuffle caught my eye. It’s only 32 quid! I snapped it up just for an experiment.

I tell you it’s an interesting experience. If you’re like me and have several months worth of music you never know what you’re going to get. Most of the time I don’t know what it is when it’s playing as it has no display. Now is that JME or Dizzie Rascal? Dunno? (skip to next track). Is that Marissa Nelder or Anni Rossi? Dunno? Sounds pretty though. You don’t know what’s coming next either and purple shuffle makes some pretty odd choices: who knew that Star Wars followed by Spank Rock would work? But strangely it does.

InRainbows

It feels rather exciting having actually paid for an album for a change. I forked out £40 for the shiny box set which doesn’t arrive until December. However I was emailed the album this morning. I haven’t been quite so excited about looking at a download bar for a long time. I love Radiohead – Thom could fart in the studio and loop it backwards through a bleepy wah wah and I’d lap it up.

Verdict so far: 30 seconds in and it’s fast paced and Thom’s vocals are unvarnished. Oooh, now the guitar has come in.

It’s beautiful….

new blog. No new dog.

Hello world. I watched my boy, dog boy, play a gig last night. It was an upstairs in a pub gig but a gig no less. While I was perched on an uncomfy fake leather sofa digesting a rather nice chicken burger whilst wearing everything I currently had on me due to to a mystery air-conditioning unit, my boy was playing merrily away on stage. And lovely he was to. Shame all the other fuckers in the pub didn’t shut up and listen.

Since when was it acceptable for people to talk loudly and blokeily over someone who’s performing on stage?

They shut up for the other people. Even for the girl with the weedy fairy voice.

check out dog boy and judge for yourselves.