This new development is making me think twice about continuing my Spotify Premium sub.

Spotify will not allow you to join unless you have or create a Facebook account.

http://is.gd/MfK8fX

Opened my copy of The Word whilst watching PMQs at Westminster and the first thing that greets me is two pages of our-former-glorious-leader's thoughts on leadership (presumably dictated to him by R. Murdoch esq.).
Considering his trappist approach to the current hacking shit-storm, is this unfortunate timing by The Word?

Ages ago I heard a cracking little tune on the radio by Mr Jankel, it was a kind of bossa nova tempo with a bunch of kids singing a description of the chord changes taking place in the tune, so they were singing things like "this is a minor fifth, and now a major fifth" etc

Any ideas what is is? Thanks

I just fancied some UK soul-ish stuff from the 80's and 90's. I started by selecting Omar, I've not heard "There's Nothing Like This" for a few years. Related artists include Loose Ends, Incognito etc. Excellent. Hit the Artist Radio button and the first two tracks are some yodelling Cuban called...Omar

Followed shortly afterwards by Bilal. Not the neo-soul singer of course , the Algerian Rai singer.

Broadens the mind I suppose!

Shaun of the Dead was on telly last week. It was pretty late and the Mrs and I were both tired so the telly went off at just after they meet their first zombie in the back garden.

I must have sat down to watch this film four times now and for various reasons never got further than half-way, maybe two-thirds max.

Any films, books etc you have actively enjoyed but failed on more than one occasion to last the distance?

Maggie Jones who played Blanche has passed away, aged 75.

I am not a massive soap fan but Dierdre's mum Blanche is surely one of the best characters of the past decade. She had more funny lines on her own in a week than a year's worth of Eastenders and her delivery would have graced any comedy series.

Thanks for the memories.

Can you name someone famous you know well-enough to be on first-name terms with. No dirt-dishing, just name-dropping.

Best I can do - and it is years since I have seen him - is Kevin Kennedy (Curly in Corrie).

Over in the hifi world there is a massive argument between proponents of loudspeakers with active cross-overs i.e. built-in amps in the speaker cabinet and passives i.e. powered by traditional hifi amp.,

There's an even more vicious split between traditional set-ups like Naim and Linn and the users of a combined speaker and DAC from a company called AVI.

Visiting those forums is like entering in a wormhole in space formed in the middle of the Rob Fitzpatrick FAQ thread.

I imagine quite a few here are familiar with studio set-ups of active speakers and whether that has influenced their listening source at home.

As we all love music with a passion I wondered how most hear listen to it. Pod dock? CD-Amp-Speakers? Computer-DAC-Actives?

- Full disclosure: I own a pair of passive AVI speakers but have absolutely no connection with any manufacturer or seller.

Apologies to anyone not watching the show but...

Just had an email from the Co-op Bank about the fate of the world and it had this image

http://news.co-operativebank.co.uk/img/CWC/thewave_v2.jpg

Aren't these the people Joseph Fiennes is chasing in FlashForward?

Just listened to the head of Channel 4, Julian Bellamy on Simon Mayo's show.

What a smug, patronising, self-regarding arse he is; just like his chairman Luke Johnson. He had the brass neck (not brass eye, sadly) to slag off the other channels for a lack of creativity and ambition. What, like come dine with me, location location, celebrity cooks by the dozen and Noel Edmonds?

Just had a look at the online version of this month's Word and as much as I cherish the paper version, if the cost to Development Hell of an online version is minimal, I would be rather partial to also having the virtual one as a back-up for such times when I am travelling and could access it from a hotel.

From the digitalspy website:

Michael Jackson's dad has reportedly admitted that his son is worth more now that he is dead.

Joe Jackson revealed on US TV show Extra that he is still learning to cope following the loss of the King of Pop at the age of 50.

The 80-year-old said that his son was "worth more dead than alive", adding: "But I’d rather have him alive.

"I cry when I'm off to myself and I start thinking about things we went through."

Yeah, then he skips over to an ATM, checks his balance and suddenly all seems well with the world. He really is a piece of work.

A bit like the reading age tests we did at school.

As we all know, there is an age after which we become unreceptive to change and our tastes remain fixed by those earlier influences.

In respect of new music styles and genres. The AVERAGE female's musical age is 18 and an AVERAGE male's is 30. The average WORD reader's is 41.

This is based on extensive research i.e. being forced to have Chris Evans or Alan Carr on the car radio instead of the iPod and thus noting the high proportion of female listenership based on those contacting the shows and their music requests, plus the CD collections of pretty much any female friend.

I would acknowledge that the average woman's emotional age is considerably higher than the male.

I remember watching a short TV series which was basically someone's Super 8 film of a journey across the USA taken from car windows and train windows set to americana / folk-ish music. No dialogue or voice-over.

It was a simple and delightful programme and I wondered if anyone can ID it as I would rather like to get a DVD if it exists.

I think the footage was taken in the '70's (or if not the cine effect gave it that feel)
I think it was shown on telly in the early 90's possibly late 80's
I think it was on BBC2, possibly, maybe C4
I seem to recall it was shown later afternoon at the weekends

Dreadfully vague I know but my mind is not what it used to be.

My wife and I had reason to be sat watching telly in a hospital ward for an evening last week. It was a cheap LCD telly with the sound set at an unobtrusive level and for some reason the picture was black and white. At first I just saw this as a minor inconvenience, the soaps were on so no problem but later it was switched to Poirot and then Blue Murder. Both are adequate but formulaic whodunnits I can take or leave but watching them in black-and-white genuinely gave both shows a sense of moodiness, foreboding even. It's one thing to watch Control or The Elephant Man this way but from now on I will watch The Bill and CSI in a mono stylee.