Heard

Rhapsody in Blue - Live by Tommy Smith, Brian Kellock Scottish National Jazz Orchestra. Thrilling, driving music that repays repeated listening. Thanks to Declan of this parish for refreshing my interest in Miles Davis live 70s work - Agharta is particularly striking. There is some serious hoodoo going on there.
I am also grateful to Retro Man for introducing me to Soundtrack Of Our Lives, who I think I will be listening to more in future. And lastly I've been listening to a lot of Neil Young, and I've reached the conclusion that I like his live recordings better than the studio ones - they breath more and he seems more directly connected, even on the studio recordings that are as-live.

Read

Shakey by Jim McDonough - hence all the Neil Young listening. What a driven individual! True to his artistic vision, however that expresses itself, and however that bursts anyone else's plans. If you're the slightest bit interested in Neil Young I recommend this book - it is packed with anecdotes and details and insight.

Seen

The Real Van Gogh - the Artist and his Letters at the Royal Academy of Arts. This is the show that has blown away the "loony artist" school of thought by showing how much preparation and craft went into his work, and also showing his artistic development - the astonishing use of colour was a natural development.

AOB

I was lucky enough to attend two Massive meetups in the month - great fun, loads of music chat and life chat, best wishes to all the Glasgow and London crews.

Listening.
A lot of Piaf and I seem to have developed a transient obsession with Lake Charles by Lucinda Williams.
Reading.
The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo,thought I'd better get round to it before taking in the film.A couple of books on Senile Dementia.
Watched.
Northern Exposure all six series in the vain hope of it cheering me up,It's been a sod of a month.Oh,also watched Zombieland and A Serious Man.
Finally.
I would like to apologise to any one I've pissed off.Sorry, as I said it's been a really crappy month.My bad.Won't happen again.

"Hunting High & Low" by A-HA.

I don't know why but am going with it until it passes.

...: Shutter Island (ok) - Princess & the Frog (ok) - Nanny McPhee & the Big Bang (good) - Masterchef (ok) - Delicious Miss Dahl (poor and, at the same time, excellent);

Read: A Stained White Radiance by James Lee Burke (excellent);

Heard: Plastic Beach/Gorillaz (good) - Wolves & Thieves/Goldheart Assembly (ok) - Here, My Dear/Marvin Gaye (excellent).

Read: The Adventures of Sherlock Homes, bought it an age ago as part of a box set and ,although enjoyable, I feel it has dated badly. The endings are just a little too neat and the reasoning often implausible. I concede that I am probabaly missing the point here.
Heard: mostly back catalogue with little new to divert me. I have just discovered Gill Scott Heron with 'Secrets' a particular favourite.
Seen: a 70's film with Richard Pryor and Harvey Keitel called 'Blue Collar' about factory workers in Detroit which managed to be gritty, funny and thought provoking. Quite a hat trick. It all ends badly, one of them dies the others fall out.

Heard. The only new CD I have bought this year is Midlake - The Courage Of Others. I really like trying to sing along to it but know I will get bored of it soon. I still like to physically own good music, as opposed to download it, for when I dip into its charms again.

Lots of old stuff as I own up to being a charity shop magpie, selling on at a profit for my charity. Fortunate to find a bag full of The Church, Julian Cope, Fall, New Order profitable items but the one that I will keep is the Robbie Williams CD single Old before I Die. It contains the most utterly, delightfully dreadful version of Bowie's Kooks you will ever hear!

Read Keep dipping into Bill Bruford's autobiography but distracted by another charity shop bargain, Michael Palin Diaries 1969 - 1979 (a snip at 90p). 608 pages of a personal insight into the birth of Monty Python, or Bunn Wackett Buzzard Stubble and Boot, as an earlier draft.

Seen Staying indoors with a new HD super-duper TV I have to confess to being addicted to the Dog Whisperer, Cesar Millan. 1 or 2 hours per night. I scoffed when I read he was touring the UK in March. Playing arenas ferchrissakes!! Now I wish I had been part of the sell-out shows. Helps if you like lots of dogs. I confess to being a dog owner and have bred/shown dogs in the past, but none as badly behaved as Cesar starts off with. *sigh* I remember dear Barbara Woodhouse. Si-TT!

Share I'm going to see Peter Kay next week. Not some massive arena gig at £50 a ticket. Nay lad, this is a more intimate soiree for about 200 people in Bury as part of his "secret" warm-up shows. Ticket £15, all proceeds to Haiti appeal. Glad winter's over...

Oh nearly forgot the Manchester Massive March Mingle. It was a brilliant night out with brilliant folk. So many tales, so many tastes in music. Hope to make the next one and you should too.

Heard

Nothing particularly new, but have been reminding myself just how much I love the Cocteau Twins. The Pink Opaque came up on shuffle yesterday and I had to stop what I was doing to bask in the 'shimmering waves of plangent beauty'.

Read

In common with half the Massive, I am currently half way through Nick Kent's 'Apathy for the Devil' and whilst I can understand some of the comments made by the naysayers about the style, it has taken me right back to my teens, buying the weeklies and looking for the latest articles by Kent and Murray, reading about a world I could only dream about.

Seen

Following the advice of the Massive, I bought 2001 on Blu-Ray to watch on the new telly. And was gobsmacked. I also realised that, despite knowing the story from start to finish, I don't think I'd ever actually watched the film before. It's hard to believe it was made over 40 years ago. Plus it's got Rigsby in it.

AOB

A good week all round, really. After 13 months out of work, I finally persuaded someone to employ me again. Start work on the 19th.

Read
The Scorpion's Sweet Venom- The Diary of a Brazilian Call Girl. Picked it up for a dollar and gave a silent "Woo-hoo!" as I did so. It's exactly what it promises but even so it's not recommended reading. It's very poorly written, even allowing for the fact it was originally in Portuguese and may have been mangled in the translation.

Heard
Jann Arden - Uncover Me
album of covers by the Canadian singer/songwriter. It's very good, her version of Love is a Battlefield knocks the Pat Benetar effort for six.

Saw
To Die For
Has aged very well, would have been an excellent choice for the recent "Discussing movies with teenagers" thread. Would make a great double-bill with King of Comedy.

Read: The Penguin Stephen Leacock. A second-hand purchase. An anthology of his essays and short pieces. Written in the early twentieth century they have a grace and pace not found anywhere any more. Also 'Empire' by Niall Ferguson. Marvellous distillation of how Great Britain robbed the Spanish of all their gear, copied how the Dutch ran theirs and ultimately sowed the seeds of nationalism thereby ending it all. Am currently in two minds about 'Wolf Hall'. It's fast paced and incident rich. But for Christ sake, Hilary - who's speaking? 'He' seems to be every significant male character.

Seen: 2012. Jesus H.

Heard: A Steely Dan best of. 'Cousin Dupree' is a highlight. Loose-limbed funk with a slighlty creepy lyric. 'How 'bout a kiss for your cousin Dupree?' I think it is. Do correct me if I'm wrong. Also The Allman Brothers Live at the Beacon Theatre. I thought them a little stodgy in the past but this is an improvisational delight. The Unthanks 'Newcastle Lullaby' Sigh.

Heard

Nothing much new, re-listening to Maxinquaye by Tricky...wonderful album.
Podcasts, new to Danny Baker Show, but it is very funny...I dismissed him as an idiot in his "Chris Evans/Gazza" period, but I am warming to him, and he is a great radio DJ.

Read

Currently reading - Flawed Genius, a book about some of Scottish football's more interesting characters
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Flawed-Genius-Footballs-Destructive-Mavericks/dp...

Once I am done with that, its Mark Kermode's book and Charlie Brooker's The Hell of It all

Seen
With a 10mth old son, we rarely venture to the cinema, so its DVD's round our way.

An Education was actually disappointing in my opinion, it was pretty hyped up but it felt a bit flat to me.
Funny People (W/ Adam Sandler), wasn't expecting a great deal, but thought it had some funny moments.
Still to see The Hurt Locker, plan to see it this weekend.

Anything else?, ran a half marathon a few weeks ago, new personal best time.

Heard:

Lord Executor on the Word CD. Is there a better track out there at present? I seriously cannot stop whistling it....

Read:

The FT. Financial Management Magazine. CIMA Study Guides for Enterprise Strategy, Performance Strategy and Financial Strategy. I have my accountancy finals in 7 weeks. Not happy.

Seen:

The Good Wife, Flash Forward and Glee. All disposable, all nonsense, and all utterly brilliant.

say that, despite the snowy start to Glasgow's Summer, today I am looking out from my lofty garret about 30k South East of Glasgow at beautiful blue skies and bright sunshine. The hills of the Southern lowlands are sparkling in the distance as the last (hopefully) snows of Spring slowly melt.

I too have been reading short stories of Sherlock Holmes - a book given to me by my mum some years ago after my dad passed away which I studiously ignored for about 40 years when it sat on dad's bookshelf. It is totally brilliant bunkum. There is a 'slagging' culture amongst my group of friends (if you ain't getting slagged you ain't nobody)and I reckon Sherlock would fit in pretty well with some of his put-downs of the trusty Watson. I think you just go with it.

Been listening to a bluegrass anthology double CD I got in Fopp Byres Road Glasgow for £3 - a bargain with everyone from Bill Monroe & His Bluegrass Boys to Hobo Jack Adkins. Brilliant.

No telly for about 18 months now and haven't managed to the movies. However, I did pick up the repeats of the Yellowstone documentary on iplayer. I watched this first time round and it is splendid. I may be ending my self-imposed exile from TV soon and investing in the latest digital, HD, blue ray whatever. So, I will be looking for input from the massive.

Otherwise, the walking boots are out again. To the hills!

Heard
I've been playing the new Joanna Newsom album almost daily over the past month and I've fallen for it in a big way. Despite never being a fan before, I've also been defending her honour in various disagreements with friends and acquaintances. To paraphrase Voltaire (even though it's a misattribution in the first place, "I may not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it, unless you're saying bad things about Joanna Newsom, whereupon I'll poke you in the eye with a stick".

Also, the new album by Jaga Jazzist (One Armed Bandit) is exceptionally good, and following a successful haul at a second hand record shop a couple of weeks ago, Steely Dan's Gaucho and Graham Coxon's Happiness in Magazines are also on fairly heavy rotation. Slightly disappointed with the new She & Him record though...

Read
It's taken me three months to get halfway through Suze Rotolo's A Freewheelin' Time and now I'm thoroughly fed up with it. Steven C of this parish kindly sent me the Nick Kent book this week, so I'd imagine that's most of my evening weekend taken up.

Seen
I don't think I've seen a single film all month, but Monday nights have been an absolute joy on TV recently with University Challenge followed by Only Connect followed by Glee.

Heard: This month I have mostly listening to Midlake - both The Courage of Others and The Trials of Van Occupanther. (I'm a late adopter.)

Read: I Don't Care About Your Band: What I Learned From Indie Rockers, Trust Funders, Pornographers, Felons, Faux Sensitive Hipsters, And Other Guys I've Dated by Julie Klausner. The title is pretty self-explanatory (!) so I'll just add that this is an incredibly funny dating memoir that should be required reading for all women over the age of 16. Also read Girl Power: The Nineties Revolution In Music by Marisa Meltzer which traces a musical path through the 1990s from a feminist perspective. Here's a Spotify playlist of most of the music mentioned in the book to get you in the mood. (Sadly some of the bands weren't on Spotify - whither Ovarian Trolley, I hear a nation cry out as one. Also I could only bring myself to include one Spice Girls song.)

Seen: The XX, live at Leeds University Union. Pretty amazing.

Read: Peter Hook's The Hacienda: How Not To Run A Club, a great story told ploddingly.

Heard: Gorillaz, some brilliant stuff. The lovely Swedish-pop-goes-shoegazing of The Radio Dept's Clinging To A Scheme. Can't quite get into the well-reviewed Frightened Rabbit.

Seen: Alice In Wonderland. Some good cameos by the British comedians (eg Lucas, Whitehouse) but it doesn't add up to a film to me. The 3D was pointless. MicMacs I liked, charming and funny and silly. This season of Mad Men has been on top form.

Books
City of Lies by Alafair Burke – New York-set police whodunit has neither the stylistic oomph of Manhattan crime lord Lawrence Block nor the deeper moral overtones of either Burke’s father – the great James Lee or the holy trinity of modern East Coast American Noir: Lehane, Pelecanos and Price. One for those who like Jonathan Kellerman or Robert Crais.
Havanna by Washington Post Film critic Stephen Hunter, a great Cold War thriller set in the 50s in Cuba. Vibrant historical details give it authenticity and the appearance of real figures like Castro and Hemingway adds to that sense of authenticity.

Films
On DVD - Matteo Garrone’s wonderful Gomorrah (2008) which shows the brutal and all pervasive depths to which the mafia permeates life in Southern Italy. From nonsensical drug turf wars which needlessly cost lives to the all too often seen ‘innocent boy to drug mule’ motif to the white collar political criminals in the pay of the mob, it is the best film on mafia ever made.
Mesrine a career defining performance from Vincent Cassel, it is the two part real life story of 60s/70s French gangster Jacques Mesrine. Breathtaking violence, glamour, daring escapes, heists, gambling, shagging and media manipulation - brilliant.
Tonight, I’m snuggling down with a 1974 paranoia-fest double bill with Francis Ford Coppola’s The Conversation and Alan J. Pakula’s The Parallax View.

Music
Amadou and Mariam for the last couple of days.
Reggae star George Faith turned up during a randomiser session as did the Nigerian-born ‘calypso’ star Ambrose Campbell whose work features on the now several years old ‘London is the Place for Me’ compilation I found thanks to Du Noyer and The Word.

Book - Scum of the Earth by Arthur Koestler. Hungarian communist jew trapped in France after the defeat by Germany tries to make sense of what is happening to him. Great read.

Film - watched Quadrophenia last night for the first time in an age. Enjoyed it thoroughly. Will be ritually watching The Long Good Friday tonight, as every year. That will be great too.

Read Have hardly read a book for ages-and was, frankly, worried about it. So very pleased that taking two weeks off made a difference at last.

Read Mark Haddon's "The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time",
Patrick Hamilton's "Hangover Square", and the bits of the posthumous best of Alan Coren that I didn't already have. Started an extraordinarily bold book called "Proust was a Neuroscientist", hope to say more on this when I've finished it. Bit of a theme developing here--have some long overdue books to read like Sacks' "Awakenings" on the shelf. Also have a few others unfinished like Bobby Fischer goes to War, and Peter Coyote's memoir "Sleeping Where I Fall" that I really want to try & pick up again. Also dipping in to Ballard's "Miracles of Life" which seems to be even better than his fiction in some ways.

Seen Not sure that they were all strictly in the month, but all these were memorable: Edward Woodward's 1990, first Episode; the docs on the Pentagon Papers and Dennis Wilson pointed to by people here; James May's full size Spitfire [mixture of TV, iPlayer & YouTube etc]

Heard Last live music was actually in Feb, and one of the shows in this series:
http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/music/...
was every bit as good as described, but musical pleasures have been many. One standout is the Classics for Pleasure Mahler 4 by Jascha Horenstein, really great to own this again having had the LP.

AOB Going on a whale watching cruise with these people
http://www.pacificwhale.org/
good enough in itself, and then
having incredible bonus of literally dozens of Spinner Dolphins turning up, several doing this

have kept me really busy at work, so haven't had much leisure time recently, but here goes:

Read
One Day by David Nicholls. Picked this up on the off chance after seeing it mentioned by Tracey Thorn and Giles Smith in this month's Word. A hugely enjoyable story of a couple who are friends for years before getting together.

Seen
Meeting Joe Strummer by Paul Hodson. This play was a Fringe First winner in Edinburgh a few years ago and is currently on tour again. Two fortysomething Clash fans meet again by chance at a Joe Strummer & The Mescaleros gig in 2002 - the one shortly before Joe's death where Mick Jones got up to play with him on stage for the first time in 20 years. The show jumps back and forward in time through the friendship, soundtracked by The Clash. Great stuff.

Heard
I just got The Sweetest Feeling - A Van McCoy Songbook 1962-1973, and it's been on repeat for the past few days. It's another of those Ace compilations where they focus on songwriters and / or producers [previous ones have dealt with Bert Berns, Goffin & King, Jackie DeShannon Randy Newman etc]. This one is chock full of great songs that will come as a real surprise to anyone who has only ever heard of Van McCoy as the guy who did "The Hustle" - he wrote When You're Young And In Love, Baby I'm Yours, Stop And Get A Hold Of Myself and loads of others. If 60s sweet soul is your thing it's a great selection.

SEEN - Rome. I've finally finished series 2 of this DVD box set. Explicit sex and violence. Apart from that it is excellent!

HEARD - John Hiatt's latest "The Open Road". I've already written something about it in 'my night in with'.

2 CDs by Paul Simon. Self Titled and There Goes Rymin' Simon. Last month I was reading a Paul Simon bio and I realised I had more solo efforts by Paul Weller than Paul Simon...jeez! This has now been rectified. Excellent albums btw.

READ - A Snowball In Hell by Christopher Brookmyre. Second time of reading, so much better though it is far fetched. A great laugh though.

The Last Mad Surge Of Youth by Mark Hodkinson. It was nice to get away from crime thrillers for a wee change but this type of book is not for me.

The Way Home by George Pelecanos. His latest crime thriller. I didn't like this one though my wife did. That's 5 of his I've read....there won't be any more for a while.

Tokyo Year Zero by David Peace. I haven't actually read this. I got to page 60 and gave up....too much hard work for me.

Read

Unreasonable Behaviour by Don McCullin.

For someone who admits to having had next to no formal education and is dyslexic, McCullin really writes well. This account of his life up until 1990 is a harrowing read, packing as much of an emotional punch as his celebrated photographs. He has seen and documented such terrible things that it is a wonder he is still alive. The real tragedy of course is that so many of those he photographed aren't.

Civilisation (BFI TV Classics) by Jonathan Conlin.

A very interesting analysis of the celebrated television series. Conlin sheds light on the complex evolution of Kenneth Clark's magnum opus and the differing reactions to it in the UK and US. Recommended.

Classic Who - The Hinchcliffe Years by Adrian Rigelsford.

I picked this up in Oxfam a couple of days ago and it's a real treat for an old school Doctor Who fan like me. Philip Hinchcliffe was the producer of the programme during the classic Tom Baker run that encompassed stories like Pyramids of Mars, Genesis of the Daleks and The Talons of Weng-Chiang.

Seen

The Sweeney box set.

I never watched the programme at the time, so it's pretty fresh for me. I love the grime and grit of mid-70s London and the fact that you could still get away with using words like 'tarts'.

Heard

I've been listening to a lot of classical music, such as Grieg's Piano Concerto performed by Sviatoslav Richter, Mendelssohn's Violin Concerto performed by Yehudi Menuhin and a selection of Sibelius' orchestral works conducted by Herbert von Karajan.

Don McCullin at the Oxford Literary Festival. The great photographer gave a talk in support of his new book Southern Frontiers: A Journey Across The Roman Empire. He did revisit his time as a war photographer, but one gets the distinct impression that he would be happy to leave that period of his life behind him if he could. Sadly it is only too clear from looking at his strong but haunted face that countless scenes of carnage still burn all too brightly in his memory.

Heard...

Its been a lot of live albums this month - Bowie / Reality Tour, Ben Harper / Relentless, PSB / Pandemonium & the Tom Petty Live Anthology. Scattered amongst that has been the Midlake / Courage Of Others which is still on heavy rotation on both CD and on the iPod in the car.

Seen...

Cinema has been kids movies - How to Train Your Dragon and Dairy of a Wimpy Kid (both okay). Was on a business trip to the US and with 17hrs of flights from here in Singapore, managed to catch up on a few things that had passed me (with the kids being the main driving force for cinema these days). Watched District 9 (excellent), Hurt Locker (very good, but I think my expectations were too high....), Damned United (excellent), Men Who Stare At Goats (okay) and Public Enemies (okay). With traveling though , I did manage to miss Alice In Wonderland which was high on the list.

Read....

Caught up on two that have been on the shelf for a while - Ian McEwans "On Chesil Beach" and Iain Banks "Steep Approach To Garbadale". Enjoyed both.

read:
The New Confessions ~ William Boyd, a major let down after Any Human Heart
I'm now onto Hooky's How Not to Run a club, expertly described by Monsignor_Bonehead above, I have Maconie's High Teas lined up as the antidote to two disappointments

watched:
CASH a pretty poor thriller/heist/caper that didn't really know what it wanted to be; An Education - what all the fuss is about is beyond me, it was no more than a BBC2 Sunday night drama from the late 70s; 9, really enjoyable story and looks great; Dude Where's My Car? moronic but not in an endearing Bill & Ted/Wayne's World/Beavis & Butthead way; The Hurt Locker first 1hr 20mins 0 I hope it picks up; Flight 666, most enjoyable; Harry Brown, brilliant Caine really shines and any duff movies he's ever made are all forgiven by this performance

heard:
The Ramones ~ Its Alive; PWEI ~ Wise Up Suckers (best of); Roxy Music, mainly All I Want Is You, over and over again - just adore it

aob:
MacMassive Meet#1, good people excellent chat, new mates; a massif swelling 27" iMac (as well documented elsewhere) my love affair with Apple begins all over again

Seen

I've been using my lunchtimes at work to good effect, by watching various films that I should've really watched a long time ago. This month's genre seems to focused on the second world war. Over the past four weeks I have seen 'Life is Beautiful' (excellent, as you probably all know already); 'Il Postino' (again, very good.) and 'The Pianist' (very good, but I found Polanski's decision to film it in English and German slightly off putting) One of the reasons why I liked the other two was because they were in the 'correct' language.

Also caught the second episode of 'The Man Who Cycled The Americas' on BBC1 the other day, which I rather enjoyed.

Read

Can't say I've read much this month. Other than what I've been reading for the last three months: 'The Victorians' by A. N. Wilson.

Heard

The month began with an obsession with The Smiths and ended with 'Rocket' by Goldfrapp being my favourite song of the year so far. Inbetween, I discovered the brilliance of both Field Music and Goldheart Assembly.

Read: Behind the Scenes at the Museum by Kate Atkinson. Stunning debut novel. I must admit I don`t generally read women authors ( I know, I know ) but I found this to be profound, funny and heartbreaking or maybe Im just menopausal
Bad Science by Ben Goldacre. Enjoyable kicking of the quacks and nonsense mongers and they richly deserve it.

Heard: Listening to a lot of Ramsey Lewis. Great for cooking to. Also heard Mumford and Sons , Vampire Weekend and the new one by Midlake

Seen: Rewatched Band of Brothers, extraordinary miniseries. The new one from HBO ,The Pacific, has not impressed me too much so far.
Sons of Anarchy, well worth it although the whole Hamlet thing was a wee bit belaboured
Glee, Glee, Glee. Love it. Definetly getting menopausal

It's been a good month for reading. Started with Perfecting Sound Forever by Greg Milner which someone here pointed me at. Fine book. Ta muchly. Went on to The Checklist Manifesto by Atul Gawande which is a fascinating book by an American surgeon about.. well.. checklists. Have moved on to The Music Instinct by Philip Ball as per the Podcast. Great book thus far. Mr Ball is a fine, fine science writer and I'll have to have a crack at some of his other stuff.

I have listened to a lot of Splittsville and have enjoyed Head First by Goldfrapp even though I think Rocket is trite rubbish and well below their usual standards.

Watching? Not a lot. BBC4 has been catching my eye. Bill Buford's Fat Man In A White Hat has been a fascinating, intelligent and beautifully filmed bit of foodie TV.

Read: Latest issue of The Word, The Independent (daily), but not much else

Seen: The Damned United, Heavy Metal Britannia, several Classic Albums on Sky Arts, Only Connect (best thing on TV), Snyth Britannia (repeat - missed it first time round).
Waiting for new series of Ashes to Ashes (starting tonight)

Heard: Following Heavy Metal Britannia, listened to a load of Iron Maiden (especially Number Of The Beast), finally bought an album by The Band (albeit The Best Of ..) and eventually got round to listening to the last Arctic Monkeys album (bought it, but never listened to it (forgot I had it!))

Read: Bicycle Diaries by David Byrne. Suits my current reading style of not having the time to get into a book properly as its ideal to pick up every now and again. It is very good and manages to be amusing and not up its arse. Word magazine is the only other paper based thing I have read (and I like to longer articles). Everything else is a website (BBC, Telegraph, NewsNow).

Heard: Still listening to Mumford & Sons which was a Christmas present. The new David Ford and Two Door Cinema Club have got a few plays. Last week or so I have been listening to The Go-Betweens. Finding You is a beautiful song.

Seen: Pineapple Dance Studio is a must see in our house. As is 24 (which is as great as ever - albeit in a way that beggars belief factually). Just watched Fast & Furious on Sky. Tosh. Enjoyed the Eddie Izzard marathon documentary. He really is a splendid fellow.

AOB:

Hearing On regular rotation has been 'Oversteps' the new one from Autechre which is astonishingly intricate and (by their standards) quite gorgeous. I've followed them since the beginning in the early 90s and they're still able to surprise and delight.

Reading Grace Maxwell's 'Falling and Laughing' about Edwyn Collins which is finally out in paperback and illustrated with Edwyn's artwork. Not finished it yet but so far an incredible and inspirational story very well told.

Seeing Eddie Izzard running and running and running and running. Masterchef, and some of the fab stuff that the Massive recommended on this thread.

Heard:

Tunng: ...And Then We Saw Land. Some great little songs on this latest effort, but oddly I find the sound a little cheesy every so often. For my money they should steer clear of electric guitars until they've honed the sound a bit. There are some goodies on here, though: "Hustle" and "Sashimi" (despite the guitar sound) are cracking, and the Russell Lissack remix of "Hustle" at the end is, rather unfortunately, the best thing here: an absolute techno-house belter.

The Kissaway Trail: Sleep Mountain. I really like this record. It manages to pull off sounding totally euphoric, but in this very cold, brittle way. Must be a Scandinavian thing. You know that kind of winter morning where the sky is brilliant blue, everything crunches, and you have to wear more layers than Ranulph Fiennes? That's what this record sounds like.

Drive-By Truckers: The Big To-Do. You get absolutely the tin-based advertising with The DBTs. Good-time southern-rock boogie, in essentials. The opener, "Daddy Learned To Fly", is lyrically rather sweet and affecting, but pounds along like you'd expect. My stand-out song on this is "The Fourth Night Of My Drinking" - a slightly sozzled, lazy rock-through of a rather fun story.

Pearl Jam: Ten - Legacy Edition. I just downloaded the Brendan O'Brien remixes from this, since I own the original, but I was curious to see what he'd make of it. I'm a huge fan of the production jobs O'Brien has done with later PJ albums like "Yield", and he's not disappointed here. "Ten" was notoriously over-produced, bloated and swathed in reverb. O'Brien has stripped all the reverb and echo off the master, and - so it sounds - EQd the guitars to be less trebly (although, that might be just a result of the mix being drier). Jeff Ament's bass, which is the bedrock of PJ's sound, is much more audible, and the whole record has a detail and focus that was missing from the original. This remix/remaster is an unqualified success - your ears will tell you so from the moment the guitars come in on "Once". Fantastic stuff.

Read
Charlie Brooker: Dawn Of The Dumb. Still hilarious, still savage, still wrong, still actually rather sweet. The thing people often overlook with CB is the fact that his rants are born of love. His TV writing is intercut with more "general interest" stuff here, though, which is a shame: TV is where his heart is. This is still a cracker, though.

Laurie Bauer (ed.) et al: Language Myths. A smug, self-satisfied collection of academic demolitions of myths like "languages shouldn't change" and "French is a logical language". I wasn't aware the latter was even a myth, and that's one of the big issues with this book: it sets up straw man after straw man. I mean, I agree with a lot of what's said here: I just don't think it's well expressed in this book. It got my goat from the preface onward, where the editors set themselves up as experts who know better than anyone else. They may well be, but if you're going to claim that, you'd better make sure your arguments are watertight. They're not. Irritating.

Saw
Lots and lots of The West Wing. This is my third complete run-through, and it never gets old. Idealised, mawkish and sanitised it may be, but it's superbly written and beautifully funny.

Read

I’m about half way through The Music Instinct which I’m not sure I am enjoying but it is really making my think about music in a way I haven’t before – and that must be a good thing.

Also read Bowie in Berlin, which explains some of my listening.

Heard:

Joanna Newsom which really is superb, as JoeR said above I’ve been playing it daily. Also lots of Bowie, esp Heroes, and from that to Cluster and Eno.

On the back of the Glasgow meet up have been listening to Big Star, which now seems sad but still timely as lots of coverage to feed my interest.

Also, the Gorillaz album, the last third of which is quite stunning.

Seen

Finished BSG Series 2, and have Series 3 at the ready; although that now needs to compete with Homicide which has just arrived. Went to see Shutter Island, and wished I hadn’t bothered.

On a different tack, went to see Emma Pollock – who was much more impressive than I had expected, but didn’t play any ‘old’

Read: Didn't enjoy Last Surge of Youth as much as Believe the Sign - didn't really believe the main character - his development from charismatic, right on indie type to throbbing babe magnet wasn't explained - maybe couldn't be explained. Didn't care for the approach to alcoholism by the author either.
More enjoyable - The Unwritten and Mysterius the Unfathomable - two excellent graphic novels that have nothing to do with superheroes.
Seen: Nothing. - cbeebies, that's all. Seem to have given up on Dexter midway through series 2. Have sadly seen the inexorable slide to disappointment at Elland Road.
Heard: The Beatles! Actually borrowed and listened to some Beatles - Help and Hard Day's Night. Dull as fuck. They were the McFly of their day. Not sure I've heard anything new that was good. Got a lot of 10000 Maniacs cds - but only really need In My Tribe - an excellent record.

I'm a sucker for anything cycling related, but even so The Man Who Cycled the Americas with Mark Beaumont is truly wonderful TV.
From Alaska to Argentina on a bike save for a wee quick dash through Honduras thanks to civil unrest after a military coup.
Needs to get 6,000 calories down him daily and keep hydrated.
Just done the last two episodes on the iPlayer.
Catch up on episodes one and two here and here respectively.
Apologies to those outside of the iPlayer's reach.

SEEN

- Rejoice, all those who were spared the pitiful sight of me attempting to ward-off encroaching illness by cocooning myself in a duvet and watching Blade Runner for it’s colourful, Bollywood-style musical interludes, and cheerful message of humanity and hope.

- On a happier note, last week, one of the volunteers at the hospital where I work handed me a small bag containing numerous action thriller DVDs, that they have been giving away with The Daily Mail. Yesterday I watched The Eagle Has Landed (Nazis invade Norfolk). Later tonight, if I am not too tired, I will sit down in front of The Fourth Protocol.

HEARD

- All 16 tracks on Plastic Beach - the latest offering from Gorillaz - are jostling to be my favourite song on the album. Currently it’s Damon Albarn’s copywriter’s ability to condense a world of resigned melancholy into a single line (Broken’s defeated chorus “there’s nothing you can do for them...”) that has won out. A few days from now it could be the day-glo advertising jingle -Superfast Jellyfish, or the progressively urgent stomp of Glitter Freeze’s glaring electro glam.

I have read many reviews of this album and interestingly everybody seems to have a different idea regarding which tracks are filler. Maybe there’s just too much, coming at you from too many different angles, to be processed in one go. It’s the first time that I’ve really liked a Gorillaz record, as opposed to just admiring it from a distance.

- My iPod’s shuffle function has been drip-feeding me tracks from The Golden Age by American Music Club. I bought the album when it came out in 2008 and it’s been slowly taking root in my subconscious ever since, revealing Mark Eitzel as one of the most insightful lyricists of his generation.

- A man in the grip of a mid-life crisis, but lacking the funds to buy a decent sports car, or the good looks and wit to ensnare a younger lover, can always find solace in the broad church of metal. Delmar - the 1998 debut by psychedelic, Argentinean stoner rock band - Los Natas- is a good album rather than a great one. The highlight for me is El Negro, which grafts the kind of skull-crushing power chords imitated by Beavis and Butthead, to a tremendous intergalactic whooshing noise, reminiscent of what you imagine outer space might sound like when you’re five.

- As an early riser I am happy to confirm the belated reinstatement of the dawn chorus, which seems to be gaining in richness and diversity by the day. The birds in our garden have a new warning call that roughly translates as: “That half-naked man’s back again and he’s frisbeeing slices of mouldy bread across the lawn.”

READ

Pulp sci-fi writer, H.P. Lovecraft, knew that for a story to truly unsettle a reader, an author needed to spend a lot of time building a convincing setting in which their nameless horror could fester. It was precisely this kind of meticulous detail that drove me mad as a teenager, when I wanted him to stop faffing around and get right to the monsters.

Now in my mid-thirties, and lacking the teenage offspring whose lifestyle choices might provide me with a mounting sense of impotent dread, I appreciate the care that Lovecraft took in creating this sensation with his prose. Last week I read his novella - The Case of Charles Dexter Ward - in which a global network of evil old men operate an international trade in the remains of the dead, who they resurrect and subsequently torture for occult secrets and information.

- When you sit down with the biography of an artist, you do so on the understanding that you will never see the subject’s work in the same light again. Thereafter, your aesthetic response will be forever coloured by what you know about their life. I am currently 50 pages into Peter Ackroyd’s biography of William Blake (Blake) and one thing already apparent is that artists who are celebrated for their childlike vision are often unflatteringly childish individuals. Ackroyd has a knack for taking quotes from Blake’s poetry and placing them in the context of things that he saw and experienced during his life.

Heard: Lost & Found: Real R&B and Soul
Compilation of old tracks put together by Keb Darge and Paul Weller. Enjoyed it because it doesn't feature the same old tracks that usually get recycled on these things (I own a lot of soul music). Good for setting a mood, though perhaps lacking in one or two standout tracks that make you want to explore that artist further.

Read: Halfway through Crisis? What Crisis? Britain in the 1970s by Alwyn Turner. Excellent new take on slightly well-worn ground, and very good on the fight for the 'soul of the nation', between the opposing ideologies of Tony Benn & Enoch Powell. I gather the same author's got a follow-up on the 1980s due out soon.

Seen: very sad at the end of another series of University Challenge. I managed to beat Guttenplan to a maths question in the final (though he wiped the floor with me for the rest of the programme), and have been dining out on the glory ever since.

Heard:
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In a silent way - Miles Davis. I know it is several years after release but it's new to me and I love it. I can see how Zawinul and Shorter got the ideas for Black Market and I have never heard Mclaughlin so understated.
The Big to do - Drive by Truckers - I love this band, they write great songs and can play a bit.
The last album by the great Bobby Charles - Timeless. Not his best in fairness but anyone who has close friends such as Dr.John and the great Sonny Landreth in tow is gonna make great music and this album is no exception.
Also, late entry - Magnetised Motherfuckers - a 4 cd bootleg compilation of Steve Earle rarities - thanks to BigStevieCook for this recommendation.

Read
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No ifs or butts - The autobiography of the former Birmingham City and Notts Forest hard man Kenny Burns. Played football when it was a game for men. Interesting insight into a former favourite Birmingham player.
Am halfway through One Day and echo the comments elsewhere that it is really very good.

Seen
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Alice in Wonderland which I thoroughly enjoyed although the Jabberwocky wasn't nearly as scary as he should have been. One of Tim Burtons better films.