deconstructing the chatshow format

Video YouTube has launched an area for television and films. It would be remiss of me not to point to some classics and whatnot:

The Quatermass Experiment: As live production created for BBC Four featuring Jason Flemyng in the titular role. Also Mark Gattis and one David Tennant, who found out he was going to be playing Doctor Who during the rehearsals for this.

This is Dom Joly: It is indeed. Joly's attempt at deconstructing the chatshow format in much the same way he did with hidden camera thingies. The number of views it currently has on YouTube also reflects the number of people who tuned into its TV broadcast, which is a shame because parts of it are very good indeed.

Alfred Hitchcock Presents: The Cheney Vase: A rare outing for the director in the series which to which he gave his name. Surprisingly cinematic considering the studio constraints and budget, which rather reflects his talent.

Jupiter Moon: Fire Of IO: Before Defying Gravity, there was. The original sci-fi soap opera created for the Galaxy Channel on the soon to be defunct and merged with Sky squarial satellite service BSB. Early emergence of Anna Chancellor. See if you can watch it without expecting a cut to TARDIS materialisation scene.

Highlander The TV Series: Though only the patchy first season mainly consisted of Duncan McCleod slaying some immortal or other on a weekly basis and me trying to work out what accent Adrian Paul was using.

NOVA: For a while PBS's NOVA and the BBC's Horizon series included repurposed documentaries flying back and forth across the Atlantic. That seems to be less of a case now, what with the BBC series relying on a more presenter led format.

Doctor Who: Curse of the Fatal Death: Rowan Atkinson and bunch of other people play the Doctor for Comic Relief using a script written by new nu-Who supremo Steven Moffat. In 1999 this looked like a viable option for the return of the series to television. Features in Hugh Grant, for a few seconds, one of the greatest performances ever in the role.

Classic Doctor Who: Sporadic stories, some of which stretch the description of "Classic" to breaking point. At present, Edge of Destruction, The Krotons, Carnival of Monsters, Planet of the Spiders, The Masque of Mandragora, The Awakening, The Caves of Androzani, and if you'll pardon my language, fucking The Twin Dilemma, voted in a recent poll as the worst story of all time.

Know Your Meme: One of the benefits of creating content for an online audience is that you can create content that only an online audience would be interested in. And thank goodness. Hilarious and informative.

North Square: Much of 4oD's content has pitched up on YouTube (including Dennis Potter's posthumous Cold Lazarus), which gives me another opportunity to recommend this rare lawyer drama from the turn of the decade featuring Rupert Penry-Jones, Kevin McKidd, Phil Davis, Helen McCrory and the underutilised since Kim Vithana. Scheduled properly this would have been a massive hit.

Slacker: The film section is a bit of a jumble but I have spotted Richard Linklater's narratively freewheeling first release in which the young population of his home town of Austin talk about everything and nothing for an hour and a half. Captivating. Watch out for that pap smear!

ASTONISHING X-MEN MOTION COMIC: GIFTED - Episode 1: Joss Whedon and John Cassaday seminal comic turned into something that resembles a cartoon. Effect is like watching Waltz With Bashir but instead of a Lebanese massacre it's about mutants and the cure plotline that was ruined in X3.

a lump in the throat

TV Try watching this without getting a lump in the throat:



Windy Miller! Order it on ye olde cd here.

relatively famous

Film Add Romola Garai to the list of relatively famous people who should be blogging but aren't:

"My week started when I spent the best part of two hours (and a bottle of wine) on the phone to a much-loved friend whose marriage is breaking up after nine glorious years. This marriage has been my template of love, the Pulitzer prize of relationships; everything that marriage should be and it came from love.

But as I stood at the top of the escalators and thought of my friend, shell-shocked and broken, I wanted to rip down that ad (frustratingly not possible as they are now electronic screens) and rewrite that phrase. "Love is at the root of everything good and everything terrible that has ever happened."

days on

Music A young Lauren Laverne on Never Mind The Buzzcocks in 1997:



Aaah, Kenickie.

A brilliant friend in New York

Beverages A brilliant friend in New York posted over to me some of the new Starbucks instant or VIA coffee for my birthday. It won't be available in most of the UK until the end of next year. I was intrigued but a bit reticent. Drinking instant coffee instead of filter is often a bit like watching a film on dvd rather than going to the cinema. It's perfectly enjoyable while you're doing it, but there's always a slight pang of melancholy afterwards because the experience just isn't quite the same, even when, as you can see, I drink it from a proper Starbucks mug.

I chose the Italian Roast for this first try. The coffee comes in small, long sachets, which when opened and tipped into the mug don't reveal granules but a dark brown powder not unlike grounds. I boil the water then let cool slightly as I pour the 8oz required into a measuring jug, then straight onto the coffee, stirring as quickly as I can so that the powder will dissolve quickly. Already I can sense the authentic smell of Starbucks coffee. I take my coffee black this has the rich shade of brown I expect from filter.

Then the taste. It's a triumph. The flavour is almost exactly like filter coffee. Like magic. A rich, strong wack of bitterness which flows about the mouth, resting on the tongue just like filter. Then there's the kick, the Starbucks kick, which makes my head cock slightly and my skin tingly as I assume the caffeine hits my system, just like filter. The strong after taste at the end of the cup stays in my mouth for minutes afterwards, just like filter. None of this do I usually experience from an instant and certainly not without overcompensating on the amount I'm dissolving.

Miraculous. And with no machine to wash afterwards, just my mug. Elsewhere, reviews have been mixed. Zoe Williams in The Guardian thought it "insipid" though based on her description I'd question whether she put too much water on it -- any more than the 8oz and I imagine it would taste blander. Similarly I'd question what it's like with milk and sugar, but then I think that about all coffee -- I do like it strong. There's an alchemy at work here and I can't wait for Starbucks to launch it nation wide in the UK so that I can experiment some more.

I like books. [...] I love films.

Books The Times has posted a list of what they think are the top 100 books of this decade. Here is a list of the items on their list that I've read:

50 No Logo: Taking Aim at the Brand Bullies by Naomi Klein (2000)

You'd expect me to be embarassed about that perhaps, especially considering Karie's appetite for pages. But the number of books published each year, each week, and the evident bias against genre fiction (reflected by the choice of judges listed at the bottom of the page), it's a surprise I've even read Klein's book.

I've come to terms with that years ago. I like books. I like the smell of them, the way they feel in the hand. But I'm not a voracious reader. I can never seem to find the time. I love films. I watch lots and lots of films. That's my narrative form of choice. And theatre. I like the immediacy of them, and the compexity inherent in the collaboration, which still exists even with the most manipulative of directors.

That's probably why the books I do read tend to be autobiographical or analytical, with only a certain type of fiction. I also at present can't seem to be able to concentrate for longer than an hour on anything. Modern life, at least my modern life is noisy. But there is hope. Audiobooks. I've been buying lots of audiobooks. Abridged. Unabridged. Fiction. Non-fiction. And I'm hoping this halfway house will help to set me back on track.

only ever made

Update! Darren Linkmachinego's first and only personal blogpost has made the cover of The Guardian (below the fold). Here's the article. As Darren says ... Fair to say he's beaten me. I've only ever made the obituaries.

horrendously homesick

Life During my first year at undergraduate university, I was horrendously homesick for at least the first few months. This manifested itself in a collection of ways but mostly it involved moments alone, in the dark of my room in halls or a stairwell, when I’d simply sit and cry, trying to retch in such a way that I didn't make too much noise, not let people know how I was feeling. It was my first time away from home, alone, and I hadn’t quite managed to work out how to mix, how meet people, how to bond, and I thought the last thing I needed was for them to thing I was a crier, someone who couldn’t stand being alone.

Eventually the feelings largely subsided, after a parental visit and parcels began arriving from home with creature comforts, most of which I could have bought myself but were somehow tastier, comfier or funnier because I knew they’d been through home and the hands of the people there. This was the early nineties, before mobile phones were cheap enough for any student, and the only email available was in the library and so that was the only real contact I’d have apart from the odd phone call home from the expensive and smelly call booth on the ground floor.

Now and then, I still felt like I was alone and surrounded by people who didn’t understand me, even the friends I’d made, which is ironic, probably, since this was no doubt what everyone else was thinking. It didn’t help that there wasn’t anyone from my home town of Liverpool in the hall. No one to reminisce with. Two neighbouring blokes in a few doors away from me were from other ends of the same street for goodness sake, and had never met before. There were plenty of similar coincidences and geographical bunching, but as far as is went, I was the Merseyside contingent.

One morning I was in a particularly low mood for the first time in ages. I suspect it was because it was a Sunday, and I was hankering for the kind of morning bacon butty only my Dad can cook but when I’d gone down to the kitchen to do it myself, someone had stolen it from my bag in the fridge. Bastards. I remember opening the window to let the cold Autumn air into the room and imagine perhaps that I was looking out across a park or the Mersey. I shut my eyes and let the slight breeze flow across my cheeks. Then I heard a girl shout:

”Earyaa babes, pass-us me shooz…”

I don’t really have a scouse accent. It comes and goes, most often it comes across as generic northern. I’ve been told it’s because I don’t particularly appreciate the accent of my home town which might well be the case, but since, if you’re from the city and surrounds you know that there isn’t just one Liverpool accent but dozens depending upon where someone is from, it’s probably truer to say I don’t like some versions of it. But on that day I loved them all.

It was like music. It was like that scene in The Shawshank Redemption when Andy opens up the public address system in the prison and plays opera music to his fellow inmates. I sighed. It was just what I needed. I later found out her name was Stella and we became passing acquaintances since she’d become best friends with someone else in the hall. Throughout the rest of the year, whenever I was feeling homesick again, I’d somehow end up meeting her and she’d remind me of what home was like, what Liverpool was like, like.

[This is my submission to the Liverpool Echo’s Open Culture Benchmark.]

speaks for itself

Music Lee Barker's piece about the Morrissey incident at the Liverpool Echo Arena speaks for itself:

"From my teens onwards I’ve been acutely aware of Liverpool’s undercurrent of annoyance. Whether it stems from the time I grew up, where the city was crumbling around us, there was mass unemployment and seemingly no future or it goes further back to the fact we are a sea port and all sea ports are tough places, I don’t know. What I do know is that time and place for these attitudes has passed. Its not applicable for life as we live it today yet this tacit approval for loutish behaviour is tolerated."

rare breaks out

Blog! Dr Magnati's reveal has turned into something of a Woodstock for UK Bloggers. Not who was or wasn't there, but who did or didn't know Brooke back in the day (a phrase I'm using increasingly which has to be a sign of my age) and who did or didn't know her secret. It's even caused Darren from LinkMachineGo to make one of his rare breaks out of link blogging to offer something more substantial:

"A couple of months went past, and after Belle de Jour won the award for Best Written Blog from the Guardian and the whole BdJ phenomenon kicked off, I had my eureka moment – I was sitting on the tube one morning and suddenly thought: ‘Could it be Brooke?’"

I love the fact that if someone had bothered to go look, a rather big clue to her identity was available in plain sight. But you had to know what you were doing. As a side note, given that this is one of the most interesting pieces of blog writing I've seen in quite some time, I wish Darren would do this sort of thing more often.

Tweet Up

TweetUp North at BT Convention Centre, 16 November 2009, originally uploaded by ACC Liverpool.

Life This lunchtime @ACCliverpool or the BT Conference Centre held their first Tweet Up North event and despite my misgivings that perhaps it was just supposed to be for corporate visitors, I went along. It's my first time inside the centre which is the heel side of the Liverpool Echo Arena if you look at it from the sky and pretend it's shaped like a footprint (no, not like Italy, that's more of a boot). The interior is reminiscent of Ethan Hawke's workplace in the film Gattaca, a giant glass atrium the size of a cathedral, which like a cathedral has a stone floor, wooden panelling and loads of small rooms leading off.

The Tweet Up was held in a mezzanine (pictured) which on the one side over looked that atrium and on the other offered a fantastic view of the Mersey and Seacombe beyond yet still managed to seem entirely intimate. There were about forty people, most of whom where indeed attending as part of their work day. We were handed a list of attendees on our way in and it's a three page mix of people faces and corporate logos. But there were plenty of familiar faces so I didn't feel out of it and a couple who knew me from my personal feed of @liverpoolblogs.

Actually, the meeting had the all the hallmarks of a good wedding; a fabulous (and I should add unexpected) buffet (tasty scouse, chicken wraps and mini-pasies), loads of people who haven't seen in a while and total strangers who are willing to chat and speeches. @ianfinch from @mandogroup talked about the corporate uses of Twitter in communicating the message of a company and joining up with clients and @alisongow from the Liverpool Echo and Daily Post talked about how Twitter allows them to properly communicate with the public.

All in all, a really enjoyable event. Not too long so that people weren't looking at their shoes too much, not so short that it wasn't worth the trudge up to the centre. On the walk back to civilisation, @LpoolChamber (hello Nick) suggested that I should take more advantage of these kinds of events, especially since @liverpoolblogs is a known experiment and people are increasingly interested in social networking. Similarly, Alison mentioned in her talk that companies should assign employees Twitter for the day to interact with their public/users. I'm increasingly wondering if it might be possible to find a new career somewhere in there. The professional tweeter.

secrets and mysteries

Blog! Karie expresses just as well as I could what Belle Du Jour's reveal means to those of us bloggers who've been in this for the long haul. As I said to her on Facebook, it's like the UK blogging culture of the earlier part of this decade rearing up to reassert itself, reminding all the people for whom its just part of a social networking landscape where it all began.

At first I was elated to know that she was a real person and that it all happened and that I hadn't been reading a fiction all these years (something sort of knew because of interviews related to the television programme and friends of friends but it was nice to have a confirmation) and that in being a research scientist and an early UK link bloggers one of us.

I felt very warm towards some fellow bloggers who knew her secret, knew who she was, but didn't blab, even to each other. Again, it was reminder of the kind of community it was back then, before the form went mainstream and stopped being as Karie says "something you do on the sly", when no one knew what a blog was and thought it was a very curious thing to be doing.

Now, nearly, everyone online is a blogger even if it's just in very short sentences and I wonder if you can still close ranks on something like that when there are so many voices involved. If someone had worked out Belle's identity back in the day and Twitter had existed with its instant gratification, would they have kept it to themselves?

But then I felt anger, towards the Daily Mail for apparently forcing her into this, because after a fashion I didn't really want to know who Belle Du Jour was. There are some secrets which are in the public interest of course, but has it really added to the world that people in general now know who she is, to have her face splashed all over the papers? Isn't it nice to have these little secrets and mysteries?

Defying Gallifrey

Elsewhere I've reviewed tonight's magnificent Doctor Who special. Well I say review, it's more like the sound of me gasping because I can't quite work out in my head how psychologically complex it was. I love the title, Defying Gallifrey, no idea where that came from.

£25 less

Finance A short public service announcement.

If you received a Tesco Personal Finance credit card statement in the post this morning, I'd give it a once over despite your embarrassment, because there's an unheralded surprise. They've reduced the extent of the minimum payment from 3% to 2% -- but -- and this is important -- the interest rate hasn't chance. Which means that if you pay by direct debit and you only ever pay the minimum payment by direct debit, you'll actually be paying rather less of your balance off in comparison to interest each month. Mine is £25 less.

This is messy and annoying and unheralded by a letter to explain the change. Indeed when I phoned my old colleagues in the call centre, they initially said that it was an error then after looking some more agreed it was a feature. I'll be working out what the 3% amount would have been and make an extra payment, which if you'll pardon the expression, is just like sooo annoying. I know I would be as well after all these years to apply for a different credit card with better terms, especially since the club card points I get hardly justify the interest charges.

But I'm a chump.

I'll probably be with them until the end of time, or the finance system implodes, whichever is the sooner.

on the subject of her clothes

Music Florence from Florence and the Machine is interviewed by Canada's The Globe and Mail on the subject of her clothes. For all I know about fashion it might as well be written in Leet, a language I equally don't understand but feel like I should. Then I see this bit ...

"What do you like to wear when you’re not on stage?

A mish mash of things. I always look like My So-Called Life or Blossom.

... and understand totally.

tedious

Elsewhere I didn't like tonight's Sarah Jane Adventures at all. Click here to enjoy my tedious sense of humour bypass.

the band’s future was still undecided

Music The murky world of the Sugababes becomes even murkier with this random interview with The Times (sorry). Which largely consists of the current line-up saying thing like"The abuse on Twitter from some people ... " and "I don’t want to go into all the ... I don’t want all the things in the papers yet..." and the rubbishing of "stories" about angry photo shoots which were "totally made up". Yes, made up by The Times's sister tabloid.

Three other nuggets, one per 'babe:

-- Heidi explains that:

"when the band’s future was still undecided, a video was shot anyway. “Only using body doubles,” she says. “They thought, there’s no band but we still need a video to put out with this song, so the girls who were our stunt doubles became the stars.”

In other words, briefly, a whole other set of girls were in the Sugababes which is just another demonstration that Mutyageddon will indeed become an increasing problem going forward. Obviously, as they say in Doctor Who circles, the canonicity of these three ladies is open to question, making them the Peter Cushing, David Banks and Richard E Grant of the Sugababes.

-- Jade: "I went into a shop in Stratford,” she recalls. “I had someone shouting abuse at me. Really rude, nasty things." That is surreal. The whole situation is curious, but it's certainly not worth shouting at the new member about. It's not her fault. We don't know the chronology of the thing, but shouting? Really? But then, we live in a world were soap stars are bawled at in Waitrose because their character has done something nasty.

-- Amelle: "Really good! Happy happy! Haha! I heard I went to some depression clinic,” she says. “It wasn’t a clinic. It was called ... well, it doesn’t matter what it’s called. It’s a place in Austria where you cleanse your mind, body and spirit. You can walk around in your dressing gown day and night, you don’t have to wear make-up, no one’s judging you. I spoke to a life coach and sorted myself out a little bit."



Glad you're feeling better.

my brain splitting in two

Life I met an old friend in the street this afternoon. She'd just finished work, I was on my way to work. When I'm on my way to work, I tend to be focused on one goal. Getting there. Head down, marching onward and sometimes upward, not speaking. So when I was suddenly confronted with this friendly face, I mentally froze and my mouth stopped working. I was literally tongue tied.

My brain split in two -- one half still apparently moving in the direction of my place of employment, the other trying to keep track of what to say to this person I haven't seen in quite some time but was still very pleased was standing in front of me. My mind was recreating a scene from a 70s sitcom were the motorcycle goes one way and the uncoupled sidecar heads off in the opposite direction.

We chatted, though in truth she did much of the talking which isn't like me. We talked about where we'd been, where we were going, and how we were. And I generally smiled, arms crossed (I know!) and trying not to say anything too unusual, constantly aware that my replies and comments were either (a) boring, (b) easily interpretable as a pre-programmed response, (c) incoherent. I hopefully managed to fail on at least two of those points.

Then the moment was over, and we said we should get together properly and catch-up, and we walked our separate ways and I considered what had happened and hoped that she hadn't noticed I wasn't myself. Presumably I'm over analysing but I wonder what she thought. Perhaps it was the same for her. Perhaps all random encounters in the street are like this, it's just that some of us are better at dealing with them than others. Well?

she'll excel

Museums My manager's manager from The Henry Moore Institute in the mid-90s (see my "CV"), Penelope Curtis, has been appointed director of Tate Britain. It's an extraordinary promotion for her and I'm sure she'll excel. Very good news indeed. Talk about a name from your past popping out at you. And from her photo, she hasn't changed at all.

final

TV Dollhouse cancelled. Not a huge surprise and at least in Epitaph One we have a decent final episode already. Let's enjoy some of the good times:



It's amazing that aired on network television at all.

Updated! Seems this might be (fittingly) an echo chamber story where one respected source publishes a story and other respected sources all say the same thing but an official announcement hasn't been made. The Futon Critic suggests that its simply that FOX haven't ordered more episodes for this season. Confusing. Until Whedon says it himself, I'm holding out hope.

Updated! The Futon Critic is now going with the crowd and apologising for false hope. Bugger. But thanks to Talia for noticing.

smeared across nearly four hours

Theatre Further to my rant or some might say measured discussion about the lack of classical theatre (or these days any theatre) on television, and how there's a specific double standard because theatre is seen as musty and old and visually unexciting whereas classical music is given a free pass (deep breath), what do we find on BBC Four on Friday 20 November smeared across nearly four hours?

Don Carlo from the Royal Opera House

Friday 20 November
8:00pm - 11:40pm
BBC4

Antonio Pappano, artistic director of the Royal Opera, introduces Nicholas Hytner's production of Verdi's Don Carlo from the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden. Based on Schiller's play, it tells the story of the conflicts in the life of Don Carlo, Prince of Spain after his betrothed Elizabeth of Valois is married to his father, Phillip II, as part of a peace treaty. Rolando Villazon sings the title role and Marina Poplavskaya is Elizabeth. Pappano conducts the Orchestra of the Royal Opera House.

Alright, smeared is probably the wrong verb to use -- I am looking forward to seeing this production -- the notices were very good. But it's extraordinary that BBC Four is happy to run an opera directed by Hytner but wouldn't go anywhere near any of the work he's produced for the National Theatre of which he is the director.

Still more with the publication of BBC Two winter/spring highlights. Apart from the film version of Hamlet we find:

"Paul Roseby, the Artistic Director of the National Youth Theatre, brings two groups of very different school children together to perform a classic Shakespeare play. In When Romeo Met Juliet, Paul has eight weeks to get them to overcome their aversion to Shakespeare and cut it as actors.

Which sounds laudable except that what'll be missing in the end will be a full version of the production itself, even though it will clearly be filmed for the documentary and people would be keen to see it. And the title makes me want to bite my own ear off.

Incidentally, in my rant/discussion I did forget the excellent semi-staged production of A Midsummer's Night's Dream from May this year which showed how these things can be done. Pity it was relegated to the red button interactive service and hardly publicised. Oh and only shown once. Unlike the Electric Proms stuff which has been on a loop for days and days and days ...

free bus travel

Travel A week's free bus travel in Aberdeen, Chester, Greater Manchester, Leeds and York (on completion of a short questionnaire). No use to me, sadly, in Arriva strangling Liverpool. But you might find it useful.

a slimmer paper

Journalism The Observer's rationalisation plans have been released:

"Guardian News & Media's redesigned Sunday title will have four weekly sections – news, sport, an expanded Review section and the Observer magazine – and the award-winning glossy supplement Observer Food Monthly. The other three supplements, Observer Sport Monthly, Observer Music Monthly and Observer Woman, will close. Business and personal finance coverage will move into the main news section of the paper, while travel coverage will be incorporated into the expanded Observer magazine."

I never read the Sport Monthly so that's no great loss to me but I did enjoy the Music Monthly, especially the columns. Presumably the expanded review section will simply hoover up this kind of material which could at least mean it's more current. I never could quite understand the point of running lengthy reviews of some LPs in both the magazine and the supplement. All in all, I'd much rather have this than no Observer at all. Plus at least with a slimmer paper there's more of a chance to get around the whole thing.

whichever device you use

Books You may have read on whichever device you use that Amazon have released a software version of the Kindle electronic book for the PC. It's a smart move. As well as possibly being a useful back-up for current users, it gives waverers and those of us who are just curious a chance to try the service. A couple of the blogs I read have suggested that there's a regional restriction, but I've had no problem downloading and running the software in the UK. but those restrictions may come into force if you actually try to pay for a book.

With respect to Amazon in this different environment simply feels like a very basic version of Adobe Reader or the Microsoft Word reader. Except in both of those your experience though different from a book, replicates all of the carefully chosen typefaces and text sizes. By (in some cases) standardising those and leaving them open for user change, you're removing a couple of the elements of the product and part of the overall experience designed by the author or more likely the publisher.

The more interesting adventure is the Kindle store, where it's possible to download samples of the books on offer. As with the rest of Amazon, it's possible to look at the whole selection in one list and sort the items by how low and high the prices are. At present the lowest priced book is The Hand of Ethelberta by Thomas Hardy at $2.30 in what looks like a version copy/pasted from the Gutternberg Project.

The highest is Selected Nuclear Materials and Engineering Systems (Part 4) by Materials Science International Team (MSIT) costing a staggering $7,213.28 (which rather a lot of money for a bunch of data). Always interested in nuclear materials (and stuff) I of course downloaded the sample. The book is 503 pages long. The sample I was sent is 286 locations.

I don't know what the Kindle conversion rate is on that, but this looks like a fair amount of the book. Probably about five hundred dollars worth. That was enough for the preface in which I've discovered:

"This volume provides basic information to a field that is facing a strong revival in a growing number of countries. The volume can not claim to be comprehensive covering all systems ..."

Wait, what? If you've spent over $7000 on this volume that's not what you'd like to hear. I know that science changes and develops but the vagueness and inexactitude of that makes me shiver. I didn't understand much of the rest of it, so I went to the product reviews seeking understanding and found this. Ha!

a good thing

Journalism Really funny, excellent little video discussion between Marina Hyde and Charlie Brooker on the subject of writing columns for The Guardian which apart from anything else demonstrates that they agonise about their writing as much as I do, which is comforting. I too have taken out jokes because I know I've gone too far and spent hours just trying to get the words to sit in the correct order to the point of desperation. It's the first time I seen Marina Hyde talking for any great length of time and she's exactly how I expected (which is a good thing by the way).

Update! 10/11/2009 The full interview is up though the bit rate should take out a whole chunk of a capped web connection. I've emailed and asked if they wouldn't mind putting up an audio version. Never know.

Update! 11/11/2009 Matt from The Guardian has emailed back to say a podcast of the interview will be available later in the week at this page.

Update! 11/11/2009 The audio has been posted. That's what I call good service.

I do own

Film The Times have published a list of what they consider to be the best hundred films this decade (a list I wouldn't obviously have seen unless I'd paid for a subscription to the website under the upcoming regime or therefore link to, but I digress). It's simpler if I mention the ones I haven't seen:

Morvern Callar
Time and Winds
The Wind that Shakes the Barley
Le Grand Voyage
The Beat That My Heart Skipped
The Hurt Locker
The Class
Persepolis
Gomorrah
Waltz with Bashir
L'enfant
The Son’s Room
Capturing the Friedmans
Iraq in Fragments
Downfall
This Is England
Borat
Hunger

Some of which I do own but haven't gotten around to yet (still Pushing Daisies). Quite what Borat is doing there and not Shortbus, Of Time And The City or Serenity. It's all subjective.

otherwhere

Life The current view outside our window. In our flat we're often above the fog, but sometimes, just sometimes, it's as though we're existing at the point where the ground fog and clouds meet or that we've been whisked out of the world and dropped in some otherwhere. The pinpricks of light in the photograph below is reflected from a hallway bulb inside.

that bird

Media Rupert Murdoch and News International always looked untouchable, no way that bird could be shot down. Then I read this. Murdoch wants to block Google from News International websites:

"Rupert Murdoch says he will remove stories from Google's search index as a way to encourage people to pay for content online. In an interview with Sky News Australia, the mogul said that newspapers in his media empire - including the Sun, the Times and the Wall Street Journal - would consider blocking Google entirely once they had enacted plans to charge people for reading their stories on the web."

He really, really doesn't understand the web does he? With any luck this miscalculation will force him to sell off Fox and I can watch most of Joss Whedon's product without a slight pang of guilt. Sadly, Cory at Boing Boing doesn't think he'll do it at least not properly.

amazingly bonkers

TV While I was researching that last post, I came across what might well be the most utterly, amazingly bonkers blog post about Doctor Who I've ever seen. After some YouTube videos, Marc offers his vision for Season 32 of the series. Firstly some casting:

The Doctor:
1st choices – Emma Thompson and Jason Isaacs (tie)
2rd choice – Bill Nighy
3rd choice – Joanna Lumley

Companions:
Billy Boyd as David Wayne
Ruth Wilson as Maeve Sweeney

Guest Stars:
Natalie Portman as Susan Foreman
Elizabeth Hurley as The Rani
Ben Kingsley as the Castellan
Embeth Davidtz as Jane Austen
Jason Statham as The Enforcer

And hello to Jason Isaacs. But I love that he can't decide between him and Emma Thompson. Also, Embeth Davidtz? That's the kind of idiosyncratic casting decision the show itself has been capable of (Fenella Woolgar). Then his list of episodes. There's no point copy/pasting them all here, just make sure you don't miss a word. Sample:

"Thanks to new evidence procured by the Castellan, the Doctor is placed on trial for destroying Gallifrey. Tapes are shown of what he did in his 8th incarnation to defeat the Daleks during the last Time War, and how his actions led to the destruction of Gallifrey. The Doctor makes his case convincingly, but he is ultimately convicted because he sacrificed his home planet without even decisively defeating the Daleks in the process. He and his companions (including Susan) are sentenced to imprisonment in New Shada."

... written by Richard Curtis.

whatever Ruth Wilson's been in

Radio Fans of Doctor Who and whatever Ruth Wilson's been in might like to know that Wilson, Russell Tovey and Harry Lloyd offered a three hander in tonight's Drama on BBC Radio 3 which was The Promise by Aleksei Arbuzov. A synopsis:

"As Russians fight off the Nazis in the savage 1942 siege of Leningrad, three teenagers are thrown together in a war-torn apartment block. Having lost everything, they forge relationships that bind them together and a new hope that keeps them alive - the promise of a better future."

Which sounds uncannily like Being Human if you age the characters slightly, put them in a house instead of a flat and replace the siege of Leningrad with vampires wanting to take over the world. So probably not at all, in fact. I've not had a chance to listen to all of the broadcast yet, but so far the performances are first rate. Should be available for a week at the iplayer. And in case you were wondering ...

Who's In It From Doctor Who?



Russell Tovey portrayed Titanic Midshipman, Alonzo Frame in Voyage of the Damned.



Harry Lloyd played Jeremy Baines in Human Nature and The Family of Blood.

Who's In It But Hasn't Been In Doctor Who (yet)?



Ruth Wilson played Young Mary in Capturing Mary and will soon be seen as 313 in The Prisoner remake.

cradling

Music On the restorative power of. After a fairly stressful day at work, I jumped in the back of a taxi (which is about as cheap as getting a bus in Liverpool if you're going the distance I do on a Sunday). After giving my destination, I sat well back cradling the bottle of milk I'd bought from the shop. As I watched the streets pass by in the darkness outside the window, the driver turned on his cd player and gradually, quietly at first then louder, the strains of a gospel version of Swing Low Sweet Chariot seeped into the edges of the inside of the taxi. The baritone, as deep and soulful as a Willard White, so it might as well have been him sang, "Swing low, sweet chariot, Comin' for to carry me home; Swing low, sweet chariot, Comin' for to carry me home" and I felt an abundant sense of calm as the vehicle cruised along the empty roads and empty darkness of Princes Avenue. I was going home.

merked

TV After a patchy series, it's fair to say this week's Never Mind The Buzzcocks was the best episode so far, mostly because of Jamelia who brilliantly seems to lack an internal censor:



Maxwell D has offered a response: "I was set up. [...] Jamelia I'm sorry. [...] I'm older and wiser now. [...] I had to stand there for fifteen minutes and get merked. [...] I'm older and wiser. [...] Trying to be a role model for my kids. [...] Check out my website."

entirely shameless

About I've been meaning to write something about this for days but seeing a similar post on a couple of other blogs has spurned me on. Let's call this:

The Pluggers Manifesto.

Recently you might have noticed I've been posting a few press releases around these parts, offered the odd competition. In the past few weeks, perhaps months, I've had an upswing of emails from PR companies asking me to talk about their client's wares and events on the blog. I'm not sure why, but it's nice to see the smaerter companies embracing social networking and amateur media.

The few that I've posted I've been happy to because there's been something interesting and unique about them or they've been for charity. But there have been others which I've ignored, mostly because they've either fundamentally misunderstood what the blog is about (if indeed it's about anything) or I couldn't see what was in it for me or you.

I could say something sarcastic about that, at length, but instead I thought I'd be entirely shameless and actually suggest what I will write about:

(1) Films. I love films. I have a degree in them. And television. Music and books. If you send me any of those kinds of things I promise write about them on the blog if I like them. Anything will do.

(2) Gadgets too.

(3) If you have a new exhibition or theatre production opening I'd love to write about that too (see below), particularly if it's in the area (Liverpool, Manchester and places between), especially if you invite me to the private view or press night (told you this was shameless).

(4) Causes are good too.

Essentially, to a large extent, what Rachel said. I'd quite like a digital picture frame. See (2) above.

Passing thoughts and making plans

Plug! I can probably count the number of contemporary artists whose work I like on one hand, and one of the contemporary artists whose work I like is Rachel Whiteread, who creates sculpture that reflects the interior spaces of objects. Her best known work, which led her to win the Turner prize, was House, in which she hosed the inside of a council dwelling with concrete then removed the brickwork so that all that remained was its impression.

Whiteread is one of many artists featured in a new exhibition, Passing thoughts and making plans, at the Jerwood Space in London (at 171 Union St, SE1 0LN) from now until 13th December. Here is the press release they've sent me:

"Passing thoughts and making plans is an exhibition that brings together artists who use photography as part of their thought process; as a tool for working out, following and shaping ideas that will develop into a finished work.

The concept behind the exhibition comes from Yass’ desire to reveal work in process and to consider that the experience of viewing preparations and sketches for art works holds complexities and interest in its own right. Passing thoughts and making plans features previously unseen work from internationally renowned artists Tacita Dean, Jeremy Deller, Sarah Jones, Alex Katz, Sharon Lockhart, Cornelia Parker, Richard Wentworth and Rachel Whiteread.

The exhibition is the third in the Jerwood Visual Arts Encounters series, which act as conversations about and between the disciplinary fields of the Jerwood Visual Arts programme. Passing thoughts and making plans is a conversation about the role of photography in each of the artists’ practice and aims to give visitors a deeper understanding of the process of making work, through having a rare glimpse of the preparatory work behind a finished piece. Finished examples of the artists’ work, displayed in books and catalogues, will also be on show.

Catherine Yass, curator of the exhibition says: “Photographic images are often part of a fluid chain of thoughts and notes that cross over into different areas. They might be snap shot prints or contacts stuck in a notebook, incorporated into a drawing, combined with writing or just left on a table amongst other bits and pieces. This process is what I wanted to convey in the exhibition.”

There's more details at their website. They also passed along this random photograph of a towel which must be by one of the artists. I can't tell which one, but it's very clever.

wild line readings

Elsewhere I've reviewed the latest The Sarah Jane Adventures. I couldn't resist the title: "I’m not sure why Floella Benjamin played Professor Rivers like she’s still narrating the documentaries on the Black Guardian dvd boxset all strange intonation and wild line readings ..."

Sugababes reunion news

Music JFK's Jim Garrison here again with this evening's Sugababes reunion news:

-- Keisha denies that there is going to be a reunion. Categorically. According to her management.

-- Various reports and rumours on what this original reunion line-up will look like. Contrary to what you'd expect it might not be Keisha, Mutya and Siobhan. Little Boots apparently says she'd like to be a member:

"She said: "They could call themselves The Real Sugababes. It would knock the current Sugababes out of the water.
"If one wasn't up for it, I could be the blonde one."

The same syndicated bit of writing is on a few websites, but none of them are forthcoming with the original source for the quote. I tweeted Little Boots about it earlier (on the off chance that she was the Donald Southerland's X figure in all this) but got no reply (unsurprisingly). She mentions being on Never Mind The Buzzcocks. I wonder if it was a joke from that.

-- The more "interesting" story -- which I've only seen in one place, this place (and linked all over Twitter), Zoe Griffin Party Princess, which offers the following contradiction in terms:

"A source told me that Mutya Buena has approached Rachel Adedeji to join the reformed Sugababes."

Then goes on to suggest that this reformed group would be Mutya, Siobhan and this ex-X Factor singer. Which still isn't the Sugababes. But then, as Simon just pointed out to me on Twitter, at this point they're in a constant state of flux.

Ultimately, it's become difficult to know who the Sugababes are any more.

Perhaps we all are. We just don't know it.

And while we're at it, Heidi still respects Keisha,Jade is scared of Keisha and Amelle is out of hospital and presumably has some opinion of Keisha which has yet to be turned into a headline.

Now, here's the obligatory YouTube video. Snow Patrol covering About You Now:



"Back, and to the left... back, and to the left... back, and to the left. "

Fireworks

Fireworks, originally uploaded by feelinglistless.

And then my camera ran out of power.
Absolutely spectacular display at Sefton Park in Liverpool with the wonderful aural theme of the moon landings, with capcom audio from Apollo 11 interspersed with Major Tom, The Whole of the Moon, Wonderful World and the epic Duel of the Fates from Star Wars (which underscored an awe-inspiring finish). Well done to all those involved.

Almost Fireworks

Almost Fireworks, originally uploaded by feelinglistless.

Sefton Park is all ready for the fireworks display tonight. Here we watch the display in preparation. What we don't see too well in this photograph, is the horrendous rain storm which is currently drenching the field and area. Assuming the display isn't cancelled, if you are coming this evening, wear your boots and wellies.

Hullabaloo

TV The digital switchover has began last night in the north-west of England with the switching off of the analogue stream/broadcast of BBC Two. For a lot of you this won’t be newsworthy news – it’s already happened in Wales and the South West and elsewhere. But it still feels like an event worth noting anyway. Perhaps I shouldn’t be too maudlin about the loss of one particular way of viewing a channel which is still available in a wider ratio and better picture quality. It’s not like BBC Two has gone (no matter what some mad old Tory back bencher might say every other month about reducing Auntie’s power or some such).

Except that this is the format on which the channel began and how I viewed most of my favourite programmes up until just under a decade ago when we signed up with On Digital. Shivering in the front room of original house in Speke (no central heating) watching the original broadcasts of Moonlighting or Twin Peaks in black and white through a snowstorming picture, needing to get up now and then to adjust the wire. When I had my own television, I probably saw most of Star Trek this way.

Now, it’s just a case of working through an EPG, selecting a programme and assuming it’s not clashing with something on the other side, choosing if I want to record the whole series then pressing OK. That’s better and more convenient but like vinyl, the old process involved in actually being able to watch a programme increased its magic somehow, of experimenting with the location of the portable tv for the best picture (corners mainly) and trying to get done before Quantum Leap started (because the signal for each channel was always best in different parts of the room).

I had planned to stay and watch the signal being shut off, but the only device which still has analogue tuned in is my dvd recorder and it was inevitably capturing what looked like a good film on BBC Four. But perhaps fittingly, someone was there, did record it, and has put a video of the event up on YouTube. There was no countdown, no reprize of the channel's launch campaign mascot "Hullabaloo" (a mother kangaroo -- see above), just the BBC's reporter at The Hague being cut off mid-sentence:



BBC Two Analogue broadcast from Winter Hill. Time of death 12:26 am.

a bit passe

History Meg Pickard was asked to give a conference talk about how businesses and companies can make the most of their time online and how not to be evil in the sphere of social network. But it's her comments on the experience of being on-line in the past decade which really gave me a lump in the throat:

"I talked to a few trusted friends, family members and colleagues about it, and they all looked at me weirdly and backed away. I learnt not to reveal my habit in public, because there was social stigma attached to it. I realised it wasn’t a productive or even necessarily healthy way to spend my time. I even used a fake name. But I kept doing it, all the same.

"Gradually, through the internet, I became aware that there was a small but dedicated community of like-minded addicts, just like me, distributed across the UK and across the world. We met up occasionally in pubs and felt reassured that we weren’t as weird as everyone else thought. In fact, we dared to think that what we were doing might actually be exciting."

It has been a busy decade. When I began writing this blog in 2001 for no apparent reason, I didn't really expect that I'd still be doing it now or that I'd be viewed as anything like an early pioneer (which has been said, I'm not making that one up). But it is strange when I mention this blog to someone and they know what I'm talking about, even stranger that it's so common place as to be a bit passe.

split and reform

Music "The original Sugababes are reforming!"
"Oh no they're not."
"Oh. Really?"

At this point anything is possible, though there are a lot of hoops to jump through, not least Keisha's current contract and the record she's currently recording according to her Twitter feed. To record one record and then have your vocals dumped would be considered bad luck -- for it to happen twice?

The originating website of the rumour, HolyMoly posts anonymously and don't give a source, but it has been going since 2002 which is plenty of time to build up a half-decent set of contacts. The denial from Warners featured at The Guardian is vague enough to mean anything:

""We haven't seen them here or heard anything about it. I don't think they've got the story right."

Which could just as well be "They're meeting in an office somewhere else and we don't know what's being said yet. I don't think they've got some aspects of the story right." Interestingly most of the comments I've seen on the different posted versions of the story I've seen online feature someone talking up Siobhan's 2007 album "Ghosts" as some lost masterpiece, though perhaps the most perceptive is the single one, so far, at Idolitor:

"Wasn’t Keisha sort of a bitch to Siobhan the whole time they were together? Does Siobhan really want to go there?"

As I said, a lot of hoops to jump through.

I love that it took two journalists from The Guardian to fact check and write that little story. Swash and Jonze are turning into the Woodward and Bernstein of the Sugababes's split and reform. I appear to be the Jim Garrison writing these wild theories late into the night. As the Costner version of him said in JFK:

"The FBI says they can prove it through physics in a nuclear laboratory. Of course they can prove it. Theoretical physics can also prove that an elephant can hang off a cliff with its tail tied to a daisy! But use your eyes, your common sense. "

Exactly.

fun with his music

Music You might have heard that Bob Dylan has a Christmas record out with impressions ranging from an expectation that he's taken leave of his senses to some warm affection as though it's unusual that the man would want to celebrate the great commercial holiday finally when he's written and sung about pretty much every other subject and do so with a glint in his eye. It's already on my Christmas list.

Bob has always had fun with his music. Take this Bob moment from 1991. Bob sings nursery rhymes:

as part of the range of clothes

Plug! Yes, that is Liz Atomic Kitten. She's wearing these clothes as part of the range of clothes to be showcased at the Asda Fashion Show in Hunts Cross, 6 November at 4,30pm. Since it's for charity I thought I'd mention it too. Ladies clothes start from £3, with babies and children's clothes available too. Here is the press release I've been sent:

LIVERPOOL STUDENTS HAVE DESIGNS ON TOP ASDA FASHION PLACEMENT – THANKS TO PUDSEY!

Liverpool Community College fashion students have got designs on a much-coveted work placement with Asda’s George retail fashion brand…and it’s all down to Pudsey bear!

A number of students have created clothing items and accessories, using a number of the iconic BBC Children in Need character’s spotted bandanas in a range of imaginative ways.

Now, their designs and finished articles will be modelled by the students themselves, at a BBC Children in Need fashion show at the Asda Hunts Cross store on November 6th – and the winner will then go forward as one of just 11 regional winners in with a chance of securing a week-long placement in the fashion design department at George.

“Some of the designs are really creative and imaginative and just the sort of thinking we look for at George”, said Asda’s National Charities Partnership Manager, Lucy Gowans, adding: “We are passionate about fashion and about our work experience programme and giving students the opportunity to gain an insight into different elements of the fashion industry in a head office environment. We aim to help students experience the unique culture here and prepare them when they are choosing what career paths and jobs to apply for when they leave education.”

The fashion show at Asda Hunts Cross will run from 4.30pm and feature Asda colleagues and customers strutting their stuff on a professionally produced stage set – complete with catwalk! The show is open to the general public and although it is free, visitors can expect to see plenty of Pudsey Bear collection buckets throughout the store.

Asda Hunts Cross is also selling many of the specially-produced Children in Need products, and have lots of free “Bake the Bear” kits to give away to budding young chefs.

Asda is one of Children in Need’s Headline Partners and has raised more than £8.4 million during its many years of involvement.

Fashion shows like the one at Asda Hunts Cross are just one element of Asda’s commitment to supporting BBC Children in Need again this year, with hundreds of thousands of colleagues and customers throughout the country fund-raising on the run-up to the event day, November 20th.

Now I'm off to listen to Whole Again. Again.

bit early

TV A bit early perhaps, but I couldn't resist. Obamicon.Me is open for business.

didn't work on Hamlet

Design The Creativel Review blog's Penguin by Illustrators series turns to my favourite David Gentleman, whose many Shakespeare covers I'm in the process of trying to collect:

"I treated each cover as a small colour print, using flat printings in self-colours instead of three-colour process. I was often quite anxious about the colours, which generally needed a second proof to get them right. Richard Hildesley, Design Manager in the Seventies would bring the proofs to the studio and we'd agree on the colour changes needed."

At least I know now that he didn't work on Hamlet. I can take that off the list.