We’re on the way back from Edinburgh and we’ve got some commercial radio station or other on. The DJ’s readying her little sales pitch to keep you tuned to her frequency above all others for the next hour. “Coming up we’ve got Mary J Blige, Will Young, and the number one hit from last year that U2′s Bono sang at his father’s funeral,” she says and I kid you not, a hint of something almost like excitement in her American accent. My eyelids are drooping, and in the driver’s seat I can hear my brother swearing.
Nocturnal radio seems to be a haven for the inexplicably odd, which seems only fair as I can’t really imagine the sort of person who’ll call up to dedicate some synthesised 80s MOR to their sweetie while the DJ rips the piss. “Oh, is he gay? D’ye no’ think that’s a girlie song? So you’re calling to play a song that you’ll like, for your boyfriend?”
Makes more sense to play your records down the phone to each other. Not only because there’s less chance of humiliation, but that seems like such a romantic idea – tape fuzz distorted even further by your respective network providers, whispered asides and the faint sound of one another’s breathing. Not that there’s anything wrong with sitting up all night trading YSI files, obviously.
They’re running a competition to win tickets for the weekend’s Robbie Williams concerts on one of the commercial stations, and I can’t help but laugh at the screaming females. “OH MA GAWD AH’VE JIST WON A TICKET TO SIT MILLIONS OF MILES AWAE FAE ROBBIE WITH A THOOSAN’ OTHER PEOPLE, HE’S CLEARLY GONNAE FALL IN LOVE WI’ ME AN’ GIES A SHAG IN THE LOOS!”
Retards.
We went to see Dirty Pretty Things in Edinburgh on Monday night and, if it hadn’t been for Dom’s enthusiasm at seeing the band for the first time I probably would have fallen asleep as they played almost exactly the same set as last time I saw them. Well, that and constantly having to keep a watchful eye out for glassy-eyed, drugged-up youngsters staggering into you from every angle. If we’d been back home they’d have been tanked up on good old-fashioned alcohol, and at least they would have been dancing.
Plus, the Corn Exchange has to be one of the most horrendous venues I’ve ever set foot in in my life. Still, with T on the Fringe over with for another year the Central Belt can breathe a collective sigh of relief that Glasgow’s position as its music capital has been safely restored.
This might be my last post for a while, as the flat worries have magically sorted themselves and I’ll be taking posession of a pretty, high-ceilinged top floor tenement (by a park and an Asda!) in the morning. I won’t be online until I either a) sort it out at the flat, or b) return to work on the 11th. As the Twin will be my first houseguest the former might be a bit rude, although she’ll probably be wanting it as much as me. We’ll see. Until then, well, have a good whatever – and if any of you guys are going to be here keep an eye out for the giggly brunettes in the polka dots…
my world is gonna revolve;
Okay. This blog wouldn’t be this blog if I didn’t point out that the first official new Ryan Adams song of the year is currently streaming on the official site (along with a list of UK tour dates with the Cardinals, if you’re the two people and dog I haven’t squeed to about this already). The song is… eh. Very 80s soft rock. Whether it means one of this years’ rumoured three (!) releases will be Rock n Roll pt. 2 remains to be seen.
And no, of course I have no idea where you’d be able to get a hold of the track in mp3 form if you asked me… *cough*
Loved this from Fluxblog, on one of Sleater-Kinney’s final shows (I’m trying to keep the SK links to a minimum as the band winds down as it’s not like I’m going to be anywhere near any of these final shows, though it’s quite difficult and emotionally draining to do so) – not least because the author comes down on the same side of the fence as me in the battle of wills Stevie and I have always had regarding the artistic merits of One Beat. And “Combat Rock” in particular.
And now that’s out of the way…
News reaches me via the Guardian’s frankly execrable Comment Is Free (the blogs are a nice idea, in theory, but in many cases come across like the deranged ramblings of obsessive sixth-formers. So like most blogs, really. Only with the name of a fairly high-regarded newspaper attached) that a blogger has been jailed in the US for refusing to hand over source materials used in a story. The case prompted me to dig out my dissertation, which was a study of the legal threat to confidentiality of sources. It raises some interesting questions: just where should the line be drawn between blogging and more “legitimate” forms of journalism, and should the rights and privileges in one instance be extended to the other? The article mentions that the blogger in question was also a freelancer – if he had managed to have a later version of the offending article published in a newspaper would that have been treated any differently? (California doesn’t recognise a right to protect one’s sources in any event – whether this should or should not be the case took me
20,00015,000 words to draw a conclusion on, so don’t expect me to get into that here.) In any event, the face of journalism is changing and that is something we must hope our courts are equipped to deal with when such cases arise.As the Guardian commentator concluded: “Blogging was a helluva lot easier when all we wrote about was our cats.”
It was very cheering last night to watch the last ever Top of the Pops (link to Louise Wener writing in the Observer) with Margaret interrupting every five minutes with “he’s dead… he’s dead…” The end of this series of Top Gear, on the other hand, was the greatest hour of television ever. EVER. But I can’t really talk about it because Jay hasn’t seen it yet. MEH.