Tuesday, 13 September 2005
Instant Improvement
The Flangitizer converts all your hard work blogging into to complete nonsense. I'm quite tempted to rename my blog "Flapbla Wow BLA Bing Ling Oodle" for a while... But... nah!
Friday, 9 September 2005
A Little Something For The Weekend
Via Robot Wisdom: Well made, well presented and fiendishly addictive Table Tennis game.
Floodweiser
Boing Boing bring news, and pics, of Anhauser-Busch's help for flood victims. Water in a can.
It's probably got more taste than their usual product...
It's probably got more taste than their usual product...
Thursday, 8 September 2005
It's A Pity He Never Did A Duet With The Shat
Not quite the maddest thing ever, but up there. Jon Pertwee singing I Am The Doctor.
Via the incomparable No Rock 'N' Roll Fun.
Via the incomparable No Rock 'N' Roll Fun.
Tuesday, 6 September 2005
Come All Ye
Amidst all their tireless coverage of Katrina, Making Light somehow find time to take a fun look at the conventions of English Folk Songs and the dire warnings contained therein:
There's more there. Some of them do have you wondering just how specific the reference is to a song, but that's all in the fun of it. The commentors contributions are also worth the time.
Avoid situations where the obvious rhyme-word is “maidenhead.”
If you look at the calendar and discover it’s May, stay home.
If you are a young lady do not allow young men into your garden. Or let them steal your thyme. Or agree to handle their ramrods while they’re hunting the bonny brown hare. Cuckoo’s nests are right out. And never stand sae the back o’ yer dress is up agin the wa’ (for if ye do ye may safely say yer thing-a-ma-jig’s awa’).
If you’re a brunette, give up.
Not that being a blonde will improve the odds much.
If a former significant other turns up unexpectedly after a long absence, don’t throw yourself into his/her arms right away.
That goes double if they refuse to eat anything.
Triple if they turn up at night and want you to leave with them immediately.
There's more there. Some of them do have you wondering just how specific the reference is to a song, but that's all in the fun of it. The commentors contributions are also worth the time.
Monday, 5 September 2005
Random Jam Session Photos
Jamming! Hey this guitar almost hides my belly!
A Little Star. Just above the Three Lions.
Peter, Bernd and Me just trippin'.
Damn B7. From left, that's Peter, Martin, Peter, some Drummer and Me.
The Big Jam Session Last Saturday
OK, so my reputation as a raving ego-maniac stage whore was cemented if nothing else.
It was mostly to the good. I was, undoubtably, just a little too much full-on for the early part of the Jam but my justification was I wanted to get the crowd interested. I ripped off the Hayseed Dixies' "Do you like Bush?" intro to nobody's amusement but my own, though I think one or two at the back got it.
I had a fairly good crack at Muddy Waters' "Nineteen Years Old" when a slow blues was played. I was, mostly, restrained and when the two verses had run there course Peter got up and did something else instead, so that saved me running through all the other slow blues I could remember. I know Jam Session are supposed to be semi-endless noodling, but sometimes I'd be happy with "verse, solo, verse, end" as a structure and leave it at that. Which is why my best moment was, again, Dead Drunk and Naked. I start, I sing, I make my point and stop. This time it had a decent build up as more band filtered in during the song. Actually the unfortuate thing here was I had nothing to follow it up with. I quite fancied Mr. Bad Example, but I didn't think I my time-keeping would hold through all of that, so the mood kind of fizzled while the band found something else to play.
I did manage a sly version of Jacques Brel's Next, later, to a tango, apparently it worked.
A Djembe player, Lamin, turned up for the first time so there were quite a few extendend percussion based work outs. These made a change from the usual jazz, blues, rock 'n' roll template and were a crowd favourite, I think. I also seem to remember I snuck my way in for some of that, too, with some Bo Diddley and Woody Guthrie's Hoodoo Voodoo plus, if I remember correctly, a verse of Living for The City.
Trouble, normally an easy song to blast through, flopped and died quite horribly, though. Again "verse solo verse solo end" would have suited it but it was just flabby all round and never really took off in the way that it can. I may have to retire it for a bit (like it's cousin Hootchie Cootchie Man) until I feel it can be brought back with some dignity.
One last highlight late on was Klaus, the night's main drummer, playing Suzie Q on guitar while Peter did Set Them Free over it and I added wild-man backing vocals. At some point I started doing Papa Was A Rolling Stone which was a slightly odd choice, but fun never-the-less. A nice capper, really.
It was mostly to the good. I was, undoubtably, just a little too much full-on for the early part of the Jam but my justification was I wanted to get the crowd interested. I ripped off the Hayseed Dixies' "Do you like Bush?" intro to nobody's amusement but my own, though I think one or two at the back got it.
I had a fairly good crack at Muddy Waters' "Nineteen Years Old" when a slow blues was played. I was, mostly, restrained and when the two verses had run there course Peter got up and did something else instead, so that saved me running through all the other slow blues I could remember. I know Jam Session are supposed to be semi-endless noodling, but sometimes I'd be happy with "verse, solo, verse, end" as a structure and leave it at that. Which is why my best moment was, again, Dead Drunk and Naked. I start, I sing, I make my point and stop. This time it had a decent build up as more band filtered in during the song. Actually the unfortuate thing here was I had nothing to follow it up with. I quite fancied Mr. Bad Example, but I didn't think I my time-keeping would hold through all of that, so the mood kind of fizzled while the band found something else to play.
I did manage a sly version of Jacques Brel's Next, later, to a tango, apparently it worked.
A Djembe player, Lamin, turned up for the first time so there were quite a few extendend percussion based work outs. These made a change from the usual jazz, blues, rock 'n' roll template and were a crowd favourite, I think. I also seem to remember I snuck my way in for some of that, too, with some Bo Diddley and Woody Guthrie's Hoodoo Voodoo plus, if I remember correctly, a verse of Living for The City.
Trouble, normally an easy song to blast through, flopped and died quite horribly, though. Again "verse solo verse solo end" would have suited it but it was just flabby all round and never really took off in the way that it can. I may have to retire it for a bit (like it's cousin Hootchie Cootchie Man) until I feel it can be brought back with some dignity.
One last highlight late on was Klaus, the night's main drummer, playing Suzie Q on guitar while Peter did Set Them Free over it and I added wild-man backing vocals. At some point I started doing Papa Was A Rolling Stone which was a slightly odd choice, but fun never-the-less. A nice capper, really.
Thursday, 1 September 2005
The Hanks
My brother's started up a blog to let you know where the Country band he's part of is playing in the future (and, if you check out the archive, the past, too, I guess).
ID KO'd
"When two opposite points of view are expressed with equal intensity, the truth does not necessarily lie exactly half way between. It is possible for one side simply to be wrong."
Richard Dawkins in The Guardian pointing out that in the Intelligent Design debate both sides are not equal.
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