Crackerwax

Tettix, huh? Never heard of them I’ll bet, neither had I until I watched a video of the construction of a Lego Millennium Falcon which had the track Earth’s Assault On The Central AI as a soundtrack. Since then I’ve been a fan.

Tettix used to be called Cicada but, probably because Cicada already existed, have recently changed their name. The music’s still good though, very much in the vein of the Boards Of Canada with just a splash of the NES about it.

You’ll notice I’m saying they all the time, I don’t know why, Tettix is simply one hugely talented bloke, Judson Cowan, what’s more he gives his amazing music away for free. Free!

Onto the track though, Tettix released an album of a cappella covers of his favourite music. Amongst the gems on the album was this cover of Daft Punk’s Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger, which is unusual but rather splendid at the same time.

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How awesome is that?

If you like his stuff I suggest you get over to his site and download a few of his tracks. Don’t forget to drop him a few dollars by PayPal if you like it though.

I’m becoming addicted to Twitter. Who cares what I’m doing? It’s an ego sling.

It’s been a while since I’ve played you some music, so I thought I’d treat you to a some new tracks over the next few days. I’m kind like that.

The first of these is Blind Mary from the new Gnarls Barkley album, The Odd Couple, and it’s a belter.

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Poppy, upbeat and altogether delicious. It’s a great summer song and if it’s not a single at some point I’ll be stunned.

The whole album is full of songs of that quality, out of the thirteen tracks there isn’t a single dud. Stand out tracks for me though are Charity Case, Run and Blind Mary each of which is so skilfully written and produced as to make you feel like you’ve known them for years.

If you like music you really need to buy this album!

Stay tuned, because tomorrow you’re going to experience the delights of a Daft Punk cover by Tettix. Exciting, huh?

I’d never really heard of Twitter before the recent Penny Arcade cartoon about it.

So, very much like the time I bought Puzzle Quest because they said it was good, I immediately jumped on twitter.com and registered myself and my phone, and I must say I’m kind of loving it.

Being able to SMS updates on my every move is great, if a little freaky. Then again it’s only trivia, as you can see to your right, but for the moment I’m updating regularly.

Let’s see how long that lasts shall we? Hell, at least I’ve updated more than some already.

I think that the title probably says it all, it’s never a bad idea to make a list of all the dicks in the world.

Very funny and painfully well observed.

I’ve never been one of those weird audiophile types. They’ve always struck me as a wee bit odd listening to John Coltrane, in the dark, with their eyes closed, suspended from the ceiling by elastic bands, completely nude. You know the sort of thing.

One of their other bizarre habits, and one which is also shared by the gullible punters who buy TVs at Dixons, is buying obscenely expensive cables.

My HDMI cables cost £3.89 each, if I were to be a cable snob I’d have paid £99.95 for a Monster brand HDMI cable.

And if I’d done that you could rightly claim that I was a complete twat, because I would be.

I recall the father of a friend of mine that bought an £80 SCART cable. He used this to connect a DVD player to a 50″ low definition, back projection television. He was informed by the salesman that it would improve picture quality immeasurably. Immeasurably.

Yeah, maybe if it was fucking magic.

That’s the point though isn’t it, the gullible can be fooled very easily. As can the conceited.

If you think you have some kind of divine power that enables you to sense the effect that using oxygen free copper over regular copper has on the electrical impulse that carries your audio signal to your speakers, you’ve got to have some kind of messiah complex. It just isn’t possible.

The same goes for HDMI cables, the signal is digital it either works or it doesn’t, there’s no in between. Even worse than that is the bizarre swindle of the gold plated optical cable. What the fuck use is gold plating to a device that relies on optical integrity? None, that’s what. How could it be, unless of course gold has some amazing optical properties I’m not aware of!

All of the above just serves to enhance the glee I felt when reading this article about audiophiles being unable to tell the difference between aforementioned Monster cables and coat hangers. That’s right, coat hangers.

Oh, how we laughed.

In his memoirs John Prescott, the former deputy prime minister, claims to have suffered from bulimia during his time in the cabinet.

For those not in the know bulimia nervosa comes in two flavours purging and non-purging, Prescott’s was seemingly the purging variety.

Generally speaking people suffering from bulimia binge eat then take measures to prevent the food from being digested, either by taking laxatives or inducing vomiting.

Clearly Prescott managed to get the hang of the binge part, though possibly not the purge bit, otherwise you’d think the fat fucker would have been thinner really wouldn’t you?

Woo-hoo! Bill’s been promoted! He’s now Admiral Adama!

You can probably tell how far through Battlestar Galactica we are now…

Get yourself over to the brilliant You Have To Burn The Rope, it’s a proper treat.

It’s all about the music. All about the music…

Aliza Shvarts is an art student. An art student who, the Huffington Post reports, has, as part of her senior arts project plumbed new depths. Read.

Beginning next Tuesday, Shvarts will be displaying her senior art project, a documentation of a nine-month process during which she artificially inseminated herself ‘as often as possible’ while periodically taking abortifacient drugs to induce miscarriages. Her exhibition will feature video recordings of these forced miscarriages as well as preserved collections of the blood from the process.

I know I’m probably meant to be shocked by this, and I am, but it’s not the art that’s doing the shocking, it’s her disregard for life and the very womanhood she probably thinks she’s defending that shocks me.

Where does a woman’s body stop and another life start? It’s a big question and one that I could never hope to answer. Abortion is an emotive subject and rightly so but inseminating yourself in order to purposefully induce miscarriage a few months later just for shits and giggles is morally reprehensible.

I hold true the fact that a woman, just like a man, has the right to do whatever they want to their body, that right carries with it responsibility though. With this act she has treated the entire process of conception like it were a body piercing, something to be used to make a statement. It is deeply saddening.

This is not art. Neither is it self expression. It is mental illness.

Why do the boffins that design toothbrushes hang around nodding in groups of three, in labs that are painted nuclear white with behemoth floor to ceiling displays?

What does it take to design a toothbrush. I mean, really.

I was watching Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles just now and one of the characters quoted from the King James Bible.

He quoted Revelation 6 in fact and good grief was it freaky, so being the inquisitive sort I looked it up on the interwebs. The entire text reads like this.

And I saw when the Lamb opened one of the seals, and I heard, as it were the noise of thunder, one of the four beasts saying, Come and see. And I saw, and behold a white horse: and he that sat on him had a bow; and a crown was given unto him: and he went forth conquering, and to conquer.

And when he had opened the second seal, I heard the second beast say, Come and see. And there went out another horse that was red: and power was given to him that sat thereon to take peace from the earth, and that they should kill one another: and there was given unto him a great sword.

And when he had opened the third seal, I heard the third beast say, Come and see. And I beheld, and lo a black horse; and he that sat on him had a pair of balances in his hand. And I heard a voice in the midst of the four beasts say, A measure of wheat for a penny, and three measures of barley for a penny; and see thou hurt not the oil and the wine.

And when he had opened the fourth seal, I heard the voice of the fourth beast say, Come and see. And I looked, and behold a pale horse: and his name that sat on him was Death, and Hell followed with him. And power was given unto them over the fourth part of the earth, to kill with sword, and with hunger, and with death, and with the beasts of the earth.

And when he had opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of them that were slain for the word of God, and for the testimony which they held: And they cried with a loud voice, saying, How long, O Lord, holy and true, dost thou not judge and avenge our blood on them that dwell on the earth? And white robes were given unto every one of them; and it was said unto them, that they should rest yet for a little season, until their fellow servants also and their brethren, that should be killed as they were, should be fulfilled.

And I beheld when he had opened the sixth seal, and, lo, there was a great earthquake; and the sun became black as sackcloth of hair, and the moon became as blood; And the stars of heaven fell unto the earth, even as a fig tree casteth her untimely figs, when she is shaken of a mighty wind. And the heaven departed as a scroll when it is rolled together; and every mountain and island were moved out of their places. And the kings of the earth, and the great men, and the rich men, and the chief captains, and the mighty men, and every bondman, and every free man, hid themselves in the dens and in the rocks of the mountains; And said to the mountains and rocks, Fall on us, and hide us from the face of him that sitteth on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb: For the great day of his wrath is come; and who shall be able to stand?

It describes Armageddon, a prophecy of the end times, and it’s a little on the heavy side.

The other thing about it is that it’s somewhat detailed yet could describe the end of the world by just about any means. Earthquake, meteor strike, nuclear war, anything.

That’s the bible thought isn’t it, a bit like horoscopes, if you write things properly you can leave them open to just about any interpretation.

The Lord relayedth a message to me by angels, and they did speak in heavenly choir. “The thing will do something.”, they spaketh in my mind.

And lo the thing did glow, or pulse, or possibly throb I couldn’t be sure. And then lo it did do something different. And this was a portent of other stuff.

And it came to pass that other things did happen. And the Lord spake.

“I told you that wouldth happenth. Now kill your children and prove to me that I did not make that thing do stuff unnecessarily. And that you love me.”.

You know the score.

Watched the new Knight Rider the other day. Jury’s still out on series potential but for a silly kids show it sure as hell beats Doctor Who.

After my recent dismay at Jackie Chan advertising for Woolworths it has come to my attention that they have a new sponsor. It’s safe to say that Woolworths have now well and truly jumped the advertising shark.

As if Jackie Chan wasn’t inappropriate enough they’re now using Darth Vader to hawk toasters. Darth Vader. The Darth Vader, the one from Star Wars.

The most evil man in the universe can now be seen on television preparing beans on toast. Watch and cringe.

Has George Lucas not got enough money already? Does he really need to let the only decent thing he ever created be seen on television toasting bread with a lightsaber? Does his description of Darth Vader’s path through life fit with selling toasters?

This first trilogy is really about the father, the struggles of a father, or a man, basically, to find himself, and at the same time fall into a trap of wanting certain powers, making a pact with the devil and basically spending the rest of his life regretting it.

No. No it does not.

Simon Smith of The Apprentice fame has been the subject of the worst hatchet job in the history of the series, after just four weeks, the only candidate I would even consider holding a conversation with, has been fired.

It stinks. He’d better not go back to installing Sky TV, that’s all I can say.

The guy has clearly got the correct attitude, he’s a doer, perhaps a little too direct at times perhaps even bullish but for Christ’s sake the people he was working along side were fucking morons. Petty, juvenile fuckwads, Sir Alan knew it and his advisors knew it but yet he still got fired. Bloody shame.

Then again I guess that’s the problem with shows like this, they’re not really intended to allow Sir Alan Sugar to find a new apprentice, they’re designed to provide ghoulish entertainment.

You have to be thick but egotistical to win The Apprentice. It’s that simple.

Oh yes, it also helps if you’re a true mangler of metaphors. Let’s here it for such gems as ‘I’ve had to breast feed you all along’, ‘throw your dummy out of the pram’, ‘stand up to the plate’ and the best yet ‘a missile that’s about to go into outer space and spontaneously combust‘. Fucking idiots.

Have you heard of Deichmann shoes? No me neither.

Nevertheless that hasn’t stopped the ever changing trio of top totty that are the Sugababes from whoring themselves advertising for them.

Unless I’m really missing something and this Deichmann bunch are a phenomenon in the shoe world, which I very much doubt given their logo and their price point, I really can’t see why the Sugababes are promoting them. The link between the Aldi of the German shoe making world and a successful British pop group eludes me.

They’d have been better using the money they spent on securing the shoe designing ‘talents’ of the Sugbabes on a good graphic designer and get rid of their aforementioned horrendous logo. I mean look at this.

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What’s worse is their tag line ‘Gutes Geschäft’. Gutes Geschäft translates to something along the lines of ‘a good business’. How very literal and German that is. Makes ‘I’m Lovin’ It’ seem like poetry.

It’s weird.

Advertising is so low rent. Recently we’ve had Girls Aloud for Kit Kat which I can understand, given that they are a product in themselves but it just makes no sense to see the Sugababes selling this kind of tat.

The real question is though is what’s next? Duffy for Brantano? Rihanna for Shoe Zone?

For the record gin and Pepsi does not a tasty beverage make. Trust me. Really, trust me.

It’s been months since I last bought a decent gadget and there’s no more decent a gadget than a really little laptop, is there?

So with that in mind let me introduce my two new little friends, the HP 2133 and the Asus EEE PC 900.

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The HP is on the left and the Asus on the right.

The specifications of both are pretty good, given their price points, but in my opinion the HP is the winner really. Then again you know there’s a vote coming so I’ll let you make up your own mind about those specifications.

HP 2133

• Processor: VIA C7 1.6GHz
• Memory: 2048 MB
• Disk: 120 GB HDD
• OS: Windows Vista
• Screen: 8.9″ (1280 x 768)
• Wireless: WiFi a/b/g, Bluetooth
• Communications: 10/100/1000 Ethernet
• Expansion Slots: ExpressCard/54 slot, SD slot
• Price: $750

Asus EEE PC 900

• Processor: Intel 900 MHz
• Memory: 1024 MB
• Disk: 20 GB SSD
• OS: Windows XP
• Screen: 8.9″ (1024×600)
• Wireless: WiFi a/b/g
• Communications: 10/100 Ethernet
• Expansion Slots: SD slot
• Price: $660

Actually just reading the specification vs. price point going on there kind of makes my mind up for me, the HP is clearly better value. Clearly. Right?

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The slog has begun, we’re watching Battlestar Galactica from beginning to end. It’d better be good!

Well I know for me that whenever I think of Woolworths the two things that immediately spring to mind are Pic ‘N’ Mix and Hong Kong action movies.

That’s why it was so nice to finally see an advert for Woolworths that features Hong Kong legend Jackie Chan. I’ve often thought that Woolworths ought to exploit its obvious links to the Hong Kong martial arts scene.

Actually if you think I’m jesting in some way, why not watch it!

How fucked up is that? What were they thinking?

Why do women leave the price stickers on their fucking high heels?! Take them off! Why would you leave them on? Are you taking them back?

Well that’s easy! He thinks he’s Vic Mackey let’s take a look at them shall we? On the left we have TV tough man Vic Mackey and on the right TV tough man Steve Wilkos. Oh, hang on, did I get that right?

Vic Mackey (left) and Steve Wilkos (right) yesterday.

Maybe I didn’t but you’d have to be fucking psychic to tell them apart, let’s look at some quotes from them shall we.

Excuse me while I get a Kleenex for the rest of this sob story.

And this beauty.

Shut up!

Well actually they’ve both probably said those things at some point but if I’m honest the first is Vic Mackey and the second is Steve Wilkos. Hell, does it even matter though?

The fact is Vic Mackey is a fictitious character played by an award winning actor, Steve Wilkos is a real person, an ex-marine, ex-cop but nonetheless a real human being who isn’t reading from a script.

After years spent mute as a security guard on the Jerry Springer Show, in 2007 young Steve managed to wangle himself a show of his own. On this show he lets loose with all the things he wanted to say during his years of enforced silence and good lord does he!

Admittedly he’s dealing with some pretty scummy people but come on, his take on it all is to shout and throw chairs! I can’t imagine that this is a modern way of dealing with wife beaters and paedophiles (his ‘guest’ of choice) surely there are better ways to do it? Perhaps get evidence and have them arrested?

Then again people quietly going to jail doesn’t make for explosive television. A massive hulk of a man throwing a chair across a stage while shouting down some inadequate in front of an audience does.

At least Vic Mackey has the grace to go after men that could quite easily have him killed.

So it would appear young Shannon Matthews wants to stay with her foster parents. Who can blame her?

Have you seen her family? Her mother, whilst claiming an age of 32, looks about 53, and has seven children by five fathers. Her step father looks like he’s staring at the world through a goldfish bowl of confusion, that is when he’s not allegedly staring at kiddie porn.

The girl had no chance.

At least now there’s some hope that she’ll be able to do something with her life.

Get Carter was remade back in 2000 and I’ve been interested to see it since then, so when I saw it in my local Blockbuster for £1.99 I jumped at the chance of a purchase.

Perhaps I shouldn’t have been quite so keen. It’s a mess of a movie, its heart’s in the right place but it’s not a patch on the original.

I was desperate for this to be good. I think Sylvester Stallone is a vastly underrated talent. One of the major reason the movie sucks though is down to its lack of consistency with the original. One minutes its scene for scene perfect, the next its taking the story off at wild, unheard of tangents, then the next thing you know it’s back to being a faithful adaptation.

That is of course until the end, when it goes very, very wrong.

Carter is supposed to die. That’s what makes the original so unique, it’s downbeat from start to end. Hollywood has its rules though and the primary rule is always have a happy ending. Damn shame.

I had written the bit that follows as an entirely straight faced rant on how English as a language was in decline because of misuse by The Youth Of Today™. However on reading it back I decided it said more about me than them.

Have a read and see what you think.

If I hear one more person describe something as being blatantly obvious, I’m going to kill myself. You see I’ve reached the end of my tether and the breaking point came about this very afternoon when I had the misfortune of sitting across the aisle from a couple of teenagers on a train to London.

During this journey I had the great honour of hearing every word of their conversation. Having said that I could probably have heard it from the other end of the train given the volume of their incessant squawking.

Anyway, I digress, as they sat there opposite each other at the table seat, each of them with their feet up on the seats, their bags strategically placed on the seat beside them so no one would encroach on their personal space, they began talking about their friends relationships.

I managed to find out that Jeremy was dating a girl and whilst he was praised for this because she was like, really pretty he was (unbeknown to him I suspect) being given very black looks in the social circle because she was really, really young.

I have no idea how old the girls on the train were but given their description of Jeremy’s girlfriend I can only assume she was a foetus.

Anyway, I’ve derailed myself again. Where was I? Oh yes, abuses of English.

During their conversation I managed to note the following examples of sloppy English usage:

• Blatant/Patent
  At one point Girl A (who looked astonishingly like Noel Fielding) turned to Girl B (who looked a bit like an anorexic version of Big Suze of off Peep Show) and said that something was blatantly obvious. As we all know the correct term is patently obvious (although this ass clown clearly doesn’t).
• Random
  On several occasions both girls used the word random incorrectly. The choicest use of this modern day gem was when, describing her previous night’s escapades, Noel told Big Suze that she had been brought a drink by some random guy.
• Brought/Bought
  See above.
  Unless of course said random guy was a waiter who had in fact quite correctly brought the girl her drink, not having paid for it himself. Although of course this would almost certainly preclude the gentleman in question from being described as random, unless waiters in the establishment they were drinking in were despatched to tables in a sequence that was decided by the roll of a die or some type of Wheel Of Fortune style rotating device of course. You never know.
• Like
  I was like, so pissed off, cos she was like, completely in the wrong and I was like, no way and she was like, shut up and I was like…
  Enough!
  I think I’ve made my point clear with that one.
• HRT (High Rising Terminal)
  Every fucking word that came out of their mouths sounded like a question? Which after about two seconds became very irritating? I don’t know how they can listen to each other?

Of course there were more abuses than that, I think my mind switched off after a while though.

See what I mean? The upshot of this is that I have decided that I am going to buy a pair of slippers, a cardigan and a nice pipe and never leave the house again. I’ve clearly become a grumpy old man.

In fact I should have seen this coming ages ago, something’s changed in my head. If you want an example, look no further than this recent episode.

Earlier in the week whilst driving home from work I switched on the radio but instead of getting the soothing tones of Eddie Mair it had been left tuned into Radio 1 and all I got was a noise. A loud noise.

The noise in question was so offensive to my ears that I began muttering under my breath that modern music was shit, that it all sounded the same and that when I was a teenager we had proper rock music, etc, etc.

It was at that point I realised I was listening to the middle section of Paradise City by Guns ‘N’ Roses.

Anyone fancy a mug of cocoa?

Sadly my site seems to be becoming a collection of YouTube clips, however never one to fly in the face of an obvious problem here’s another one.

This is Dr Bunson Honeydew demonstrating the solution to all our banana storage problems. Ladies and Gentlemen I present the Banana Sharpener!

Bloody hell The Muppets were funny!