Ouch! My bald pate is sunburnt. It’s sore, it’s sore.
Today, got to get all my work done. Got to get it all done before deadline. Went mad and ordered a new digital camera on condition that I can flog my old one for £150 on eBay. I am constantly amazed how electronic equipment is constantly getting better. My old camera was the best of its class in 2002, but now three years later, I’ve bought a better one for a fraction of the price. Amazing.
Getting excited about the VDGG concert at the end of the week, though I won’t be listening to any VDGG music until the day of the gig, just to get me whipped up to fever pitch. 2005 is a great year for gigs so far.
More Sows’ Ears have been produced and are ready to be sent off to the US of A. Got paid for digital playbacks today. My goodness, the digital payment is pure profit and I am astounded that people are willing to buy music from a no good bum who’s never played a gig in his life. If only I was a proper musician, I might make some more money. 🙂
Latest Entries »
Was taken out in the car to visit a retail park, looking for a DTT Freeview box to replace our knackered Sky+ setup. Out of three shops, none of them had the one I wanted in stock – nor did they have any boxes with hard drives to store TV shows. Should have ordered one online, but I wanted to have a mooch in a shop. Sometimes some old fashioned shlepping around the shops is good for the soul, no?
On the way back, we stopped at the pub and had a couple of pints and a bite to eat. I was concerned that the man with the mobile phone would be there, ready to harrass us, but he wasn’t. After an afternoon in the sun, I got a big fat red face for my sins and a couple of quid lighter. On the way out of the pub who should be standing by the car park resplendant with a pint in one hand and his mobile phone in the other (clamped to his ear and engaged in conversation) than our old friend Mr Mobile Phone Big Mouth Man. People never change, eh?
Oh well, I sold out of Sows’ Ears again. 🙂 So the morning was spent making some fresh copies to go over to CDBABY. It’s a popular number and I’ve shifted a bucketload. I guess folks love quantity over quality everytime! So popular is the 4-CD set that I am thinking of just releasing another 4-CD compilation and dispensing with separate releases. This means that Without Words/Textures/I am Not Your Enemy/Fragments could all end up in a big boxset. It’s something I’m considering as it means my music gets out there with the minimum of fuss.
On a separate note, Dr Who was very good fun last night. It was very good fun indeed. 🙂
What can I say? When I was about ten years old, I was first exposed to the works of Douglas Adams. First it was via the TV shows, then the books and eventually the radio plays – so I kind of did it arse about face. During a run of the TV shows, I contracted chicken-pox and suffered for a fortnight, but that programme got me through and I loved how so knowingly clever it all was. Hitch-Hikers, like Dr Who, was a thing that I loved in my childhood, but both are having a resurrection, so at the moment, I am feeling a little bit like and eleven year old again. It’s bloody brilliant!
Back to the movie. There’s been a lot written by the “fans” about this film and most of it has been bad. This is a shame, because I thoroughly enjoyed this new version of the classic. Firstly, I wasn’t expecting a complete conversion of the book, I wanted something NEW and FRESH and that’s what I got. Not a crusty adaptation of a 30 year old book where the everyman Englishman was ever-so middle-class and had a tea fetish. I could never identify with the old Arthur Dent because he was so far removed from my experience, but I like the new Arthur Dent played by Martin Freeman who sums up his modernity towards the end of the film when he says: “I could murder a cuppa”. Too right, Arthur. 🙂
Anyway, the film radically departs from the book, leaving a lot of the oh-so clever, self-reverential words behind and instead taking a more filmatic journey through the HH universe. I think the fans that complained about this film wanted large chunks of the text projected onto the screen so they could read and giggle along – alas, movies do not work like that. They are a visual medium (no shit, Einstein). The story cracks on at a frightening pace and it is not long before we are into the action. It certainly was the fastest 109 minutes I’ve spent in a cinema. The special FX are absolutely excellent and I absolutely adore the new Marvin robot, voiced by Alan Rickman. All the cast work well with Sam Rockwell nailing it as the shallow, vain and frankly stupid Zaphod Beeblebrox. Some of the new ideas, like the point-of-view gun are inspired and I liked it how the white mice are more malevolent in this version of the story.
When the opening banjo plucks of “Journey of the Magi” began to play, all the hairs on the back of my neck stood up. It was fantastic. Granted, some of my favourite passages weren’t included, but it doesn’t matter. This is a new film aimed at an audience who hasn’t read the books. My only major gripe was that there wasn’t enough from the Guide itself, voiced by the superb Stephen Fry. I thought Mos Def did a great job as a spaced-out Ford and Zooey Deschanel made a very attractive Trillian. A lot as been made of the “romantic” thread in the film, but I thought it was OK. If you are the last two humans left alive after the destruction of Earth, it’s only natural that you might want to “get it on”. Am I right or am I right? 😉 Bill Nighy makes a great Slartibartfast and the journey through the planet workshop on Magreathea is the film’s money shot. I really liked that bit and the bit when they activated Earth Mk II. Fantastic!
This film was made for the next generation of fans-to-be and luckily, we had some ten year olds sitting in the row in front of us. It was cool because I was that age when I first got introduced to this work. The kids laughed at the jokes, loved the whale and let our a roar when the mice shouted “Bollocks!” and got squished. As the curtain came down, they looked like they enjoyed the film and I was left hopeful that they would investigate the source. The only people complaining were the fat, flabby-arsed, unattractive anoraks we heard outside moaning about the fact that not enough money was spent on Zaphod’s second head. For fuck’s sake, get a life. It’s a movie. It either entertained you or it didn’t.
I was entertained. For my money, I got 109 minutes of entertainment. OK – it’s not wet-your-pants funny, but then HH wasn’t like that for me. It’s more a wry smile “that’s very clever” kind-of-funny. When it finished, there was a final, very quick, shot of Douglas Adams’ face zooming off the screen and my eyes went a little moist. It was my love of Douglas Adams and Harry Harrison that made me start writing sci-fi stories when I was a nipper and caused me to vow that I wanted to be a writer. I liked this film a lot and it saddens me to think that a lot of fans who’s minds are stuck in 1977 or 1981 won’t realise that this movie wasn’t actually made for them.
I loved it and can’t wait to own it on DVD. Please, I hope that enough people see this film so that the DisneyCorpTM decides to make “Restaurant at the End of the Universe”.
Blimey – diary entries are like buses…wait ages and two come along at once. Anyway, for the loyal reader who visits everyday, here’s a demo of a track I recorded last night/this morning before I went to bed. It’s called “Eastern Pipes” and the percussion loops is by me and it is more of a sketch than a fully-fledged track. I’ll subsequently re-record this and develop the idea. This is how I work now…I record a couple of demo passes, trying out some ideas and then go for a proper take. Of course, sometimes I end up using the demo if it is that good. Anyway, I am gibbering…here’s da toon:
It’s only seven days till the UK elections, but seeing as you can’t vote for me to be your benevolent dictator, I would suggest that you vote for this fellow instead:
Apparently, that song makes a small cameo in the new “Hitch-Hikers” film. It’s by Neil Hannon from The Divine Comedy and a couple of guys from Travis. Well it made me smile and it has got me all juiced up for my visit to the cinema to see the movie itself. I can’t wait! 🙂
While out walking Alex the Wonderdog this Sunday lunchtime, we happened to spy a couple on the green area opposite our house “getting it on”. It wasn’t exactly the weather for it, but these people (not sure if they were man & woman, woman & woman or man & man) were dressed conservatively and wearing hoods. But despite this fact, there was plenty of dry-humping going on. We diverted our gaze and continued with our walk, but as our projected route arced round back to the house, The Missus was sure that she saw one of the couple giving the other a blow-job. All this on a Sunday afternoon – normally I have to trawl the Internet for a cheap thrill, but now it is happening just a stone’s throw from the house. It’s not the first time this has happened. Because we live in a fairly secluded area, couples having illicit affairs have used our road as a spot to “get it on”. This has happened during the day time (middle-aged couples copping a feel on a Friday lunchtime, out of sight of their work colleagues) to the youngsters steaming up their Vauxhall Nova’s windows at 11pm at night. We’ve seen it all and the remains of their spent passion the next morning. Ho hum…get a hotel room, fer Christ’s sake.
As for this lunchtime, at least it gave all the other dog-walkers something to look at..