Tuesday, December 01, 2009

Shoreline, Half Moon Bay




Fireworks + Small Dog = Win

I Was Thinking Of Trimming My Beard

...but then I saw this....



(Seen over at Now That's Nifty)
Golfer's Wife Uses Club To Rescue Crash Husband

I saw this nicely summed up on b3ta as

"Woods uses wood to save Woods from woods"

Monday, November 30, 2009

˙ʎɐqə ɯoɹɟ pɹɐoqʎəʞ ɐ ʎnq ı əɯıʇ ʇsɐl əɥʇ sı sıɥʇ
Brilliant, Yet Scary Robot



Bigdog, from Boston Dynamics.



There is also the less scary, but still sort of creepy Little Dog. There is something that is almost, but not quite, organic about the movement of these robots that makes the hair on the back of my neck stand up.
Facebook - Universally Popular

Did you know Darth Vadar has an account.

Saturday, November 28, 2009

Album Review : New Frustration - Guns On The Roof****



For Fans Of : Rancid, The Wildhearts, Green Day, Bad Religion, Stiff Little Fingers

I'm quite sure that if GOTR came from Los Angeles instead of Leeds they would already be playing to packed theatres instead of busy pubs, and that's as much the fault of the British music fan, we're so open to anything American and so closed off to our own great bands. I first saw GOTR performing with another awesome Yorkshire band, G.U. Medicine, at a back room pub gig in Huddersfield, and they were both tight, furiously energetic bands, GUM in a metal sense, GOTR as a melodic punk outfit.

New Frustration is probably the best bit of new British punk I have heard in ages, this is the sound of a tight outfit who write catchy hard pop punk numbers and perform them with precision and drive, really, if you're thinking that Bad Religion are getting too long in the tooth, that Green Day have sold out, or it's just too long to wait for another Rancid album, then please do buy a copy of New Frustration, you won't be disappointed.

For your money you get 15 tracks of highly enjoyable bouncy punk with fast controlled riffs, passionate vocals and the odd big chorus here and there. There is a general good quality to the album that it makes it hard to pick stand out tracks, it is pretty much all killer, no filler, but still, 'Last Night' and 'So Tired' raise the standard a little further.

This is highly infectious stuff, a couple of spins and you'll be wishing for a loud, sweaty mosh pit to get involved in, GOTR pump out the sort of songs perfect for live performance, loud, immediate, raucous and anthemic in a punk fashion.

New Frustration is a powerful and accomplished album from an exciting and talented British band, you will hear echoes of Rancid and Stiff Little Fingers along the way, but presented as affectionate familiarity rather than plagiarism, it might not be climbing new heights of originality, but in terms of presentation and entertainment value it is very good indeed.

You can get some free samples of GOTR's excellent melodic punk from their Scrobbler page.

For Your Entertainment And Delight......

......Nowiy god by Steklovata.



Although, I could swear they were singing 'lovely goat.'
Staff



I have no idea what is going on in this picture, but sadly I employ one of these people......

Friday, November 27, 2009

Friday Quiz



How many men can you see in this spicture ?

Thursday, November 26, 2009

Pale Is The New Tan



Lots more strangely coloured people over at Pale Is The New Tan Blog
Dear Mandy (An Open Letter to Lord Mandelson) - Dan Bull



Another spot on protest song from the wonderful Dan Bull.
Question Of The Week



So, we're on the settee watching Life with Keira Knightley and Cheryl Cole, and we will be eating pizza (although some fool of website writer left curry off the choices, duh), pizza you said, but what topping ?
Trawling The Depths Of Human Misery

I didn't consciously realise when packing my holiday reading selection what a concentrated heap of evil, spite and awfulness I had gathered.....

Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen : Little rich girls mope around

Catcher In The Rye - J D Salinger : Spoiled rich kid hates everything

Lord Of The Flies - William Golding : Lost boys amuse themselves with murder

On Chesil Beach - Ian McEwan : No sex please we're English and uptight

Night - Elie Wiesel : The Holocaust as seen by a survivor

Push - Sapphire : Incest, rape, brutality and the death of joy

Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte : The endless Gypsy's curse

No Country For Old Men - Cormac McCarthy : Everyone's gotta die, by shotgun

Good Lord, it's lucky I'm a fairly happy person, because that was a few thousand pages of evil and sadness, only slightly alleviated by reading a couple of Armistead Maupin's light and frothy San Francisco soap operas in between.

On a slightly surreal note, I just noticed this sticker on the cover of Push..."WINNER - Grand Jury Prize and Audience Award at the Sundance Film Festival", right, so the film of the book is thought to be great, but that does not actually say anything about the book itself. You cannot draw a line between a film based on a book and the book itself, otherwise you would have to assume that the brilliant and wonderful Hellblazer (filmed as the execrable Constantine) is a huge and steaming pile of manure. If the book has won an award, then it is sensible to indicate that, but to point out that a film translation of the book is award winning seems odd to me.

That said, having read Push, I would be interested in seeing Precious, as the book has been re-named for film. I would imagine that some scenes, in fact quite a few scenes, will be upsetting and unnerving.

Has anyone seen either The Road or No Country For Old Men ? Are they any good ?

I did see a few movies when I was away, the Disney/Pixar animation Up was pretty good, I enjoyed The Imaginarium Of Dr. Parnassus, and Sam Rockwell is very good playing two versions of the same man in the nicely paced and thoughtful SF drama Moon. The next film I'm really keen to see, in all its 3D glory, is Avatar, I do like a bit of Sci-Fi.
Twilight Sequel Cancelled

Wednesday, November 25, 2009

Ian's 40th Birthday



L-R Standing, John, Beverly, William, Dan, Margaret
L-R Seated, Shelley, Ian, Elizabeth, Doug, Meg, YS

I think Ian had started celebrating at 11am, this was 6pm ish at a Mexican restaurant, he seemed even more 'merry' when we left the rather lively sports bar at 10pm.

Tuesday, November 24, 2009

Pier, San Matteo



The original.



Black and white and sharpened.