I follow a good few comedians on Twitter and one of my favourites is Dara O’Briain. He’s as sharp as a tack and as funny as hell.
Here he is sticking the knife into unscientific “medical” practices:
As a brucey bonus, here’s a related portion of the extremely funny Mitchell & Webb taking the funny stick to homeopathy:
Filed under Entertainment, The Interweb
Some things remain in the memory for a long time. I have no idea why but one Children’s Film Foundation series really buried itself in my psyche:
Chico the Rainmaker. I remember going along to our local cinema (The Lounge in Headingley) to watch the matinée screenings. This was one of my favourite programs for some reason. Probably all down to that catchy little theme tune.
Happy days!
Filed under Entertainment, TV and Film
Go and watch this before it’s taken off. It’s brilliant – pure Whedon genius. Funny and bittersweet, just as it should be.
Filed under Entertainment, The Interweb
…when you start listening to BBC Radio 2.
Let’s get this straight – I’ve not started some habit-forming addition to the radio station or anything, it’s just that I’ve listened to it once. And I kinda liked it.
I’d dropped my girlfriend off at some friends’ house in Manchester yesterday. She’s off to Morocco (without me!) for some fun and frolics with old friends, so we ended up there and I got to drive home back to to Nottingham in the evening. Luck would have it that Radio One were playing Appetite for Destruction in its entirety that evening and so I listened to that.
I’d forgotten what a great album it was. It’s now over twenty years old and sounds just as good now as it did then – certainly one of the best rock albums from the 80s, if not all time (apart from Sweet Child O’ Mine which just gets on my tits).
Unfortunately, Pete Tong followed after Zane Lowe. I’m sure he’s a pleasant chap and all but I really don’t get on with dance music on the radio. I can just about cope with it in nightclubs, during rare appearances in Nottingham’s sweatier drinking establishments, but it’s just not for my normal listening tastes. Jo had taken her iPod out of the car to take on holiday so, stuck with the radio, I hit “scan”.
Some local stations popped up and were quickly discarded but eventually I came across a track I quite liked. It turned out to be a Suzanne Vega song and it was being played on your Dad’s favourite radio station – Radio 2. To my surprise it turned out that the DJ was one of my old Radio 1 heroes Mark Radcliffe! I had no idea that the Lardless one was now presenting on Radio 2 and I was chuffed to bits to hear his Northern voice rambling along just like the old days.
I may have to tune in again, even if he has dispersed with his old sidekick Lard and recruited knowledgeable musico Stuart Maconie. It was a good show and I’m going to have to tune in again at some point.
Mark Lamarr followed radio’s favourite Boltonian, but he proceeded to play rockabilly and other ancient music stylings so I was glad when I arrived home soon after.
Filed under Entertainment, General Chunterings
I’ve been listening to some quite heavy stuff this week, but not matter where my current musical tastes lie I can always fall back to this song:
I think I’ve posted a different version of this very song before. It remains my favourite track of all time.
I love these guys!
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Filed under Entertainment
World of Warcraft got better this week with the release of the first Expansion, The Burning Crusade.
Expect no end of pale-faced geeks to spending even more time sat in front of their PCs running around in a fantasy world hitting things with swords, maces and other pointy objects. At least, that’s what I’m going to be doing.
The thing is, this isn’t just a geek’s game. Blizzard tell us that there are 8 million people that have subscribed. 8 million! This is a hugely popular game and even though it does stem from the fantasy genre there’s a huge interest in this from “normal” society too.
It’s a social game. OK, you can play solo if you want but there’s a far more rewarding game experience if you group up with other people. In-game chat is integrated into the user-interface and as long as you turn off the General Chat channel then you can usually tune down the many clueless idiots to just background noise.
There’s lots of fighting of course. Much of it is repetitive, true, but if you’re in a good Guild or play with like-minded people then you’ll pass the time rather nicely. It’s not all about shiny loot and gold, although those things are nice too.
So, what of the Burning Crusade? Well, on Tuesday I kept out of the new high-level area on purpose and just started a new Blood Elf Paladin (like so many other people). You can see her in the photo. Yes, she’s a lady Elf but no I’m not planning on stripping her down to her underwear and dancing for cash. Well, not that I’m willing to admit. The new starting area for the Blood Elves is a little too cutesy for me but I enjoyed the first few levels and look forward to questing with her more. I’ve not really played a Paladin before – should be interesting.
Yesterday I went into the Outlands with my level 60 Troll Hunter. I spent the first hour or so just wandering around going “Wow!”. The new world is just stunning. With so much new content to explore I was stuck for the best levelling strategy so I just decided to do a bit here, a bit there and see what was about.
This is going to keep me entertained for months and months. Blizzard have done wonders with this plus they’ve surpassed my expectations with the upgrade – the servers have actually been quite stable and we’ve not seen numerous crashes and unending frustration where people can’t login for days. Top work that company!
It’s going to take me ages to level to 70 but what the hell, I’ll take my time and enjoy the journey.
Here’s to many days of seemingly wasted time in from of my PC!
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Filed under Entertainment, General Chunterings, Photos and stuff
Last Saturday night millions of UK viewers tuned in to see Leona win the third series of The X Factor, probably the most popular, and influential, talent show around at the moment.
Now, Leona is a real talent. She has an incredible voice and immense potential and I’m pleased that she’s won this competition. However, I have some real problems with this program in general.
My issues stem from the fact that this show is just a cash cow masquerading as Saturday Night entertainment. Sure, it’s fun to watch and there are some nice tunes sung by the artists, but none of it is helping to advance the British music culture. It’s a glorified karaoke show rehashing old hits.
This is fine for TV, but look where this is heading. Within seconds of winning the show Leona’s first single, and inevitable number one, began it’s printing run. A Moment Like This will no doubt jump straight into the top spot of the weekly singles charts next Sunday, and thus begins a £1 million recording contract.
That’s big money for Sony BMG. They’ll be receiving some nice profits from this and the following album despite showing a complete lack of imagination with regards to their new artist. Leona has such a lot of potential, and yet they’ve chosen to play it safe by having her cover the Kelly Clarkson hit. The whole X Factor show is based around the artists singing cover songs. Not one song in the entire show has been an original composition, and yet millions have tuned in and spent their own money voting through these acts.
What is it about these shows that allows sub-standard performances of old songs to become so popular? Two or three acts aside, these are singers that are no better than the sort found in Working Men’s Clubs up and down the country. Even Leona, the worthy winner, seemed happy enough singing the usual vapid, sugary ballads week after week.
This is killing original music, or at least subduing it. How many young singers are watching this show thinking “I could do that”. They’re being fed the idea that they can become rich and famous by becoming a covers singer. It’s ideal for all concerned – pretty young woman or handsome young man sings popular songs for large profits.
There’s millions in it for the companies involved and nary a composer in sight. Rehash those old tunes – hell, this one was only released four years ago but we’ll use that anyway. Who needs to encourage young bands to play their own instruments or compose their own tunes if it’s so easy to make money this way?
This manufactured crap is topping our charts week after week. There seems no end to chart recycling and it isn’t healthy for popular music in general.
Leona deserves better than this. She has the raw talent to become something worthwhile but I somehow doubt that the likes of Simon Cowell and Sony BMG could care less about that when it’s so much easier to find a new artist every year.
Filed under Entertainment, General Chunterings, Musical Notes, TV and Film
Some games get a little addictive. I suppose you could say that I’m just a little bit addicted to World of Warcraft.
I’ve been playing this thing for over 2 years now – I started in the Beta stages of the game’s development too – and I just can’t seem to stop playing it. I love it to bits so I always look forward to logging in and being a Troll for a few hours.
It’s almost like I’m refusing to grow up or something. Not that this is unusual for a bloke of my age.
I have plenty of other things going on in my life that prevent me from playing WoW 24/7. Obviously I have to go to work every so often and I also have band practice and performances that mean I’m regularly blowing my horn rather than shooting things with bows. My girlfriend might (just might!) be considered slightly more important that the game too.
This has all meant that I’ve had to remain a casual player all this time. Just about everyone I know in-game has levelled faster than me and gone on to find better gear and go to the most dangerous places in Azeroth. I’ve been unable to apply for the end-game raiding guilds that do all the hardest, and best, content as I couldn’t honestly spend enough time playing to make it worthwhile. I’ve been happily spending my time in small guilds and enjoying the quests and dungeons that I could get into.
However, over the last few months things have been a bit different. My current realm, The Venture Co, is a Roleplaying server (sad, I know, but I enjoy it!) and there’s an RP Raiding community there called the Plunda Klub that recruit players from small, RP guilds so that even casual players can enjoy the end-game content. This wonderful community has really upped my enjoyment of the game and I’ve been enjoying raiding the 20-man dungeons fairly regularly when my shifts allow.
We’ve been so successful with recruiting that we’ve managed to get enough players together to have a go at Molten Core, the first 40-man dungeon in-game. I’d never been here before last month and we had another go at it last night.
On my only third ever trip in Molten Core we took done the second-hardest boss – Majordomo Executus. It was tricky for the first few goes, but when we got it right we finished that battle with only two men down. It was a great fight and I’m sure that we’ll find it easier next time.
It was getting late and a few people had to leave, but we decided to have one go at the final, most difficult boss – Ragnaros. I’d never fought him before and I was really looking forward to seeing him in the flesh (or rather, pixels) for the first time.
Bloody hell, he is HUGE! You can maybe see in the screenshot how big he is compared to the players behind him. He’s also a little difficult to take down and we were subjected to a major beatdown. It was worth the repair costs just to see him in action.
We need to get some more Fire Resist gear before we really have a chance against him, but fight him again we will. Then, onwards and upwards to the harder dungeons that have appeared since, although I suspect that we may end up spending as much time as we can levelling up once the expansion, The Burning Crusade, comes out next month.
Roll on the Outlands!
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Filed under Entertainment, General Chunterings
I’ve just been watching Eurosport while I was waiting for the nice Gritish Bass man to fix our central heating. There was football on, a lot of football. I got to watch a bit of Celtic versus Benfica followed by Spurs against Besiktas.
I don’t often get to watch much football so it was nice to be able to catch a couple of games. However, Eurosport kind of spoiled it a little bit by having a collection of the worst TV adverts ever made, and they’re all by the same company.
That’s right, it’s those purveyors of shit music collections Time Life. So far I’ve had a succession of tedious love songs and country “classics” and it’s starting to get on my tits. Do people actually watch these adverts and think “hmmm, that sounds great! I’ll phone up and buy that right away”?
Maybe they do. Either way, I’ve turned it off now that I’ve noticed that Real Madrid are having an easy game and doing something more interesting, like picking my nose and hoovering (who says that blokes can’t multi-task?)
It almost makes me want to go to work early. Almost.
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Filed under Entertainment, General Chunterings
Anyone remember Tiffany? I certainly do. She made quite an impression on me when I was a teenager, although maybe not the one that you’d think.
Of course I fancied her. Everyone did, but the one thing that I remember the most from those heady 80′s days was how utterly, utterly shite she was. I’m often bemused by how many people still seem to think that her cover of I Think We’re Alone Now was the bee’s knees.
It wasn’t it, it was crap. She had an emotionless, flat voice that only made the song sound more shite. Edith was playing it on Radio One this afternoon and people were texting in to say how much they loved it. Pffft. Not for me thanks.
Tiffany – she was no Nena.
Filed under Entertainment
