The View from the Spaghetti Factory

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Entries Tagged as 'Music'

Pete Townshend – John Peel lecture

November 1st, 2011 · 5 Comments · Consumer, Music, Music industry

Pete Townshend gave the inaugural John Peel Lecture yesterday. I was initially rather surprised by the choice of Townshend. Peel, it seems to me, stood for the fearless exploration of new music and the blurring of the received boundaries between “mainstream” and “alternative”. Townshend was an Angry Young Man once, but has been part of [...]

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The return of the album?

January 18th, 2011 · 1 Comment · Music

I’ve seen a couple of BBC radio and TV news items about the Classic Album Clubs running in a few British pubs. A reaction to the one-song-at-a-time ADHD listening habits fostered by the downloading culture, the clubs have an atmosphere of reverent reflection. The heads of listeners are shown gently nodding to the sound of [...]

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Trish Keenan RIP

January 15th, 2011 · No Comments · Music

So sad to hear that Trish Keenan has died from complications caused by the H1N1 virus. I think I get a bit blasé about “celebrity” deaths, as the people seem so distant and unreal, but this really shocked me. Trish was relatively young and creatively active; I saw her on stage at the South Bank [...]

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The Roundhouse Zappa festival

November 16th, 2010 · 1 Comment · Music

At risk of spreading myself too thinly, I also have a couple of Posterous blogs. One of them, SFORZO is just a daft little photoblog for little snaps as I’m bumbling through life. The other one is where I babble about music I like, or big up stuff by friends, or… well, whatever. So, in [...]

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Custom Transcription – new site

October 1st, 2010 · No Comments · Guitar, Music

My little freelance transcription sideline is always a going concern, but while we’ve all been putting a lot of energy into jamtrackcentral I haven’t really done much to market myself. There hasn’t even been a website for about two years, so I’ve rectified that with a new design… custom-transcription.com Oh, and in an attempt to [...]

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In praise of geeks

July 20th, 2010 · No Comments · Art/Culture, Music, TV/Radio

One of my favourite radio programmes is Laurie Taylor’s Thinking Allowed on Radio 4… it manages to hit a nice middle ground of eclectic, intelligent discussion without going full-on academic. A recent edition focused on the concept of fandom, specifically music fandom among mature women. The two expert guests had studied the loyal followers of [...]

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No, THIS is England!

June 4th, 2010 · No Comments · Football, Music

If you’re on Facebook, you can’t have failed to notice the groups with names like “ENGLAND SHIRTS BANNED IN ENGLISH PUBS!”, “ENGLAND FLAGS BANNED BECAUSE THEY OFFEND ISLAMS”, “LICKLE KIDDIES CALLED RACISTS FOR SUPPORTING ENGLAND”, and so on, ad nauseam. And of course it’s all gibberish. A legitimate complaint is misunderstood, a comment is taken [...]

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This blog’s accompanying Posterous

May 25th, 2010 · No Comments · Admin, Music

While I’m treading water, dealing with a sudden workload and thinking of more stuff to write about, I’ll draw your attention to my Posterous site… http://sfocata.posterous.com I like Posterous… it’s such a simple, flawless blog platform, and the simplicity of design (not to mention its seamless integration with other social media) makes it arguably better [...]

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The music industry must die, part 293

October 6th, 2009 · 1 Comment · Music, Music industry

Lily Allen’s contradictory stance on filesharing was just a bit of silliness, but this is really, really stupid. Edwin Collins stopped from sharing his music online (Guardian) Despite astutely retaining the rights to his downright catchy hit “A Girl Like You”, Edwyn has been stopped from sharing the song (HIS song, remember) on his Myspace [...]

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Dan Bull’s musical open letter to Lily

September 26th, 2009 · 1 Comment · Music, Music industry

Oh, and on the subject of my last post, the scandal they’re (oh okay, I’m) now calling Lilygate has developed further. After a major toys-out-of-the-pram moment she’s now made a rather more dignified adjustment to her original stance. Not that we’re really in a position to poke fun; some of the comments have been pretty [...]

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