And now, the news…

Posted on 28 January, 2007 by adrian

Y’know, I spend a lot of time backing the BBC. I’m happy to pay the license fee and I’m comfortable with the concept of a patriarchal state media corporation that dares to tell us what it thinks we ought to watch, rather than letting the “Great British Public” drag programming content down to the lowest common denominator. I’ll gladly defend it against the likes of Paul Dacre, who seems to think we’d be better off with a fully commercial US-style range of TV channels, where the primary motives are maximising viewing figures and keeping the advertisers happy.

There’s plenty on the various BBC channels that I hate. No problem… I don’t expect my every whim to be catered for. What’s sad, though, is when part of the BBC’s output goes so dramatically downhill, dumbing down faster than you can say “well… duh”. I’m talking about the news bulletins. With laptop on lap, I sat and watched tonight’s 10pm news programme, typing this accurate (-ish) transcription…

After a widely reported outbreak of controversy and conflict, a TV series (which involves confining people to a house and observing them with the intention of provoking controversy and conflict) has ended. There was racism. Or maybe it wasn’t racism… it wasn’t very nice, anyway. Still, it was on a different channel from this one, so please do not adjust your set.

A man who was paid a lot of money to drive a car very fast while being filmed for a TV programme, but unfortunately crashed, is now in good health and presenting that TV programme again. This man is a national hero and his programme is on this channel, so it’s bound to be worth watching. It features no racism or CCTV footage of people arguing.

By the way, 250 people were killed in Iraq today. That’s miles away, though, so it’ll be safe to put the cat out tonight.

There were several football matches today, and normally we’d just give you a quick run-down. However, for some unknown reason there’s no Match of the Day tonight, even though these were important FA Cup matches featuring big teams, so we’ll have to show you some more detail. Unfortunately, we had to burble so much about celebrities at the start of this programme, we’ve only time to show you one or two random goals from each match. Oops, soz about that.

Now the weather. Tomorrow will be quite a usable day.

Yeah, I know I’m cynical and the Big Brother thing has (whether I like it or not) been a big media event, but really! And yes, the weatherman really *did* describe tomorrow as being “usable”. I may get out of bed after all.

Posted in Drivel, TV/Radio | Leave a comment

WordPress 2.1

Posted on 27 January, 2007 by adrian

Well, it’s installed. Upgrading and reinstalling WordPress is very easy, especially once you get over the initial fear of blitzing years of precious blog drivel. The backup process is very clearly documented on their site, so there’s little chance of anything going wrong.

This post is mostly just to test whether the LiveJournal Crosspost plugin is working properly. In its current state, the plugin will not work in WordPress 2.1, but a useful comment on the programmer’s site provides the necessary hack to make it work.

I’ve also noticed that the very pretty Snap Preview Anywhere plugin is acting quite strangely, so I’m going to leave that uninstalled for a while until I know it’s compatible with the latest WP.

Posted in Admin | Leave a comment

I went to the supermarket and I bought…

Posted on 24 January, 2007 by adrian

… a lovely tin of whitewash!

Somehow, I just wasn’t surprised by the results of the Competition Commission’s investigation into large supermarket chains and their effects on the grocery market. Where I live in suburban south London, the cushy status enjoyed by these companies is all too apparent. You’ll shop at a supermarket or do without. It’s a terrifying thought, but I can’t think of a single “proper” butcher anywhere within a two-mile radius of my house. Or a baker (Greggs don’t count!) for that matter. There’s a decent fishmonger, and I try to buy from him as often as possible, but he’s a rare gem in a sea of flavourless pap.

Instead of going into more local detail, I’ll just redirect you to the more eloquent work of Felicity Lawrence (writing for the Guardian’s Comment Is Free site)… A grocery understatement.

Posted in Consumer, Politics | Leave a comment

Burble with Key Changes

Posted on 24 January, 2007 by adrian

This should have appeared sooner, but an air-conditioning failure at 34sp‘s datacentre put a temporary spanner in the works. Anyway…

In the continued absence of Exciting New Musical Concepts (not that I’ve tried particularly hard) I decided to spend more time working on my improvising. Still focusing on ways to reduce the “burble”, I knocked up a backing track featuring three key (or rather mode) changes, forcing me to use “target notes” and play around the chords.

The result, via Youtube… Burble with Key Changes

(If you’re interested in the gear used, it’s just my recently acquired Tokai Love Rock plugged straight into a Cornford Harlequin, with a touch of reverb and delay applied in Logic)

Posted in Guitar, Music | 2 Comments

Slow Gilmourish Jam

Posted on 16 January, 2007 by adrian

Lacking any concrete musical ideas recently, I decided to try and resurrect my atrophied improvisation abilities. A recurrent trait in my playing is that, after periods of less-than-diligent practice, I tend to “burble”. The technique is there, but the mental sharpness disappears, so my fingers seek out the comfortable, well-trodden routes.

So, having recorded a bass/drums/chords backing, I set about improvising a few solos, with the aim of editing, harmonising and generally arranging them into a supposedly “written” piece of music. This is an approach I love… Frank Zappa used it on numerous occasions. However, having started all that, I then got sidetracked by a thread on uk.music.guitar where a few people were jamming over a backing track and posting the results on Youtube. This seemed an ideal opportunity to investigate using iMovie to combine high-quality audio (recorded in Logic) with video clips from my compact digicam.

The resulting solo is a bit messy, but the experiment worked well enough to convince me that it’s a useable working method for future projects. In particular, I found some tips for optimising iPhoto projects destined for Youtube… thanks to Martin Backschat for being more patient than I could ever be (tips in handy visual form on Flickr).

Video on Youtube… Slow Gilmourish Jam

Posted in Guitar, Music, Technology | 1 Comment

iFawn?

Posted on 15 January, 2007 by adrian

In the long, speculative build-up to the announcement of the iPhone, my attitude varied between mild intrigue and real excitement. As the sort of mobile phone user for whom being able to talk to people is one of the least important functions, I knew that the right mix of features could easily put me in the market for yet another Apple toy.

In this particular case, though, they just haven’t hit the mark for me. First of all, the cut-down version of OSX used on the iPhone doesn’t allow for the use of third-party applications. That’s a bad limitation, and Steve Jobs’s explanation doesn’t really wash with me. I don’t recall hearing of Sony Ericsson’s being criticised because of their smartphones bringing down mobile networks.

There certainly quite a tasty selection of software already on the iPhone, but the internet features seem to be geared towards access to Wi-Fi or, at the very least, EDGE networks. Free public Wi-Fi is still a rarity here in the UK; the rip-off wireless services offered by cafés and certain rail companies are more common, but still not sufficient for widespread mobile phone use. As for EDGE, Orange’s UK network was only launched last year and still seems quite limited.

No, if I’m going to be making the best of the ridiculously expensive mobile internet facilities offered by UK service providers, I want to use WAP sites for the basic information services (train timetables, football scores) and a browser (such as Opera Mobile) for cut-down, bandwidth-saving versions of regular websites. See? That’s why I want to use third-party apps, iSteve.

Finally, although the interface looks absolutely beautiful (in true Apple style), I wonder how effective the touch-screen system will be when you want to start sending emails or writing documents. For that sort of task, I would have thought that handwriting recognition (with a stylus) or a physical QWERTY keyboard would be minimum requirements. With that in mind, I think I’ll be sticking with my P900 for a while yet…

Posted in Apple, Technology | 3 Comments

Merry Christmas!

Posted on 25 December, 2006 by adrian

However you choose to celebrate/ignore/abhor this “Pagan Festival Adopted by Christians and Now Largely Used as an Excuse For Mass Consumption and Crap TV, in Both Secular and Christian Communities”, please do it nicely, okay?

Back soon…

Posted in Drivel | Leave a comment

Let me eat cake!

Posted on 22 December, 2006 by adrian

Kaffee und KuchenMy combined birthday/Christmas present from Nicola was a long weekend in Vienna, perfectly complementing our summer trip to Budapest (Habsburg history, y’know).

I didn’t actually know where this mystery trip was taking me until we were at Heathrow and she handed me a boarding card with “Vienna” helpfully printed on it. Stepping onto the plane to see our regular travel companions Howard and Lindsey, the conspiracy became clear. I’m not normally one for surprises (my control freak nature) but this revelation was well worth the mysterious build-up.

In summary… fabulous city, loads to do, barely scratched the surface, surprisingly cheap in several respects, perfect for a winter break, want to go back as soon as possible. Photos here…

Vienna, December 2006 on Flickr

Posted in Travel | 2 Comments

Won’t someone think of the PIGEONS?!

Posted on 16 December, 2006 by adrian

Having occasionally been known to post “Have Your Say” comments on news websites, often with tongue planted firmly in cheek, I guffawed heartily at the reader responses to this story from the Surrey Comet…

Marksman called in to kill Kingston’s pigeons

What tickled me in particular was the genuine response from (presumably) an old lady, standing like a flimsy barrier of normality against the oncoming surreal flood. We’re a witty bunch down here in SW London, y’know.

Posted in Drivel, Local, London | 2 Comments

15 December

Posted on 16 December, 2006 by adrian

Tony Blair interviewed by police

Government tactically abandons investigation into BAE corruption

Airport expansion plans but profit over environment

One day in British politics… the Prime Minister becomes the latest senior government figure to be questioned in the “cash for honours” investigation. Meanwhile, a whole new scandal emerges, regarding an allegedly corrupt deal between BAE and the Saudi air force, only for the Attorney General to call off the corruption probe. Could this be because BAE risked losing the deal to a French company? Surely our elected leaders wouldn’t put financial gain before ethical behaviour? Oh, except they did it twice in one day… the new plans for additional runways at Stansted and Heathrow airports fly in the face of environmental good sense and local opinion, all in the name of profit.

Through gradual downfall from the rosy optimism of 1997, there was always the reassuring knowledge that the Blair government could never be as bad as the last Tory government. I’m not so sure now. The combination of sleaze, irresponsible profiteering and sheer arrogance is just so reminiscent of the early 90s.

So now the only positive is that at least they’re not actually *worse* than the last Tory government… well, unless the Dear Leader happens to order the murder of all male infants during the next week or so. I mean, it’s happened before…

Posted in Politics | 1 Comment