So, while we're planning concerts for the year (I already have Sleater-Kinney and Neko Case booked, with more to come in Oxford soon), does anybody fancy The Dresden Dolls at the London Astoria sometime in May?
Patti Smith — Horses (Legacy edition)
The Gossip — Standing In The Way of Control
Cat Power — The Greatest
Mono Taxi — MTU
Does anybody else feel that the Lib Dem leadership contest is starting to resemble a rather bad showing at Lemmings?
The Johnny Boy album and the remastered Horses arrive on the same day. YEAH! YEAH!
But I have something for you too! An interview with representatives from the BPI, IFPI, HMV and Napster! THRILL! As they mostly avoid answering the question! SHRIEK! As they point out that they can prosecute you for transferring a CD to your MP3 Player! And CACKLE! As most of them admit breaking the law!
Well, I'll bet it doesn't have one of their presenters licking Cliff Richard inbetween acts, does it?
EDIT: Also, after watching Late Review last night (an almost all-NME edition!), I get the feeling that the Arctic Monkeys are going to be this year's Kaiser Chiefs for me. Admittedly, this group doesn't want me to rip out my eardrums, but I don't see "OH MY GOD BEST THING IN THE WORLD EVER EVER EVER *explodes*" either…
ITN has morphed into the Brasseye Special. But I was particularly impressed when they pointed out that there's 5,000 foreign teachers in the UK, and we only have the word of their countries that they're not child molesters. Goodness knows what they'll do when they work out that the age of consent in Canada is 14…
Dear customer
Today Megastore.se has shipped the following products:
KING027CD JOHNNY BOY JOHNNY BOY CD 1
YEAH! YEAH!
I win this round, hated piece of hardware.
And guess what I found waiting for me when I got home?
Seriously, if anybody knows the correct configuration for a Cisco 837 through a Demon ADSL connection, I'd be much obliged. It's either that, or I take a chainsaw to the routers tomorrow.
But! In happier news! Nice of David Cameron to come over to our side too. It's insane that the Government refuses to even talk about how much this is going to cost us.
It's been a weird few days since I last wrote. Drake invited himself over to my house last Friday. I think his eyes were a little blinded by the shiny robofloor I had installed earlier in the week.
Drake was more interested in suggesting that Pattie and Maelle should make out rather than any constructive advice about my house. I did find out that Alli is leaving because she broke up with Curly, though. I can see why that couple failed; she's an alligator, and he's a pig. It was always going to end in tears, or bacon.
I'm not entirely sure whether Margie was coming on to me when she said that one of her fantasies was to have me jump from a diving board into a giant baked alaska. Sometimes the inhabitants of this town frighten me.
I had my second visitor yesterday! Bik, from KKKanada. She came over to Nustram, met a few of the inhabitants, took some oranges, and then invited me back to her town! She has some ducks that she's trying to hound out of town. I met one of them, Dermet, and I can see why. He's a bit of a know-it-all. I had a look around, nought a few things from her shop, looked at one of my constellations which made the jump across towns, then sauntered back off to Nustram for bed, leaving thank-you letters in my wake.
I have a new housemate! She calls herself Bonnie, and she's already paid 3,000 bells towards the mortgage. She's got funny hair, but then I've been walking around with a moustache and monocle all day…
Because I'm shamelessly stealing from Simon again, and also because I liked playing around with AppleScript so iTunes generates the list by one click of a button:
- Saturday Looks Good To Me – Girl Of Mine
- Stars – one more night
- The Go! Team – Bottle Rocket (Single Version)
- Stars – the first five times
- Placebo – Every You Every Me
- Girls Aloud – Biology
- Johnny Boy – Fifteen Minutes
- Johnny Boy – Livin' In The City
- Lucky Soul – Lips Are Unhappy
- Sleater-Kinney – Jumpers
Fluxblog has one of the tracks from the Johnny Boy album up. Go Go Go!
I don't think I'm quite ready to talk about it yet.
YATGTBMSAYGWYD
It's only thirty minutes long.
It doesn't waste a second.
It's Motown crossed with The Clash. Xenomania with C4 strapped to their chests.
Currently unavailable in the UK. Or anywhere in the world except for Sweden. See? Scandinavian socialism IS better than Thatcherism.
It's Bonnie Parker's 115th Dream.
You'd better play the full deck.
I look in the mailbox to find a new letter from Margie. She's sent me a screen door. Maybe she thinks I've been changing in front of her too often. Not something I can fit in my house at the moment, and Tom Nook's shop is closed today for refurbishment. Typical, really, as I'm sure I would have been able to pay off my mortgage if he wasn't closed.
I put the screen inside my snowman fridge for storage; I might send it to a villager in another town, sell it, or keep it for when I get another house. I write a thank-you letter for Margie, and head over to the post office to send it. On the way, I pass the snowman who gave me the fridge. He's in a bad way now; he's been getting smaller for days, but now he's about the size of a tennis ball. But he's still cheerful about life; I guess must snowmen know they're not here for very long, so they enjoy life while they can.
On the way to the post office, I bump into Chow and Pattie. They're having a rather nasty argument over fossils. Chow has been a pain ever since he moved into Nustram; I've sent him letters asking him to be nicer to the other animals, but he won't stop being mean. I should do something about it.
After I've posted the letter to Margie, I have a look at the bulletin board outside. Apparently it's La-Di-Dah day on Saturday, whatever that is (I ask Margie later, and she tells me that it's a contest; all the residents of the town compose a new theme song for the town (it's currently Blue Monday), and I have to choose which one I think is the best. Plenty of opportunity for new enemies there, then). There's also a fishing contest on Sunday, which I think I'll skip, as I haven't got the hang of fishing just yet.
As Nook's Cranny is closed, I wander over to the Able Sisters's costume shop to see what new stock they have in. Chow snaps at Allie as she's walking past. Grr. Looking aorund the new clothes, I find a hockey mask.
An evil plan forms in my head.
An hour later, I grab my net from my house, stick on my hockey mask, and go Chow-hunting. I chase him all over the town, whacking him over and over. I think he got the message. Either that, or he'll move to another town soon.
But it's getting late. A stranger has asked if she can visit later on, so I open the gates and watch the stars on the beach while I wait for her. My constellations drift by as the clouds disappear and the night sky turns blacker and blacker.
Animal Crossing: Wild World is the gaming equivalent of the scene at the end of Toy Story 2, where the Barbie turns her head to show Prospector Pete that her owner is an artist. It is rainbow-hued, it is cute, it is sweet, it is twee; to be blunt, it is effectively an electronic version of having tea with your cuddly toys (those of you who want to strip Barbies naked and subject them to torture and humilation will have to wait a little longer for your fix). It's difficult to pin down just what makes the game so addictive; after all, it's a free-form affair without much to do except for dig for fossils, visit shops (and pay off your mortgage - capitalism exists even in Nintendo world sadly), go fishing, or write letters. Yet you soon become attached to the characters that live in your town; sure, none of them are going to pass the Turing Test, but even with their rather simplistic thought processes, they seem quite real. You find yourself writing a letter to an elephant, thanking her for her present, and telling her not to worry about the mean old panda around the corner. Yes, really.
You can design your own clothes, and put them on display in the clothes shop. Characters will come in, buy your designs, and compliment you on your work. You can draw your own constellations in the sky, make up songs, and even create an emblem for the town (Nustram is currently using a 32x32 pixel replica of the Blue Monday 12" single). It's like that Barbie Fashion Wheel you always used to see on TV.
But perhaps the greatest part about Animal Crossing: Wild World is the part I haven't really explorered yet. The Nintendo DS has an 802.11b adapter hidden inside it, and Animal Crossing takes advantage of this by allowing you to visit other people's towns. They may have different fruit there, different items in the shop, and of course, lots of different people living there. Actually getting to another town is a bit of a hassle (both users need the other's friend code to cross over), but when you do, it's magical - a whole new world of different characters to meet and greet. And yes, you can send them letters, and they might reply by sending mail right to your mailbox in your hometown.
At this point, the game becomes viral; your characters may fancy life in towns that you've visited, and yes, they'll move to your friend's town, and you might get new arrivials from towns you visit. They don't forget you, though, and will often show their new user some of the letters you sent them. Your designs may travel from your shop to your friend's town and spread out all across the towns connected via the Internet. It's actually rather scary.
My name is St. John. I live in Nustram, and my friend code is 2448-7607-5318. Come visit!
Tonight, I'm going to pay off my mortgage and get a bigger house. Yeah! Yeah!
Erm…where's Girls Aloud, lads?
(and as said before, if Paul Weller sings My Ever Changing Moods at the Brits, I'll forgive him for most of the last decade. The cover of Wishing On A Star is not included in this deal)
Who's up for a spot of being evicted from your own residence? Huzzah!
(Meanwhile, David Cameron picks up more Labour policies. Gotta Catch 'Em All!)
Faith in the British political system is close to breaking point right now…
(I promise to get back to you tomorrow, Richard!)
Many of you know about my Apple habit. This year is the first time where I've been able to watch a MacWorld, and have the money to do something more than gaze lovingly. My credit cards have been cowering in fear.
They have survived for another day, however. All the rumours indicated that Apple were going to update their iBook and Mac mini lines with Intel chips, but what we got was a new iMac, and a new PowerBook (I refuse to call it a MacBook, as that just sounds stupid). I suppose it makes sense, as if you stuck Core Duo chips into the iBook or Mac mini, they'd out perform pretty much all of Apple's PowerPC range, which would cripple their sales while they were working on updating the rest of the line.
While I was a little disappointed, Apple has made up for it with their new power supply. So clever!
So rest easy, credit cards! You live to fight another day!
Tomorrow: the beginning of a short series (well, you better hope it's short, really): The Animal Crossing Diaries!
Firstly, a happy 21st birthday to Bonnie, Queen of The Couch!
But he has a sick sense of humour (take your pick - the Boyzone reunion, or the My Life Story reunion!)
Beware, for I will probably start talking about this in a few days.
Rule 1 of poll-based charts: Fans of Norwegian bands are to be feared and respected, lest they unleash their might forces against you.
Internet still not short of people with far too much time on their hands (these people need to read a few k-punk reviews, seriously).
Glancing over at Sweeping The Nation's UK Albums of 2005 poll, I have to confess:
I still haven't heard Funeral.
Well, 2006 is beginning with endings, sadly, and that's before Unicron shows up to threaten the universe (it's going to take me a while to get it out of my system, sorry). After almost six years, New York London Paris Munich is closing its doors. Together with its sort-of-half-cousin-through-an-illicit-affair site, I Love Music, it has kept me entertained and informed over the past half-decade, so I'm sad to see Tom close it down. But these things happen, and definite endings are better than drawn-out zombie deaths, I guess (please don't mention Hobart Paving).
Anyway, 2006. Snobbery and decay. Yes!
