Twitter Tools is dead…

March 10th, 2010 § 1

…long live Twitme.

I used to use Twitter Tools to notify Twitter when I posted to this here blog, but it just packed in working one day. I fiddled with it, uninstalled and reinstalled, and next time I posted it worked. This week it packed in again. So fuck it. From reading forum posts and FAQs I’m sure it works fine for the developer, and for x other people, but that just doesn’t wash when you’re one of the people for whom the product fails, so bugger it.

Twitme to the rescue – if you’re having similar problems with Twitter Tools, you can find Twitme in the Wordpress plugins search page, though be sure to uninstall TT first if you’re going to switch – they don’t play together.

And if you’re using TT and it’s working fine, great! Stick with it! For me, it broke, so I replaced it. YMMV.

–c.

EDIT: Scratch that, Twitme didn’t work either. Does anyone know of a reliable Blog->Twitter Wordpress plugin, or am I just running up against Twitter’s innate flakiness here?

Clive Live! – Thunderhead gig, 13/3/2010

March 10th, 2010 § 0

I’m actually playing a gig! Last year the first line-up of Thunderhead played exactly one (1) gigs, and promptly exploded.

This year we are back with a new line-up (in actual fact it’s the line-up that used to be Panik Attakk), and this coming Saturday we will play as many gigs in one day as we did all last year. Yes! One!

We’re opening for Hastings stalwarts of old, The Lost Boys, at Phoenix Arts Centre in Hastings. We’re first on of three bands, and we’ll be kicking off around 8:30pm.

Should you be in the area and wish to come along, get advance tickets here and find the venue here.

It has literally been a long time since I rock and rolled, and I for one intend to have a fucking blast.

Get on it,
–c.

Top 100 Albums of the 00s – #80-#71

March 8th, 2010 § 0

Quelle heure et-il?

#080. Racer X – Getting Heavier (2002)

Racer X - Getting Heavier

Racer X - Getting Heavier

If you’re anything like me – and I know I am – then you first became aware of Paul Gilbert’s pyrotechnic (such a cliché to use that word in this context, but when it comes to Pablo it really is appropriate) guitar playing during the Mr. Big era, circa 1990 or so. At the time, reaching into his back catalogue and dipping into the older Racer X albums was a bit of a painful experience, to be honest. Dude – so not cool. But in 1998 they got back together and stuck their tongues properly into their cheeks, releasing the awesome Technical Difficulties in 1999, followed by the  if anything more amazing Superheroes in 2000. But I’m featuring Getting Heavier here, purely because I personally like it more, and hey! It’s still MY chart! Fab tracks like “Go-GG-Go”, “Lucifer’s Hammer”, “Dr. X” and the track which named my podcast “Bucket of Rocks” are not only shredmungous, but will also put a smile on your face. Get thee behind me, po-faced widdlers!

TOP TRACK: #6 “Heaven in ‘74″.

» Read the rest of this entry «

Top 100 Albums of the 00s – #90-#81

February 17th, 2010 § 0

Mucho splendido?

#090. Eluveitie – Spirit (2006) [spotify]

Eluveitie - Spirit

Eluveitie - Spirit

So, what do you get if you take poundingly heavy metal, add penny whistles and hurdy-gurdys, and sing over it in an extinct language? Eluveitie, that’s what! Yes, it’s more folk metal – this time hailing from Switzerland (the German-speaking bit, I think) and singing/screaming largely in Gaulish. Bloody excellent fun, this is.

TOP TRACK: #3 “Your Gaulish War”.

» Read the rest of this entry «

Top 100 Albums of the 00s – #100-#91

February 9th, 2010 § 0

So. Away we go. My top 100 albums of the last decade.

Some of them I already reviewed in Rocktober, some of them will get a decent review, some just a couple of lines. Note also that unlike Rocktober, this chart takes in all genres – at least the ones that I listen to, which as mentioned before, is not really what you’d call a broad church of music.

Also, it’s a very rough list, position-wise. Any entry could easily move at least 10 positions or so in either direction depending on what day of the week it is, how much sleep I got the night before, how many drinks I’ve had etc. And it’s my list, my opinion, my party and I’ll scream and cry and kick and scratch if I want to. You may cry out in dismay “What, no (Duffy/Megadeth/Dizzee Rascal/Paolo Nutini/whoever)??? Again, it’s my list. You no likee, you get your own. (Anyway I still haven’t heard Megadeth’s “Endgame”…)

That is how it is, it could never be otherwise.

#100. David Bowie – Heathen (2002) [spotify]

David Bowie - Heathen

David Bowie - Heathen

Is it cold in space, Bowie? Do you have just one spacesuit, Bowie, or do you have a few ch-ch-ch-changes?

Say what you like about Bowie – go on, say it – but you have to admit he doesn’t just churn out the same old stuff over and over. According to his Wikipedia page this 2002 release falls into his current “neoclassicist” era. I have no idea what they mean by that, but it sounds good. This is (as WP also points out) a very atmospheric album, with a dark melancholic almost ambient vibe running through it. Ideal for driving wistfully through the night along the A66 over the Pennines in February fog.

Do they smoke grass in space, Bowie? Or do you smoke Astroturf?

TOP TRACK: #5 “Afraid”.

» Read the rest of this entry «

Top 100 Albums of the 00s – Clive vs NME

February 4th, 2010 § 1

Some time back, perhaps December or so, I happened across a link to NME magazine’s top 100 albums of the decade, spanning release dates from January 2000 to December 2009. Unsurprisingly if you know me, I found little to cheer about in this list. My taste in music is not what you would call particularly NME-friendly. But seeing it made me start to think about what my top 100 albums would be from that period. The earlier years were when hard rock started to re-emerge from it’s dormant post-grunge state, and though unbeknownst to me at the time, the mid-00s bore a whole new genre – one that has since captured my imagination in a way that no genre has before – Folk Metal.

I don’t claim to have a wide musical taste. No, really. It’s about 60% hard rock, 25% metal (folk and otherwise), 5% acoustic, 5% ambient/chillout, and 5% classical, according to a recent poll I just took of myself.

So I have spent the last 6 weeks or so compiling my own list. And you know what? I’m going to post it, 10 at a time, with very tiny reviews. Why? It’s my blog and I’ll cry if I want to.

Only 6 albums appear on both my list and NME’s, and those are:

  • Muse – Black Holes and Revelations
  • Green Day – American Idiot
  • Muse – Absolution
  • The Coral – The Coral
  • Queens of the Stone Age – Songs for the Deaf
  • Radiohead – In Rainbows

But where do they appear? And what do I think of them? And what will be in the top 10? Well the answers to all these questions and less are on their way soon for whoever gives a monkey’s.

–c.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Folk_metal

Gaming state

January 20th, 2010 § 2

  • Dragon Age: Origins – completed
  • Half Life 2: currently playing, I’m on chapter 11 of 14
  • Mass Effect: евтини мебелиcompleted
  • Bioshock: queued
  • Halo 3: queued
  • Dead Space: queued
  • GTA IV: currently playing, I just got to second smaller island
  • Assassin’s Creed: bought
  • Crackdown: bought

Yeah, I loves me some Xbox. It may be noted that many of the games listed are pretty old, with newer versions out or imminent. Well, I tend to play a couple of years behind the trend, which means I get the same gaming experience as everyone else, for about a quarter of the price – a strategy independently featured on XKCD. :-)

My gamer tag is Tommi Starr, by the way.

–c.

Sigh No More

January 15th, 2010 § 1

Mumford & Sons - Sigh No More

Mumford & Sons - Sigh No More

In about 2000 or so, my then girlfriend (now fiancée) moved to London a few months behind me in order to go to South Bank University. She was in halls, and occasionally – despite the smallest single bed in the world – I would go and stay over. She had a little micro stereo bought special to take away to uni, and one of the CDs we would frequently play on it was David Gray’s White Ladder, an album which I still unashamedly love to this day. I always remember a quote which was affixed to the case from some reviewer said something like: “…an album that makes you feel better simply by knowing it exists.”

I’ve always felt that was certainly true of White Ladder, but that feeling is totally eclipsed by the peace and warmth exuded by Mumford & Sons’ Sigh No More. This is an absolutely exquisite album from start to finish, and every single note gives me the feeling that I’m sitting round a pub fireplace somewhere in the Cotswolds surrounded by my nearest and dearest, feeling utterly loved and at peace with all the world. From the opening title track to the closing refrains of “After The Storm” there’s not a note out of place, and I challenge even the meanest-spirited of you to listen to songs like “Roll Away Your Stone”, “Winter Winds” and the epic “Dust Bowl Dance” and not feel uplifted. This is without question my album of 2009. (The only question there is whether The Last Vegas tie for the #1 spot…)

If you don’t like this, you don’t like music, and you have no soul.
–c.

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