An Interlude With Bobzilla

Today while have a wander round the Tyne Bridge and High Level Bridge with Scott we dropped into Arch 16 and we were well impressed by the latest avian based artwork on display. You can see it here on my Instagram feed , I also had to use the loo and was very impressed with the repurposed vinyl single display on the wall (see here).

We had a cafe latte and the guy serving us told us this was all his work and he goes under the name Bobzilla, and apart from being a talented artist (you can see more by visiting his "I Am Bobzilla" site) , he makes a great cup of coffee and is remarkably engaging to talk too. Among other things he is also a DJ and had some excellent sounds playing while we were these. It was so pleasant we had another coffee before departing back across the High Level Bridge to Newcastle.

So you get art , cake , coffee , tea , good sounds and good vibes, a thoroughly excellent half an hour, worth visiting for a coll and chilled atmosphere in which to eat cake and drink coffee.

So it's the day before April Fool's day but it has been a most excellent final day of March , chatting with Bobzilla and enjoying his art and sounds, so continuing with the art theme I've included my slideshow of the Armageddon themes paintings of the North East's greatest artist John Martin. I've just found that the book of his work I have is going for up to £200 on Amazon, like my Handy Wah! compilation on the last post but one.

Anyway hope you have a wonderful week.

Awake

It's eleven o'clock Saturday Night, although you could say it's really midnight as the clocks go forward for Daylight Saving rubbish, I've been out with Maureen and Scott and Fiona and eaten some of the best burgers in Newcastle at Meat Stack at The Dog and Parrot, then tonight eaten at Rajnagar for the first time (had lots of takeaways) but had one of my best Indian meals ever (and that was everyone's opinion) , although one has to wonder what happens when you get used to perfection.

The thing is I am now feeling wide awake. Obviously the sugar from that excellent food has obviously stimulated me to whatever. Everyone else was asleep two hours ago after watching an episode of Timewasters and Black Books, both class comedy, if you click on the links you should be able to watch for free.

So I thought I'd just do this post, which is really just a diary entry to remember what I have done today , I think I have managed to put all the analogue clocks and watched forward, and I suppose an appropriate record to share would be Bryan Ferry's "This is Tomorrow" because it sort of is, all my analogue timepieces say it's Sunday but all my digital timepieces say it's Saturday. So I will see you tomorrow, or is it today? Who know?

Dream Complex

I woke from an amazingly complex dream , just having to deal with people who don't understand reality. It reminded me of a situation at the PPA many years ago when I was charged with making 2 + 2 = 5 because someone had run an obsolete report and it didn't balance with the new one. There was an office full of idiots coming up with solution which were basically calculate to n decimal places and that might not solve the problem. I asked to speak to the accountants about it (it was caused by the VAT rate of 17.5% ) but I was told I was not a high enough grade to talk to accountants, so I instructed my team to SAY we were working on it if asked and at the end of two weeks told them it couldn't be done. Luckily in my present job I work with accounts who listen and have a more than basic grasp of numbers.

I was considering mowing my lawn today, but am going to give it another week to ensure it is up to being mowed, it's not laziness, it's being sensible.

I've decided on the theme for #AprilSongs and each day I will post a song relating to that day, it may be simply or complexly related, so Monday may be New Order's "Blue Monday" (or one of the many covers) or something by the Happy Mondays,  while Thursday could be the Theme for Morse / Endeavour by Barrington Pheloung because Morse's boss is called Thursday.

Another beautiful day although still cold, but looking forward to another great weekend.

As it's the ^Music Festival I thought I'd share Pete Wylie's "Heart As Big As Liverpool", mine and John Peel's favourite song about Liverpool , but ignored by the hip 6Music DJs. Amazingly it is not easily available on Amazon, my Handy Wah! compilation going for an eye watering £200, still you can listen on Youtube.

Today Is So Gorgeous ...

...that I went out in the garden and refilled the bird feeders before seven am. When I first started blogging that would have been enough for a post, and as it's more like a diary than anything else, it should really be enough for a post now, but although my posts are still bite sized, one sentence is never enough.

Lots of friends start blogs and come in with a big excellent piece and then that's it. On the one hand they may think that's enough or they may just realise what they have let themselves in for. Here's a few:

• The Ape of Wrath
• Peas on Earth
• Grumpy Geordie
• Little Wittering
• Dust on the Stylus
• Molecules of Madness
• Soul and Tonic
• Thumbrella
• Tea on The Tyne

These are just a few that seem to have been abandoned, but what they contain is still worth taking time to read and enjoy.

So yes a very short post and I'll leave you with "Eye Know" by De La Soul  because it just came on 6Music and sort of goes with the mood.

Have a great Friday everybody we aren't leaving the EU today and hopefully the whole Brexit thing will crawl away into a corner and die.

Buying Books and Listening To Podcasts

I'm listening to the podcast "How To Burn A Million Quid" the BBC Sounds mockumentary about the story of the KLF and the influence of The Illuminatus Trilogy by Robert Shea and Robert Anton Wilson (and my mind immediately connects the Tony Wilson broadcaster, punk leader and Factory Records supremo, but I will put that on pause).

The thing is I have now ordered The Illuminatus Trilogy along with a parralel publication by the KLF themselves. I never knew what KLF stood for but according to the pocast it is Copyright Liberation Foundation but they decided that the letter "K" was way much cooler than "C" so instead of "CLF" we got "KLF". I sort of see what they mean.

So whether or not I will read the book, I am just getting it to see what tangents it zooms off in, rather than expecting any revelations.

The thing is, it does show you that product placement within and environment you enjoy can influence you to actually purchase a placed product, although I am sure this is not a prime example of product placement.

So it looks like more KLF rated stuff to share so I'll go with their Tammy Wynette collaboration before I go to make my tea,

Life Too, Has Surface Noise

All our TV channels are now digital, and we are continually told we need to upgrade to HD, Ultra HD, 4K etc. When you watch a normal channel you often get pixelation and digital drop out. I don't remember getting that with analogue TV, yes sometimes the picture might get fuzzy due to weather conditions or a problem with the ariel but it was never due to the general condition of the signal.

Similarly with sound, over the years we have been steered towards digital rather than analogue. One major benefit of digitally stored sound is it never deteriorates, but ironically with both music and film it has created a situation the things can be stolen and restolen, the original owner creates a digital item to sell, but once it is out in the world it can be stolen and shared and the originator gets nothing.  I have written about this before here.

I bought a GPO turntable and plugged it into a Samsung soundbar with subwoofer and thought it sounded OK but at times missed something. There were also issues with the amp dropping completely out for quiet passages. I listen to digital music on my Google Pixel phone and on my home network and that is fine, and listening to albums on DVD is satisfying as often visuals can be used to accompany the music (I'm thinking Jethro Tull's "Thick As A Brick".

However last night my friend Marek brought my new vintage record player (Period High Fidelity with Garrard Deck and it has a cassette recorder)  from RPM, and we set it up and when it's turned up it really does blow you away. The speakers contain woofers for bass and tweeters for treble and this enhances the sound so much that it comes from the same unit. The digital set up has dragged me away from this. Digital gives you incredible convenience, but analogue because it is a true curve gives a warmer, truer sound.

I posted some videos of the new set up on Instagram here

Yes the older and lower quality records have crackles and surface noise, but as John Peel said "Life Too, Has Surface Noise". I have been particularly impressed with the sound on my copies of "Dark Side of the Moon" and "What Time Is Love".

There is a place for both analogue and digital, although I do feel that analogue is more real and pleasurable , whereas digital is about experience and making money.

Pocahontas, Podcasts and Cassettes

Pocahontas you ask. Why? You ask. It's been in my head today, the Neil Young song, possibly a result of me reading Michael Moorcock's "The Skrayling Tree" and the song from the acoustic side one of "Rust Never Sleeps" has been running through my head, and I think I may try and record a take of it and put it on Soundcloud, it is a truly beautiful song from a wonderful album. I am listening to it as I write this and it is still as fresh today as when I first heard it.

I'm also waiting for my new vintage record player to be delivered by my friend Marek from RPM, and wondering what I should play first on it, I only have "Rust Never Sleeps" on digital format, but who knows, that may change.

I've also started listening to "How To Burn A Million Quid" the sort of story of the KLF and it is quite entertaining although it does stop me listening to albums, but that is the nature of interaction, it takes time to do things. I was talking today about the record played and we were talking cassettes which I said were a thing of their time, but you had to put the time in to make a mix tape, whereas sharing playlists as most do today can be done in seconds and it loses the personal touch.

As a teenager I remember making takes and physically splicing them to make music and compilations, there is absolutely no way I could do that today, I'm just not dextrous enough. I have the ideas but not the abilty, and digital often looks easier but always throws some problem in your way.

So I will publish and see what happens next.....