Rage against the Boyle

In possibly the biggest case of bending over for the man ever, Rage against the Machine (RATM) want to do a duet with Susan Boyle (SuBo) as a sort of olive branch to Simon Cowell (SiCo?).

"I don't think anybody has heard anything of that Joe guy since Christmas, but we have nothing against him. The truth is Simon's shows occasionally produce talent. We love Susan Boyle, she is hot.

"To show there are no hard feelings we would like her to perform with us on stage this summer. She is a great vocalist and we would love to perform 'Killing in the Name' with her. Everybody knows her in the U.S. and she can add her vocals to anything. It would be an honour for us."

Yeah, nice one Zack - what happened to "fuck you I won't do what you tell me", eh? What a sell out.

I even checked the date on this story in the hope it was some kind of advance April fool, but alas it seems genuine enough.

Ricky Martin

Has come out apparently, and described himself as a "fortunate homosexual".

I'm shocked, I really am. I'd never have thought he was fortunate.

Champions League Qf's

United v Bayern
Arsenal v Barcelona
Lyon v Bordeaux
Inter v CSKA

From the top then, a repeat of the 1999 final, i see a similar resylt this time, united to squeak through. Arse/Barse is an intriguing one, because anything could happen-but I think Arsenal might just take it. Lyon /Bordeaux is a 50/50 as far as I'm concerned, but I'll take Lyon purely for their greater CL experience. Inter should win quite easily, so they won't. CSKA on penalties.

British Summer time

It's Snowing. Again.
Here's me when I looked out of the window this morning.

Alien vs Pooh

This is close to being the best thing ever, go here for greatness.

Pencil Sculptures

Oo-er missus. Don't panic, it's nothing involving gentleman vegetables, it does exactly what it says on the tin.
They're really quite stunning.

More here

Wolves 0-0 Everton

Aah shit, we could've and shoul've won this one easily. Never mind though, and I hope Wolves stay up, Mick McCarthy seems like a decent bloke

Wolves v Everton

Both teams are fresh off good away wins, but I can see us winning this one without too much trouble.

Wolves 0-2 Everton

The World Cup

I told you I'd be doing more about this, today I'm going to tell you why England won't win.

1. Goalkeepers. The other major contenders -aside from Argentina (more about them in another episode)  all have a top quality goalkeeper. Buffon, Casillas, Julio Cesar, England have David "Calamity" James. While he's not as shite erratic as he used to be, he's not in the same class as those previously mentioned. As for backups, well, there's Rob Green who looks like a farmer, and Paul Robinson, who can't catch.

2. Defenders. 2 or 3 years ago, john Terry and Rio Ferdinand were pretty much on a par with any centre half partnership in the world, maybe except Chiellini and Cannavaro. Today, Rio has hardly played and looked leaden footed when he has, a shadow of his former self. I've never been Terry's biggest fan, but this season his form at times has been awful-I'm guessing Capello must be having doubts too-at least privately. The fullback positions are a worry too, Gary Neville got old and looks unlikely to make the squad, his replacement, Glenn "I cut off your" Johnson is good going forwards, but is a shocking defender. On the other side, Ashley Cole-one of only a couple of genuine world class players in the squad is injured and going through a split with that annoying bint of a wife of his-he's not due back much before the end of the domestic season, and who knows how he'll be, mentally as much as physically in South Africa?

3. Midfield. On paper at least, Englands strongest area. Have Lampard and Gerrard ever really cut it at international level-I don't think so, but they're guaranteed starters. Who plays on the wings? No idea, the best I can come up with are Joe Cole and Aaron Lennon, one of whom can't get a start for Chelsea, the other is injured. Big problems I think.

4. Strikers. Emile Heskey.

Music Time.

Citeh 0-2 Everton

A great result and a good performance from the boys, maybe we can sneak that final Euro spot if we can keep up this sort of form.

Man Citeh v Everton

Joleon and his interesting hairdo are out injured for this one, so that can only be good for us. City have been on fire though, so a real tough one to win, I'll go for a draw.

Citeh 1-1 Everton

Mmmm......Coffee.

One of these please, preferably right now.

Go here for more

Deftones - Diamond Eyes

Before I start this review, don't you think that "Diamond Eyes" sounds like something those freaky alien women from L'Oreal want to sell you? I do.
Right, a new album from my favourite band, we'll do this track by track I think.

Diamond Eyes - A killer opening. A real jarring sludgy riff from Stef marries beautifully with Chino's swirly seductive vocals here, heading into a great chorus with it's " time will see us realise, diamonds reign across the sky” and finishing with a groove-tastic 45 second hammer blow. Wow. Follow that.

Royal - And follow that they do, the transition between this and the opener is barely noticeable, and this sounds like a fusion between the ambient portions of White Pony and the fury of Around the Fur-this song is like falling off a mountain-fun, but you realise something solid is on it's way to meet you.

CMND/CNTRL - Hey, it's 1998 again! It sounds like someone upset Chino before they recorded this one, he's really barking out the words here, this will be brilliant live, sort of like a new 7 words

You’ve Seen The Butcher - And we finally hit kind of what I was expecting, the first full on Ambient peice on the album......sort of. Stef lurks in the background playing Stoner rock riffs Josh Homme would have been proud of in his Kyuss days, and Chino is just making a beautiful sound-at this point it doesn't matter what he's singing, his voice is an instrument. This is my favourite so far.

Beauty School - A great bass line with Chino crooning over the top. A magnificent, swirly floaty thing. This is exactly the reason I love this band so much.

Prince - All hi-hats and rumbly bass before a great chorus interrupts proceedings, this is a bit like Digital Bath from White Pony, but only a a bit. Actually, maybe it's more like Digital Bath meets Change -until that is about halfway through, when all hell breaks loose.

Rocket Skates - The first single, I actully think this is one of the weaker tracks on the album - this is all relative mind you, on 99% of other albums, this would be the standout - but that “Guns! Razors! Knives!” refrain certainly makes you pay attention in a hurry.

Sex Tape - "Floating underwater" are the opening words to this track, and it's a perfect description. This is the best track on the album by far, and up there with the best they've ever written.

Risk - Nice riff, not much else - the weakest track on the disc by far.

976-Evil. - Gently progressive and with some heart wrenching undertones, this is a really subtle builder of a track. Stunning.

This Place Is Death - Is this a reflection on what could have been? Maybe, but it's perfect to end with-the calm after the storm, so to speak.

So, what to say? This is stunning, really. I honestly thought no-one had a chance of topping "Plastic Beach" from my much coveted Album of the Year slot, but this has done it, and it's done it easily. I should never have doubted them. Go and buy it. Yes, buy it-download it if you want to listen first, but then buy it anyway, I'm going to.

One final thing "Is it better than White Pony?" Not yet, but after a few more listens it's going to be very close.......

Everton 2-0 Bolton

Another win for the boys in blue, fairly easy, that's 7 in a row at home now, a new record

Everton v Bolton

Shouldn't be too hard for us, Bolton have been struggling of late. Having said that, we'll probably lose.

 Everton 3-1 Bolton

Weekend music

Here you go Collette, this one's for you.

Beautiful

A 1948 Buick Streamliner by Norman E. Timbs.

More pics Here

Alex Zane

Just what is it that this guy does exactly? Apart from ruin anything he's on with his "Ooh, look at me, aren't I wacky?" stream of inane horseshit that he gushes.

Wanker.

Here's Alex, looking a bit of a twat.

music time.

Today, Fear Factory's cover of Gary Numans' "cars"

Humans

What a strange group of creatures we are. Capable of great kindness, moments of creative genius and incredibly inquisitive about how everything around us works. We've created machines to make our day to day lives easier, stuff to let us have fun and this machine I'm typing away on right now. However, we're also capable of quite remarkable cruelty (usually to each other), we are always convinced we know better than nature and we've been responsible for some truly shocking hairdos. We've invented machines to let us kill each other more efficently, more cheaply, and perhaps most remarkably, to kill each other whilst leaving most of the buildings where the vanquished lived intact.
Why do we have to have this eternal dichotomy? I accept not everyone can be a Michelangelo or a Gallileo, or even a Desmond Tutu, but surely we could get by with a few less Pol Pots, Pinochets or even Jamie Redknapps.

Breadcrumbs

I just got an e-mail from a guy I occaisionally talk to and he was telling me about a meal he'd recently had at a swanky restaurant.

"they were the best breadcrumbs I've ever had"

What? See, the sort of people I know have a rating system for breadcrumbs-I bet you lot don't move in that kind of social circle. :)

The world cup

The first of a few this.

 David Beckham has ruptured his publicity ligament and is out of the World Cup. England's hopes in the silly haircut stakes now rest soley with Glenn Johnson.
We're expecting a statement from Posh soon, but she's probably busy bringing up her breakfast.

Pac -vs- Clottey, pt.2

Josh Clottey set out to survive and managed to do it. He was tough and brave, but not in Manny's class. (is anyone?)
If the fight with Mayweather or Moseley happens I think Pac will start a red hot favourite.

Pacquiao v Clottey

It's about 30 minutes before the start of the card and it should be a good one. I'll take Manny by TKO in about 6 or 7.

Birrrrrmingham 2-2 Everton

After going 2-0 up we manage to only semi-blow it.
A bit disappointing.

Friday moosic

A new song from my favourite band.

Name suggestions please

Ok, give me your best attempts at naming this.  It's a girl, btw.

Toyota

Lurching from one crisis to another, the fallen Japanese car giant really seems to be on the verge of collapse. Following stories of the Toyota Pious, sorry.....Prius and it's brake woes, today I've learnt that one of these beasts has run over it's owner. (I'm being serious here) A man was accused of killing his wife by running her over, but has been found not guilty because of the now well known brake problems his car has suffered from.
Oh, and the work force at Toyota apparently sent a letter to their bosses 2 years before any reported faults to the effect that they were sacrificing safety for profit. Shocking really.

The Car in Front is a Toyota.

Yeah, that'll be because it can't stop.

The worlds most beautiful object

No, not me (I was 3rd) but an alien looking fireplace. who votes for these things? I didn't get a vote, that's for sure, because this wouldn't have made my top 1000-it's nice, but the most beautiful thing-no, and it's not even close.

More here

Things I want.

And they're not even made of wood........
Beautiful -if somewhat cold and stark looking- steam punk-esque lights from German designer Frank Buchwald. Stunning.

More at http://frankbuchwald.de/engl_v/serie_e.html

My favourite music video

So, it's monday morning.

So on goes the computer and I set off around the interweb in search of interesting things to tell you about-you know, the usual stuff -things made of wood that really shouldn't be, nerdy things, stuff that appeals to my sense of aesthetics- but as I'm perusing the TimesOnline homepage I spot something about a third of the way down on the right. 

"Over 500 dead in Nigerian sectarian massacre"

What? Upon further reading it appears that over 500 people-mostly women and children have been hacked to death by gangs using machetes-for no other reason than the hackees were Christians and the hack-ers were Muslims. People are fucking mad, seriously. Islam doesn't promote that, no religion does. If people want to kill each other at least stop blaming it on your imaginary friends.

Btw, this story was featured a little way below the Oscar results. Seems reasonable.

Everton 5-1 Hull

Hull are the worst team to visit goodison this season (apart from Liverpool, obviously)-worse than Sunderland even, and that's no easy feat-the Black Cats were shocking- and on this form seem likely to be heading back to the Championship.
We were fairly good, but not 5-1 good, and we even managed to miss a penalty, hit the post and waste a fair few other good chances.

Song time

A nice cheery effort from Sonic Youth for you all.

Everton v 'ull

This should be a relatively easy win  for the blues, although everyone seems to be injured again. However , I'm still confident.
Everton 3-0 Hull

A Wooden Mouse

I seem to have a bit of a thing for wood currently (Oo-er missus). Wooden phones, wooden mice-if I could get a wooden PC and a wooden car, I'd be happy for quite a while.

 

  

Made by those clever Russian chaps at http://www.alestrukov.com/

So, am I a nerd or what?

I'd like to think not, people tell me otherwise.
My attraction to these sculptures made from old hard drives leads me to believe it's time to accept the inevitable. Oh well.

 

  

More at http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2009/12/hard-drives-sculpture/all/1

External hard drives.

Not the most exciting things in the world, granted-But I've just got one of these, and it has a blue light coming out of the bottom of it, a bit like Vin Diesel's car in the Fast and the Furious. Marvellous.

Ethiopia

So, apparently a fair proportion of the money that Saint Bob got us all to donate to Live Aid was not spent to sate the starving masses as we were led to believe, but instead was use to purchase weapons for the child armies of various rebel gangs. Not just a bit of it, 95% of it.
So what do we do, stop giving money to charitable organisations in the area? Well no, because that'd mean no money or aid would get to the guys who need it. Ethiopia is barely better off now than it was 25 years ago when the pictures were beamed all over the world, but we've moved on to new people to feel sorry for-The Afghans, Haitians-maybe Chileans now?-do people still care about Ethiopia? I do, but the world at large seems to have forgotten them, after all, it's not as if they have anything we want, is it? I mean, they don't even have any oil for god's sake.

Things I want.

PLY by Kamihara Hideo and IIDA

 

 

A wooden mobile phone, brilliant.

Stick your Iphone

Gorillaz - Plastic Beach

I'd been looking forward to this one for a while and I haven't been disappointed, not even a little bit.
The cartoon back story, about drummers called Russel Hobbs (arf!), islands made out of rubbish and kidnapped lead singers might at first lead you to believe that the concept as a whole is wearing a bit thin, but it really isn't.
Not that you'd know it from the start- a nothing, swirly intro followed by Snoop Dog phoning in a performance on Welcome to the World of Plastic Beach, but from here on in, things take a massive turn for the better.
Rhinestone Eyes, Stylo and Superfast Jellyfish are all magnificent, and there's still better -far better- to come. Empire Ants, On Melancholy Hill and my personal favourite Some Kind of Nature are as good as popular music gets.
The scope, vision and depth of this album is staggering. Look beyond the cartoon visuals people, this is better than anything Blur managed.

Cover versions

A tricky and slightly controversial subject, some people love them, some think they verge on herecy-I can fall into either camp depending on the song and who's doing the cover.

Good as the original or better.

Reuben-The hand that feeds. Done on their "Rest Of" compilation " Should Have Gone To University" this is a really good cover of Trent Reznor's original. A cover of Gorillaz' Feel Good Inc. is also on this album, but it's not quite as successful as the NIN song.

Jeff Buckley/Led Zeppelin- When the Levee Breaks. This is so different from the original ( A happy go lucky Delta Blues classic) that it's almost a different song. Buckley's version is slightly superior for me simply because of his angelic voice. On a side note, A Perfect Circle do a dreamy Trip Hop version which is rather nice too.

Orgy - Blue Monday. A guitar heavy rocked up version of the new order classic. I like it a lot, but I can see people not really going for this one.

Deftones - Passenger.  Not the Iggy Pop song or even the Elton John one, but a little known Duran Duran track and it's brilliant. Chino and the boys also do a great cover of Sade's No Ordinary Love too.

Worse than the Original/Shouldn't Have Bothered

Johnny Cash - Hurt/Rusty Cage. I know a lot of people like Cash's cover of Hurt, but for me it loses the desperation of Reznors' original-the feeling of a young man in the deepest pit of despair- And just doesn't work as well. His cover of Soundgardens' Rusty Cage sounds like something rejected from the Rawhide soundtrack. Fail.

Chris Cornell - Billy Jean. Oh god. If I thought Cash's cover of Hurt wasn't up to much, this abomination nearly made me fall off my chair. I wasn't a fan of the original, but this is, well, shit. No other words can describe it. The worst cover since Audioslave decided to ruin The Clash's "White Riot"

Glee. Fuck off.

Peter Andre

So, Pete had an affair whilst he was married to Jordan. Well you would wouldn't you, probably just to get away from the vacuous bint for a while.
If anyone cares it was with a former page 3 model, -In other words a girl.

Yep, surprised me too.

Spurs 2-1 Everton

Bah. As i suspected, our european hangover continued, albeit only up until half time. If Donovan hadn't somehow managed to miss an open goal we'd have got a draw. Having said that, Spurs just about deserved to win. Ho hum, onwards and upwards.