The geeks guide to netiquette
Great article from the Independent on Sunday about how to act on social networks.
Review : Sigur Ros – Með suð í eyrum við spilum endalaust
Með suð í eyrum við spilum endalaust (in english – with a buzz in our ears we play endlessly) is the fifth full length album from Sigur Ros and is released on 23rd June in the UK.
For the first time, they have drafted in some outside production talent and enlisted Flood (Depeche Mode, U2) the wiggle the faders.
On the opening two tracks ‘Gobbledigook’ and ‘Inní mér syngur vitleysingur’ there is a more progressive, jumpy up and down style from Sigur Ros which really works. Its a euphoric opening to an album which will draw comparisons with Arcade Fire.
Track 5 is marvellous ‘Festival’ starting off with 4 or 5 minutes of the Sigur Ros everyone recognises, gentle vocals and ethereal sounds before building to a climax complete with horns, guitars, fearsome drums and cymbals – it is both brutal and beautiful and compelling listening…right down the feint whistling on the outro as the melody repeats.
‘Með suð í eyrum’ – is a nice quiet interlude, with a rolling drum line & gentle piano – before my favourite track on the album – ‘Ára bátur’ (rowing boat?) arrives, a Sigur Ros epic, just shy of nine minutes opening with just a piano and Jonsi’s vocal, including his voice cracking and straining, but by the time the track ends there are more than 90 people involved in the track, including the London Oratory and the London Sinfonietta with the choir and the strings adding layers of depth I’ve not seen before with a Sigur Ros track. It really is a masterpiece – and I think we’ll hear this one for many years to come played over sunrises and sports celebrations as TV music.
The album closes out with ‘All Alright’ which to my knowledge is the first time that Sigur Ros have recorded in English.
It is definitely a good progression from ( ) and Takk and SIgur Ros have produced a really compelling album, full of texture and detail but accessible enough that they will discover new fans. Hvarf/Heim plugged the gap between releases – but this is the real deal – buy it now, you won’t be disappointed.
Click More for a full Tracklisting
Interviewing at MSFT and Google
Interesting article on interviewing at Microsoft, and comparing to Google
Coldplay – over played, over smug and everywhere
The media has been full of Coldplay in the last few weeks, as they release their album ‘Viva La Vida’ – and it’s not a bad album, well produced, excellently performed and pretty well written.
So, I watched the ‘Coldplay live at the BBC’ concert this week and listened to the concert from Brixton academy. I also bought the album – despite the fact it isn’t a bad album, I’m beginning to find Coldplay really, bloody, irritating, and particularly the unbearably smug Chris Martin.
I’ve seen interviews recently where Chris Martin walks out, essentially because he’s bored, I watched the BBC coverage last night where he just talks rubbish whilst the other members of the band try to answer questions, and watching him bounce around on stage like an orang-utan on speed is frankly a bit embarrassing. And what is it with the playing the piano out of tune business – he did it at both of the BBC gigs – I’m not sure if it was the bouncing around or whether it was intentional – either way, no-one in the band looked impressed – and it sounded rubbish.
Fortunately – the band are talented enough. The music kind of makes up for his shenanigans (despite the accusations of plagiarism), but as they carpet bomb the press for the new album – I wonder if they could just take a leaf out of Sigur Ros’ book, who are releasing their new album with a few choice performances and less of crazy showbusiness antics.
You can download the Coldplay Live at the BBC video (or watch it online) at the BBC iPlayer page by clicking this link. You can also listen to the Coldplay concert from Brixton Academy at the Radio 1 site here.
Extraordinary Virtual Earth Implementation
Just spotted this over on Steve Clayton’s blog, a great implmentation of the Virtual Earth maps, using Deep Earth and Silverlight. The zooming capabilities of this map are fantastic, and the level of detail (take a look at the center of London for instance) is astonishing. I zoomed in to take a look at Terminal 4 at London’s Heathrow airport.
As Steve says – it’s too cool for school! Click on the map – or here to take a look.
Review : Engleby – Sebastian Faulks
After finishing Devil May Care, I decided that I needed to read more of Sebastian Faulks work, so I plumped for ‘Engleby’ first. After finishing it late last night, I’m glad I did – it is an absolute corker of a book.
Engleby is the story of a man who wins scholarships to first a public school, and then a top university but never really ‘fits in’ at either place. Eventually taking a career in journalism, he finally seems to settle down – until his only, distant relationship at university, comes back to haunt him.
The main character is the narrator of the story, and Faulks skillfully blends his unreliable story (maybe influenced by drugs, drink and psychosis) with the diary entries from the object of his obsession.
Faulks writes with a great style, Mike Engleby is a dark, obsessive man with a great sense of humour and razor sharp intellect. By the end of the story, you wonder who really is the damaged character in the story – and until the last page, you are never quite sure of what really happened.
Excellent book – from an brilliant writer, I’m going to buy Birdsong next and I’ll update when I’ve given that a read.
Tiny Twitter – for your Smartphone…
Do you use SMS to send messages to Twitter on the move? If so, you should probably check out TinyTwitter, which as the name suggests is a Twitter client with a tiny footprint that runs on Windows Mobile devices.
Big hat-tip to Jason Langridge for pointing this one out.
By the way – you can find me on Twitter here.
Never trust the french with technology…
Wait for it! Wait for it! It’s not what you first think it will be…
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