Black Music Matters Too

Hello everyone,

I've been thinking about doing another music post for a little while and the current events have given me a bit of a theme to work with ! But first ... thumbnail pic ...

The formerly unnamed Dwagon Rock Band has another member. Actually it's had another member for almost two weeks now but I haven't felt up to doing any more on that project just yet. The name is likely to be Chromatic Fever, cos you know ... metal and dragons ! May need to draw more colours of dragons and not just the green ones.

Actually, that digression takes me to mention another fella who uses dragons for his avatars, Aavak of the lovely voice that owes a lot to Welsh heritage. Great voice, lovely fella. Here's a link to his Youtube, which will take you to the rest of his accounts.

But this isn't supposed to be about streaming people, it's about the great music. One issue I've always had with my music posts is that they always go to the same groups and singers. Like The Cardigans, All About Eve, Bat For Lashes, Tori Amos. Let's have some different people who are just as awesome.

First up is Seal, who's song Future Love Paradise was essentially the catalyst for this post when it took its turn on my iTunes. Seal has an amazing voice and he's an expert at using it. This song is one of his best.

Next up is Massive Attack, a local band to the Bristol area. When I first heard Teardrop as a song (I think I'd heard it on adverts), I thought it was amazing. Pure magic.

Morcheeba's been a fun band to listen to as well. Sometimes it's ballad type songs, sometimes it's more like rap, sometimes it's lyrics that are there for fun. It's diverse, it's interesting. Here's The Sea, sung by a wonderful Skye Edwards.

You can't discuss artists of colour without going back to the classics and the originals. Nina Simone's music will be unforgettable, timeless and always guaranteed to draw on the emotions. And get you singing along to songs like Here Comes The Sun.

And then there's Aretha Franklin with Respect.

(Are you chair dancing while listening yet ? I am)

Ella Fitzgerald with another classic, Lets Fall In Love.

We have Nat King Cole with more Unforgettable songs. The older singers had a wonderful way of standing there and letting that music flow out for them in just a wave of beauty.

You're probably noticing that these are tending to be older songs instead of current artists - that's just me and the style of songs I like. Am old and like the older styles :-D. Nicki Minaj has added a lot to some recent Madonna albums but her usual stuff is too fast, too attack, not calming. So while I have some Beyonce in the library, she's not someone I listen to much.

Not forgetting those utter wizards with their instruments, Lenny Kravitz had a string of amazing songs on Are You Gonna Go My Way and then there's the legend that is Jimi Hendrix with my favourite of his, Voodoo Child.

I'm a lucky owner of a Sammy Davis Jr collection as well, now there is an incredible voice and apparently an even better dancer. This legend's song can only be Mr Bojangles. Oh and The Impossible Dream which I remember first from when it was adopted for a fantastic Honda advert.

You have to mention Michael Jackson here too for his innovative contributions to dance and dance music. Smooth Criminal is a classic.

Moving on to Prince, who was a brilliant singer and an even better songwriter. You'll have heard his songs sung by other bands and singers including Sinead O'Connor, The Bangles, Kiss, Cyndi Lauper, Madonna, Kate Bush ... Here's When Doves Cry.

I love Roberta Flack's voice as well, here is the original Killing Me Softly With His Song.

I'm gonna finish on Seal again because he's just so good. Another topical one to end on, Don't Cry.

Actually no - this is the perfect song to close on. It's Louis Armstrong with What A Wonderful World. Because despite all the trouble and strife, this is a wonderful world to have you, yes you reading this, in it.

Stay safe, be well and I hope you enjoyed these wonderful songs as much as I have while collecting them together. There are so many more songs too ... but only so much room in a post. Find them, enjoy them !

To the Charts !

Hello everyone,

Just over a year ago, a new laptop arrived and one of the things that meant was .... listening to all of the music again ! I could copy over the library again but transferring over the stats would have been Interesting. Especially as I was switching over from Apple to Windows and the two systems have different ways of organising their files.

The picture that I'm gleefully borrowing there is from the always inspired TeeTurtle and here's the link to the t-shirt that you can get it on.

Music ! How long did it take ? Later. I use iTunes exclusively and the iTunes DJ feature (now long gone) to semi randomly line up what I'm listening to. The feature they replaced that with is utterly worthless and it does mean I have to stay on iTunes 10.7 and iOS 6 on my otherwise retired iPhone 5. It's actually why I retired that iPhone in favour of switching over to Android. What iTunes DJ does is say "I want at least 25 tracks in a playlist and when that goes below 25, add some more in." So I'll queue up albums, queue up stuff I haven't listened to much, queue up the best tracks again to space out the albums and then iTunes will fill in with more random stuff out of the library.

It's led to a nice way of getting through the library for me.

I'm listening via a Logitech Bluetooth adaptor that takes the audio from over the airwaves from the laptop and sends it to my hifi. There's no need to get expensive dedicated stuff from the likes of Sonos, you can easily and effectively use much cheaper adaptors to take advantage of the sound systems that you already have. The Logitech device has been very solid over the last 14 months, having taken over from an Apple device that expired the same week as I changed the laptops (or it could have been issues with Windows iTunes vs MacOS iTunes). I do have to power cycle it occasionally but that's maybe 5 times in a year and it's getting used A LOT. It's also excellent for sound quality and doesn't need a router reboot every week or so like the Apple device did.

(Declaration note - I bought it, devices not provided)

But ... you're here for the music right ? iTunes keeps a lot of stats for me which I use to help space out what I listen to and decide what's coming up next. I have just over 16,000 tracks in the library now and it's taken 14 months to get through all that lot and get it listened to. Sometimes multiple times too, as there are still 1500 tracks that I've only listened to once. I'll listen to individual tracks first and then listen to the albums a little while later.

Music ? In usual tradition, least listened to stuff first. In the tracks with 7 plays over the last 14 months, we start with :

Bear & Cat - Teslagrad theme. I didn't copy over that many of the gaming soundtracks to the new laptop but some were special. Distinctive. This is one where it comes on and you go "Wot dis ?"

From there you have the amazing voice of Tori Amos, who is in here a few times with tracks from The Beekeeper album. The track, The Beekeeper is one of those that tends to come out in those late evening sing along to youtube sessions but here's it's going to be Toast. Haven't had any buttered toast for too long.

We have film soundtracks in there too with Ron Goodwin music from Where Eagles Dare and Elmer Bernstein's The Great Escape (The Chase) plus Sheena Easton's For Your Eyes Only from James Bond. Curiously, the instance of Crockett's Theme from Miami Vice is not the one from the soundtrack ... Going back to Where Eagle's Dare, I'm reading Athabasca by the same author (Alastair MacLean) and it's sooooo good.

Back to voices and we have the wonderful :
Katie Melua with Blame It On The Moon from Call Off The Search;
Lily Allen with the brilliant Who'd Have Known from It's Not Me, It's You;
Kate Bush with Wuthering Heights from The Kick Inside;
Frank Sinatra kicking out I Get A Kick Out Of You;
And Siobhan Maher of River City People with Walking On Ice.

Moving back to songs like Road To Somewhere by Goldfrapp on the Seventh Tree album. This has been picked for the car a few times because it's a really chilled out album, which definitely helps on GB's roads at the moment ...

Talking of travelling, the one Cardigans song that has snuck into this Top 40 (and a bit) is Daddy's Car from the Life album. Great track.

There's a few not so perfect voices that still come out with amazing songs :
KT Tunstall with Saving My Face from the more rocky Drastic Fantastic album.
Duffy with Warwick Avenue. Another incredible track. She has a very unusual voice but when she gets a song that fits it, it's a piece of wonder.
George Harrison with My Sweet Lord.
Castle In The Clouds from Beverly Craven.

The last of the 7 plays are :
Eleanor Rigby from The Beatles. There may be more of these coming because this one is from the 1 album, which I haven't listened to all the way through yet. This one will always be a special song.
A collection from All About Eve but I'm saving them for the 8's.
For a little while, I went by the name Alisha's Addict due to adoring tracks like Barbarella from the Illumina album.
And then there's the pretty new Bat For Lashes aka Natasha Khan, with tracks like Prescilla and the very special Laura. I still need to pick up her latest album.

And the very last of the 7's is Agnes Obel with a track from Aventine, The Curse. I heard the track Close Watch from a sampler album and I'm now on 2 albums later. Well worth a listen if you haven't heard of this group before.

Into the 8's we have :
All About Eve ! With Apple Tree Man, which will always be a favourite for me. Here it is with a bonus Martha's Harbour too. Julianne Regan has one of the best voices I've heard.
Mindy Gledhill is in here with the lovely Cravy Love from the adorable Anchor album.
Roxanne from The Police.
An unusual one for me, Sex On Fire by Kings Of Leon.
A little bit of classical, with Holst's Mars from the Planets Suite.
Beware ... Christmas music with Elaine Paige's excellent version of the Coventry Carol and Chris Rea's Joys of Christmas.
And the last one of the 8's (there are more ... but only so much room in one post !) is one from one of the best albums there is, Go Your Own Way from Fleetwood Mac's Rumours.

And then there were the 9's :
I seem to collect music that has very dark lyrics inside, music that otherwise sounds wonderful but when you listen closely ... very dark. Caution warning on Dubstar's Not So Manic Now. This is incidentally why I'm very careful about linking tracks from The Cardigans !
Christmas is in here again with O Come, O Come Emmanuel sung by Joan Baez;
And then there's David Bowie in here with Golden Years. This was on one of the most charming sequences in A Knight's Tale, which I would thoroughly recommend watching if you've missed out so far.

Queen get in here with no other track than We Will Rock You and the last of the 9s is from the Arctic Monkeys with 505 from their brilliant Favourite Worse Nightmare track.

A great 14 months listening to music !

Songs that bring out the singing

Tonight's album coming through on the iTunes has been the Let It Roll collection by George Harrison and ... I've been singing along to some of the tracks again.

Can't remember when I did that last ! Which means it's been too long.

(Picture credit - Theresa Snyder on Pinterest)

About those songs though !

The first one up for this list is that George Harrison opener to his Let It Roll collection, Got My Mind Set On You. A great post Beatles song, not sure about those lyrics now though ...

A lot of Cardigans tracks get me like this too, countless of them indeed. But the track I seem to keep coming back to is Algebra, from the first of the two A Camp albums and it was borrowed at one point for the tv series Haven. Oh ... here's another one ! I started this post with the intention of just one song per group but ... Communication is an awesome song that speaks to people like me on many levels. And the animated video is excellent.

A quick aside into instrumental music. This'll get you humming along too and the last track up was from the 90s game, Master of Magic. This was a game heavily inspired by Civilisation but was transplanted to a fantasy and magic world with great variation in the races and the addition of a tactical battle layer. It also had a fantastic set of music in there, albeit usually transmitted over crude FM synthesisers in the sound cards. (not finding a worthwhile link to the music though)

Another instrumental that's guaranteed to get me doing the chair bopping is Candyland by Tobu. One from the Non Copyrighted Sounds collection which are handy for streaming people, which is how I first heard it.

Going back a bit to the yoof days, we have the singers of groups like All About Eve and I'll always join in with Martha's Harbour. I grew up with the Anne McCaffrey Dragonriders of Pern books and Julianne Regan of AAE has always had the voice of one of the best characters of those books, Menolly. (The link is to the bonus version that has Apple Tree Man on it as well, another wonderful song from their first album)

I also grew up with Kate Bush, who can be tough to sing along to because of her incredible vocal range. But you gotta have a go anyway. I think the song for this collection is going to be Oh England, My Lionheart. A haunting song.

Talking of having a go, Alison Goldfrapp has as remarkable a voice as Kate Bush and uses it to devastating effect for Utopia. I think that's inspired by the Fritz Lang Metropolis movie.

After those years, I dived into an Alisha's Attic addiction and perhaps because the two sisters had diverse voices, it made it easier to sing along ? Maybe. The Incidentals is a really happy song to sing along to.

The Only Exception is a great one too, on a similar theme by Paramore.

One of the random tracks that popped up in the car on one of the trips lately was Fernando by Abba. Can you hear the drums ?

Hopefully we'll never get Stuck on one of those trips (Caro Emerald at her best).

I did catch the boss man quietly murmuring away to Wish You Were Here by Pink Floyd on our last trip ... I especially like how on the album, the transition from the previous track is a listener changing the stations on the radio, finding a thread of music and then joining in.

And then there are the powerful songs like Laura by Bat For Lashes. I've known a few people called Laura and they've been wonderful people. I wonder who Natasha Khan's Laura was ?

Edie Brickell was another one I grew up with and Ghost Of A Dog was an especially poignant song. (No video because I'm not going to link to a rampant copyright thief !)

Something from way long ago which we've pretty much just rediscovered is the Jesus Christ Superstar album penned by Andrew Lloyd Webber. It's an excellent album, the bible story set to 80s rock music. Hosanna tempts you in ....


The weather here at the moment is pretty shocking but you shouldn't Blame It On The Weatherman. (B*witched)

What's next ? Garbage are still going strong, making mayhem and taking names. One of my favourites of their songs is Cherry Lips from the Beautiful album.

You shouldn't be Super Critical though, which is a great album from the Ting Tings. Best track and a definite one to join in on is Wrong Club.

I bet that club never plays Moves Like Jagger (Maroon 5)

This collection wouldn't be complete without something from the infectious, impish Little Boots and I'll go to Remedy from her first album. (note - video needs a flashies warning)

Another impish songstress is Norah Jones, latest of the tracks to play on my iTunes ... Let's see ... Oh yes. Man Of The Hour is a fun song.

Mindy Gledhill's songs have a definite joy that lifts the heart and makes you grin as you listen, like I Do Adore.

Last one. Ours was another car where Queen Greatest Hits tended to rule the popularity and ... Yep. You're about to be singing along to Bohemian Rhapsody again.

Nope. I have better. Yes. Better ! Star Trekkin' ... Across The Universe ... Best music video ever.

Nostalgia themes

A surprise late post !

A surprise to me too ... (I should really be heading off to bed now).

Reading the Blake's 7 book made me think back to some of the themes that heralded those great ... and not so great shows. The ones you still vaguely remember now, even years after the programme finished airing.

What themes ? Here's the Blake's 7 theme. A great opening and a well crafted finish. Check out those state of the art BBC special drama budget graphics. This programme was never about the graphics though, it was about the interplay between the characters. Would Vila run ? Would Avon turn on everybody ? How irascible would Zen and Orac get ? How much trouble would the idealistic Blake get ? Great show. I was glued to this one as a kiddie.

I was also glued to Battle of the Planets. Yep. Nostalgia - check. A great show for after school. Oh and then there's Dogtanian (It's awful isn't it ...) for when we moved back to England. I'd rush back from school for that pup. I never got back in time for Mysterious Cities Of Gold, although I have the dvds which I haven't managed to watch yet. Ulysses 31 was a highlight too.

I hear Thundercats is coming back too. Hey look ! It's a Dungeons and Dragons ride. Classic comics.

And this one was pretty bad but spawned it's own legends. It's the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.

This was from the days when the programme makers would quite happily dedicate a minute or two of their 25 minutes to an intro theme to show you all the characters again.

Back to the more adult stuff .... I adored Battlestar Galactica, the original movies. It took a while before I could catch up on the series though. It didn't matter that the space effects sequences were used, reused and recycled thousands of times, it felt and looked great.

And then there's Knight Rider, the unmistakeable Woo Woo and futuristic music of its intro launching the Hoff on his career.

Yep. We had some very silly telly on every week in the 80s.

Not quite so silly in set up but extremely silly in its episodic plotlines was Space 1999. Sadly didn't have the scripts to back up Moonbase Alpha's setting. I loved the Eagle spacecraft. Very utilitarian, very flexible. It was a while before I got to watch this on reruns though.

Talking of silly .... Captain William "Buck" Rogers had a freak mishap, freezing him so that he would reappear ... to save Earth in the 25th Century with faithful sidekick robot Twiki.

There were many more too, like Sapphire and Steel which I really need to try and watch again.

One that I have enjoyed coming back is Macgyver. The new remake series has been an excellent update.

Right - I think it's getting too late for me to think of more to post. But if you need them and if you can find them, maybe you can hire ... The A Team.

And a late add on. How could I forget to include Doctor Who ? Here's the Tom Baker intro.

10 Albums meme

You know me. I can't resist a good meme theme to get me talking about things for a post and ....

I love the music posts.

The meme I've been seeing posts for covers one album a day for 10 days and it's the albums you found most influential. Here goes ! Obligatory links to Youtube of course.

First up - All About Eve by All About Eve. I grew up with this album, it was perhaps the first that I owned and I listened to it a huge amount. They were a goth band led by a beautiful singer with a classic, amazing voice. I would listen to this while reading Anne McCaffrey's Dragonriders of Pern books which included a character called Menolly who had a wonderful voice and made up catchy songs. She was a loved character and Julianne Regan of All About Eve will always be the voice of Menolly for me. The album is packed with wonderful songs and here are a couple of them, Martha's Harbour and Apple Tree Man. Gorgeous songs, great lyrics.

Second is an old classic by Pink Floyd. We all listened to these albums and Wish You Were Here was probably my favourite for how the tracks merged into each other. Here's the title track, on the album this one transitions from the previous track by someone changing the channel on the radio. They bounce over a few stations before finding one with a guitar playing, the band joins in and it goes from there. Great album, great song.

Third - Alisha's Attic, Illumina. I went by the nickname Alisha's Addict for a while because I adored listening to the two sisters and their intermixing voices. Illumina is their second album and it's packed full of raw, emotional songs like Wish I Were You, fun songs like Shameless and Barbarella and sugary sweet lovely songs like The Incidentals. The Incidentals is one of my all time favourite songs.

Fourth is a soundtrack, it's the Legend album by Clannad. It was written to accompany the Robin of Sherwood series, which I grew up with in the 80s. Good series, wonderful soundtrack with Celtic atmosphere dripping from Together We, Strange Land and the Robin title track.

Fifth is a Cardigans album. You know how I love Nina Persson's voice don't you ? :-D The album of choice is Long Gone Before Daylight due to all the amazing songs it has. The thing about Cardigans albums is that, in the words of Nina, they'll creep up behind you and hit you on the head. With an axe. (That's from their iTunes Original interviews). So while this one doesn't have the song that drew me to them (My Favourite Game), it has so many songs that speak to you like Communication, You're The Storm, 03.45am No Sleep, For What It's Worth, Feathers and Down and more. Oh and then there's Algebra from the A Camp album which I needed to listen to again. Just cos.

I only have to listen to the first chords of a Cardigans song and I'll smile, start to chill out and know I'm going to enjoy what's coming.

BRB.

There we go.

The thing about The Cardigans though is that you'll be listening to those lyrics and realise those amazing songs are actually talking about some very dark themes ... Themes like domestic abuse, so I'm quite careful about who I recommend them to and which songs I recommend.

Sixth is a Dire Straits album, following that theme. This group is another band that I listen to a lot but you listen closely to some of their lyrics instead of letting that sublime guitar interplay wash over you and ... there's some seriously dodgy lyrics in there. (I'm looking at you Money For Nothing and most of the Communique album !) Album of choice here is Love Over Gold with the epic Telegraph Road and excellent Private Investigations.

Seventh draws back to my teenage years as well with Kate Bush who conjures up magic with her voice and wrapt attention with the music and lyrics. Any of her earlier albums could be the one here but I'll go with Hounds of Love with its mix of great commercially oriented songs in the first half and the story of The Ninth Wave of the second half. Highlights are Hounds of Love, Cloudbusting and Running Up That Hill.

Number 8 is a Christmas album and it's from Elaine Paige. This has a few classics in there like her version of The Coventry Carol (best hymn), Wishing On A Star and A Winter's Tale. It's a fun album from start to finish.

Number 666 (or 9) is Seventh Son of a Seventh Son by Iron Maiden showing how to expertly mix heavy and musical. This was one of the first of quite a few metal albums I listened to a lot. Highlights are the title track and The Evil That Men Do. And more.

I'll give the last one to Jeff Wayne's War of the Worlds which tells a classic story over its two cd's. I'm talking about the Richard Burton, David Essex and Justin Hayward of the Moody Blues original with songs like Forever Autumn and Thunderchild.

Honourable mentions go to people like Fleetwood Mac with Rumours (That Grand Prix theme with The Chain !), Frankie Goes to Hollywood with Welcome to the Pleasuredome, anything by Garbage (and Cherry Lips in particular), Utopia from Goldfrapp's Felt Mountain and River City People's version of California Dreamin'.

And I'm going to sneak in an extra one which was always, ALWAYS on in the car when I was a kid and we were going places as a family : Queen Greatest Hits 1. Bohemian Rhapsody anyone ?

Rewriting the songs again

You know sometime, I'll have to get that headset out again and actually try recording some of these parody songs.

Daft post tonight .... Surviving Mars is out tonight, which I've been quite looking forward to. The pre-release streams on the ParadoxExtra with Susie and Nikki of the publishers have been particularly enjoyable. (Here's the link to their playlist again)

Anyway, Nikki mentioned that she's listening to more heavy metal music lately and .... that triggered the "let's rewrite a song into a parody" thing again.

Here goes :
The Martian Immigrant Song

Ah-ah, ah!
Ah-ah, ah!

We come from the home of the pa-ra-dox
From the planet Earth, where the pizza's cold
Managers of people
We'll drive rockets to red Mars
To build the domes, and rush the babes
Mysteries, I am coming!

On we seek with rover drones
Our only goal will be a perfect dome

Ah-ah, ah!
Ah-ah, ah!

We come from the home of the pa-ra-dox
From the planet Earth where the pizza's cold
How fine your dusts so red
Can whisper "look meteor"
Susie the host, Nikki controls
You are our overlords

On we seek with rover drones
Our only goal will be a perfect dome

So now you'd better stop and come join us on Mars
For Nikki's dome will rule the sol despite of all your lazing

Ooh-ooh, ooh-ooh, ooh-ooh
Ooh-ooh, ooh-ooh, ooh-ooh
Ooh-ooh, ooh-ooh, ooh-ooh
Ooh-ooh, ooh-ooh, ooh-ooh
Ooh-ooh, ooh-ooh, ooh-ooh

Here's a link to the Led Zep original of Immigrant Song (you may recognise it from Thor Ragnarok where I was most definitely head bopping along to it in the cinema).

I also rewrote another classic lately for KatherineOfSky, warlord of the Factorio wastes. This one was based on Run To The Hills by Iron Maiden (another link to a youtube version)

Woman came down from the sky
She brought us smoke that made us cry
She killed our blues she killed our nests
She took our dead for her own need

We fought her hard we fought her well
Out on the plains we bit and spit
But still she came with tank and flame
All our colonies will be tamed?

Jumping through ash clouds and barren wastes
Broken tree limbs on the plains
Chasing the robots back to their ports
Biting them in their own game
Murdered for freedom the nuke sneak attack
Woman and turrets and lasers ransack

Run to the hills, run for your lives
Run to the hills, run for your lives

Orange warlord in barren wastes
Hunting and nuking her trade
Mining the iron and stealing the fish
The only good trees meet grenade
Cracking the fuel and being a pest
Destroying the worms and erasing their nests

Run to the hills, run for your lives

Can't beat those classics. But sometimes you can improve on them. I'll leave you with a link to a Weird Al parody based on American Pie. Here is "The Saga Begins". It's brilliant.

PS Too tired to open Surviving Mars tonight but I did enjoy listening and watching to the Susie and Nikki launch stream.

Book 2 - Brick Flicks. And music !

I had a brilliant intro in my head for this earlier but it has escaped into the bounds of amnesia.

Something to do with "Let's face the music ... and dance" but with Mini Eggs and madness involved. It's quite possibly a good thing that it's disappeared into amnesia.

Two subjects for today. I quickly moved into 2 books completed for 2018 ! Ahead of target. I quite enjoyed Brick Flicks. It's a book where the authors have recreated vignettes from many of the famous films out there. From Ben Hur to the Godfather. Alien to Tomb Raider. Death on the Nile :

To Indiana Jones :

It looks better in your hands than when trying to arrange the pages for a photo. I didn't want to damage the book by scrunching the pages back in a rather tightly bound hardback ! Cruelty to books is a very deep evil.

Good book. Great present.

Music ? I have a huge amount of music in the library. The library is expanding fast enough that it threatens the capacity of my laptop ... Aren't there those songs that when they come on, you just can't help trying to join in ? Tori Amos gets me a lot like that, despite her being blessed with a remarkable voice and me .... not.

What are some of these songs ?

The one I'll start with is by Nina Persson, formerly of The Cardigans, singing Algebra with the band A Camp. I've linked this one a few times before but .... this is a special song by a very special singer who has produced so many songs that catch my ear.

Back to Tori Amos and there are a bunch of songs I go back to with this special lady. The one that provoked me croaking along over the weekend was The Beekeeper.

I Do Adore a good song and that's one right there by Mindy Gledhill.

Sad songs too and Ghost of a Dog is a remarkable one by Edie Brickell.

Sometimes All I Need (by Air) is a classic song to break a dark mood and set me into happy times again.

Son of a Preacher Man (Dusty Springfield) is definitely a classic that always catches me.

Seal has been making a trade in singing old classics too, here's I Can't Stand The Rain. Must get his latest album.

Or a not so classic really new song that's ultra catchy like Call Me Maybe by Carly Rae Jepsen. Love the humour in the video.

Most of the Rumours album by Fleetwood Mac gets me singing along and the F1 theme will always be The Chain for me.

Glad I didn't get Stuck in the limited wintry weather we had over Xmas. Caro Emerald is another remarkable singer. Guaranteed to get me chair bopping as well as singing along.

It can feel good to be on a Road To Somewhere, one of Goldfrapp's best and most singalongable.

I found a particularly good version of Martha's Harbour by All About Eve too a while back. Here it is with Apple Tree Man.

And an unusual one by Nouvelle Vague, I Melt With You.

So Thank You For The Music (the songs we can't resist singing) and I hope this selection brightened your evenings !

PS There's so many more songs that coulda shoulda been here too ! Like Walk Like An Egyptian that's just been playing on the iTunes :-).

Music for a galactic flyboy

It's been a while since I've done a music post !

Time for one that's a little different. I've been enjoying my time in Elite with a restarted character. It's become fresher, there's a sense of much more risk that brings engagement, it's a definitely novelty having to dock with my own piloting for a change and I like the small, nippy ships. Oh and no one in the galaxy knows Cmdr Keela Danne yet, Cmdr Iceangel was quite well known and could get the good contracts.

I should probably say that this is partly intended as a New Player Advice Post !

I definitely didn't have a sense of being Indestructible (Alisha's Attic) in the trusty Sidewinder I started in.

Cute ship. If you can call a box with an engine cute. This is the ship they give you at the start, with 1000 credits and all loaned parts to make your name with. It can hold 10 tonnes of cargo if you take the shields off it, a little more if you run without a scanner too. But that's a bad idea because you can make a little bit of money with the scanner, plus it's very useful for planetary landings on bodies that you actually need to find.

Anyway - Space Dog (Tori Amos) ... or Space Puppy on the move again.

There isn't much option in the little ship to do anything other than moving cargo and letters around. The jump range goes out decently when you get a better hyperdrive but it's very limited in the amount of fuel it can carry.

And a Starman (David Bowie) wants to range far and wide.

I started off in Federation territory, where you can pick up some fairly easy courier contracts (but be prepared to Run) that boost up the money supply pretty well. Quick enough to get that Sidewinder upgraded quite nicely to a longer range hyperdrive. And then ....

The black Hauler class ship called Dignity. That name comes from a track by Deacon Blue which is one of the favourites. There's a fella out there who wants to retire and buy a ship called Dignity. Good song.

That ship didn't end up being a Frequent Flyer (A Camp). I got rid of it after one flight ! It's not actually that much of a jump between the Hauler and the Adder class multirole ship. The black Adder not actually known as Edmund can hold 20 tonnes of cargo with a shield. I've put guns on there now too to chase away pesky Sidewinder pirates.

I think my original Adder was called Starbug. This one is named after a play on its class name. It is the ICV Algebraic (Independent Courier Vessel) after another wonderful song by A Camp, Algebra.

The next step up from an Adder will be the old favourite from the very first Elite, the Cobra Mk3. I'm not quite there yet. I could buy the ship but I'm waiting until I have a good packet of money available for upgrades. It's good to get into that top level hyperdrive as soon as you buy the ship.

Cos you know, that Road To Somewhere (Goldfrapp) can be a Long And Windy Road (Beatles).

Can you believe that this :

Makes this ?

I think I need one.

And then it's up the ship classes into Cobra Mk4 for a while (bigger, more capable), the Asp Explorer, the Python and then maybe .... one of the bigger ships. I'm only intending to fly ships I'll enjoy flying this time around which counts out the freighter type ships. They can make a decent amount of trading cash for their size but they're pretty hateful to fly. It isn't all about the money though. Sometimes it's How High (Madonna) can you go.

One thing about the switching between ships. There's a few very sites for the new and not so new Elite player.
Coriolis.edcd.io (the edcd version is newer) lets you build ship designs, see whether they work in the weight and power limits and ... sends you over to EDDB to show you where to get them.
Elite Dangerous Data Base is invaluable for trading, although you can get caught up with the data being out of date.
And then there is Inara.cz as another site carrying tonnes of info about the game.

If the ship isn't capable of turning that quick, you can't really Blame It On The Moon (Katie Melua) for slowing it down.

A few more quick ones ?
Don't want to get Stuck (Caro Emerald) and dry on fuel ...
I avoid Open mode like the plague cos of Kids With Guns (Gorillaz);
If you Linger (Cranberries) too long, it is a crime punishable by death (Really !);
At some point, I'll be Chasing Pirates (Norah Jones);
The Midnight Sun (Lisa Miskovsky) is especially pretty ... but if I'm seeing suns at midnight that's going to be really bad for my sleep pattern !
I'm definitely in the best ship for Mathematics (Little Boots) at the moment;
I hope the Lifeboats (Snow Patrol) work ...
I'm always hoping for Safe Travels (Lisa Hannigan);
It's wonderful being Under Stars (Aurora);

One last one. One of my favourite albums which doesn't get enough linkage here is Dark Side Of The Moon (oh even more appropriate !) by Pink Floyd with .... Great Gig in the Sky.

Oh wait ! There is the perfect song for any Elite or space game player ... It can only be ... We aim to misbehave, Firefly style.

So a new song happened ...

Not wanting to talk too much about me at the moment ... Cos there's better things to talk about !

(I'll give an update at the end).

I've been rewriting the songs again. Adding it here so a couple of extra people can see it.

This time it's inspired mostly by the lovely Lauren (aka Radderss - see link on the right) who has just started playing the game The Witcher 3. There's a bit of inspiration from Yogs Hannah too, who spotted this from a short play through she did of the same game. You see, there's a non player character in there who has lost something ... She says it in a really broad country type accent. And the country people in this game definitely have something in common with deepest Zummerzet and a little bit of the Devon too.

Yep. She says "Moi Pan" in a way only a local could.

My mind couldn't let it stay at just that though. Nope. There had to be a song. Especially when the lovely Radderss (who just got partnership with Twitch - hurrah !) started singing the Combine Harvester song.

Here it is. And don't click on the Combine Harvester link ... It'll give context and tune for what's coming but ... listening to Wurzels has been known to endanger people's sanity. BEWARE !

The way this one is intended is that it is being sung by the Moi Pan lady, who is brandishing that pan at a rather scared looking but normally ultra tough looking Witcher fella (monster bounty hunter) called Geralt. She gonna get her man if she has to hit him over the head with her pan and drag him back to her house.

A Serenade for Geralt :

You rode your horse Roach through my hayfield last night
(ooh aah ooh aah)
I threw an old pan at the door HEY YOU QUIET
(ooh aah ooh aah)
Now something's telling me
That you're avoiding me
Come on now darling I've got something you need

[Chorus] Cuz I got a brand new fryin' pan
An' I'll fry you some tea
Come on now let's have the fry up
It's gert lush can't you see
I got bacon rashers
An' you got herbs-I see
Now I got a brand new fryin' pan
An' I'll fry you some tea

You make me laugh ha ha

I'll stick by you, I'll give thee all that you need
(moi pan moi pan)
We'll 'ave eggs and bacon
I'm a girl built for speed
(moi pan moi pan)
And you know I'll love you darlin'
So give me your 'and
(moi pan moi pan)
But what I want the most
Is all thy best cards of gwent

[Chorus]

Ooaah he's a lovely bit of stuff an' all

For seven long years I've been alone in this place
(moi pan moi pan)
Eat, sleep, in the kitchen, it's a proper disgrace
(moi pan moi pan)
Now if I cleaned it up would you change your mind
(moi pan moi pan)
I'll give up drinking cider and it'll only be tea

[Chorus]

Who loves thee Geralt ha

Weren't we a grand couple that last time you danced
Oi wore moi best dress and that fine brasserie
In your new Sunday best with that beard trimmed just right
We had our portrait done, now you have the card

Now I got a brand new fryin' pan
An' I'll fry you some tea
Now that we're both past our fifties I think that you, yes you
Should stop that damn witcherin' and you'll marry me
Cos I got a brand new fryin' pan
An' I'll fry you some tea

Aahh yu're a fine lookin' witcher and I can't wait to get me 'ands on your unicorn !

Haha. I did warn you. I suspect it does need a little context from the game though.

How about me ? Rough week. I had the pizza on the Tuesday night which hit me far worse than usual. I was actually ill ... that hasn't happened for a while. Only slightly ill but still ill. So ... no sleep plus feeling decidely ropey from the after effects.

That's pretty much passed now but my outsides went backwards too. I'll be wearing more of the bandages tomorrow and it's been handy having an extra day off this weekend.

It's not as bad as that seems though, at least my body is attempting to heal up now even if it's just all two steps forward, a step to the side and a leap backwards sometimes. Just gotta manage the damage until it all goes away. It is healing, just very slowly.

That's enough from me though. If you're reading this on Sunday, check out that stream while it's still on !

Songs, old songs, new songs

I've been doing something new ....

Nope. Not that. Although I have started building my Lego Millennium Falcon.

Nah. As the post title says, I've been rewriting the occasional song. Just two so far but ... who knows where inspiration might lead at some point. I'm not an instinctively creative person. My creative bent tends to be restricted to modifying things that other people have done. Seeing good aspects and improving on them, translating potential amusement in my head to things I hope other people appreciate. It's one reason why I keep up with the writing here, so I can develop that sense of making new things.

It does mean I have a huge amount of respect for people who are creative like that. I'd like to be more like them.

Songs ?

Songs. This all started a month or so ago when I rewrote 12 Days of Christmas for a Twitch streamer that I've been enjoying watching over the past year. That'd be Heychrissa (see link over on the right) who has a community so good, I signed up to join in. I've even subscribed. People as good, as lovely, as quality with the streaming as this need to be encouraged so they stick around and do more. And one way of doing that is by joining in with positivity and even ... a subscription. Because if people can't afford to do things that YOU love, in this case streaming video games, then they're forced to go off and get a different job. And we lose that source of enjoyment. More about that in a bit.

The first song for today is 12 Days of Chrissa. I think the idea for this came from her community talking about potential Christmas songs for our Queen of Saltiness Chrissa to sing for Xmas. Her anxieties mean we won't see that (I think !) but the warm comments I got from posting it made my day. Here it is ! 12 Days of Christmas is a very long song with all the verses, so here is just the end one :

On the Twelth day of Chrissa my true love sent to me
Twelve chatters chatting
Eleven beams beaming
Ten kids a-DEREing
Nine Gifs of dancing
Eight Subs a-subbing
Seven hours of streaming
Six games a month
Five Du Hasts !
Four awkward faces
Three tea cups
Two awesome mods
and a Lady on the Twitch screen

There are some very in-jokes which only those in the community may understand but we liked it. Perhaps a bit too in-jokey for full release perhaps.

This next one is the new one. The Kim of the Yogscast who I used to write a fair bit about posted a video saying how she is giving up the youtubes. I haven't watched much that Kim has come out with lately (had to be more selective with what I watch, not enough time to watch the amount I used to ...) but I do remember some old series, like The Last Of Us, very fondly. Those old videos laid bare a wonderful, lovely soul who was sharing a certain degree of magic over the interwebs.

Kim asked on the Twitters today "Are there any particular videos we'd like to see on her channel before she pirouettes off in to the sunset next year". Youtube is becoming more and more hostile to content creators at the moment, to the point where people are abandoning it in favour of the Twitch streaming service. Good on 'em, I hope they succeed (see above comment about supporting good people making nice things !). People should be able to do what they enjoy doing.

That comment made me instantly think of her Xmas video from a few years ago "So This Is Yogscast", which I thought was absolutely magic. And it got me thinking ... what if she made another one ?

Here is ... American Pie, Kim edition. Try not to weep like I nearly did when writing certain bits !

A long, long time ago,
I can still remember how new videos
Used to make me smile
And I knew if I had my chance
That I could make those people like
And maybe they'd be happy for a while
But recently, it made me shiver
With every video I'd put up here
Bad words in the feedback
I couldn't take one more crack
I can't remember if I cried when I
Read about youtube gone bad
But something touched me deep inside
The day the videos
Died

So bye, bye this here Youtubing life
Did my doodles of the noodles but the noodles were gone
And them good old subs were asking to twitch you cry ?
Singing this'll be the day that I fly
This'll be the day that I fly

Did you trust the youtube line
That said create, upload and online
If the Google tells you so ?
Now do you believe in subs and likes?
Will new vid views see some upspikes?
And can you teach me how to smile, again?

Well, you know that I'm going to twitch
Cause youtube is being a bitch
A better platform for you
A place to truly be you

I was a pretty bouncin' youtube gal
With a flower in my hair and your fluxy pal
But I knew I was out of luck
The day the video died

So bye, bye this here Youtubing life
Did my doodles of the noodles but the noodles were gone
And them good old subs were asking to twitch you cry ?
Singing this'll be the day that I fly
This'll be the day that I fly

I saw a place where people play
And I asked chat happy things to say ?
Then chat said, we love you Kim,
I went back to that old youtube
Where I'd put the videos years before
But the stats said the videos wouldn't pay

And in the comments, the people cried
The watchers sighed and the likes all dried
But not a word was spoken
The view counts all are broken

But now this song, it must end
For Nano, Kim and the Fluxy Friend
They caught the last flight to new ground
The day I turned streamer

So bye, bye this here Youtubing life
Did my doodles of the noodles but the noodles were gone
And them good old subs were asking to twitch you cry ?
Singing this'll be the day that I fly
This'll be the day that I fly

Hope you like.

One last comment - songs should make you feel. Videos should make you feel ! I'm noticing this more and more. It feels like my emotions are opening up again after being somewhat closed down through my school years. I still suppress a fair bit but ... the feels definitely come out more.

Whether it's blubbing in the cinema to Interstellar, always having a tear at certain parts of Bolt and ... almost abandoning the American Pie rewrite due to it almost bringing out a tear or two again.

And I'm not afraid to admit it !!! Having feelings is good. It shows you're alive.

Even if they do lead to an imminent need for cuddles.

PS Addon message for Radderss - found you via the Yogs Jingle Jam, thought you were amazing on that. A great character in a lovely person. Looking forward to watching you more ! But am holding off until you're through the Mass Effect (too much stuff to see, watched ME1, 2, 3 last year again with Chrissa !). If you'd like a song rewrite, let me know, give me ideas, will see what I can do :-).
PPS For anyone else reading this, check out Radderss. Link on the right in the Lovely Gaming People list. I'm rather enjoying listening in to a stream at the moment.

PPPS Check out Jean Michel Jarre : Calibrations : (link to original video)
Calibration!

Human; Not Human
Turian; No Turian
Love; Not Love
Calibration!

Archangel; Not Archangel
Garrus; No Garrus
Normandy; No Normandy
Calibration!

Calibration!

Rave; No Cat Rave
Extranet; No Extranet
Future; No Future
Reaper Invasion!

EDI; No, No EDI
Probe; No, No, No Probe
Uranus; No, No, No Uranus
Calibration!

Choice; No Choice
Paragon; No, No Paragon
Renegade; No, No, No Renegade
Garrus; No, No Garrus

Calibration!

Simply The Best

Have you ever listened to a song and thought ... This is their best, it cannot be beaten.

I have ... and here are a few of them. They're some of my favourites from a multitude of artists but beware, most of the songs in here are in the list because they provoke an emotional response. Some may require hankys !

Oh and there are a few artists I listen to a lot who aren't here ... If you have some amazing music to suggest for me, please leave the track name and artist in the comments. I'm always on the look out for more to listen to. A lot of what I do listen to is due to suggestions from other people.

Bring 'em on ! Oh and this post was mostly inspired last night by me going "I'll just listen to Ting Tings The Wrong Club and go to bed." That track is possibly the best they'll come up with, it's got the words, the message, the music and an excellent video too. It's a track I'll keep going back to.

Labelling something as "the best and they will make nothing better" is a little sad though. It's better when the group constantly surprises you with more and more excellence. Bat For Lashes is a perfect example here. You hear songs like What's a Girl To Do ? (Dat video) and you think it's amazing. Then she beats it with the beauty of Moon and Moon from her second album. And beats it again with the powerful Laura.

But it's best when the groups constantly change their style. Madonna does this with every album, Goldfrapp do to a certain extent. I don't think Goldfrapp have beaten the Metropolis inspired Utopia. I'll keep going back to Alison Goldfrapp's incredible voice that's shown off in Utopia and the weird and wonderful Voicething. And then there's the chill out of Road To Somewhere.

It's a little sad when groups seem to burn out early or they do one song out of character that has total beauty. Here are a few :

T'Pau's - China In Your Hand
A-Ha - Take On Me (still more brilliance to come but nothing got close to this)
Cranberries with Linger, Shakespeares Sister with Stay
Stairway to Heaven ! (I hope they didn't copy)
Dirty Vegas - Days Gone By (perhaps it's the acoustic style)
Alisha's Attic - The Incidentals - I was hoping for much more from these ladies, 3 albums were not enough.
Massive Attack - Teardrop
Morcheeba - The Sea
Snow Patrol and the Martha Wainwright combination for Set The Fire To The Third Bar
U2 with Beautiful Day ? I don't listen to much U2. Too disconnected from reality.
Evanescence with My Immortal

And an advert just gave me a teaser of Kate Bush's forthcoming live album. I'll pick that up at some point but she's a good case of an artist who was incredible for a long time but then seemed to lose the touch. For me, her albums after The Sensual World just aren't nearly as good as what came before. The advert was for a track from Hounds Of Love but I present here, This Woman's Work.

Other groups who have gone away from an earlier style or perhaps ran out of inspiration are people like :

Pink Floyd's style changes with the decades but they were most inspired in the 70s with tracks like Wish You Were Here.
Arctic Monkeys had a brilliant first few albums but have gone off a bit. But then you listen to songs like A Certain Romance again and remember their magic.
Similar with Seal, the voice is still there though but has he ever bettered songs like Future Love Paradise ?
Dire Straits seemed to run out of ideas after Brothers In Arms. Indeed, they split after the following album. Mark Knopfler still makes amazing music and excellent soundtracks.
Air's magical All I Need.

I'd include Portishead here with songs like Roads. You see the intensity in live performances like that and you wonder how they can pull it off so well without collapsing into a mess afterwards.

There are also artists taken from us before we heard all they have to give. I still like Eleanor Rigby best from the Beatles but there was more to come after the Beatles with songs like John Lennon's Imagine and George Harrison's My Sweet Lord. And then there is Thriller by Michael Jackson, he definitely had more gifts to give.

You know. Songs that make you sit up and listen. The Veronicas did that to me with their song Untouched. Very powerful, very dramatic. And the ears always perk up with Little Boots comes on too. I don't think she's bettered Remedy. Paramore's wonderful The Only Exception is always a sit up and listen highlight.

That's a lot of music though. Lots for people to listen to ! (I have been pondering investigating Spotify playlists ... would it be worth it ?)

There have been a few bands who keep coming out with new and even better music than we've heard before. Nina Persson still has it, after starting in the Cardigans, moving through a very dark phase with the Cardigans, transitioning to A Camp with songs that speak to me like Song For The Leftovers and now going solo with tracks like Animal Heart.

I've always kept an eye on Tori Amos too, she just continues to give us new albums with more brilliant music. And there's usually a surprise in there too. Just when you think she couldn't beat Silent All These Years or Space Dog, out comes an I Can't See New York or a The Beekeeper.

All About Eve too, kicking off with tracks like Martha's Harbour, indeed all of their first album was amazing. Then there's Scarlet and Are You Lonely to finish off their third album. And then she comes back with the Mice album ! Love the Doctor Who inspired Blue Sonic Boy.

That's an awful lot to listen to though. (And I'll be catching up the links too !)

One last song. The way an album starts and finishes is very important. Arctic Monkeys did this with A Certain Romance but the one I'm really thinking of is Sleeper. They seemed to be interfered with somewhat by labels wanting to split the singer from the band and never really bettered their first album which finished with the song I'll close on : Click ... Off ... Gone.

Anyone got any more song ideas for me ?

Tired - send pizza

I feel like I've been hit by that truck again !

I am improving in general though. My outsides are gradually being reclaimed from the condition that's afflicted me these past years. There are still awkward bits and I have to manage the condition but ... it's getting there.

Hopefully when it finally fixes, I'll get some of the old energy back. It does help to have a good sleeping pattern with that though and I'm still losing the sleep. And I'll probably grab another week of leave from work at the end of October. That's not fixed yet and it depends on what's happening.

Picture for thumbnail ?

I actually kinda wanted to do another music post. Haven't done one for a while. What have I been acquiring and listening to lately ?

I pick up on music from various sources. I'm always on the lookout for new stuff to listen to, whether it be from tips from friends or what I hear around me. The HeyChrissa streams have been pointing me towards some great songs too lately.

Candyland by Tobu is one of those ... It's a wonderfully tappy, bouncy, happy tune, as catchy as it is likely to send you into wiggly chair dance boppiness. HeyChrissa uses it or other tracks on the NCS Infinity non-copyright music collection as startup songs for her streams. It's a little bit of awesome.

The album I have on currently is Moon Safari by Air and I've linked songs from it before but 2 are so good they always bear relinking. Here is All I Need. A wonderful song, chilled out with lyrics and a tune that you melt into.

The latest album I bought was Every Open Eye by Chvrches. I haven't listened to all of it yet but my favourite so far is Down Side of Me. This group is promising. I can see me collecting all their albums ...

There are 3 albums that I have my eye on for getting soon ... Norah Jones has a new one coming, KT Tunstall has one out today. And then there's Lisa Hannigan with that fragile but oh so sweet voice. I haven't picked them up ... just yet.

I just remembered back to a song that gripped me by the throat and didn't let go until I looked firmly lipsmacked. It's The Veronicas with Untouched.

And yes. I am singing along to Untouched at the moment. Or rather I am singing along to Song For The Leftovers which is a classic from A Camp, the project Nina Persson started up after The Cardigans. Another excellent live song was Laura by Bat For Lashes.

What else have I acquired lately ?

Angus and Julia Stone provided music for the Life is Strange game ? This album got played as warm up music too and I kinda liked the jinglyjangly soft guitar music. Especially liked Hold On.

I got a soundtrack sampler with the new Deus Ex game too ... must play that soon when I have the mental energy to give it a good crack.

A fairly old soundtrack I picked up is Ghostbusters. Yep, the original. It's still a classic but I haven't wanted to pay much for it. £3 was a bargain. I have a synthesizer version of the theme tune somewhere from When Computers Were Old and it was actually pretty good.

Reaching back a little :

Sia - 1000 Forms Of Fear - great voice, so so songs.
Bat For Lashes - The Bride - incredible voice, inspired songs.
Garbage are still kicking it with Strange Little Birds. Here's Magnetized.
Massive Attack are capable of extreme beauty in their songs. Here's Teardrop (I actually bought Blue Lines but ... Teardrop !)
Passenger - All The Little Lights. Not my usual music but you need variation to keep things interesting.
Sia again with This Is Acting - same comment, great voice, so so songs.

One last one and then I'm done for tonight. After all this illness and bad outsides, I want to kick start my life again. And what better song to represent that than ... Goldfrapp I Wanna Life from the Head First album.

Cya ! And be healthy, be happy.

Are your ears ready ? Eurovision

It's here again !

Yep. My twitter feed is going nuts at the moment. Oh - I've that picture before but it sums it up so well. I've used this one before too :

That sums up some of the entries pretty well too.

Eurovision is a curious thing ... and that's before you get to the nationalistic judging. It's a cultural thing we indulge in every year, a song contest where you have the occasional cracker mixed in with so-so songs, wannabe popstar songs who are just missing something, the toneless hacks, the weird, the attention seekers and the just plain bad.

But we still watch it (or I'll have it on for the songs and then put my own music on while the judging is happening).

If I remember right, Sweden's song won last year on the back of a very gimmicky stage show and a highly repetitive song. That's one of the themes, a mediocre song is buried underneath a boppy dance track or the gimmicky stage show.

You also have the curiosity of performances so bad they must be planned that way. (I don't think Sweden wanted to win it again this year).

Who do I like so far ? It's on song 12 by Poland so far and from what I've seen, Belgium and Bulgaria are fairly ok. (I'm not going nuts over them by any means).

Apart from Eurovision - I'm having a chilled out weekend after burning myself out somewhat in the week. I really need to curfew myself from the games because the Pixel People Planetbase game has a combination of Just One More Day ridiculous addictiveness combined with being supremely easy to play. You just tell your Pixel People what buildings to build and what to put in them and that's pretty much it. There's a little more interaction and the orders take some planning but ... that's it.

Actually makes for compelling gameplay as you see if your Pixel People can get through the latest disaster. So far on this planet, the Ice planet where you are dependent on wind power only, they've escaped* death from running out of air due to lack of power and they nearly ran into a food crisis ...

*(escaped - translation : after half the colony died at once due to running out of air, I reloaded an earlier save and then learned how to manage the power better).

Yeah - I'm putting the time in on this one and really enjoying building up the bases. On the Warm Out There Base :

I'm in that Job Done phase where the colony needs to grow to 300 people and I need one more technology. Job Done being where you have all 10 milestones for having the colony a certain size, for surviving, for having robots, all the techs, building daft monoliths, things like that.

But I have been playing it at daft times like 2am, 3am, even 4am. That's when you have to look in the mirror and ask "Am I addicted ?" and answer in the affirmative. And addictions are really bad things to have.

(We have a definite Boy Band wannabe on Eurovision at the moment - definitely not my type).

I've also been playing the Elites, as I tour around the galaxy trading in all sorts of rare goods. If you don't have much capital (and I started this run on 800k credits), then rares trading is really effective. Normal trading tends to net you around 500 to 1500 credits per tonne. In the Cutter, that will be far more effective with its 700t cargo hold. Rares trading gets you 16000 credits per tonne. It can get the balance built back up again fairly quick.

Oh - Croatian tailoring and dressmaking - there are ... no words suitable.

Elite ? I'm about 6 million up so far and just started the next run around the rares circuit. When I finish that run, I'm going to try out the Long Range Smuggling which supposedly gets you up to 20m-30m credits per hour. Not a bad boost !

But I may be having a break from the Elites because the rozzers caught me smuggling stuff and I didn't realise until a few systems away. They first give you a fine and if you don't pay the fine within a week, you get a galaxy wide bounty on your head. And then the cops and stations shoot you. That doesn't end well. So I'll keep my pilot in the station while the bounty is active.

Eurovision - I think Spain forgot to fill in the gaps in the lyrics in their song. Pretty lady, has a bit of a voice but needs to stop with the heavy breathing.

Where was I ?

Possibly enjoying the gaming a little too much. I was pretty wrecked yesterday after finishing work. I'll reserve my strength for when I need it but then go zonk when I don't need the strength. So I started switching off after walking out the door from work.

So nearly bought the Lego Le Mans car though. It's on offer for 20% off.

Oh - another Boy Band wannabe ! Seen an Ed Sheeran wannabe tonight too. Haven't seen anyone that I'd be interested in following up on though. There are usually one or two.

On another note though - telly cricket season starts very soon ! Awesome !

Yep. I heard that groan. It's just like the one from the last entry (didn't catch who ! Malta up next). (oh - it was Ukraine, terrible song, not the way to put a poolitical message across)

Time to disappear now into maybe more buzzing around the galaxy.

Oh scary ! Big Disembodied Head ! Phew. She got her body back. Not many more left now.

(picture is from story at the link)

Again with the flashing light show ! Georgia have actually gone for a song that you might hear on the radio. Shoulda finished it off though.

If you don't hear from me again, I'll have been reduced to a dribbling photosensitive puddle courtesy of the various light shows.

Missing The Greats

We've lost a lot of amazing people this year haven't we ?

Especially tonight with Prince. I didn't listen to that much that Prince released with his own voice but he was a musical genius who influenced so many artists with his style and music he wrote for them.

I haven't been doing too many open tributes for the people that we've lost this year but I have turned the avatar back to this one for a bit :

Little Red ... not quite a Corvette.

I haven't done a music post for a while but with the stories today and after listening to a Michael Jackson track come up ... yep. Here goes. Here's one for those where we very definitely miss their voices, their songs, their inspiration.

Victoria Wood too ! Here she is being unrepentantly Politically Incorrect.

What was the Michael Jackson song ? One of his better, Billie Jean. He always managed to match so much power and passion in with those dance beats.

Bringing them all together on a Sunday morning was Terry Wogan. He had the odd song or two as well. Definitely odd in the case of the Floral Dance. He was unforgettable as the UK commentator in Eurovision. We would tune in annually just for his acidic sarcasm. Magic stuff and like the rest of his work, totally charming.

It goes back a few years too but I miss some of those golden oldies too.

Bob Marley with Could You Be Loved ? I think so.
The legend that is Jimi Hendrix and his unmistakable guitar riffs in the Purple Haze.
George Harrison and John Lennon with classics like Imagine and While My Guitar Gently Weeps.
Everybody pays attention when Nina Simone sings. I hope you are Feeling Good.
That's Life though - we lost another Sinatra too sadly.
And then there's Johnny Cash, his turn came round again on the iTunes. I'll always enjoy songs like Ring Of Fire.

David Bowie too ! And another missed actor too. David Bowie provided much of the soundtrack to A Knight's Tale which I need to watch again because it was one the better movies that I've seen for a while. Heath Ledger made that movie come to life. His Golden Years ?

Artists like this make you want to Sing along. The Carpenters definitely do.

And then they charm you with songs like Son Of A Preacher Man. Little bit of Dusty.

Glenn Frey was one of the main members of the Eagles with songs like Take It Easy. I like to take it easy, don't stress what's outside of your control.

Pink Floyd's music was ever present as I grew up. I enjoyed their 70s stuff where Richard Wright was a major contributor for songs like The Great Gig In The Sky.

The thing to remember though. However bad it seems, keep on going. Remember those who have left us. Treasure their memories and their legacy. And ... The Show Must Go On. That's one of Freddie Mercury's last songs with Queen. Very poignant.

I hope we don't lose many more loved artists this year ! Too many already.