Review: Mercury Rev play Deserter’s Songs
On Friday night I was fortunate enough to see Mercury Rev performing their 1998 magnum opus Deserter’s Songs at Manchester’s spectacular Bridgewater Hall. The Bridgewater Hall, for the unfamiliar, is a purpose-built concert venue designed for the amazing sound of Manchester’s Hallé orchestra. The building’s attention to acoustic detail is extraordinary; so much so that the whole building floats on a foundation of 300 giant springs in order to separate its acoustics from those of the street outside. You can hear the difference: this is the first time I have seen a pop music act play at the venue, and it is possible to discern every note of every instrument as though you are sitting right next to it! The building only has trouble with...
Fascism, immigration and the English language
The BNP and other right-wing groups I loosely term fascist (although some may, legitimately, disagree with my use of the term) are always talking about making sure Britain stays “British”, and keeping its population “indigenous” so that our culture is not polluted by those of the immigrant nations. Here’s a representative quote from the BNP web site1: Immigration is out of control. Britain’s population is now over 60 million and rising, solely due to immigration. Not only is Britain increasingly overcrowded, but the fact is that a country is the product of its people and if you change the people you inevitably change the nature of the country. We want Britain to remain – or return to – the way it has traditionally been. We accept...
I’m not stupid, but: what is https about?
Any tech-geek followers of my blog will probably know this inside out, so this one is for the rest of you. My next entry in the I’m not stupid, but… series is about the difference between http and https in web URLs. We’re all told https is more secure, but there’s a shroud of mystery about what this actually means. In a nutshell: https prevents anyone but you and the owner of the web site reading your communications. At a public internet connection, not using https means anyone in that same location can steal your login sessions at any sites you visit while there. The certificate proves the owner of the site you are visiting is who they say they are. When you visit a web site, you are communicating with a computer somewhere else in the...
Reviews: Guillemots and Fleet Foxes
Guillemots – Walk the River The multi-national, multi-instrumentalist, multi-talented Guillemots have a lot to live up to. Their 2006 debut Through the Windowpane was a seminal masterpiece that proudly boasts my favourite song ever (São Paulo). The followup EP Of the Night and subsequent album Red showcased the whole band’s songwriting and experimentation with every popular music style under the sun, alienating most of their fanbase in the process but creating a smorgasbord record with great repeat-listen value for those of us who chose to stick with it. Lead singer Fyfe’s solo album made him a brief bigtime personality when his Billy Joel cover was used on a John Lewis advert that made the nation cry. The new offering, Walk the River, takes the...
I’m not stupid, but: what’s the difference between envy and jealousy?
I thought since I’m known the world over as a pedantic git and someone who has an unrelenting desire to share crateloads of useless knowledge with everyone he meets, I’d start this series on my blog that I call I’m not stupid, but… In this series I try to explain those things that I’ve encountered that are very simple to understand but for some reason it took me some years to grasp, perhaps because no one bothered to teach me about them, in school or otherwise. I’ll start with one of my favourites, because once you know this, you’ll see the mistake everywhere and (if you’re like me) constantly have to fight the urge to correct people. I’ve noticed, also, that many novels contain passages that highlight this...
NHS dentists; or, how I learned to start worrying and hate my teeth
I’ve just come back from having the second of two fillings put in at my new dentist. Why did I need two fillings, you ask? Well, this dentist is the first dentist I’d visited in over ten years. Why did I stay away for so long? I’m not really the squeamish type: I don’t have a problem with jabs, blood tests and so forth… I went ahead with a circumcision given an on-the-spot choice about having it that day, for heaven’s sake. No, I stayed away because the NHS dental system itself set the ball rolling on the cumulative fear process. The cumulative fear process, as I call it, is that process that occurs when you put something off because you’re scared of it, but the longer you put it off, the scarier it becomes, which of...
New York photos
I know it’s been over two months since I got back from New York, but I’ve just got round to post-processing my favourite 32 out of 2000+ photos I took when I was there. Hope you enjoy them! New York photo...
Leeds-based non-binary nerd and sewist. I won't break my streak on Duolingo for anyone. 
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