After the initial flurry of new year’s music poll/preview posts, it’s now time to get back to the varied remit I set myself for this at the beginning.
So here are a few bits and bobs that I have found stimulating over the past few days:
Easily the most exciting news I’ve heard this year, is that Leftfield are to reform to play Rockness. The duo are yet to make an official announcement regarding whether they’re playing any other gigs or recording new material, but seeing as I genuinely never thought I’d get to see them live, this is more than enough to be getting along with.
Sticking with music, I finally got to see Gui Boratto this weekend, the Brazilian family man and super-producer doesn’t play over here very often, so when I saw he was opening Renaissance’s new residency at Cable (and promoting his new CD for them) I jumped at the chance.
I’m glad to say, after some rather disappointing nights out in recent memory, that he more than lived up to expectations, playing a lot of his own stuff mixed with that wonderful bassy, melodic, tech-house he’s made his own.
The morning after I woke up just in time to see Andy Murray lose the Australian Open, meaning he’s back to being a Scottish cry-baby for the next few months until he gets close to winning something and becomes British again.
In less cynical sporting news, the Winter X Games continued the incredible progression of freestyle skiing, with Bobby Brown (no, not that one) stomping some incredible new tricks to win both big air and slopestyle, while TJ Schiller landed a record-breaking 1620 degree spin!
And whilst I wait patiently for my chance to hit the slopes, I have been watching some new year’s telly; the third series of Mad Men continues at its slow and sexy pace, while Charlie Brooker’s second series of Newswipe (see below for his cynically accurate news piece demonstration) is still full of acerbic/amusing/annoying observations, and finally Family Guy spin-off, The Cleveland Show, which continues Seth MacFarlane’s downward trajectory into comedy mediocrity.
That is all.