Bands you don't remember and that I thought were dead.

I'm having to write this on an exceedingly slow computer so if the article suddenly ends without any conclusion it's because I got fed up with the slowness of this machine and I published the article as it was when I had enough with it.

So, bands.
The other day last month a conversation in my house led to us dredging up the past. Basically we were discusing bands we remember from back in the day and wondering where the hell they are now.

The bands in question were:

Kinesis
Serafin
Hepburn
Thunderbugs

So without further ado I'm going to go over who these bands were and what happened to them.

Kinesis
Who on Earth were they: From what I recall a bunch of 6th formers who supported Hundred Reasons and The Lostprophets on tour. Lots of people who I knew thought they were great, I on the other hand was less bothered about them. For a while it looked like they could be the next "Big Thing".
Where are they now: Following the split, three of the members returned to education. Tom Marshall is studying International Relations at Toronto University, Canada. Neil Chow is studying Graphic Design at the University of Plymouth, based at the Exeter campus. Conor McGloin is due to begin a degree in PPE at Oxford University in Autumn 2006, whilst Michael Bromley is currently working as a website designer and is a member of the Church of Scientology. (Yes I stole that paragraph word for word from Wikipedia).


Oh and you might want to know Captain's of industry have made their 2nd album available for download for free from their website.

Serafin
Who were they: Some band around the same time as Kinesis they had this one song that was pretty popular and quite good, although I can't remember what it was called.
Where are they now: Members have come and gone but they are technically still together touring and playing around the London area. They have only released one album (No Push Collide (2003)) but another one exists it just hasn't been released.



Hepburn
Who were they: Before Girls Aloud made all girl groups cool again the music industry in all its wisdom believed the way forward for (in the year 2000 at least) pop music was for all girl bands to play their own instruments, so that it what Hepburn did. The most famous single was called "I quit" and was on the Buffy season 1 soundtrack. Also once they played at my secondary school.
Where are they now: I don't know. Although I'd guess somewhere very far away from pop music.


Thunderbugs
Who were they: A year before Hepburn exisited Thunderbugs tried the same trick. Eg. A girl band who played their own instruments. Their 1st single Friends Forever reached #3 their second single It's About Time You Were Mine reached #43. So they got dropped by their record label.
Where are they now: Again with the I don't know. They fell into obscurity even quicker than Hepburn.

Post No.75

I just thought I'd apologise for the lack of updates. (These last couple of weeks have been exceedingly busy). So apologies.

I don't have time to write anything substantial at this moment in time but I'll try to write an "article" in the next couple of days.

Anyway I'll leave you with a message of Merry Christmas and try to be kind to your fellow man. (If you don't celebrate Christmas then happy generic inoffensive religious festival A and that be kind to your fellow man thing still applies).

3 albums and 13 top ten singles and a knowledge of how to get kids to vote? It can only be Girls aloud.

Things just seem to get weirder these days with Girls Aloud voicing their opinions on politics and actually making some sick kind of sense.

I mean sure I don't agree with everything they say:
"They need people like us to go into the schools and help spread the word," says Cole. "Our fans would definitely listen to us. They'd think, well, if Kimberley and Cheryl and Nicola are interested in it, then I want to know about it".

I'm not so sure that'd work for 6th formers or Year 11 but generally they're talking some sense.
The full article is here and I suggest you read it as it's mildly interesting.

So my main point is maybe I'm wrong perhaps Girls Aloud could provide me with the female dinner conversation I've been looking for.

Oh and of course the obligatory picture of them -




And to think that mate of mine Dave was trying to convince me certain sectors of society shouldn't be aloud(pun) to vote - the elitist git.

Social Issue #4,355,988C

How to solve the Iraq situation:



Sorted!

See it's not difficult to write a political blog Rob Cheesewright: http://www.robcheesewright.blogspot.com/

Sound of the Underground

OK everyone I'm afraid this post is going to be a bit of an advert for a band that I like. I'll do a "real" update in a few days - I promise.

So this evening I was taken to a gig by one of my housemates. The headliners of the gig were called The Ghost of a Thousand and he knows them because he went to secondary school with one of the guitarists and is good mates with them. (That's just a bit of irrelevant information for you).

The point is T-GOAT (as they're known or something) played an absolutely amazing live set and were freakin awesome. They jumped about a lot and made a bit of a scene which is what live rock music is all about. In the next few months they have an album out and they'll be touring or about near you. Go see them if you get the chance as they are superb. Also they are in this month's RockSound magazine.

Information you need if you want to find out more.
Myspace: www.myspace.com/theghostofathousand
Website: Doesn't seem to be working
Album title: This is Where the Fight Begins
Album release date: 19/02/2007

Oh and they were with a support band called The Mirimar Disaster they were good too.

Tune in next time for an "article" that hopefully won't be a glorified advert.

Take That an institution for 30 something women

In these last two days I have been genuinely amazed by Take That.
Yes, that's right, you have read that previous sentence correctly - Take That have genuinely amazed me - and not in some kind of teenager post ironic way.

Anyway the start of this realisation took place yesterday when I ended up watching a documentary about Take That from their conception to their eventual splitting up. What was so brilliant about said documentary was that every member told the truth about the situation within the band and this "truth" was infact the same as the stereotypes that exist about them.
I've just realised I've written a horrible sentence there, so to put it more clearly: Take That were living up to their own stereotype.

(Just to point out this isn't my own 15 minute internet psycho-analysis they pretty much said this themselves)

Robbie Williams: He drank a lot and got a bit messed up. He has the strongest individual career of all of them but he would trade it all for the family stability Gary has. Robbie still has beef with "The Barlow".

Gary Barlow: Writes and produces successfully for other people and has a loving family and lives in a big expensive house. But he still desires the career Robbie has.

Howard Donald: Howard doesn't even get to release his album. But he does work as a house DJ - maybe he mixes his unreleased album as part of his set. His daughter is the reason he goes on.

Jason Orange: He didn't know what to with himself after the breaking up of the band so he goes travelling and then back to college. He also acts in the play "Gob".

Mark Owen: Releases a few albums of varying success over the years. The singles that come from these albums have varying successes too. Oh and he wins celebrity big brother in 2002.

So like I said I found that documentary pretty awesome.
Then today they performed on an audience with Take That Live.
Not only did they do some mildly amusing banter with the crowd, and have enough attractive background dancers to make it interesting.

But they also performed proper old school boyband style. None of this standing around a piano new school Backstreet boys style or sitting on chairs Westlife style. They got up and had proper ridiculous dance routines, and they did it well.
(Also just to point out most of the talking was done by Howard or Jason who must've been trying to prove they weren't just the other 2 in Take That - there's some good advice for everyone - speak up today otherwise you'll be regretting not saying anything for the next 10 years).

So I salute you sirs may you carry on doing what you do best - living up to your stereotypes and dancing like maniacs.

Whatever happened to the Power Rangers?

Was in trouble with the law last thing I heard. Came back to Power Rangers as the Gold Ranger.


Died on September3rd 2001



Sells crack to children - Actually he salsa dances and was 1st in 2004 Mayan International Salsa Championship.



A "serious actress" and released a couple of albums the debut of which was titled "The Trans-American Treatment".



Missing Presumed Dead... or more accurately TV producing. He was in all 4 seasons of the Mighty Morphin Power Rangers and the 1st season of Power Rangers:Zeo and for that he should be commended.



Worked on Mighty Morphin Power Rangers/Zeo/Turbo/Wild Force and Dino Thunder. He was also inducted into the World Karate Union Hall of Fame as Master of the Year "American Karate". He has his own karate style "Toso Kune Do" and it's between him and Jason Statham to win my award "the new Steven Segal".

Guildford's top attraction

Let's start at the beginning.
Beards...
I have a beard, you have a beard all women have honourary beards (you can read that how you will).
The point is I like a good beard. And there is no better beard than that owned by the bearded woman of Guildford.
I had actually completely forgotten "it" existed but thanks to facebook.com and myspace.com I've been reminded about of "its" existence.

Anyway the myspace address is this, should you want it:
http://www.myspace.com/guildfordbeardedlady

But for all those of you who can't be bothered to frequent it here are the key photographs:

I don't know that man but she is going to kill him. I've seen that look before.

The caption below this photograph on Facebook.com "Bearded lady at one of her favourite habitats, outside burger king, no problem if she's hungry, plenty of children about. As you can see from the photograph bearded lady carries the standard issue bearded lady shopping bags and leopard skin jacket. In this particular scene bearded lady can be seen scouting out potential babies or young children approaching White Lion Walk or 'The Killing Grounds' as we newspapers have begun to call it."

Oh how I laughed.

The media have done a lot of these - so it's my turn.

The new Bond movie is just around the corner and no one will shut up about it.
So here is my contribution:

Best Bond: Sean Connery (he slaps women about just like Bond does in the books).
(I'm joking)
Best Bond Girl: Sophie Marceau (From the World is not Enough) - All you Denise Richard's fans are fools, she is but a girl. Sophie Marceau is a "real woman" (the kind who steals all your personal possesions when you are asleep) - now that's when you know you've had an experience.
Best Bond movie: Not Moonraker
Worst Bond Movie: All the Roger Moore ones.
Best Bond bad guy: the studio head who had Pierce Brosnan "removed" (from the franchise not murdered).
Best Bond gadget: The Goldeneye N64 game engine.
Most underrated Bond: Timothy Dalton
Best Bond action scene: The entirety of Goldeneye on the N64.
Best Bond song: View to kill by Duran Duran
A Bond film that needs mentioning just because I don't like it: Tomorrow Never Dies.

Oh and here is the video for a View to Kill because it funnied me up:

I'm about to write about my own blog - Does that make me self involved?

I think advertising has gone too far.
Guess what pushed me over the edge -

Well it wasn't a McDonalds advert

or a Cilit bang advert

or that annoying Frosties advert with the kid who sings the song and is now involved in a shit load of internet urban legends.

Nope it was this - posted as a comment on my blog:
"Hi, i was looking over your blog and didn't
quite find what I was looking for. I'm looking for
different ways to earn money... I did find this though...
a place where you can make some nice extra cash secret shopping.
I made over $900 last month having fun!"

Then there was a link to some kind of "scam" website. (Or at least what I interpreted as a scam).
So be warned even "innocent" internet blogs have become a hot bed for weird advertising. It's a disgrace I say.

Quick note to whoever wrote that comment -
A)Thanks for reading my blog
B)Thanks for leaving a comment
C)I apologise if that was some sort of crazy joke I was too stupid to get. Please be clearer next time.

If selection C does not apply please see selection D.


D)I don't apologise you're a twat and no I don't want to give money to any Nigerian Princes.

Facts of the week: Cocaine and Fish

This post may seem a bit random but -

According to the vice President of Columbia Kate Moss is responsible for the countries civil war.
Well kind of...

He actually said that the cocaine industry is funding the countries civil war. He singled out Kate Moss and said;
"When she appeared to snort a line of cocaine, she put land mines in Colombia, she killed people in Colombia, she displaced people in Colombia, she helped finance kidnapping."

Sounds to me like she is almost some kind of super villian.

Well if the World survives the tyranny of a model/super villian from Croydon we have bigger problems as by the year 2050 we'll have run out of resources and will need to colonise another planet.

Or so I read...

This, however pales in comparison to the fact:

"By the year 2050 we'll have over fished the seas so much we'll have no fish to eat."

To break it down for you I have read two completely separate articles one telling me we'll have no "resources" (which I took to mean fossil fuels) and another telling me we'll have no fish.

Sounds to me like something weird is going on. The same year we run out of fossil fuels is the same year we run out of fish. What is the link? Is it that fish are employed to mine for oil? Or something more sinister.
I theorise that the fish swimming causes the planet to rotate on its axis, so that when all the fish die out the Earth will stop turning causing the temperature to rise (it was the turning keeping it cool - making a small breeze (like a windmill)).

So the lack of fish will finally finish this planet off. An increased temperature will melt the ice caps and raise the sea levels. This seems somewhat ironic as the only animals to truly gain from this are the fish, which are now dead.

So it would seem (assuming my theory is correct) that over fishing destroys the planet, don't think Al Gore saw that coming.

Frances Amey keeping it real since 1996

I was eating dinner the other night (the other night about 3 weeks ago) when one of my chums asked me who played Dinah Glass in the BBC adaptation of the Demon Headmaster.
This seemed odd as no one was talking about anything to do with the Demon Headmaster, infact I don't think I've thought of the Demon headmaster in about 10 years.
Anyway my reply was "I don't know". And left it at that.

Time passed.... (several hours)

And suddenly I realised I desperatley needed to know who played Dinah Glass in the Demon Headmaster.
I'm not going to go into how I found out who she was (paid a private detective, who found a computer hacker, who hacked into the government files, which gave me blackmail information on the Triads who were harrassing a chinese laundry, which I then saved whoose customers happened to be the mother and father of the work experience tea boy, who worked on the set of the Demon Headmaster and was a pen friend of the girl who played Dinah Glass).

Actually none of that I just used Tv.com.

The girl's name is Frances Amey and I was exceedingly intrigued as to what she does these days. So I did another search (this time cutting out the middle men and going straight for Google).
It turns out she does a dental degree at Newcastle University and is part of the drama society. This is their latest play:

"'Out of the Corset' is a seductive lesbian romance set amidst the sordid underworld of Victorian London. Follow the journey of Nan Astley as she begins her life as an innocent oyster girl who is slowly led astray by a series of intense and passionate relationships with some very colourful women. Will Nan's tour of debauchery through the tantalizing realms of theatre, prostitution and sex slavery make or destroy her?".

I think it sounds like good stuff.

The theatre group were at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival so I could've seen them, but I didn't.

Cheap Update 2

I was always going to do another one of these I just had to wait for the resources to become available.
Anyway here is some more footage of the subtley sublime Mitchell and Webb. Basically I just really like these sketches.
Enjoy:

As far as I know this could be common knowledge

Yesterday on Teletext I read that a Pelican ate a pigeon.
Then later on the news I saw the footage of the Pelican eating the pigeon (this supposedly freak occurence happened in St James' Park in London).
Anyway now I present to you some footage of the pelican swallowing the pigeon.



I don't mean to be a "negative nancy" but I think this might be the start of the end of days - having watched Ghostbusters recently I can safely say this would be the type of thing that could be a sign of the Apocalypse.

5 Disney movies that make me cry

God damn it has taken me an absolute age (11 days ish) to formulate my answer to the question I set myself (What are the 5 worst Disney films?).
Basically it was a stupid question to ask and thus I'm never asking myself anything again (excluding What would I like to eat? Or what's zero/zero).

Well as stupid as the question is I will attempt to answer it and explain why it took me ages to find the answer.

So without further ado - Worst 5 Disney Films.

Actually no, I'll announce them in a bit. I'll explain myself first, the reason it took me so long to decide on the worst 5 Disney movies is due to the scientific terms of "Disney's shit period(s)" or "The Madness of Disney".
Disney started off by making some excellent movies (Snow white not so much - but it was only the first one so doesn't count) then seemingly went mad between the 60s and 80s making appalling films concentrating and obsessing on anthropomorphism. Then they produced superb films in the 90s (this period ended with Mulan) then caught the madness again and this period has seemingly not ended.

I'll point out now this is a bit of a generalisation there are exceptions - (The Black Cauldron in the 80s was good and Pocahontas in the 90s was really poor).
So in conclusion it took me a while to get 5 truly bad Disney films because a lot of their movies are either bad or indifferent.

Anyway now without further, further ado - Worst 5 Disney films

5. The Aristocats

Set in France a mad old woman plans to leave all her family money to her cats instead of the butler who has lovingly cared for her all these years. The butler is understandably pissed off and tries to abandon the cats on a farm. They come back, and end up posting the butler in a box to Africa. What's so bad about this film? I'll tell you - Human cruelty (butler posted), anthropomorphism, a weird party with animals and swing music at the end and a moral that says "no matter how hard you work, the aristocracy (in any form) will steal your hard earned money". Also the animation is rubbish.

4. Basil the Great Mouse Detective

"I know let's make a film about Sherlock Holmes but instead, right, get this, instead of a man he's a mouse and he has to fight Ratigan the World's biggest rat." Wrong, wrong, wrong no more anthropomorphism and no shitty detective stories with mice. Have you learned nothing from the Rescuers? (1977) (The Rescuers isn't in here based entirely on the fact the "bad guy" Madame Medusa says "Bottles" in a really funny voice). In defense to Disney it's based on a book (not Sherlock Holmes - idiot) so it's not entirely their fault. And apparently it has a large fanbase so I'm in the minority but I still preach to you that the Black Cauldron (year before this) is the better movie. So as far as I'm concerned this is almost the pinnacle of the Disney decline in the 80s but it's not because of:

3. Oliver and Company

This is the Everest of Disney being terrible in the 80s. It's Oliver Twist with Oliver as a Cat and Fagin as a hobo and his gang as dogs. It's absolute crap (dreadful characters, more awful anthropomorphism and it bad mouths 80s business men - yuppies were funny). It's made worse by the fact that when I was a kid we had a video with the trailer for the cinema release on it. I waited years to see it then we finally got it on video and it was so awful. Oliver and Company was a bitter pill from Disney that stole my youth and started me on this dark path of writing blogs.

2. Bambi

I don't feel I need to really go into detail of why this film is so bad. Disney sanitised a perfectly fine dark story and made it all cutesy with more damn anthropomorphism (you are allowed to animate animals in silence - look at Fantasia no words just the orchestra). If you're going to change your source material so much don't use the name of the book call it "Tragic the deer and the forest of forever."

1. The Fox and The Hound

"Two friends who didn't know they were supposed to be enemies" is how the tagline read. "A studio that didn't know it used to make excellent family films" would probably be a more accurate description. This film is so by the numbers the plot was probably knocked up on a post it note. Now I'm not saying that Disney films have the most developed plots of all but they usually contain something that makes them special, that's why they are loved so much. But his doesn't contain anything of the sort, it's an inferior production that's just so pff. Nothing really happens that's worth mentioning but there is an evil bear in it (you can tell he's evil he has red eyes).

Disney the man and machine

Hello there, gosh you're looking swell! I haven't seen you look that well in ages. So what's going on with you? Nothing? Do you want to know what I've been up to? You don't? And you think the only reason I'm being this nice to you is because I want to boast about something? Well that's bloody typical! I haven't seen you in time and you start acting like a complete prick on the first chance meeting we have in this season of Autumn. No don't apologise the damage is done. I'm seriously hurt.... ah I'm only joking don't worry about it, I have tougher skin than that you know. But could you please listen to what I was going to say I was hoping you would find it interesting....

The other day (on a complete whim) I looked up Walt Disney on wikipedia. There were two reasons for this, 1st I heard that when he died his head was frozen in cryostasis. 2nd I heard he was a big rascist. Well basically I was intrigued to see if this was true. Well what I found out was that nope neither of those things are true - he was cremated (yes even his head) and there was no mention of rascism so I assume that's just an urban legend.

There were a couple of other things in the article I found interesting (namely Snow white was known as Disney's folly because it was so expensive everyone thought it would bankrupt the Disney studio and Disney pumped out a load of propaganda films for WWII because they were conscripted to do so by the American army. ( Well I found that interesting even if you don't)). The point is I've realised that I've seen a lot of Disney movies in my lifetime and I've decided to give my list of the 5 best Disney movies and the 5 worst. The difference here is that instead of the obvious ones (ie Aladdin, Little Mermaid) I'm going for the slightly weird ones.

5 Best Disney Movies

5.Tron

The plot is a little complex but basically this dude gets sucked into a computer where programs are real life people and computer users (outside the computer) are given a role of God. It was the 1st ever film with computer generated graphics and it served to be my revision for an Electronics exam. Sure it's cheesy and dated but the plot is actually really neat when you work your way through the "tricky" metaphor. Either that or I like the idea of tiny people worshiping me inside of my computer.

4.The Black Cauldron

Made during Disney's shit period (more on that in the worst film section). It's a Disney cartoon based on a book and aimed at the Teenage fantasy market. There were no songs and the whole film has a darker overtone than usual. Also the bad guy (the Horned king) looked like the physical representation of death. Story wise this kid Taran ends up leaving his life as an assistant pig keeper to help a princess, a bard and some really annoying creature rescue an oracular pig captured by the Horned king. Taran goes on a quest to get a magic sword and sort out this black cauldron business (the Oracular pig was needed to find said cauldron).

3.Muppet Treasure Island

This film was technically made by Jim Henson's company but nevermind I still count it as a Disney film. It's a simple formula really Muppet's + songs + pirates = absurd edutainment. Also in it's favour it had Tim Curry as Long John Silver and Jim Hawkins was the comedian who played George Michael the other day in star stories (I'll write something about that soon). I'm not going to go over the plot of this as it's Treasure Island with Muppets. (If you really want a plot descrition go read the blurb of Treasure island off the back of the book in a Waterstone's then imagine it with Muppets).

2.The Reluctant Dragon

The actual cartoon's alright but the real reasons this is up here is because at home I had this version where this guy takes the book of the Reluctant Dragon to be made into a film. He then spends the next hour wandering round the Disney studio seeing how the animation is done and watching people record voices and also watching other animated shorts. It's like a making of within the film and it's great (well it was great, my youngest sister broke the tape and I remind her of it everytime I see her).

1.Return to Oz

I always felt the Wizard of Oz film sucked it had lost the darker overtones of the book and Over the rainbow is a painfully dated song that just reminds me the general public are idiots. This film was a Disney sequel (from the 80s) that was a lot darker then the original and to be honest it was a little bit mad (talking chicken and a woman who takes her head off anyone?). Dorothy Gale is depressed and keeps talking about Oz, so naturally her Aunt thinks she is a bit mental. She takes her to a local crazy doctor who plans to do tests involving hi- tech (it's the end of the 19th century) machines on Dorothy to find what's wrong with her. Dorothy stays in the hospital overnight - there's a storm and she ends up back in Oz. The Scarecrow isn't king, infact he's frozen as a statue and so are the Tinman and Lion. Basically Oz is a mess. So Dorothy has to find out what's gone on and put it right... trust me it's awesome. Also the film doesn't end with a shitty line like "and Scarecrow I'll miss you most of all." I always thought that was really harsh on the Lion and Tinman they must have really hated that Scarecrow for getting all the attention and he was made king of Oz - the git.

So that's my top 5, I'll do the bottom 5 later when I'm ready. I'm sure it'll be worth the wait.

They've just tried to remake Grease

Ok hands up if you've heard of High School Musical.
Well for all those who haven't I'll tell you about it.
A straight to TV movie made by the Disney channel it follows the exploits of the new girl at school and the captain of the basketball team auditioning for the leads in a musical at said High school.
In the States it's a massive thing with it scoring 9 singles in the top ten or twenty or something like that.
Basically I saw it this evening and it's a bit good. I mean it must be good containing lines such as:

Chad Danforth "You can't be in the muscial Troy your the basketball captain not a singer".
Troy Bolton "Dammit can't I be both?"

See amusing and dramatic and it's like that the whole way through. Infact it's almost as dramatic as the Top Gun 2 script I've got ideas for - one of these days.

Anyway here's a list of why it's good.
A) The beginning is a complete rip off of Grease.
B) The whole movie is quite a rip off of Grease.
C) They never actually make a musical (it's about the auditions).
D) The male lead (character name - Troy Bolton) looks like Mark Hamill
E) It is filled with Neighbours style acting (ie overly dramatic)
F) The director is listed as a Director/Choreographer - so he must know what he's doing.

Here is why it's bad
1) No big screen kiss at the end - all musicals should end with one it's tradition.
2) Post credits there is a really odd coda.

Well here is the end sequence.



Hopefully after seeing this you'll want to see the entire thing (it's being shown on the BBC over Christmas). Oh and this routine looks like it's stolen off of the opening of Bring it on.

Update: That last video has been removed from youtube by someone (probably Disney - though it is television so it should techinically be in the public domain). Anyway watch this fan made thing it is brilliant.

A real update - not one of those fake ones I've been doing

Recently on this blog I've been getting away with just adding videos and not really putting in content. The reason for this is A) I've been feeling lazy and B) there has been nothing to really write about. You don't really want second rate ramblings do you? No I thought not.
So today I've tried to rectify this by adding videos but putting in my own written content to link the two together.

Anyway Girls Aloud are great!
They seem to be a proper genuine pop phenomenon the kind that just doesn't seem to be about anymore. Most pop acts these days seem to be either serious vocal acts (the Sugar Babes), shitty pop punk esq bands (Fall Out Boy (not real emo)) or Lily Allen and Sandi Thom (there's a genre there but I'm too tired to work it out, oh and by the way I do quite like Lilly Allen - she's alright). But Girls Aloud are old school generic fun pop music from girls who are nice to look at and aren't that strong vocally.

Yes, so Girls Aloud if you have noticed they are the only real survivors from the crazy world of Popstars/Pop idol and X factor. (Apart from Will Young and Myleen Klauss who for the sake of this article I'm ignoring). And although it's obvious why they are popular (I've told you back in the previous paragraph ( - they're old school) I'm going to use some videos to illustrate the other reasons they're excellent.



That's their performance of Jingle bell rock it illustrates the fact they are dead hot and sugary sweet. It's like eating lava with canderel.


That's their "live" performance of Jump on this show they did for T4 where they went and performed in people's hometowns. Needless to say the show was shite. If channel 4 want to make shows for Teenagers/Students they should employ me as I'm cheap to employ and I wouldn't make the mistakes most of these show designers do (ie using June Sarpong as a presenter). Anyway what's important here is that Girls Aloud must have a choreographer who finds it amusing to make them start and end in hilharious statue esq positions (you might not be able to view the end it may be corrupted - sorry).



That's their new single Something kinda ooh. This illustarates the fact they can't really dance or that their choreographer is a git and wants to make them look stupid.

So in conclusion Girls Aloud are superb based entirely on the fact they are manufactured, attractive and funny leading me to believe I should be dating some kind of sexually appealing clown robot.

Oh and just to answer the most important question (who is (are) my favourite(s) Girls Alouder) - Cherryl Tweedy and Nicola Roberts are the best. Tweedy because she is blatantly the hottest. Nicola I've no idea (according to one of my mates it's because my brain thinks she is the least popular one and I'd have more of a chance with her. (This may or may not be true my mind is an idiot)).

Cheap update 1

David Mitchell and Robert Webb are brilliant that's an actual FACT.
So their new show the Mitchell and Webb look is thus brilliant.
I figure that some people forgot to see it or haven't seen this superb duo before so I present to you some of this genius:









Well that's it for today. Come back soon for more cheap updates.

BTW: MTV, ATDI and RGB FYI :P (Yes I feel dirty and ashamed with that kind of title)

Several updates, in two days?
This is a sign the summer is finally over I'm actually starting to use this blog again.

Anyway apparently teenagers aren't watching the shows that are actually being made for them (that's why Top of the pops got cancelled - teenagers weren't watching it) instead they're wasting their time with Desperate Housewives.

So after hearing this I started to get a bit worried that there would be no more teenage shows (think about it no OC, no T4, no Hollyoaks). But then I realised there would always be MTV, their entire output is shows for teenagers (granted American teenagers). MTV have got loads of money so there is no way they'll go bankrupt and they'll never change so they will make shows for teenagers for as long as western society survives.

Well anywho after thinking MTV were great I decided to watch more of their shows. And that's when I finally realised that pretty much the majority of their output is actually diabolical. I could write the whole list of dreadful dreadful shows they make but the highlight for me is a show called MADE.

Basically horrible loser teenagers try and achieve something that they just weren't meant to do: The social outcast nerd (with no balance and a complex about her looks) tries to become the cheerleader, the non cheerleader tries to become the homecoming Queen and they had a girl become an American football player (just to clarify I've no problem with girls playing American football but she was playing against guys which I'm sure is not legally allowed). Anyway bottom line is it's retarded but funny. I couldn't find any footage of MADE but I found this spoof which like all good spoofs is damn close to the original.



Bizarrely the soundtrack to the real Made features repeated use of 10 second exerts of different songs one of which was Invalid Litter Dept by At the Drive In which I have to say is one of the greatest songs EVER from one of the best albums EVER.

Here is some ATDI footage off French TV. A live performance of One armed Scissor followed by Invalid Litter Dept.



And yes the sound is a little off but it's all about the performance.

And finally something completely un MTV related. I found this footage of The Real Ghostbusters edited together with some German song.



I just thought it was neat.

It's official the internet is the scariest place ever

OK sorry another update is needed.
Just as I was logging off I got contacted by one of my chums who runs a clothing line for mountain biking and such. (Rythumandflow.co.uk)
He just found this video on youtube.com

Disclaimer: This video is not for squeemish people it's a bit nasty.


Anyway we have no idea who this guy is he's not sponsored by rythumandflow.co.uk and we have no idea why he found that necessary.

The internet can be a weird weird place.

Update: Found out how this all came about. That guy knew a friend of a friend and heard about rythumandflow.co.uk and chucked it in when he decided to do that. (Still don't understand why that was necessary). Anyway just for a moment that was really rather freaky.

(And yeah even though the mystery was solved I'll keep this update simply because it's the only legitimate not encouraging violence kind of way to include a video like that. This also provides an excellent way to shoehorn in rythumandflow.co.uk (just like The Sun does, making an advert look like an article).

Transformers a religious symbol in disguise

Yet again I'm doing a "dual" update because I'm feeling wordy today.

I recently bought the Transformers movie on DVD for the bargain price of £5 and it was worth every one of those 500 pennies (or 1000 half pennies). It's a really funny film with amusing dialogue and an amazing soundtrack. It's filled with 80s power rock tunes and when combined with the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles soundtrack of "white" hip hop provides a musical overview of the late 80s / early 90s. Also just worth a mention one of the tracks on Tranformers: the movie is provided by Weird Al Yankovic, so does that mean it's ironic? I just don't know.

Anyway after watching the film I went on to reading up on Tranformers via wikipedia just to see how many seasons there were how long it ran for - that kind of stuff. It was after I scrolled the page to the bottom that my head metaphorically exploded. The Transformers universe is absolutley massive there's so many spin offs and back stories I was at a complete loss.
And people say kids don't learn anything from TV.

Also worth a mention Tranformers: the movie was Orson Welles last film (he died in the middle of recording his voice for it) which also proves the angel of death has a sense of humour.

So weeks later I show Transformers to one of my good chums. He points at the TV and shouts (in the Optimus Prime Vs Megatron sequence (2:40 on this video)).



"Look he's shot in the side, you know what that is? It's a Christ reference!"
Just to explain Christ was pierced in his side by the lance of Longinus. So now any side wound equals a Christ reference.
Well anyway I thought back to my Ten commandments - thou shalt worship no false idols (well thats the modern take on it).
And thought yeah, maybe we have made Optimus Prime a false Idol he's a robot and a truck.
A man and machine.
Think about it...

(For all of you who are confused I'm being profound).

You Know this song deserves to be no.1

I don't know how many of you have noticed but a lot of my updates have actually been completely ripped off of Popjustice.com

And today is no exception...

Earlier on at the beginning of June I was championing this song as my "official" song of the summer. But then it disappeared, without a trace.

But now it has re-appeared and this time with a video!
SO watch this:



The band are called Superjupiter and they are Norwegian.
You know (that's the single's name) is out on October 23rd
I hope this single goes to No.1
And I demand all the Djs I know (all of one) to play this song in their sets.
(Interestingly I did used to know more Djs but I haven't seen them in ages).
(Also interestingly when I previously said interestingly I meant boringly).

The Mint

As I haven't done many updates this month I figured I'd go "a little bit crazy" and do two in a row. So here is the second.

I'm currently watching the Mint which is a really rather shite gameshow on ITV which starts at late o'clock and ends at stupid o'clock. I'm not going to go into the details of the show because trust me you really won't care. I'm here to talk about the one highlight of the entire show...

Cat Porter...
In these lonely early mornings of the summer I find myself wanting to have dinner conversation (not a eupherism) with Cat Porter. She makes the mint watchable and these are the reasons why she's great.

1. She wears evening dresses.
2. She has a nice accent.
3. She lives in Tunbridgewells (which is not that far from me)
4. She was an extra in James Bond - Die another day (to be honest that's just a fact not really a reason to like her).
5. She tells the worst anecdotes ever (that's endearing).
6. She has a degree from Kings College in biological sciences (and I wouldn't mind lighting her bunsen burner (and that is a eupherism) although in all honesty not a very good one more of a chemistry one than a biology one)).

French people don't wear converse

I've been away for a week in France - it was an adventure as I travelled there on the Eurostar which has reduced check in times when compared with flying.
However it also has a band playing whenever the train to Disneyland Paris departs. Seeing men in Lederhosen with tubas and banjos playing "It's a small world after all" at 8am is just not cool and liable to give you a headache. (Also Lederhosen are obviously German not French so I didn't quite get why they were dressed like that - maybe they just liked it?)

So anyway as the title suggests I didn't see a single person in France wearing a pair of Converse. I found that rather strange. ( It's stranger still as one of my mates tells me all the French people he knows wear Converse. (Just to clarify, it probably seems a bit odd that I'm going on about Converse but they are just such cool shoes and I keep seeing them all over the place .... even when I close my eyes. Ha ha again I joke when I close my eyes I see Nikes and those hideous images of Cream the rabbit)).

So back to talking about my trip. While I was there I was eating dinner when my Grandmother suddenly says to me; (by the way my Grandmother was there at dinner with me she didn't just start talking to me from "beyond the grave" or anything). "Do you ever say or do supid things?" And I say (because I'm feeling honest) "Yes actually I do all the time." To which she replies "I was just wondering because on one side of our family there is a real streak of doing and saying stupid things. Your father does stupid things, your uncles do stupid things and your father's cousins do stupid things. Infact when I was at a family reunion I spoke to a relative of ours who was telling me their son says and does stupid things all the time - so it definitely runs in our family".

My reaction to this was not one of dismay but of acceptance. The next time I look back on doing something and think "that was really stupid" I won't get embarrassed I'll just shrug my shoulders and think "well I was always going to do something stupid it is inherently in my nature" - you see it's brilliant I can blame everything on genetics, explain to everyone my stupidity is due to genetics and never have to accept responsibility for some of my behaviour. Now if I can just find that my family is genetically inclined to being Pretentious, Depressing, Complaining, Hypercondriact, Emotionally Hypersensitive, Perverts I'll be sorted.

Nothings happening, nothings happening a lot of people look pissed (off).

It's still obvious to me it's August (despite the shitty weather) because nothing interesting has happened - August is a boring month in the world of me.
Anyway a couple of important CD related dates. New Audioslave album 4th September (though I think the single is shite).
New Mars Volta album 11th September (no story this time just mad song writing and yeah I know they are an "aquired" taste).
New Sparta album 10th October (their new single Taking Back Control is on their myspace and is actually really good).

Also has anyone else seen that new police campaign for Community officers - it's awesome. There are hand drawn pictures of police officers staring off into the middle distance like heroes. It looks like the propaganda out of a fascist state or communist Russia.

Unfortuantely I don't have a picture of said propaganda because I can't seem to find one. (Unless I e-mail the police asking for it which just seemed mean as I was going to mock them over it).

So yeah keep an eye out for funny police recruitment posters.

Have I been reduced to this? (Yeah, Yeah, Yeah)

Christina Aguilera's current single (Ain't No Other Man) has been harrassing me ever since its video release. I don't even like it.
Whenever I turn a music channel on it's always there waiting with its sparkly dresses, overtly sexual attitude, speakeasy drunkenness and red lips which are like some kind of sex beacon (Nelly Furtado is guilty of that too).
Anyway back to the topic, yer it just seems to be everywhere.
When I went away I was camping in a tent and yet I still managed to hear it on the campsite. And the other day I was in work and it came on the radio... except we don't have a radio at work. Someone had got it off the internet and burned it onto a CD!
Everytime I mention to anyone that this single seems to be following me I get told I'm obviously going insane as hardly anyone else has heard it - insantity is brilliant.

On the plus side in the middle of the song there's a section where Christina sings "Yeah yeah yeah" then follows it with a "No no no". I'm finding it mightily amusing to answer yes/no questions with those responses. Oh and when she wears that red jumper she looks like a blonde Jennifer Love Hewitt which is great because if you had both Christina Aguilera and Jennifer Love Hewitt you'd have light/dark twins and then you could walk around acting like Two Face from Batman Forever. (Except better than Batman Forever which was shit. (Yeah Yeah Yeah). It was no Batman Begins. (No No No)).

So in conclusion watch the video I find it annoying.

Explaining a few things

I've been away for a few days hence the lack of updates but I think people have still been reading this blog which is good... however I feel an explanantion is due on the last two posts due to them being a little odd.

Well anyway what happened is one of my chums said my tone on here was a little negative and that I should write something positive. Infact he challenged me to write two positive posts which I did try to do. However on retrospect both Positive Post 1 and 2 sound really negative and sarcastic. And as we all know sarcasm is the lowest form of wit, but then again wit is the highest form of intelligence so fuck it. (And in all honesty I do think Wallace is a decent town and that Llamas are great).

So yes onto other things. I road tripped (via Corby) up to Edinburgh for a couple of days of the Fringe festival. I learned quite a lot on the trip which I figure I'll share with you:

Surrey and Edinburgh are roughly 7 1/2 hours away from each other which is a really long trip to do in a day.

Corby is a scary place with a history of murders and the pizza there is almost as good as Papa John's in Reigate.

The Fringe festival as well as being brilliant fun is expensive, pretentious and weird (see picture above).

Either Scotland has the largest population of attractive women per square inch or it's that the Fringe encourages drama students which are the hottest type of students.


Above is an example of the kind of attractive girl available there. (I took a photo of her from the bushes....ha ha ha I'm just joking I was sitting on a bench).

The drama dept of Cambridge Uni are damn good actors but when they put on plays translated from the works of Kafka the audience has an uncomfortable and on occasion unintentionally hilharious viewing experience. Also I may have made the lighting director uncomfortable by continuously leering at her, basically she was hot and my eyes took on a mind of their own....stupid eyes.

Finally if you take a paper mache cat with you and take it out your bag people will gather round you and assume you are going to put on a play. (The cat's name is Spuffy she likes views, we found her in my room before we left and figured we'd take her for some reason).

Positive Post 2

What's the best animal in the world?

Unless you said llama you are wrong.
(Although you get half points for the following: Platypus, Flesh eating Kangaroo, Grimace from the crazy world of McDonalds or Rush the dog from Megaman).

So anyway Llamas are great. You can ride them, they spit and Disney made a whole film about a man becoming one (Emperor's New Groove).

So I was exceedingly impressed and happy to know about Llama trekking in the Surrey Hills (which is near where I live).
What happens is you go and pay these people money, then you and a guide take the Llamas for a walk in the forest. You can't ride the llamas (you pull them on a leash) but they carry a picnic, which you stop and eat halfway through the walk. The best thing is these llama people (llama farmers?) organise all kinds of events. You can have:
A Kids birthday party
A corporate event
A winter morning trek
A summer evening trek
The luxury champagne picnic trek (they recommend this as a wedding gift)

Also you can go repeatedy as all the llamas have different personalities so if you choose a different one each time you get a whole new experience.



Doesn't everyone look happy?



That's Grimace from McDonalds. Interestingly I don't grimace when I'm eating a McDonalds it's usually afterwards when I feel lke I've eaten a bowling ball, and I always feel like this no matter how much I've eaten.



Rush is Megaman's dog he's the shit because he can fly, and has a spring which comes out his back, he's basically a dog tranformer. Which is more impressive than anything your dog can do isn't it?

Positive Post 1

I haven't updated in a week, which for this blog is a long time.
The reason for the delayed absence is I have been "researching" topics to write about. (When I say researching I mean reading internet articles).
Anyway pull up a chair, sit down, take your shoes off and smoke a pipe as a will tell you a story.

In the State of Idaho lies a town called Wallace. It's a pretty ordinary small town in one of the fly-over states however it houses one of the greatest claims to fame ever...
It is the centre of the universe...
Just think about that for a minute, the centre of the whole universe, how amazing is that?
And it's not just that which is great about Wallace as per usual here is a breakdown list of great facts:

1) Dante's Peak was filmed there and the local were paid extras.
2) Only 960 people live there compared to the 1 million trees in the valley.
3) Wallace is famous for its brothels (the last of which closed in 1988) now it just has brothel museums.
4) The sraight freeway connecting both sides of the USA curves round Wallace - it is that good.
5) The guy who owns the hotel calls himself the Primeminister - he started doing this on a whim.
6) In the 70s Wallace was a silver mining area which was highly polluted (obviously due to the mining). When the mines were eventually closed everything re grew so the area is evironmentally stable and beautiful.
7) The town has a by-law which allows snowmobiles to be driven on the roads round there.

So there u go Wallace is a super excellent place which has a load of random stuff going on.

Watch this video without question

Put your hand up if you remember Mis-Teeq.
They were some "pop band" with "Uk Garage roots" (although it was always debatable whether Uk garage was a genuine genre).
Anyway check this video, it is the new single from Alesha Dixon the MC from Mis-Teeq. (She used to put on an excellent Shaggy/Sean Paul esq voice).



Watched it? Did you understand the songs appeal?
Well here is why I like it.

1) An excellent rock guitar riff.
2) That woah woah bit is good.
3) The bridge comes out of nowhere and doesn't fit the rest of the song.
4) It's the kind of pop song the Lostprophets would cover.
5) The song finishes with the guitar on its own.

It's like a beautiful modern pop/rock hybrid and that should be saluted and encouraged.

If you have a spare 25 mins

Watch this if you have the time.

It is a short anime film called Voices of a Distant Star.
I think it won some awards somewhere or something.

Just in case you need more persuasion here is the blurb (don't know if it's the exact one off the back of the box).

"When a mysterious alien force begins their annihilation of the human race, a young pilot feels called to join the resistance. But the danger of an interstellar battle is not Mikako's greatest concern. For she has left behind the one young man she loves. And as Mikako flies further into deep space, her only way to connect with Noboru is by cell-phone text messages. While Mikako risks her life to save mankind, Noboru waits. At first days, then months, then years for each new message that will let him know whether Mikako is still alive. And while she barely grows older in the timelessness of space, Noboru ages. How can the love of two young people, torn apart by war, survive? To what distance would you go...for your one, true love?"

Oh and you may need to watch it full screen (actually on Youtube.com) as occasionally the subtitles can get blurry.

Part 1 running time 9mins 22secs


Part 2 running time 9mins 5secs


Part 3 running time 6mins 34secs

I read this and figured it was wrong

So there I was reading an article the other day when I finally decided that Paris Hilton might be the worst celebrity of all time.
There is so much to dislike about her but I kind of already knew that - this article just pushed me over the edge. It had become quite apparent to me that Miss Hilton thinks she is excellent and has (in her own words) "suffered enough through life" and can "finally allow herself" to be happy. She sells herself as some kind of "brand" but it's just stuff man - where's the substance? She thinks she'll be remembered forever but she hasn't earned the right for legendary status. Also I've watched her try to manipulate people on Tv and she sucks at it.
On the plus side she dated Edward Furlong who is an absolute hero because he played the young John Connor who led the human resistance in Terminator 2. Then when Terminator 3 was in production and he was old enough to carry on the role from whence he left off, he wasn't used because he was a "mad bad boy drug addict" - awesome stuff a genuine role model.



In the words of Leopold "Butters" Scotch "Well you are kinda pretty Miss Hilton even if you do have a big nose."

Then after reading this annoying article I went on to read something equally as annoying entitled - The Top Ten Golden rules of Myspace - the following contains the authors rules and my interpretation of why they are factually incorrect.

1) It's about quantity not quality - Wrong - If you're trying to impress people on Myspace it's a lot better to have 100,000 friends instead of 1 obviously. Also no one is going to sift 100,000 people in great detail.
2) Never request a Myspace Cliche as your friend - Wrong - Request anyone you like don't be different for the sake of it that's just stupid.
3) If you're not going to do this properly don't do it at all - A big lie - I only use my Myspace profile for fishing and not for showing off - that is what the blog is for.
4) Think long and hard before filling in your profile and update is regularly - Lies - Honestly no one cares that much about your Myspace, update it when you are bored this keeps things varied.
5) Be careful with friends requests you don't know - an untruth - You could be careful or you could go crazy and mix things up a bit.
6) Live the Myspace lifestyle - Yer see everything in black and white, pull stupid poses and make sure you only appear at certain angles.
7) Use Myspace as a dating tool if you like, but only after the fact - that's not even a sentence - idiots - I assume the author means only use Myspace on a person after you've started dating. Please ignore this, search anyone you want on Myspace Tom designed it with stalking in mind.
8) Never use ironic music in your profile - No - ALWAYS use ironic music it reminds people of the classics missing from their collection.
9) Be careful not to offend actual best friends - Don't rotate your top eight. If they're your real friends they will understand why your top eight is filled with porn stars and trashy models.
10) Keep your friends international - Look it's harder to communicate with international people (you are less likely to have things in common) so by communicating nationally you're not stifling your creativity.

And finally to close I'll point out that Facebook is cooler than Myspace simply because of its elitest entry system which only allows you to be a member if you attend a certain university (you have to use a specific university e-mail address).

Smells like July

Hurrah it's Saturday again.
So here I am to spoil you with another thrilling update.
Except nothing has happened again this week.
So I figured I'd throw you the bones of what could be called some enticing tales.

So I went to my vilage fair which contained rides and balloons. But the Ferris wheel was overpriced, the stalls were overpriced, hardly any of my friends were there and the candyfloss tasted like sugarless crap and the fireworks were cancelled (due to the ground being too dry). On the plus side I saw a carny folk who I think I recognised.

The only other interesting thing that happened is on Popworld Alex Zane said he was going to Hull on holiday but I think he may have been lying.
After all Alex Zane has the face of a liar.



Alex Zane - he's not the Phantom or as the bloke out of Titanic (that's Billy Zane) he is just a liar.

Fun times with weapons

I once read this newspaper article that said London is currently like New York in the 80s. What I hoped this meant was that there were 4 vigilantes with ninja weapons dressed as turtles running round the city.
It didn't mean this at all.

But I'm not here to talk about "facts and newspaper articles and world affairs". Today I'm discussing Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 2 and 3 (the movie sequels).
(Just as a quick fact when it came to the cartoons Ninja was used in America. Hero was used in the UK as Ninja was deemed too violent sounding for kids).

I'm not going to review the movies (the negative critique would put a downer on the article) so as per usual I'm going to write about the movie's plus points.

1) The Turtles are comedy characters who occasionally take down their advesaries with wet willies.
2) The never use their weapons for fighting, Leonardo is more likely to cut a rope bridge with his sword than stab someone.
3) Splinter the rat looks more like a weasel (than a rat).
4) Both films feature the turtles doing bad ass dance routines.
5) A super hip hop soundtrack is involved and proved once again it is a necessity.
6) No one dies apart from the lead bad guys.
7) The Turtles have the best pithy banter ever.

(Specific to 2nd film)
A) Vanilla Ice is in it.
B) Hopefually that shitty side kick kid never worked again.



(specific to 3rd film)
A) In 17th Century feudal Japan everyone speaks 90s coloquial American.
B) It just seems random that they end up going back in time.
c) Turtles 3 doesn't really follow on from 2.
D) The actor who plays Casey Jones in Turtles 3 plays another part which means the film has a crappy budget.



The only things I didn't like about the two sequels are: Casey Jones is in the third one and doesn't beat up anyone (that's all he's good at). And in the 2nd one the Bebop and Rocksteady mutants are replaced by shitty mutants.
Still both movies are better than that stupid live action Turtles series with that fifth female Turtle.

So in conclusion humans have fought for hundreds of years. Then giant human turtle hybrids have been around a relatively short time and bring peace through fighting. Thus they are the next evolutionary step.
(Splinter is just an evolutionary mess, like the animals found in Australia).
This proves to me the 90s was a new exciting time for film.

Yeah... Capital City

I've been having a bit of down time, so to make up for things I'll be posting two updates now doesn't that sound exciting.

(This 1st update is based in my real life which probably means it won't be that hiharious or entertaining, but that's the summer for you.)

Anyway my Great Aunt phoned up about two weeks ago and asked if I wanted to accompany her Grandson on a trip to London. I of course agreed as figured a trip to London would be a hoot and a holler (it's not really a main part of the story but The Grandson is Greek, and yer he does speak English).

So I listed the help of one of my mates who studies in London. So me and the Grandson met my friend at Waterloo station. I'm not going to go into huge of details of where we went in London because in all honesty it's not very interesting. But I will explain to you the end part of the evening.

I had decided the best evenings entertainment was to be found at "Club Justice". A nightclub in Soho that most of the week was a gay bar, I figured that on Friday's it was a bar that was sometimes gay. (Also I had looked at the Pop Jutsice messageboards and got a brief description of said club - unless of course it was all a cunning ploy to entice me). Well as it turned out we got to the door and the doormen announced it was a gay bar so we left with me complaning about how it didn't say that on the website.

We ended up in the Metro Club and although it got busier it was still pretty damn quiet I think we probably would've had a more exciting time at Club Justice. So eventually we left (the club) and the Grandson didn't look impressed, my friend didn't look impressed I wasn't impressed.

Then while waiting for the bus some Bride to be was chucking up on the pavement with her friends shouting "She's getting married tomorrow!".

So as a final note I think I undersold London quite nicely.

Local Legends

Urban Legends are great.
They're like a story combined wih a lie.
Infact that's exactly what they are.
So anyway these are my favourite urban legends I've heard.

Legend: The singer from Aqua was in a coma.
Details: Aqua were due to perform on Top of the Pops that week with some single (can't remember which (possibly Turn back time)). But supposedly the lead singer (Lene Grawford Nystrøm) had taken a lot of drugs and fallen into a coma.
How I knew it was fake: They performed on TOTP just fine. And yeah it does count as an urban legend because friends of mine heard it from other people.

Oh Aqua the only good song you ever did was Turn Back Time (which I swear contains a sample from Donkey Kong Country 2 on the SNES). Although that time you were on the Eurovison contest as half time entertainment was pretty cool.

Legend: Peter Andre was killed.
Details: Peter Andre had disappeared off the pop music scene after making some albums that were (for some reason) successful. Years followed and he was seen on some nostalgia program threatening to make a comeback in the next 6 months. This time passed and no sign of Andre. I was then informed that Peter Andre had been killed in either a (plane crash, car crash, water skiing accident, jet ski accident).
How I knew it was fake: He did make a comeback and re released some of his back catalogue (thanks to a campaign led by Chris "Paved the way to hell" Moyles).

This is my personal favourite.
Legend: Kel from Kenan and Kel was killed.
Details: This absolute dickhead at school told me that Kel was killed in a car crash and replaced with a Kel with a beard. (On a side note he also told me that his dad owned a vinyl Red Hot Chili Peppers album recorded in 1970).
How I knew it was fake: Besides the guy being a chronic liar Kenan and Kel were seen after The Kenan and Kel show in Good burger.

I recently looked up Kenan and Kel on wikipedia and it says that an urban legend went round saying that it was Kenan who died in the car crash. The reason people thought he died is because the Kenan and Kel show was cancelled so abruptly.

One day I hope to start my own Urban Legend but it will have to contain my name so I can lay claim on it.

Watch this please

Ed is back on Tv again.
(Channel 4 12:30pm (that's lunchtime in case I've mixed up PM and AM)).
If you have never watched I encourage you do so as it is exceedingly enjoyable and hilharious.

To try to persuade you to watch Ed I've decided to give a basic plot synopsis.

SO Plot Synopsis - There is this guy called Ed who is a top flight Lawyer. One day (seemingly at random from what I remember) he breaks up with his wife, returns to his hometown, buys a bowling alley and sets up his lawyer practice in this bowling alley (Stuckeyville bowl).
Each episode he either defends someone in a court case, tries to help a teenager, tries to win the affection of Carol Vessey (the local school teacher and head cheerleader from when he was at school) or tries to make his life better by looking at an incident in his past and improving upon it.
There's a cast of excellent sub characters (Phil who works in the bowling alley with his money making schemes, Mike the childhood friend who is a doctor, Warren Cheswick the troubled teenager, Molly the teacher who is overweight with a nice personality).

If that wasn't enough to convince you here is a breakdown of great things about Ed.

A) The theme tune is sometimes (depends on the season) "Next Year" by the Foo Fighters I like this song and thinks it's one of the only good songs on the album There is nothing left to lose.
B) Mike and Ed have bets with each on other which usually involve doing something embarrasing the bets are usually mightily bizzare.
C) Every episode has a moral and it is well implemented.
D) Ed is played by Tom Cavanagh who plays JD's brother in Scrubs.
E) Warren Cheswick is played by that guy who was the teenager in Dodgeball, the male lead in Jeepers Creepers and the Mechanic in the Herbie re make. He will forever play a teenager (just like Freddie Prinze jnr).
F) Carol Vessey is played by Julie Bowen who was a side character in Lost and one of Doctor Carter's girlfriends in ER.
G) Mike is played by this guy who was also a side character in Lost (I refered to him in Lost as Ed's mate).
H) Ed talks really quickly which is to be admired.
I) One of the side characters in the Stuckeybowl looks like John Goodman.
J) Ed got me through the summer of 2002.
K) The show lasted 83 episodes which a good amount (not too few or too many).
L) Ed ends with Ed marrying Carol Vessey so the show is completed (which doesn't happen that much on TV).
M) Ed's hometown is in Ohio and as everyone knows Ohio is the best state.
N) If you take the "T" from Stuckeyville it becomes Suckeyville this is intentional (maybe).
0) The guy who played Mike was also arrested on July 31, 2002 for allegedly smoking crack cocaine with a homeless man but charges were dropped.
P) Carol and Ed's wedding had a circus theme then halfway through the wedding they stopped (an the realisation it was a shit idea) and got married in the Stuckeyville bowl.
Q) There was a whole episode about a lucid dream Ed had after eating pickles.

I wanted to cover 26 (enough for the alphabet) great things about Ed but I ran out and started grasping at straws but don't let that put you off.
Watch Ed it breaks up the day.

Ed Stevens and Carol Vessey happiness that took just 83 episodes.

Bitesize chunks of literary goodness

It's Saturday so it's blog update time.
Usually this is where I'd tell you about something I've noticed or something I've deemed exciting. However this week has been dull, very very dull.

So rather than disappoint my future self (I'm the only one who reads these things or will re read these things). I'll do a series of small updates.

Ben Affleck - a man
Why is it he annoys me so? He mocks himself in real life (ok cinema - Kevin Smith films) but yet he makes me shout and rant. Please tell me why is he such a cock?

Buffy The Vampire Slayer - My Summer
In a month I've watched 3 seasons of Buffy and now I'm starting the 4th (the one where it gets a bit shit and they go to university). I'm a bit disappointed though that in my 1st year of uni I was not chased around and called a freshman. (Though I would've been if I'd joined a sports team (actually glad I chose videogames over being macho and sociable) ). Also there's never a mention of a university in Sunnydale before they have to choose a university - which is bizarre because it's a big area you would have thought Buffy would patrol there regularly.

Totally Frank - The blonde one
Have you seen this show? It's realy really shite. I'm not even gonna explain it just trust me really not very good. However I'm quite attracted to the blonde one (at least I would be if she didn't have such a horrible voice).
I can't get the link working for one of their videos where they are all burlesque dancers but if you go to
http://www.channel4.com/entertainment/tv/microsites/T/totally_frank/video.html
then click on "Turn it up" Pop Version aka bad song great video.

Insert male sexist comment here (_______________)


Lostprophets - They finally reach the bigtime
Their new album has been reviewed in the Times which officially means they are recognised as a band by the general public. It scored 3/5 and the best song on it (obviously according to the reviewer) is Everybody's screaming. The reviewer is wrong.

Top of the pops - Cancelled

Pop Justice wrote: "This is partly a good thing because it is currently shit and none of the people you'll read a-blubbin' in tomorrow's press have actually watched it once in the last four years.But it is mostly a bad thing because - unlike Smash Hits - it could have been turned around. It wouldn't have been easy, but it was possible".

That sums up exactly how I feel but they put it more eloquently than I could. Oh and whoose fault it is for TOTP becoming shit it's Andi Peters for producing it and saying one line in Toy Story 2.

It's all your fault Peters and I can tell by your smile and the fact you jumped ship before the SS TOTP hit its iceberg of cancellation that you just don't care.

ANDI WHY WON'T YOU CARE!?

I don't find them attractive I just find them confusing

"Don't you wish your grilfriend was hot like me?" is not really a question many women ask me.

For a start I don't have a girlfriend which kind of makes the question irrelevant and more importantly I'd counter argue that in asking that question you probably have self esteem issues (you pretend to the world you're hot, but inside you're crying because you were the fat kid bullied at school) and I'm not interested as have enough issues of my own.

Anywho the ladies who came up with this question in the first place (or at least made it popular) are the Pussycat dolls. The thing is I recently realised than unlike most girl groups I haven't seen them interviewed or talking about themselves or decided whether they are attractive or not. (I know I mixed tenses there but if they are hot they will still be hot (present/future) but they were interviewed (past) - do you see?)
They only concrete thing I know about them is they used to be burlesque dancers. So I went and did a quick bit of research - I present my findings here.

Question 1: Do they have separate names?
Answer: Yes

Question 2: Please can you please tell me their names?
Answer: Only if you do a comical dance.

.......Actually screw that I'll do things seriously(ish) . Here are names and a brief description of each of them.

Nicole Scherzinger - Lead singer aka the mouthy one.
Carmit Bachar - Red head aka the ginger blokey one.
Ashley Roberts - One of the blondes aka the one who fades into the background.
Jessica Sutta - Brown haired one aka is she attractive?
Melody Thornton - The dark one aka the dark one
Kimberly Wyatt - One of the blondes aka the one with the "rock chick" look.

You can't actually find that much written about them individually (even the bio on their website talks about them as a group). They all seemingly want to be actresses or singers. So this leads me to ask the question are they a group entity? I think the answer is yes - basically whats happened is at school they were regarded as attractive so switched off their brains (they figured they could get away with just beauty) and now they rely on a group conscious state to answer questions and stay alive that's why they are all vaguely similar (socially), regarded as a group and have the same ambitions it would also explain why they do few interviews and why only one of them actually sings.

Anyway that was a side issue you don't want the Pussycat dolls for smarts. But the question remains are they actually hot - usually the video is so quick edited you only get quick shots of most of the girls (excluding the singer she gets the main focus) in the single "Buttons" they did look hot but that was the lighting they were using (I could tell even the ginger one looked alright and in real life (regularly lit TV) she is a skank).
Anyway I'm not gonna give any evidence of this but I've flicked through the internet and they are all vaguely attractive (except the red head one) and they sure can dance so yeah the Pussycat dolls are alright in not very clever, kind of attractive (sometimes), no dinner conversation kind of way.

I do like the way all their songs have a moment in where they do a sexy dance - in truth this is the one time where I would like Life to imitate Art I think it would be cool to have a moment everyday where suddenly music plays out of nowhere I'm there/hot girls turn up and we all do a sexy dance that would break the day up nicely.

And just as a quick fact they occasionally have had guests performing with them (actually as a Pusseycat doll) these include Carmen Electra, Christina Aguilera and Rachel Sterling (not that famous but uber hot).

Oh just to answer the Pussycat dolls lead question "Don't you wish you're girlfriend was hot like me?" Not really I need someone with dinner conversation.

Two completely unrelated topics

Rather than write two separate updates I've decided to write one update on two topics that have nothing in common with each other - maybe along the way they will link up or maybe not.

Anyway on with "the show"

Russell Brand seems to be all over the place at the moment (mainly in Magazines of Sunday newspapers) because apparently he's the cool new funny guy (now that he's been seen with Kate Moss).
But I just don't see why he's so popular or that quirky charmingness he is supposed to contain.
He's not that funny though I do admit he occasionally makes me laugh but that's more due to the output of words. (Pure probability states he will eventually put words together that make you laugh)
His retro stylings and "dark past" are a modern day cliche.
He has a really annoying voice.
Oh and he presents Big Brother's big mouth (which I've already told you) makes me furious.



Russell Brand I just don't like him.


Now onto bigger and better things. Actually scrap that make it more annoyingly retarded things.
I finally witnessed Resident Evil: Apocalypse
My god that film was a giant pile of asses. And not warm asses either big freezing cold asses (actually I don't know which would be worse - dammit why did you confuse me by bringing up asses). The point is Resident Evil: Apocalypse may be worse than the uninspired 1st attempt and heres a list of why.

1. It seemed to me like there was hardly any dialogue which led to a poor explaining of what was going on.
2. The whole thing contained a helleva lot of gun porn.
3. It wasn't tense.
4. It wasn't scary.
5. The fight scenes were poor, there weren't many scenes with hordes of zombies infact it just seemed like a whole load of scenes which were a big bunch of nothing.
6. It had a bollacks cliff hanger ending.
7. It was like an interpretation of Resident Evil 3 (the videogame) but where someone had taken out the interesting set pieces and swapped them with their own that they came up with 5 minutes before each scene. Then they took out all the dialogue which explained the story and replaced it with a wasteland of nothing.
8. The end song on the credits was Killswitch Engage "The End of Heartache" which just seemed to have nothing to do with anything.

So as a summary it was badly made, uninteresting, un intense, not scary, completely unengaging and worse than the 1st one. But don't worry they're making two more which gives plenty of time to get it right - or they could knock out two cheaper paler imitations - which do you think it will be? Answers on a postcard (or sealed envelope) to the usual address.

On a lighter note the girl who played Jill Valentine was hot.



The thing is I know it was in keeping with the videogame but that blue top is digustingly impractical - if you ever go fighting zombies take a jumper with zip up pockets to keep ammo, herbs and keys to obtuse puzzles in in then you won't have to visit chests so often.

Facts about Cents

Did you know when you are going out with/close to/dancing with members of the opposite sex you secrete more pheromones which makes you more attractive to them. So for example if you were a guy dancing closely with a girl you would give out more pheromones and other girls may take notice of you.

50 Cent knows this and thinks he understands it.

Mr Cent (or Fiddy as his loyal followers know him) can be seen in many of his music videos surrounded by beautiful women - usually in his rap he explains to us (the viewer) how he has had repeated intercourse with all these so called "stunning hotties."
It's at this point in his rap I usually raise an eyebrow.

You see I don't think he has. Mr Cent may be exceedingly rich and have what I would call a passe gangsta rap career but he boasts so much about all the women he has had I think he is overcompensating. But the question is overcompensating for what or why?

I think the answer lies in my opening statement - I believe Mr Cent wants to score a lot of "poon" becuase he hasn't had the time before (he was too busy building a rapping career to be interested in girls.) So what he has done in these videos is to surround himself with girls and talk big to try to encourage more girls to "get with him." Unfortuantely he hasn't taken into account our televisions not being smellevisions so no ladies are recieving his pheromones.

Either that or Mr Cent is a bit of a Robbie Williams.




Ladies and Gentlemen -> 50 cent a proverbial Bell-End.

Scenesters an update-me-do

I was going to leave doing anymore updates for tonight but then I remembered I had some more to say about scenesters.

I think the now agreed definition for a scenester is someone who: Hears about a band, buys their latest album then goes up to you pretending they've been into said band for ages and says "Have you heard of this band?" in a smug and inquisitive tone.

See the thing that started me off again on the whole scenester issue is I recently read that Taking Back Sunday said "they didn't like being called emo as it was a ridiculous and meaningless term." This bothers me.

TBS are one of the most emo bands I know going on the facts they were signed to Victory Records (a label where all so called emo bands go to) and they play (considering this is my definition of emo (with the help of pandora.com)) modern power chord based rock with interweaving vocal harmony heavy rhythm and lead guitar and emotional lead voice.

So do they not like the definition of emo because:
A) They think they're "above" genre definition this really winds me up. I hate it when bands say something along the lines of "we're beyond any genre" this doesn't happen with film. No-one says my film doesn't fall into any genre category infact it's completely beyond identification. They don't say it as it would be untrue and quite idiotic. Most films (music too) would be cross genre and I don't see what the big issue with being part of a genre is it's just another way of grouping similar things together.

or

B) They don't want to be seen as emo because there is a whole group of scenester kids who walk around saying "We're emo and cool look at me I'm so depressed." Then everyone else goes "you're an idiot piss off."

Personally I think TBS comment of "we're not emo" extends from the fact they don't want to be seen as leading these scenesters. This is a sad day for music when you're not even willing to be seen as part of a genre you are in.

So in conclusion scenesters make TBS cry.

Oh yeah on a side note TBS have lost quite a lot of members over the years. (Singer, Guitarist, Drummer and two Bass players) thats enough for a whole band with one left over. I don't think they're very happy.

Hollyoaks an exciting show for young people

The thing is Hollyoaks is great.
I mean you know you've found a good show when all the people in it are attractive and no-one can act. That is a sign of realism.
Also if you don't watch it for weeks then come back to it you know exactly what has happened even though all the characters have changed.
And you see that is another reason why Hollyoaks is great - actor turnover - I would absolutely love to have a look through the Hollyoaks financial records and see how many actors they've had on their books. People just seem to be chucked in that show and then written out in a bizzare manner. (I could give an example but I don't want to).

Also I've got a couple of mates from Chester who inform me its exactly like Hollyoaks - yet again proving its realism.

Actually I'm joking Hollyoaks is undescribeably inefficent as an exciting and original drama, however it is a good source of E-list celebrity.

I say "Bring back Heartbreak high now that was entertainment"



See here's Jodi Albert of Hollyoaks fame.

Just remember kids good things come to those who wait - if you wait long enough she'll be an even more washed up failure and then you can pick her up with your caring attitude and money - that's how love works.