Lazy git!

Ok ok ok!! New post! Sorry, I feel a long one coming on (no jokes please!)

Firstly I really wanna say sorry to anyone who's been diligently checking here over the last few decades in the vein hope that I'll one day put finger to key and provide more enlightenment and joy in the form of one of the longest sentences I think I've ever written that didn't have a comma or a semi-colon in it anywhere!

And BREEEATH, and relax...
(I wish there was an emoticon thing on blogger, don't you?)

Well I'm sat here wearing many layers, typing on frosty keys and I can see my breath in front of my face. Those of you who saw In the Attic will know that my boiler went KAPUTT! some days ago (yes, in a German accent smart arse!), and it's around zero outside so the house is not very warm at all! (The plumber is coming again tonight with yet another part to try - I really hope it works this time!)

Speaking of In the Attic, I couldn't help popping in to say hi and bye on Wednesday, and I'm glad I did - it was really good to see everyone, I was starting to miss them. Just wish I had something prepared to play. I don't think I'll be able to make the Christmas special on 17th Dec due to work commitments, i.e. I have a gig. Very sad about that :-(
Oh by the way, good work Alisha - loved the logos you did for In the Attic and Basement Jam. They were simple, bold, and had continuity between them. Top hole!

Well I've spent a fair amount of time over the last week or so chatting via Yahoo!IM (which is by far the best instant messenger IMHO) with Jessica late afternoon (hi Jess!) and Claire 'Bum-face' Eliza late at night on AIM (which is, by comparison, positively primative, but perfectly good enough if it means I get to chat with such a lovely girl as Claire).
I think most are aquainted with Jess, but if nobody knows of Claire (my mistress) you should ALL go see her blog and force her to write more. I haven't heard her sing or play yet, but something tells me she may well take our radios by storm one day. Fingers crossed :-)

This will embarrass her (yesss!) but I think it's so cool that there are young people with such great taste in music (which is weird to say 'cause that means I'm judging other people's tastes, which I cannot and must not do) but I'm sure you know what I mean.

In case you don't, I mean it's great that good music - that is good songs; true, passionate lyric writing and quality, heartfelt musicianship, combined with great production - has reached through all the chaff that's out there clogging and clouding our ears, minds and radios, and being sold directly to this age group. Even the old stuff that's so popular at the moment is being quantized and remixed and reinforced. Now sure, bring stuff up to date, but why suck out the unique and amazing groove and [insert James Brown grunt here] that this music has, and make it all stiff and samey? The guys that made those records, such as the Funk Brothers (if you haven't seen the film, do so!) et al were hired and head-hunted because of the unique way they could make a record sound and feel. How DARE somebody today just remove that soul they injected into them.

Young people like Claire give me hope that we won't always be subjected to the whinings of good looking but otherwise talentless nob-ends, written for by big fat queers who already own half the songs in the Top 20 of the last two decades.
There IS REAL YOUNG TALENT out there, and it's everywhere. Excellent songwriters with PERSPECTIVE and PASSION, gifted singers with SOUL who can SING A TUNE and COMMUNICATE, musicians with GROOVE and FEEL, producers with ORIGINALITY, programmers with IMAGINATION, mixers with EARS! (hallelujah!) and DJs who'd play it all if only they weren't glued to the corporate playlist and completely unaware of these artists because the record companies won't fucking sign them! In fact if the people who have the power to bring on this talent, the A&R men (not many women, weirdly enough) had EARS (and BALLS) themselves, the radio and tv would be a very different place.

Woops, small rant there - sorry! Hehrrmmm....

Anyway guys/girls, you're both gorgeous - thank you for the long chats :-) Best of luck with everything Claire x

Still, on to tomorrow. I'm playing golf with my good old school buddy Simon in the morning, down in my old hometown of Bournemouth, in Dorset, southern England. It's going to be around 4 degrees, but will feel more like -4 with the northerly wind, so I'm gonna wrap up in my skiing thermals and hat! Wish me luck ;-)
Then tomorrow night I have a black tie dinner to go to, for which I have no black tie, no shirt and no evening jacket! I may well get shoo'd out of the pub!

Please keep the comments and giggles coming in, you're all wonderful and interesting people and I LOVE YA! hehe

Bye for now, Stuee xxxx

P.S. Here're another couple of pics for ya.

The first is of a shield bug, sat on my mum's lamp in her house in France




And this one's a light bulb, but a view we would never get with the naked eye