Hey, You! Remember this?

Hey, You! (revisited)
FREE MUSIC!

Yes - Hey, You! is getting its debut radio play later today on WRIR-FM's The Great American Music Hour! Never mind the fact that I'm not a Great American, let's just celebrate the fact that it's being played.

Even if I keep on being called "Special Lad".

Ah, who cares. Be pleased for me! Follow the link, listen to the podcast or even go for the giddy thrill of hearing me being played on the spot. The programme starts at 11pm EST. That's a work-destroying 4am over here. Eep.

You know, I think I'll do the podcast.

UUUHHHGGG-rrrr!

With a title like that, it can only be Chewbacca's blog. I'm not a Star Bores geek, but I wish I'd thought this one up.

It's the sheer persistence of the joke that I love - as anybody subjected to my running jokes will attest.

Thunderbirds! (But not as I knew it)

Ah, Thunderbirds. It scared me as a pre-school tot. Sensitive, y'see. Then I got into it as a junior school kid. Loved it. Later, in my early teens, I watched it with ironic detachment; gleefully counting the number of puppets dashed to matchwood whilst shaking my head and commenting on how violent television had become.

I was an odd child, I suppose.

Anyway, this is the title sequence. Only it's in Spanish. Did my head in a bit, truth be told. Notice Spanish kids have to have an announcer tell them who the cast members are. Jeeze: can't they read English?

Ah. S'pose not.

As an aside, I once very fleetingly (I was 16) went out with a girl (that's not the end of the anecdote, by the way - that kind of thing has happened quite frequently since, he adds slightly too hastily) and her dad was, and still is, a film editor. He told me that he once had the mind-numbing task of slicing the ad-breaks into Thunderbirds. Drove him near barmy finding the right cliff-hanger point in each episode in which to do it (can you even imagine the torture?), but he could do a perfect Scott Tracy head-wobble as a result. And believe me, it was good.

yeahyeahyeahyeahyeahyeah!

New music time, people. And about time too.

So what I have done? It's a big mish-mash of all sorts, this one. And I love it.

Lucky You: 2.8 MB download
FREE MUSIC!!!

Let's let someone I really respect do the talking. Take it away, Boris:

"you realize that is going to be "shivering on the tip of my tongue" for the next three days?
this was just such a knockout smack that it demanded to be listened to again. and seriously, again! very unexpected and very smartly fit.

'what have you done?' well, you've successfully lifted Beatle elements and made them into your own. from the Taxmanish bass line, to the "yeah, yeah, yeah's," this easily puts a walrus in any Beatle fan's pocket without ever saying "i'm trying to be a beatles song."

there's a couple of specifics worth mentioning: your voice is just great here. i love the pacing, clarity, and charm. well presented! the word "girlfriend" is just brilliantly placed.

also, the way the piece moves is very sexy. it's got a swagger about it that exudes unforgiving attitude. it's got a "2bad, 2sad" vibe going on, while still being a quartful of fun.

great song art, as well. is there anything bad i can say about this? well, i'm not a horns fan. i tend to steer away from them (hmm, joke in there? horns, steer, bull?) but they are the charm and lure of the song and work very well in doing their job.

this was just a lot of fun and very well performed! thank you!! the more i play this one, the better it gets! another inspiring piece to chew on like good jerky."

Phew. I think he likes it.

Best. 12". Single. Ever.

Yeah, yeah. Blue Monday. What else? And in an "it had to happen" kinda way, I bring you the Blue Monday Owners Club, where the proud owners of FAC 73 get to show off their gorgeous possessions, courtesy of artist Spencer Graham.

It's a seamlessly pointless affair. I love it.

Garfield isn't funny

We all know that.

Mind you, it is funny if you remove all Garfield's thought bubbles...

Incidentally, this was the 666th post to Abroad At Home. Make of that what you will.

Polish Poster Designers:Mad as a Bag of Badgers

Over at Retrocrush, there's the most wonderful thing.

"While most movie posters in the United States pretty much showcase the standard corporate style imagery to hawk the film, the fine folks in Poland have a brilliant dramatic license when marketing Hollywood's finest in their country, resulting in some of the most brilliantly surreal and amazing pieces of movie artwork ever created. Some of them are obvious, some seem to be crazy nonsequiters that have nothing to do with the original picture, while others seem to change the focus of the movie altogether. Weekend At Bernies now looks more like a horror film, and Polish poster for The Terror of Mechagodzilla looks as if it was animated by the folks that made Yellow Submarine."

Get your Polish movie posters here.

"Spit on the purists. They're there to be trodden on..."

Ooh, what have I here? Welcome to the dark underbelly of my musical life. This is the video for one of my favourite songs.

Quick back-story time. It's 1982, and Soft Cell are on their way to becoming the most successful act in Britain in terms of singles chart weeks. What does a sane person do? Make the most of your main project. On the other hand, what does Marc Almond do? Form another band. Crackers, I know, but the result is gold dust.

Marc & The Mambas were formed around the nucleus of Marc Almond and Annie Hogan (keys) and had an ever-changing band roster that included variously David Ball, Matt "The The" Johnson, Peter Ashworth (as in the photographer immortalised in Mari Wilson's kitsch classic Just What I Always Wanted, and Zeke Manyika from Orange Juice.

Sleaze was originally a Cellmates-only single and it electrified this young lad from Lincolnshire. So much so that I'd never be out of mascara by the end of the year. So much so that I ripped off (sorry, paid homage to) the minor to major electric piano riff in one of my songs.

Don't let the fact that Sleaze was recorded in Heckmondwike (Heck-mond-wike? Uh?) put you off.

Change at Crux For Disco for Lob Horn and Sap Lust

I like the London Underground map. Anagrams are fun, too. So imagine my joy when I saw the two combined.

It's a surrealist's paradise.

A vintage computer; in LEGO, for crying out loud!

How odd is this? Andy Carol has built a Babbage Difference Engine from LEGO.

Imagine, girls - you meet a bloke, go back to his place and you see that. You'd be on the blower for a cab in seconds.

Bless him though - it's quite the feat.

Matthew Parris Talks Utter Sense

The world is fighting a losing battle against dogma.

I'm not a great fan of The Times. I'm more a Guardian man myself; but The Times has one ace up its sleeve in their columns that goes by the name of Matthew Parris - a columnist I have immense respect for. In today's Times, Matthew Parris strikes a blow for self-expression in the face of those who would scare us into silence.

Read his stellar column here.

A Revolutionary Use of New Technology

It seems that iFingers, the founder of Macidol (the lovely site where I keep all my music) has found a project that could take all the hard work out of the creativity required to make great music. And it involves hamsters as a MIDI controller.

Should I? Would the hamsters need a writing credit?

Incidentally - have a look around Macidol. It's a fabulous place. Some truly great music, and all from unsigned types like me.