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Surveillance
in at number ate
plat du jour's number 8 on the bbc 6music album chart. nice interview on bbc collective too, with a cheeky free track to download, esme's waltz
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21st Aug 2005 - Add Comment - Tweet
hey shoe the foot steady crew
not sure if these are reissues or deadstock or what, but still got a soft spot for rsc…
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put your crazy legs in these
rsc
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21st Aug 2005 - Add Comment - Tweet
More Maps
Now Amazon's secret weapon A9 is jumping on the local search/mapping bandwagon, with a photo breakdown of US cities, using streetlevel snaps.
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21st Aug 2005 - 1 comments - Add Comment - Tweet
b.o.b. update
no direction home, the dylan doc from martin "no oscars" scorsese is scheduled to show on bbc2 26 and 27 September, the dvd's out on 20 sept in the us, 30 oct uk
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21st Aug 2005 - Add Comment - Tweet
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pixies chat
"One time," she says, "I came to buy pot and the band credited me with production." pixies interviewed in the guardian today
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20th Aug 2005 - Add Comment - Tweet
garage band
reviews up for Primer, a great white-collar sci-fi getting a big chimp-up, and this summer's dumber entertainment/marketing device for nokia/puma/tag hauer/msn search (?!) /calvin klein etc The Island
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20th Aug 2005 - Add Comment - Tweet
Primer
(dir. Shane Carruth)
"I haven't eaten since later this afternoon…" Always been a fan of time-travel films, but you've got to love one that really finds something new to do with the whole time-paradox conundrum. Shane Carruth apparently made this white-collar sci-fi for $7000, using Super 16 short-ends - bits of film stock left over from other shoots, filmed it mostly in his garage and with his friends. It shows - but not in the usual lo-fi excuse kind of way. This is one of the first films in ages where you're struggling to keep up, but in that great way where you're convinced that it will make sense if you do. We follow some geeky science buffs working on some new projects in their spare time, trying to hit on something they can license on. Two of them work on a box which is giving them some unusual results - somehow they've built a time machine. What follows is a series of increasingly paranoid scenes, a looping plot, and a lot of hanging out in hotel rooms all afternoon. It's like a less self-consciously cool Donnie Darko, that almost seems believable. Definitely one to watch again. and again… the best kind of small-scale project, where they've spent time on a great script and a smart story that holds together.
20th Aug 2005 - Add Comment - Tweet
Read more 4 star reviews
The Island
(dir. Michael Bay)
In the future, two beautiful survivors of Earth's 'contamination' while away their days in a utopian paradise, hoping to win the lottery and move to another even more utopian paradise. Then they realise they're just clones of rich or famous people, being harvested for spare parts in a secret underground bunker.
Very nice of Michael Bay to 'tackle' the issue of cloning for us, as I wasn't really sure what to make of it. The whole set up to this movie is kind of dumb, and pretty derivative of THX1138 and Logan's Run, but once they get out into the real world things pick up. The fact that the 'real' Ewan McGregor and Scarlett Johansson are characters not dissimilar to themselves (Scottish motorcycle riding hoon & Calvin Klein model) is a nice twist, and the whole thing is just so big, fast, slick and expensive that it's hard not to enjoy it.
20th Aug 2005 - Add Comment - Tweet
Read more 3 star reviewsFoo-Tang Clan
No Foo tickets for any of the Chimp squad. If you have spares for the Astoria gig, post info here
18th Aug 2005 - Add Comment - Tweet
britpop
quite good where are they now? thing on britpop (even though it leaves out some players like gene and er, powder)… but more interesting is the side note that jarvis cocker and some of radiohead (jonny greenwood, phil selway) are following ian brown's cameo and teaming up to play the weird sisters in the next harry potter film
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17th Aug 2005 - Add Comment - Tweet
ichaos
iChaos in the US, with a batch of $50 iBooks on sale…bit like iKea
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17th Aug 2005 - Add Comment - Tweet
secret foo
tickets to see the foo fighters play one of those "secret" warm-up gigs at the astoria should be on sale on their site tomorrow, from 9am
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17th Aug 2005 - Add Comment - Tweet
Better Toast
Better toast is nearly here. The final beta version is in testing right now...
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16th Aug 2005 - 1 comments - Add Comment - Tweet
Bonus Jacket
CAN YOU DANCE?
DJ NIGHT WITH JIM JAMES (LEAD SINGER OF MY MORNING JACKET) BEHIND THE TURNTABLES ON MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 5TH.
Wash Your Hands @ The Social
5 Little Portland Street, London W1.
Nearest tube station: Oxford Circus.
7 - Midnight. Free entry before 11pm.
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www.mymorningjacket.com
www.thesocial.com
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15th Aug 2005 - 1 comments - Add Comment - Tweet
os london
not quite sure how legit this is (might have to research it a bit later), but there's an os mutantes gig lined up at london's guanabara bar. well, "SERGIO DIAS’ Os Mutantes" as they put it. aug 31st.
*****
update: think it is legit - being organised by a chimp-friendly source…
and he's the only one of the three original members still playing the os mutantes stuff - they were an out-there brazilian tropicalia band, totally influenced by 60s british psychedelia, but never actually made it over here then: this is the first time any of them will play here. should be great
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9th Aug 2005 - Add Comment - Tweet
NYTE Biscuit
Nyte Biscuit - Acid House £7
Friday 12 August , 9pm - 3am
Andrew Weatherall
Mark Broom
Kruton
Jim Clarke
The RHYTHM FACTORY
16-18 Whitechapel Rd.
London E1 1EW
9th Aug 2005 - Add Comment - Tweet
prime cuts
thoroughly confused by primer in the best possible way last night. a kind of white-collar sci-fi, with garage boffins building a machine that turns out to be a kind of time-travelling photocopier. lo-fi production as well, about $7000 so the story goes, but just great. and totally one of those films we're all going to have to watch again to keep track of everything
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9th Aug 2005 - Add Comment - Tweet
Tales of the Gold(en) Monkey
Lost 80's classic/Blatant Indiana Jones rip-off Tales of the Golden Monkey is out on DVD.... and it's even been re-named.
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9th Aug 2005 - Add Comment - Tweet
public beastie
adrock on public enemy's new greatest hits compilation
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9th Aug 2005 - Add Comment - Tweet
Paycheck
(dir. John Woo)
After selling 3 years of his memory to an evil corporation, engineer Ben Affleck slowly discovers mysterious details of what happened in the missing years - thanks to a series of apparantly meaningless items he left in an envelope....
Pretty standard future-thriller, in the post-Minority Report world of action-is-better-than plot. Ben Affleck doesn't do anything to change his status of 'only in it for the money' and John Woo drops the ball as usual.
6th Aug 2005 - 1 comments - Add Comment - Tweet
Read more 2.5 star reviewsGriffin Dunne plays Zappa
Quite literally, in the cheesy oddball TV movie Warning: Parental Advisory, on TV tonight and based on the 1985 Senatorial hearings about music censorship. First thing I noticed was a big Black Rebel Motorcycle Club poster in a record shop. Didn't realise they'd been around so long....
6th Aug 2005 - Add Comment - Tweet
Russian Posters 1960 - 1990
Old Spitalfields Market
London E1
Auguest 2nd-28th
10am-12midnight
5th Aug 2005 - Add Comment - Tweet
Song Of The Day
If You Could Save Yourself (You'd Save Us All) by Ween.
The serious conclusion to another whacky Ween album. It's got piano AND hammond organ.
That's a whole CD worth of Song of the Day. Look out for volume 2.
5th Aug 2005 - Add Comment - Tweet
imovie competition
the guardian's running an imovie competition, with mike figgis talking about digital film…
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4th Aug 2005 - Add Comment - Tweet
20 Years Too Late...
...Apple introduces a 2 button mouse.
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2nd Aug 2005 - Add Comment - Tweet
MMJ
News just in.... My Morning Jacket are playing a London show on September 6th at the Scala. See you down the front.
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2nd Aug 2005 - Add Comment - Tweet
backstroke of the west
chimp north's sent in this great site with photos of chinese pirate dvd subtitles of ROTS
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1st Aug 2005 - Add Comment - Tweet
2003 UB313
some scientists have detected a new planet way out beyond pluto… but the best name they've come up with so far is "2003 UB313" which isn't very catchy.
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31st Jul 2005 - 1 comments - Add Comment - Tweet
ice haven
daniel "ghost world" interview and screensaver stuff up on bbc collective, talking about his new comic ice haven.
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29th Jul 2005 - Add Comment - Tweet
Song Of The Day
Cross Bones Style by Cat Power. Been hearing that about a lot recently.
29th Jul 2005 - Add Comment - Tweet
Double Whammy
WOLFMOTHER: Garage: 21st September
BEECHES: Farewell Concert: 23rd September
29th Jul 2005 - Add Comment - Tweet
mpfree
apparently p2p downloaders end up buying more music…
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27th Jul 2005 - 1 comments - Add Comment - Tweet
Batmun Biggins
Caught Batman Begins again last night, at the mahousivmungous IMAX cinema.
Still good. Just bigger.
27th Jul 2005 - Add Comment - Tweet
Fear of Music w/Park Attack
Fear of Music @
The Montague Arms
w/ Park Attack live!
29th July ‘05
Future wonky classics from your hosts/professional amateurs:
Will & Leaf vs The Anarchic Hand.
Pints the price your old man paid at this heated South London coach house
Friday 29th July 8pm – 12.30pm
£3
@ The 'Legendary' Montague Arms (the best old boozer in this whole land - once owned by a taxidermist, untouched for years...)
289 Queens Road
SE14 5JN
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26th Jul 2005 - Add Comment - Tweet
What's really visible from Space?
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Possibly not the Great Wall...
Definitely not the Great Wall...
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25th Jul 2005 - Add Comment - Tweet
Space Ghosts
Not quite sure the history behind this, but there's some Pavement mp3's available over at www.acidcasualties.com. There's also a few live bits and pieces from Malkmus' newer stuff...
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24th Jul 2005 - Add Comment - Tweet
Subway
(dir. Luc Besson)
always intrigued by this film, commonly held to be a cult classic. well, the poster was a staple of 80s student decoration kits along with betty blue and the big blue. think i had in mind it was some existential sci-fi or something. what a pile of le merde. totally plotless. christopher lambert and isabelle adjani arse about in some cool subterranean world on le metro spouting le crap, avoiding les flics and drinking les coffees and vauguely falling in l'amour while jean reno droops around in the background with a dumb moustache drumming on everything. best thing is christopher lambert's uncanny resemblance to stewart copeland, but that's not really enough to keep you going.
24th Jul 2005 - Add Comment - Tweet
Read more 1 star reviews
v for vendetta
no doubt it'll get lots of daily mail "terrorist film shock" articles when it comes out, but this is one of alan moore's greatest graphic novels, and the trailer looks ok (well, despite the slightly dodgy fonts) so maybe it will survive the wachiowski bros treatment - the plot is light years more coherent than the back to the matrix nonsense.
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23rd Jul 2005 - Add Comment - Tweet