Friday, 10 October 2008
Living Icons of the UK
At the end of last year, BBC TV's Culture Show asked people living in the UK to vote for the UK's Greatest Living Icon. The rules of the poll? Well, to be eligible, the person nominated had to be alive; they had to have been born in the UK or be currently living in the UK; and they had to have made 'an impact on British cultural life'. We, the voting public, were also asked 'will we still be thinking about them in 10 years time?'
And the winner is... It should come as little surprise, then, that the top place in the poll went to Sir David Attenborough. Now 80 years old, he has a varied and long history in broadcasting. During his time as controller of the BBC in the 1960s, he introduced colour to the UK's television sets. He's long been a campaigner on environmental issues - many years before it was considered trendy to support such causes - and his recent BBC series Planet Earth has been watched by an estimated 500 million people worldwide. In 2008, the David Attenborough Studio will open in his honour at the Natural History Museum, ensuring that there will be a permanent reminder to keep us thinking of him 10 years into the future and beyond.
TOP 10 LIVING ICONS
- Sir David Attenborough
- Morrissey
- Sir Paul McCartney
- David Bowie
- Sir Michael Caine
- Stephen Fry
- Kate Bush
- Alan Bennett
- Kate Moss
- Dame Vivienne Westwood
Still, Sir David should be up there... they at least got that right.
See the full article here.
Is this Europe's biggest catfish?
...I don't know but it aint no duck.
Alan Melhuish spent half an hour reeling in the 102kg (16st) giant on the River Ebro near Barcelona.
The 61-year-old was nearing the end of a week-long fishing trip when the 2.4m (8ft) long fish took his line 'and raced 40m up river'.
Woman, 105, links her age to walking - and no sex
A woman celebrating her 105th birthday has attributed her longevity to plenty of walking, the odd glass of wine - and remaining a virgin.
Clara Meadmore, a former secretary who was born in Glasgow in 1903, said that she had had her share of suitors but sex had never appealed to her.
"People have asked me whether I am homosexual and the answer is no. I have just never been interested in sex." Meadmore, who lives in a nursing home in Cornwall, added: "I imagine there is a lot of hassle involved and I have always been busy doing other things ... I've had platonic friends."
Some words from Keita Takahashi (Katamari Damacy)
The oddball genius behind Katamari Damacy shows off the first technical demo of his latest project, shares insight into his creative process, and talks about the fights he has with his neighbours.
Game director Keita Takahashi took to the stage in front of a packed audience to talk about his new game, Noby Noby Boy, and immediately kicked off his shoes.
"I'm very nervous," he said, and talking through a translator, explained that he would play some soothing "forest sounds" to give the auditorium a more relaxed atmosphere. He then added that two days before coming to the UK, his favourite sandals had broken, which he had been worried was a sign that the plane might crash.
Takahashi told the audience that he didn't want to talk about Katamari Damacy, as he was "sick of it." He then fired up a PlayStation 3 and showed the assembled guests the technical build of the game he is currently working on, titled Noby Noby Boy. Noby Noby means "stretch" in Japanese, but also, like many Japanese words, has several other meanings. Takahashi explained, "In Japan, Noby Noby also means postponed, which shows this is the right name, as it has been postponed."
The game does not have a definite date for release yet and is obviously still in the early stages, although Takahashi did reveal that it would be a PlayStation 3 exclusive. He handed out controllers to the audience, showing that up to three people could play at once, taking control of the Noby Noby Boy, who can do such things as stretch, jump, eat animals, eject them from his nether end intact, and lasso creatures by circling them. He also showed that animals will be able to hop on to Noby Noby Boy and enjoy a free ride.
Talking about his latest project, Takahashi admitted, "People do not understand it yet, even my boss. I think it looks fun."
He also berated the industry for a lack of creativity. He said, "Just as people have different personalities, in terms of games, you can make your own rules to develop and play. But in reality, we rarely see such variety. I wonder why?"
Takahashi also used his forum to remind people the importance of caring for the environment and doing such things as recycling rubbish and being nice to people in the street. He said, "I don't know about the future, but we will see more of the darker side of the earth. I really think so. I don't know if we can afford to have video games in 10 or 20 years' time...video gaming is good, but also it's a luxury. You can't play video games unless you're financially well off."
A wise man. See the full article here.
Thursday, 9 October 2008
Applique illustration
There is an artist whose colourful, and warm appliques seem to have a mysterious healing power. Today PingMag talks to Tokyo-based Yoshie, who when she is not teaching workshops, seamlessly stitches and sews her illustrative embroidery art onto picture books, ads, and CD jackets to spread the love with mixed sewing media.
First, please introduce yourself!
I work as a picture book writer and illustrator. Since the end of 2005, I have been working freelance. Now I live in an old house which contains a studio, and I spend my days creating
Yoshie’s studio in her own house. Looks like a cozy work of art already!You used to work in the apparel industry: How did it start with the picture books?
When I was a kid, I was always drawing. For a while, I wanted to become a veterinarian, and after that I wanted to work making something. I found a job in an apparel company, but I realised I wasn’t able to create the kind of world that I wanted to create. I wanted to make something with fabric and somehow naturally came back to the world of drawing that I was living in when I was a kid.
How do you think up picture book stories?
It is hard to explain, but in my mind, I just throw out fragments of ideas. So I always have all these thoughts racing around in my head! Sometimes I take memos and begin to build on ideas and start scene out of them. That is always the most exciting moment for me. Pulling together tiny little thoughts to build something new is a bit like making an applique picture.
See the full interview and more pictures over at PingMag.
Tim Westwood
This guy is ridiculous...
You've been nominated for two Mobos [best club DJ and best radio DJ]. Last year when you won best DJ, you were booed. Why?
If I was those other DJs I would be mad: this dude has won it four times, this dude is rocking Pimp My Ride like crazy, this guy has been No 1 in the game for 20 years. I'd be mad, I'd be booing. Those guys wanted to piss on my parade but that wasn't going to happen.
Some people have said you play too much US hip-hop, and that you don't champion UK music enough.
Oh man, those cats really ain't paying attention. I've championed UK from day one. On Sundays, I do a show which is nothing but grime artists. We play UK music on every show I've ever done. For anyone to say I don't support UK, find something else to hate me for, but don't hate me for that because you're getting that wrong.
People say that you pretend to be from the "street" when you're really middle-class. Do those comments bother you?
I don't see that, it's not on my radar.
You must hear it?
Honestly, baby, I get love out there, pure and simple. I'm DJing every night this week, those people who come to those parties are paying money to see me. The people who listen to the radio show listen because they love the show as part of their lives, they've grown up to it. If people don't understand me, that's their loss, man.
Is it that they don't understand you or they are confused by you? Because there seem to be two Westwoods; there's the one sitting here now, quiet and considered, and then there's the Westwood on the radio.
I'm in the entertainment game. If you come to a Westwood party, you want some energy, you want some excitement, you want me to tear it down. Now, I couldn't invite you to a Westwood party and just be sitting here chillin', kicking it back with some serious issues. You're not coming out for that. You're coming out for entertainment, you want to get your drink on, get your party on, meet girls, meet guys, whatever. But if I was screaming into your mic now, that's not going to work because we're talking about some real things here, this is talking seriously now - it's time to put your serious face on, not your game face - but it's still me.
But you must know that if you calmed down a bit, if you turned it down maybe four or five levels, you'd get less flack?
If people stumble across me and think I'm an idiot, well that's fine, but I'm not an idiot to my audience, man. I'm the hottest cat out there for my audience.
Your father was a bishop, you were born in Lowestoft, and yet you're a hip-hop DJ. Why do you think people are so interested in your upbringing?
Maybe they would want me to be a 25-year-old black guy from the 'hood, from the endz, but I'm not and I'm not making any apology for that. I never said I was that and I don't aspire to be that. I am who I am. On the show the other day I was laughing about coming from Lowestoft. I had an artist on who was from Hackney and he was all, "Howz the manz dem in Lowestoft? What's the endz like in Norwich?" It's fun, no one has a problem with it. That would be like me saying "Trevor Phillips [he means McDonald] shouldn't be reading the news, I want to see a white guy on there." Now, obviously I'm not saying that, but if somebody did say that, it'd be a fucked-up thing. So why isn't it a fucked-up thing if you're saying that to me?
Full interview here.
Historian says Beatles were just capitalists, and not youth heroes
"John Lennon controversially declared they were bigger than Jesus, and the levels of fan hysteria and devotion they engendered made them synonymous with the youth culture of the swinging 60s. But a Cambridge University historian today argues that the Beatles were not heroes of the counter-culture but capitalists who cynically exploited youth culture for commercial gain. David Fowler claims: "They did about as much to represent the interests of the nation's young people as the Spice Girls did in the 1990s."
He believes that much that has been written about the Beatles, that they were at the forefront of a cultural movement of the young, for example, is untrue. "They were young capitalists who, far from developing a youth culture, were exploiting youth culture by promoting fan worship, mindless screaming and nothing more than a passive teenage consumer."
Fowler points out the Beatles were appearing on TV shows such as the Morecambe and Wise show in 1963: "In effect, they were family entertainment, rather than at the cutting edge of youth culture."
Read the full article here.Having just finished an entire course unit on the 60s and the debate on counter-culture, I found this really interesting.
Wednesday, 8 October 2008
Amnesty appeal
"This autumn the Government wants to push through a Bill allowing police to lock people up for 42 days without charge if they are suspected of a terrorism-related offence. When the Counter-Terrorism Bill comes back to the House of Commons, your MP will have a chance to help defeat it: the Bill only passed by nine votes last time, so it will be close.
Allowing police to lock people up for a month-and-a-half without charge will undermine basic human rights to which everyone in the UK is entitled. It will also damage community relations, make intelligence gathering more difficult and possibly ruin the lives of innocent people. This Bill needlessly sacrifices important civil liberties but gains nothing in the way of security.
The only way to convince MPs to vote against 42 days is to show them how many of their constituents are against this unnecessary and counter-productive piece of legislation."
Sign the petition here.
Team Ico: new release 'coming soon'
This article over at Kotaku made me laugh:
"Sometimes it seems as though Team Ico are taking the 'explain nothing' ambiance of their games a little too much to heart.
When asked if Fumito Ueda’s followup to Ico and Shadow of the Colossus would be ready by thi year's Tokyo Game Show, Sony Worldwide's Shuhei Yoshida could only say "I cannot tel, but But I can say that they’ve been working very hard since the release of Shadow of the Colossus."
Well, I should flippin' well hope so. But come on, a little detail about the game would be nice. Is it long? Short? Is it 3D? Does it have corners? How does it taste? Anything?
“Soon you’ll see,” says Yoshida. Gaaah.
All we can say for sure is that it is out of critical production and will be ready 'soon'. Honestly, if they ever hold a proper press event for this thing they will probably make journalists traverse a mysterious landscape populated by mute PR reps to get to it. It will be shrouded in mist, and there will be limited internet access."
Some Spaced photos
This lucky guy got to meet Simon Pegg and Jessica Hynes (nee Stevenson) during the writing of Series 2 of Spaced.
"Just been digging around through some old college work from when I was at Central Saint Martins, and found this set of shots I took for a photography brief.
The brief was to document a day in the life of a comic. I'd worked in advertising a bit before college, and managed to convince a casting agent to ask Simon Pegg and Jessica Stephenson if I could spend a day with them while they worked on the scripts for the second series of Spaced.
It was a fantastic way to spend a day. They were both very funny, and very generous with their time.
(Actually, they were an utter nightmare, total prima donnas - but they gave me a tenner and a bag of chips to say they were lovely.)
It was only later that I realised I must have looked like a total fanboy stalker, as I'd bleached my hair blonde a few weeks earlier (it was an art school thing), so looked like an obsessive Simon Pegg wannabe.
They were gracious enough not to mention it."
See the full set of photos here.
Student 'antics'
Working for a University you get used to seeing them everywhere, all looking the same, trying to be 'zany', buying their posters, listening to their iPods and talking about how much of a student they are. "Oh that is such a student thing to do!", "I'm gonna go home and watch Tellytubbies because I'm such a student"... They pop their collars as if to protect themselves from the working class employees. But what really takes the biscuit for me is students thinking that it's okay to wear pajamas around campus, or even to the shops. NO! It's not okay, you look like a tw*t and I don't want to see your 'crazy' pajamas.
Monday, 6 October 2008
Misheard Lyrics
I was looking at this archive of misheard lyrics, my favourite of which was definitely: "might as well face it you're a d**k with a glove" (Robert Palmer, Addicted to love) when I remembered some of my favourites from people I know and thought I'd document them here:
"There is a line on another gazelle" - The Smiths, There is a light that never goes out
"I'll never fall, time that we're eagles" - Hundred Reasons, Falter
"You've been hit by, you've been struck by... A small criminal" - Michael Jackson, Smooth Criminal
"And you told me you wanted to eat all my sandwich" Bloc Party, This Modern Love
There's many, many more... help me out here Bek!
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