Last week, I was up in Rothes, which is in the Northeast of Scotland. I flew to Aberdeen from Birmingham – with an unscheduled stopover in Edinburgh because Aberdeen airport was temporarily broken – and then took a 90 minute drive into the countryside and out to the river Spey. I was there in my [...]
Monthly Archives: September 2010
Roasts and Records at my local 0
I did my the first of my new weekly DJ slots at the Hare and Hounds pub down the road this afternoon. They’ve turned the back room into a rather nice restaurant space, and they’re serving leisurely Sunday roast dinners. And as the people eat their meals and read the newspapers, I’m playing records – [...]
Categories: Birmingham,Food,Music
UB40′s Signing Off – 30th anniversary 0
Ub40: The 30th Anniversary Of "Signing Off" Documentary by Sam Coley on Mixcloud This is the sound of where I live – including the people I work with, like Paul Long, Sam Coley, Jez Collins and Robin Valk; the music of Birmingham and specifically Kings Heath; as well as the characters from around here as [...]
Categories: Birmingham,Music
Tagged: documentary, Radio, UB40
Myspace – now with glitter 9
The first thing you should know about the Product Manager for MySpace Music is that he’s an independent musician. He’s in a band called Big Kid. That’s him playing the drums. He also writes most of the songs. I found that both encouraging and surprising. Myspace Music Product Manager Steve Clark approached me through my [...]
Categories: Music
Tagged: Internet, New Music Strategies, online music
The trouble with special events is that they’re special 4
They’re having one of those ‘traffic-free’ cycling events in Birmingham today. They’re designed to get people on bikes and enjoying a car-free city for an afternoon. Which is cool. But it doesn’t fix the problem, it sort of absolves the people who should fix the problem, and it prevents them from actually having to address [...]
Categories: Birmingham,Politics
Meeting @nancybaym in Berlin 0
I first met Nancy Baym on Twitter, and now we’re also friends on Facebook. We’ve talked via email about a couple of things as well. She’s a professor in the US and we have some mutual friends in common, many of whom one or both of us have never actually met in person. She’s written [...]
Categories: culture,Education,Technology,University
Tagged: Academic, Internet, Interview, Music, Social media
Soul Food Sunday – Vol. 2 0
Soul Food Sunday – Vol. 2 by Dubber on Mixcloud I’ve just finished a new mix to promote the regular Sunday afternoon DJ sets I’m going to be performing as part of Soul Food Sundays at the Hare and Hounds. Not much else to say about it – except that Jake made the cover. Click [...]
Categories: Birmingham,Music
The meaning of writing according to the iPad 7
Photo of Jake ‘Andy Warhol’d’ on the iPad I thought this would be a shorter blog post than usual. I wrote it on an iPad – and while that’s not as arduous as some people would have you think (“It needs a real keyboard!”) it’s a slower process than writing it on the laptop would [...]
Categories: Technology
Tagged: iPad
How to lose friends and have rubbish conversations 13
Photo by smlions12 I’m not very good at Facebook. I know some people who are masters of it, and it pretty much dominates their web experience. Whereas, I’m in a constant struggle to make it useful, friendly and interesting all at the same time. I’m actually a little bit frightened of it. But I want [...]
Categories: Technology
Tagged: Facebook
Of course we’re still friends – I’m just ignoring you 2
Photo by estoril This started out as a discussion on Twitter, but it got a bit out of hand and I had lots of questions thrown my way as a result, so I thought I’d capture and clarify it all in a quick blog post. I kicked it all off by saying this: And then [...]
Categories: Technology