This week’s photo comes at two removes from myself; it was taken with the camera of the one and only Rusty Sheriff (Aeroplane Attack’s drummer), taken by Spikey Mark (barman, soundman, DJ, tour manager, Transit van pilot extraordinaire and long-term good buddy), and taken of us (Aeroplane Attack) battering out the riffage at our show on Monday:

Yes, I am in there; look in the dark patch at the right. They keep me there to prevent me scaring women and small children away from the front of the crowd.

Album of the week

Actually not an album; it’s more of an EP, and I’m not entirely sure if it’s on release as anything other than a demo. But nonetheless I commend unto you the self-titled EP by Wraptors, who play something like a combination of The Hellacopters, King Crimson and Fugazi. Post-prog’n'roll – you heard it here first, kids.

Writing about books

You’ll note how I include this section every week, just to make myself feel bad for not having done any reviewing^[1]. That said, I have actually been getting some reading in; it’s not like I’m short of stuff to talk about. Time^[2], on the other hand…

Freelance

Connecting neatly to that previous statement, everything’s still hellishly busy here in the office. This is a good thing; if there hadn’t been so many gigs to watch (and play) this week I’d probably be further ahead than I am, but next week is looking pretty sparse for extracurricular stuff, and hence ripe for some long evenings of deck-clearing. If the weather stays like it is, it’s not as if I’ll have many other options!

Futurismic

All is well at Futurismic; a good week for traffic again, and a sudden spate of posts about computer games. One of the things I like most about blogging is being in a position to see these themes bubble up out of the Zeitgeist; reminds me that the world’s just one big emergent system. Synchronicity is meaningless, but all the more beautiful and fascinating for that.

Books and magazines seen

Nothing new for a second week running. Then again, it’s been a slow week for new music arriving, as well… the music and publishing industries have their own little biorhythms, too. All part of that Zeitgeist, y’see.

Coda

As I did an Aeroplane Attack update separately, I think I’ve pretty much said my piece for the week, except to point out that playing one gig and going to watch two more in the same week is as tiring as it is fun, and it would be nice to be paid to do nothing else but make loud music or watch other people doing so. But if we were to start listing all the things that it would be nice to do for a living, we’d be here for hours! So I’ll spare us all the tedium and just wish you a good weekend – look after yourselves, OK?

[ ¹ - You'll probably also note that it doesn't seem to have any effect, unless you're of a more forgiving nature than myself. ]
[ ² - Stop me if you've heard this one before, yeah? ]

… but we have them anyway. Because since when did “need” enter into the rock’n'roll equation, eh? Behold!

Our drumber[sic] made up the logo, which we’re all rather chuffed with. Aircraft buffs will note that the plane depicted is a Vulcan bomber. Ever heard one of those take off nearby, say, at an airshow or something?

Well, know you know what Aeroplane Attack sound like. We’re playing our first gig tomorrow night. I am, to coin a phrase, kinda bricking it. But it’s going to a lot of fun – please come by if you’re in Velcro City for Saturday evening.

Writing about music

Shockingly behind this week for various reasons, but TDP is still ticking over pretty much daily.

Album of the week

This will surprise (and quite possibly appall) a few readers, but I’m going to plump for Shallow Life by Italian goth-metal-popsters Lacuna Coil. Oh yes, it’s cheesy as hell and totally overproduced, not to mention lacking any vibe of authenticity. But by hell it’s catchy, and sometimes that’s enough. Especially when you’ve only listened to two new albums in the last week or so…

… though if you’ll accept a reissue, the Brendan O’Brien remixed and remastered version of Pearl Jam’s Ten (only available on the deluxe and hideously expensive version, folks!) is a well-executed polish job on an album whose primary flaw was always its budget production. Take a trip back to 1992 as it should have sounded.

Writing about books

Sheesh, what do you know – I’ve not written any reviews this week. Though, to be fair, I’ve been compiling notes for This is Not a Game, and that should pretty much write itself once I sit down and attack it for a few hours. I’ve also been mired in reporting on an unusually competent (but very long) novel typescript, so it’s not like my brain’s been having a holiday from books. Frankly, managing to squeeze in an hour of reading before bed is about all that’s keeping me sane right now…

Freelance

Much as it should do (what with it being my job and all) the ol’ freelance work has been really chewing up my time this week. And to little obvious progress; last week I finally bit the bullet and ordered my first dedicated server, and the last seven days have been largely focussed on learning how to set up and run the thing. Thanks to some helpful hints and hands-on tweaking from friends with relevent skill-sets (cheers, Phil!), the machine is now serving pages to the web. Those pages are only the demo pages of a sample MODx install, though, so lots of work still to do (on the server and in general). Aye caramba!

Futurismic

The Big F rolls on relentlessly; a new piece of original fiction goes up in seven days time, one columnist is about to change direction and another is about to join the fold. Plus the usual bloggery from the fuzzy line between today and tomorrow… won’t you come join us?

Books and magazines seen

Nothing at all this week, I’m afraid, with the exception of the latest issue of SOUTH Poetry. This is not a problem; I have plenty to read already.

Public appearances

April is shaping up to be the month in which I appear in the public domain as more than a mere pedestrian.

• Back on Wednesday night, the Aeroplane Attack gang were interviewed on a local radio station (which, as we pointed out at the time, is a weird thing to happen to a band yet to play their frst show).
• This afternoon saw me talking over Skype with Tony from StarShipSofa, long-time internet amigo Jeremy Tolbert and Tor.com’s unfeasibly-multitasking Pablo Defendini for the second instalment of the Sofanauts podcast, which should be available at the weekend
• Tomorrow night is Aeroplane Attack’s debut gig
• Next Wednesday sees me attending the Arthur C Clarke Awards ceremony as an employee of the publisher of one of the shortlisted books

Cripes. And we’ve got another gig lined up for Monday 11th May, too. It’s like a runaway train, y’know? Exhilarating, but a bit scary too. But as Hunter used to say: “buy the ticket, take the ride”.

Coda

It’s a common refrain, for sure, but it should be evident I’m pretty busy. And I expect you are, too – whether it be with worky-type stuff or getting the most out of your weekend downtime – so I’m going to sign off before dosing myself up with pills in an attempt to shift the last of this headcold before tomorrow’s show. Whatever’s on your to-do list, have as much fun doing it as you can, OK?

Oh, and did I mention I’m playing a gig tomorrow? Yes? OK, then.

An appropriate title for today, in some respects; after a few weeks of very passable sunny (though brisk) weather, Velcro City is once again drowsing beneath a sky the same dull grey as pre-dotcom computer hardware, the pavements slick with a noncommittal rain that suggests even the elements can’t be bothered to do anything properly today – bank holiday Friday, innit, mush?

Appropriate or not, it seems I never FPB’d any of the shots from the Mono show^[1] I caught the other week, so here you go:

Great band (as suggested by the liberal deployment of Fender Jazzmaster guitars, among other things). Good music for cold dismal weather, too.

Of course, if I was at Eastercon with the great and the good (and the weird) of British science fiction, I wouldn’t give a monkey’s about the weather. But I’m not, so I do. Selah.

About that service interruption

So, yeah, last week. To cut a long story short: my girlfriend finished with me. She had some justification for being upset with me; whether her response was proportional to the issue in question given the prevailing circumstances of her life is something only she can judge. I’m gutted, but I’m getting on with stuff. Life’s too bloody busy to sit around and mope; I neither need nor deserve pity.

That’s about it.

Album of the week

Suitably enough, the best album I’ve heard in the last few weeks has been Mono’s Hymn To the Immortal Wind. Go buy it.

Writing about books

In a shock turn of events, I’m well behind on review writing – I need to get finished on Reading Science Fiction (eds. James Gunn et al), but that should be in some respects less challenging than a fiction review, given that it’s supposed to be criticism of criticism. Then again, I may prove to be fooling myself there. We’ll see.

I still haven’t reviewed Cyberabad Days, either, which is second on the priority stack. And last night I finished reading Chris Beckett’s Marcher, so I need to do a reading journal entry for that as well. If you want to read a thorough review of Marcher by someone better qualified, Niall’s Strange Horizons piece is the one you need.

Futurismic

It’s business as usual at the world’s foremost near-future science fiction webzine… at least as far as content rolling out of the door is concerned, anyway. I have a big list of emails that need to be sent regarding new fiction purchases for the coming months, and it’s high time I got them done.

In other news, I’m in the process of roping in a new columnist to the team, which looks like it may work out pretty well. It’ll be good to have another new voice on board. Now, have you read Tim Pratt’s story for this month yet? No? Well, get to it – it’s short but fun.

Freelance

It’s all go in on the business side of life at the moment, largely thanks to me dropping the metaphorical balls of productivity last week and scrabbling to get them airborne again. This is the major upside of not being at Eastercon, namely having a whole long weekend to get myself back up to speed (and to schedule) with a bunch of different projects and tasks. Which should, in turn, distract me from thinking about how much I’d rather be at Eastercon.^[2]

Plenty of other interesting stuff on the horizon, too. Myself and Adam Wintle of Mallmus Media are putting together a two-prong pitch for a fairly prestigious local project, which will be a lot of fun to do if we land it. We’ve also been swapping experiences with different CMS packages and hosting options, and I’m now pretty much convinced that it’s time to rent myself a proper VPS or dedicated server and stop pissing around with huckster hosting companies. Which means all I have to do is choose a good vendor and learn how to do command line sysadmin tasks… anyone got any Modafinil?

But hey, I’m busy, and there’s work in the inbox. That’s something to be grateful for.

Aeroplane Attack

So, it’s our first gig in just over a fortnight, which is pretty cool. We’re pretty confident that we’ve got our set sorted and rehearsed; now all there is to worry about are the logistical challenges of crowbarring a five-piece band who have four half-stack amps and a drum kit between them into the limited space available in the actual venue… well, that and selling more tickets, of course.

But hey, you can help with the latter by buying one yourself over the magical tubes of the intermuhwebs! Three quid for three bands, one of which is a frighteningly loud reincarnation of the fuzzy melodics of nineties grunge, shoegazer and alt-rock? That’s a bargain right there, so buy one right now.

Go on.

Books and magazines seen

No fresh books in the last few weeks (or rather “no books in which I’m interested and haven’t yet already seen a different edition or binding of”), but the turn of the season means that the quarterly poetry mags are starting to arrive. So far we’ve had Obsessed With Pipework and the newly redesigned Iota… if the latter’s content has improved as much as its outer appearance, it’s going to be a real contender.

Coda

So, not the most gripping of FPBs, but what can I say – that’s just the way it works out sometimes, y’know? Anyway, you’re probably either at Eastercon or doing something else to enjoy the long weekend, and I’ve got stuff to do, so I’ll play the hand of mercy and shut the hell up. Have fun doing whatever it is you’re doing, and take care of yourselves. Hasta luego.

[ ¹ - Like many venues nowadays, Digital uses those horrible light cans that have LEDs instead of incandescent bulbs. Great for the environment (and cheaper in the long run), but they make getting a decent shot of a live band with a cheap camera a virtual impossibility. Meh. Mono look good a bit blurred, anyhow. ]

[ ² - Yeah, like that's gonna work. ]

Well, you know musicians and their propensity for keerrrrrrazy highjinx. Somehow last Sunday (for reasons now forgotten) my bandmate Phil ended up playing some evolving little riff for about ten minutes with a tote bag^[1] on his head.

I’d like to be able to claim we were using some Eno-esque oblique strategies to come up with new ideas, but it would be more honest to confess we were mostly just mucking around…

Writing about music

We’re nearly back up to full throttle at TDP, so I’ve been writing more reviews. This year so far has seen an unprecedented number of submissions from unsigned bands, which is excellent – people getting off their arses instead of waiting for a label to come knocking is great news. However, some of them would be much better off working on their music beforehand…

Those of you among the Twitterati may have noticed that I’m now contributing #SoundBytes – 140-character album reviews – to Outshine, Jetse De Vries‘ Tweetmag. This is, incidentally, my first pro (and paid!) column of any sort, so I’m rather chuffed about it! My reviews go out every Tuesday evening (European time), so do tune in.

Jetse has managed to convince no less a luminary than Lucius Shepard for the movie reviews column on the Thursday slot; that’s one hell of a name to share a masthead with, I reckon.

Album of the week

Nothing particularly award-worthy reviewed this week (though the best of the rest would be Chickenhawk’s eponymous début of stoner-spazzcore), so I’m going to recommend an old favourite in the form of Devin Townsend’s Terria, one of the man’s more thoughtful solo side-project efforts. Because, sometimes, all you need is a bipolar be-skulleted Canadian guitar wizard.

Townsend seems to be one of those artists you either love or hate; I’m happy to fit into the former camp, having seen him perform live both as himself (i.e. fronting The Devin Townsend Band) and as frontman for the ridiculously heavy and unhinged Strapping Young Lad. If you’re into metal and you’ve not tried his stuff before, follow those links to Last FM and have a listen. I defy you to be indifferent.

Writing about books

Ah, the magic of procrastination! Having reached a particularly tricky bit of my Mind Over Ship review, I engaged the displacement engines and battered out a little review of Ehsin Masood’s Science & Islam, a History. In summary: decent little introductory text to a subject that’s much bigger than you may realise.

A little breathing space in the reading schedule has seen me start off on Kay Kenyon’s Bright of the Sky. Enjoying it so far, though Kenyon moves POV in mid-scene from time to time – although it’s always clearly signposted, it’s not a style I encounter often, and as such it can be a bit jarring. But so far it’s a strong story with a good premise, blending a sort of Greg Bear meets Greg Egan sf future with a science fantasy world set in the dimension next door; promises to get more interesting very quickly.

Freelance

The first fortnight of freelancing has been staggeringly unglamorous, largely involving clearing down a backlog of administrivia and catching up on daily tasks disrupted by my jaunt Northwards last week. But things are limbering up, and the daily schedule is starting to look a lot more manageable as I whittle away at it all. Now, if I could just mend my sleep-deprived^[2] bodyclock and get up at the same time every morning, I’d be rocking in the free world…

Now there’s a bit of temporal space, I can start on a few of those ’someday soon’ tasks that have been sat in my Remember The Milk inbox for months… things like skinning my portfolio site and making it something more than a newly-installed honey-jar for spam-bots, f’rinstance.

Futurismic

I’m pretty happy with things at Futurismic at the moment. The increase in output over the last few weeks (facilitated by a new approach to pre-planning posts the day before) is showing traffic dividends already, which is great news.

My interview with Bruce Sterling went up to much less fanfare than I had hoped, but seems to have been well-received by those who read it. It’ll still stand out as a golden fanboy moment for me, though… at least until the day I get to meet Sterling in person^[3].

We’ve got a new story in the purchase process, too; another sober piece, but one I think folk are going to like, so keep ‘em peeled. In the meantime, Marissa Lingen’s “Erasing the Map” is short, smart and thought-provoking, so why not take a ten-minute break and read it now, eh?

Creative writing

Oooh, look, a new FPB section! As much to keep myself informed as for the benefit of you lot, I figure I’ll keep a vague record of my non-work related writing output here as well. And as such I can report that, while story writing has not yet been achieved (thanks to the aforementioned bodyclock wreckage), I’ve probably written more poetry in the last month than I did in the preceding year. That’s not to say it’s good poetry, of course, but it feels nice to get the engines turning again, and it comes a little easier every time.

I’m wondering how much it has helped that I restarted journalling at the beginning of the year – just scribbling down an account of the day in a Moleskine before I go to sleep. It seems to have the effect of making me remember the ephemera of things a little more clearly, and enables me to map my thinking-over-time a little better.

That said, it’s all banal so far (with occasional flashes where something grabs my mind and runs off with the pen); the downside is it can reveal just how much of your time you spend doing effectively nothing. Hmm. The unexamined life, and all that.

Books and magazines seen

Another mailout from the BSFA appeared last week, including the first issue of Vector not to feature a review by me for quite some time, if memory serves. Still plenty of other good stuff in there, though, most of which (along with Focus) I have yet to read the bulk of.

The last fortnight has seen the arrival of the mass-market paperback of Iain M Banks’ Matter (bringing my total to four different editions, only the promo ARC of which has actually been read), and the final bound ARC version of Toby Litt’s generation ship story Journey Into Space (no, I still haven’t gotten round to the spiral-bound galley they sent a while back; it’s in the TBR queue).

Genuinely new titles appearing in the last fortnight include the arrival of a new title from Icon Books (literally the day after the Science & Islam review, which felt a little spooky). This one’s a lot more beefy – Atomic: the First War of Physics and the Secret History of the Atom Bomb 1939-49 by Jim Baggott.

Looks fascinating; also looks immense (550 pages plus, medium font). So many books, so little time… a sentiment that applies equally to this week’s other new arrival in the form of a limited edition (#204 of 555) ARC of China Mieville’s new title, The City & The City:

You can all be jealous now. The time will be found to read that book very soon, I can assure you.

Coda

So, yeah; a busy fortnight that included a four-day jag to Manchester by train (miraculously avoiding any snow-based snarl-ups), the ordering of a kick-arse new computer (which has yet to arrive – guessing on Monday) and purchasing of a second-hand Wacom Bamboo tablet (cheers, Jasper), one pub quiz, two band rehearsals, one live gig (The Confederate Dead at The Cellars in Eastney; one of our better local bands), a lot of hours at the keyboard, and a distinct lack of opportunity to sit and panic about the future. Which strikes me as a pretty decent start to this whole freelance malarkey… though it is only a start, and I need to be building up momentum sooner rather than later. Onward and upwards, eh?

Anyway, the weekend’s here and I’ve got stuff to do – and I’ll bet you have, as well. So let’s bid each other a good weekend and get to it, shall we? Yeah, why not!

Take care, folks.

[ ¹ - The tote bag in question is used by our bassplayer to carry his pedal board. That's just how rock and roll we are, yo. ]

[ ² - The ongoing upstairs neighbour issues are, er, ongoing. ]

[ ³ - This will no doubt be a horrible melange of fawning and gibbering on my part, despite my hopes that I'd be calm, erudite and incisive. Looking at how Sterling made my emailed questions sound naive without even trying to, however, I can confidently predict that, face-to-face, he'll make me seem (and feel) about two foot tall should the opportunity ever arise. ]

Gah, curse this miserable season. The few moments of sunshine there have been this week have occurred when I have, perforce, had to be indoors. As a consequence I’m grumpy and my bodyclock is still wrecked… and I’ve not been out taking photos.

So here’s a group portrait of Aeroplane Attack, the band in which I make loud squalling noises with a guitar, as taken by our drummer Rusty Sheriff.

That Converse sponsorship deal^[1] is really working out well, despite Rusty’s insistence on rocking the Adidas. As an additional bonus, here’s the equipment with which I make the aforementioned noises:

Lovely. The temptation to deploy the thing at full volume at home in recent weeks has been difficult to suppress. Lucky for my neighbours that I’m a nice bloke at heart, eh?

Writing about music

The TDP slow-down has become a full stop, near as dammit. Waiting for a review from a friend to post early next week, and then I shall be putting up the webzine equivalent of the “Gone Fishing” sign for a week or so.

Album of the week

Not that there’s many to choose from, this week’s top pick is Satya by My Sleeping Karma. Buddha-flavoured psychedelic/stoner space-rock; music for, ah, sitting still to. Yes.

Writing about books

No sustained reviewing has been committed this week, though I’ve been taking notes on Melko’s Singularity’s Ring (which I finished last night, as it happens).

Freelance

The Pretty Big Project still awaits some final choices and finishing, so that’s on the simmer ring for now; T’other Project is proceeding slower than I’d like, principally because my brain is so damned slow at the moment that I can’t concentrate on anything properly and keep making a lot of silly mistakes as a result. Still, getting there slowly.

Lots of other little updates for other clients, too; it’s that time of year, I guess.

PS Publishing

I expect you’ve probably noticed the announcements over at PS Publishing regarding some of our plans for the company’s tenth anniversary, but I might just mention there’s more where that came from. Keep watching the skies!

Futurismic

Also having a bit of an unintentional slow-down over at Futurismic at the moment, partly because it’s a struggle to find anything genuinely newsworthy in amongst the OMG Ten Best [X]!!1 lists and silly season stories. But so it goes.

Books and magazines seen

Just the one incoming title of note this week, namely an ARC of Mind Over Ship by David Marusek.

I went totally doolally over Marusek’s début novel Counting Heads when it came out, so I begged and pleaded with Niall to let me take this one on for Strange Horizons; Niall evidently can’t stand to witness a (theoretically) grown man debase himself in such a manner, so he caved in and got it sent over from the States. w00t!

Coda

Ludicrous how fast the week has passed, especially when compared to the productivity levels achieved… I suspect I’m partly ursine in origin, which would explain my imperative desire to curl up somewhere warm in early October and sleep through until mid-March, at which point to wake up and raise merry and energetic hell with the world in general. I have yet to find an employer sympathetic to this particular lifestyle pattern, however. Selah – at least you are spared my verbosity by the gloom, eh?

But here we are: it’s Friday, and The Allegedly Festive Season is next week. This year is almost done, and it feels like I only just started it! Still, it’s all just arbitrary temporal markers, innit? Now, I need to get some food going on before cracking on with some work… have a great weekend, girls and boys. Hasta luego!

[ ¹ - No, we're not actually sponsored by Converse. But we'd quite like to be sponsored by Mosrite, Electro Harmonix and Devi Ever. Just so you know, like. ]

Set the controls for the heart of the stash! Here’s the keyboard guy of wig-out psych-rock space-cadets Pilgrim Fathers. He’s evidently not down with the whole “standing-up” thing:

T’was a good show on Wednesday night, with Pilgrim Fathers and the oh-so-controversial-no-really Gay For Johnny Depp* supporting the staggeringly good 65daysofstatic.

However, it seems that when I get sent to interview an act something bad happens to them – Pilgrim Fathers caught a flat tyre on the motorway that afternoon, and only arrived at the venue an hour before doors. Needless to say, the interview is being rescheduled …

Writing about music

The second week of full-time day-job mania has meant keeping up with The Dreaded Press has been a strain once again, but here we are at another Friday and I seem to have survived with deadlines and sanity (marginally) intact.

Album of the week was probably the audio insanity of iots by flu.ID – be warned, it’s not for the faint-hearted.

Writing about books

I have, somehow, managed to crowbar a first draft of the Severian Of The Guild review into my schedule this week**. The challenge will lie in making it plain that, while I personally found the crescendo of Biblical allegory to be incredibly wearisome and off-putting, I’m not the sort of person who thinks religious themes have no place in literature at all. Hoping to go over it a second time this weekend.

Finished reading Walter Jon Williams’ Implied Spaces last weekend; will be squeezing a VCTB review out as soon as schedule permits.

Freelance stuff

As some of you may have already noticed, the other aspect of my expanding freelance duties has been announced – I’m the new webgeek and online publicity personage for PS Publishing! Thanks to everyone who has already sent their congratulations, it’s very kind of you. I have an awful lot to live up to as I step into Darren’s shoes.

Of course, I’ll feel a lot more like I’m actually doing these jobs once I get back to having the time to get started on them*** … but still, yay me! More details on this when (a) I have them and (b) I can think straight.

Books and magazines seen

The Yen Press manga imprint continues to baffle with their polar-opposite themes; one book on raising an autistic child, the other a sniggering smutfest of obvious gags about a demon and a sexually-stereotyped Japanese schoolgirl who have accidentally swapped bodies. Go figure.

Also from Orbit comes a new Jeff Somers novel, The Digital Plague, as well as cookie-cutter vampire-shagger number fourteen from the high queen of vampire-shaggers … fourteen books? Empirical proof that quality and popularity are completely unrelated properties, if such were needed. Will nobody think of the trees?

I’ve been given an interesting non-fiction title for a long-deadline Vector review: Love And Sex With Robots by David Levy.

Promises to be an interesting read, that’s for certain. Robot-shaggers > vampire-shaggers.

Coda

Well, I’m exhausted. A fortnight of full-time work plus all my other commitments has worn me out thoroughly, and if it weren’t for the amazing ability of caffeine to prop up the otherwise unconscious, I’d not have made it through at all.

I was under the (sadly erroneous) impression that I had this coming Monday off work, but it turns out that isn’t the case – it will in fact be my final full day before my colleague returns from her holiday. Still, I can manage just one more day … though I feel I’ll be doing a whole lot of sleeping this weekend.

It’s either that or have some sort of breakdown; much like the ILLUMINATIONS episode, I’ve been gamely skating along the cliff-edge of my ability to cope under pressure, but I know that I need to rest properly or risk the consequences. I’m aware that learning (and testing) your limits is a good thing, but from where I’m sat right now I could do without it … at least for the next six months or so while I settle into the new regime of the freelance****.

But I’ll not complain – things seem to be going pretty well, and if hecticness is a symptom of positive change then I guess I can live with it. It’s just that I’ll live with it a bit better once I’ve had a long lay down in a dark room.

Anyway, enough of my jabber – I can’t think of anything entertaining or interesting to say. I’m going to take my aching shoulders and itchy eyes around the corner to fetch another Hard-earned And Much-anticipated Friday Curry Of Justice before steeling myself for a weekend of catching up with all the little things I’ve had to let slide this last fortnight.

I hope that you have a good weekend yourself … hopefully one blessed with weather somewhat less rotten than today’s, too.

Hasta luego, amigos.

[ ** I honestly can't remember writing any of it, which is quite scary ... but there it is in my Google Docs account. Home espresso makers are dangerous things, kids. ]

[ *** SRSLY. Sixteen hour days have been killing me. ]

[ **** So why do I still crank out a few pages of blather for FPB every week? Because routine is an anchor for sanity, basically. This actually relaxes me, and I can do it piecemeal. ]

I smell serious memetic potential – you can blame Jeff VanderMeer*.

So – you can assemble a rock band out of science fiction authors living or dead. Who do you pick, what do they call themselves, and what’s their signature cover version? [image by flashbacks.com]

***

Shaper and the Mechanists

Drums: M. John Harrison. The guy’s got rhythm – rock climbing’s all about timing. Plus drummers are often way more poetic and thoughtful than the cliches would suggest.

Bass: Charlie Stross. I suspect very strongly that, given half a chance, Charlie could get his groove on in a fearsome way. Rock-star facial hair a bonus.

Keys: William Gibson. He wouldn’t do riffs and melodies so much as pads and atmospheres; a kind of post-rock approach. Will gradually accumulate a vast bank of interconnected effects and found-sound devices by poking around in Cash Converters in each town the band plays.

Rhythm guitar: Rudy Rucker. Already has experience with the instrument, and knows a good riff when he writes one. Could probably out-Townsend Pete Townsend with his power chords.

Lead guitar: Neal Stephenson. Aloof, idiosyncratic, a unique style often imitated but never duplicated. Like Charlie Stross, not averse to rock-star facial hair. Also a fan of Soundgarden, so must know what good guitar lines sound like.

Backing vox/posturing/inexplicable extra stage presence (aka “Bez“): Cory Doctorow. Give him a megaphone and a silly hat, feed him up with … er, sugary foods and caffeine? … and just let him do his thing. Guaranteed to PWN hecklers and get the crowd moving.

Lead vox/songwriter: Bruce Sterling**. He may not have the perfect voice, but every single song would be about something important, and you’d find new meaning with every listen. Inter-song banter would be awesome.

Tour manager: Hunter S Thompson. OK, so not a science fiction writer, but I figure I can have one genre-breaker. No one is going to stiff the band on a deal with HST handling the biz. Plus the band will stay largely drug-free, because all illicit substances will be “headed off at the pass”, so to speak.

A&R guy: Harlan Ellison. Typecasting, I guess.

Cover version: “We’re In This Together” – Nine Inch Nails. Simply because it’s an awesome tune.

***

Damn; I really want to see this band now. Maybe the band I joined recently could be the support act!

[ * Not just for this post, either - you could try to pin the decline of postmodern culture and the sub-prime crisis on him too. It wouldn't be very fair, though, let alone true. ]

[ ** This was a foregone conclusion, of course. Fanboy is as fanboy does. ]

Those of you who like my live music photography are in luck; those of you not so keen have probably been longing for periods with steady sunny weather wherein I have more time on my hands. Sorry!

This is the bizarrely-named Grog, singer and bass-player of a three-piece band called Die So Fluid:

Don’t be put off by the pseudo-goth fetish outfit; their music is straight-up chunky alt-rock, close to the metallic end as far as heaviness is concerned, and wow – she can really sing. Proper gutsy vocals, none of your Gwen Stefani schlock.

Go check ‘em out on MySpazz if you don’t believe me – great band, live and on record.

Writing about music

The results of my night out in Southampton last week can be seen above, at least in part; Die So Fluid [live review] were supporting My Ruin [live review], who I also interviewed.

The pictures of the My Ruin set were unfortunately awful, thanks to a combination of poor lighting, low-end dSLR, a push-and-shove mosh pit … and my lack of ability to compensate for all three of them. Life’s a learning curve, eh?

Another busy week for CD reviews, but there’s a sort of pang about it – by Sunday, I will have finished my last weekly batch of reviews for sites other than my own.

I’ll still be writing for Subba-Cultcha and Pennyblack on an occasional basis, but I’ve reached a point where I need to devote all my music writing time to The Dreaded Press. The work is coming in steadily, and I need to stay on top of it.

But in the spirit of assessing ones achievements, it’s pretty impressive to me that in less than twelve full months writing for those two sites I’ve managed to rack up over 250 pieces of work (if you include the ones yet to be published).

You’d be forgiven for not believing me – I find it quite astonishing myself – but you can see the proof as a list of items tagged with my name at del.icio.us.

Crikey.

Writing about books

Minimal once again; see above. Will hopefully pick up steam again; see above. I did manage to get the latest Interzone review offers list out of the electronic door, though.

I sent a re-polished edit of my review of McDonald’s Brasyl to Andy Sawyer at Foundation; he seems pretty pleased with it, and reckons it will only need further trimming if the other pending material is equally excessive in length.

I don’t know if you remember me whining on about how immensely frustrated I was at being unable to hammer that particular leviathan of a review into shape at the time*?

Well, here’s a lesson for my self-critical facilities – with some relatively minor edits, it actually read fairly well. Amazing what a distance of a few months can make – I now understand the fiction writer’s advice about leaving stories fallow before editing them.

Currently reading Gene Wolfe’s Severian Of The Guild, and enjoying it immensely – although I can see a lot of reasons it might infuriate others. It reminds me of Mervyn Peake, though, and it’ll take a lot of frustration to dull that particular shine as far as I’m concerned.

As for analysing it from a reviewer’s perspective, however, I have no idea where I’ll even start. That said, I’ve not even finished the first book of four yet.

Other stuff

Much to the great frustration of a vocal minority of readers who have actually made a point of asking me about it**, the Great Pending Announcement will not be made today – it will be made on Monday 11th, for reasons that should become clear when the announcement is made.

But the way forward is clear and unobstructed – or at least as unobstructed as it’s going to get. Keep watching the skies.

Books and magazines seen

Zero on the fresh literature front this week, with the arguable exception of some very smutty manga from Yen Press that has no real literary merit that I can discern.

Let me be plain – I’m in no way opposed to the sale of smut (I’d be a hypocrite if I were), but sheesh – either give it a decent plot or stop pretending, y’know? An absolute endorsement of the adage that something labelled “not suitable for minors” might as well be labelled “will only be of interest to minors, mostly male”.

The end of an era twice over, too – picked up the final instalments of Doug Rushkoff’s Testament and Brian K Vaughn’s Y: The Last Man.

Y:TLM is a great piece of science fiction, though I’m sure the film they’re threatening to make will strip all the good bits out.

To fill the small but poignant gap that my only two running comic subscriptions have created by ending, I’ve put a couple of Warren Ellis titles on order. Yay!

TTAcon

It is my intent to head up to the Big Smoke by train tomorrow for TTAcon 9, a gathering of folk connected to TTA Press, be they staff or readers.

It’s being held at a pub called Filthy MacNastys near King’s Cross on Saturday 9th February – full details at the TTA website.

If you end up going along and you see me there, please make a point of saying hello – it’s nice to meet people from the intarwebs.

However, my attendance or otherwise is dependent on me clearing a bunch of writing this evening and tomorrow morning … I’m pretty sure I’m going to make it, though.

Coda

Those interested in the results of my frugality experiments will be fascinated to hear that I haven’t spent any unnecessary money since this time last week (with the obvious exception, which was declared in advance anyway).

Still not smoking, no alcohol for seven days, minor but daily exercise, early rising. It’s uncanny; I feel like I’m living someone else’s life. Part of me hopes they’ll ask for it back real soon; the other part is trying to decide how it should arrange the furniture.

But as for now I’m busy busy busy, so I’m going to wrap this up and get on with my proper work. Well, right after The Friday Curry, that is.

Hasta luego, amigos.

[ * You'd be forgiven for forgetting, because I was beginning to sound like a scratched record or a particularly uninspired televangelist. ]

[ ** This actually happened. It was very flattering - and it made me realise that I'm not the only person in the world who needs to get out more. ]

These chaps are from a band called Minus The Bear who I went to review on Monday – and who have now been added to my “how the hell did I avoid discovering them before?” list.

They do a kind of super-technical post-hardcore progressive thing, but with very minimal distortion … and a lot of delay and effects, as should be obvious.

Really great stuff – go take a listen. “Knights” is a winner.

I know that’s technically a very flawed photo, but I really liked the way the one guy is motion blurred when everything else is sharp. Kinda captures the atmosphere a bit.

I still can’t get good results in colour; I think I need a faster lens or something. Still, black and white is classy.

More photos here – advice and criticism welcome.

Writing about music

Yeah, so I reviewed a show on Monday, and it was very good indeed. This week has been mostly killing off pending deadlines before [holiday which shall remain nameless], with little in the way of published stuff – I think it’s being held back for the next few weeks.

Editors are sensible people*.

Writing about books

No concrete work in the LitCrit department, I’m afraid.

I’m currently reading M. John Harrison’s Light and applying post-it notes to pages in my usual fashion, but I don’t think I stand a chance of even scratching the surface of it in a review.

Reading Light is like being a rainforest dweller dumped into the middle of New York – you know it’s an awesome work of genius, but it’s completely beyond you describe the individual functional parts and explain how it all fits together.

Also in the process of compiling the inevitable “best books of 2007″ pieces for various outlets, which is why I probably won’t bother posting one on VCTB – there’ll be one in Vector, one on Strange Horizons and one in Interzone (plus a simple list at SF Site), if you’re really curious about my opinions.

Speaking of SF Site, my review of Adam Roberts’ Headless went live over there. Doctor Roberts seems to be quite happy with it (but then you can never be sure – it’s the clever way he writes, you see).

Writing about other stuff

Zip. Still faffing about learning web-dev stuff like PHP, trying to dredge up my memories of object-orientated programming from my teens.

Programming is just like riding a bike – you never entirely forget how it’s done, but if you leave it in the shed for years it gets horribly rusty and looks very dated and clunky compared to everyone else’s**.

Books and magazines seen

No magazines this week. But in magazine-related news, you may well be aware that you can now get Interzone electronically from Fictionwise – I may well give that a try once my paper sub runs out.

Last week’s red-card parcel delivery was (as I suspected) an Orbit item, and one that looks rather interesting:

So that’s going on holiday with me in the coming week; I think it deserves a crack of the whip.

It certainly looks more promising than the plentiful vampire-boffing stuff (another of which arrived this week, in the company of a brace of fantasies).

Coda

Blimey, the year is almost over. I’ll refrain from musing and sentiment – partly because I’m not good at sentiment, and partly because there’s stuff I need to get done this evening so I can trundle off up north for a few days.

I will say this, though – I’m not a fan of [unnamed holiday] myself, but nor am I a humbug. So I hope that all of you have whatever sort of winter-centric festival and celebration it is you like best, in the company of people you care about and doing things you like doing.

But I bet you all envy me – I get to celebrate tomorrow’s solstice by spending ten hours on a coach! Yeah, beeyotches; you see me rollin’ – you hatin’.

But like I say, there are things to be done – not least of which being the observation of my own personal religious ritual, namely the procurement and consumption of The (Festive) Friday Curry. But first, I’d better go collect my laundry …

Have a good holiday, ladies and gents.

[** In case you're interested, I offer services in metaphor mangling and analogy overextension at extremely reasonable rates.]

[tags]friday, photo, Minus The Bear, band, gig, live, writing, music, books, blather[/tags]

A little live music action for this week’s FPB. This is a shot of the superb band iLiKETRAiNS in action at the Joiners Arms in Southampton on 13th September (last night):

Suffice to say they’re far better musicians than I am a photographer. The demands of shooting live music are many, and I’m still fumbling around at the bottom of the learning curve. I have, at least, discovered that an excess of red stage lighting is best dealt with by taking shots in black and white … which is quite apropos for iLiKETRAiNS, although given their propensity for writing songs about historical characters and events, sepia-tint would probably be even better.

Added bonus plant blogging! – after waking up grumpy on Monday morning, I decided some retail therapy was in order. When I do retail therapy, I don’t go and buy shoes or clothes (two activities which, far from cheering me up, tend to stress me out even more). Oh, no. I buy plants. So here are the new additions to my extensive cactus orchard:

I love cacti (Freudian analysts, don’t let the door hit your arse on the way out, please). They come in so many different forms, and they’re such an elegant solution to the environment in which they evolved. The hairy one is just brilliant. I mean, what the hell is it hairy for? Some sort of moisture retention, I assume. Research is required …

Stuff I’ve been doing – mostly music related

Well, you already know what I was doing last night, namely interviewing and reviewing iLiKETRAiNS (lovely bunch of well-spoken young blokes, and they make astonishingly good music). Go check them out on MySpace. It was a great night out; the Joiners is a superb venue if you’re a fan of the more obscure bands, because it’s just the right size to give a really intimate feel to the shows.

That said, it’s a bit too intimate when the shows are sell-outs, but last night there was a merciful abundance of elbow-rooom – probably not such good news for the bands themselves, but much easier on the audience.

The support act, Lisa Lindley-Jones (beware: Flash-based website), was quite something as well, a sort of post-folk singer-songstress, delicate voice and clever songs. I’ll link to the review and interview in a daily link-dump once they go live (should be within a few weeks).

This was a two-gig week; Wednesday saw me down at The Wedgewood Rooms for the long-awaited return of local heroes Little London, back with a new line-up and some new songs. If you like your rock and roll fast, sweaty and drenched in whisky, you should give them a listen – though in the spirit of transparency that I maintain here at VCTB, I should make the point that I know the band members quite well, and Dev the frontman has been a friend for a number of years.

But hey, I know enough about music to see past my personal biases. I’d like Little London even if they weren’t my friends. Maybe you will too – why not give them a listen? Friday night music at its best, I assure you. Play it loud.

Apart from some snarky product blurbs for the website of Dress Code, a local alternative clothing store, this week’s writing has been almost entirely music related. The highlight was delivering my review of the forthcoming Oceansize album, Frames … though it was tricky to write. I find the same applies to book reviews – the ones you like best are the hardest to review, because the burden of justifying your subjective enthusiasm is that much heavier. Still, I can think of worse chores!

And just to cap off with the most rock and roll thing of all – I filed my first ever tax return! Go me! (Though this would be significantly more impressive had I actually had any freelance business figures to put in it … next year promises to be far more, er, entertaining.)

Books and magazines seen

It turns out my last copy of Locus wasn’t my last copy of Locus after all, but I’m assuming the one that arrived this week (September 2007) definitely is.

A bunch of stuff turned up from Orbit, most of which looks to be not my cup of tea (Laurell K Hamilton, NO-thank-you-very-much), but Jeff Somers’ Electric Church has been getting some good reviews, and has an interesting sounding premise, so that’s been added to the “provisionally-to-be-read-when-some-time-appears-out-of-nowhere-maybe” pile. Good bold cover art, also; reminds me of the Sin City graphic novel covers:

Coda

Another week drives through Velcro City at a breakneck pace – I can say with certainty that I rarely have the time to be bored these days, and that can only be a good thing. And here comes the weekend – which, having been making the effort to work hard during the week, shouldn’t demand too much writing time from me.

Of course, that said, the reviews for the next issue of Interzone are starting to trickle in, and I have a few applications from would-be bloggers for Futurismic to read through … ah, well, it’s all good. Keeps me off the streets and out of trouble!

So, time for The Friday Curry Of Legendary Justice. I hope you all have a good weekend; adios!