A long, self-indulgent story that starts in a far-off past and ends in a chilling vision of the future

This is a story about men.  Met who met in a distant age, before everyone had iPhones and laptops and wi-fi and facebook and neither the means nor indeed the inclination for the constant, relentless barrage of shared information which, if we’re all honest, is just another welcome distraction from what we actually should be doing.

It was 1999, and I was starting university.  I had terrible dress sense; a velour luminous orange v-neck Cotton Traders shirt was the worst offender, usually accompanied with black shiny plastic-effect trousers.  Inexplicably I was single.

Filed under: Music, Nostalgia, 1999, All I Want For Christmas Is You, Alvin Stardust, Andy, Bat Out Of Hell, Big Steve, Birmingham, Championship Manager 2, Christmas, Cotton Traders, Custard Factory, David Ford, e-mail, Eastbourne, Eastbourne Hippodrome, Elvis, Ericsson T10, Evans, facebook, Firecracker, Gareth Evans, Gary G-Man Page, Gold, I Sincerely Apologise For All The Trouble I've Caused, iPhones, Jersey, Kazaa, laptops, Management Accounting, men, Milk & Cookies, MSN Messenger, New York New York, Nottingham, Rock City, Ryan Adams, Settlers 3: Gold Edition, Shannon Elizabeth, State Of The Union, Stoke, Sugarmill, The Settlers, whatshername, wi-fi, Wildflowers, X-Factor

The Haiti Charity Single, and Arise, Sir Simon Cowell

At the risk of appearing unpopular, I want you all to boycott the Haiti charity single. 

The Haiti earthquake was and continues to be a terrible, awful tragedy, and the people of Haiti need our help.  They need our money.  What they (and we, the rest of the world) don’t need is a bunch of self-serving, back-slapping celebrity twats cobbling together a half-arsed karaoke version of Everybody Hurts

Filed under: Music, Rage, Bob's Record Company, DEC.org.uk, Everybody Hurts, Haiti, Michael Stipe, REM, Simon Cowell, Sir Simon Cowell

Yoko Ono's pockets, enjoy every sandwich, and just meant to be funny

You may remember last week I introduced you to a singer named Paul Hewson, from Irish pop band You Too. Paul was fairly vocal on the subject of music piracy, and particularly angry that the illegal downloading of music from the internet was damaging the “creators” of the music. Well, genuine question here, what if the “creator” of the music is now dead? Surely downloading a dead man’s music doesn’t leave him any worse off. It’s sure as hell not damaging the creators. And why should the creator’s estate (widow, kids etc) get royalties for something they didn’t create? I refuse to buy anything John Lennon has written for fear that some of my hard-earned cash will end up in Yoko Ono’s pocket.

Filed under: Music, Writing, All Summer Long, Bill Hicks, Bob Dylan, Bruce Springsteen, cancer, Excitable Boy, John Lennon, Kid Rock, Letterman, Life'll Kill Ya, My Shit's Fucked Up, Neil Young, new year's resolutions, Paul Hewson, pot roast, Rolling Stone, Warren Zevon, Werewolves of London, Yoko Ono, You Too