Help save the old Edinburgh Odeon cinema

Since it closed down around five years ago, the old Odeon cinema on Clerk Street, Edinburgh has been subject to various rumours of regeneration and redevelopment, some good, some bad. But the latest plan is to gut the interior, demolish the historic auditorium and create yet another ’boutique hotel’ on the site.
This proposal has been [...]

A list of bands, musicians, pop stars and rappers on Twitter

Remember a few years ago when every cultural commentator and his uncle was heralding a new age of direct communication between artist and fan via the wonder of MySpace? Well Twitter takes this trend to its ultimate conclusion, so now we know exactly when Nick Cave is “drinking my eleventh strawberry daiquiri and talking to [...]

Catching up with Flight of the Conchords

Yeah, you’re probably thinking I’m oh-so-behind-the-pack by only now blogging about New Zealand-in-New York musical comedy duo Flight of the Conchords. Fair enough. The first season of their sitcom premiered on American TV in 2006, and they were even nominated for the Perrier Award at the festival of my hometown, Edinburgh, in 2003.
So it’s inexcusable [...]

‘Hallelujah’, cries Leonard Cohen’s accountant

It’s looking more and more likely that one song could occupy number one and two in the Christmas singles chart this year – an unprecedented achievement at this or any time of the year.
What’s more uncertain is which version will pip the other to the festive top spot: X Factor winner Alexandra Burke’s rendition of [...]

Poll of polls, or, Best of the best-of-2008 album countdowns

Confession: I’ve had some free time lately.
I had to use up the rest of my holiday entitlement before 2008 was out, so I now find myself with nine days of welcome but unproductive home-time in mid-December.
My internet browsing is on the high end of the scale at the busiest of times, so inevitably my modem [...]

The ongoing genius of The Onion

The Onion is probably the only website that can be consistently relied on to make me laugh. Others, such as The Daily Mash, have made a valiant effort at importing its news satire to a British audience, but The Onion is the original and best – and has perfected the art of turning mundane reality [...]

Will someone make Mark Ronson disappear, please?

The first time I heard the name ‘Mark Ronson’, I think it was a radio play of his cover of Radiohead’s ‘Just’. It was one of those times when you take a mental note of the name and check their MySpace later.
Ronson’s funked-up version of ‘Just’ may be a stoke of genius, but his current [...]

Triptych, R.I.P.

There are perhaps more serious things to lament than the death of a mere music festival, but then Triptych is/was no mere music festival. This weekend it bows out with a typically diverse barrage of gigs across Scotland, and I at least plan to attend the Clinic show, with Errors and RememberRemember in support, at Cabaret Voltaire [...]

Coldplay are so dull they cause sleep, officially

Newspaper and website editors were finally able to publish a headline today that until now has been just a cynical complaint of the tasteful minority: ‘Coldplay sends you to sleep‘.
Yes, Chris Martin and his fellow bland members have been voted number one in a poll of 2,248 Britons who were asked what music sends them to sleep, [...]

In breakfast cereal news: Honey Monster rips off Boosh, Tony the Tiger turns up in Tibet

Adverts for cereal don’t usually have much effect on me. Of course, it’s all about keeping the brand there in our subsconsiousness, not about teaching us anything we don’t already know about the sound Rice Crispies make when you pour milk on them. They snap, crackle and pop, I presume?
Anyway, I’m a Tesco fruit ‘n’ fibre [...]