Tuesday, September 30, 2003
Radio Active 89FM NZ Music Show Playlist30 September, 2003 Totally random today... The Subliminals - Radiance Loves Ugly Children - Senseless The Mint Chicks - Licking Letters Revolver - Muhammad Ali One Million Dollars - Get Off Supergroove (Baitercell vs. Timmy Scuhmacher) - Can't Get Enough (Club Boom Schwack mix) Degrees.K - John Travolta on my Shoulder The Rainy Days - The Boy Next Door (ain't the boy next door) HDU - Amino Laughin' Gas - Sunset on Saturn Nuvonesia - Transcontinental & Interdimensional 103 - London Otter Poultice - Cotton Wool Disasteradio - I have a computer Salmonella Dub - Peyote Dub Steve Cook - To Be With You Dating Godot - A Woman is Like a Car TrinityRoots - Beautiful People Hasselhoff Experiment - Shifting Sands The Datsuns - I Ain't Got Time Enough For Love Marystaple - Highly Strung 147 Swordfish - Love Little Thief - Whiteout # | Friday, September 26, 2003
Cheeky. Darkie.Crikey. 'Veteran radio and television host Paul Holmes has been made a Companion of the New Zealand Order of Merit.' Well, in June he was. The Queen may be regretting her decision considering Paul's recent remarks over his another member of her far-flung Commonwealth. His outrageous spiel about the Ghana-born United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan, (transcript here) has been making headlines around the world (BBC, The Austrlian & The Guardian for starters. The AP blurb made it all around the USA, hitting such fantastically named papers as the Fort Wayne Journal Gazette and Rocky Mountain Telegram). And, as if that wasn't enough, then followed it up with a swipe at women in journalism. His guest at the time, Dr Brian Edwards chortled: "Oh, you are in trouble. You are in desperate trouble for saying something like that." Indeed. Anyway, back to the headlines — my real favourite was the Canadian Christian website Crosstalk.com who felt the language contained withiin the news item warranted this warning: Editor's Note: This story contains language some readers may find objectionable. It's come to this: Paul Holmes is offending Candian Christians. Anyway, where to from here? The PM has virtually apologised on behalf of the country, and Bill Ralston must be wondering whether he can take the opportunity to throw his most highly paid employee overboard while the cost-cutting cruiser is under full steam. Go on TVNZ, replace Holmes with a nice arts show. I might start a petition... # |
New Feature section over at NoiZyland
Well, after about 6 months of storing the data, and many half-hearted attempts at actually writing the code, one spirited burst of enthusiasm has seen the addition of the 'Features' section to the homepage of NoiZyland.com. I'd been collecting articles that fell outside the reviews/interviews sections for a while, and it had taken me a while to figure out how to squeeze it into the site. So, a bit of space consolidation in the reviews and interviews sections, a bit of a table shuffle (yes, yes, CSS and DIVs to come in the future, I'm sure), and voila! 'Tis done. Also tidied up the catalogue as well, since I was there. # | Thursday, September 18, 2003
BnetsChoice. Managed to blag my way into another bnet music awards ceremony, this time by defending NZ On Air's honour on the nzmusic.com discussion boards, which led to a grateful Brendan Smyth acquiescing to my request that I be included at his organisation's table for this year's 'alternative' NZ Music Awards. I can't believe my luck sometimes. Turns out the other table's guests are Brent Hansen (Chief Executive of MTV Europe), and Greg Haver (UK Record Producer: Manic Street Preachers, Super Furry Animals, Catatonia, and, ahaha, Tom Jones). So little ol' indie noizyland me gets to hang out with the big boys for a night. Hopefully it won't have such a catastrophic result as my drunken 2001 effort, when I told Malcolm Black - Sony's A&R guy for NZ - that his sideburns were a little lame. # |
Work
Been working flat out on this for a week, so sorry for lack of updates. Normal service will resume shortly... # | Thursday, September 11, 2003
September 11?Didn't something significant happen on this date in history? Oh, that's right, in 1973, the CIA and US Government finally managed to instigate a coup against Chile's President - Salvador Allende - the first democratically elected Marxist leader in Latin America. "Allende survived the aerial attack but then apparently shot himself to death as troops stormed the burning palace, reportedly using an automatic rifle given to him as a gift by Cuban dictator Fidel Castro."One day, someone is going to get *really* mad at the USA for meddling in other nation's affairs, and take matters into their own hands. Mark my words... # |
NZ Music 'Competition' goes awry, again
Well, the NZ corporate's are trying at least, but they do seem to muck things up when it comes to helping out local acts. After the debacle that was the Air NZ/Capitol Records competition (where it was revealed that only Capitol Records acts had made the short list of finalists), you'd think other companies might be a bit more careful about who they choose to receive what are some pretty generous prize packages. This time it's the latest ZMFM promotion - Project nZM - which gives an 'upcoming' NZ band the chance to win...
"To enter Project nZM, you just have to be a band or a soloist who hasn't had a previous significant radio hit and you must have a current single or album that can be commercially released - that's it!"It's pretty easy to find out that Evermore have had a significant radio hit, with their song 'Slipping Away'. Said song received Radio Hit Funding from NZ On Air in June this year (2003). The requirements for receiving Radio Hits funding are pretty clear... "This is where we [NZ On Air] offer funding to record companies to recover the costs of recording and releasing songs that pick up significant airplay on commercial radio."Keywords there: significant, radio, hit. And, other than that, Evermore, despite being relatively new on the scene (and I'm not getting at them here, by the way, they are a talented band who write good songs), have also also received NZ On Air grants for video making, new recording, and album production costs. Ah well, like I say, at least they're trying. And besides, as was pointed out on NZM, who listens to ZMFM anyway? # | Wednesday, September 10, 2003
ReflectopornWeird. People are getting their kicks by selling items on ebay where the item for sale has a reflection of the seller posing nude. "Buyers browsing eBay have found busty naked women and fat nude men reflected in kettles, TVs, toasters, guitars and even knives and forks," reports the UK's Mirror newspaper. I love the fact the Mirror is at pains to point out the women are 'busty' and the men are 'fat', as if saying 'nude' alone just isn't enough. # | Tuesday, September 09, 2003
Radio Active 89FM NZ Music Show Playlist 9 September, 2003 too busy, here's the playlist... * twinset - sunny * the phoenix foundation - let me die a woman * rhombus - spaceman * cane slide - i done stuff * double happys - big fat elvis * dimmer - drift * the bats - north by north * onanon - peninsula * 103 - cool cove * throw - honey blonde * letterbox lambs - shit red sports car * breakfast of champions - ursula andress * 50hz - longitude * shihad - you again * batrider - number one * tokey tones - je n'aime pas * trinityroots - passion * idols of eve - avangeliste * marineville - adventure * sleepers union - fortress of souls * conray - i lost you * chicane - hotel room 93 * little thief - half past seven, half past eight # |
Life, the Universe, and Everything
Google's new calculator functionality that I blogged about recently does an excellent job on translating full english queries like how much is a pound in kilograms? (about 0.45kg, if you can't be bothered clicking through). Turns out it also takes on the more esoteric queries like ... what is the answer to life, the universe, and everything? On a related note, it turns out enough people have Asked Jeeves about his sexual tendencies for it to warrant an answer. # | Monday, September 08, 2003
Mail ProblemsI don't go to McSweeny's enough, preferring to spend my time frittering around link sites like MetaFilter, Fark and BoingBoing instead of expanding my brain at the online home of the excellent quarterly journal. Anyway, I do make the effort once in a while, usually when my brain is screaming out for some decent input. And, as always, there's gold just sitting there, on the front page... Q: Hello, it's Chris from across the hall.Ahahahaha! Busted. There's another couple of 'Interviews with Neighbours' stories online right now, either invented or transcribed by Chris Mohney. Good stuff, as is the whole McSweeny's site. # |
Geekboy #24
Geekboy has updated his excellent live gig review/pix site with some new words and photos featuring the likes of the Psycho Daisies, Devils Gate Drive, The Gladeyes, Hoof, The Feds & Pacifier. For those of you (like me) who are too fogeyish to get out to live gigs all that often, or (also like me), don't actually live in Auckland and want to know who the up'n'coming movers and shakers are on the scene up that way, I'd highly recommend checking out Geekboy's site on a regular basis. It's ace. # | Thursday, September 04, 2003
Grimmybug: new siteVirtual NZ Music buddy and artist extraordinaire Michael McClintock (aka Grimmybug) has just revamped his website. Head on over and check out his striking and often dark artwork (the latter attribute I've always found a bit of an oddity, considering his witty and warm online postings). One day, when I actualy get to the point of finishing some tunes, I'm gonna ask him for permission to use some as artwork for a dodgy noizyboy electronica release. # | Tuesday, September 02, 2003
No Smiling PleaseNew Zealand is bowing down to US demands for the introduction of biometric passports, in order keep the current visa waiver dispensation kiwis have when travelling to the 'Home of the Free'. A bunch of mostly Western countries have been told to start using biometric systems with their passports to make it harder for counterfeiters to ply their trade, and, presumably, as another step in countering potential terrorist infiltration into the USA. Canada's already got the system in place, and Australia aren't far away. The Canadians have banned smiling in their passport photos as a result of the new system, as it mucks up the ability for the 'face readers' to correctly identify the person being scanned. All very well in theory - I just don't like the idea of being quite specifically 'pinged' by the Man when moving around the world. Which is also why I don't own a cellphone. # |
Dell forces customers to lie
Well, you know, no-one ever actually *reads* those Terms and Conditions blurbs that come with every bit of computer-related software/hardware you see, but you'd at least think a big company like Dell would at least play along with the charade of 'I Have Read and Agree...' by allowing users to actually do so before using their systems. Before using your computer, read all of the software license agreements that came with each program that you ordered. There may be several agreements to examine.Problem is, of course, the Terms and Conditions for all this software are on the system itself, so you need to agree to the terms before having read them. (I do love a good Catch 22). One (might say pedantic) customer decided he wasn't going to lie to get into his new system, and rang Dell to see what could be done about getting his new machine up and running legally. They didn't have a clue, and the whole thing spiralled into a classic case of help-centre forwarding mayhem, where most of the people he talked to didn't even seem to understand the problem. He did get all sorts of crazy suggestions as to how to resolve the problem - 'just say you agree,' said one of the more senior managers he talked to, 'I do it all the time.' - but the best of which was a suggestion he go to a public internet PC and look up all the relevant software T&Cs online. Even this wouldn't have worked though, for, when the buyer asked just what software was loaded onto the machine, they couldn't tell him. The person in question eventually gave up the ghost and returned the machine for a full refund. Good on 'em for sticking to his guns I suppose, and hopefully it'll wake Dell up to their slightly crazy process for getting one of their new machines up and running. Ah, the madness. [via j-walk] # |
Time Travel Spammer: it's no joke.
Fantastic. The 'Time Travel Spammer' - a guy who has sent out over 100 million email requesting assistance in finding parts to help build a time travel machine so he can return to his own era - has turned out not to be some elaborate money-making scheme, or even a weird hoax. The guy really thinks he's from another time, and desperately wants to get back. Wired magazine have done an article on him, where he says... "A lot of people will say the stuff I talk about is crazy and out of this world. But I know for a fact that it is true and does exist. Untrained minds may disagree with me, but they don't have access to the sources that I do."He should hook up with the Timecube guy, they sound like a match made in heaven. # | Monday, September 01, 2003
A Job to get ahead withOld news now, but I just stumbled across this interview with the chief Saudi Arabian executioner, who, on a 'good' day, can be responsible for the death of up to seven people, usually by beheading. He seems pretty well adjusted for a state-sanctioned mass murderer... "I sleep very well," he says.And it's becoming a family business... As an experienced executioner, 42-year-old Al-Beshi is entrusted with the task of training the young. “I successfully trained my son Musaed, 22, as an executioner and he was approved and chosen,” he says proudly. Training focuses on the way to hold the sword and where to hit, and is mostly through observing the executioner at work.'Mostly' they say. Crikey. Wouldn't want to be the poor soul who got the new guy: "Do you mind if my son has a go at executing you? We're having a training day." # | |
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