Not a new track this week, instead an old track from Cold War Kids. Rachel will hopefully appreciate this given her current location. If you’ve not heard any of the Cold War Kids albums go and buy one now, they are all excellent and they are brillant live to boot. They are from Long Beach, California which surprised me as their music just doesn’t sound like it’s from that part of the world.
I’d also like to mention that Florence and The Machine covered this track as a B-side. You can find it on Spotify if you have a search. As much as I like Florence I don’t think her cover is quite up to the original.
(Source: Spotify!)
On Saturday my lovely lady Rachel gave birth to our son Isaac James who was a rather healthy 4.326 kg. Both are well if rather exhausted.
This weeks track is from Santogold or Santigold as she is now known. Released last week along side Jack White’s first solo effort, I have to say Santigold’s album has been more instant with me than Jack’s but I’m not sure it reaches the same heady highs as her first album. There are some really excellent songs and no terrible songs. So it is a good album and perhaps the weaker songs will grow on me with a bit more listening. I’ve also no idea why she is now Santigold supposed to Santogold. If you’ve not heard her first album you should also check it out.
(Source: Spotify!)
What, really.. are the British government really going to ensure all research funded by the tax payer is open access? I’m completely for this but it looks a little like a policy decision without thinking the whole thing through first. It’s clearly going to cost a lot more and potentially stop UK academics publishing in some top flight journals. Unless the rest of the world promptly follows suit the libraries will have to continue to pay for access to journals plus there’ll always be the requirement for historical access to journals. These aren’t arguments against open access, I’m just pointing out that a larger portion of the research/university money is going to have to be given over to publishers, at least in the interim. Until someone gets around to writing a decent peer/social review engine to pair up with the arXiv and similar services journals are going to continue to be were academic publishing is at.
Home made blueberry birthday cake for me! Yum! (Taken with instagram)
This week’s track from this week’s new album. A highly acclaimed album as well, most of the press have raved about it. I have to say it hasn’t been as instant with me as say Elephant or Broken Boy Soliders but it is growing on me rapidly and at the minute this is one of my favourite tracks. Jack White continues to make good music, end of story.
(Source: Spotify!)
This weeks track of choice is Primitive Girl by M Ward. He was support for Feist a little while ago and wasn’t bad so I bought his new album. It didn’t get the best reviews but I think they may have been a little harsh. Apparently his earlier stuff is better. I certainly think his collaborations in Monsters of Folk and Tired Pony are perhaps stronger but perhaps that is because I know those albums well. I’ve not checked out She & Him. Anyway, worth a listen..
PS Thought I’d tried the SoundCloud embed this week.
Karla Black at GOMA (Taken with instagram)
It’s a pile of layered sawdust. A big pile. Then there’s some cellophane hung above it. Is it good? Personally I’m not sure it even qualifies as art apart from the fact it’s sitting in a gallery. Of course she was nominated for the Turner Prize. This work makes me question nothing, amazes me in no way and gave me absolutely no thrill. Therefore I think it is pretty pointless.
As an aside I’ve been in Glasgow for three and a half years and today was the first time I’ve been to GOMA. Previously I’d been told it was rubbish, so never bothered to go in. It probably took me less than 45 minutes to go around it and to be honest I’ve seen much better collections in small private galleries. It’s hardly worth visiting, plus while I was wondering around a member of staff was actually telling a member of the public that GOMA leads Tate Modern in some ways. Whilst vaguely tempted to try and establish what ways these are (it’s certainly not in their collection) I feared I might end up falling around laughing which would be terribly rude. Of course I’m being terribly rude now. All in all I think someone needs to given them a hundred million or so, then they’ll maybe be able to pick up the odd great piece.
Apparently the cafe is very good though I didn’t visit it.
Astounding stereographic projection by Greek photographer Chris Kotsiopoloulos combines 24 hours into a single panoramic photograph.
We like to show our 24 hours in pictures in a gallery, but this is pretty nice too
Pretty cool…
