Hello, regular readers.
I’ve been thinking about making some changes here. As anyone who’s been reading for any length of time knows this blog covers a fair variety of stuff, including music and book reviews as well as my own fiction and occasionally any political posts I feel like writing. Not to mention the more whimsical material.
I think I’d like to devote more time to writing about music, but I don’t want to overwhelm everything else. So I was wondering about splitting the blog into two: one part for music, and another for everything else.
I’ve considered this a lot in the past but previously left the blog as was because hell, my interests are broad and why shouldn’t those of other readers be the same? Whereas now I’m inclined to go for it: to retain NFI here as a receptacle for my more general writings, and to set up a new sub-blog and try and have a proper crack at something dedicated to music. I think this would be advantageous as it wouldn’t change anything about NFI except the absence of music coverage, and with a music-dedicated sub-site I could write more informal pieces alongside reviews. In cases where there was definite crossover interest I can of course cross-post or link both ways (an example of this would be the Taqwacores review).
But before I go ahead and do this… what do you think? I absolutely want your feedback, and would be v. interested in hearing arguments or opinions either way.
“Do you suffer when you write? I don’t at all. Suffer like a bastard when I don’t write, or just before, and feel empty and fucked out afterwards. But never feel as good as while writing.”
- Ernest Hemingway
[Via Gareth Powell]
Right then.
A segway is a somewhat ridiculous-looking mode of two-wheeled transportation based on gyroscopic technology.
A segue is a smooth or unbroken transition from one subject or section to another.
They are homophones, which means they sound the same but are in fact spelled differently and mean different things.
Thank you for your time.
A website called Arthur Magazine brings us Douglas Rushkoff’s An End To Movements:
“That’s right. Mass organization may just have been a twentieth century thing: collective actions of all sorts—good and bad—were responses to the corporatization of government and industy. As such, they took the form of the entities with whom they sought to do battle. But—like the top-heavy, highly abstracted creatures they were created to counter —they are proving utterly incapable of providing an alternative to what they would replace.”
It’s an interesting read, and makes some accurate observations, but I don’t agree with Rushkoff here. I think he places too much faith in reformist symbolism like petitions and too much stock in the large-scale efficacy of the “change begins at home” argument. And whilst statements like “mass organization may just have been a twentieth century thing” make for great headlines, they’re exactly the sort of generalised nonsense that makes banner-waving new media advocates sometimes look a bit silly.
» Read the rest of this entry «
See here for the reason why I post these lists.
It seems that the Freebutt is no longer owned and run by the Joiners, and is now under the command of a local consortium of four blokes who have the good taste in music (I met one of them on Friday; he was wearing a Holy Roar t-shirt and played the Murder City Devils and This Will Destroy You among many other fine bands). Since independently owned and run venues are rare and getting rarer in today’s Brighton, I hope you’ll join me in supporting the ‘butt and the Penthouse bar when you can.
Aug 16th – World Inferno Friendship Society – Engine Room, £8.50
Aug 16th – Spraynard, Bangers, Break The Habit, Big City Plan – Hector’s House, £free
Aug 18th – Wooden Shjips, You’re Smiling Now But Soon We’ll All Turn Into Demons, Soul Punch – Freebutt, £7.50
Aug 18th – Voodoo Glow Skulls (yes, again!) – Engine Room, £?
Aug 21st – Dinosaur Jr – Concorde2, £17.50
Aug 27th – Subhumans – Engine Room, £8.50
Aug 29th – Fake Problems, Riverboat Gamblers – Freebutt, £7.50
Sept 3rd – Paint It Black – Freebutt, £8.50
Sept 17th – Kayo Dot, Manatees, Blackstorm – Freebutt, £7
Sept 25th – Citizen Fish – Engine Ro0ms, £8.50
Sept 27th – Fuck Buttons – Audio, £8.50
Oct 4th – Obits (ex-Hot Snakes, Drive Like Jehu) – Freebutt, £?
Oct 9th – Johnny Foreigner – Audio, £7.50
Oct 10th – The Slits – Concorde2, £13
Oct 18th – This Will Destroy You, And So I Watch You From Afar – Audio, £?
Oct 19th – Dalek – Audio, £9.50
Oct 28th – Dananananaykroyd – Audio, £8.50
Dec 14th – Dillinger 4 – Engine Room, £8.50
(It occurred to me after writing the review of ‘Feels Like Steven King’ last week that I’d promised to post my Vector reviews online a month or two after they appeared in the magazine itself. That deadline has long since passed for the first three reviews, so I’ll post one on Saturdays for the first three weeks of August.)
This all-new story set in Brooks’ world of Shannara is not only its first appearance in a graphic novel, but also my first experience of the setting. Fans may wish to take my opinions with a pinch of salt.
Set after the events of ‘The Wishsong of Shannara’, ‘The Dark Wraith of Shannara’ resumes the story of Jair Ohmsford, a young man capable of using a form of magic known as the wishsong. As the story begins Jair’s sister has him swear not to risk using the dangerous wishsong again, but Jair is troubled by portentous dreams. The following day he learns that several old friends have been kidnapped, and so Jair and those allies he can round up set out to rescue them. Along the way Jair learns more about the wishsong and about his own potential.
This story is generic, inoffensive quest fare, featuring appearances by various characters who I assume will be known to Shannara fans. The central plot works well enough; it is unoriginal but comprehensible to a newcomer. But it is as a graphic novel that ‘The Dark Wraith of Shannara’ is flawed. » Read the rest of this entry «