As the astute will have probably gathered from the above, I’m wrapping up my music reviewing. It’s been an absolute blast over the last couple of years, not only in flexing my writing muscles and thinking about ways to articulate my feelings on a ton of different records, but also in listening to some fine music, hearing some fantastic new bands (a number of whom have become firm favourites) and chatting with some great people from various bands, labels and PR companies.

At the time of writing I’ve got about 130 record reviews (albums, EPs, singles and splits) up on NFI, with a bunch more queued and about 50 more records that have been sent to me that I’ve yet to write about. And if your record is among these then don’t worry, I’ll be honouring everything I’ve been sent up until today unless I really can’t think of anything to say about it, which going by past precedent is unlikely as I am an opinionated and rambling son of a bitch. If you’re a fan of reading my record reviews, they’ll still be going up regularly (two or three a week as usual) pretty much until the end of 2011.

I won’t be accepting anything more for review, however. The submissions page has been updated to reflect this.

I have a number of reasons for hanging up my guitar-shaped novelty pen. The first, and most important, is that I want to focus my time and energy on other projects. I want to spend more time getting better at guitar and writing songs for my own band, Wrecktheplacefantasic. I also want to turn my efforts at writing elsewhere; not only a renewed focus on the younger project that is Arcadian Rhythms but also getting back into writing some fiction. Not only that, it would be nice to have more of a social life again. I’ve been hanging on in there – I do regularly enjoy a pint or four and a sprawling conversation with friends – but you’d be surprised how much of your free time music reviewing takes up. I can’t remember the last time I spent a day off from the day job that didn’t involve a few hours of writing-related activities of some kind.

A slightly more shameful reason is that I’ve increasingly found myself with a sensation that I’m beginning to repeat myself, which I suspect is the inevitable result of writing in-depth about a lot of music that faithfully follows in the footsteps of what inspired it. Now, it should be patently obvious from my prior body of writing that I am quite far from having a problem with this. I am not an innovation-or-bust critic and have always tried to engage with music on its own terms or to at least explain why I couldn’t. However, whilst I am quite comfortable with holding this opinion I’m less comfortable with repeatedly restating when I’m supposedly writing about a particular collection of music. It becomes a little dull to essentially repeat yourself, even if you do have an excellent soundtrack at the time.

Anyway, those are my reasons, and I figure I owe it to my readers and my, ahem, suppliers to explain them rather than just stop replying to emails and allow the post schedule to decline as so many blogs and review sites do.

For the record NFI itself will continue going strong (I will inevitably write about whatever I’m up to and continue to post original material here too), and I may even decide to write about records or shows that I have something in particular to say about, but they’ll be sourced by yours truly and written on my whims.

That’s it… goodbye. For now.

So! The project I have spent the last few months and especially January working on has gone live and the first content is beginning to appear. Check it out!

One thing the internet does not need is another gaming blog. So, here is another gaming blog!

We like to play games. We like to drink (most of us). We like to talk, or rant, or ramble. We slip through our days in ARCADIAN RHYTHM.

Mostly of interest to gamers, what with it being a group blog about gaming, but you may enjoy having a poke around regardless as some of our writers can be quite amusing. Plenty more content going online this week and we have regular updates scheduled for the next few months!

Forthcoming pieces from myself include a response to Jonathan McCalmont’s arguments around the idea of a videogame canon in Futurismic last year, a biographical piece examining the question “why game?”, reviews of indie titles Recettear, Flotilla and The Void, and contributions to group pieces – one arguing the toss about achievements, the other looking forward at what’s coming later in 2011. Plus some occasional fluffy pieces – like one about my naff Minecraft constructions or me bitching about how tough the last levels of Syndicate Wars were.

Other writing & projects

It was a very quiet year for fiction. I wrote one flash fiction story (here) and worked on a few unfinished short stories. It’s a shame to have let this lapse but equally I think it’s been beneficial to let those fields lie fallow for a bit. The itch to write stories is returning, and thanks to thinking rather than doing I have some ideas on how to improve my weaknesses as a writer of fiction (chiefly that my characters tend to be of a type or flat, and my prose lacks descriptive character and colour).

I only wrote one review for Vector last year, which was This Is Not A Game by Walter Jon Williams. Alas I’ve not yet seen it in print because my copy of Vector went to my old address.

I reviewed the debut issue of Re/Action magazine as well as #231 of Interzone. So, very few short fiction reviews last year, but it was good to dip a toe back into that pool towards the end of the year, and it was a different kind of challenge to review a feminist media magazine.

Most of my book reviews appeared in the first half of the year. I reviewed music books about 80s US punk rock and 80s/90s post-hardcore, a book about US corporate skullduggery, a bizarre vanity project, a really excellent biographical comic, and a couple of genre novels (one of the latter reviews has also been repurposed for Vector but I’m not sure if it will actually be appeared).

I reviewed a beer festival, which was particularly fun to “research”. I also wrote a bit more about film this year, with reviews or posts about Four Lions, Triangle, Inception (which I’ve still not actually seen), and the new Harry Potter (published this year but written in December). Alas my Pontypool review still isn’t finished but will be soon. I may write more on film next year but at the moment I just enjoy dabbling.

As for games, I had a couple of posts about Mass Effect 2 (a very good game but not as “massively affecting” as my early experiences indicated), as well as reviews of Blood Bowl (atrociously broken netcode on the 360) and a trio of indie titles: The Terrible Whiteness of Appalachian Nights, TimeFcuk, and DeTweet.

At some point I was supposed to be working on some indie games with Kerry Turner, with my words and her code and our collaborative game design. We came up with some neat ideas for a seance-based game but it kinda tailed off. We may yet do something but will have to wait and see.

Kerry, myself and a number of other friends are also working on setting up a group games blog. You know, because the world needs more of those! Anyway, as yet there are only two of us who have written anything for it, and one of the two already has his own games blog which he updates at least once a week. It’s a project that needs a kick up the arse, frankly. If we do get the ball rolling it should be a lot of fun. That’s actually our mission statement.

Oh yes, and I did some copywriting for money. It was quite dull, I’ll be honest, but trying to make holiday destinations sound exciting at the same time as providing cross-linking and SEO opportunities was another unusual challenge. If I ever went freelance (not likely) it would be a good to way bring in some bread.

It would also be nice to be writing in more places that aren’t NFI. This may be something I’ll look into this year. I drifted away from writing for other people because I don’t work well with deadlines and dislike not knowing when something I’ve written. Not to mention the joys of overbearing editors (though I’m happy to say that every editor I’ve worked with in the last four or five years has been a delight).

Personal shit

On a personal level, 2010 didn’t feel particularly special. I moved into a new flat which I’m much, much happier in than our old place (which I loved, but which was also a tip and it was making me genuinely unhappy trying and failing to stem the tide). I got a promotion at work, which was nice – new challenges, was bored of the old job – but also has the downside of being much harder and more demanding, and I also got tripped up over pay. Still, I’m getting more dollar during a major recession, and I can hardly complain about that (too much; I am British after all).

I saw most of my friends not as often as I’d like, and my love life is still notable by its absence. Looking over everything I’ve written above, though, I’m not exactly surprised that I don’t have more time for other people. I’ve always been very independent and quite reclusive so I figure that affects the way I choose to spend my time too. Still, I’m sure the people that know me have some inkling of what I’m like and how I spend my time. Besides, it means y’all value / despise the time you spend with me all the more, right? Right!

I’ve been a lot more content this year, after ’08 and ’09 involving lots of the fun twins depression and insomnia. Overall I’ve spent 2010 in considerably more positive headspace. This has been awesome.

On the negative side of things my gym-going massively tailed off. I guess that happens to everyone. I’ve not spent as much time practicing guitar as I’d like. As mentioned above I’ve not written much fiction at all this year, despite a friend and I forming a writing club to chivvy ourselves along. These are all things I’ve resolved to work on in 2011, a year I’m feeling pretty optimistic about personally. I also suspect it will be a year of rage which will make 2010 pale in comparison, and bear in mind that 2010 saw the British public finally getting pissed off enough about the shit they’re made to eat that they took to the streets in large numbers to speak their minds about it.

I can only hope that the nascent student, anti-cuts and anti-corporate tax dodge movements continue to build momentum and grow in number, because I genuinely believe that if the Coalition is permitted to pursue its neoliberal agenda unchecked Britain will not only be a crueller, harsher place to live, but also take many more years to recover from the devastating recession brought on by the banking crisis. I’m contemplating getting more involved with some local political groups – socialists, the Green party (I live in the ward of Britain’s only Green MP), or the various anarchist groups. On the other hand, that takes a lot of time, and I don’t have much to spare, so I’m kind of torn. It would be nice to write more about politics but while I’m always game for an argument or discussion, I lack confidence when it comes to writing about political and ideological matters. Still, perhaps that’s something I could do. Hell, I could always write more posts slamming our craven media and its propensity to internalise the language and perspective of authority. If I put some swears in and name-drop rightwing commentators then that is guaranteed many hits.

If you’re still reading: I hope your 2010 was excellent and your 2011 is even more rad.

I’ve split this post into two parts to break it up a bit; if you’re wondering where the other bit is, be patient. I’ve scheduled the two posts an hour apart.

Music writing!

Over the course of 2010 I posted reviews of (in chronological order) Nothington, French for Cartridge, Victoria & Jacob (twice), Rolo Tomassi, Throats (twice), Antares, Blacklisted, Bomb the Music Industry!, Bull See Red, Growns Ups (twice), Stegosaurus, Sundials, the Menzingers, Deftones, Boy Mandeville, the Black Keys, Dirty Tactics, Static Age, Campaign, Off With Their Heads, Victor! Fix the Sun, Junior Battles, Everyone Everywhere, Iron Chic, Frontier(s), Ghost Robot Ninja Bear, Come On Gang, Bastions, the Holy Mess, Pianos Become the Teeth, RVIVR, Banquets, Fake Problems, Charles the Osprey, Mixtapes, Direct Hit!, Bangers, the Border Surrender, Daughters, Young Adults, Let’s Talk Daggers, Jackals, Museum Mouth, Go Rydell, the Great Explainer, Castevet and Candy Hearts.

By my count that’s 48 reviews (there are a couple of splits in there). It’s been hugely rewarding to write these. At the start of the year there were only 1 or 2 PRs sending me material for review. 12 months later and I’m getting numerous submissions every week. The upshot is that I’m now getting sent lots of cool music to listen to, think and write about, and those reviews are being read.

It’s also been great to hear from a few of the bands I’ve reviewed – some people have gotten in touch to thank me for a “thoughtful” review or to express appreciation that I “get it”. While I may not always get what a band is trying to do I try and approach my reviews as thoughtfully as I can. I love a hilariously snarky review or a heavily contextualised critical review as much as the next guy but I can’t write those, so instead I do thoughtful.

Aside from record reviews my music-related writing was slim. Here’s my “best of 2009″ round-up – I’ll have the 2010 equivalent sorted, uh, at some point. I also wrote a little about my friends’ band Offcuts / WW2 vs Dinosaurs, and two solitary live reviews (the second day of 2009′s Offset festival, and a bunch of nu-thrash bands at the now-defunct Engine Room here in Brighton). I now prefer writing record reviews as it’s harder to take notes during gigs. Also I drink and am very forgetful. There are only so many times you can get away with a live review that is basically “I like this band and, erm, they played all the songs I like except this one, possibly, and the singer told a joke that was pretty funny and a guy stood on an amp and waved his dick around.”

Anyway, links to all of the above can be found on the music reviews page.

Wrecktheplacefantastic

It’s been a really good year for my band. We’ve played just over a dozen shows around Brighton and are now much more comfortable and confident onstage. Thanks to playing those gigs and regularly practicing we’re also much tighter and it’s been commented on that we seem cohesive as a band now (as opposed to a collection of individuals who happen to be playing the same song).

Much of our set is still composed of our oldest songs, but tunes like Bus Song and Down With the Ship are proving quite difficult to let go of. The former is still my favourite thing to play (mostly because it’s the only one where I get to really let rip with a super melodic power chord chorus that’s dead easy to play) and I like the latter because I get to gruffshout a lot (coming in 2011: I learn how to sing?). Fortunately the less interesting old songs like Song 3 and Don’t Forget are facing the axe. The former is almost insultingly basic and I’ve never much liked the latter; that said, there are people who come to see us who love these songs.

We’ve added a number of new tunes to our set that we’re much more proud of. The Worst That Can Happen is from ’09 but was debuted live in January ’10 and is now much better; Everywhere At Once is a really solid tune; No Teeth is an unusual song in that it features our first time signature change and both myself and Ben experimenting with delay effects; Pckl Yr Lvr is the first song that I’ve written for the band – a fast number with lots of double octave slides – and I’m proud of it. We also have another new tune, Ruin, which has a really hooky chorus and clean guitar picking from both myself and Ben in the verse (I almost exclusively play chords so it’s been good to push myself a bit there). Ben’s lyrics are increasingly good, Jack is now a much tighter drummer (I hugely admire his multi-instrumentalist skills), and Chris’s aggressive yet melodic bass and powerful vocals have been a superb addition to the band.

We also recorded our second demo that is about a million times better than the first. Oh, and I made us a website.

Massive thanks to everyone who came to see us, everyone who put us on, everyone who has expressed support and everyone we’ve played with for being awesome.

[Read part two here.]

Shaun Green manages to put literature, gaming, punk Rock all together to somehow turn this into a blog. It hosts or points at his fiction, book, music, game, film reviews, info about his musical projects, and other general bloggery. Honestly when i saw the name Nostalgia For Infinity, I thought what a terrible name. I still dont know what im reading about, Shaun Green either has something orignal and unique or completely horrible. I find his book reviews to be much more interesting than reading about his music reviews, but still nothing amazing..

“Still nothing amazing” smells like a tagline to me!

For what it’s worth, I’ve considered splitting the different strands of content into separate blogs in the past, but others persuaded me against it. I’m now fairly comfortable simply writing about what interests me. I can only hope that a few other people share some of my interests and enjoy reading some of what I write. Thanks to the author of the review above for sharing their views!

Oh yes, and the name of the blog is a relic from back before I learned to use WordPress. It’s a reference to some of SF author Al Reynold’s novels. The other names I considered were Haste Killed Creativity and Muscles Burning Alcohol and Nicotine because holy crap did I love Against Me! at the time.

1.) My band is recording a second demo tomorrow. TOMORROW! So I’ve been busy practising our newer songs, installing new tubes in my amp (turns out that balancing the power tubes in a DSL100 is pretty easy, even when you’re drunk) and restringing my guitars (ugh, replacing strings is for when you break them, at least in my book). EXCITING.

2.) I’ve had a promotion at work at the same time as a friend / colleague has left so I’ve been pretty preoccupied with plugging gaps in dayjob-world.

3.) I’ve been kind of inclined to spend my free time chilling out with films, videogames and friends rather than writing in a darkened room. Not that I have a problem with the latter, but it’s more like work than blowing off steam.

4.) IT’S THE SUMMER <3 <3 <3

I’ll post up the occasional review as and when the mood takes me & will be back with three more levels of experience and a +1 Something of Whatever in the near future. I may also have other cool stuff to share, e.g. a friend and I are going to collaborate on an indie game… I’ll provide writing and “ideas” and she’ll do the hard work. Awesome!!!

If you want to follow something I’m doing in the meantime, check my twitter or tumblr thingies.

…if you can make it down, we’d love to see you there!

Today a chap I work with, who I think has reviewed books for The Guardian in the past, spoke to me regarding a review I’d written on this blog. He mentioned that the author, who was a friend of his, had sent the link to him as he was pleased with it. The author’s friend realised the reviewer was me… small world, huh? Anyway, it was a really cool thing to hear as I thought a lot of the book in question. Little things like this make the whole endeavour feel a little bit more worthwhile.

It’s also cool when people stop by and leave comments – I’m glad you guys do that. Thanks!

Anyway, I’m posting this mainly because today has been a good day. Despite being shittily hungover and tired all day at work, and getting done pretty much none of the stuff I wanted to do this evening, I feel upbeat about this blog and my writing, and to cap it all off I’ve just found out that my band will be playing its first headline show next month. And now I’m off to get drunk and play music with my friends in said band.

Today is a good day. Have a lolcat.

P.S. Yes yes yes I am still working on my Four Lions review. Apparently a nearby screening this weekend has a Q&A with Chris Morris and the cast. I’m tempted even though I have very few monies…

In other news, Jake “bass” “face” Powis left the band in the middle of last year while he swanned off to Japan “for a few months”. It ended up turning into the rest of the year, and now he’s staying for 2010 as well – he’s met a girlie out there. Aww! So we replaced him back in November with Chris Watson, a stalwart of a number of bands around Brighton, presently Another Day Lost (for whom he sings). I first met Chris at the Concorde2 – who we were there to see, I don’t remember – where we found out that we both liked obscure 90s British melodic punk bands like broccoli and Hooton 3 Car. He’s a cool guy not to mention even taller than Jake, and his bass playing brings a more aggressive edge to our sound that I feel has re-invigorated our songs.

We have our third gig – ironically with our third line-up – on January 15th, where we’re opening Friday night’s punk round-up at the Brighton Hobgoblin. It’ll probably be pretty busy so no doubt I’ll be bricking it.

As for the demo which we recorded, oh last May or something, Ben is still mixing and mastering the bloody thing so who knows when it’ll be done. To be honest I’m on the verge of sticking the unfinished mixes online because he’s taking so long to get the proper versions sorted. Anyway, if we don’t have anything available to listen to come the day before our gig I’ll stick those early mixes online so people have something of ours to check out.

Big love and many boozes from Wrecktheplacefantastic!

On a personal level the last three or four months have been pretty fucked up, but after a relaxing and head-clearing break over Xmas and the New Year I’m feeling a lot better and more optimistic, which is always a good thing for my writing. I’ve got some reviews queued up for the next few days and will hopefully continue to provide semi-regular content as this shiny new year grows.

Thanks for your patience!