Skinnyman, not to be confused with Skinner (Mike), who also produced a UK rap concept album this year. Council Estate Of Mind is a huge worthy polemic on the opportunities available to youths on inner city council estates which comes bundled with a […]

I was surprised that Star Of The Sea was so little about the actual voyage of a ship from Ireland to New York during the potato famine, and rather an attempt at a literary pastiche to try and fill in a lack of nineteenth century Irish literature. For[…]

It is good to see that despite a blip with Tigerland, Joel Schumacher has returned to stake his claim as the worst director in Hollywood. Whilst I did not expect The Phantom Of The Opera to be any good, I did not in my wildest dreams expect it to be […]

The Big U by Neal Stephenson
This was Stephenson’s first novel, before the PoMo blockbusters. Unsurprisingly therefore, it’s a campus novel, but it’s not like any other campus novel I’ve read. There are comically useless profe[…]

by way of farewell to a complicated (and intermittently awful) (but with good bits) year
i guess i think of contrarianism more as a tool than a principle – i like it for its effects not its “morality” – except i also know say[…]