Archives – Tom  
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To Live A Life Of Freedom, Machos Take A Stand: COLONY EARTH!
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This is an entry in Discourse 2000, my year-by-year, story-by-story analysis of 2000AD strips. Contains spoilers for Colony Earth!

Which Thrill? A hard-bitten Naval Commander battles an alien invasion, almost single-handedly. If that doesn’t[…]

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I Was Shocked To Find What Was Allowed: THE VISIBLE MAN
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This is a post in the Discourse 2000 series, looking at 2000AD story by story, year by year.

Which Thrill? A daredevil gets into a car accident and ends up with transparent skin. Hijinks ensue.

GOT A HEADFUL OF IDEAS AND IT’S DRIVING ME I[…]

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Space Travel’s In My Blood: DAN DARE ’78
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This is a post in the series Discourse 2000, exploring 2000AD year by year and story by story. It contains spoilers for Dan Dare’s run in the comic.

Which Thrill? Dan Dare boldly goes where no pilot of the future has gone before, exploring t[…]

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Dance Our Way Out Of Our Constrictions: INTRO ’78
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Previously on Discourse 2000: After successfully helping launch war comic Battle, editor Pat Mills had the opportunity to launch a new kind of boys’ comic at publishers IPC – Action, a title which turned the violence and grittiness of typical[…]

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’24 Candles
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Last year I wrote up some trends in the way British people listen to Christmas music now – as expressed via the medium of the streaming-era Christmas charts, which offer a fairly accurate barometer of passive festive listening.

So what happe[…]

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UncoolTwo50 V: That Sounds Like Something Out Of A Dream
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The UncoolTwo50 is over – well, the voting phase is – but the posting continues. These are the final 10 near-misses.

60. PUBLIC ENEMY – “By The Time I Get To Arizona” (1991)

I learned too late that this record is NOT[…]

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UncoolTwo50 XV: Then I Felt Just Like A Fiend
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23. MYLENE FARMER – “Libertine” (1985)

Events overtook me – they overtook everyone – and two weeks ago, when I posted this song to Bluesky, seems a very long time indeed. I’ll try to reconstruct this ancient era.

W[…]

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UncoolTwo50 IV: Through The Speaker Boxes, Loud’s My Diagnosis
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Re-rewind! Pausing midway through the main blurbs to go back and fill in another 10 of the nearly-made-its…

70. ORLANDO – “Just For A Second” (1996)

We’re now into the section of tracks which had a real, honest-to-goodne[…]

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UncoolTwo50 XIV: You’re All Fakes Run To Your Mansions
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27. THE WATERBOYS – “Church Not Made With Hands” (1984)

This feels, to me anyway, like my most idiosyncratic choice – a 1984 single that’s very very much in their “The Big Music” phase, which is neither an ethos or a so[…]

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UncoolTwo50 XIII: We Are Far Too Young And Clever
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31. ERIC B AND RAKIM – “Paid In Full” (1987)

It’s been heartening to see a lot of people picking this, though opinion has been fairly evenly split as to whether the original album cut or the Coldcut “7 Minutes Of Madness” rem[…]

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