Clarification: (since I’m being misunderstood in this thread) I have no problem at all with the use of pop hits to soundtrack documentaries – great idea and can be very effective. I have a problem when those pop hits are chosen solely on […]

Strike!: C4’s documentary on the Miners’ Strike was entertaining. I’m not sure if a docu on the strike should have been entertaining, but there you go – as a primer it pretty much worked (I was 11 in 1984 and the strike took p[…]

Very interesting post about machismo and ‘favourite films’. I don’t like those films either, not so much singly but as Kathleen says presented as a group, a way of filmmaking, a canon if you like. I’m not sure it’s the p[…]

Wanted: Easy Games! – I will test the muscle of our new comments system with a request. Isabel wants some new computer games to play, for the PS2 or GameCube. They must be fun – she is no fan of shooters, survival horror, cyberpunk etc et[…]

Fantasy Reader: titled with admirable honesty this is a blog run by somebody who reads fantasy books and then writes about them. It’s a neglected genre (justly in some ways?) so it’s interesting to see the enthusiast’s own perspecti[…]

Somebody wrote in reminding me to name the Tooting curry house we liked so much (see below), so here we go…
Shahnaz Indian Cuisine, 102 High Street Tooting
“To avoid disappointment please reserve a table” it says here but Pumpkin Pu[…]

J.C.CHASEZ – “A.D.I.D.A.S.”
Everybody’s going on about this song at the moment, and they’re quite right. Something I like about it: one-note choruses aren’t uncommon in pop but the way Chasez grates his voice for t[…]

I swear I had no idea that Marcello had laid into 1985 when I put Red Box in my Top 12 just now. He really has a go at that particular single, as well. Maybe I’m the only person who likes it: I’ll admit I gulp slightly at its bug-eyed pos[…]

Level Playing Field: I’ve rearranged the blogs section so that there’s no more ‘ten favourites’ stuff going on – apologies if your hits drop as a result of this but it seemed a bit self-important.
On the other hand comme[…]

PopNose: it’s part of FT but it won’t be linked from the front page, so you might want to make a note of it if you like the idea. (UPDATE: no PopNose yet readers as we have bandwidth issues. When we’ve worked out how much we can use[…]