One of the things that’s fascinating about the UK Top 40 is that a device designed to be a pure expression of popularity also works as a reflection of so many other things. People buy songs: if enough people buy a song it gets into the charts, […]

Another in our series of posts about the ghost stories of MR James. You can find this story here.
“Oh Whistle” has the reputation of being one of MR James’ most chilling and effective stories. It’s also – not coincidentally – one of his […]

My list of my songs of the 00s is still counting down at @freakytrigger. Because it’s mostly YouTube links some of the tracks aren’t available to everyone looking, so here’s the first 50 on the list in raw form. (more…)[…]

At Poptimism last night we held the draw for the 2010 Pop World Cup. If you’re playing, and would like to know who you’ll be managing, details are below! The names – where I don’t know you already – are drawn from the or[…]

Well, I gave it a shot. But this is formally announcing that my tracks of the decade list was one project too far, so I’m discontinuing these write-ups. While I think some of the posts were good, and I enjoyed doing them all, I didn’t hav[…]

It’s an all too common problem for the modern web surfer. There you are, browsing the internet, when suddenly you encounter a blog post informing you of the death of hip-hop. Shock! Horror! Why were you not informed?! Can it be so? While our ow[…]

Unpacking my crate on the first day in a new office I glanced out of the window. The first thing I noticed was a pie with Hitler’s face.* The second thing I noticed was this unassuming, but tempting, little boozer.
“Excellent,” I sa[…]

Pop giant Sweden failed to make the final 32.
We’re looking for people who want to manage a team in next year’s Pop World Cup.
If you don’t know the concept of the Pop World Cup, it’s simple. Tracks from participating countrie[…]

On Twitter yesterday, while writing the Pet Shop Boys entry, I asked “Who is the most intelligent person in pop?” – I got a lot of replies, so here is a list of all the crowdsourced nominations, from Lady Gaga to Clint Poppie.
The l[…]

What I said about “Young Boy” back in 2002 on this site:
“My favourite Neptunes production trick is their most retro- the explosive-horns-and-shouting thing you get here and to some extent on Beyonce’s ‘Work It Out’. It’s w[…]