Further to my Pop-Culture Passings blog that included O.D.B., the New Yorker's 'Wrong Number' piece is hilarious, in fact, a lovely humourous obituary to Ol' Dirtee:

Talking of Dirty, here's a sound-clip & review from new 'grimester' on the block, Liberty The Dirty Guy & 'Err'; another fave single so far in '05; oh baby I like it raw!!!

Fancy snapping up one of the world's first fully rotating buildings/flats?

Each floor of this 11-story building in Curitiba, Brazil can independently revolve 360 degrees either way (imagine the chaos if they all had to simultaneously!!)
Cost - about £160,000.

Having trouble sleeping? Maybe you need to relive that Godfather moment:

Or a 'Silence Of The Lambs' muzzle, perfect attire for that first date:

Click VW logo below (then scroll down a bit) for the spoof 'Viral' ruffling feathers in adland & with its creators, Dan & Lee, in deep sh*t:

& keeping on the technology tip, check dis out:

Twisting up telephony by providing cheap/free calls when it's hooked up with Skype. It's all about the Voice Over Internet Protocol (VOiP) baby!!! How long will it stay golden?

....SUCKAZ NEVER PLAY ME!!!

Technological transitions are the tip of the iceberg:

AUDIOSCROBBLER
Builds your musical profile via your Media Player's plug-in (Winamp, i-Tunes etc.) sending info. on what you're playing to Audioscrobbler's server. Your tastes can be compared & matched with other 'Audioscrobblers', think of it as a musical 'Friendster'. Goes beyond Amazon's "If you like this, you'll probably like this."

ETREE
Online trading of live gigs, rare recordings, bootlegs etc.

LASTFM
Your personalised online radio station. For example, ban Westlife, block any Speed Metal and allow more 80s Soul & 90s West Coast Rap + experience new music from genres you selected, via Audioscrobbler's statistics -you are programme controller.

PODCASTING
Just read the links & news about it. Like Tivo for Radio. Yush!

Major industy panic when Shawn Fanning unleashed Napster mainstream in 2000.

Well, here's the sequel Hollywood doesn't like, Bram Cohen with 'BitTorrent'. Let's see how legit this one goes/lasts......this and this, both must-reads. Bram's a deep dude, 'specially when it comes to puzzle solving!!

Didn't watch too much Celeb BB, just dipped in & out. Plenty surreal moments, the most obvious, Brigitte Nielsen - from Rocky IV, Beverly Hills Cop II & Sly Stallone to this!! OK, she also did VH-1's 'Surreal Life' and a Danish Big Brother, but still, seeing her in da UK - runnin'! Channel flicking around 1AM the other night watching Bez in green night vision who was conked out, motionless, almost dead - does anyone (apart from Channel 4's Production Team) actually sit watching the inmates sleeping for long periods of time, without channel-hopping?

One other personal surreal moment? Lisa I'Anson since I used to work with & produce her at MTV; I vividly remember the night she went 'awol' in Ibiza whilst filming a 'Party Zone' special with Simone and they both did things I saw but am not going to write about here!!!! That Ibiza 'missing persons moment' unfortunately cost Lisa her Radio 1 gig.

I warmed to Kenzie throughout the 2 and a half weeks but big up Bez, from freaky dancing & melon twisting in the Happy Mondays to this moment in time, the winner for '05!!

One of the 'sickest' (i.e. f*cking incredible!!!!!) pieces of 'Mix-Tape' work I've ever heard, apart from the
'James Hyman/Audio Shrapnel Feature Presentations' (!!!!)

The triple-pronged track-attack (!) of researching, mixing & editing this eargasmic-epic history of 'cut-up' are spot on; I'm still trying to nitpick for any important omissions but can't! The mix? 'Genius At Work', no, not 'Big Apple Productions' but Ninja Tune's super-slick, sample-sticher, Strictly Kev.

If, for some reason you can't download Kev's 'magnum opus', catch Xfm's Rinse, Saturday into Sunday, 12 March at 1AM to hear it in full.

(p.s. - love the 20th Century Fox logo/artwork, reminds me of that 'urban myth' about a kid who apparently trademarked 21st Century Fox in the late 90's and was trying to blackmail the corporate in early cyber-squatting days!!!)

STOP PRESS: If you're not au-fait with, or if you worship at the temple of, Steinski, one of the godfather's of cut-up, read dis or this (which links to the 1st link anyway).

One of my favourite singles of the year so far:

Listen here

Slam dunkin'!.
Andy Baio's Blog is DOPE!!!

Xfm/Rinse homepage here:

where you can search all Tunes Of The Week (from '00-'05) & tracklistings etc.

Finally, thanks to Mixmag:

Squeezed a quick pre-Xmas/New Year trip to NY. Took advantage of great exchange rate & went berserk in HMV & Virgin, snapping up 'nuff DVD box-set bizness like 'Director's Label', 'Ed Wood', 'Educational Archives Lunchbox' (!) + plenty of browsing/buying in Bleecker St.'s record stores; many like those in High Fidelity.

Then, M.O.M.A, recently renovated and celebrating its 75th anniversary:

As ever, I enjoyed soaking up the Pop Art - when I look at those famous works from the likes of Andy Warhol, Roy Lichtenstein & Jasper Johns, I tend to draw parallels with Mash-Up and Bastard Pop culture.

Warhol 'borrowed' Campbell's Soup cans and made a lot of money from them, Lichtenstein 're-mixed' comic book frames into striking prints. Did these artists have any problems with copyright? Without more research, I don't know the exact answer but doubt it; they were reflecting everyday images that are and were pretty much unavoidably public domain. The Music Business however takes a more agressive stance if you decide to reflect it's content in a new creation. Just read the surreal story of Negativland and what happened when they parodied U2's "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For".
Negativland's web-site is a fascinating resource for reading up on Copyright, Intellectual Property & Fair Use law.

Furthermore, what about DJ Dangermouse unleashing the phenomenal 'Grey Album' late last year which wasn't even for sale? Surely just a piece of art? Parody & the First Ammendment are serious defenses in such a murky world. Respect due & props to Illegal Art as well who treat Mash-Ups as just that, Art - check their site and big them up!!

My mind was blown away a couple of days later by a visit to The Museum Of Television & Radio. Pushed for time, I hurried to the 4th floor to test the computerized catalog of over 120,000 TV & Radio Programmes and Adverts too. OK, what do I want to see? One of my all-time faves, Rod Serling's 'Twilight Zone' was too easy/obvious. OK, how about 'Omnibus - Video Jukebox', a little more obscure. I remembered watching this as a kid circa 1986, still at school, it was presented by the late great John Peel and brilliantly covered 'Pop Video' just as MTV was about to blow up in Europe.

So I find it on the system, go up to the counter and within about 2 minutes the friendly staff printed me out a slip, I took it downstairs and, again within 2 minutes another friendly staff member showed me to viewing console no.6 and explained how to easily view my nostalgia - game f*cking over!!!

Oh, if you go to NY and visit The Museum Of Television & Radio and want to check that cool 'Omnibus - Video Jukebox', save a minute of your life, tape number is "071376"- aiiiiit!!!!

More madness when I popped in to catch up with Henry & Bill at Jaybee Magazines. Last time I saw them was about 7 years ago when I came over to shoot a G-Shock/Junior Vasquez piece for MTV with Simone.

Much of my magazine collection was built up from Jaybee's; you'd go down into a basement and Jerry Garcia, sorry, Henry would ask what you were looking for. Like the TV & Radio Museum, Henry worked at lightning speed - say you asked for an issue of Rolling Stone, Vogue or Entertainment Weekly from years back, within seconds Henry would re-appear with numerous copies of that one issue so you could choose the one in best condition!!! Bill revealed he'd never been to London, moreover, he'd never been on a plane in his whole life!! Maybe that's why he looked so good for his age. Henry & I haggled over some Interview mags & his CD collection which he was about to put up on ebay and having paid, I left the shop. We all reckoned the spooky green mist colour of the photo was the spirit of Lou, who ran the business before Henry (he's the dude in the picture I'm holding). Guys, if you're reading this blog; you rule!!!

Caught some movies. Ray is fab, one of the best Hollywood bio-pics though Tony Hackford's film does omit some major bits if you know Ray Charles' life story well - no mention of Mary-Jane Robinson or first wife Linda who went with him to Seattle in 1949 and who had a daughter with him.

Anyway, talk about method acting, Jamie Foxx IS Ray Charles. Before he passed away, Ray Charles met Jamie and gave his serious seal of approval. Best Actor Oscar? I hope so. No Oscars for 'After The Sunset' but nevertheless, highly entertaining. Like a light-hearted 'Heat', retired (but not for long!) criminal Max (Piers Brosnan) & FBI agent Stan (Woody Harrelson), play cat-and-mouse with a tropical paradise backdrop. Brett Ratner's spot-on casting, locations and overall direction is super-slick with an obvious nod to another De Niro flick, 'Midnight Run'. Good to hear Mamas & Papas as part of the soundtrack too.

NY SHOUTS: Rockstar, RadioShack, Jonnie Lia, Johnny B, Markert!!, DJ Reset & Phil M.

The James Hyman 007 Mix-CD was one of
The Telegraph's top 5 CDs of 2004.
If you've still not heard it, click here for copy.

Damaging evidence in the Phil Spector shooting; it's not looking good for Phil. So sad - this guy once produced such soulful, heart-wrenching pathos-pop, some of my all-time faves, like The Ronettes 'Be My Baby', The Shirelles 'Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow', Ike & Tina Turner's 'River Deep Mountain High' & The Beatles 'Let It Be' album which Sir Macca deciced to remix last year after disliking Phil's phenomenal 'Wall Of Sound' knob-twiddling. OK, so Phil may have theatened artists in the studio with a gun from time to time, maybe he was anxious and on a tight budget, schedule - whatever (!)

Jacko case looming too. Mad Vanity Fair Magazine piece last year on the Neverland naughties. Wot da f*ck's gonna happen here? OJ trial? Celeb Big Brother? Nah mate, watch this, dis are da remix!!!

Does what it says on the tin & some!!!

9 hours, a ruler, spraycan + 'nuff post-it notes =

The rapid growth/spread of Blogs/Blogging is, for now, a healthy virus on the World Wide Web. Here's one I didn't make earlier:

- a healthy bedside companion to BoomSelection, concise & with smart hyper-links too - big up your blog!