DJ Set Sunday August 21st

Well yet again I have been asked to play some cranky old records at The King Street Tavern in Southsea Portsmouth. You can expect hear some Funk some Dub a few old Soundtracks some interesting Library Music some Radiophonics and Electronics and some Krautrock. Also expect all other sorts of audio oddities. It all starts at 7.30pm so best I make an effort.

Phantom Circuit 78 Session

I would just like to say that I have a session on Phantom Circuit 78. The session tracks are Not Just a Holiday, The Adventures of Mr Charles Fathom and Cold War Claims. All three tunes are new and not on my album Consistently Mediocre and Daydreams.

A couple of fine releases

Due out on August 8th and available to download from iTunes and Amazon is this fine album by my good friend Mr Heartfield. The inspiration for this album is the Len Deighton novel Bomber I recently played the track Schrage Musik from the album on my last cloudcast, and I must say that all the rest of the tracks are of the same high standard. I should also point out that the fine artwork for the album was done by me. We both liked it.

Next up is the new album by Carya Amara.

Now this is all a bit of a mystery. The Phantom Circuit sent me a link to The new album by Carya Amara, I did not know what to expect.....but I was not disappointed. This album is full of lovely synths electronics pulses and drones and is FREE to download. Or £6.00 for the CD. For more info on Carya Amara go here What are you all waiting for.

Consistently Mediocre and Daydreams. Now on Spotify

My album Consistently Mediocre and Daydreams is now available to download from Spotify as well as iTunes and Amazon.

Man Ray and Lee Miller Exhibition

From 1929 to 1932, Man Ray and Lee Miller -- two giants of the European Surrealism movement -- lived together in Paris, first as teacher and student, and later as lovers. Their mercurial relationship resulted in some of the most powerful work of each artist's career, and helped shape the course of modern art and photography. Combining rare vintage photographs, paintings, sculpture and drawings, this exhibition tells the story of the artists' brief but intense association and reveals the nature of their creative partnership.

Text is from The Peabody Essex Museum. 

The Peabody Essex Museum is at 161 Essex St. Salem Massachusetts 

The Exhibition is from June 11th to December 4th 2011

Dynatron Headphones

Got these wonderful 1970s Dynatron Headphones for my birthday from my friend Mr Foot. These were found in a Charity shop. They not only look good, but they sound good as well.

Ipcress File

What can I say about The Ipcress File that probably has not been said already?? I first saw this film when I was 12 years old. I have to admit, I was never a great fan of James Bond (apart from Live and Let Die, which I love, its the Voodoo) but I loved Author Len Deighton's Harry Palmer character, played by Michael Caine. Of course in Deighton's books Harry Palmer was not his name, in fact we are never told his name, he just has a string of aliases which he adopts depending on his assignment. In the book, when  the main character is approached by someone who says "Hello Harry" he later says "Now my name isn't Harry, but in this business it's hard to remember whether it ever had been." My affinity with Palmer was just that he was a sad loner, plodding about in the often very dull world of espionage and deceit. This is also the reason why in the 70s I liked the series Callan, who definitely had much more in common with Palmer than with the super spy Mr Bond. The book does differ quite a bit from the film, but all the main elements are there.

John Barry's haunting and very sombre soundtrack blends so well with the pace of the film, perhaps best shown and heard in the telphone box fight scene.

Sidney J. Furie's direction is superb. He shot scenes through pains of glass in phone boxes, over the shoulder, Point of View in fact he shot scenes at any odd angle he could (he did say later in life that he did that to liven the film up as the screenplay was just to slow and dull) But whatever the reason it worked for me. Unlike the follow up Funeral in Berlin. The 3rd film in this series The Billion Dollar Brain, which was Directed by Ken Russell is in my opinion a much underrated classic. With an amazing 60s intro. Have a quick look.

Which? Magazine

Well here I am very excited today, because I have just found the fickr Photostreams of Brighton based Design Studio Delicious Industries. One of the Photostreams is solely devoted to old copies of The Consumers' Association magazine - Which?

The covers were all contributed by Delicious Industries and Sell! Sell! The covers were all designed by Banks & Miles (Colin Banks and John Miles) and really are amazing. So do not waste time pop over to Delicious Industries flickr photostream for a look.

Take Three Girls

Here for your enjoyment is the intro and BBC promo to the 1969 series Take Three Girls.  The series ran until 1971 and 11 years later a 4 part follow up called Take Three Women was produced for BBC2.  The intro music is Light Flight  by Pentangle.

Its The Future

The Future that was Tomorrows World. Every Thursday just before Top of the Pops.

Music by John Dankworth (1970s) Denton & Cook (1980s)