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I Love Shit Like This

I’ve been a David Shrigley fan for a while. In fact, I’m drinking coffee out of this as I type. Anyway, a few years ago he embarked on a new project that I found both hilarious and brilliant.

In 2017, a charity bookshop in Swansea, UK made headline news as a result of exhibiting several hundred copies of Dan Brown’s 2003 novel ‘The Da Vinci Code’ in its window with a sign requesting that no more copies of the book be donated as they had more than they could sell.

‘Pulped Fiction’ is a project by visual artist David Shrigley, who has produced a limited run of 1,250 copies of George Orwell’s dystopian novel ‘Nineteen Eighty-Four’ made entirely from the pulped remains of unwanted copies of ‘The Da Vinci Code’.

In 2023, Pulped Fiction was launched at the very charity shop in Swansea that started it all. 250 copies were available to buy at an exclusive price. After selling out within the first hour, and making headline news, the remaining copies are now available to buy.

Throughout the journey David and his studio team were documented by filmmaker Jay Bartlett. Telling the story of how the project came to be and the numerous hurdles faced along the way, the documentary can now be seen online for the first time here.

And if you’re interested in picking up one of the few copies left, it’ll set you back £1095. Cheap!

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Hey Now!

Somehow, I missed this upon release last October, but it’s available to rent on Amazon Prime.

Based on the novel written by Glen Matlock, I WAS A TEENAGE SEX PISTOL follows Glen Matlock’s journey as a founding member of the influential punk band the Sex Pistols. Having co-written ten of twelve songs on their only studio album, NEVER MIND THE BOLLOCKS, Matlock’s contribution was essential to the band’s success. Experience the Pistols’ rise to global infamy with an honest, insightful account of a group of malcontents, determined to change the music business and to attack hypocrisy and stale conventions in society at large.

I know what I’m doing tonight!

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I Said Goddamn

Phenomenal Kinks cover from 15 (!) years ago, bonus points for Andy Stack’s double duty on drums and keys. I think Wye Oak is still around but they haven’t released a studio album since 2018. Anyway, YouTube reminded me I really like this and now I’m telling you bastards. (Yes, I’ve probably posted this before.)

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Labels Down, Frank

From Ars Technica …

The robotics startup Figure AI has been livestreaming humanoid robots placing thousands of packages onto a conveyor belt for nearly a week—a spectacle that included a robot competing against a human intern at one point.

The promotional robot demo has become a viral sensation among tech enthusiasts, spurring YouTube commenters to name the robots and the company to rapidly roll out related robot merchandise in response. Users on X have described the livestream in glowing terms, such as “the greatest product demo since Steve Jobs’ ‘one more thing.’” But despite such sentiments, it’s worth bearing in mind that even the most impressive robot demos represent narrow windows for understanding real-world robot capabilities.

Truly, we are living in the future. Oh! And don’t forget to pick up some merch!

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Yes, I Ordered One

I’m usually not a fan of composer t-shirts, but I had to make an exception here: the fact that this image looks more like Clark Kent than Shostakovich makes some kind of demented sense to me.  Hardly matters anyway.  Only  0.000002% of Americans will know who it’s supposed to be.

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Another Beatles Book?

You’d think the Beatles and Dylan had been examined from every possible angle, but nope.  Here’s a chronological look at their careers in parallel, with plenty of commentary on their influence on each other, friendship, rivalry, etc. I’m about three fourths in, and I’ve enjoyed it.  Good mixture of things I know, things I’d known and forgotten, and things I’d never known.  It’s always interesting and moves along.  A few of the analogies seem a bit forced, but of course no two people will agree on everything.

As I’m biased towards music over lyrics, I might have preferred a book on the Beatles and Brian Wilson, but no doubt they had fewer interactions.

One minor peeve.  Like just about every other Beatles book, the quote about “Aeolian cadences” and Mahler’s Song of the Earth rears its ugly head like it’s evidence of the Beatles’ artistic viability.  I don’t get why these journalists who are obviously good at research never bother to examine that quote.  “Aeolian cadence “ has about as much meaning as “C major time signature” or “F minor drumstick.”  Or “the explosion left a 15 mph deep crater. “ It makes no sense.  And the song in question, “Not a Second Time,” absolutely does not end with the same chords or chord pattern as Song of the Earth.  There’s no room for debate on the matter, it’s factually wrong.

I can’t believe that quote is still getting recycled.  Just put it in the trash.

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Do Not Go Gentle

The premise of Last One Laughing UK is simple and diabolical: stick a bunch of professionally funny people in a room together for six hours and forbid them from laughing. Crack once and you get a warning, break a second time and you’re out.