Shatner does 'Rocketman'
Now there's a potentially litigious splash headline if ever there was. I was just browsing some dusty old bookmarks and came across this gem courtesy of the nice people at I-am-bored.com

On the eve of Live8, when we're bound to be 'treated' to a few songs from Sir Elton this seems to have some resonance. I think. I cannot recommend this enough. If you are bored, that is.

 

In a recent discussion with friends we tackled the tricky question of why I haven't seen ITV's new comedy sketch show Monkey Trousers. The less than tricky answer is that it's on ITV. Rather than launch into a rant about why this is so, I'll allow Charlie Brooker to provide a clue:

"It's easy to see why ITV's audience has collapsed. Having spent years relentlessly pursuing the lowest common denominator, it's inadvertently become a specialist channel for the very, very thick, while its traditional audience (the slightly thick) is now openly courted by Channel 4."


And that's without getting started on the Big Brother 'phenomenon'. I'll add my pint of bile to that topic on another day when I can give it the treatment it deserves. Don't tell me that if I don't like it I can turn it off. I already do that and I still don't like it.

Back to ITV. You've only got to check out the cast list for the aforementioned Monkey Trousers to guess that it ought to be good comedy. Good comedy I like. So is it a form of snobbery that prevents me from watching? No. Well, not just that. By tuning in to ITV, you guarantee its future, as they deliver the audience (us) to their advertisers (scum). And you thought it was about providing programming? Still at least we've got ITV2 and 3 now. What bounty!

An interesting piece in today's Guardian G2 about the ongoing file sharing debate. There's a particular bit that got me, bearing in mind that I believe the record 'industry' is the architect of its own problems:

"...the decline of the CD is a more intriguing tale than it may at first seem. Album sales actually reached a record high in the UK in 2003; it's singles that have suffered the biggest catastrophe."

A few years back, the BPI decreed that for a single to be included in the singles chart it could not contain more than two tracks (it might be three: sue me. They're doing it to everyone else). Before this, artists could choose to give the buying public a bit of added value in the form of extra tracks, material that didn't make it to the final album, live stuff etc. Oasis used to do it (in fact they even managed to squeeze a pretty damn good album out of B-sides by getting fans to vote for their favourites. The Masterplan turned out to be better that anything they've produced since, but I digress...) This practice could be traced back through a number of other big bands (not least The Smiths).

Then one day you find yourself picking up a CD single, scanning its contents (2 tracks) then its price (usually £2.99 minimum) and comparing this unfavourably with the £10 or so you'd pay for 12 to 14 tracks on the album a week later. Bear in mind this was before mp3s were everywhere. We all did the maths and stopped buying singles altogether. Simple. As soon as the pony-tailed, Porsche-driving, coke-snorting, penthouse suite-dwelling record executives began to feel the squeeze from this crappy bit of legislation they devised a solution which Stalin would have been proud of (perhaps a little OTT): blame Napster, release the hounds and sue 14-year-olds for every penny their bewildered parents can raise.

A slight shift from the orthodox 'Home taping is killing music' argument.