Author: Rob

Great news from the freeform gurus at Jersey City’s own WFMU:

Coming soon: an online digital library of music that will allow music fans, webcasters and podcasters to listen, download, and stream for free, with no restrictions, registration or fees. And most amazing of all, it will all be legal.

The Free Music Archive is being directed by WFMU, the most renowned freeform radio station in America, and is funded by a grant from the New York State Music Fund.

We take inspiration for the Free Music Archive from Creative Commons and the open source software movement. Both are based on the idea that there is merit in waiving certain rights to intellectual property. Radio has always offered the public free access to new music. The Free Music Archive is a continuation of that purpose, designed for the age of the internet.

Isn’t that great? I’ve been a fan of the FMU for years, and Beware Of The Blog is a regular hit on my newsfeed. in fact, as I’m writing this, I’m checking out some cool sounds from Philadelphia on one of their regular sampler pages. I can’t begin to tell you how excited I am about this. Who knows, it could be the impetus for the garagepunk stylophone phreakout I’ve been musing on for a while…

First Blake’s Seven. Now Survivors is being retooled!

BBC Drama Productions has acquired the rights from the Terry Nation Estate to develop the Seventies drama series Survivors, it was announced today by Jane Tranter, BBC Controller, Fiction.
 
Set in the present day, the new series will be written by Adrian Hodges (Ruby In The Smoke, Shadow In The North, Charles II and Primeval) for transmission on BBC One.

 
Looks like The Galactica/Who effect is trickling down to some of the more interesting 70’s shows. Who’s up for a Sapphire and Steel reboot?

So, it would appear that the “ick” factor is about to become legislatable, and images showing extreme acts are to become illegal.

What bothers me most about this (and trust me, I could bang on for hours about all the things that bother me about this rushed, shoddy legislation) is that the catch-all phrase “appears to” has made it unscathed through all the readings.

Let’s review the basic points of the addendums to the Criminal Justice Bill…

An act which threatens or appears to threaten a person’s life

An act which results in or appears to result in serious injury to a person’s anus, breasts or genitals

An act which involves or appears to involve sexual interference with a human corpse

A person performing or appearing to perform an act of intercourse or oral sex with an animal

Anyone else see the problems? How many films or TV shows have you seen lately that show life-threatening situations?

Yes, alright, this is supposed to be used within the context of a pornographic film/image/soundfile/tapestry. But the fact that the artist, performers and crew can, and for the most part do create these images/films/cartoons/flickerbooks entirely consensually, and for an audience that consumes them safely, and responsibly doesn’t seem to matter. Let’s not forget that the definition of pornography used for the bill remains the Obscene Publications Act, which still uses the over-loose phrase “liable to deprave or corrupt”.

Which is one reason that I refuse to watch Big Brother. I feel dirty just skipping past it on the remote.

So, what we have here is a loosely-defined bill that’s pretty much open to any interpretation that a judge or barrister feels they can get away with. Under this bill, criminal responsibility shifts from the producer, who already has to work under the auspices of the Obscene Publications Act, to the consumer.

Criminalising thousands of perfectly innocent couples who use extreme imagery as part of their consensual sexual relationships.

The particularly telling quote to my mind comes from Liz Longhurst, mother of murdered teacher Jane Longhurst, whose killer was found to have regularly surfed violent porn websites. It was her campaigning that led to the ammendments to the new Bill. When asked how she felt about the charges of criminalising innocent people who happened to have a kink, she replied,

“Hard luck. There is no reason for this stuff. I can’t see why people need to see it.”

Hmm. Ok then. Tell that to the flourishing and affluent BDSM community.

There’s an element of rebellion in the House, I’m very glad to say, with amendments to the amendments allowing people to hold images of themselves involved in consensual acts (I bet the Spanner Group are besides themselves about that one) and significant amounts of disquiet over a Bill that even Lord Hunt, the man in charge, has admitted is being rushed through to meet a deadline. It will, he claims, only affect images that are “grossly offensive and disgusting.”

Ahhhh, the ick factor. I find this distasteful, therefore I will legislate it out of existence. This is different, therefore wrong, therefore illegal. And that’s the kind of attitude that underpins the increase in incidents of abuse directed against anyone that looks a bit strange. In extreme examples, that can lead to horrible events like the nasty, pointless death of Sophie Lancaster, stamped to death for being a goth.

That’s grossly offensive and disgusting, as far as I’m concerned.

Backlash are still fighting the good fight, although time’s running out. Support the weird and keep the government out of the bedroom!

Michael Chabon (of course) gives us the skinny on spandex, capes and masks.

via Neatorama

Well, I was going to post on Saturday’s Doctor Who (I’ll leave that to better, wiser hands), but having read Clay Shirky’s bit on cognitive surplus, I think I’ll find something else to do.

Although to be fair to myself, I do tend to watch the telly with the laptop open these days. Proper multitasker, me.

…I mean, apart from it being as addictive as some of the substances it features so heavily, is that the viewer can begin to take on some of the mannerisms of the characters.

So, for example, I’ve found that I’ve started peppering my conversations with the odd “no DOUT”, and “you feel me?”

Which is all well and good, but I’m a white fortyhuhum English male, and I’m starting to sound like a bit of a knob.

Hey, at least I’m not drinking like McNulty…

If it’s true, and if it’s done the right way, Terry Nation’s greatest hour will knock that Galactica nonsense into a cocked hat.

…you always remember your first love.

Here’s a fun thing to try. Rather than just putting iTunes on random play, filter the results by putting in a single-word search term. Any word. It’s surprising what comes up. Swears can be fun.

Today’s word for me is “ghosts.” NIN blurring into Siobhan Donaghy drifting into Placebo. Not bad at all.

I’m trying to optimise Twitter, Fbook and the blog so one post hits everything. Six Apart’s BlogIt may be the answer…

The funny thing is, it’s not like I couldn’t have blogged. I’ve had plenty of opportunity. It’s more like TUT was kind of… well, in the way a bit. If I’m honest, Death Week left me with the feeling that I could do without for a couple of weeks. I needed a bit of time away, so sorry about that, hordes of adoring fans.

AAAAnyhoo. Following the mania of Straight 8, I’ve been involved in the other big project of the moment, the dance documentary Decks Dance and Videotape. It’s been an ongoing project for a while now, but has really kicked up a notch this year. It helps, of course, that 2008 is the 20th anniversary of the Second Summer of Love, and all of a sudden people seem to be interested in talking to us.

Saturday last found me in Dom’s Acid Citroen, heading north to interview Scott, uberfan and creator of the archive site Ravehistory. He lives just outside Birmingham, so it was a 2 hour drive up the M42 to find him, watching the weather change all the way. We were nervous, and with good reason. Dom had the idea of filming at one of the service stations where the rave puppies would gather before finding the weekend’s party. Scott knew the perfect place – Keele, another hour up the M6. By the time we arrived at Keele, and set up at a spot with a view of the road and the services, a field just across from the car park, it was past 4 in the afternoon. And black clouds were forming.

Robin The cameraman and I set up the four cameras Dom insists on, and we rolled on sunshine. Which within ten minutes had darkened into rain. A shower, fortunately, so Robin and I covered the cameras and we kept recording. The sun came out, and although muddy, it was nicely idyllic. I took some long wide shots of the huddle of cameras and swaddled film-makers bathed in sunshine in a field. It looked like the smallest rave ever. The Beloved’s The Sun Rising spooled unbidden through my head. This was good. If the wind kept down and the noise on the mikes wasn’t too lousy, we’d have some great footage.

But there were black clouds rolling in, and at the 50 minute mark on the interview, it started hailing. Hard. Any normal crew would have abandoned the shoot at that moment, and run for the trailers.

Not us, adoring fans. We are hardcore. We don’t know the meaning of “give up”. We kept going. The footage is priceless. Dom and Scott tried to talk seriously about where the rave scene is going, while being pummelled by hailstones the size of Bird’s Eye peas, in a scything wind. When we finally cut, Scott’s hood was full of snow. We were freezing. I had to use my gloves to protect the Mini-DV from the elements, so my hands were raw frozen meat. But the adrenaline and sheer absurdity of the situation kept us going and cheerful, and it was only when we were snug in the service station cafe, hands wrapped round warming drinks, that we realised just how cold we had been. Scott was an absolute trooper, and didn’t flag under circumstances that would have sent lesser men screaming for the hills. Great stories, great times.

Then all we had to do was pack up and go home. Via Robin’s place. In Bath. Dom sent me a text the following morning to let me know that he did a little under 500 miles that day. I know. I was there with him for all but forty of them. But London/Reading/Oldbury/Keele/Bath/Reading/London is one hell of a triangle to score on the face of the country. In dayglo orange, of course…

Dom’s now sequestered up at his mum’s place in East Anglia, working through the angles on his new Macbook Pro, lucky thing. I, meanwhile, have a grade to do on Afo’s short tomorrow, a documentary grade on Saturday, and all the assorted favours, scams and fixes that are part of the reason that I am such a popular man. Meanwhile sorting out the major refurbs to the house (the new fireplace went in yesterday, and the whole place is coated in a thin layer of soot from a chimney that didn’t look like it had been swept since the 50s) and getting spring planting into the garden is taking up a little (by which I mean a lot) of my spare hundred seconds or so of spare time.

What, and you want me to blog as well…?