I had that rather sinister lyric stuck in my head and was trying to remember where I’d heard it. Then it came to me; it was a live version of an Alice In Chains song I’d heard on a European b-side. I haven’t been able to find that particular version, but this is some vintage gold right here. For a band that’s known for being pretty dark, this is darker than most of their offerings.

Going back to the days when Layne Staley even looked healthy, recorded at the Moore Theatre in Seattle, here’s Love Hate Love.
Sweet little angel, you should’ve run….

My old friend Etienne sent me this wicked timelapse photography piece he did in Vancouver, leading up to the Olympics.

Check it out!

I stumbled across this track a couple of years ago. I’d never heard of the artist but I found the tune to be incredibly infectious. The video is really wild too and worth the time to watch.

Check out the song “Hayling” by FC Kahuna.

Nintendo made a big impact with the Wii because of those motion sensing controllers. At the end of 2010 Microsoft will be entering into the game with Project Natal for the Xbox, except in this case you don’t hold anything; your whole body is the controller. What’s really amazing is that you don’t have to wear any special gear. Natal has a camera that follows your movement. It even includes facial & voice recognition so the Xbox will know who you are while you’re speaking to it. Of course there will always be haters who say it’s lamer than lame and the lamest thing that ever existed etc, but even if you’re not into this potentially exhausting style of gaming, Natal is a huge technological advancement and will probably be the hot item next Christmas.

Check out this trailer:

Lionhead Studios are working on an amazing looking artificial intelligence project using Natal. Meet Milo:

And by special request for Sonic girl Kim, meet my new kitten Sod. She’s about 10 weeks old.

She has sharp little claws for letting me know when I’m not paying enough attention to her.

In July of this year, 17 year old Zac Sunderland arrived home after a 13 month voyage to make world headlines. He had become the youngest person to ever sail solo around the planet. His father warned him to beware of pirates. If an unidentified boat approached, Zac was to fire a flare across the bow and then get the real gun ready to fight back.

Almost immediately the record was beaten by Mike Perham, who came home a few months younger than Zac. Zac’s sister Abigail turned 16 in October and is about to attempt to bring the record back into the family.

There is currently a 16 year old Australian girl named Jessica Watson, out on the high seas by herself in another attempt.

Child care services intervened in the case of then 13 year old Laura Dekker of Amsterdam, whose father was ready to let her give it a go…

Contrary to common belief, the Guiness Book Of World Records does not list every known record. When it comes to attempting to go without food or sleep the longest, Guiness feels it’s better not to encourage competition. There are graves on the road to glory.

These things seem to be showing up in some really cool ideas recently. The “Galaxy Dress” is a one of a kind garment right now, and is on display at a museum. It’s made with 24,000 full colour LEDs that are powered by iPod batteries stitched into the fabric. It lights up and constantly changes colour.

And even wilder than that is an idea that’s still in the works: tiny LEDs implanted into the skin to make dynamic tattoos! You could turn your tattoo on & off, change the design, or have it crawl across your skin. The input could also be connected to a device like your phone. Accurate time & call display could literally be in the palm of your hand! Check out the video at the bottom of this page.

Wikipedia says the birthday of the late great astronomer Carl Sagan is November 9th, yet Carl Sagan Day was supposed to coincide with his birthday, and that was November 7th. Either way Jack White has delivered a fantastic tribute to the man in the form of a new single & video called A Glorious Dawn, and I’m loving this so much it hurts.

The whole thing is Carl Sagan quotes and it even features an appearance from the legendary physicist Stephen Hawking.

Thanks for everything Carl, and thanks Jack for the tremendous tribute. It’s a real treat for music fans and space geeks alike.

Enjoy…

(update: it looks like the piece was actually created by John Boswell, but is being released on Jack White’s label)

I thought I’d dedicate this little blog post to my dad who lost his battle with cancer 20 years ago today, just a week after his 46th birthday.

To say he was my “inspiration” to get into radio doesn’t seem like the right word. He always referred to his job as something he lucked into, like winning the lottery. He stressed it should never be a serious career choice… so it wasn’t. Then after he died I can actually narrow it down to the exact moment. In the span of a second, getting into radio went from being something I’d never considered before, to suddenly being the only thing in the world that made any sense.

I’m very grateful that I’ve had the chance to understand his love for radio first hand, and he really did love his job. So much so, he did his last show just 3 weeks before he died.

I don’t have that many pictures of him, but I did meet a guy in Vancouver who had managed to sneak into the Montreal hotel room during John & Yoko’s “Bed In For Peace” and snapped some photos, including these of my dad interviewing John Lennon (click to enlarge)

I came across this item on a Beatles auction site. One night my dad had stayed late at the Bed In and was given this memo of reprimand by his boss. He showed it to John who wrote an amusing reply at the bottom. On the right, an illustration from the Capital Radio days after he left Canada.

He moved to BBC Radio 1 where he launched the Classic Albums series. This has since spawned other similar series, mostly on tv I think. Here are some of my favourite episodes (right click to download)

The Edge on U2 - Joshua Tree

David Gilmour on Pink Floyd - Dark Side Of The Moon

Sting on the The Police - Synchronicity

If you’re interested, there are some other episodes here

Last week his old friend Bob Harris noted the 20th anniversary with a great one hour tribute on BBC Radio 2 that you listen to here if you like.

A very cool memorial service was held on Dec.7th’89 at Abbey Road Studios. Here’s the full 51 min radio special, or just check out my favourite part here, featuring Mark Knopfler’s very touching speech and song.

And this always gives me chills. My dad’s final sign off on Oct.8th’89

Listen to this guy getting a familiar effect by singing through a tube and running that through a keyboard

How about this “virtual piano” using a computer keyboard

Some dude at home playing guitar

Now add those clips with a bunch of others and get something incredible!

Check out all the mixes from Kutiman Mixes Youtube - brilliant!