The Afterword

Musings on the byways of popular culture

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The Pretty One

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In the ‘sixties (a bore writes), it was the format of the U.K. beat combo; three snaggle-toothed, whey-faced, potato-nosed blerks, and one for the girls to scream at.

Here’s one example: Yer Beatles. Paul was the Pretty One. Yes, the others had their Special Fans, but Paulie was The Pretty One.

Other examples?

It is my contention that Punk Rock put an end to this. The Pretty Pistol? The Pretty Pogue? But are there any exceptions? Why am I asking you?

Rolling Stones Add Bass Player, Drummer To Permanent Line-Up

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Veteran rocker Mick Jagger today confirmed the addition of a permanent rhythm section to the core three-piece band of Jagger, Keith Richards, and Ronnie Wood. “The more we thought about it, the more sense it made”, says Jagger. “These guys have the experience, were available for work, and fit right in.” “To be honest,” says Paul McCartney, “Ringo and me were waiting for the call for, like, the longest time. We learned pretty much the entire Stones back catalog for the audition.” “We were scared shitless!” laughs Ringo. “These guys are like our idols, you know, and I dropped me sticks at one point during Gimme Shelter. But we got the gig!” Will the new boys be appearing on the next Stones album? “Nah,” says Jagger. “We need to get on the road for a bit, let them settle in.” And what about incorporating some Beatles songs into the setlist? Keith Richards laughs, “Are you fucking kidding?”

Anyone Fancy A Fight?

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Things seem pretty quiet here. Too quiet, you ask me. Nothin’ much of anything happening. Even a KFD piece about Inuit Yurt Zither ensembles trailing an entire day’s worth of YouTube clips behind it would be welcome. So to tide us over, is anyone up for a bout of fisticuffs? I’m an old man and out of shape and should be a pushover. Come on then, if you think you’re hard enough! See you next Tuesday!

The Afterword Platinum Collection Of Obsolete Skills

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It occurred to me today that my Melvyn Bragg impersonation will probably never again be fully appreciated. I live in a country where he’s not widely known. Or at all. My wife looks askance at me when I add an adenoidally compressed Braggsian commentary when feeding the dogs, unaware of its satiric nuance. Similarly, the number of requests for me to perform “Anji”, or the first few bars of “Oh Well Part 1”, on guitar have fallen to their lowest ever for many years now. And who will gasp anew in amazement at my uncannily realistic Owl Hoot, produced with just my cupped hands?

It is nothing short of tragic that these finely-honed life skills have no value in today’s couldn’t-care-less world. Perhaps you have specialised abilities that will likely never be called upon? Why not join me in compiling a useful Skills Bank, right here on this lively on-line community? Plenty of reasons. But join in anyway.

Create Your Own Artificially Intelligent Pictures!

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Heard of DALL-E? Of course you haven’t. You’re still watching Kate Bush videos and trying to convince yourself the latest Van Morrison album is actually pretty good.

DALL-E (a portmanteau of WALL-E and Dali) is a computer technology that creates images from text input. This means, it will draw what you type. Although in its early days of development, the images are stunning (google image search), and the implications are terrifying (basically, you will be able to see anybody doing and saying anything).

The image above (I hope) is the result of my typing the words ROCK FACE into a field at this site: https://pixray.gob.io – I don’t think it’s as advanced as DALL-E, but it’s still scarily impressive.

Vision On? Why not try this at home? Your input will be queued (only seven people in front of me, so pretty quick), and you may well think of something more amusing and provocative to type (@moose-the-mooche). You can post your picture here in a comment! (Pat Keysell voice: “I’m sorry, but we can’t return any of your pictures”)

View post on imgur.com

Abbatars

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Can someone explain to me exactly how the Abba show (at the “Abba Arena” apparently – not the Abbarena) is done? Are they holograms or not? What’s the technology here? I’ve read a couple of reviews this morning (it’s fantastic, apparently, if you liked Abba, which would be kind of a dealbreaker for me) but there’s no explanation of what’s happening.

Somebody here must know, Shirley?

Slow Horses

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Binge watching on recommendation of Archie Valparaiso (14). It’s terrific. Which is a surprise as his recent recommendations have been for Adele and Batman. Of course, if you don’t “have” Apple TV, and you do “have” morals, it’ll mean breaking the law and possibly incurring a prison sentence or hefty fine if you watch it at home. So let me tell you what your high moral stance is costing you: the finest televisual binge since Engrenages. Everything is perfect, as far as I can tell. London is grimy and gothic. The streets are slippery with red herrings and every door bangs open onto a cliff-hanger. Gary Oldman farts himself awake and doesn’t mind re-opening his dinner in front of Kristin Scott Thomas, who makes Helen MIrren look like a crack whore. Some LOL-out loud lines, some exciting violence, and an overall impression of it having been made by grown-ups for grown-ups. I’m four episodes in, out of six (I think), and I’m already gagging for another series based on the works of the author whose name I have forgot (like Gary Oldman’s fart). But I’m not going to read them in case they make another TV series. Who needs books » Continue Reading.

Our Parents’ Record Collections

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When you were a wee tyke, becoming aware of music, what records did your Mum and Dad have? (Apologies at this point for exclusionary, entitled, gender-restrictive terminology). The records in my home were mostly my Mum’s – in spite of his claims to be “a musician”, the only notes my Dad was interested were wrong ones, or the ones he considered to be wrong. I can’t remember him ever bringing a record home, but my Mum did. She’d buy records that were playing in the record shop if she liked the sound of them, without knowing anything about them. Ike Quebec’s “Blue And Sentimental”, George Shearing’s “Out Of The Woods”, Bing Crosby & Rosemary Clooney’s “Fancy Meeting You Here”, and Dave Brubeck’s “Greatest Hits” were high points, and albums I’ve listened to ever since. There were also the usual James Last and Bert Kaempfert soundtracks for swingin’ suburban parties (not that kind of swingin’), a couple of classical albums, and a Readers’ Digest box set (“Mood Music For Listening And Relaxation”) that in common with other box sets – to this day – remained mostly unopened. The singles in a shoe box weren’t of much interest – I can remember » Continue Reading.

It’s Not You, It’s Them!

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I was about an hour into The Batman (on wall screen via USB) when I gave up. Visual murk, I can take, especially when it’s as appropriate as it is here. Gotham ain’t Saint-Tropez, and the gloom fits the bone-deep corruption and fog of dread and shadow. But WHY IS EVERYBODY WHISPERING? I can hear maybe one word in ten. Why isn’t everyone saying “what?” or “again, please?” or “speak up!” Have they just rocked a baby off to sleep in every scene? Not only is everyone speaking in whispers, the ambient sound is at eleven. Traffic noises, background conversation, air-con hum, footsteps, whatever – it’s all as loud as the dialogue. And that’s before we get to the music (much louder than everything else, as is the way) and sound effects in action scenes, which fry your ear hair. There’s a range of sound options I can tweak on the TV, but none that digs the dialogue out of the dirt.

It’s one of the reasons I tend to avoid contemporary movies, and I assumed it was age-related. Turns out not. Here’s a very informative and fascinating article that explains the problem:

https://www.slashfilm.com/673162/heres-why-movie-dialogue-has-gotten-more-difficult-to-understand-and-three-ways-to-fix-it/

But don’t get your hopes up » Continue Reading.

Ballsachingly Boring Questions About Updating Mac OS Sierra – FAO Fentonsteve

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My question is – is it possible/advisable, given the throat-slashing scenario described below?

1 Current OS: Sierra 10.12.2 2 Clicking comedy “update” button in “about” pane leads to “no app updates available” 3 I have no Apple ID/account, and cannot get one, because Thailand (I’ve tried -it’s beyond me) 4 I have found no help on-line as to which OS I can theoretically upgrade to, nor how 5 Safari is broken after an attempted update when it became truculent, cannot find any way to fix 6 Getting a Mac “Genius” to update would mean getting it sent to Bangkok and not seeing it for weeks, and then possibly with all my data erased, do not have the extra Mac box to back up my stuff, but do have several external HDs

Nothing (apart from Safari, which is a real pain) is broken. Should I be worrying myself (or anyone) about this yet? When my Mac eventually falls over, I won’t be able to afford another, so it’ll mean starting over with a *gulp* PC, for the first time in my life. Not looking forward to any of these possible futures.

Hawkfall’s Radio 1 Roadshow Thread

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In a private email, Hawkfall confesses to “not having the confidence” to start this long-overdue thread “in spite of my Mastermind Special Subject knowledge.” In the hope that he’ll join in the fun, then, let’s get some sand on our Mivvis and relive those wonderful years of sunny fun times!

(I should point out that I’m doing this as a favour. I haven’t watched the YouTube clip, from Hawkfall’s private collection, so caveat emptor.)