MUSIC. - See the list further down this page, in the music section.
DOGS. - Nothing makes me smile more than watching, playing with or simply being with dogs.
COMEDY. - Faves include:
Chris Morris
Mark Leyner
The Simpsons
Qi
John Shuttleworth
South Park
The Onion
Marion & Geoff
Green Wing
The Smoking Room
Monty Python
Withnail & I
Dara Ó Briain
Sean Lock
etc, etc.
REAL ALE. I don't have the gut to go with it, though!
DISLIKES:
Spiders; Children; Cats; Bigots; Conformity.
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Music
The interface is a bit crap (and this may not show up at all in Firefox) but this should give you some idea:
Largely electronic, but it goes a bit further than that. I've recently been enjoying stuff on some of the labels you'll see in my 'top friends': Bunker, Creme, Radio Cosmos, Minimal Rome, etc.
The last few things I've listened to in the real (i.e. non-Myspace) world are:
KRAFTWERK: "Tour De France Soundtracks"
VARIOUS: "Musique Compacte"
VARIOUS: "Searching For 808"
QEK JUNIOR: "Ausverkauf"
SKANFROM: "Hand-Picked Fragments"
BERNARD FEVRE: "The Strange New World Of..."
VARIOUS: "Damp Caves With An Old Book"
VECTOR LOVERS: "Capsule For One"
ELLEN ALLIEN: "Thrills"
AS1: "Identity Singularity"
ZOOT WOMAN: "Zoot Woman"
BETA EVERS: "Eruption"
BETA EVERS: "Passion"
THOMAS FEHLMANN: "Visions Of Blah"
GOSUB: "Data Mining In Anthilia"
HADAMARD: "The Moral Core"
2562: "Aerial"
...and the last few gigs I've been to are:
IM NAMEN DES VOLKES & DAS INSTITUT / OPPENHEIMER ANALYSIS / KATJA VON KASSEL at Brave Exhibitions
AN EXPERIMENT ON A BIRD IN THE AIR PUMP at Stay Beautiful
SCARLET SOHO / FASCINATION / MADISON at Bedsitland
SCARLET SOHO / GLOBAL CITIZEN at The Railway, Winchester.
KATJA VON KASSEL / VISTA / TENEK at Bedsitland
DOPPLEREFFEKT at Plex
HEAVEN 17 / ABC / THE HUMAN LEAGUE at Sheffield Arena.
HEAVEN 17 / ABC / THE HUMAN LEAGUE at Hammersmith Apollo.
KATJA VON KASSEL / HERTZINFARKT at Synthetic.
OPPENHEIMER ANALYSIS / LOOPTRON at Synthetic.
GLOBAL CITIZEN / NORTHERN KIND at The Purple Turtle.
MY BLOODY VALENTINE at The Roundhouse.
YELLOW MAGIC ORCHESTRA at the Royal Festival Hall.
NOUSH / NORTHERN KIND / ELECTROBELLE at the 'Electronically Yours Vol.1' album launch night at Industry.
RICHARD H KIRK at the Grosvenor House Hotel, Sheffield.
IN THE NURSERY at Sheffield Cathedral.
However...
My favourite bands over the years have included: RICHARD H. KIRK SOLVENT Lowfish Figurine Lali Puna PILOTE Isan Biosphere Beaumont Hannant Kraftwerk John Foxx / old Ultravox Gary Numan OMD Heaven 17 Japan Simple Minds The Cure Joy Division Bauhaus Siouxsie & the Banshees Cocteau Twins Dead Can Dance / Brendan Perry / Lisa Gerrard THIS MORTAL COIL Breathless Bowie Paul Quinn and the Independent Group Gavin Friday The Divine Comedy Swans Danielle Dax SHEILA CHANDRA IN THE NURSERY Laibach Death In June D.A.F. Clock DVA Front Line Assembly & offshoots (particularly Will!) Front 242 The Young Gods Killing Joke Ministry Thrill Kill Kult Sheep On Drugs Consolidated Meat Beat Manifesto The Chemical Brothers Leftfield Underworld Moby Orbital Drug Free America Tricky Portishead Massive Attack Scorn Techno Animal Simm ...and too many more to mention!
(My abiding loves in that list are in capitals.)
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John Foxx - "Smokescreen":
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Cabaret Voltaire - "NagNagNag":
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Kraftwerk - "Aerodynamique" (live at the MTV Europe awards, introduced by Kylie):
Good stuff, basically. David Lynch "Amelie" "Before Sunrise" Wim Wenders "Ballad of a Soldier" "Alien" "Das Boot" "The Kingdom" etc.
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Television
Hmmm...
More than I ought to, though not as much as I used to! I spend more time on the net than in front of the telly.
I like good (i.e. odd) comedies, decent science programmes (which seem to be in decline, sadly) and some sport.
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Books
Considering that I've worked with books most of my life, I don't actually read that much! :-S
Stuff I have read in the past (and almost certainly will again) includes Mark Leyner (Humour), H.P. Lovecraft (Horror), Gene Wolfe (Sci Fi), Edgar Allen Poe (Horror), Spike Milligan (Bio) and Mick Farren (Sci Fi). I've also read alot of graphic novels. Of those, my favourites include "Ed The Happy Clown" by Chester Brown, which is the funniest thing in any format I have ever read; "Elektra Assassin" by Alan Moore and Bill Sienkiewicz; "Blood: A Tale" by J.M. DeMatteis and Kent Williams; "Arkham Asylum" by Grant Morrison and Dave McKean; ...and loads more!
These days, the thing I read most is the internet! It's great ...and there's no wasted paper!
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Heroes
...could have easily been compressed into half the number of episodes it actually was!
"Mehhh! ...Making teenagers depressed is like shooting fish in a barrel!" - Bart Simpson.
I am evilC. I'm a geek - mostly about music (it's the main reason I'm here) - but overall just a geek.
I used to be a bit of a Goth, back in the 80s and I still appreciate the aesthetic. These days, though, I have returned to my real "roots", musically speaking, of electropop, space disco and electro. Thus, I've quite enjoyed the resurgence of these "scenes" over the last fifteen years or so.
(Btw - I've been through my phase of shouty guitar-based music long ago and though I still like those older bands - older Ministry, Young Gods, Killing Joke, etc. - I find the current crop really quite bland and dreary.)
I abhor conformity. All the 'social evils' I dislike are a consequence of conformity, I believe: all kinds of bigotry, religion, drug culture and the human compulsion to breed, to name a few.
I try to keep it out of my everyday life but, if prodded, I *am* political - on the left, to be precise - and *very* anti-Nazi!
I hate snobbery and although I like a good cerebral chat, I equally enjoy simply having a good laugh, getting tipsy, going shopping, nature - the simple things in life, to coin a phrase.
P.S. - I will no longer put individuals in my "top friends", so as to avoid any perceived favouritism. Just so you know, like!
Not too late to get advance tickets for my shows coming up - including two tickets for £5 for my Birmingham gig (3 Nov). And remember I'm playing with Ebb at the ICA in London (9 Nov) - this is a very special performance and it would be great to see you there. /MaJiKer
