This is normally how I begin these review posts … What is the Eurovision Song Contest?Started way back in 1956 as a way of drawing a fractured Europe back together with the healing power of music, the Eurovision Song Contest, or Concours Eurovision de la Chanson – the contest is Continue Reading
Try some COVID-19 social distancing Wes Anderson style
Want to practice safe social distancing? It’s easy: just pretend you’re in a Wes Anderson film. (synopsis (c) Little White Lies via Laughing Squid) There is a gorgeous artistic sensibility to every Wes Anderson film, one that manifests in snappy, quirky dialogue, idiosyncratic visual flourishes and characters who seem to Continue Reading
Six Seasons … and a reunion? Not quite the hoped-for movie but pretty cool even so
If you are a fan of Dan Harmon’s brilliantly quirky sitcom Community, you will be well acquainted with the idea of Six Seasons and a Movie, the rallying cry from fans everywhere who dream of the perfect send off for one of the best and most original comedy shows of Continue Reading
Songs, songs and more songs #24: Coach & Ref, I Break Horses, Jadu Heart, Boys Noize (+ Rico Nasty), AJR + Eurovision 2020 update
Do you feel like life has an unsettlingly otherworldly feel to it at the moment? COVID-19 has well and truly put the pandemic cat among the pigeons and it’s easy to feel like life is so mixed up that there’s no hope of it resembling normal ever again. But as Continue Reading
Book review: Separation Anxiety by Laura Zigman
If there’s one “truth” we are told growing up that needs some serious re-examination if we are to have any hope of getting through life with our sanity and emotional good health intact, it’s the idea that there is something inviolable about the good things that happen to us. Were Continue Reading
Comics review: Asterix and the Chieftain’s Daughter by Jean-Yves Ferri and Didier Conrad
What first attracted me to the books of Asterix all those years ago in a town of 5000 whose library had a delightful inclination to stocking European children’s authors of every imaginable stripe, was the sheer, good-humoured insanity of it all. Here was a rich, clever take on history which Continue Reading
Star Trek: Picard review: “Et in “Arcadia Ego, Part 1” and “Et in Arcadia Ego, Part 2” (S1, E9 & E10)
SPOILERS AHEAD … AND TRUST … AND OLD FRIENDS … AND THE END OF THE UNIVERSE? Picard is, especially in its epic, edge-of-your-seat finale that sees the fate of the universe hang once again in the balance, proof positive that it is not only possible to go back but to Continue Reading
Weekday pop art: Classic album covers receive the social distancing treatment #COVID19
SNAPSHOTSocial distancing is the new normal and it will be for a while. 6 feet or 1.8 meters is the distance that experts recommend we keep between each other. We will rock again soon. Just remember to keep the 6 feet distance. It will save lives. (synopsis via Laughing Squid) Continue Reading
Book review: The Bird King by G. Willow Wilson
Every good thing, so the saying goes, must come to an end, driven by a harsh chronological reality which has no place for favouritism, sentimentality or once transcendent power. Whether the Emirate of Granada on the Iberian peninsula is one of those good things is entirely dependent on whether you Continue Reading
Book review: The Rearranged Life of Oona Lockhart by Margarita Montimore
Books with quirky premises are always a challenge to execute successfully. Either you don’t make the most of the idea underpinning the narrative and the story falls flat, taking the ascendant expectations of your readers along with it; or, you over-egg the concept and the book ends up feel so Continue Reading