Tuesday, July 31, 2012

Surely not!...

Hang on...surely I've got this wrong? Please tell me I've got this wrong. Twitter user Arrested (!!!)? after saying 'you let your Dad down'?! about Tom Daley. Not even 'I'm going to kill you' or 'I'm going to blow you and your mates up' or 'I know where you live' any other kind of threatening language. Not even threatening language. Just an opinion, however ill-informed or half baked or whatever. Actually 'inconsequential' would be the word I'd choose. Not a bill board or an TV campaign - a Tweet!

Well, the people who made this arrest decision (if this story is true which surely it can't be) have certainly let their dads down. Blimey, it's a fair cop officer... In fact I'm coming round to disembowel them with a blunt copy of 'Civil Liberties for Dummies'.

If this story is true (though it can't be, surely even Constable Stupid of the Stupidshire police force's Special Acting Stupidly Squad isn't that stupid?) I'd be be rather afraid if I were you.

Surely this is some wag spreading a false story to illustrate how far from reality law enforcement has come?

Tuesday, July 10, 2012

Chilly indeed...

Here’s an email I received recently to the AAZ Records email address, from “OKMusic.fm”. The full text follows but basically they’re looking for original songs for a film. You upload your song and you never know, it might be picked to feature in the film. Well, that sounds OK, some songwriter may have just what they’re looking for (if they have a song about "a dog that is left home alone with his best friend Bobby, an eleven year old boy, on Christmas Eve. Together they foil the attempts of a bunch of bumbling thieves"...) But at the bottom of the message it says “If your original work is chosen, there will be no reimbursement”. Now correct me if I’m wrong but I think that means they don’t pay you.

I assume therefore that the actors auditioned for the privilege of being in this film and aren’t being paid? I assume the director, crew and whatnot aren’t getting paid then? I guess the caterers will be there simply for the prestige of working on this film? Or is it just the music that they want for free?

I don’t generally get too arsey in replies to these kind of things (though you wouldn’t believe how many battle of the bands and song writing competitions there are, complete with ‘registration fee' and list of ‘celebrity judges’) but I do write the odd 'I'm afraid Whole Sky Monitor do not enter competitions' and suchlike. So for this one I just said

"You want to use someone's song in a film and "there will be no re-imbursement? I assume the director and actors and everyone else are working for free on this film"?

John AAZ Records


Not particularly clever but you never know, my email might be picked to be read by the director!

Here's the whole email for anyone interested...

Challenge your Skills! Enter the Chilly Christmas Contest!
Have your music featured in the upcoming Hollywood film Chilly Christmas.

This is the chance to make your national debut! Create and upload original
song(s) for a chance to have them featured in the soundtrack for the
upcoming family comedy, Chilly Christmas, staring C. Thomas Howell, Tom
Arnold and Brooke Langton.

Movie description and trailer can be found here:
http://okmusic.fm/events/chilly_christmas

Upload your submissions from July 6, 2012 at 6:00am(PST) ~ July 16, 2012
at 4:00am (PST) and for the possibility to have your song chosen by the
director of Chilly Christmas. This is the opportunity to get your music heard
alongside other major artists, on a scale like never before!
* Submissions must be original work, no covers, re-mixes, etc. **There is no
guarantee that your music will be chosen by the director. ***If your original
work is chosen, there will be no reimbursement.

Get started now and upload your submissions at the Chilly Christmas Contest
page now!
http://okmusic.fm/events/chilly_christmas

Thursday, July 05, 2012

Let's try to wound a few eh lads?

While I'm having a pop at the police, have you noticed how they always seem to shoot the 'gunman' dead (whether or not he turns out to be an actual gunman) during those armed sieges you get once in a while? They never seem to wound them these days. I'm not saying the police have a shoot to kill policy but I would like to see a few armed sieges resolved with someone being hauled off to court (via hospital would be acceptable) rather than dead. It may be that death is what notches the stories up the news agenda so I don’t see the non fatalities so much - but they’d surely make the local news? Just saying…let’s try to wound a few eh lads?

A proportionate reaction then...in a bag...

If I was a terrorist I guess I’d have a list of possible targets. Clearly there are ‘prestige’ buildings that if I successfully attacked would attract a lot of attention (assuming that’s what I wanted). There are also high profile individuals and facilities and so on. But bang at the top of my list would obviously be setting off a home-made slow burning bomb in a carrier bag on the cheap bus service from Preston.

I heard a spokesman say that the reaction of the emergency services to an electronic cigarette on the bus from Preston was ‘proportionate’. Yeah right. Decontamination areas, military personnel, police dog handlers, firefighters, armed police and other specialist units apparently. Not to mention searching everyone and closing the motorway for four hours (imagine what would happen to me if I closed a motorway by dicking about to no effect for 4 hours!) And more police and fire vehicles than you thought existed in the world. Give a load of blokes the chance to dress up and order people about and generally go into publicly funded drama queen mode and they'll just love it. And afterwards they can be really pompous and self righteous and refuse to admit that they cocked up big-time. They look like bloody seven year olds…Unless this was cooked up as a rehearsal of course.

Thing is that the whole anti-terror shenanigans is gigantically rubbish on the value for money front anyway. I’m not saying that you should always work every cost out according to how many people are actually saved from death or injury or whatever but there are so many things that could be done with the money that would save more lives –Road safety? Safety at work? The starving millions?