#21; Mime Acts Stay Away - Geniuses at Work

Monday, 29 June 2009

I’ve been thinking today in work about what to write about in another entry. It’d be nice to get a bit more activity with shorter posts rather than my stupidly long posts at times, and I was given some lovely advice from Pat W in the comments the other day which I do appreciate and took to heart quite well, so thanks Pat! Back to this entry, tonight I just wanted to share a few live videos of Muse that are up their with my favourites and do a bit less writing, videos that I do absolutely adore.  Hopefully you guys can get a bit more of an experience into why the band are considered one of the best live acts arguably in the world right now! So go ahead, read on, and enjoy…

Hysteria – BRIT Awards 2004

The BRITs are generally a quite mainstream affair with lots of pop, rap, r n’b etc type of music that I’m personally not too accustomed too. No doubt everyone’s entitled to their opinion but they don’t usually produce a show with anything much to my tastes. Nevertheless, when I heard Muse were opening the show, my jaw dropped – something I was not expecting! But that’s certainly no bad thing, as I welcome Muse in any kind of form. And as you can see for yourself, the performance speaks for itself in terms of sheer power, brilliance and every wonderful adjective in the dictionary…

 

 

 

 

 

Stockholm Syndrome – Earls Court 2004

Again, in 2004 this was performed at two incredible gigs over 2 nights in London Earls Court. It’s all about the raw power even more so in this more so than the Hysteria one aforementioned, and you get all this release of excitement, frustration, anger of the song and everything thrown into this brilliant, brilliant setlist closer. Just want to point out a special mention to the final chorus and the amount of emotion thrown into the lyrics ‘This is the last time I’ll abandon you’, I’m sure you’ll understand when you hear it. This, for me, is just the perfect Stockholm Syndrome. Period.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Fury – Royal Albert Hall 2007

I’m sure I’ve mentioned Fury many a time to friends, on Twitter and on this blog but I simply cannot get enough of the song. Fury isn’t on any Muse albums asides from the Japanese release of Absolution – it is simply a B-side. Yet in 2007 it began popping up in Muse’s live setlists around the world completely out of nowhere to much surprise and glee, as it is quite simply an incredible song. here specifically, watch the concentration in Matt as he strikes out the chorus on the guitar, and that menacing bassline. Something incredibly addictive about this performance. Brilliant brilliant brilliant!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Butterflies and Hurricanes – Wembley 2006

This was the setting for arguably Muse’s biggest gig of their career – the first band to play at the new Wembley Stadium. It was a hell of a gig – 2 nights of playing to 80,000 people in the biggest stadium in England? Yeah, I’d say that’s quite something… and this performance for me was the best of the evening. The entire thing is a pleasure to watch on the HAARP DVD they released of it but there’s just something about this rendition of B&H. Maybe it’s the short, sharp guitar that rides it along, or that incredible riff in the centre that takes full attention, perhaps Matt’s piano tinkling just jungles along inside my mind. Whatever the reason is, I simply love this.

 

 

 

 

 

Citizen Erased – Le Zenith 2001

We’re going into the darker, more insanically twisted days of Muse now, in the ‘shroom era of Origin of Symmetry, where tracked were recorded from bender sessions and everything was just a whirlwind experience of distorted guitars, progtastic excellence and an almost rebellious breakaway from the dark introduction of their debut album Showbiz. The thing I love about Citizen Erased is how it’s such a loud, in-your-face song and yet at the same time, the last few minutes are the sweetest, softest moments of Muse’s career and the contrast of styles in such a song sends chills up my spine every time. I bed of you to watch the video and enjoy every second for what is deserved, and excuse the vast amount of camera angles used!

 

 

 

 

 

Ruled by Secrecy – Earls Court 2004

Again we find ourselves in Earls Court as seen earlier with Stockholm Syndrome, and I promised myself to only choose one song from those gigs but I simply can’t. Ruled By Secrecy isn’t a setlist sitter – it isn’t almost guaranteed a spot on every Muse setlist like Stockholm Syndrome is. The thing is with Ruled by Secrecy in this performance is how well it synchronises with it’s video and presentation, everything builds up so well and you’ve got this beautiful song, the band synchronised, the song synchronised, and everything just placed together in a wonderful package. Plus once that piano kicks in…

 

 

 

 

 

Bliss – Fuji 2002

The gig in question here is the Fuji Rock festival, obviously in 2002, one for me that is unfairly ignored by many Muse fans especially when a pro-shot of the entire set is on Youtube to enjoy. Nevertheless, Bliss is in general one of my favourite live songs in any form – it has that excellent, excellent riff that accompanies the song and Muse do a hell of a job making it sounds so fresh every single time I hear it. Even better is that the song is ‘extended’ with the riff being repeated and given variation at the end of the song, which you’ll see to the side in the video. Such a fantastic performance of one of their earliest best gigs personally seeing as it’s back in ye olde year of 2002. Although they had 2 albums out by then… but still! Watch it, engross yourself into it, love it!

 

 

 

 

 

There’s so much more I could go into but I’ll leave it there. Songs like Knights of Cydonia at the V Festival in 2008, being preceded by Chris playing The Man with a Harmonica, or , stuff like Bliss being combined with the balloons and Matt’s tinkling introduction to New Born, Muse’s earlier stuff in France and small UK locations, even stuff like their early performances of Bliss that sound absolutely awful but have such a history about them, little stuff like that I definitely recommend checking out. If you yourself have any memorable gigs of the band or performances, please comment and remind me! Hopefully you’ve experienced them a bit more of the band with this though if you’ve ever wondered why their live reputation is so good.

#20; Wibbly Wobbly Bloggy Woggy… Stuff…

Saturday, 27 June 2009

You might be reading your feed readers or looking at that entry title and thinking I have finally gone mad. Finally lost my mind, simply throwing out random words and creating nonsense that sounds quite silly. No, that happened a long time ago! Hopefully some of you will have understood what the title is actually relating to, and what is my favourite show on television asides from sport like Formula One. This television program, well you may have heard of it… it’s called Doctor Who! In all seriousness though (Yes, you can be serious with that show for you silly doubters!) I can’t stress enough how much I enjoy every second of the modern re-launch of the much loved series. After thoroughly enjoying/reading an excellent entry by Christine over at her personal blog (SmarterThanYourAverage.com) discussing her personal favourite 5 episodes of the modern reincarnation, there was simply no way, after being inspired by that fantastic entry, that I could go through the evening without talking about the show and what makes it so brilliant for me in my own little corner of the interwebs.

Let’s face it;  the show is immensely popular. Millions upon millions of people not just within the UK but around about the legacy of the Doctor and his sci-fi antics in all corners of the galaxy. It has been around for decades, and if you’re a fan of the show, you will know what I mean when I say that you ‘have your own doctor’.  As you can probably assume already, a certain Mr David Tennant is without a shadow of a doubt my doctor. Yes, I know about tennant-and-tatethe erratic brilliance of Tom Baker and that booming voice, or the witty impulsiveness of Peter Davidson, plus the fact when I started watching the show in it’s modern form it was given a new lease of life via the gritty but strangely appealing Christopher Ecclestone (Ecclestone… where do I recognise that name?). Nevertheless, Tennant has been a figurehead for so many audiences in the modern run of Doctor Who – he appeals to children and to adults in his own brilliant ways, he has that likable quality about him to allow new fans of the show to become followers of the show, and he also brings in everything a Doctor should have for the old school fans. Sadly, his reign will be up as the Doctor by the end of 2009 as he hands over the torch, or the Tardis so to speak, to Matt Smith – before I make a final decision of Smith, it’s only fair we see what he does as his Doctor but I will admit, I do have many worries as to how he can follow up David Tennant. For all I know, he could be incredible and be quite something; when the choice of Catherine Tate was announced in terms of being the Doctor’s companion, it came from much conserved criticism and quite a confused attitude from myself, but she became my favourite companion. Her attitude was refreshing in her relationship with the Doctor, her general appeal was completely different to that of Rose and Martha, and she was exceedingly funny; it was obvious Tate thoroughly enjoyed every second she was involved on Doctor Who, and that she had given as much influence into her character as possible. So for all we know yet, Mr Smith (See, it already works considering the Doctor’s alias!) could be the next big thing.

Over time with the progression of the modern series’, I’ve seen lots of people simply write it off as a kids program – this is quite simply one of the most ignorant, narrow minded viewpoints I hear about the show. I won’t deny the obvious, and that is that Russell T. Davies absolutely keeps in mind with every single episode he produces that the show does keep a younger audience in mind, and so it should. The appeal of the show itself is that it appeals to EVERY age though, not just children! weeping-angel-2I’ll give you an example with an episode; my favourite episode of the modern adaptation is the thrillingly brilliant Blink. The synopsis of the episode runs through the story of a young British woman finding a hidden message through the form of DVD extras and easter eggs, and further uncovering the Weeping Angels, a race that take the form of everyday statues that kill when a target blinks or looks away from them. if you find such a story stupid, or unbelievable, you should – that’s what makes every single episode so bloody brilliant! In Blink’s case, the story was incredible – it features such a little amount of the Doctor in it’s 45 minute timeslot, and yet is arguably the best episode for my own opinion. It excited, it thrilled, hell for me it frightened!! you know those screamers you find on the internet, that flash an image and scream loudly quickly? It even had that! So much for a kids show. The show consistently creates such an aura from the content it creates that truly makes it out of this world, the stories are totally completely mad, and the way they are portrayed, written, acted out, and produced make then 45 minutes of gripping, exciting, and thankfully amusing television. Sure, it’s not Hollywood effects but it’s the best damn thing on television for me when the series go out and I could never in words sum up how enjoyable I find every second of Doctor Who. Everybody deserves to give the show a chance because I still truly believe so many people are missing out on an excellent drama that may simply be dismissed because of silly little reasons. It has a protagonist that has a huge, rich history and back-story created by simply the best writers in the business, it has a sidekick that usually is a fantastic character and an excellent addition to the show (I wasn’t a fan of Martha, but I shalln’t go there…) and every single episode is special to me because of one simple reason – they’re always different and yet they’re always Doctor Who.

It does make me sad that we haven’t got a series until next year to love and cherish, and it does feel kind of wierd at the same time though annoyingly. When we had the third series, there was a brilliant arc leading up the the finally where the series would constantly hint at the return of The Master, a fellow time-lord notorious for being one of the Doctor’s enemies no matter how much The doctor reached out to him, and when we got to that finale, it created the most epic feeling in the way it was presented. Every week you could just see it building and building, you would keep your eye out for special events in episodes, you would see adverts on television hinting and it was the same with the fourth series leading up to that huge encounter with Davros and The Doctor – it’s that feeling that I miss just as much as I do the show at the moment. The excitement of not knowing what to expect next even though you just know in your mind what is coming around the corner, the hinting and teasing of the future for The Doctor and the presentation of the show created such a great atmosphere for fans I felt, and without the show around, television feels a lot more empty to me.

Long live the future of Doctor Who. I say this, but I also should say, long live the history of Doctor Who! Before the modern series had made it’s way onto BBC1 once more on our Saturday evenings, I had only watched a few episodes in all honesty – mostly Baker, Pertwee and Davison episodes. They were undoubtedly enjoyable and I have no reason to News9_0believe if I watched the entire back classic catalogue I’d love it, but if I’m honest with you, I’m more than happy to stick with my modern Doctor. Yes, we have a new future with Matt  Smith at the helm of being the Doctor when Tennant moves onto new things at the end of the year (God, how good is that finale going to be for Tennant though?!) but we have a new breath of fresh air with Stephen Moffat at the helm of being the genius that puts it all together, replacing Russell T Davies. It goes without saying I am excited and I’m nervous at the same time for this – Smith is an unknown, but so what? Like I say earlier, he could be anything. He has Moffat behind him and if there’s anyone I can place faith in to continue producing this genius show, its him. Russell did a grand job to be fair to him - he created new characters that he wasn’t afraid to unleash into the wonderful world of the Lone Wanderer. Yes, he overused the Daleks and Cyberman I will admit, and yes, at times he probably did things in a pretty stupid way that could have been explained better, but he introduced us to Rose Tyler and her fantastic family, he laid the foundation for some incredible pieces of television on Saturday nights, he created new vital characters in the Doctor’s world (Just look at how popular Captain Jack was for example, and even smaller characters like Donna’s uncle Wilf who I personally though was beyond legendary status!) and of course, probably his most important achievement, he was the man that got the BBC to bring back the show to our screens. So with his and Tennant’s departure, I still remain positive. The future is just as important as the history, which seems appropriate for the context of the show really.

Now I wish I could travel back in time and watch everything for the first time once more… where are you, Doctor?!

#19; Saluting the Loyal Family Pt. 2

Tuesday, 23 June 2009

Earlier this week I began a two parter blog entry delving into the realms of loyalty within the sport I love to watch, Formula 1. It’s not the easiest subject to discuss I find because we as the fans can never truly see the full side of an F1 driver in modern times due to teams almost providing the words for their drivers to speak rather than the drivers being given full reign to speak their mind should they want to. However, as I previously stated last week, I find this subject quite an interesting area of study. How loyal can you be to a team but have the offer of more money staring down at you from another source? Would a team matter that much to you should a faster, better team come looking for your services? There are many questions that maybe I cannot answer but I am certainly willing to discuss, and in this second parter, I am going to start with the current leader of the world championship in 2009, Jenson Button.

There is absolutely no doubt about it – Jenson is having the Formula 1 season of his life so far. Out of the 8 races we’ve had in 2009, the man has won 6 of them and got 7 consecutive podiums from Australia to Turkey. We’re hearing a lot of famous names from the past being mentioned alongside his name – Schumacher, Clark, Prost and others. If Jenson does become champion (and perhaps even if he doesn’t) by the end of the season other teams will be fighting for his signature – but as much as the rumours suggest big name teams like Ferrari or McLaren want him, is their reputation enough to pull Button away from Brawn? Let’s look at the facts; Jenson has been a part of his team since 2003 where he joined them in their British American Racing days. It’s very much been a rollercoaster ride for Jenson, with seasons of success in 2004 and 2006 but then the depressingly jensonslow final 2 years of Honda’s recent run in Formula 1.

He certainly has a history with conflicts with teams though, as we saw with the Williams dispute in 2004. For those not in the know, Jenson was driving for BAR Honda but his entry into formula 1 was through Sir Frank Williams’ team (obviously Williams F1), and whilst they allowed him to drive for other teams such as Renault and BAR, they kept a form of option for Jenson to return to the team in the future. In 2004, Jenson himself stated that he planned to rejoin Williams for the 2005 season but BAR were on a rising path in terms of performance. As stated previously, he had an excellent season in 2004 – despite no wins yet in his Formula 1 career, he had achieved his first pole position and finished 3rd in the driver’s championship. Williams were not necessarily a step down at the time as in 2004 they had managed to win with Montoya, but they had finished lower in the championship than BAR Honda. Jenson was obviously stuck between the two, a contract he had signed and the possibility of a future with BAR. Eventually, BAR ended up getting Jenson’s services and it is reported he paid £20 million to Sir Frank Williams in order to clear the conflict. This boils down to a very big area though if true – money.

Was Jenson simply offered more from Dave Richards to stay at BAR? He soon signed a new multi year contract after the dispute was over, and a huge payment was involved in order to stay at BAR so this theory is definitely possible and critics of Jenson will say money was the reason he stayed. You can easily accuse myself of being biased which I do appreciate is going to be because of my support towards Brawn GP and long time support of Honda, but I still see Jenson as an honest driver within the grid. The past few years Honda have had an awful time struggling with many issues and after years of good performances and that fantastic first win for Jenson in 2006, he could have easily given up on the project Honda had after 2007’s disastrous year and furthermore in 2008 after another poor year. In November 2008, Honda CEO Nick Fry had confirmed Button had signed a new deal with the team despite all this (and of course no knowledge into the pulling out of the constructor in December 2008), and again when Ross Brawn bought out the team and before this news was confirmed, it could have been very easy for Jenson to jump ship to other places. However, he stuck with the team and it’s paid off without a doubt.

So what about the future for the Frome Flyer, will he stick with what he has now or will he be tempted by bigger and better offers after this season? At the moment the sport is in a grand state of uncertainty due to the every ongoing war between the masters at the FIA and the minions at FOTA, or so it feels. There is no guarantee that we will even see teams like Brawn GP in the sport in 2010, although I personally feel that there will still be a championship in F1 that we have now and will continue to have for years to come. Aside from my own point of view though, Jenson will get offers. If the money is right, teams will bid a lot for him because of his reputation as a smooth, easy and fast driver, and because of how this season has gone for him so far. I still feel that he will stay though – he obviously is comfortable with his place in Brawn GP, and his previous history with the entire setup with Honda and BAR of course. He has stuck with them through thick and thin and they have rewarded  both him and Rubens with the most wonderful car. You have to remember that despite the car being in development for over a year, this is still a brand new independent team set up a month before the start of the season, and despite a good but not excellent Silverstone showing, the car’s performance has been mind-blowing as has Jenson’s drives. Arguments have arisen whether if this was Schumacher dominance we would all be complaining, and it is a fair point as 2002’s year of Schumacher caused much upset, but Jenson has finally got the car behind him to prove he is worthy of being a champion if it happens. For the future, he will remain at Brawn in whatever form the sport becomes, I’m sure of it. Constantly he has shown his support to what the team are doing, and he has a fantastic relationship with his teammate Rubens Barrichello (off the track of course, on track it’s every man for himself as it should be!) and most importantly for him as a driver, the team are obviously willing to support him through whatever lies ahead.

Formula 1 isn’t just about the guys at the front though, there are 20 drivers on that grid and everyone deserves to be considered. The next subject of loyalty I want to talk about is with underperforming world champions, for different reasons though perhaps. Renault managed to get back double world champion Fernando Alonso into a slower car from McLaren in 2008 after a controversial year at McLaren, whilst Kimi Raikonnen has never really shown that lightning speed he produced in his championship year of 2007. Alonso, for me, is still the most skilled driver in Formula 1. His car last season was very much a huge disappointment in comparison to that brilliant machine he used to fight alongside Michael alonso-raikkonen1-lgSchumacher; it was much slower, it didn’t have the same power as what Renault produced in 05 and 06, and on a vain note, it was freakin’ ugly to look at, unless 200mph creme eggs are your type of thing. Why on earth would a champion want to drive a car that seemed so clumsy? The reason for me is because Alonso has a connection with the Renault setup. Flavio Briatore may make some misjudged and ridiculous comments within the world of Formula 1 but he has brought in some spectacular drivers into the sport and given them a stepping stone to make their name undoubtedly. He himself has said how much he appreciates working alongside Briatore and the two have the right relationship to make the team work so well and to add that loyalty aspect to Alonso’s job at Renault; just look at how disastrous the year of Mclaren was for Alonso after a complete breakdown between himself and the team’s management style with Ron Dennis specifically. he is not the most loyal driver on the grid for me though because of this, the job of a driver is obviously to go for the wins in a race but you’re contracted to a team in the same way a normal person is contracted to their company to work – you are there to work for them. Some of the decisions Alonso made, specifically that pit stop at Hungary 2007, jeopardised his reputation. He is an incredible driver, and he is a worthy name within the sport, but he obviously has a line where loyalty stops and personal choices come in. The Renault he has now in 2009 is still generally below average as it was in 2009, but Alonso proved his own dedication and enjoyment in Fuji and Singapore last season winning the two races in a car that really had no right to be there. We’ve had the huge, huge rumour for years about his move to Ferrari being in the works but who knows? If Renault continue to stagnate in terms of their development and lack of pace, it’s definitely possible. He has already left a team he seems dedicated to once, remember…

On the other hand, Kimi Raikkonen just as confusing to study for completely different reasons. He’s at the biggest name team in the history of the sport, the blood red colours of Scuderia Ferrari and the Prancing Horse following his every move in his Formula 1 life, and he has pretty much always had a sensational car behind him (apart from the start of the 2009 season of course) – so why is it he seems so absolutely unmotivated on the track? He’s an excellent driver as are the previous world champions of the past few years and there’s no disputing that, but if you compare how he was in 2007 to how he has performed after it,  to me he just seems like a transformed man. There’s no consistency to his driving; he can have flashes of utter brilliance, then the next weekend drive unnoticed in the background. We of course had that infamous scene in Malaysia 2009 where nearly all the drivers pretty much worked on their cars in a drenched, ‘undwivable’ grid whilst Raikonnen was seen strolling through the pitlane in flip flops eating an ice cream seemingly in another world completely. His attitude in interviews has never been his strongest point and he has admitted that he hates that aspect of the sport, but he does say he loves the obvious racing aspect of Formula 1. It just amazes me. It’s a little strange because he didn’t have a bad 2008 at all really, he was a contender the championship up until the Japanese Grand Prix. It just bothers me that the second highest paid sportsman in the world seems to have such a lack of motivation and spark in his driving where his teammate, who was ridiculed far more than Kimi at times, showed his brilliance last season and was an incredible challenger for the championship. Where does this all fall into loyalty though? Well for me the lack of motivation is a huge, huge aspect of Raikkonen’s loyalty to not only Ferrari but also to the sport in general.  He obviously has a bank account set for life – as I say he is the second highest paid sportsman in the world behind Tiger Woods, an incredible feat. If the Ferrari rumours about Alonso do indeed materialise, will Raikkonen simply leave the sport that seems so plagued and wallowing in a sea of politics and uncertainty? Honestly, it would not surprised me if he did move away from Formula 1 should that happen. You could just place it down to his personality, the way he acts is just how he is, but if that were the case it would still not prevent him from an inconsistent set of performances and furthermore, it would surely have seen him try to get more out of a car that was still amazingly powerful in 2008. His previous history in the sport has seen him at a few teams so he is certainly not loyal to a particular team, although the wage he is on at Ferrari may definitely see him stay if he had the option. It’s just another case of ‘who knows?’ with Kimi, something I’ve wondered for a long, long time.

I’m getting on a bit now with this entry and I apologise if it’s a lot of reading but there is a lot to say I feel. I’m going to finish though with the big talking point within the sport at the moment – the FIA and FOTA ‘war’winner. There’s no intention to delve into the tiresome world of the politics we’ve all been subjected to of recent months, and years even. We’ve heard enough of that. All I plan to say is that loyalty is obviously being thrown about in FOTA at the moment – Force India and Williams placed their own entries alongside the conditional general entry that FOTA applied for 2010 with all the teams. Can you be loyal at the same time as confirming your teams future? I believe so but it’s obvious that the teams in FOTA do not agree with the suspension of these two teams from the organisation because of their choice to enter. It’s a shame because FOTA have the potential to present ideas to an authority that seem adamant on taking the sport into a direction no fan seems to have any support for, but with these suspensions question if any problems are happening within FOTA themselves. Will we have a breakaway series in 2010? I don’t think we will. Hopefully, within the next few years we will get Formula 1 with cheaper tickets, with the rules the team wants and what they are suggesting with their breakaway threat. But you must remember – this is the Formula One Team Association. They make their threats for a breakaway and confront the FIA where necessary but every single team wants Formula One to have a future. I feel that even with the doubts of futures for teams like Toyota and Renault, they still want the sport to survive through everything that is going on. If we do indeed get a breakaway, I will be watching but at the same time, I will know at the back of my my mind that it is not what it should be, and I wonder whether this is the case with several teams within FOTA. As loyal as they are to the organisation and their goal to bring power to the teams, you have got to wonder how loyal they are when their future within the sport is in disrepute. Max and even Bernie Ecclestone as the commercial rights holder have shown how they treat loyalty – they simply don’t have any. They have thrown tracks with a huge history in formula one out of the window like a piece of litter because of financial reasons and provided us fans with the loss of some excellent circuits for their own benefit. After further thoughts of the whole subject, and especially after these bog entries and researching deeper into the various aspects of Formula 1, I can’t help to feel that loyalty in formula 1 is something hard to achieve when the people who run it seem to have no knowledge of the word.

So… that’s it. The Loyal family has been discussed, criticised, saluted and thought about. Thanks for reading these entries, a lot of thought has gone into them and again I apologise if there’s simply too much writing. There’s a lot more I could have gone into but I feel that enough has been said for now, and who knows, maybe a part 3 in the future ahead depending on whatever happens in the sport I love so much. I hope you guys have enjoyed reading this!

#18; A Simple World Within 140 Characters

Tuesday, 16 June 2009

The year of 2009 has seen Twitter become very much a mainstream tool of social networking, so to speak. No, it does not take all your personal details and flash them about for the world to see. No, it does not work on creating a webpage advertising yourself with a song streaming in the background and an offensive use of HTML. It’s simple; it allows you to express what you want to express in 140 characters. Simple; that to me is what makes Twitter so brilliantly useful. Those characters, that small message, can do so much. It can express a thought, pass on a message, anything that your mind can manage to withhold within such a small boundary. So what makes Twitter so useful? How can such a simple system provide such a useful result of success?

Much like the way it’s designed, the answer is simple – because it IS simple! It doesn’t need any kind of fancy web design to ‘pimp your page’ or show off photos left right and centre all over the place, it works because it’s simple. for myself I use it in a personal sense, I use it to express my feelings on various things, to simply place me feelings in a simple message for people who may actually want to hear it, to talk to the people I love and to hear from even the most ridiculous of sources such as the Fake F1 drivers that make up the entire grid basically, and if you’re an f1 fan, it’s definitely worth checking out. It’s not just f1 though of course, you know how much I love the sport so I apologise for going on once again! It’s very easy to find out information from people whether they be in the public eye in music, or films, or whatever (look at how much used Stephen Fry’s tweets have been mentioned in the media for example!) There really is a surprising amount you can do with this system and for people reading this who have never used the system, then I hope you can learn a bit or two as to how useful it has been so far.

Twitter though has proved that, since its’ insurgence as a mainstream use of micro-blogging (or social networking depending on how you view it) now it seems, that it can be fantastically useful though. I provide the example in which twitterreally shot up it’s status within the world of the interwebs earlier this year; the crash of the plane into the Hudson river in New York at the start of 2009. It wasn’t the journalistic predators of the world’s media that reached their way to the crash site first, but rather, simply a twitter user who uploaded a picture he took on his mobile phone, and posted the message to the public via the image sharing service TwitPic. From this, news began to spread and this ridiculous sounding message “There’s a plane in the Hudson” grew eventually into the realisation that a major event had actually happened, and the picture backed it up. Brilliant! It is things like this that make me love using the service though; when people start embracing it, major media centres, television presenters, companies, famous people, whatever, you can find out some brilliant little things that otherwise we wouldn’t know about whether they be for formality reasons (brief news posted on twitter may just be ignored as a simple comment elsewhere for example) or whatever, twitter has just provided a new way for people to just say things in a lovely, simple way.

It would be safe to say we’re living in a technology-based world now though. Teenagers and young adults are extremely tech-based in the way their lives are run, whether this be in an occupational purpose or for general casual reasons, as a society we log onto your computer and share images over the internet, blog much as I’m doing now, play games over huge distances with no real notice of how far you actually are and all of this is thanks to the advancement of technology over the past few decades. Again, I take another example into the tech-central society in even places you may not think of. The current disruption of power and society almost revolting in disgust at the elections in Iran has seen censorship of the country’s internet based social networking sources. The young within the country are still finding new ways to share information, to show video footage from their phones, to tweet messages in protest, disgust, anger and all this in ways that the government and censorship officers are simply unable to hold back. Using the twitter search, I decided to check out just how many people are talking about it in such a short period and within 5 minutes of waiting…

twittercomp

5 minutes of waiting, and 736 results from people talking about such a massive current event. I left the webpage open, and within 10 minutes, there were well over 1500 comments found, yet this is only from people mentioning it with the hashtag I searched for; for all I know in that 5 minutes there could have been hundreds more not using the hashtag to help, inform, retweet, whatever… just astounds me really. I apologise that I’m not the most convincing person to read in explaining why this amazes me, but knowing that thousands of people are discussing ideas all day and all night about something as serious as this makes me a bit happier about us as human beings. Stephen Fry posted the following comment in a twitter message last night: “Iranian govt should at least know we're watching & we care. We're not imperialists, we just care.” – there are simply no intentions to turn this into a political blog entry at the current events but this, for me, sums up just how much power we can have via these simple messages. It’s not even just about the Iran revolts, but everything in life, anything that upsets you, anything that delights you. Anything you want to talk about, there’s your stage.

As with everything else in life, Twitter comes with it’s criticisms from people. A lot of people have mentioned to me, “who cares if so and so is eating some pudding? Why do we need to know every 5 minutes?” – it’s a fair point. It’s bound to annoy people where you see updates like that for no apparent reason, but there’s so much out there that can be actually interesting to follow if you gave it a chance. Another complaint I’ve heard is that it is just ‘too simple’, to go back to what I discussed at the beginning of this entry. It is simple, definitely, but that’s what makes it work for me like I’ve already explained. Perhaps after the use of social networking websites such as Myspace, Bebo or Facebook you, as a user, are to expect some kind of similar service where you express your inner personality via a webpage or two? again, this for me is where Twitter shines; if you’re creative enough, there’s a grand amount you can express in those 140 characters.

I personally hope that the service doesn’t die down anytime soon. Obviously it’s been immensely popular recently and has become the darling for media in terms of popping it into the odd article and news report perhaps to appeal to a younger audience (although in experience, the user-base come from all ages of people to be fair!). If you are with us lovely folk on twitter, then please do follow me because I do vastly enjoy every single person’s comments that I follow as well as always welcoming people to try and enjoy the possibly annoying musings I tend to shout out  – you can find me @LukehMuse, and as you can see the last few updates get posted just over there on the right! Whala! This entry is very central to how I see the service obviously due to it being a personal blog, but I do want to know and for you as a reader (whether you use Twitter or not), what do you think about Twitter? Of course I would love to hear from your comments because, as I say, it still finds complaints in it’s sea of positive reception. A quick summary of what I think? It’s not just image sharing, or music streaming, or pages of information, it’s just one simple message… and the best thing about it is, it’ll never, ever need to be anything more.

Simple!

#17; Saluting the Loyal Family Pt. 1

Sunday, 14 June 2009

Formula 1 can be a very fickle sport at times for it’s inhabitants. For a sport that speaks volumes in racing, it’s just as much about the politics and money transpiring between the various spokespeople, principals, liars and folks behind the scenes that both build up and break down what we love about the sport; what happens out on the track. The drivers themselves are not the lovable gentlemen and characteristic playboys of the 60’s that we so often study and read about, and often remember and love to reminisce about. Concerning modern day drivers, I have been wondering a question recently to my mind about the personalities we watch driver around circuits many times a year to much enjoyment from myself and millions of others; at what price does a team become a team before an opportunity to these sportsmen? In what case do they see a team that may provide a future over an team that may provide economic providence? Does money rule over reliability to some?

It’s an unfair accusation personally to simply say that formula 1 drivers are simply there for the money; it’s simply not true. In the same way that footballers may be provided with the most ludicrous wages at times per week, and no matter how ghastly they may perform on the pitch at times, their role within their employment is the same as any of our employment roles within normal life; to turn up, get on with our job, and get rewarded for out input. Every driver has his own personality and opinions, of course, much like I have my own opinions that may vary from you the reader. The following content of this entry however is just my personal view of how I see the drivers in their position in the teams, and wondering just how loyal they are to their employers. You may think I’m right, you may think I’m wrong, that’s perfectly ok, but it’s something that has been on my mind and something that might be quite interesting to discuss. So… just how loyal are they?

The original plan was going to be to go through every driver and study their loyalty and previous history. However, after reviewing the blog, the ideas and after a bit of lovely feedback, I did decide that would be simply too much to write about. I love Formula 1 just as much as the next fan, but it seemed a tad ridiculous to study every area so thoroughly. There are new drivers to the grid, and there are drivers I don’t know so well in comparison to others, for example, look if I were to analyse Barrichello alongside Buemi – the difference in experience and history would be a huge difference! For me it seems best to simply look at the drivers who’s loyalty could come into question in the current climate of formula 1, and how the future could shape out to them. This is only the first part of this, and I hope to do another in the nearby future (this week) to conclude my thoughts and feelings and break up things a little. This, I feel, would make for a far less demanding read and also not so much content to include. I hope you agree!

A good place to start would be the world champion. Let’s face it, we have a champion who seems to be Formula 1’s marmite driver in the UK; you either love him or hate him. Lewis has a great deal to be loyal for personally concerning McLaren. The team, and Ron Dennis in particular, had a lot of faith in putting a new, inexperienced driver to the sport into thedave very top rank of cars in his first season. It paid off; Lewis has proved time and time again he has the skill to be at McLaren and as we all know by his second season he was World Champion, which is quite a fait. This season, it seems Lewis’ loyalty to the team that brought him into f1 and watched over his rise from karting into the big bad world of Formula 1 has bee brought into question plenty of times so far. His attitude towards the team has been very dismissive at times, and whilst frustration is bound to boil over the current world champion when he is struggling to get any pace out of a car still progressing towards the front again, it is imperative that he sticks with what he has for me personally. Of course, the ‘era of Ron’ is over and McLaren seem to be putting plenty of emphasis upon this new, honest setup they appear to be throwing at both us as fans and the FIA. Lewis is a very, very good driver, but he has a lot to learn if he wants to be remembered anything like his idol Senna; he has had plenty of challenges to overcome this season, and step by step, he can build his way to be in the top tier once more. He certainly has the skill, now he needs the head to go with it to remind him just what he has at McLaren. All that being said, McLaren haven’t been an honest team this season and have caused problems for Lewis themselves, as well as unnecessary headlines to accompany a frustrating entry into the 2009 season so you yourselves can ask where you feel blame is to place where loyalty is concerned with Lewis.

Let’s compare the top driver at McLaren (Sorry Heikki, or for Sidepodcast readers, sorry Amy!) to the top driver, for me, over at rivals  Ferrari. I have a lot of time for Felipe. When I see him in the car, and around the paddock on TV, there appears to be a great deal of hunger in his style of racing and the attitude he has towards his role at Ferrari, not to mention how impressive he was in 2008 concerning his title challenge. He also seems genuinely delighted to be at a team such as Ferrari, which I’m sure anyone would in all fairness considering the pay packet you would be picking up and the team themselves with that iconic heritage orbiting the team, but there is a genuine loyalty to succeed in that car for me in Massa. When Schumacher retired from the team after 2006, he stayed on with Ferrari for various little roles but also as a mentor for the drivers, and it seems more specifically with Felipe. This has worked wonders personally; Felipe has matured, his driving ability has increased tenfold since those days at Sauber (Ah, good comedy) and he is a big landmark on the map of Formula 1. In the future, I can easily see Felipe staying but only at the teams choice; many a time have us fans been held to accusations within the rumour bank that a certain Mr. Alonso and Vettel may be driving in the blood red of Ferrari’s colours in the nearby future  – only time will tell.

As a sport always pushing for the future, as with most recent seasons we have quite the amount of drivers with youth on their side and generally inexperienced with the sport yet apparently ready for the demands of Formula 1. I’m looking at the likes of Sebastien Bourdais, Sebastien Buemi and Nelson Piquet, who have only a single season or two’s history within the sport or, in Buemi’s case, a few races. How can we analyse the loyalty of a driver that is new to this world? Everybody has to start somewhere, even if you have criticism nelsleft right and centre, it’s your role as a driver to prove why the teams should sign you on. Formula 1 is now a very expensive world where money is constantly a centre point of discussion for several different reasons, so I question, are some of these newer drivers coming into the sport for the heritage of teams and the sport itself, for the passion of racing on the pinnacle of motorsport, or simply to ensure themselves a financial future in a job willing to embrace them? Piquet, in particular, seems to hold a very negative attitude to the way he addresses his job. He recently did an interview with F1 Racing magazine in which his responses to the way Flavio works as a boss, and how Alonso is as a teammate, showed how frustrated he was with his position in the team. You can sympathise I suppose in this aspect; he’s very much the number 2 under, as he calls it, “Flavio’s favourite son” and Flav himself gets little praise from myself. At the same time, Piquet’s performances on track have been far less of what should be expected of a team who just a few years ago were world champions, and the positive he has done is vastly overweighed by the negative in his driving whether it be his poor qualifying performances or inconsistent driving. Would he be better with another team? Possibly. He may have a chance to get out of how he feels is Alonso’s shadow and possibly get a car he feels he can get a better drive out of, but in his current role, there is obviously no loyalty to Renault. I have mentioned plenty of times myself how he expresses no real connection to the team, and if he had the chance to up his money and go, I feel he would happily take it over this seemingly secure drive.

There is plenty more to discuss about the various aspects of loyalty within the ranks of Formula 1, and possibly not just with the drivers. But for now, I shall leave it at this and move onto my next areas of discussion in my next entry, including Jenson Button’s domination of the 2009 season and what could be next for him. Again, this is all simply how the world of Formula 1 appears to me as a diehard fan, and there is no wrong or right necessarily in what I have mentioned. I do hope though that you return for the second part of this later in the week!

#16; We are not amused

Tuesday, 2 June 2009

Let’s get the obvious thing out of the way; Muse are beyond my favourite band. Everytime they come on TV, or I hear their music, they get my undivided attention. The band have been in my mind with their incredible musical ability and what they do for years and years, and I have only seen them live once, as well as missing out on the biggest gig of their career with Wembley Stadium in 2007. No matter what mistakes they make, I continue to support them and listen to every individual piece of musical brilliance I feel they make. This year, we are getting their fifth studio album in “The Resistance”, what is expected to be a symphonic, completely bat-shit insane rock opera type of over the top thing that Matthew Bellamy seems to fascinated over creating, with the main attraction of the album expected to be a 3-track long “Symphonic Monster”, as the band call it, to close the album starting from a quiet build-up and ending in a clash or orchestral bliss. Just describing it now gets me so excited to hear this – the last album was out in 2006, and finally, we’re here with a new album! Fantastic! So… why am I so fed up of hearing about the band I love so?

The World Tour was announced yesterday. “The Resistance” tour, as the band put it, sees the threesome making their way around Europe (European Tour, surely?) from the snowy horizons of of Scandinavia, the peaks of Switzerland, and the sweltering luxury of Spain. Of course, the band will be coming home to their native United Kingdom to address their adoring fans with their new material, their classic hits, and maybe a surprise thrown in with a grand stage show. So for me, I sit there yesterday evening reading the dates in November… London, of course… Birmingham, for sure… Sheffield, ok… Liverpool?… Glasgow…and… that’s it for the UK? No Cardiff? No Manchester? Nothing? Just these measly few gigs in a 30 gig calendar? No Cardiff. And at £42 a ticket… what a disappointment. A horrible sense of anger and frustration ran through my body when I saw this, and whilst it seems a pathetic issue to get angry over, let me try and express myself to give you a greater understanding.

Why is it that Muse feel necessary to ignore the entire west-country as well as Wales? It makes no sense to me! There will be people who will travel to the Birmingham gig of course, it’s the nearest to any of Muse’s Welsh and West Country fans, but not everyone has that luxury of splashing out £45 + travel + accommodation every so often in life. This includes myself. As I say, I love the band but there’s no chance I can even begin to justify spending that much for 2 hours of something I still have no guarantee of making, and getting home from without any issues as well as the fact that it’ll be during a year of University where my future just may be depended on. We’re also stuck in an economic climate where money is a necessity; there are something I’m willing to travel for and I have my undoubted priorities in live that means the world to me no matter how far, but I’m sorry Muse, this is one area that you don’t come into. Cardiff would have been perfect, but alas, Cardiff is obviously not perfect for them.

Furthermore, 2009 is the year they’ve been touting for months and months about the new album, and finally coming back to the UK for a tour to us fans, something that has stayed on my mind for such a long time and I’ve been so mega excited for. The feeling of being at a Muse gig and seeing them perform to me is indescribable; a flurry of emotions, the incredible sensation of power, excitement, everything that the body can emotionally conjure up comes out in their live performances. There’s a reason why they’re widely considered arguably the best live act in the United Kingdom at the moment, and now I’m stuck with the feeling that I know I won’t see this after years of waiting for it so much. But…. that’s life. Life would be boring if it were too perfect, as they say.

The point of this entry is to not act like a selfish, self-centred spoilt brat who throws his toys out the tantrum – I apologise if it does seem that way but I am simply trying to convey just how much of a disappointment this is not only for me but thousands upon thousands of Muse fans nearby for sure. My sister, for example, got off the phone with me earlier today and her disappointment as I told her the new was unparalleled; she was mega excited such as myself to finally get the opportunity, after 3 years or so, to see this incredible band once again. She had constantly told me to remind her when the tour was announced, when  we could see them, when they were coming. To phone up and tell her we weren’t going because they simply aren’t close enough absolutely crushes me and her reaction comes as no surprise. Hopefully 2010 will bring a proper tour of the UK and proper dates for us to enjoy. I can only hope for now.

The new album is still on the horizon and I’m still so very excited for it. The band are still an amazing collaboration of 3 guys who create sheer excellence in their talents and like I say, I’ve missed out on Wembley Stadium, so I’ve already had stuff like this before. It still hurts knowing what could have been. It really annoys me deep inside that they simply just haven’t accommodated for all areas around the UK. For 18 months after Black Holes and Revelations, the band toured around the world with gigs never tiring and losing faith in what they were doing so there’s still hope for next year. Onwards and upwards, I myself have a fantastic summer to look forward to in my personal life and events like Goodwood and other things occurring. Luckily for me, this hasn’t ruined anything at all. I’ve probably annoyed far too many people about this, and this is absolutely the last time I shall talk about how I feel about it all. However, I still love the band, I still love their music and I’ll continue to support them. This world tour will still make me ask myself though…

…why?

A question I suppose I’ll never know the answer to.