You Can't Go Wrong With JSB
Week from Monday 27th July 2026 - That's it! I managed to get through three weeks of TOUR DE FRANCE highlights, without once having to listen to the scintillating dialogues of Rob Hatch and Sean Kelly! Of course, it was always going to be 'THE POGGY SHOW' (previously known as 'THE POGGY & VINGO SHOW', but THAT ended abruptly a week ago!). Mathieu van der Poel clinched the coveted CHAMPS-ÉLYSÉES sprint (m'eh!), but now that the Montmartre climb is now a permanent(?) fixture, the whole 'finale' was spectacular.
It was a fairly good Tour for the LiDL-TREK lads in the end. MADS PEDERSEN sealed the deal in the GREEN JERSEY competition. He now joins a select handful who have taken the Points in all three Grand Tours. JUAN AYUSO and MATTHIAS SKJELMOSE both figured in the GC top ten. LiDL-TREK took the overall TEAM PRIZE, although I'm still not sure how THAT gets calculated! QUINN SIMMONS also received some sort of Combative SUPER-BEST Team-Mate Award ("PRIX DU MEILLEUR ÉQUIPIER").
This week in the "MORE CRIMSON THAN CRIMSON" files... the new release from TU-NER (Messrs REUTER, GUNN and MASTELOTTO) has just arrived from That Bandcamp They Have Now. It's called "RENDEZVOUS RODEO" and, without wanting to sound all gushingly fanboy about it, it's bloody marvellous! Didn't I once say that I preferred STICK MEN doing "LEVEL FIVE" rather than the 'big band' KcRIM? Well, this version's even better! ...along with fab renditions of "LARKS' TONGUES IN ASPIC Part IV" and "THE CONSTRUkcTION OF LIGHT" and select items from the solo careers of the various members, plus plenty of that good ol' StickyProjeKCt-type IMPROV... Yeehaw!
ANOTHER PROJECT... I downloaded the latest version of AV LINUX (AVL_MXe 25.2, if you will...) and installed it on a 'LIVE' USB stick, so that I could try it out. First impressions are that it's a pretty archaic and ugly-looking operating system, but it does have a lot of interesting ready-made features (once you know where to find them). On a powerful laptop, it would make for a very comprehensive MUSIC WORKSTATION, providing you can get used to a 'different' kind of interface. Personally, I'd prefer a MATÉ or XFCE operating platform, rather than DEBIAN, but there you go. There's probably more stuff there than any individual would really need, so I'll probably make a list of the features and apps that I found useful, as and when I try them out, and then search other repositories with a view to adding them to a system of my own (I've already found and added the delightful YOSHIMI SYNTH to my current LinuxMint!). I've also copied the USERS' MANUAL pdf onto my tablet, as I envisage that this might be one of those projects that requires me to look at several screen at once!
Week from Monday 3rd August 2026 - Every weekend, I habitually take part in "JOHNNY'S ROCK QUIZ" via the DJTees newsletter. But this week's was particularly difficult. I was unable to name the band who released a five-inch single in 1980, or pinpoint which COLOUR has never appeared in the title of an American Top Forty single! I gave up and failed to submit an entry for the first time in yonks! (Meanwhile, all those GEOGRAPHY PUZZLES that I do every morning have started to get out of hand! There's ruddy loads of 'em now!)
On Wednesday, I have to head out west for an MRI. They've sent me to the 'FAREHAM COMMUNITY HOSPITAL', but it's neither anywhere near Fareham or any 'community' that I'm part of! Getting there involves two bus journeys and a fifteen-minute walk. Plus, one of the bus routes has an 'once-hourly' service, so I'm bound to get there far too early...
The MRI unit is situated in the back of a large truck, a bit like a mobile studio. As usual, it's a pretty TRIPPY experience, where you DISCORPORATE and lose all track of time! I'm sure that different machines have different noises. The one at the hospital was a bit like "METAL MACHINE MUSIC", but this one (branded under the General Electric concern, so it might be an older model?) sounds more like some sort of avant-garde techno like Black Dog. WARP RECORDS would release it, anyway! If you wiggle your ears to affect the timbre, you can get some interesting riffs going! I'm not sure how long I was 'under', but we finished around four-thirty, so it may have been only half-an-hour? I was pretty disorientated (and stiff) when I stepped out of the caravan. I couldn't work out which direction to walk for the stroll back to Locks Heath!
I'm catching up with a couple more BBC PROMS today. There was a delightful Prom featuring 'top roots names' THE UNTHANKS, their various folky friends and the Royal Northern Sinfonia. Lovely stuff! (Note To Self: I probably need to hear more of the group ENGLISH TEACHER.)
It's always nice to hear LADYSMITH BLACK MAMBAZO in concert (or at least the surviving members and offspring thereof, anyway). But I'm not sure I'm ready for another of those unaccountably popular "OTHER PEOPLE DOING OTHER PEOPLE'S SONGS" Proms, wherein we 'celebrate' the fortieth anniversary of Paul Simon's "GRACELAND" with inappropriate guest vocalists and orchestral enhancements. It had its moments, but I'd just as soon listen to the album itself, rather than in karaoke form.
But you can't go wrong with JSB! A couple of Sunday mornings ago there was an all-BACH solo recital, by OLIVIER LATRY on the mighty Albert Hall organ. So that's next up on the BBC SOUNDS app. Sounds fantastic on headphones!
My current morning crop of CYCLING HIGHLIGHTS include the TOUR DE FRANCE FEMMES AVEC ZWIFT (to give it its full title) and the TOUR OF POLAND (or Tour de Pologne, to give it its inexplicably FRENCH title). JONNY MILAN has been doing rather well in the latter, winning three out of three sprint stages, thus leading in both the GC and POINTS jersey contests. There's a few more races going on elsewhere, but I can't follow them all!
It was a fairly good Tour for the LiDL-TREK lads in the end. MADS PEDERSEN sealed the deal in the GREEN JERSEY competition. He now joins a select handful who have taken the Points in all three Grand Tours. JUAN AYUSO and MATTHIAS SKJELMOSE both figured in the GC top ten. LiDL-TREK took the overall TEAM PRIZE, although I'm still not sure how THAT gets calculated! QUINN SIMMONS also received some sort of Combative SUPER-BEST Team-Mate Award ("PRIX DU MEILLEUR ÉQUIPIER").
This week in the "MORE CRIMSON THAN CRIMSON" files... the new release from TU-NER (Messrs REUTER, GUNN and MASTELOTTO) has just arrived from That Bandcamp They Have Now. It's called "RENDEZVOUS RODEO" and, without wanting to sound all gushingly fanboy about it, it's bloody marvellous! Didn't I once say that I preferred STICK MEN doing "LEVEL FIVE" rather than the 'big band' KcRIM? Well, this version's even better! ...along with fab renditions of "LARKS' TONGUES IN ASPIC Part IV" and "THE CONSTRUkcTION OF LIGHT" and select items from the solo careers of the various members, plus plenty of that good ol' StickyProjeKCt-type IMPROV... Yeehaw!
ANOTHER PROJECT... I downloaded the latest version of AV LINUX (AVL_MXe 25.2, if you will...) and installed it on a 'LIVE' USB stick, so that I could try it out. First impressions are that it's a pretty archaic and ugly-looking operating system, but it does have a lot of interesting ready-made features (once you know where to find them). On a powerful laptop, it would make for a very comprehensive MUSIC WORKSTATION, providing you can get used to a 'different' kind of interface. Personally, I'd prefer a MATÉ or XFCE operating platform, rather than DEBIAN, but there you go. There's probably more stuff there than any individual would really need, so I'll probably make a list of the features and apps that I found useful, as and when I try them out, and then search other repositories with a view to adding them to a system of my own (I've already found and added the delightful YOSHIMI SYNTH to my current LinuxMint!). I've also copied the USERS' MANUAL pdf onto my tablet, as I envisage that this might be one of those projects that requires me to look at several screen at once!
Week from Monday 3rd August 2026 - Every weekend, I habitually take part in "JOHNNY'S ROCK QUIZ" via the DJTees newsletter. But this week's was particularly difficult. I was unable to name the band who released a five-inch single in 1980, or pinpoint which COLOUR has never appeared in the title of an American Top Forty single! I gave up and failed to submit an entry for the first time in yonks! (Meanwhile, all those GEOGRAPHY PUZZLES that I do every morning have started to get out of hand! There's ruddy loads of 'em now!)
On Wednesday, I have to head out west for an MRI. They've sent me to the 'FAREHAM COMMUNITY HOSPITAL', but it's neither anywhere near Fareham or any 'community' that I'm part of! Getting there involves two bus journeys and a fifteen-minute walk. Plus, one of the bus routes has an 'once-hourly' service, so I'm bound to get there far too early...
The MRI unit is situated in the back of a large truck, a bit like a mobile studio. As usual, it's a pretty TRIPPY experience, where you DISCORPORATE and lose all track of time! I'm sure that different machines have different noises. The one at the hospital was a bit like "METAL MACHINE MUSIC", but this one (branded under the General Electric concern, so it might be an older model?) sounds more like some sort of avant-garde techno like Black Dog. WARP RECORDS would release it, anyway! If you wiggle your ears to affect the timbre, you can get some interesting riffs going! I'm not sure how long I was 'under', but we finished around four-thirty, so it may have been only half-an-hour? I was pretty disorientated (and stiff) when I stepped out of the caravan. I couldn't work out which direction to walk for the stroll back to Locks Heath!
I'm catching up with a couple more BBC PROMS today. There was a delightful Prom featuring 'top roots names' THE UNTHANKS, their various folky friends and the Royal Northern Sinfonia. Lovely stuff! (Note To Self: I probably need to hear more of the group ENGLISH TEACHER.)
It's always nice to hear LADYSMITH BLACK MAMBAZO in concert (or at least the surviving members and offspring thereof, anyway). But I'm not sure I'm ready for another of those unaccountably popular "OTHER PEOPLE DOING OTHER PEOPLE'S SONGS" Proms, wherein we 'celebrate' the fortieth anniversary of Paul Simon's "GRACELAND" with inappropriate guest vocalists and orchestral enhancements. It had its moments, but I'd just as soon listen to the album itself, rather than in karaoke form.
But you can't go wrong with JSB! A couple of Sunday mornings ago there was an all-BACH solo recital, by OLIVIER LATRY on the mighty Albert Hall organ. So that's next up on the BBC SOUNDS app. Sounds fantastic on headphones!
My current morning crop of CYCLING HIGHLIGHTS include the TOUR DE FRANCE FEMMES AVEC ZWIFT (to give it its full title) and the TOUR OF POLAND (or Tour de Pologne, to give it its inexplicably FRENCH title). JONNY MILAN has been doing rather well in the latter, winning three out of three sprint stages, thus leading in both the GC and POINTS jersey contests. There's a few more races going on elsewhere, but I can't follow them all!
#OnThisDay #TwentyYearsAgo We keep getting telephone cold-callers asking to speak to "THE PERSON IN CHARGE OF COMMUNICATIONS". I politely explain that, as we are but two people in an oft noisy workshop, "communications" generally consist of me sticking my head round the door and shouting.
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