Friday 23 April 2010

Why so quiet?

Truth be told, there hasn't been much to say of any great revelation over here but rather than leave it to grow weeds I'll bother a few keytops and see where I end up.

It seems I omitted something from my last post which should be rectified. I'm sure I tweeted it and plonked it on a message board but I feel the need to include Adam's (he's wearing a hat, you know) little video heralding his visit to Jersey.


There's a clip here that won't embed but dear Louis Theroux give a fond mention of his schoolboy buddies in this five minute film.

Remember when Adam had an incident with a fitted sheet and a shopping mall? Knock2Bag have included some audio from his March gig in their Podcast #9 which Adam also introduces.

I'm going to get this out of the way and then forget about it. Such is the desperate nature of the media, several sources are happy to report that Nick Clegg went to the same school as Adam and Joe, albeit a couple of years in advance of them. This has spawned a dribble of inane tweets that I feel like baking in a pie with some blackbirds but that's my fault for having too many columns in my Tweetdeck.

When Louis was on The One Show he gave some detail of a trip he and his brother took to the States with Nick and to all intents and purposes, it sounded as though he fagged for Nick, during his first term. Beyond that, any other nonsense is pure conjecture.

Adam's Sunday show is going from strength to strength. It's heavily trailed and the podcast remains at a healthy position in the charts. Just in case you didn't notice the addition to my last post, here's a Spotify link to Adam's "What I'm Listening To" tracks he did for the Observer the other weekend and another thank you to Kevin E G Perry because I saw from the hard copy that he had supplied me with something far more extensive than the tiny bit that got into print.

Nick Frost tweeted to the effect that he was having a good time working with Joe but another tweet implied that the silicon filled death bomb hovering over the country put paid to some on-set media visits.

The crowning glory of this post must surely go to the wonderful Chris Salt's film for Adam's version of "Changes". We are all familiar with his awesome talent but there is so much incredible detail in this, it really needs multiple viewings. Chris was also name-checked in Adam's show with Garth last Sunday.



Please play it and pass it on. Heck, it's so awesome, it's the front feature of Love6Music's satellite site.
You have done all that business to save 6Music, haven't you?

You can scuttle along to the next protest which happens just before the 'consultation' closes. The demo is on 22nd May and more details will come through this portal.

Lovely Lauren Laverne invited requests for her MirthMix section which resulted in Doctor Sexy steaming out of many a DAB on Wednesday lunchtime. You can catch the clip here.

Can't decide on your next cross-stitch project?
Look no further than this handy link.

Hot Sauce have gone live with their website and they've included a clip from


"Adam And Joe Go Tokyo" wherein Joe sports that t-shirt with the most bemusingly delicious slogan in the history of daft t-shirts.

Leon Trigg - the originator of the Schwarzenegger fanzine featured in Adam and Joe's Juvenilia section, had a film showing in the London Independent Film Festival earlier this week. Look out for other screenings.

==============Below-the-line-mentions============

If you're in London & you like your cinema-going to be truly experiential, nip along to UltraCulture's screening of The Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call – New Orleans on 5th May 2010. If you're not familiar with central London, please understand that Charlie's map for the ICA is ......loose.

Absurd though it may seem, Jarvis Cocker is nominated for a 'Rising Star Award' at the Sony's. There is still time to vote for him.

Funny Or Die UK have launched their YouTube Channel wherein young James looks far too sweet and beardy to be such a naughty man.

Speaking of beards and Funny Or Die, they hosted another incredible session with BeardyMan himself, beatboxing requests on a live stream the other night. I lost an entire hour of my silly life to it.

One final note of apology. I don't seem to get email alerts on the rare occasions when comments are made on this blog. I feel that I've checked all the right boxes but I still don't get them. Sorry, I did not mean to ignore anyone.

It's ludicrous how much I can waffle when there's nothing to say, isn't it?

Sunday 11 April 2010

Adam makes some more lists
and Joe beams in the dark


Adam must be about as happy as the day he got married.

He has been sitting firmly at the very top of the iTunes podcast charts for most of the week, having crept into the top five several days before the first show even aired.

Now, he has an almost grotesquely oversized banner on the BBC Home Page, for goodness sake.

While today's show was airing he trended at 8th most popular topic in the UK on Twitter and tomorrow, Prince Charles is going to lecture an entire arboretum about the virtues of listening to him and 6Music to promote healthy leaf growth and fulsome root balls.

It was a fabulous show today. If you need to catch up, the full broadcast is a must. For a convenient recap and a couple of extra bits, download the podcast and check out the tracklist, a photo and more on the blog.

The Adam And Joe Easter Egg Podcasts continue next week. I've made a list of the broadcasts here where you can also find details of the Memory Tape he did as this week's guest on Lauren's feature. After each Easter Egg broadcast ends you can download the podcast from which the aired version was taken.

The Guardian blogged about all the riches we have enjoyed without even needing to mention that Adam was helping to cover for Jonathan Ross as well.

The BBC 6Music Adam And Joe Show has been nominated for a Sony Award again!

These are like the Baftas of the radio world, in fact I always chuckle at the thought that the Baftas may go the same way and end up being called the Oranges. It will seem rather lame to hear Joe say "I've been given an orange for Best Director". Anyhoo, the Radio Academy Awards are more commonly known by their sponsor's name of The Sonys and this year we'll accept nothing less than pure gold for our idiotholes and their production team.

With great thanks to Kevin E G Perry, I have a transcript of the answers Adam gave him in the 'What I'm listening to' section of the Observer New Review today.
"The Mystery Zone"
Spoon
I've been into the band for ages. I think they're a good, tight pop band in an art-school tradition, but very accessible. It's a good one, nice and uptempo. It's a song about escaping and reinventing yourself, doing something crazy. It just went down well. It passed the kitchen-dancing test and got everyone dancing.

"Bad Guys"
Bugsy Malone Soundtrack
I was in a production of Bugsy Malone at school with Joe and Louis Theroux and people, aged 15 or 16. It was a very formative moment in my life. I played Fat Sam, or Slightly Overweight Sam, and it was great fun. That soundtrack is amazing. A guy called Paul Williams, who has had an extraordinary career in music, wrote the Rainbow Connection in the Muppets Movie and a couple of Carpenters hits. He wrote the Bugsy Malone soundtrack, which is one of the best soundtracks ever. "Bad Guys" is a very good and a very funny song.

"Mobile Phone"
Kevin Eldon
It's a ridiculous song about mobile phones. It's like they're doing a kind of Europop, high-energy song a bit like Aqua or something. It comes out really weird and Kevin sings in a weird German accent. That's one that I heartily recommend and goes down well with the children.

"Out of Space"
The Prodigy
An early Prodigy effort from when they were still dressing as harlequin-type clowns. They didn't have too much eyeliner on. It's amazing and it stands up really well.

"Seems To Be On My Mind"
Suburban Kids with Biblical Names
They're young, they were barely in their twenties when they did this, but it sounds brilliant. It's really uptempo, tuneful, slightly wonky pop. They sound like an indie band from the early 80s, jangly with good harmonies. I think basically what it is is that they're massive music nerds from Sweden, who have listened to all that music and are making it now themselves.

"Brave Bulging Buoyant Clairvoyants"
Wild Beasts
I played this to a muso friend of mine the other day and he was impressed by all the unusual chords, so I felt impressed with myself that I was attracted to songs with unusual chords. They've really got something special and different going on. Funny lyrics as well. I would heartily recommend them.

"Ocean Man"
Ween
This is the song that closes the SpongeBob SquarePants movie. This song is amazing. I really like Ween anyway. They're kind of a guilty pleasure, not the kind of thing I would recommend to everyone but that song is fantastic.

"The Enemy"
Guided By Voices
My sons are into war at the moment so I'm trying to bring them down about it. I don't want them to go to war so I'm trying to show them the miserable side of war. I don't know if this song is even specifically about war but it makes me think of being in the trenches feeling depressed about having to go over the top and kill people, but it's also really exciting. It's a really brilliantly epic, well-structured song and it has a very over-the-top, crunching guitar coda.

"Canceled Check"
Beck
The producer Nigel Godrich told me that they were trying to recreate Hunky Dory when they went in to do this. The warmth of that album. I really think they nailed it. It's nice and mellow, a bit of country and his voice sounds great.

"Sunday Sunny Mill Valley Groove Day"
Sir Douglas Quintet
This is late Sixties, and they were country-rock dope-smoking types from Texas. I got into them through Frank Black. He had them on in his car while we were driving through Los Angeles. He took me to all his favourite scenic spots and we had sushi and he was playing this tape in his car of Tom Waits, Captain Beefheart and Sir Douglas Quintet.

"The Man Who Invented Himself"
Robyn Hitchcock
This is the first track on his first solo album after he left The Soft Boys. This is a really good one. Again, it reminds me of Hunky Dory. This is a nice, piano-driven track. I think it's about Syd Barrett. He sounds really great. It's one of the all-time great first tracks on an album.

Of course, there are a couple of tracks there from today's Big Mixtape but Adam's life seems to be a mad maze of music lists at the moment - CMU, Lauren, Observer and his own show. What an ordered little mind he has. Edited To Add: Just seen the hard copy of this and it's a flimsy representation of what the lovely Kevin EG Perry sent to me so a double thank you, there. It does however, include a Spotify link to his list.

Nothing would give me more pleasure than to balance this happy post with a picture of what I hope and presume is the equally buoyant Commander Cornballs. The good news is we have been treated to such a picture but I'm not going to risk upsetting anyone's copyright by showing it here. Just slide along to Edgar Wright's blog and bask in the sunshine of their smiles. [The original image is a full 7.5MB from Flickr]

I can't remember if I linked the on-set photographer, Matt Nettheim's blog before but he posted about the film a couple of weeks ago. It's good to note that he is a friend of Dan Mudford whose name you'll remember from Joe's Little Britain documentary etc. He clearly has his feet firmly under Big Talk's table and we can only hope he's been covering lots of lovely DVD extras for Joe's film too. I'm particularly looking forward to the Special Edition that will contain the director's waterproof pants from the night shoots.

Nothing has changed on the Big Talk production page for Attack the Block but the sluggish old IMDB uprated the status to 'in production' finally. Jodie and Nick's names have been added, as well as what I presume is a supporting artiste.

The telly is on & I was just distracted by Sean Pertwee voicing an ad for "High Definition Tunas". I'm going to resist firing up the ol' Photoshop. Of course, I've seen 1080p dolphins before but never tunas.

I've lost my train of though but I don't think I've missed anything really important since my last post. I might be back on the little Posterous blog with a Podcast Intro tomorrow but I'll leave the rest of the week to BBC 6Music.

Thursday 8 April 2010

Cornballs can't touch this face.

Who could forget those bleak months when we had to witness the torturous vandalism used on Adam's face in the iPlayer wing of the Big British Castle?

It remains in the same state during this glorious Eastertide of bountiful pocasts.




However, we seem to have a quantum of sweet retribution at last.
Obviously, a beardy Buckules would have been overly sexy for the Radio Two area so we have Angel Buckles instead but at least we can see him properly.

Poor Liza now suffers the pirate patch treatment (which looks more like a Frownie on her) and an attempt at face flagging although, since she's a lady, they have not completely covered her.

It's a sweet but short-lived revenge for Adam. These circumstances lead me to believe that there may have been a grain of truth in the rumour that Commander Cornish himself had engineered last year's flagging sortie. The insidious actions of a deviant schoolboy.

I've been tweeting the remarkable progress of Adam's new show and the retro-podcasts on Twitter but here's the current status, for the record.


Sunday 4 April 2010

There's no better time to visit your back-street ear syringer

With so many opportunities to hear Adam and Joe on the BBC at the moment, you'd better make sure there are no waxy build-ups or foreign bodies in your lug holes.

Adam joined Liza Tarbuck to cover for Jonathan Ross on Saturday and will do the same next week. We have yet to discover if there will be podcasts for these shows. They were like a couple of delightful, giggling children but I hope Adam is able to have a little more influence over the playlist next week.

At the same time, 6Music had the Adam and Joe Show Easter Highlights which will be here for 7 days and the podcast is ready to download but keep thumping that button over the next couple of weeks because there will be more retro podcasts to grab.

Earlier today we heard the first of Adam Buxton's Big Mix Tapes. Adam has tried to imply that this first one might be a bit wobbly compared to future shows. That's just his sweet way. Nothing wrong with episode one at all! The podcast is also good to go and James has put a lovely picture, track-list and the front page of the running order sheets on the 6Music Blog. Adam also recorded a show with Louis Theroux. You really should check out the photo here. I must be getting old because if Adam has the date right (and why wouldn't he?) none of them look like they've passed the hormone explosion period of their lives.

Last week, Adam phoned into Shaun Keaveny to talk about the show. You can listen to the clip here.

From a couple of days before his show, the podcast subscriptions were steadily carrying him up the charts and he was resting at position 2 in the main chart tonight, with The Adam and Joe Show sliding into 15th place in the comedy charts as you can see from the screen grab up there.

In the fullness of time, I'd imagine some lovely people will make all the recent shows available in various forms here.

If you have a Spotify Premium account, you can access a playlist that Adam made for CMU.

Chris Gower spotted this Adam and Joe reference in the XBox360 magazine.

BUG19 will be at the end of May as follows:-
20th May @ 20:45 and Directors Cut 27th May @ 20:45.
PLUS BUG UNKLE special 7th May @ 20:45.

Ticket sale dates are: "Champions' Priority" 5th April, "Members Priority" 6th April & "Public" 13th April.

Adam and his colleagues gave some wonderful, hearfelt speeches at the Save BBC 6Music protest. You can watch them here. Do have a look around the rest of the site and perhaps you'll want to join in their campaign to get Joy Division Oven Gloves in the charts.

This report claims 'thousands' attended which seems like an exageration but it's good publicity and the BBC could not be seen to be covering it. The Guardian reported here.

The videos for Adam's "Changes" have started to appear. The first real contender was a stunning and hilarious group project by all the Facebook teamsters.


I was particularly thrilled by the inclusion in that video of an image from this person. I unsuccessfully tried to get his permission via Twitter but I think it's so clever that I'm going to post it here anyway and remove it if he gets in touch.
You can check the artwork on which this is based here.

Here's another "Changes" vid.....


....and this is mine.


===============Fiddle Zone===============

Here's a lovely fan-video that popped up this week.


I'm not happy with this post. It seems like a bald list of information and I can't seem to inject any fun into it today. I'm wondering if this blog is wearing itself out a bit.