Retro Blog The Interweb

If I was a PC user, I'd find one of those pony, fist-shaking emoticons and ftp* it right into the webmastery turret of the Big British Castle.

They've completely revamped their interfaces over the last week or so and are behaving like a middle-aged woman trying to squeeze into those jeans that looked so good when she was 25.
The main omission to the Adam and Joe page is in the gallery area but at the point of writing this, most of the stuff is still sitting on the server.

While I'm dissecting their page, I should say it now has one of those ludicrous alpha-numeric mumbo-jumbo addresses that doesn't so much trip off the tongue as dribble onto the floor like some weirdly named sweet from abroad that you thought would be good but actually had a strange aftertaste.

Furthermore, if it weren't for a hole full of idiots like me, you'd have to Google for the link because they are not showing up in the list of 6Music presenters at the moment. I suppose we should be encouraged that they have made a page for them at all and the artwork is double plus fun.


They've also linked this page in the tabs at the new Mixtape page and Collins and Herring have their own page at last. Richard doesn't have a castle email addy and his Twitter isn't listed but it's a start, isn't it?

I've been trawling the cached pages to gather and preserve links for as long as stuff is still stored on their servers. I saved a page last night which has subsequently gone from Google but happily, other search engines with cached pages are available.

The new format does still have a photo gallery but only seven sections have been retained so I'm listing the older links below.

The new video section points to a list of blog posts with 'video' tagged in them, similarly with the Song Wars link. Happily they've retained an area for the Video Wars which showcases A-Salt with a deadly Chris-p's wonderful Lego film for Jane's Brain and also gives a link to the runner-ups'. I still love to watch Stuart Lanceley's, by the way.

Their biography is in dire need of an update. Apparently, Joe is doing some other thing for Film4.....chortle. When will he finish writing that?

The contact page is only showing an address for Adam which sent me into a downward spiral of depression but I have to remind myself that they made this page, didn't they?

If you happen upon some of the tabbed links, you'll see a right-hand side bar that will hot you over to Adam and Garth's downloads but it's not in the top menu tabs.

They have finally removed Joe's Myspace link and replaced it with an IMDB clicker. They're still linking Adam's Blog and one of his YouTube channels. The lovely fansite is only linked on the Blog homepage now.

The tracklisting section has been tidying itself up nicely throughout the domain over the last few months and it's a really good resource these days.

My opening gambit was not intended as a complaint about the new website format as it's impossibly sexy. It was more an exasperated exhalation because it prompted a time-draining click around the endless nettosphere.

Black Squadron Have a look at members of the Black Squadron elite following their commands... Tinsel Undies Front Room Festival Human Christmas Tree Prehistoric People Bin Bag Fashion Fun Bath Sit In Bin Felt Pen Tattoo Problem Biscuits In Pants, In Street Lavvy Paper Egyptian Mummy Attack Toast Bracelets Backwards Clothes Poltergeist Attack Pan Hat Division Poltergeist Attack Old gallery Juvenilia Adam And Joe (from Nerd Army) Camden Crawl

WARNING: SEVERAL LINKS ON THIS PAGE ARE OLD CACHED DATA AND WILL EVENTUALLY TAKE YOU DOWN A BLIND ALLEY FROM WHICH YOU MAY NEVER RETURN.

So I poodled around some other cached pages and it was like unpacking that box you brought with you when you moved home but never got around to opening. It's going to take a long time to go through it all as I stop to reminisce.


Things like the Guardian Webchat, Joe's Big Jaffa and this short animation.


If you're like me, you've been horribly frightened by a great big MALWARE WARNING shouting at you when you try to access the old Adam&Joe.co.uk website and whilst it looks rather old fashioned nowadays, it's got some tempting little nuggets. You can splash around a pool of cached pages if you go in through this little keyhole. There are all kinds of silly memories there, like a thingumy they did for the Might Boosh website.

In the early to mid-noughties, David Buxton used to keep Adam and Joe's net presence organised (sort of) with various incarnations. I think I'm right in saying all these are his: The Poo Pages, www.doctormacintosh.co.uk and latterly, Reliably Broken where much of the blind alley data you've been frustrating yourself with, now resides.

The Poo Pages has an entertaining piece from Adam about why there would never be a fourth series of the tv show.....erm.

Other long-since-gone sources are Martyn Gilbert's comfortingly retro site (possibly the first ever Adam and Joe fansite), The Adam And Joe Zone, and The Toy Factory with it's gigglesome profiles here.

Finally, a site that is very much alive and kicking but was brought into my memory vortex via one of David's old links is The Idler. It has the Cooking with Toothpaste Guide, list of Very Bad Things and Joe's breakdown of twenty years of Bounty bar ad campaigns.

Otherwhere around the web was a little bit in the trade mag Televisual about BUG and an addition to the Attack the Block IMDB entry about some video effects.

I know various people got a bit antsy about the current John Smith's ad featuring Peter Kay which reminded us of a Text The Nation submission and also the Graham Norton Show featuring the Lost Kawfay British accent tutorial woman.

For what it's worth, I don't have the energy to be frisked by this kind of thing. Our lovely radio munchkins and their impossibly clever brains also have an area of cosseted naiveté (how many makes a score, again?) and I'm pretty sure the John Smith's line has been knocking around the circuit long before someone submitted it to the 6Music show. That's not to say the ad wasn't written by some agency peeps who heard it on 6Music but it doesn't really have a genuine ownership. Without wishing to shock anyone of a delicate nature, ads thrive on current trends and tip-toe on just the right side of plaguerism ninety per cent of the time.

By his own admission, Adam was sent that link to the silly accent lady and it may well have been doing the rounds. For my money, Adam's presentation of the material was in another stratosphere to Mr Norton's but it's usually the researchers that find this stuff and even if they knew what Adam had done with it, I still think it's fair game to put it on a tv show - it's a visual on YouTube, after all.

Life is too short to let this stuff get you down. Adam and Joe delight in recycling their own material and I hope they're chuffed when other people pick up on stuff they've used. If we weren't so invested in these idiotholes, we'd realise it's par for the course throughout the media.

Apropos of very little at all, this idiothole gathered a lifetime of experience and came up with the brilliant discovery that "Adams big mix tape" is an anagram of "Database Gimp Mix". Priceless, if it weren't for my OCD problem with the repetition of 'mix' and the potential insult contained therein.

Adam was showing this wonderful film at BUG this month and like a heavenly, timely meteorite, he plopped it all over us on the morning of The Great Launch


Other stuff has happened this week but the main thrust (if I may be so base on a Saturday night) of this post was to preserve a few dusty old corpses before they were interred forever.

Don't miss your chance to see Richard Herring's Sony Nominated show As It Occurs To Me at the Leicester Square Theatre.

* fling to pillory (not to be confused with ftb)

Arts Attack Interview Joe Cornish

Happily, he's right at the start of the piece but don't let that put you off listening to all the other little nuggets because it rounds off with Joe's Antiques Roadshow song.

The interviewer seems to really labour what she perceives as the reverse trajectory of Adam And Joe's career. Joe handles it really well, so much so that I wondered for a moment, whether it had been pre-arranged.

At last, Joe revealed that the 6Music show goes through a special shamboliser, as we had all long since suspected. He also mentions that he's into pre-production, casting etc for 'Block' and that he hopes to shoot in February.

On this week's Arts Attack, Kate chats to Joe Cornish, one half of 6Music's Adam & Joe and asks Shadow Minister for Culture, Ed Vaizey about his favourite type of biscuit. Cassie presents her coverage of the London Film Festival and interviews acclaimed director, Stephen Poliakoff whilst Joe asks the crowd what they thought of Frank Turner's gig at the Shepherd's Bush Empire.

Pirulo news: Podcast is up & Holiday Blues available for download.

I have surprised myself with my own arrogance again by suggesting that some people look here before they might check the actual Adam and Joe blog but it's really a thinly veiled attempt to put some content on this bloomin' thing.
James has popped Adam's extraordinary "Coming Back From Holiday Blues" symphony on the blog as a hard, in-your-ear download.

Podcast is up and I realise I am descending deeply into old age. There is what I suspect is a stingle (not really a jingle but too big for a sting) at 40 mins which I have a hazy memory of being at the beginning of an older podcast but each time I hear it (OK, I've listened nearly 3 times now) it sounds fresh enough for me to laugh like a horse. Is it new or is my brain very, very old?

Last week, I made a few potted, random comments about the show but that only works if you're in the moment. It's not real if you have time to think about it, I find. So I shall comment on the Podcast while I listen.......again.

1) I don't like hearing Joe talk about periods (even when he whispers it) or the way he said arse crack but I did like the sound of Adam moving his mike.

2) Love Adam being the grown-up moderator and fore-warner of silly rude bits moving into James keeping the bit where Joe sweetly asks if what they've laid down so far is going to be OK for a Castle podcast. Love Adam sensitively having the grouchy blues in synch with his wife and Joe's apparent lack of empathy.

3) Glad they finally dissed sexy bored link lady.

4) I have the "s t i n g flbldlbl" sting as my text alert so I've had phone-based disappointment three times today.

5) I nominate Joe to make a made-up fact jingle because a) he is the main guilty party and b) the show is always Adam jingle heavy. YES - he is really good at them but if I can generate a little bit of competitiveness about this, Joe is bound to accept the challenge.

6) Staggered that Joe can pronounce Des Moines perfectly but doesn't know it's in Iowa.

7) Pleased to see Boggins back in the studio but I am worried it might be a bit too silly (and you know my silly threshold is very low) I like the premise where Joe pretends Boggins in uninteligable and I thought his 'ouch' acting and general timing was as good as when we heard him wailing and crying at the start on the XFM show that he did on his own because Adam was Spooning at a festival.

8) I knew someone who's boyfriend called her kneebles Kevin and Kevina. Love Joe's giggle when they get back on track. I don't know anyone that can contain a laugh so far back in their throat. Wish I could have a look and see how he does that.

9) Song Wars is BACK! When Adam's song started I thought he'd really excelled himself with a few different features and then he went and did the talky bit and it went on a tad too long but there is SO much to commend it. Part of me thought it was going to be too good for Joe to touch even though I have no intention of voting (Don't Make Me Choose).

Joe's song is called "Bathtime for Bowie" even though the Castle doesn't list it as such. He's right, it cant touch Adam's production value but there are some lovely naughty bits and it's almost like an anthem to all their little Bowie impression phrases. Fave reaction from Adam to Joe's reigning it in comment. "Do you think you're working on Newsnight, or something?"

10) Glad to see that Adam's picked up a proper BBC2 voice-over gig tonight for a 6 parter at 9pm (Design for Life) because he really does have the most bountiful delivery basket. I also note that there's signed repeat on Thursday which he is bound to have some fun with.

11) I know it's a necessity but I always feel a little bit deflated when Joe alludes to the fact that the listener based content is filtered before it reaches him. I know it happens but I don't like to be reminded. That said, I rarely attempt to interact with them (heaven forfend) though I was one of the millions(oh really?) who screamed CARRIE at them.

12) Adam did a gentle little 'let me tell you something, baby sister' voice when Joe couldn't get his head around Wymondham. He loves him so much.

13) Loved Joe's impression of Piper Laurie and Sissy Spacek

14) So Adam has production logistic anxieties, too. I have less of a problem with tv stuff but I often have these moments invading my dream state when I'm watching a doco film in the cinema. I get it with dramatic movies too which is very troublesome because it's the entire nature of a dialogue based film. It's a curse. It's like when someone explains changeover dots to you. Life is never the same.

15) I firmly believe Joe overheard me pose the same 'is it too late to find him and punch the silly Scottish Pirulo from Alone in the WIld?' question to a friend.

16) both Adam AND Joe were the best this week, apparently. I think that pretty much flies in the face of the Big British Castle's trust when words like 'best' are allowed to be bandied about as if they have been demoted from their superlative status. We've had this debate with Adam's jingle.

17) I've listened three times to the giggle attack at 43 minutes and I still don't know what they actually found so ruddy funny.

18) Still thinking about Joe enjoying some lovely Tutti Frutti flavour.

19) Nice email addy work there. Situation normal.

20) Why do the Castle mice imagine that there might be any merit in listening to the Jon Richardson podcast straight after this one? How much disappointment can a person endure? My advice, listen to the Adam and Joe podcast at least three times and leave Jon alone until you have an attack of insomnia.

I do have lickle grabs from the webcam but I've waffled for too long already.

Wot? No Boggins?

Am I aurally retarded or was there no reference to Boggins in today's show?
The butterfly mind of a haughty Cornball has left us high and dry with no continuity but I was distracted, so perhaps I missed it.

The main thing was that I was unusually in company for the Black Squadron command so I was able to carry it out with great ease. That said, I should make it clear that solitary tickling presents few problems for me so I'm not sure why Dr Sexy thought it would be a challenge for singletons.

How lame will I allow this blog to get now that the Squadron Leaders are back in situe?
Stats are still healthy & I can always use it as a portal for 6Music blog alerts and stuff but that just seems like doubling up. I do notice that Blogger stuff comes up in searches when BBC blogs don't. I can always throw a little webcam shot up here, I s'pose. Like most of my net based mumbles, I'll add something when I really have nothing better to do, I guess.
Who knows, I might even be grand enough to offer my opinion on current A&J output!

1) v worried that the first few mins were as lame as this blog
2) deliriously happy that they got back on track at lightening speed
3) incandescent with joy at the prospect of a Song Wars next week.
4) frustrated that Joe had a jingle in his pocket that he failed to share with us due to a sudden rhyming concern - a predicament which has hitherto never halted his presentations