Christmas Catch-up: Websites
Posted: December 28th, 2009, by Marceline SmithSpotify
I’m slowly getting my head around the value of Spotify, and now realise it’s the music/internet of Christmas presents. Things that you might never want to buy for yourself, but that you don’t begrudge having around for entertainment. I’m not sure that I believe it’s so much of a ‘try before you buy’ service, but I don’t think it’s about to stop me buying records. It’s just going to make me listen to more music. (Simon Minter)
televisiontunes.com
Few would deny that the epoch of human culture is the television theme song. While such tunes have mostly been phased out by revenue hungry TV executives desperate to squeeze a few more seconds for advertising, in the heyday of television music – arguably the 50s to 80s – theme songs were masterworks of musical minimalism, laying out the flavor and narrative of a TV show in a hummable ditty. And because these songs are the backbone of civilization, one would rightly be concerned that if they were to fade away, society might descend into animalistic savagery. That’s why we should all be thankful for the website televisiontunes.com which has a vast collection of TV theme songs from popular shows everyone remembers to bizarre obscurities. (Were you even aware there was a “Weird Al Show”?) Your friends, family and employers may grow frustrated as you whittle away the hours of your life absorbing each of the masterpieces contained within the site, but you’ll be content knowing you have dedicated your life to studying important cultural artefacts. (Wil Forbis)
Answer Me This!
Answer Me This! once again proved one of the most solid and reliably funny podcasts and in July I had the great experience of being at the live recording of the 100th episode which then doubled up as a treat when I got to ask (bobble) the 1000th question of its history. (JGRAM)
Nedroid.com
Sweetly odd comics about the adventures of Beartato. Part bear, part potato. Link. (Alex McChesney)
What I Wore Today (in Drawings)
A genius idea from illustrator Gemma Correll, basically a Flickr group where shy illustrators can post drawings of their daily outfits. It’s an ace flipside to the sometimes terrifying narcissism of the Wardrobe Remix photo groups – in general it seems illustrators are much more likely to mock themselves, pointing out their ink-stained clothing and unbrushed hair. You can see my submissions here. (Marceline Smith)
Screw the internet!
Get off the internet! (Chris Summerlin)
Marceline Smith
Marceline is the fierce, terrifying force behind diskant.net, laughing with disdain as she fires sharpened blades of sarcasm in all directions. Based in Scotland, her lexicon consists of words such as 'jings', 'aboot' and 'aye': our trained voice analysts are yet to decipher some of the relentless stream of genius uttered on a twenty-four hour basis. Marceline's hobbies include working too much and going out in bad weather.
http://www.marcelinesmith.com