Those of you with time on your hands (Hi Chris!) might be interested in ZineWiki, which I have just stumbled upon. Yes, a wiki directory of zines. The fact that it doesn’t include Damn You, Ablaze or indeed any other amazing UK zine that I spent my days swapping with back in 1998, means we need to act. Get on it, people!

Hello, by the way. I have no internet (this is DAY NINE) and thus have not been able to do anything much including update diskant, reply to email, activate the diskant robot etc. However:

1. I am back from Japan and it was awesome. You can look at my 700 photos on Flickr and also read my Tokyo Shopping Guide in progress.

2. My exhibition is now open so do go along and be impressed at the sight of an enormous banner with my name on it (and my handmade purses). More info here.

3. The annual diskant end of year polls will be taking place very soon. If you are a long time diskant reader why not email me (diskant-overlord AT diskant.net) and we’ll let you join in.

4. Please go round to BT and kick their asses for me. Dial-up is for losers! I want my broadband back! Thank you.

Celebration: A hell of a band

Practically everyone I know has spent most of this year LOSING THEIR SHIT to this song, and I have been unable come with anything even approaching a valid reason not to do the same. Only saw this video for the first time the other morning after a particularly gruesome night before, and suddenly the song took on a whole new life of it’s own, entirely different from the one that had been previously bouncing off the insides of my skull. Sublime.

Hell yes. Finally, a reunion worth getting excited about. My Bloody Valentine will play live and will also release new material. I’ve got my tickets (I’m off up to Glasgow). Anyone else coming?

It’s a You Tube feast today. Sorry! I’m incapacitated! This Bo Diddley footage is unreal. Bo used to walk onstage and take a fat roll of bills in a money clip out of his back pocket and put it on his amp like you or I might take our shitty little wallet and keys out before playing. Bo suffered a stroke recently but mere illness can’t stop the man. He’ll be 79 this year. The Originator!

Just to re-address the balance this is the MC5 live at Wayne State University doing Looking At You. It’s mind-blowing. Imagine it in colour, real, there, live in front of you. You’d shit yourself. Wayne Kramer and Fred Smith are possibly very high which is why Kramer doesn’t destroy his knees at 3.31. It’s unbelievable.

What’s happening to me?

I know. But how good is this?

Back from a knee op. I think the drugs have made me soppy, this song and video is incredible. This means I am now sacked from diskant I am sure.

In case you hadn’t heard, UK music site Stylus is no more. I always liked their writing and it’s sad to see it go but I think every online music writer will understand why. Freaky Trigger posted a link to Stylus writer Nick Southall’s blog post Why We Killed It and really, never a truer word spoke. If you’ve ever wondered why diskant isn’t updated more often, there is your answer. It is literally another day job for many of us, who already have a day job and one or two other side projects on the go. It’s also pretty much a thankless task repaid in endless emails, piles of terrible demos and without even the ego stroke of web stats, now that RSS feeds count for many of our readers.

The Web 2.0 stuff is also a problem we have at diskant. None of us are programmers and we just can’t build the things we and our readers want to make the site better or easier to use. So, we have to stick with the old ways which are more and more time consuming with less and less people to help out.

I hope I won’t be killing off diskant any time soon but I also hope you’ll continue to be patient and take us for what we are – a bunch of busy people trying to write about the music (and films! and PIE) we love.

Anyway, go read some of Stylus’ best writing while you can. I hear some of the writers are moving to Pitchfork too.