Well, the votes have been added up for who WE THE FANS want to play at the new Triptych replacement event(s).  Here are the results (complete with pie charts!!). As expected, it looks exactly like the average festival but without the experimental/local stuff of Triptych. Ho hum. I appreciate they’re trying to do something different here but give some indie kids a voting form and they will just write Muse, Belle and Sebastian, Arcade Fire without even looking.

The next stage should be interesting, and one we are getting no say in, as they take the band list, locations and type of event votes and go and book all the events. As they say here, “We’ll feature as broad a selection of talent from the final Top 40 within this year’s full line-up as possible…budget and artist availability permitting.” (my italics). If one were to be cynical, one would think they will just book whatever they damn well like, considering that at least 50% of these bands will refuse or be unable to play, especially since the kids also voted for “A series of smaller site-specific gigs”.

ATP’s version seemed a lot more transparent, and they were pretty quick to get unavailable bands crossed off so people could move their votes elsewhere. The Tennents version is turning out a lot more behind closed doors, despite being ‘shaped’ by the fans.

I await further news with interest.

This is getting old, our sniping at DiS, I KNOW, but damn they make it too easy.

I was over there to link up their interesting interview with wee Stuart Braithwaite about Young Team’s reissue. No hard feelings – promote what’s good and all that. While I’m there, I get a popup asking me to take a survey so I had a look.

These are the only choices for what music sites you have visited recently.

Even for the NME, that would be a sad list to see. Hell, even for Q Magazine. So, what’s the deal, DiS? Do you really think these are your readers?

It’s almost as funny as the time Interscope hijacked Trail of Dead’s mailing list to try and sell their fans fast food and trainers.

Bad news everyone!

– that was the last of the old columns from Wil Forbis. I hope you enjoyed them. If you want more, remember Wil’s book, Acid Logic: A Decade of Humorous Writing on Pop Culture, Trash Cinema and Rebel Music, is available now and is jolly good. He also writes regularly at Acid Logic, of course.

Good news everyone!

– Look out for an interview with Wil about his book, website and exciting life very soon. He might also be popping back here to blog now and again. Woo!

– We have a new set of old columns ready for you, this time by Chris Summerlin. I’ve been dipping into them and they get funnier and more enraged by the week so keep reading. There will be a new one every Tuesday and Friday for a couple of months. This ties in nicely with Chris gallivanting off to Australia later this month so you’ll hardly have time to miss him. First one up sometime today.

Poster time! Sadly we were too late for Summerlin poster action so flag-waving cupcakes is where it’s at. Who doesn’t like happy party cupcakes?

I have also made some diskant and pie-related badges which we’ll be giving away FREE until they run out so get there early. If you miss out, or can’t make it to Glasgow, you can buy a set right here for just £1.50.

Are you excited yet? More info here of course.

While I was in Bangkok (did I mention that?), I purchased a handy memory card for my DS from a nice man in a shopping centre. To my complete and utter surprise, officer, it came complete with 23 full DS games! It was almost like I’d chosen a bunch of games I liked out of a book and then other similar games had been added til the card was full. Amazing.

Anyway, I thought I would give my opinions on these games in a series of posts. Probably not all 23 as a) some I already own and babbled about ages ago, b) the chances of me ever getting bored enough to play Nintendogs or The Urbz are pretty slim, and c) one of them is Tetris.

Pokemon Link
There’s a DASTARDLY PLOT afoot and only you can save the poor Pokemon by using a scientific breakthrough known as ‘lining up 4 matching Pokemon so they disappear into the transporter’. Yeah yeah, it’s a puzzle game featuring Pokemon in a sickeningly cute style. However, this is my favourite kind of puzzle game – one that has an Endless mode that you can literally play until your fingers fall off. And then some – after reaching even my limit of repetitive task fun, I stopped pressing any buttons and it still managed to play itself for a good 5 minutes before the screen filled up. It also has a cool RULES MODE where you have to clear the stages in the correct and logical way, not just by randomly stabbing the stylus around in a panicky way until it all eventually works out, as is my normal method. It’s never going to replace Zoo Keeper but it’ll make a change sometimes.

Mario Kart DS
Okay, who feels like an idiot now. Yes, me. Why the hell didn’t I buy this when it came out? This is literally the best Mario Kart ever. Not only does it have ace new tracks, actually cool new items and a fun mission mode but it also has a full set of 16 retro tracks straight from the SNES, GC, GBA and N64 games. I nearly cried. I pretty much unlocked the whole thing at 5am the other day with jetlag. SO YAY! Wifi play anyone?

Sonic Rush Adventure
Fascinating fact – the first console I owned was a Game Gear and I only ever needed 3 games for it – Sonic the Hedgehog, Sonic 2 and Sonic and Tails. I could play those over and over and over.  Sonic Rush Adventure is clearly no Sonic The Hedgehog but it’s still fun running around levels doing exactly what Sonic always does. Sadly the developers seem to have decided this was becoming too much fun and so they broke it up with the lamest “adventure” story I have ever frantically button pushed my way through in my entire life. I just spent about 30 minutes tediously flamethrowing rocks only for Tails to pipe up that he can’t see any island out here and we should just head back to the village where he can tell me I should really get on the boat and go look for that island. ARGH.

Bubble Bobble Revolutions
I got confused and thought this was Bust-a-Move. Boy, was I disappointed.

New things!

– An interview with everyone’s favourite pixie-voiced geometry-loving indiemetallers BATTLES which took place in their chalet at ATP while watching King of Kong. They were surprisingly good fun and the interview is well worth a read. Go go here >>

– Narrowly escaping the fate of being branded the new “Oedipus demo tape” in diskant’s useless slacker hall of fame, Glasgow’s FINDO GASK finally turn in some answers for a Talentspotter profile. They made The Guardian so giddy they both used the word “ecclesiastical” and compared them to Aled Jones. Read read here >>

– I can also announce that Findo Gask will be one of the exciting live bands at the diskant 080808 birthday extravaganza, along with diskant’s own electronic pioneers Sunnyvale Noise Sub-element. Everything you need to know is on the 080808 page of INFORMATION. Party party here >>

Okay, I need a lie down now. ENJOY.

I am back now and have some exciting news. diskant will soon be TEN YEARS OLD and thus we are having an extravaganza on the eighth of the eighth of the eighth. This is not the actual date of diskant’s anniversary as I didn’t think it an event worth noting at the time but it’s the right month and it does tie in nicely with the only other diskant event, our gig on 02/02/02. However, that was a complete coincidence as I only noticed what date it was the other week.

Anyway, it will involve bands, tunes from the glory days of diskant, secret surprise guests*, PIE, free badges, an INDIE TOMBOLA with AMAZING PRIZES** and some other awesome stuff. I will announce more details soon but get your diaries out and make sure you’re in Glasgow that weekend.

*No, The Oedipus will not be reforming. OR WILL THEY? (No)
**If you would like to donate an amazing prize, or just some tat, get in touch.

Datassette.net / Daytrotter / Burning World
I haven’t been buying many records lately, due to extreme skintitude, but I am discovering the joys of free music on the internets.  I don’t go in for gratuitous piracy of full albums by bands who genuinely need the cash, but there are loads of sites from which to download single-track samples of new records, live bootlegs, or music by unsigned or just plain prolific artists who don’t mind giving it away from free.  Some of my favourites:  Datassette.net – Lovely glitchy 8-bit electronica and ingeniously evil mash-ups. Daytrotter – John Peel reincarnated as an American website.  Loads of exclusive sessions to sook down to your hard-drive. Burning World – Awesome MP3 blog.   Individual tunes plus occasional radio sessions from way back when. But visiting any of those, Firefox users shoud install DownThemAll, an exceptionally useful extension that allows you to automatically download all files of a certain type from a given page.  Ideal for grabbing a big handful of MP3s in one go.

Flickr
Still love Flickr. They added video which means I got to learn to use Movie Maker and make short films about winning at badminton. Here’s a visual tour diary from March 2008 too. I also discovered the joy of FAIL blog – so simple, so effective at raising a laugh from me. Yes, I’m about 5 years late. Story of my life…

JMusic Ignited
I don’t think I would ever have known that bands called Bathtub Shitter and Ogre You Asshole existed were it not for the JMUSIC IGNITED website. And now I’m pissing my money away on JPop CDs on Ebay as a result. [JGram]

Homestarrunner
I honestly don’t know. But this has reminded me that I haven’t checked out Homestarrunner in years – I’m off to look at that right now. [Simon Minter]

Shopify/Etsy/Twitter
I spend far too much time on Etsy, selling, buying and reading stuff in the forums. The place for handmade stuff, you can buy literally anything on Etsy, from original paintings, zines and handprinted tshirts to cookie dough soap, Super Mario coasters and knitted Yoda earmuffs. I only dabble in Etsy though, saving most of my online shopping love for Shopify, an online shop service so good and run by such awesome people that I made them a cake. Also, no day is complete without documenting every random thought I have via my Twitter. What are YOU doing? [Marceline Smith]

Nothing
The internet’s so old hat now – hadn’t you heard? [Dave Stockwell]

Gustav Klimt, Painting Design & Modern Life in Vienna – Tate Liverpool
A showcase event in Liverpool’s City of Culture calendar is the first major exhibition of Austrian Symbolist painter Gustav Klimt ever staged in the UK.  One of the most prominent members of the Vienna Art Nouveau movement, his major works include paintings, murals, sketches, and other art objects. Klimt’s primary subject was the female body, and his works are marked by eroticism. The exhibition includes most of his major works and is presented alongside the work of the architect and designer Josef Hoffman, co founder of the Wiener Werkstatte and close friend of the artist. Hoffman’s extravagant interiors created for Klimt’s patrons compliment the gorgeous decorative paintings. If you like pretty things you will be attracted like a magpie to the work on show here. Hoffman expressed the ethos of the exhibition perfectly ‘It just isn’t enough to buy paintings. As long as our towns, our houses, our furniture, our clothes and our language and feelings do not reflect – elegantly and simply and beautifully the spirit of our own time we are living at a level far beneath that of our forefathers.’ Link [Mandy Williams]

London
I still love LONDON.  After the mistake that was the job on Baker Street, I now work in St John’s Wood around the corner from Abbey Road, I am continually finding new haunts and exciting things to do all across the capital. [JGram]

My House
Well, I’m certainly enjoying living in the house I bought with my other half recently. To hell with property prices spiralling all over the place; we’re happy and that’s that. [Simon Minter]

Wollaton Park, Nottingham
I have spent lots of time recently in the lovely Wollaton Park in Nottingham. A Council-owned beautiful stately home set in acres of lush meadows, lakes and with wild deer roaming free, it’s a blissful place to spend a weekday afternoon. Weekends are a bit more ice cream and screaming in summer but roll on winter when the deer are a bit more friendly and no one is around.  Photos. Also went up to sneak into Riber Castle (talking of Dead Man’s Shoes, the Shane Meadows film). [Chris Summerlin]

Belfast
Any kind of open space with greenery is good enough for me these days. I hopped over to Belfast the other weekend and spent a trundling up and down the coast, which was suitably spectacular. [Dave Stockwell]

Baby McChesney
The birth of our child sometime in the next few weeks is likely to be the biggest event I’m likely to attend… well… ever.   I am excited and terrified in equal measure. [Alex McChesney]

Bangkok, Thailand
Thanks to the wonder of future scheduled posts, I can say HA HA, I’m in Thailand just now, shopping in the markets, swimming in the sea and stuffing myself with curry-filled pancakes and Mr Bun. How’s Glasgow? Is it raining? Just wondering…. [Marceline Smith]

Seminal Aquacade
Seminal Aquacade fanzine out of Leeds is a good old-fashioned paper zine featuring the writing skills of Diskant’s own Daniel Robert Chapman who provides a very eloquent rant against Patti Smith in the issue here, as well as an interview with No Age and Yorkie Paul’s Friday night party tape compilation too. [Chris Summerlin]

King Cat Classix
I recently indulged and bought the hardback edition of John Porcellino’s King Cat Classix, a collection of the highlights of the first 50 issues of his home-printed King-Cat comix. Dating back 25-odd years, it’s an incredibly affecting collection – you find yourself reading his development from teenager to 40 year-old one man and the progression of his attitudes to life. Plus the strip about his daydream of marrying Madonna (circa 1991) is absolutely hilarious. Totally essential stuff. [Dave Stockwell]

Vice
I still love VICE MAGAZINE, it can be so wrong and so right all at the same time.  Not that it faces much competition in this category. [JGram]

Net magazine
It’s supremely geeky but I’m very much enjoying getting Net magazine every month, these days. There’s nothing like keeping up with CSS, SEO, AJAX and XHTML technologies. Admit it, everybody, we’re all getting older and rock and roll alone isn’t enough any more. [Simon Minter]

Feral Debris
Feral Debris is another excellent paper zine out of Nottingham by Sian and Rich that features occasional scribbles and some forthcoming writing from myself as well. It also comes with a CDR that features “smoking jams” from the likes of Throuroof, Family Battle Snake, Robedoor, Nackt Insecten, Blue Sabbath Black Cheer and others in the current issue. It has a blog and a Myspace – like it was a young emo girl instead of a zine written about completely random stuff by a bunch of old folks who like to chat and watch horror films. [Chris Summerlin]

Geezers Need Excitement
The latest zine from my friend April, a UK-obsessed American who I’ve been swapping zines with since ye olde teen-c days, is a split travelogue between herself and her comedy script writer friend Chip. It’s a hilarious jaunt around England with the experienced tourist (April) showing round the newbie. It’s always fun to see your country through someone else’s eyes – they get over-excitable about the smallest of things and hook up with April’s celeb friends along the way. A quick, fun read. Get it on Etsy. [Marceline Smith]

The Wire
As always I am enjoying the writing of David Keenan in The Wire which will probably morph into a series of noises or interpretive dance over the next year judging from the trajectory so far. Or maybe you’ll open The Wire up and his latest primer will come at you in the form of a smell. [Chris Summerlin]