When it comes to music I know there are genres out there that I’ve not taken the time to listen to. I’ll leave out my usual rant about how there are too many genres and sub-genres out there which I sometimes feel is done just to confuse the hell out of me. Oh who am I kidding? Of course I know record producers are not sitting there doing bumps of coke and hitting the bong thinking, How can we fuck with Mr Omneo today? Oh I know we’ll invent a genre called Black Metal and see how long he takes to realise it’s just that Thrash Metal shit he doesn’t like. Or maybe they do? I dunno…

Anyway, the other week I got an email suggesting I have a listen to an e.p. of a Mancunian Grime artist who goes by the name Skittles.  Now, when I hear the word grime I think of dirt and when I hear the word Skittles I think of  brightly coloured sugary treats. Grime+Skittles= Bright and dirty sugary treats? Hmm I wondered, is this someone fucking with me again? I read on and was told to imagine Frank Skinner and scroobius pip but more urban.  Whereas I might have hit delete I instead hit download.  My curiosity was well and truly piqued!

If you like music, which I do, then there is a good chance you’ll know James Lavelle, the world-renowned producer, label owner and DJ.  It’s possible his name is unfamiliar to you but if I said UNKLE, you might think, Oh yes, that guy from Mo’wax.  Well, James has now added the role of art curator to his CV and if his pop-up exhibition at London’s Haunch of Venison gallery is anything to go by, he’s pretty good at it.

Sometimes, just sometimes, you hear a phrase that brings back memories and if you’re of a certain age the title of this entry probably brought back a flood of memories for you.  Yes, I’m talking about Soda Stream!

From the conversations I’ve had over the past few weeks you possibly fall into one of two camps.  You either had a Soda Stream or you were friends with someone who had one.

Interestingly, so far, I’ve yet to find someone who had one but everyone seems to have had a friend who did.  Far be it for me to suggest that people were only befriended for their Soda Streams but as a kid I think the only reason I  stayed friends with a classmate was because his mum would always say those magical words when I used to visit his house, Would you boys like a Soda Stream? and off we would rush into the kitchen to make our own individual little bottles of fizzy pop.