As you’ll see there’s been another long gap between the last post and this one. All very hectic round here at Omneo Towers.  The holiday period passed without a hitch i.e. no injuries sustained whilst socialising and plenty of rest was had, which is why no blogging was done, very little tweeting either truth be told!

There won’t be time for a proper update for a week or two. This is a result of my annual aversion to doing my tax return which results in me spending most of January trying to scrabble together last years paperwork so that I can file it online by the end of the month.

Yesterday I managed to sort out the contents of The Tax Drawer, which as the name suggests is simply a drawer filled to bursting with any paperwork I need for the return. Now to find the enthusiasm to start working with numbers…oh joy!

It’s also a busy and rather exciting time. I managed to get a stand for the Vibes Saxophone mute so I can now start making some noise with that! In addition I’ve enrolled on a photography course, just an introductory one; given that I bought the DSLR last year it’s about time I learnt to take a proper bloody photo with it and much to everyone’s amusement, I’ve started knitting!  I joined a group on Sunday for a few hours. Now, some may scoff at the idea but personally I’ve no objection to being the only guy in a group of 6 females!

The problem is there is so much happening and I’m such a lazy sod most of the time that by the time I’ve sat myself down to update the blog it’s old news.

In an effort to get myself up-to-date I’ll cut back on my waffle and just let you know about what tracks are available either right now or in the very near future. If you like what you hear be sure to follow the them on Twitter and Facebook as you’ll find out whenever they have gigs lined up elsewhere. I guess in ye olden dayes they’d have had all that on their MySpace but is anyone other than Tom still using it?

A few weeks ago Skittles released a new track, Dot to Dot, from his forthcoming album Poor with £100 trainers. The track features remixes from Zed Bias, Dub Phizix and Joe Kalius. Have a listen to the track, what do you think? It’s been getting a lot of airplay from Mary Anne Hobbs on XFM, never a bad sign!

Next up, celebrating two years in the game, Utopia Records are offering a free download. Dubbed Out by Mute and Mako is a slice of modern British D n B and its yours for free if you Like them on Facebook.

Mute and Mako are also responsible for a couple of rather sublime offerings on the Mars Recordings label. Essential Forms and Who Knows was released on 14 November and should, if you are lucky, transport you back to the 90′s when D n B had a nice soulful sound. Made me think wistfully of the good old days of listening to Grooverider more than was probably healthy!

Still on a Drum n Bass tilt, something that looks really quite exciting for vinyl lovers, but more importantly those who play and listen to vinyl. Samurai Music are launching the Horo, an exclusive 10″ vinyl limited edition series that will come as a pre cursor to a release by the same artist on Samurai Music or Samurai Red Seal. Having listened to the snippets on the site I can’t wait to hear the full length tracks, looks like there’s some tasty shit coming our way soon! What do you think?

Now for a couple of things that will be with us very soon. First up, Andyskopes will be releasing Readings from The Lake and Distance from You also on the Utopia Records label on 28 November. I particularly like the quiet, seductive vocals that opens Distance from You that moment when the BPMs kick in…very tasty!

Leaving Drum n Bass behind the second release to look forward to will be on 5 December when Mindset Records release a new offering from Troy Gunner. The three tracks, Fools Gold, Heads in Hands and Dancing in the Leaves are a very nice selection which I think a lot of people are going to enjoy.

Finally, It’s impossible for me to ever say enough how much I like and enjoy the output of Kelly Sylvia, whether she is DJing, making or producing she can do no wrong in my ears. If you like House music and I surely do, then Kelly is certainly someone you want on your iPod.

Kelly has just released a terrific deep house track on S*mplified Recordings called White Lies which comes with an extremely tasty remix by none other than Soy Mustafa, under his S2000 guise. I implore you to listen to it and not find yourself wanting to groove a little.

Obviously it’s easy enough to listen to the track on Soundcloud but as with all these tracks, shelling out a couple of quid for the high quality files will makes your ears happy and your feet dance, so grab your debit card and buy a couple of tracks today so these poor musicians can have some gravy with their Christmas roast this year!

It was a great experience and one of the acts I was fortunate to witness was The Boxettes, a five piece all-female acapella outfit with the most amazing beatboxer in Bellatrix. I’m guessing the fact she is the current female world beatbox champion might explain why she is so good but hey, what do I know?

What I do know is I had pencilled them in as a maybe on the guide but that afternoon Sonia and her daughter (the girl) had taken part in a workshop that the Boxettes had run having just arrived from Austria of all places!

After Sonia & the girl raved about the workshop and the girl demonstrated her new-found beatbox skills I crossed out the question mark I had placed in the guide and circled their name instead. The Boxettes were hugely impressive and incredibly friendly on stage which made me slightly regret not going to the workshop however when I think of how embarrassing it would have been to attempt to beatbox in public, the feeling of regret was very fleeting.

So, you can imagine that when I found out that the final Last.fm Presents Live Fridays in 2011 would be headlined by The Boxettes there was a smile on my face. I should mention that this will be the final Last.fm Presents Live Fridays event to be held at The Garage, from January 2012 the venue changes to the HMV Forum in Kentish Town.

Support on the night will be provided by Clement Marfo & the Frontline, Daley and Stooshe as well as the ever present Last.fm DJs. Ticket inc. booking fee are £11.50 however before you reach for your debit card why not enter my competition to win a pair of VIP tickets?

LAST.FM COMPETITION

As with previous months, Last.fm have kindly given me some VIP tickets to give away but as it’s the final event of the year instead of 1 pair of tickets they’ve given me 5! So, if you want to win a pair of VIP tickets just answer the following question:

What is the name of the current female world beatbox champion?

If you think you know the answer email it together with your name and a contact number to lastfm@mr-omneo.co.uk

Your entry has to arrive before Noon on Monday 28 November 2011, the winners will be the first 5 (five) correct entries selected at random. Over-18’s only. Prizes are non-transferable. No cash alternative. Travel to and from the event is not included.

However I felt unable to resist this week when I noticed how to take advantage of a promotion with Boden. They stock the Tusting Clipper for £300, £30 less than Tusting themselves. However their current promotion is 15% off if you spend over £120 meaning you get the Clipper bag for only £255. Suddenly it was much easier to decide between the two bags; did I want to spend £325 or £255? Yes, you guessed it, the cut-price Clipper should arrive on Monday. I’m embarrassed to admit I’m looking forward to it.

What I’m not embarrassed to admit however is how much I like Fisherman’s Friends. You may recall a while ago I blogged having a general moan about spending one weekend feeling rather poorly and generally sorry for myself. If you missed it I wouldn’t say you missed much but feel free to have a read.

One person who did read it was Janita who dropped me an email and suggested a Fisherman’s Friend might be just the thing to ward off those commuter colds. When I saw the name, Fisherman’s Friend, it was like a deja-vu flashback.

Suddenly I was back to when I was around 7, perhaps 8 years old. Back then I would spend every other weekend with my granddad and on those weekends I was allowed to have one of the sinus clearing menthol lozenges from the tin he always had in his jacket pocket. I also realised that it was a brand I hadn’t seen or at least don’t recall seeing, for so many years I had genuinely forgotten it.

However with a fan base of millions in over 100 countries, Fisherman’s Friends from Lofthouse in Lancashire have been quietly introducing different flavours, some uniquely regional, to no doubt attract a younger market. For the last few weeks I’ve been quietly researching the difference in taste between the original Fisherman’s Friend and the newer flavoured varieties; as far as I can gather only the original extra strong and the aniseed versions are full fat, the rest are either low sugar or sugar free.

Trying to decide which ones I liked more was no easy task. I liked the choice of flavours in the low/no sugar varieties, Cherry and Lemon being my favourite, but they just didn’t taste like a Fisherman’s Friend. They just weren’t as strong as I like. The sweetener makes them too sweet I think BUT that is because I prefer the strong menthol eucalyptus taste which for me, identifies Fisherman’s Friends from other sweets.

When I pop a cherry flavoured one in my mouth it tastes exactly like a cherry menthol Tune and I play the old 2nd Class return to Dottingham advert in my head. Yes, they are nice but they just don’t taste right to me. I have to say this was true even when I compared the Original Extra Strong with the Extra Strong No Added Sugar version.

With all that said, when I offered them to people in the office the initial reaction was “Fisherman’s Friends? I haven’t heard of them in years!” but few were willing to take one as they all remembered them as being “very strong!” However a few colleagues aren’t old enough to remember them so happily tried them, said they were quite nice which resulted in the wary ones trying them and declaring that, by and large, they liked them but weren’t willing to try the original version.

Last week I happened to pop into the shop next to the office and noticed that on the counter was a box of Aniseed Fisherman’s Friends, these weren’t low sugar so I bought them and they are re-assuring strong, I’ve since noticed the Original Extra Strong version for sale in Boots the chemist. What I would like to try however are the Spicy Mandarin and Apple and Cinnamon flavours, not to mention the Salmiak which is supposedly very much an acquired taste.

What I’ve opted for is the FFC (Fisherman’s Friend Cocktail). Lemon and Blackcurrant varieties go quite well and I’m currently enjoying Aniseed and Cherry. I wouldn’t try Blackcurrant and Mint, it wasn’t that nice.

Of course what makes all of them taste even better is the simple fact that they come from my own Fisherman’s Friend tin, which will be stowed safely in my new Tusting Clipper bag as of next week.If you send in 4 Fisherman’s Friends wrappers you can get your own tin, full details at www.fishermansfriend.com

Few of us are likely to be braving the Icelandic deep sea but travelling in most parts of Britain requires all the protection you can get and these fiery little lozenges are great when you’re walking to the bus stop or station, morning or night.

I hadn’t actually planned being home to blog tonight, for a week or so I’d been counting down to tonight as Peter Doggett was giving a talk at Foyles about his new book on David Bowie during the 70′s.

I guess because I was born in the 70′s the music of the time subliminally ingrained itself in me. It wasn’t too unpleasant a situation although it wasn’t until I was in my late teens before I could listen to certain Bob Dylan tracks as I’d grown up listening to a family member strangle each note to death when he was learning to play guitar.

However, I tip my hat to him because he persevered. Playing by ear he’d listen to each track he wanted to play and then repeat it over and over until he’d perfected it. I, as you can imagine, would have given up long before then, much like I do when I tell myself I’ll learn a language. Result? More teach yourself books than Waterstones and an ability to count to ten and perhaps say hello and goodbye in 6 or 7 languages.

I would say the same is true of the saxophone however that’s heavily influenced by the fact it’s a noisy fucker and as I can hear the people upstairs chop vegetables you can imagine what the sounds of someone crucifying Oh when the Saints go marching in sounds like. Yes, it’s true I did spend £240 importing a mute case from France but by the time I get home from work and eat I’ve no desire to spend 15 minutes just getting the thing ready. Anyway, I digress…

As I was saying, I was supposed to go to the talk clutching my copy of the book to get it signed. Yeah I know, what a sell out autograph hunter I’ve become. However poor time management screwed things up. I was supposed to meet Natasha prior to the talk but she had some deadline shift for a manuscript so couldn’t make it. So I figured I’d just stay a little longer at work until it was time to head out. Then rather than doing a 15 min job I started something more involved and before I knew it I’d left it too late to get to Foyles, if I was lucky I’d have arrived in time for the round of applause.

However, a signed book I may not have returned home with, but it did allow me the time to waffle on here for a bit and I haven’t even mentioned the thing that I planned on blogging about!

Even with the knowledge that the internet affords us, very often I have a thought, one of those regular, “I wonder what/why?” kind of questions.

An example is always when I’m buying lettuce, I very often ask myself, “I wonder why it’s called iceberg lettuce? Why iceberg?” but even with the power of a smartphone linked to the internet in my pocket, I’ve never been that interested to actually look it up. Sure I think about it; I just lose the thought in the jumble that exist in my head.

Yesterday I was browsing through a recipe book to see if I could get some inspiration for something new when I came across a ‘food fact’ which explained that the popular name iceberg lettuce was born in the 30′s when  a Californian by the name of Bruce Church started packing and shipping fresh heads of lettuce across America in ice-packed rail cars. As the trains trundled along people would say, “The icebergs are coming, the icebergs are coming!”

As I finished the last paragraph I had a sudden thought that the recipe book might have been horseshit so I quickly Googled it and lo and behold it’s all true. What is now called Iceberg lettuce was known as Crisphead lettuce until Bruce’s trains pulled out of Salinas in California where he grew his lettuces and pulled into cities as far East as Maine all year round.

Well, that’s one question answered after many years of idleness. If knowing who Bruce Church was ever wins you a game of Trivial Pursuit, let me know =)