Wintry Norwegian waves

There is something about this video that I love. These guys are pretty damm hardcore to be surfing in the arctic circle in what looks like winter. The surf looks fun though..... (apologies about the ad)

Indonesian moments of joy

Random Mentawais rights

The arena of fun - Mentawais Oct 07

Twilight tropical blaze

One of my new favourite waves - Mentawais Oct 07


These shots just make me want to go surfing.....

Syndicate the average

In order to keep myself distracted from the fact the surf is still good and I am still not in the surf I thought I would set up an RSS feed on this blog project to fuel the army of scraper splogs and weirdo's who may subscribe. Nothing like installing a bit of basic HTML code on a Saturday to eat up the afternoon.

Well I'm off tinker with further semi tech aspects of amateur bloggery.

Fish Out Of Water

Its sunny four foot and semi pumping in Sydney and I'm sitting here at the computer in the top floor apartment I share with my beyonce feeling pissed off, emasculated and generally like a slightly fat tubby ageing super hero past his use by date who can no longer fight crime and is reduced to reminiscing about the good old days. I am such a poor fucking loser and can't stand that it seems like everyone I know is surfing fun waves today while I slowly sink into a torpid mire of despair and mediocrity. It seems like years ago that I was on a boat in Indo getting
barreled and inhaling the heady smell of surfing progress and two short months later I'm a whingey over it ladyman venting my highly spoilt egocentric bullshit to the digital void. Fuck its not like I've had anything major go wrong in my life, one little ongoing hiccup in my life and my attitude plunges to the same level of average as Ben Cousins on a moody Tuesday. Well enough of my self centred crapola I'm going to seize the day and watch everyone else compete over fun overhead waves.
And yes I do realise how pathetic I sound

Apathy hip hop and a recurrent ruptured tympanic membrane

The title of this says it all really, I'm sitting at home feeling average due to a geezer I work with spreading his cold germs through the office as effectively as social media sites propagate whiny emo bands. I'm also feeling average due to my fricken dodgy eardrum getting a hole in it last weekend after 3 weeks out of the water. So I've been fuelling my cyberchondria by reading up online about the "spontaneous healing time for traumatic ruptured tympanic membrane" type that shizzle into google for a spot of light medico style reading on a Saturday arvski.

I tell ya I feel like I've been incarcerated on land for crimes against punctuation and grammar sometimes. For me I sometimes think that life without surfing is like a barbecue with no snags and alcohol free beer. Oh well I guess I can focus on planning a wedding an live vicariously through my surfing friends the coogs', philomena, Macksteen and all the other dudes getting amongst the warm crowded conditions in Sydney.

In other news I got all b-boy last weekend and caught a wicked hip hop show featuring z-trip, swollen members, the jungle brothers and DJ Format. They were all excellent, I loved the jungle bro's little sashay into a mash up with a drum n bass tune, the swollens tore the roof off , and z-trip totally destroyed the joint with rock/hip hop huge mash up bizness. It was a super fun night with the only downer being the 45 minute walk I had up Oxford street trying to get a cab (Sydney taxis are as reliable as Dick Cheney with a shotgun around Christmas).

Anyway that's my average health whinge - I gotta stay positive and focus on all the good things like my honey beyonce, the nice life we have and the mountain of good fortune and luck that easily eclipses any hardship or struggles I may face

Maybe Myspace isn't dead

With all the social media hype/accolades and fuss being caused by Facecrook* its easy to forget about the original massive social media hit Myspace that is being eclipsed by it's upstart cousin. I personally am not a huge fan of either of these aforementioned social media sites as I think its stupid to give your content to someone else to monetize and make millions off of. However where I do think Myspace kills it is with the promotional aspects for DJ's/Musos/Bands etc. I have been checking a few Myspace pages this week in order to get myself psyched for a gig I'm going to tonight. It's pretty sweet to be able to listen to a few free tracks from an artist to get yourself in the mode before checking them in the flesh. As I covered earlier I love listening to good music (or my heavily biased take on good music) and in that regard Myspace gets my attention every now and again as I check new tunes. I think that will prove to be Myspaces key point of differentiation over Facecrook* and will be one of the main sources of ongoing traffic in the future as they continue to lose market share.

The main artists I have been listening to online this week include:

• http://www.myspace.com/djztrip (One of the DJ's I'm seeing tonight -If you like hip hop mash up bizness you'll dig this
• http://www.myspace.com/soupdj (Another DJ I'll be seeing tonight - more mash up goodness)
• http://www.myspace.com/burialuk (Dubstep icon/underground hero - I love the tune on his page, there is something about that bass line that does it to me)
• Shapeshifter (Real ugly URL so they get some specific link love) I've mentioned before my love of kiwi drum and bass. These guys just kill it

*Facecrook: My highly cynical take on Facebook for a number of reasons. One of them being that once you upload content they own it which in my opinion is fucked. I also particularly dislike the photo tagging feature which means that if/when they open the gates to search engines unwanted photos may be appearing in search engines for years to come with the photo subject having very little opportunity to control their image. And no I'm not paranoid I just want to be able to control and monetise my own content/images

This sheep's getting hitched

For this post I'm pretending that this blog is not devoid of all attention and doesn't actually resemble the digital equivalent of a texan ghost town complete with tumble weed, spooky wind sounds and squeaky cantina doors.

(sound of man furiously trying to chop the tendrils of the tangential Hydra monster that often lurks and looks to attack when he opens his mouth)

Anyway I decided last weekend to make a commitment to my significant other and surprised the shit out of her by being organised enough to propose in a highly romantic restaurant (no irony the place we were dining at Bannisters is exxy but a good venue for that kind of major commitment/decision) whilst away down the south coast for the weekend.

It was a peculiar and vaguely terrifying thing to do but thankfully she said yes and at some point in the not so distant future I will be someones husband.

So I guess the interesting and insightful topic of weddings may added to my already full agenda of items to pontificate about.

The other highlight of the weekend is that I got super fun waves at various spots which felt like some kind of karmic reward for making a good decision and doing the right thing.

Oh and if you are wondering why I don't mention my SO* much in this blog its not just because I am egocentric and erratic. I also think that she should be free to remain anonymous in case I say something stupid/mention something vaguely dodgy from my past to prevent any embarrassment/ career limiting exposure.


*Significant Other

Technorati claim

In order to increase my readership to two people I am trying to get this blog indexed in Technorati hence this post

Technorati Profile

Nothing like home cooking

If you like cutesy little animals then don't watch this video as one cutesy little animal ends up as a sandwich

"perfect for an afternoon snack when you are watching a football game"

Sometimes I wonder if there is any niche/deviance/weirdness that isn't catered to online.

Yes I am a leftwing pinko

And I find this video fucking hilarious. Some of the political satire surrounding this election is awesome. There are some kidz dropping bombs with their mash up skillz big time.

Sorry is not an apology

So according to John Howard saying "sorry" about something doesn't equate to an apology? What a peculiar little man.......

Wave of Bloggeration part deux

I have been fortunate enough to work with an awesome guy Kunaal over the last 16 months. Kunaal is exceptionally gifted technically and is a legitimate tech geek (in the best possible sense). Unfortunately for me and my colleagues he is moving on to other employment. I thought it was timely to throw a link his way as he's been blogging for a while (way more frequently than me) and think he's pretty good at it. So here you go here's a link to K'mans blog.

anchor text to be specified after conducting extensive keyword research to identify the highest yielding terms

Ten things I learnt about the Mentawais

Australia's Surfing Life magazine recently ran a great article by Tim Baker about the Mentawai Islands (in Indonesia). I had the immense good fortune of going on my first trip there in October. I thought in the true spirit of slacker commentary I would steal the concept of Mr Bakers piece and kind of mash it up with my own opinions on this over exposed surfing paradise.

1. As was pointed out in ASL A Skipper who surf's is critical. Our trip was unfortunate to have a rotund sweaty dude piloting our vessel who didn't surf. His care factor in terms of the waves we were getting was limited. I felt jealous of the guy's on the boats like the Indies,the Barrenjoey or the Huey who had skippers who not only surfed, but ripped and were tuned into the conditions. This probably lead to their guys getting better empty surf.
   
   



2. Booties are important (for the average surfer at most breaks). We've all seen copious footage of pro's getting tubed and destroying HT's and Macaronis sans booties. For the average guy a surf at these joints can result in your hooves being hacked apart by the beautifully evil reef. Alpha and the Gooch discovered this on our first surf at HT's when only wearing one booty each they tore lovely holes in there footsies. This lead to a fun time as I got to scrub Alpha's wounds out with a Tooth brush and hydrogen peroxide whilst he squealed like a girl and the cougar hit him in the face to distract him from the pain.
   



3. Take loads of boards. Having a range of boards ensures that you can derive fun from what ever conditions get thrown at you.
   



4. Pin tails and rounded pins rule up there. There is something about the feeling of surfing a refined pin tail or rounded pin in good clean powerful surf that cannot be beaten. I took a new 6'3" DHD rounded pin which was unridden and fell in love with it.
   



5. Give money to Surf Aid. if you haven't heard of them Surf Aid is an awesome grass roots charity started by a Kiwi doctor Dave Jenkins. We were wandering in Tuapejat while our tubby wolf larsen wannabe refuelled the boat and came across surf aids local office. Dr Dave was in a planning meeting but graciously made time to chat to us about what they were doing. Surf Aid has made a huge difference in the lives of the locals in the Mentawais with their malaria prevention work and are now moving into teaching the locals about other areas like better building practices and sustainability and permaculture. This is what charity is all about and I couldn't think of a better organisation to give $50 to (apart from Medicin Sans Frontiers)



6. Good waves is to surfing progress what water and sunlight are to plants. The feeling of improving your surfing is what all surfers are chasing (from the top pro's to the masses of flailing backpacker kooks at bondi). I'm not busting 540's or anything but my trip has definitely helped me refine a few style issues and make me a little sharper.
   


7. Watching your mates get good waves is almost as good as them watching you get good waves. Seeing the cougar nail a late vertical forehand top turn on a four footer at Macaronis was one of my highlights of the trip. Also seeing Alpha's wave selection, fearless charging at HT's and general approach improve was another highlight.
   


8. Getting barreled in front of your friends is what its all about. One wave at ****** (censored) I managed to secure a fun little barrel and then backdoored another little section while the cougar was paddling up the shoulder hooting madly. It was a very good day.
   


9. Take a good quality SLR with a paparazzi grade zoom. Most of the indo photos on this blog are courtesy of Brian an American guy form Santa Bruta in California. Brian had the foresight to bring a kick ass camera that captured some awesome shots. All surfers are closet egotists and we all secretly like to see photo's of ourselves on waves.
   


10. Its still prone to earthquakes. There was a quake while we were crossing between islands. It felt very strange and was quite disconcerting. In my biased opinion I would avoid land camps like the plague as the chance of another big quake is high. In the land camps that I saw there wasn't a lot of high ground. This means that any tidal wave action would obliterate you.
    

A reminder for my friend the cougar

This post is a reminder for my friend the cougar (who answers to other names in real life) to e-mail the list of all his friends so myself and the true Iron Chef can book his Bucks Party activity (a nude drumming workshop on a boat followed by Celtic nose whistling and dolphin hugging if you must know)...........

Boycott British Airways

British Airways have recently banned the carriage of surfboards and a few other items due to supposed baggage handling issues (excerpt below from their guidelines)

"Due to the large size and handling complexities, some sporting equipment cannot be accommodated through the airport baggage system or within the aircraft hold. Therefore we no longer accept the following equipment at check-in as part of your sporting equipment allowance.

hang gliders
windsurfing boards and sails
surfboards
kayaks or canoes
pole vaults
javelins"

Now I'm not sure of the motivation for this decision but I figure that as long as my total luggage weight is under the allowance I should be allowed to travel with my boards. If BA aren't careful they might find themselves at the middle of a bad PR shitstorm as micro publishers like myself vent and say nasty things about their business, like "I will never ever fly with BA again for business and or leisure and I will actively recommend to everyone I know to not fly with them until they revise their wayward thinking about surf travel".

It will be interesting to see BA's response to bad vibes that are being directed towards them online.

Radio Silence

Long time no type. I have been preoccupied with other biz over the last little while mainly two weeks in Indonesia on a boat surfing awesome waves and then a few weeks recovering from my post travelling stress disorder*. Holidays are awesome and coming home is awesome but getting back into the frantic frazzled 180bpm city vibe sucks the big one, Especially after chillaxing for 12 days on a boat in the tropics.

Anyway this post is not the full wannabe indo pirates tale more an effort to get back online and into the habit of downloading the words and ideaz in my brain. In other news it appears that this blog has been indexed by the big benevolent G (Google) which means I may be getting traffic from very confused visitors who were looking for hot sheep action but instead got my abstract barely literate ramblings.

Laters

*Post Travelling Stress Disorder is a term I coined (maybe plagiarised) that describes the feeling of getting home and seeing things with a fresh set of eyes. It also explains the malaise and questioning that takes place after a good trip like "why do I have to work every day?", "Where is Kasta my lovely indonesian chef?" and "How do you people put up with surfing such shitty waves?"

Oceanic Addictions

As I have previously mentioned one of the reasons for starting this blog was to channel some of my creativity and energy that would have normally been eaten up by surfing as mentioned in this post. Anyway my ear is about 90% good and my ENT has allowed me to get back in the beautiful brine at the bottom of my street. I have only caught a few waves in the past few weeks but the joy has been overwhelming. Fuck even just paddling lights up my soul and floods my lobes with serotonin. Today due to a lack of swell me, Alpha, The Cougar and my bro went on a paddling mission around the headland from one metro beach to another. The reason for our faux watermanly efforts is that me Alpha and the Cougar are heading to the Mentawaii islands in two weeks on a surf charter to reacquaint ourselves with the barrel and try to avoid losing too much skin to the reef. Paddling fitness will be a prerequisite for a good time so we figured a few hours at sea would be a good down payment on (hopefully) some filthy steaming indo pits.

I sit here typing while sucking back on a crisp ale relishing the specific slight ache in my shoulders that only time on a surfboard can deliver, while secretly hoping that my ears can cope with the heavy smashings they are going to endure in two weeks. I cannot wait for the near future where both ears are fixed and strong and I can get back into my daily fix of saltwater therapy - oh the joy I will feel.

Oxygen thief with a handy cam

Sometimes I worry for the future of the planet - especially when there are morons with access to technology like this dude. Crying over the plight of Britney Spears is like claiming that Kate Moss was sniffing vitamins and was set up, or that Mel Gibson has never emptied a liquor cabinet and treated our Semite brothers with disrespect............

Rolling in the RS4

Sometimes this blog feels like a small child that has been left in the basement to play with fireworks, explosives, power tools and firearms - so much potential but oh so neglected.

I had the absolute sheer joy of piloting a fuck off bad boy vehicle at the weekend. Due to a trusting and benevolent employer who is having a few license issues I was allowed to swipe his black brand spanking new bad boy Audi RS4 convertible to head up the hunter valley for the weekend with my significant other.

For those not in the know this car is the thinking mans muscle car. Where your average bogan gets wet for a shitty commodore with a V8 or a boring vintage Mustang your modern existential contrarian gets a jolt of visceral joy from the RS4. Driving this biatch with the top down, fat bass heavy tunes blaring on a Saturday arvo in the sunshine was pure egomaniacal rev head joy. This car eats up the road like Roseanne Barr with the munchies and sticks to the tarmac like its on rails. The best part of the whole deal is the roar the finely tuned v8 makes when you (carefully) floor it in sports mode out of the lights or onto the motorway. The sound of those 8 cylinders purring makes you feel like Audi have captured and shackled eight of those dragons from lord of the rings and stuffed them under the hood and they are not happy about it. Driving this car has ruined me for life as its unlikely I can get one any time soon being that its worth about a third of the price of my house.

One of my favourite places in the World

The font of tech genius that is the big G (aka Google) have recently upgraded Google maps to allow embeddable content (similar to You tube). This piece of tech means that I can now break all rules of surfing conduct around identifying surf spots and throw in a map of one of my favourite surf spots in the world. Now before the hardcore watermen form a stoic and super gnarly posse to chase me out of the castle like an angry mob in frankenstein with deep tans, wearing volcom and brandishing sharp pointy Merrick's, dhd's and firewire boards , I should point out this is a "known" spot that is named in surf media in NZ. Anyway I love this beach, I did a lot of learning there and I have had some really fun waves there. Although not epic or even super consistent this beach holds a special place in my heart, because of the serenity, beauty and total New Zealandness (not a word I know) of the place.



View Larger Map

I'm probably going to regret this but anyway its a display of how easy this technology is getting to use if a monkey like me can throw in a map with so much ease - bring on the not quite geek revolution where people with minimal digital skillz flood the web with an avalanche of average noize......

Wave of bloggeration

The full fury of the blog is being unleashed like Jackie Chan on ice in a kings cross strip club. Ladies and Gentleman I have helped enable one of the poet laureates of our generation get on this digital tip..............I give you pure genius. Watch and learn as this wave of bloggeration captures at least 15 seconds of your time in our attention based economy. This is the way forward as you give some 23 year old kid your content to monetise for billions (yes facebook). The true way forward is to unleash and monetise your own content (eventually)

Snow Windmillz

Its been a while between posts due to the usual random static that sucks up time and energy like work, life, life admin, no internet access at home yadda yadda yadda ad nauseum, ad infinitum. Anyway I thought with this post I would go completely web 2.0 and include some video of a friend who is a fully sick breaker busting some moves in a rural NSW pub. Anyway check these mad skillz and don't slip a disc trying to emulate this hardcore b-boy....

The best dub reggae band you have never heard of

If you live in Sydney and have done the city to surf in the past couple of years you may have encountered an unruly posse of people listening to some fresh sounding dub/reggae/ska goodness near the golf course at north bondi. The band are called the Sniffer dogs and in my humble opinion are a fricken awesome live group. They punch out tunes that are kind of like a barbecue at Bob Marleys place with a bunch of Irish, English and Aussie mates who all happen to have weapons grade dub reggae skillz - very sweet indeed. Along with this musical prowess they also have wits sharper than one of those new nine blade razors. Anyway if you like live music with a bit of bass you should check these guys out before they get really famous..........

Random Saturday arvo link love

Two posts in one day - crikey this blog bug is biting hard. The concept of this post is to give some sites & people I dig some random link love. Whats link love? Well for those non search savvy readers of this blog (not that there are any readers yet) links are one of the main things the overlords of all modern information retrieval (aka search engines - specifically the big G) love. They use links to figure out whats good relevant content (the wheat) and whats not (the chaff) and by linking to stuff you like your little link may help a site rank better and get more traffic. Now at no point am I intending for this ongoing exercise in keyboard based verbosity to become yet another internet marketing blog. Its more that I figured I should explain what my in jokes to myself are about. So heres a list of people that deserve some link love:

• Happiness reflexology - I had some reflexology from my friend Lou who runs this business a few weeks ago. I had never had reflexology before and afterwards I was the most relaxed I had been in weeks. Which is saying something, as sometimes I can be a little mAnIc. So if you want a good reflexology sydney clinic check the site and pick up the phone. (yes I know the last sentence does not read perfectly but with the big G its all about the anchor text (the words in the link) .

• Six ounce surfboards. Ben at 6oz is my fibreglass dealer. He is the purveyor of dreams to a number of us surf crazed fiends in the eastern suburbs. And don't let the retro, yellow tint chunky, quad finned DVS board thing fool 'ya. Ben has access to some very very high performance Australian shapers. So if you live in Sydney; hell even Australia; and want to access some sweet new surfboards then talk to the dealer man.

• Violent Acres - this is perhaps the most piss funny blog I have ever read by an anonymous women (?) in the US of A. Confronting , angry and hilarious this is everything the internet was meant to be. She has a tonne of links so maybe I'll thow her some generic anchor text like piss funny blog.

• Dave Naylor - an English search engine optimisation (SEO) sith Jedi (who I stole this whole idea off). His blog's probably too niche if you're not into online marketing but I can't "repurpose" his idea without throwing a link his way. So if you want to read a kick arse seo blog then click the little link.

Well that completes my random link-a-thon - and an important note none of these links are paid for (I'm talking to you Google). And so ends another journey off the on ramp of my brain. Stay tuned for further words and bizness.

Snow Biz

I have had an ongoing task on my mental to do list that I haven't attended to in the past few weeks due to slackness having non digital fun. That task was to sit down and create some more content for this mental download.



So whats been going on? I hear none of you ask as I have barely let anyone know that this blog exists. I went south last weekend with an mixed posse of geezers, dudes & snow terrorists to throw down some 320 stevie wonders to fakie Stephen Hawkins on the slopes. As the old song goes "there's no biznezz like snow bizzness" especially when the snows this good. An awesome time was had by all although there were a few casualties throughout the weekend:

• Crazy Ayyyyyyman the Egyptian sim card dealer had to get a lift off the mountain by the ski patrol after unsuccessfully trying to destroy his knee with some kind of rag doll falling manoeuvre
  
  
• Van Homo the grand wizard of below the line DM campaigns and pervy books had his snowboard successfully destroyed by a careless monkey operating a base grinding machine at Perisher.
  
  
• Alpha the man child entrepreneur air specialist busted an "angry bouncer" air - named because when he tried to jump it looked like an angry bouncer threw him off the jump and onto his side.
  
  
  
• The Chomp (aka me) I managed to land a number of air 0' window winderz to face - named because the board doesn't spin but my arms do as I try and wind up the windows in the air before gently rotating forward to land on my face. (they are all the rage with the creaky jointed middle aged drum n bass posse's)

• Ski-mon my work associate SEM/SEO/SMO/SMP geezer who ski's like a bad guy in a James Bond film -all style and fluid control. Due to having mad skillz on two skis he didn't fall all weekend which marked him as the black sheep of our avalanche of average slope style. Although he did manage to hurt his cerebellum with an evil concoction on the friday night

We all managed to turn a positive into a negative when we transformed our early arrival in Jindabyne on the Friday night into an opportunity to have too many beers. This then degenerated into Jiu-Jitsu as Alpha demonstrated a range of chokes on my inert form to the rest of the posse. Good times indeed. This smart move meant that we all had a horrible taste in our mouth for a solid chunk of our alpine activities on Saturday.

We had much fun and even got fresh snow and blue skies at Perisher on the sunday which is generally unheard of on our snow trips - normally its gale force winds, sleet and ice/slush with patches of grass. Other highlights included checking all of the fresh styles on the hills. Massive style points must go out to:

• The asian dudes rocking the matching jacket pants combo who were projecting a kind of P Diddy in aspen, wearing burberry ghetto chic vibe. Oh so hip hop but also a little contrived.

• The tall older caucasian gent who was unafraid to wear stretchy tight pants. This meant that on first inspection it appeared to be a very very ugly six foot four lady russian pole vaulter from behind. Never a good look.
  

Anyway was fun -I must go and pursue a life away from this keyboard.

Music is food for my soul

Due to some recurring issues with my Ears (from too much water time) I have been unable to pursue my favorite pastime and one of the key loves of my life much in the past 4 months- Surfing . This especially sucks due to the east coast of Australia having had one of the best winters of surf since I've lived here. Want further evidence - check these ridiculously good waves . (bit of link love for swellnet -best mid range surf forecast going).

Rather than slowly go nuts at the thought of how many fricken waves I'm missing I've decided to suck it up and pursue other things. Hence the establishment of this blog, my descent into OCD like workaholism and reading as many books as I can.

One of the things elevating my heart beat at the moment is listening to some of what I think is completely awesome music. Kind of ironic due to having had a skin graft on my left eardrum 3 weeks ago. My musical evolution has been erratic and spanned a number of genres. It started early but key infatuations run something like:

• Early electro & breaks (when I was 8 or 9 the whole hip hop b-boy breakdance thing was huge and incredibly seductive. I was a one man rural b-boy of some repute)
  
• Dire Straits when I was 11 or so - I really loved those muscial nerds for a while
• Licensed to Ill era Beastie Boys (before buddhism & sobriety calmed them down). I loved this album although I felt slightly naughty due to the dodgy lyrics & concepts.
• Guns N Roses when they were cool and drunk and drugged with an appetite for destruction. A path in boganism was calling along with a love affair of black t-shirts.
• Metallica - yep GNR lead to loud speed metal. Pretty much where my teenage dodgy hair cuts began.
• Nirvana -This was perfect for me when I was a confused, weird, angsty, depressed rural teenager.
• Suicidal Tendencies - I loved angry Mike Muir for a while - must have been craving some kind of latino ghetto styles. I even got in trouble at school for wearing a bandanna like Cyco Myko. This was maybe my nadir of angry.
• Dead Kennedys - I always had a scratchy mix tape somewhere with California Uber Alles during my rural / semi urban skate punk period (13-16)
• Fugazi - The sobre thinking mans angry Music - Waiting room is one of the best songs ever written. These guys are nuclear reactor meltdown hot live as well (maybe I should have warn earplugs)
• Boss Hogg - Damm she was a hot cartoon
• Chemical Brothers - Exit Planet dust is the start of my circular return to the beats
• Massive Attack - Blue Lines and protection were just so dammed cool and Tricky is the scariest, stoned gangster from noll west I've never met
• Sonic Youth - Noisy NY art geniuses all of them and I always thought Kim Gordon was attractive. The Goo Album was an awesome soundtrack to 3 months surfing in south Portugal a few years ago (well 10 actually).
  
• Roni Size - new forms - the drum and bass oddysey begins
• RJD2 - deadringer - hip hop brilliance
• Salmonella Dub - inside the dub plates. These Guys , Shapeshifter and the All Blacks make me proud to be a kiwi
• Gerling - seeing them a few years ago got me high on life

Anyway thats a very breif snapshot of the weird and wending road that has shaped my musical tastes. The Five tunes that are doing it for me at the moment include:

• Roots Manuva feat Rodney P - Swords in the Dirt. 3 minutes plus of booming mashed up hip hop and drum n bass. (Now listen again 8 on Ninja Tune by DJ Food & DK)
• Tayo meets Acid Rockers - dread cowboy. Dub + Breaks + Bass = goodness
• LCD sound system -North American Scum. Dirty NY seppos with humour and electro biz -is good
• DJ Shadow - Right Thing (massive mega mix by Z-trip) oh how I love this
• Shapeshifter - One - Drum N bass + soul + Aotearoa love. Pure Beauty

Anyway I've taken the last train to ramble town with this sonic summary. I would have linked to some to these bands but I'm a lazy bastard.

Conceptual Randomisation

So this is the first post as I embrace the interweb and use it as a means to publish the random concepts floating through my brain. I have no pretence that I have genius skills when It comes to writing , Its more that i have finally decided to scratch the nagging itch in my brain telling me to write dammit as maybe there may be some gems of insight amidst the cloud of average.

Anyway why the name Subtle Yet Sheep? I had a number of other titles but due to being about 9 million years to late to get my act together and set something up a number of my titles had been used by all the quicker cooler kids who are on point with their digital skillz. Titles I was toying with included:

• Tangential Meanderings (tangentials been done - look mum no new ideas on the net)
• The Random Cowboy/Off the Randometer (I sometimes possess weapons grade randomisation abilities - unfortunately the random concept has been done even more to death)
• Edge World (Way too late as bleeding edge tech voices own this concept)

Then I pulled the old take 1 concept and add it too a concept so diametrically opposed or unrelated that you get some weirdness:

• Puppy Hammer (never the main option and could get flamed to hell by humourless animal rights terrorists)
• Creepsy Thoughts (kind of a disney movie about a stalker connotation - which I'm not)
• Tickle Punch (a bit too much of an abusive B&D relationship vibe)

Subtle yet sheep worked because I couldn't find it in Technorati (yegads a smidgen of originality in a sea of sameness). I also like the sheep thing as I'm from a little country called Aotearoa that has more sheep than people. I also like that you could spin it into the whole "however much I embrace mass individualism and contrary consumption I'm still a sheep".

Anywho the tangential, meandering, randomised, rambling has begun. If you dig come back and I may even write some more.