Vinyl Update

Artist> NEBRASKA
Album> MIXED UP MUSIC FOR MIXED UP PEOPLE
Label> DOWN LOW US
Format> VINYL
Release> July 2008

Key track> 'Vicarious Disco'

Definitely a favourite for the moment, fits in with the onset of autumnal colours, dusky trips home from work dreaming of European winter destinations and glass shrouded architecture.
Most of the music is constructed as filtered cut and paste disco without the OTT production, but grafting the best breaks, basslines and snipped strings into abstract house and instrumental hip hop.
Actually bought this by mistake thinking I'd just bought a 12" cut of 'Vicarious Disco', probably the most dancefloor friendly track here.
Really its the soundtrack to Saturday nights bound indoors as the wind whips the chimney pots, this record will keep you warm.

Listen here

Mispelt Youth

Bloomfield Avenue, Belfast, May 2008

JOHN O'DONOHUE 1954-2008

For those not aware of the work of the great man of the West of Ireland, maybe its time to catch up with some of his beautiful words.
The Belfast based group IKON (above) have dedicated this Sunday nights service to tribute his work.
For those who read of his sad passing this week, a sense of deep loss has been echoed across blogs and websites worldwide.
I can't pretend to be an expert, I've never got round to reading any of his books I just heard him speak 3 times over the last few years, the last as I departed for the plane at Greenbelt this summer, but I never left his presence without feeling deeply moved in thought and action.
His Poems, words and writings probed the spiritual mystical conscience that exists in us all, questioning our belief systems and planting new ways of thinking along the journey.
A body has left this world but a voice has not been silenced.

Other blog tributes
godisnotelsewhere.blogspot.com

Johns website
www.johnodonohue.com

ce n'est pas un appareil photo numerique!!

In the age of digital technology and obsession with instant imagery I have taken a step backwards into a less accessable but glorious past by buying a new 35mm film camera.

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I first discovered 'Lomo' Cameras in 2002 and bought the solid built LC-A which came with me everywhere untill on a holiday in Germany in 2004 the shutter jammed and wiped out 8 films.....aaaaaggggghhhhh!
Needless to say my trust was broken and the camera ended up in the 'bottomless abandoned objects box' never to return.

So recently while everyone around me seemed to be splashing out on digital cameras I decided to re-invest in a 2nd new Lomo.

The originally Russian designed and built Lomo L-CA camera has no adjustable lens, no optical zoom, no aperture or shutter speed and is highly unpredictable, but the results while hit and miss can be spectacular.
It has a unique depth of field which depends on 4 crude distance settings you can adjust. The lens is fixed at 28mm resulting in a nice wide angle. The colours if developed correctly are saturated and intense almost like the dreamlike quality of super 8 movie film.

It is hard to deny that in giving in to the shiny new technology of digital we have lost something of the element of surprise in photography.
I have been taking photos since I was 12 and never lost that anticipation of the film arriving home without knowing what I had captured or how well, or years later standing in my dads darkroom developing a negative laboriously and watching my 1st print appear in the developing liquid.
Instead we shoot photos self critiquing and editing as we shoot, sometimes without even using a viewfinder, the images loaded onto a laptop minutes later and pushed out onto the swarming sea of the web.

I'm not knocking the newfound oportunities digital cameras have created or the time saving devices that contribute to creativity in photography, but there is something refreshing about a crudely built device like the Lomo that creates a different kind of freedom digital cannot satisfy.
By throwing away all the distractions of brightly lit displays, custom menus and instant playback the Lomo cries out.
"Don't look, just shoot".
www.lomography.com

P.s the above photos were taken with a digital camera....see!!!!

Jellytopners

Definitely one of my favourite christmas presents of 2007, friend phoned me just before christmas to borrow a camera rig for an aerial video shoot in a chopper and said there was a free seat if I wanted to join them.
Having got the shakes riding belfasts shiny new big wheel 2 days before I hesitated, two hours later we arrived at Newtownards airfield for an hour long flight to the glamorous destination of Cokes new plant in lisburn.
The chopper was a 4 seater R4, kind of like sitting in a fiat 126 with..well rotar blades attached.
We had to take the doors off one side so mike could shoot directly at the plant, thankfully I had the door side and wrapped myself up in scarves and coats to stay warm.

I have to say it was an amazing experience floating above County Down in such a small craft, the cold air blasting through the cockpit. Got to see in detail landscapes that would blip by in a plane if you were lucky to get a clear day,
patterns of rivers, a field surrounded in a circular hedge, secluded manor houses and farms.