Dag 1268: Global Swarming

It is indeed ironic that the recent high levels of rainfall experience across the UK are being caused, not by global warming, but by the very people who believe it is caused by global warming.

Now this is a bit complicated so you might need to read it more than once.

The low pressure that is producing the current rainfall has a system of high pressure to the south of it producing some very nice warm weather. This weather system isnít new, it is always around at this time of year and it always has a high pressure system to the south of it. The difference is that this low pressure system is normally located to the north of the UK so the rain misses us and the high pressure weather system to the south of it will be right over the top of us giving us our usually nice warm(ish) summer. The thing that causes this low pressure system is something known to scientists and other intellectuals as the Jet Stream.

In the jungle where the foliage is very dense animals tend to use the same routes between places and this creates a path through the foliage.
Exactly the same thing happens in the sky when jet planes use the same route to fly between Europe and America and this path in the sky is called the jet stream.

An Aeroplane

Before global warming became the watchword on every bodies lips, the jet stream used to be created to the North of the UK and all was well with the UK weather. Now that pressure is being put on everybody to try and produce less CO2 the airlines have been changing the routes between Europe and America so that the planes fly further south, thus emitting less CO2, and cause the jet stream to go straight across the UK. So now we have low pressure causing us to get all this rain and to the south of the UK is all the good weather that we should be getting.

So I say "Lets get the airlines to stop all these namby pamby CO2 reducing initiatives and move the jet stream back to where it should be so we can get some nice warm summer weather again."

Dag 1255: A Forest

The sun shone obliquely through the foliage leaving patterns on the damp musty ground. No one heard the snap of a twig under foot save the fatigued and stooping figure that caused it. He had been travelling for 3 days and he had no idea where he was. He didn't even know what country he was in, but he had an image engained in his mind of an upright girder, surrounded by water, reaching into the sky. The top of it was bent and a human figure was standing there with arms stretching up towards the sun. He had no recolection of ever seeing such in image other than in his dreams.



He had fallen asleep in one of the business lounges at Heathrow airport, or at least he thought that's what had happened. He hadn't noticed the intense looks he had been getting from a group of similarly dressed men at the next table and he hadn't noticed that when one of them had dropped a pen next to him they had poured a little white powder into his drink as they picked it up.
All he knew was that as he drank his drink he felt more and more sleepy.
When he woke up he was in a glade in the middle of a forest. There was a small wooden building in the glade. It was painted bright red, but the paint was peeling and the door was hanging from one hinge. When he first came to his senses he had headed straight for this red house but it was obvious from the layers of dust that no one had been inside for many years.
He pushed the door and there was a clatter and a cloud of dust as it fell backwards into the main room of this small red house. At one end of the room was a stove. Like everything else it was covered in dust, but it contained a bed of rolled up newspaper with a layer of sticks above that and a few cracked logs on top.
Next to the stove was an unused box matches. The box looked old and had a picture of a lion in the middle with the legend "The Lion Safety Matches" and "made in Sweden". He opened the door of the stove and looked at the corner of one of the pieces of newspaper. It had the date 1st February 1973 written in smudged ink. This fire had been waiting for a long time to be lit so he struck a match and held it against the corner of paper.
The fire soon took and he began to feel better as the warmth from it crept through his body. There wasn't much furniture in the room but his eye was drawn to an 18th century side board under the window. He opened the doors and looked inside. He was surprised to see a portable Bang and Olufsen cd player and next to it a small pile containing 3 CDs. On top of the side board was a moleskin notebook and a mont blanc pen.

He had nothing better to do for the time being so he picked up the first cd and inserted it into the slot.

Maps - We can create ****
He had heard that the Maps were a group to look out for as they were doing something very different. When compared to the glut of groups like The Arctic Monkeys, Kaiser Chiefs and others currently doing the rounds he could partly agree with that, however as he listened he thought to himself that although he quite liked the music, it didn't sound radically new. He felt it was more of a follow on from such bands as Boards of Canada, Röyksopp and possibly even Portishead. There were also hints of shoegazing buried in there too, which he felt was definitely a good thing.
The opening track "So low, so high" is instantly likeable, but the albums stand out track is definitely "It will find you" with its ever repeating loop that soon become s engrained in your mind. The instrumentation is varied and although mainly electronic there are also glimpses of traditional instruments like the acoustic guitars intro to "To the sky". He felt that the vocals had a distinctly Scandinavian quality to them, but this could be because one of the band comes from Iceland.
On the whole it is a good rather than a great album, but worthwhile getting if you like any of the bands mentioned as being similar to this. The only duff track, in the opinion of this lost reviewer, is "Glory verse", which is probably best described as boring, but its easy to press the skip button.

After listening to the first CD and writing a short review in the notebook he had a look around to see if there was any food or drink. He expected that if there was any it would be old and inedible, but he was pleasantly surprised to see a large bottle of sparkling Ramlösa and a large bag of sour cream and dill potato chips. Both were well within their sell by date so he took them and put the next cd on.

Mahogany - Connectivity! ****
As the first track faded in the reviewer was instantly reminded of an old Cocteau Twins track. He tried to think which track it could be. Was it Hitherto? No, it was more like Orange Appled. It was interesting that this CD should sound so instantly like the Cocteau Twins as it featured Robin Guthrie and Robin and Liz Fraser's daughter Lucy Belle on a couple of the tracks (though not this one). The music was instantly likeable and definitely fitted firmly into the shoegazing category. Obviously whoever had left these CDs in this hut was a fan of that genre.
As the first track progressed the male vocals were joined by female vocals and the effect laden guitar brought more thoughts of the Cocteau Twins. The next track started off with a telephone ring type sound and sounded similar to some of the music on the Maps CD, but with female vocals. The third track "Supervitesse" had been mixed by Robin Guthrie and reminded me of Slowdrive rather than the Cocteau Twins. The forth track "One plus one equals three or more" reminded the reviewer of Wire, though still firmly within the realm of shoegazing. The reviewer ate his crisps and drank his ramlösa as he jotted notes down on the found notebook.
He wrote that the fifth track "Mantissa" opened with a very Cocteau Twinesque sounding drum machine loop. He couldn't quite think which song it was closest to, but the contenders included "I wear your ring" and "My Truth" among others. The next track "Neo-plastic Boogie-woogie" caught our hapless reviewer completely by surprise. It sounded like the Beach boys in all their Surfin' USA glory (I'm sure glory isn't the word I should be using here). In fact it you wanted to do a jokey take off of the Beach Boys this is what you might end up with.
This is definitely the low point of this CD and things pick up nicely with track 7, the instrumental "Windmill International". This reminded our hopelessly lost reviewer of some of Steve Reich's minimalist compositions. With track 9 came the obvious high point of this CD, the fantastic Domino Ladder Beta (which is repeated featuring Robin Guthrie later on on the CD for an even higher high point).
Looking through the notes left in the notebook I see that the track "My Bed Is My Castle" also gets a mention as one of the stronger tracks and this one also appears twice (the second time featuring Lucy Belle Guthrie). I also see a note saying that the track "Springtime, Save Our Country" could easily have been recorded by Slowdive.
The review ends with a note saying that if the reviewer ever manages to find his way back to civilisation he would like to go and see Mahogany live.

The CD finished and the man through some more logs onto the fire before he reached for the next one.

Magga Stina - An Album ***
The reviewer didn't write much about this, so here are his words in full: This CD opens with some nice analogue sounding synth drones and affected percussion. The first track "In" is very promising, but then it finishes and we are presented by some brass followed by Hawaiian sounding slide guitar and then follows the realisation that Magga Stina is very possible trying to be the Danish version of Björk. The album follows and it could almost be a Björk CD, but not quite as good as Björk. It's not bad, and worth a listen to on occasion, but unfortunately, it isn't brilliant.

By this time it was dark outside so the man thought he should try and find some more food before settling down for the night. He managed to find a tin of Beans and Sausages so he heated them up over the wood stove and ate them with some flat bread he had found in a bread tin in the small kitchen. As he slept that night he had a strange dream of being asleep on a boat and then slightly coming round as he was carried from the boat to the shore by some unknown people. Through his hazy vision he saw the upright girder that was to be on his mind for the rest of his life.

At this he awoke with a start. It was light outside and he thought he had better try and find his way out of this forest. He had one last look around the strange red house to see if he could find any clue to its owner, but all he could find was a poster of Glen Tilbrook on one of the walls and a faded photo under a book about art on the only shelf on the houses main room.



With that he put the notebook and pen onto the shelf next to the black and white photo, left the house and walked due east into the forest.