Author: Alasdair

The Fat Duck

Posted on by Alasdair

It’s a bit of a mission, getting there and back. Forty minutes by train from Paddington, then queuing for fifteen minutes to get a five minute taxi ride, then doing the reverse at the end of the meal, to get back into London and then spend an hour and half on night busses to get home. For those keeping score, that’s about three hours forty minutes of travelling, total.

That’s OK. It took us a bit over five hours to eat the meal (which is, in many respects, the best way to think about the prices, but more about that later), and there were no pauses of longer than a couple of minutes between courses.

But, having told you that it took five hours to eat, you should be duly warned that this is going to be a very, very long entry. Strap in. And no slacking. There will be questions at the end.

How we won at food.

Not just linkdumping this

Posted on by Alasdair

It’s a very interesting piece by Matt Webb on Attenuation, the process by which we filter and connect information to what it useful and relevant to us. I’m flagging it specifically because it’s such a big and important topic, and one I think any communications professional should give a lot of thought to.

And also, a reminder to myself to read Mr Webb’s blog more often, because it’s extremely sharp.

This entry was originally published at my workblog.

“Don’t Need No Freaky-Deaky Fractal Geometry”

Posted on by Alasdair

You know what’s sexy? Confident people having fun.

I mention this because I am back from the Alabama 3, and this description applies to the band, the dancing girls on stage, and the crowd of people I was dancing with in the audience.

It was a very good gig. Country and Gospel music for a chemical generation, this is the cleverest dance music I know. If the KLF have successors, the Alabama 3 are very much it[1], only they’ve gone one better. The KLF were just very clever. A3, on the other hand, put a bit of soul and passion into what they do, and it pays off all the better for it.

I was idly thinking about another music type that sounds like it’s basically a weld of late 80s/early 90s dance and another genre (goth) – EBM (and I’m sure a few people are about to leap on me for that generalisation, but I don’t really care) and how the A3’s brand of music really shows that lot up as a bit basically joyless. Something to come back to another time, perhaps. The important thing is that D. Wayne and Larry and their friends preached a very fine gospel tonight, and I for one am quite prepared to shut down my chakras and shift Shiva offa my shelf. Yes indeed.

[1] And I note the most of the serious KLF fans I know are also A3 fans…

links for 2005-10-11

Posted on by Alasdair

  • Remix Culture

    This is a semi-regular hobby horse of mine, and here’s an interesting article on the idea that 90% of people’s use for culture is to remix it, and that fighting it (in the manner of the music and film industries) is bloody stupid.

This entry was originally published at my workblog.