Not watching #totp tonight as I am determined to finish my 2025 mix before @peoples-pop-polls.bsky.social finishes the countdown. Gonna be close!

Dear Samsung phone, turning off the music to play notifications can fuck off, always, no I don't care if it's the most important of all notifications, you are an evil lump of metal and music is sacred. How actually dare you? (yes it's Friday afternoon)

Listening to this reminded me of this amazing bit of footage of The Who live in 1964. 1964! This is while Freddie & The Dreamers and Herman's Hermits were big. www.youtube.com/watch?v=NBen...

#TheTenx5 Day 13/50 Icona Pop feat. Charli XCX - I Love It 09/05/2012 ...and talking about the beginning of things! Such a joy to see this slowly make its way to number one. Please note that both of Icona Pop were born in the 80s but Charli was born in the 90s. www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uxxa...

Getting myself in the mood for early 50s by reading Ian Fleming's Casino Royale, very much a book set in a pre-rock & roll era of cool. Fleming clearly fetishises this high-flying jetset lifestyle and the sounds, sights and feels of the casino and hotel are the real stars here.

Pls help LinkedIn Learning is making me more stupid.

It's Mandatory Monday and AI is clearly the future. mandatoryrollercoaster.com/post/8081046...

#TheTenx5 Day 12/50 Loreen - Euphoria 26/02/2012 I was surprised as anyone that this made the final cut, but if one Eurovision song had to, what better choice could there be? It still feels like the dawning of a new age. www.youtube.com/watch?v=bcnW...

UK People - please spend some time on this.

Harold and Maude is an all-timer for me since high school. R.I.P. Bud

This is the perfect encapsulation of our stupid time, I love/hate it.

#TheTenx5 Day 11/50 Santigold - Disparate Youth 14/02/2012 On to 2012, the year I paid least attention to in this decade. I was already into Santigold, but this mix of hip hop with a kind of dubby post-punk sound somehow ended up almost new rave (complementary) www.youtube.com/watch?v=mIMM...

One thing I found striking during my decade in China was the different attitude to the concept of "popular" - my students would think "lots of people like it, so it must be good" and I would have to explain to them the "popular = lowbrow culture = low quality" attitude which is so common in the UK.

Lots to marvel at here, but marvel most at the fact that this went out in the schools programme education slot on a weekday. "The past is a foreign country". Not if you spoke the language. www.youtube.com/watch?v=L7xi...

#TheTenx5 Day 10/50 Azealia Banks ft Lazy Jay - 212 - 06/12/2011 Another extremely problematic fave, we can't say she didn't warn us though. Just a masterclass with four entirely different rapping/singing styles, and so cheeky in a way American music so rarely is. www.youtube.com/watch?v=i3Jv...

Just remembered in my last job I had a group of students put together a pitch for a business, which they worked on for a month, these were *business* students, and their idea was a "cat nightclub" - like a cat cafe, but a nightclub, in Central London. Just one of the funniest things I've ever heard.

It's my duty to report that around 63% of bangers are not in English.

#TheTenx5 Day 8/50 High Contrast – The First Note Is Silent (feat Tiesto & Underworld) - 28/10/2011 Must mention this classic from three masters of dance music which spent how many weeks at number one? What was that? A single week at number 48 you say?! Surely not! www.youtube.com/watch?v=MWOJ...

Hm, Morgan McSweeny has the same stress pattern as Eleanor Rigby.

Why does everyone on the BBC pronounce Beijing as "Beizhing"? That zh sound isn't even used in Mandarin.

Quite a bizarre thing really, aged 6 I was listening to this naughty bubblegum version of scratchy post-punk. The guitar solo at 1:14 ofly prefigures plenty of the music I would be listening to a decade later.

#TheTenx5 Day 8/50 Kelpe – Same New Era - 11/07/2011 I spent 2011 listening to every new release and making a top 200 for the year. Many wonderful discoveries, but this glitch-psych-electro-hip-hop thing still stands out as unlike anything else. www.youtube.com/watch?v=uZlz...

Nice little video explaining & demonstrating the Edison Diamond Disc, one of my favourite old formats. youtube.com/shorts/27PJ6...

What do you call someone whose instinct, confronted by evidence that their policies are contributing to a massive increase in deaths, is to cover it up? And should that person be a Labour Minister? Or in prison?

Without naming your job, tell me something you say over and over again at work. "No you can't drop English. Everyone needs to take English. It's not extra work for you, it's a support class, it's to help you with your other work."

In Search of Lost Time, the video game: first hour of gameplay is trying to convince your mother to tear herself away from dinner and give you a goodnight kiss.

Last night's film, the BBC's 1962 adaptation of Hedda Gabler with Ingrid Bergman. So glad I watched it knowing nothing of the plot - won't be able to do that again.

#TheTenx5 Day 7/50 John Maus – Believer - 25/04/2011 In truth this is still one of my favourite pieces of music of the 21st century, however no bonus points as John has turned out to be not the best guy. www.youtube.com/watch?v=PMku...

#LostProjectsHome Here is the "London Pun-derground" - I attempted to make every station on the TFL map into a pixel-art visual pun, then I realised I am not at all talented at pixel art and it would take me years to finish. If anyone want to finish this then please go ahead and do that.

The problem with Capitalism is you eventually run out of other people's money.

Bandcamp Friday - so come have a look at my selection. There's very old (restored) archive stuff + two LPs of original music. centuriesofsound.bandcamp.com

#TheTenx5 Day 6/50 Toro Y Moi – Still Sound - 22/02/2011 - 11 POINTS Released just as my first child was born, I listened to this LP as I took the bus to and from the hospital, the snow outside thawing after a long, cold Beijing winter. 2:02 onwards is everything. www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Gqh...

Anyone else find that whenever they search for a video on youtube they are now served with an auto-generated playlist instead of just the single video they wanted? Any way to turn this "feature" off?

Sir Ian McKellen performing a monologue from Shakespeare’s Sir Thomas More on the Stephen Colbert show. Never have I heard this monologue performed with such a keen sense of prescience. Nor have I ever been in this exact historical moment.TY Sir Ian, for reaching us once again. #Pinks #ProudBlue

Kier Starmer to perform a live 'apology rap' in a move his closest allies are calling 'misguided' and 'a mistake'

This has been an absolutely incredible section this morning.

#TheTenx5 Day 5/50 Twin Sister – All Around And Away We Go - 22/11/2010 - 12 POINTS I had been separated from new music for most of the 2000s, but this astounding song brought me back in, and it has never lost its power. Simply the best record of the 21st Century. www.youtube.com/watch?v=3yn0...

Been binging on a podcast series this week and I won't say which one because it's like 70% absolutely fascinating and 30% interminable bro banter which is at best annoying and at worst makes me want to give up on it completely. Why do guys feel they need to do this?

Just been reminded of this fabulous truth

Not a doctor or even a podcaster, but audible/amazon have him presenting a health podcast now because just being a celebrity is qualification to do anything in podcasting now.

OK, very quiet day at work, but got to stay at it until 5:40, so you have approx. 1.5 hours to AMA! ngl.link/centuriesofs...

My 1961 listening includes The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, Bob Dylan and The Beach Boys. Not sure all will make it to the final mix though.

I started my BA Film Studies in 1998, and didn't even know anyone with a mobile phone, let alone social media, and yet the majority of students could not sit through difficult films, I would go to a 10am screening and 2/3 of the audience would be asleep by 11am.

Debut strip and origin story for Lew Stringer's Tom Thug.

#TheTenx5 Day 4/50 Caribou - Odessa - 24/04/2010 Just a series of inspired choices, building to perfection in the last 30 seconds - may make a remix where that bit goes on for another five minutes. www.youtube.com/watch?v=aiSa...

#TheTenx5 Day 3/50 Yeasayer - O.N.E. - 23/03/2010 At the time this read to many as "bloody hipsters" but with 16 years distance it just feels like really creative pop music, and a song about the struggle to overcome alcoholism is hidden in there too. www.youtube.com/watch?v=6m1O...

RIP Les

#TheTenx5 Day 2/50 Janelle Monáe feat. Big Boi - Tightrope - 11/02/2010 If anyone feels like the face of the decade for me it's Janelle - so it's fitting that she kicked off her imperial residency right at the start of 2010. www.youtube.com/watch?v=pwne...

So, it's 1961 (at least it will be in my house for the next couple of months) and here's what I'll be listening to. I know there's a lot there, but what's missing? For example I had forgotten about Dave Brubeck until just now. docs.google.com/document/d/1...