"IT ABSOLUTELY WILL STOP!!!"

My AirPods have a Conversation Awareness mode, where they duck your music for 10s or so when you say something. This is useful, but I just found out that if you sing along with your music it goes quiet on you, like a punishment for your lapse of headphone etiquette. I felt like I’d been shamed.

Imgur being blocked in the UK is a disaster for the usability of the web. The few surviving forums that exist outside the walled gardens of social networking rely on tools like these. This will just accelerate the death of the open web and give US tech giants even more control over our lives.

Physical Media Collector Pumped For Downfall Of Humanity https://theonion.com/physical-media-collector-pumped-for-downfall-of-humanity/

I found a £12 L.L.Bean chamois shirt on Vinted after reading about them online. They seem to be staples in the US, but obscure here. Anyway, it’s been two weeks and I now basically live in this thing. Cosy without being heavy, works open over a jumper or closed over a t-shirt. Love it.

The hygiene rating Was concerning. Even worse? The menu’s kerning.

Too hot for streaming, it’s Jens Lekman’s first three albums. His DIY approach meant his early music was full of magpied samples, all uncleared. The first album has survived, but with the wonderful Maple Leaves removed. The other two had to be re-recorded. Swedish releases shown here! #cdFriday

ASDA was named after it's founders: Agnetha, Senny, Djörn & Anni-Frid

Still in love with TOSLINK. Just replaced my aged Asus Xonar U3 with this neat doohickey, the coincidentally named Douk U2. This is the newer model with the XU316 chip, and does CD quality PCM from my computers to stereo without any drivers needed. Japanese jazz from YouTube is back on the menu!

York University! I used to live in the building on the right. They’ve taken the (leaky) roof off the bridge now, and those willow saplings are huge trees, but otherwise it’s much the same.

Mr. Dont Walk Man has arrived at the Cleveland Gaming Classic.

Now spinning, probably the only Kraftwerk album where I strongly prefer the German language version. Schaufensterpuppen has so much more punch. Come to think of it, my German Duolingo lessons are currently all about train travel, which has probably been a subliminal influence here! #cdFriday

Lettuce, bureaucracy, pejorative, and the name Neil.

Took the day off. Got caught in a downpour while in town, and was forced, *forced* you understand, to take shelter in Earworm Records. While I was there, I picked up these three for a tenner. Very chuffed with the Kenny Burrell. #cdFriday #jazzsky

Last Saturday’s car boot haul, some happy hunting. £14 all in. The copy of Off The Wall is an early JP-for-EUR disc, with the original LP mixes and pre-emphasis. It also (contrary to the first photo) has the booklet cut and stapled so MJ is correctly oriented for the gatefold image. #cdFriday

Medical diagnosis

“Ford,” he said, “You’re turning into a penguin. Stop it.”

Down a Flaming Lips hole this week. This is the 5.1 DVD-A release of The Soft Bulletin, but crucially it also includes a standard redbook disc with all the original mixes of this much abused album, the only digital source that I’m aware of. All the right tracks, just in the wrong order. #cdFriday

Look at that beautiful blue sky! ⏰☠️ Wake Up Dead Man, the new Benoit Blanc mystery. Thanksgiving in theaters, 12/12 on Netflix. More to come very soon…

Installed ScummVM on my new laptop, and spent some time idly tinkering with the shader settings. The original art design really shines with a nice CRT filter on the glossy MacBook Air screen - this is a tweaked version of consumer-crt. Phone photo weirdly does it more justice than a screenshot.

Fish and chip dinner with some of Hull’s finest. #cdFriday

Pulled this out midweek to work out how to reliably detect discs with pre-emphasis on my new MacBook. Now to actually listen to it. The opening track slams the rise of fascist-coded politics in the UK following the election of a right-wing president in the USA. Plus la change! #cdFriday

What’s the best thing to hang from a lamppost in your area as a clear alternative to the current messaging? Is it a Mussolini?

Beautiful composition.

Cat updates: they are thriving.

After a decade back on Windows, I've just got a MacBook Air M4. It's passively cooled, absurdly capable, and utterly *offensively* anonymously tasteful. After a lifetime spent peeling stickers *off* my devices, I will be absolutely plastering this with them at the first opportunity.

Enjoying some Plumtree this week, after they came up in conversation online the other day. They’re a cult Canadian indie band best known for inspiring the creation of Scott Pilgrim. These are probably my rarest CDs. Not particularly valuable, just unobtainable, doubly so here in the UK. #cdFriday

*pfft* A piddling little Pillsbury Doughboy? Is the best you can do, America?

Just back from holiday to find this one waiting for me on the doormat. 1995 re-issue of the foundational 1978 synth-pop single T.V.O.D/Warm Leatherette, the sole released work of The Normal, AKA Daniel Miller, founder of Mute. #cdFriday

Bewildered by the Popeye’s advert I was just served during a podcast. “You take a bite. Suddenly, you’re on the streets of New Orleans, chicken sandwich in one hand, trumpet in the other. You know what to do!” > USE SANDWICH WITH TRUMPET > FIRE MAKESHIFT PNEUMATIC SANDWICH CANNON AT VOODOO PRIEST

Bought a replacement CD assembly from eBay and fitted it, but it showed no signs of life. Eventually determined the the new motors were DOA. So I had one assembly broken mechanically, and another electrically. Thought I’d try one last thing before admitting defeat… Behold, Frankenstein’s CD player!

In an effort to be less perpetually online, I have removed all social media, news and forums from my phone. Seems to be working, although I keep pulling my phone out and staring at it blankly out of habit. Anyway, if it seems like I’m here less, that’s because I am.

Funnily enough, I was sorting out the TV setup earlier, and accidentally ended up on Freeview for the first time in years. We all somehow got sucked into watching Homes Under The Hammer and it was weirdly wholesome.

A random salad of discs picked up on my way to/from work. The Jeffes CD is lovely, a previously unknown delight. Currently listening to the Joe Henderson, which is certainly hitting the spot. #cdFriday

Re-reading an old friend. I acquired this three-volume version of Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell as I thought my daughter might be about old enough for it, and it’s less intimidating to newcomers than the old brick. I didn’t mean to read it again, but these slim volumes are just so easy to pick up…

Proposed replacement for the Drake Meme Format.

Giving myself an energy kick with the Buzzcocks’ debut, from this wonderful set. Love the one-and-done nature of this fatbox - all the original albums and singles, in pre-loudness war (1989) sound, plus a great booklet. #cdFriday

We just did a family viewing of only the songs that *didn’t* qualify for the Eurovision final. Australia’s entry is… quite something. It’s possibly too perfect a Eurovision entry, to the point where audiences suspected, almost certainly correctly, that it was a piss-take. youtu.be/EJ0RdIU_G8g

This week’s other new arrival was the ‘91 Japanese release of Shout by Devo (WPCP-4175), completing my set of these releases. They’re a pig to get on CD! Shout is a bit of a curate’s egg. Mark building absurdly busy tunes on a Fairlight, Jerry singing, and the rest of the band redundant. #cdFriday

New arrival just in time for #cdFriday. This release (2014 RCA Legacy, CD+DVD, Vic Anesini mastering) is fairly uncommon outside the US, but a cheap copy turned up on eBay in Germany about 2hrs after I set up a saved search. Totally manifested. Arrived today, and it turns out it’s sealed to boot!

*crab-walked

Lunchtime and after-work listening, respectively. - Cocteau Twins - Victorialand (CAD 602 CD) - Cate Le Bon - Reward I forgot how good this Le Bon album is, not that she has released a bad one. #CDFriday

Hey you! You’re losing, you’re losing, you’re losing your Vitamin #CDFriday! Ege Bamyasi by CAN, Spoon CD 008.

Now spinning a recent arrival for #CDFriday - The Kinks third album, The Kink Kontroversy. This is the original 1986 UK PRT CD, sounds great (in a raw kind of way). Getting Kinks albums in the contemporary mono mixes can be a pain, but this one (and Kinda Kinks) are easy, as no stereo mix exists!

Amazed to find that I can still make my eyes do the necessary contortions to make these things work, after 30 years or so. Turns out they still make me feel sick, too! Good times.

I regret to inform you that Bullet With Butterfly Wings remains a banger. Got to love any work of art which manages to be simultaneously supremely effective at what it sets out to do, and yet indistinguishable from parody. CAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGE!

First up for #CDFriday - The Cardigans second album, Life. This is the original Scandinavian version, which is kind of a whimsical lounge-indie semi-concept album. For UK/US release the first two albums were mashed together to make something more Britpop sounding, but much less coherent, IMO.