Jaws was released across the UK on this day 50 years ago. These terrific photos are from an on set scrapbook kept by actor Al Wilde, who played Harry Wiseman (aka "Bad Hat Harry")

Oh lord I think I've eaten a wok.

Heavens to Betsy, Zack. I can't believe you'd release an on-demand video at the exact same time as the King's also pre-recorded, and available through multiple sources message. It's very sad that we can only watch these two short videos at the very moment they're first aired.

It really is about the notes you don’t play

"a collection of archival material - cassettes, cdRs, MiniDiscs - sourced from Tony Bevan's personal archives: to be released on the 20th anniversary of Derek Bailey's passing"

Lunch all in hand and my offers of help have been politely declined until later, so I'm making an appointment with some headphones and gifted downloads. Merry Christmas, everyone.

7 reasons why The Thing (1982) is a Christmas film: 1) snow 2) bearded men concealing surprises 3) compulsory party games 4) introverts shunning group activities 5) digestive issues 6) revellers bursting open to reveal partially assimilated canine lifeforms 7) knitwear

Celebrity Mastermind: "Who in 1963 gave a speech in Berlin saying 'Ich bin ein Berliner'?" Contestant: "Erm...was it Hitler?" One for @privateeyenews.bsky.social here 😂

“Like prime, but with human beings”

Wrapping presents away from prying eyes which gives me a chance to blast this out a bit. Have a fine Christmas all, be lovely to one another 🎄🍷

The BBC Scandal That Went Unnoticed Christian Kriticos for the Telegraph on the disastrous changes to access at the BBC Written Archives Centre. The article does an excellent job at detailing the issues at stake [gift link] www.telegraph.co.uk/gift/65a1031...

Interesting. Some emails from Bandcamp that I'm not allowed to open. <rubs hands with glee>. I suspect destination-out.bandcamp.com might be having a good Christmas...

Grab some codes in the morn iheartnoise.bandcamp.com/album/boston...

Story from Joolz Denby over on Facebook. A bad day at TotP in 1985 with New Model Army, and Chris Rea suddenly appearing and being compassionate and gernerally decent.

I liked Chris Rea very much, but having read this lovely piece on Richard Williams’ always interesting blog it turns out I knew very little about him at all. I’ll be investigating. thebluemoment.com/2025/12/22/t...

Hey, you can view all of our heartfelt top 10 charts of the year over at @thewiremagazine.bsky.social. Always a nice little treasure trove for discovering new stuff. www.thewire.co.uk/issues/chart...

The best time to ditch Meta products was 10 years ago. The second best time is today.

Trump playbook: 1. Make imbecile a Special Envoy 2. Wait for some enraged Greenlander to shoot him or feed him to seals. 3. Invade New Trump envoy says he will serve to make Greenland part of US - BBC News share.google/MsqiB93V8Efz...

Bot plague on here recently. Accounts with zero original posts following thousands and all reposting the same damned post. What's going on?

Per NY Times’s Michael Grynbaum on X, this is Sharyn Alfonsi’s email to her “60 Minutes” colleagues in full:

Happy Solstice, everyone.

I thought that looked familiar!

Almost bought a record just for the cover this afternoon: a real labour of love version of Neil Young's Zuma where someone had hand-coloured the entire cover (very well too).

The White House has been caught. The administration inserted a photo of Bill Clinton, Michael Jackson, and Diana Ross into the Epstein files and falsely implied it showed them with victims. In reality, it’s a publicly available fundraiser photo featuring Jackson and Ross’s own children.

The sleep walking/talking Dead

#NowPlaying A Christmas album? Maybe not but it's working a treat for me. Season's greetings, all.

THREAD. My parents' cat Bridget vanished. As the weeks dragged on they became ever more worried, so to distract himself my dad began to paint Bridget's adventures, imagining her travelling through time and popping up at some of art & music's most important moments. I've collected his work here...

Thanks to @jim.londoncentric.media I discover that Daisy Green has profits of £2.4 million a year, in case anyone was wondering how money is concentrated into the hands of the wealthy. Presumably the family who have run the Parliament Hill café for 44 years will be encouraged to retrain in tech.

Steven Spielberg is 79, the big game hunting bastard.

Finished Mick Herron's "Clown Town" earlier. Has the feel of a penultimate book in the Slough House series, although I could be completely wrong. Also the best use of the word "custard" as an insult I've ever seen.

MAGA's Annie HALL remake Scene: BBC: We are not biased in any - TRUMP: oh yeah? Well that's funny as I have no less of an authority - <he points to a stand up poster> - than UK PREMIER LIZ TRUSS! <sounds of movement> <everyone waits> <the stand-up wobbles> TRUSS: Help, I'm lost

@reecedinsdale.bsky.social Good morning Reece. For so many people Christmas is a very difficult time and sadly not one bringing happiness. This infographic might help someone-

“No less an authority than the United Kingdom’s former Prime Minister, Liz Truss” That’s a real sentence that someone wrote, which made it into Trump’s legal filing.

And yet 'Liz Kendall, the secretary of state for science, innovation and technology, told parliament on Monday there was “no clear consensus” on the issue.' A 95% rejection of the proposal feels like pretty clear consensus to me.

Fourth of the ECM bonanza for the Qobuz users out there, from ECM 1159 to 1214. High-res versions, where available. Happy listening. open.qobuz.com/playlist/487...

In honour of Rob Reiner, have David Moore's thread on the best sword fight in movie history and exactly how nerdy it is.

#NowPlaying today's other happy pickup from the Cafe Oto Christmas Fair.

"I kept thinking about all the extremist voices promoting hate & division. They are given so many platforms, while voices that represent kindness, open mindedness & empathy seem to be scarcer & scarcer. I felt I couldn’t pamper myself with the luxury of silence.” www.theguardian.com/media/2025/d...

To the chap whose name I didn't catch but who insisted on giving me a sample of the 1945 (!!) Domaine Bourdy Côtes du Jura Rouge from The Sampler in Islington - thank you sir, and all the best to you and yours. Wine from the year of liberation: good lord. And yes, it was fabulous.

Crikey. The Christmas Fair @cafeotodalston.bsky.social and Steve Noble have come up trumps: I've been looking for this for years. Suspect the (likely original) Cornflakes probably deserve the biohazard label by now...

Sunday morning, and my partner comes into the room dancing to Monk's Well You Needn't. My work here is done.

I'm being press ganged into watching #Strictly. Judge Anton looks like he's been whitewashed by irregular pigeons.

Some days, Violin Phase from this record just takes up space in my head and refuses to leave. Which is fine with me. #NowPlaying

For 99 years, my church, St Martin in the Fields, has been raising money through a BBC radio appeal to help the homeless at Christmas time. We help not just people in London, but all over the UK. Dig deep, folks. smitfc.org/christmas/

I almost thought about buying a Merzbow album that was welded into the CD player of a Merc, wired to the ignition to play as soon as it started. £1000, a bargain for a good runner.

Offer me Han Bennink's Cheesemobile and I'm in

Tilda Swinton being interviewed by Jefferson Hack at the V&A. I could listen to her talk for days.

Very sad that I felt I had no choice but to resign from The Infinite Monkey Cage - a victory for the transphobes and other bigots - I did it because so much of the media has chosen to believe the kind and empathetic people are a fiction - they are real and so often unrepresented.