I was a teenage dark elf priestess

Hazel — 1 Jul 2013

This article by Laurie Penny on the pervasiveness and persuasiveness of the manic pixie dream girl trope is really good.
I’m the same age as Laurie Penny, so was plagued by the same cultural stuff as her- I don’t know if it’s just e[…]

A Million Hearts

Tom — 19 Jan 2002

Everlasting Pop and Dexys Midnight Runners
There is pop, and there is popular, and then there’s popular. And there’s also “timeless”. Sometimes when people say that a record is “timeless” – let’s pick o[…]

Why, Claudius? – Waiting in the Wings

Bec — 24 Mar 2024

So anyway, Gaius died. 
Old Clavdivs mumbles this to himself while ransacking his study for family history research material, so for the very first time, the opening flash forward actually serves a narrative purpose. He finds the letter he needs up […]

Why, Claudius?

Bec — 8 Mar 2024

Puritanical belief in predestination has fallen somewhat out of fashion in modern times, although some might argue that true free will is an illusion, even without an asshole God casting people into the fiery pits of hell without regard to their actu[…]

Do You Feel Real, And If So I’d Like To Know…

Tom — 30 Jan 2000

I. 

The cod-philosophical question at the centre of pop fandom is this: is pop a genre or a state? Not all records designed to be ‘great pop’ – in the sense of being good for the feet, the heart and the bank balance – […]

Why, Claudius? – Hail Who?

Bec — 26 May 2024

No flash-forward this week: instead, we see Clavdivs reading a letter in a modestly furnished room. Calpurnia, his flatmate and friend, wants him to read it aloud since epistles from Herod are always amusing. The letter is packed with concern-trollin[…]

Why, Claudius? – Fool’s Luck

Bec — 2 Jun 2024

This week’s flash-forward is ultra short: just a few frames of Old Clavdivs in his study late at night, scowling at his crown of gold-plated laurel leaves. The previous episode’s concluding cheer long live the Emperor increases in volume as the s[…]

The Sound Barrier Podcast: 8: The Phantom Carriage & A Ghost Story

Pete Baran — 15 Aug 2017

Spooky happenings over on Silent London this week, where the Sound Barrier Podcast dabbles in the supernatural, otherworldly and ectoplasmic. Or rather, a pair of meditative films which use death, and the afterlife, to dwell on the nature of existenc[…]

Pokémon X And Why

Tom — 9 Jan 2013

GET UR FROAK ON
While most of my online acquaintances were geeking out today at the thought of a new David Bowie album, our house was far more excited by the announcement of new Pokémon games – Pokémon X and Pokémon Y, the first on Nintendo’s […]

Omargeddon #50: Mantra Hiroshima

Bec — 10 Feb 2025

Labelling music as ‘psychedelic’ is about as useful as labelling it as ‘progressive’. Both are wildly subjective terms, and both are frequently deployed when defining Omar Rodríguez-López’s extensive catalogue. I’d like to see a handy […]

The Sex Pistols At The Manchester Free Trade Hall: THE TRUTH

Tom — 14 Apr 2007

Plenty of words have been written about the seminal Sex Pistols’ seminal gig at the seminal Manchester Free Trade Hall in 1976. There has even been a whole book about it! Everyone knows that the gig was really very important indeed and that eve[…]

The Magic Mill

Tom — 23 Apr 2000

My first encounter with the exotic was on the Magic Mill at Thorpe Park, a South-East England theme park which from appearances had originally been based around a cramped zoo or city-farm set-up. At some point in the late 70s it had seemingly panicke[…]

I was a teenage dark elf priestess

Hazel — 1 Jul 2013

This article by Laurie Penny on the pervasiveness and persuasiveness of the manic pixie dream girl trope is really good.
I’m the same age as Laurie Penny, so was plagued by the same cultural stuff as her- I don’t know if it’s just e[…]

A Million Hearts

Tom — 19 Jan 2002

Everlasting Pop and Dexys Midnight Runners
There is pop, and there is popular, and then there’s popular. And there’s also “timeless”. Sometimes when people say that a record is “timeless” – let’s pick o[…]

Why, Claudius? – Waiting in the Wings

Bec — 24 Mar 2024

So anyway, Gaius died. 
Old Clavdivs mumbles this to himself while ransacking his study for family history research material, so for the very first time, the opening flash forward actually serves a narrative purpose. He finds the letter he needs up […]