Got a new phone today, because I was due an upgrade, and it was free, and I need something to forstall my technology lust for the next few months, because I won’t be able to afford any of the shiny toys I’ve had my eye on.  The phone has a decent camera (well, it’ll take 640×480 images and not look utterly shit, which is what I wanted) and bluetooth, so I can get the damn things off without having to email them.  This makes it actually worth having a cameraphone.  Hurrah!  Now all I have to do is resist spending 50 quid on a bluetooth adaptor for the palm…

Things that Rock (ii)
Today, it is Real Gone that rocks.  After the sheer brilliance of Mule Variations (one of a very few albums that I would genuinely regard as essential listening), I thought Blood Money and Alice were a bit of a let down.  Still good stuff, you understand, but just not in the same league.  I’m still making my mind up about Real Gone, but it’s much closer to the ballpark – the sound has moved on, but it’s a pretty clear progression, and I like it, mutant beatboxing and all.

If you’ve any fondness for the blues and weird noises in your music, you need to check this out.  The opener, “Top Of The Hill” is a brilliant explosion of rattling, crashing sounds, over a much-too-catchy beat, and it at least had me hooked from the off, and the rest of the album keeps my interest pretty well, even in the rather slower tracks.

I suspect that if you picked fifteen people who heard it, and asked them to pick out their favourite track, you’d get fifteen different answers – the songs are all good, and all very distinct from one another (while unquestionably belonging on the same album), but I think my single, stand out track has to be the warped blues holler of “Don’t Go Into That Barn”, which I can only describe a strange sort of murderer’s worksong.  Marvellous stuff.