Resonance FM Blog

From today’s G2 supplement:

Dear Hooting Yard readers and listeners,

Today is Bloomsday, when Joyceans celebrate their myopic hero. My mother, on the other hand, once announced in her finest Flemish accent “Tch! James Joyce was a fool!” We don’t celebrate Bloomsday at Hooting Yard, but then every day is devoted to other matters of towering import. Do remember to check regularly, probably about as often as you breathe in.

You will see when you visit that a second Hooting Yard paperback is now available. Make your purchase of Unspeakable Desolation Pouring Down From The Stars, And Other Tragedies directly via the website, as you won’t find this little beauty in the shops, alas.

You’ll also find a link to the Hooting Yard On The Air podcasts, so if you’re stuck for something sensible to listen to, there are innumerable hours of me babbling into a microphone for you to download. Thank you for your support.

Frank Key

http://www.hootingyard.org

The Curzon Cinemas network now have a podcast produced by Resonance FM and presented by our own film guru Alex Fitch, which takes a look at what they’re showing over the coming month along with clips, director Q&As and more. Definitely worth checking if you’re a more discerning filmgoer.

Here’s the feed link:
http://feeds.feedburner.com/curzoncinemas

…and they’re also listed on iTunes if you’re so inclined.

Or take a taster of the podcast here before subscribing (click to listen):
http://audio.resonancefm.com/curzon/Curzon_Podcast_1.mp3

Now, as someone who used to work in IT, I remember very clearly the nightmare of having to deal with staff who had opened an AOL account and then had trouble changing it. It was always pretty clear that one method of these megacorp ISPs is to make cancelling so damn hard you can never do it.

So, after running a story on how AOL tries to retain the accounts of the deceased, Consumerist.com has finally recorded an attempt to cancel, and the result is, well, both side-splitting and kinda scary.

Check it out here

I came across this link on the Ninja Tune forum and thought it was of some interest. Apparently DFA requested that their tracks be removed from the popular Headfone Sex blog, stating that posting them in advance of their release in this manner was highly detrimental to their sales etc.

Read the article here

In doing so they highlight a growing issue in music, namely: does the model currently used to pay artists for their musical works actually stand up in 2006? Now that piracy has grown beyond all control - be it via P2P, newsgroups, YouSendIt links or music blogs - its safe to say that if you want to avoid buying an album, you can certainly do so… and in the process ensure that the artist does not get fair remuneration for their efforts.

Word also reaches me that AIM (the Association of Independent Music) are now lobbying the UK government, urging them to re-think the laws governing Intellectual Property. The complete details are vague, but I believe the main jist is that AIM would like to see taxes placed on consumer goods such as CDRs, MP3 players, ISP accounts etc., from which monies would be distributed to those artists whose music is downloaded. I can see the benefit here: it would mean music would effectively become free, with your downloads being monitored more (presumably) and the collected tax monies being redistributed according to what’s been downloaded.

Changing times are upon us… but what do YOU think?

Nothing takes off the stress in a lunch hour like putting on some quality death metal and drumming along:

Next week: Kev D’ead cuts loose with some speed metal guitar solos on his teabreak.

Hmmm - according to this article it seems there are now more people podcasting via Feedburner alone than there are radio stations on the planet.

Interesting stuff certainly, but I am left wondering just how significant all the pro-Podcasting stats really are. After all, you can have millions of people podcasting, but how many people are listening, and how captive is the audience.

The future for Resonance perhaps? Hmmm… time will tell!

For just one of the swarm of Pestival events taking place between 27th May & 4th June at London’s Wetland Centre, a crack team of circuit-soldering folk (including Toby Arnott O.B.E.) have been gathering once a week in a dingy basement in London’s fashionable Denmark Street.

Amid the odour of burning wires and solder (which is uncannily similar to the smell of urine…I’m told) and using tools and materials which often resemble insects themselves, magnificently noisy instruments are being created for a production of David Tudor’s Rainforest IV.
This will be a large performance piece using junk objects as loudspeakers.

More photographic evidence can be viewed at Salim Fadhley’s photo page.