Swear to god an advert on TV tried to sell me 4 different things at once tonight. It was an ad for a video game, but it played music from a shitty popshit album (details of which where on screen), gave not the price of the game but the price of the game console, all with the bright red name of the supermarket where you can buy all these things from. Bill HIcks was right about you people. And what’s with making the adverts louder than the program I’m watching?   

 I think I’m gonna be squeee-ing every day until its release…

Old news nobody! A special episode of the most recent Turtles cartoon called ‘Turtles Forever’ came out last year or sometime, and over christmas I got a chance to watch it, and I recommend it to all. Funny stuff wherein the attitude-ridden new Turtles meet the cringe-worthy 80’s Turtles, and then they all meet the original bad-ass Turtles from the original comic series. Oh how I laughed. 

The night of the oscars! Yay (sadface). Having watched the Brits, the Baftas and the NME awards without finding anything fiendishly clever/new/funny or even descriptive to write, I think I’ll give the Oscars a miss. But hey! Last night was the ‘Razzies’ the annual troll-fest that celebrates the worst of Hollywood. One thing I have been steadily learning is that Sandra Bullock is cool. She turned up…

I haven’t seen this film she talks about, but I’ll look out for it now. Win for Bullock.

I was terribly sad to hear today that Mark Linkous of Sparklehorse took his own life this weekend. His music has probably meant more to me over the years than that of any other; I first heard Hammering The Cramps on a free compilation CD as a 13 year old in 1996 and bought the first Sparklehorse album soon after. I had a burgeoning love for music but at the time the media was swamped by Britpop- I had ‘discovered’ REM but this was really the first album that not only introduced me to a world of alternative and alt-country music, but changed my life forever. It had its own internal world, sad and beautiful, which has helped me through sadnesses of my own. I was lucky enough to meet the man himself twice, in 1999 in Edinburgh and 2002 in Manchester- after a show he would tend to wander out after a show, shy and completely humble but happy to talk to his fans. He made no secret of his struggle with depression and addictions which he expressed through his lyrics. He almost died from an overdose in 1996, and was in a wheelchair when he wrote Good Morning Spider;

Every hair on your head is counted
you are worth hundreds of sparrows
the tree you planted has become fecund
with kamikaze hummingbirds

I’m so sorry
my spirit’s rarely in my body
it wanders through the dry country
looking for a good place to rest.

Rest in peace.

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I demand Oscars for these chaps!!!

(Yes that’s a real film). Via topless robot, en route from Gorilla mask

 Screw those philosophical plants in my last post! Depressing bastards. This one is purely for me. My favourite cartoon when i was growing up was the Pink Panther, particularly the DePatie/Freleng golden era. I call it golden, to most it may have appeared yellow or even light brown. I watch those cartoons now and I am reminded of the smell of toast with melted butter. YeAH. Most people I speak to remember the Pink Panther (of course) but forget the extra cartoons they made that ended up filling the ’Pink Panther Show’ (which was an excuse to re-run previous Panther cartoons) including the Tijuana Toads and Crazylegs Crane. My favourite additional cartoon was The Ant and the Aardvark. I love it all, from the backgrounds down to the zoidberg-ian voice of the Aardvark…

The last remake of PP which I was excited about back in 1993 had him talking (with the voice of Max Headroom, no less) and I remember being deeply dissapointed about it, but this is reviving The Ant and the Aardvark! Once again people will know what the hell I’m talking about!! Yeah! Go me!

Americans must tell me how it goes, as it premieres today (sun 7th) on cartoon network 
I’m taking this one as a personal win.

(Also via Cartoon Brew. Good site that.)

Plants seem to exist in the moral vacuum of existential necessity. Or whatever. I hate plants. If you have 13 odd minutes care to use your eyeballs at the below animation featuring the voice of Whoopi Goldberg. It’s pretty cool, but sad. Like life… only we’re better than plants because we can enjoy the works of Nicholas Cage. Take that plants!!

Descendants from Goro Fujita on Vimeo.

via Cartoon Brew

This has been around the webs already I’m sure (that is my last apology on the matter)… but this is an amazing review of James Cameron’s film Avatar by it’s own creation! Kind of. Dog version? I dunno. Stunning animation, which by the way, Cameron, is alot of hard work.

via cartoon brew

Heart goes out to his family. A great actor and activist against human rights violations, particularly in Burma. His parents have my total respect by trying to make sure that people in his situation don’t do what he did. Their press conference is beyond the clicky more, because quite frankly I can only really watch it once. If anyone is feeling like life’s a shitter (which it often is) make sure you exhaust all your options. One of which is the Samaritans… and if you don’t want them there are a thousand more. I suppose it’s all about talking… everyone needs to talk.

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BBC announced today their plans to close BBC 6 Music (home of Adam& Joe, Jarvis Cocker, Guy Garvey’s Finest Hour, Mark Riley to name a few) in 2011.  Apparently the digital station “competes head on for a commercially valuable audience” which might otherwise be listening to Radio 1(Chris Moyles, Fearne Cotton, Vernon Kay) or 2 (Steve Wright’s Sunday Love Songs, Alan Titschmarsh with Melodies for You, Going Out with Alan Carr). No, no, no. No. Given the selections above, everyone who can will switch to XFM and the rest of us would prefer to record nails scraping on a blackboard/Jimmy Carr’s laugh/Janet Street Porter singing the birdy song. Or maybe just a nice podcast, or CD for those of us that can remember such things.

6 Music entire annual budget is a relatively paltry £9 million. Check out the rather beautiful work of art that is the BBC-o-gram to get a sense of how this compares with the budgets of BBC 1/ BBC 3, or (sorry to get all Daily Mail on your ass) the salaries of Jonathan Ross, Graham Norton, or Anne Robinson. Or see how much they’ve been spending on shiny buildings.

Happily, the latest reports indicate the beeb may be prepared to reverse their decision, in the face of the tsunami of discontent they’ve seemingly created. There will now be a 12 week public consulation. Ideas for ways to make your voice heard by the Big British Castle can be found here. Just imagine little Lauren Laverne’s eyes welling up, and give what you can. Here’s an awesomely catchy song from the playlist to get you in fighting spirit (especially you Black Squadron);

Just a quick heads up of some interesting Telly viewing coming up in the next wee while for those of you like me who have nothing better to do;

Dr Who:

New Who is scheduled for April the 3rd on BBC 1, and is looking good. As you might expect me to say, ’cause I’m so gay for it.

The Pacific:

Looking forward to what I call ‘Godzilla vs. Band of Brothers’ (no I don’t call it that, that’s stupid). It looks great and miserable and uplifting and harrowing. The next mini series produced by celluloid-blooded Steven Spielberg and squishy-faced Tom Hanks takes a look at War in general, and in specific the Pacific. Due for release in the UK April 4th on Sky movies.

Burn Notice:

I heard alot of talk about this, but the most important thing to me is that it has Bruce Campbell in it. Hell, Bruce Campbell could shit in my soup and I’d still eat it. Starts 4th March on Fiver. Check out the promo video here (That’s Burn Notice, not Campbell crapping in my food).

Being Human

Ha! I trick you! This show has just finished its second season run on BBC 3 this past sunday. It’s the tale of a ghost, a vampire and a werewolf who all share a flat together. If you haven’t caught it yet, check it out even if you feel abit bored of all the vampires and magic that we’ve been inhaling these past few years. It’s funny, for a start. Bad news is that they are making an American version. Is that bad news?
 

Youtuber RyanIverson is responsible for a series of funny videos in which Moon favourite Werner Herzog seems to read childrens stories, but with the stark, dark philosophy that pervades his work.

via neatorama

This is a few months old, but very funny and most definitely Fresh. Impressive impression to say the least from Jimmy Fallon, previously of Saturday Night Live.