Highlighting the actually not-so-secret world of mass food production, and product manufacturing in general. Streamlining is cheaper, hence single producers are contracted by various brands and chains to supply their needs. They’ve been doing it for decades. (That branded thing you like? There’s probably an own-brand equivalent that is literally the same product.) But there’s a cost for this efficiency, whether relatively benign (like ‘metallic-tasting’ hummus) or more significant from a public health standpoint (see the horse meat scandal, which was really about not knowing what was in the food, rather than that thing being horse meat). #link
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Sigh. ‘Pivoting’ is great for start-ups and VCs, who must believe it’s a virtue to be so nimble. It’s not so good for their employees or contractors, those who supply the necessary labour, who can’t possibly be expected to follow suit. And it’s all in the service of an ad market that doesn’t have a metric for (and therefore, doesn’t understand) the way advertising works now. [c/o Kottke.org] #link
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“The future will not have the nine till five. Instead, the whole day will be interspersed with other parts of your life. Scheduling will become freeform.” Ah, the privilege of having a career one loves to the point where work/life balance is no longer a relevant concern. #link
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Happy Golden Week, everyone! I’m celebrating by watching live puroresu, right now #aside
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Every random Prime Time Wrestling I've picked to watch on the Network has 'Dangerous' Danny Davis in the opener #aside
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#NowPlaying Wreche - Desert (piano/drums black metal, out next month, RIYL Botanist) #aside
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Midori Takada’s 1983 LP Through The Looking Glass. Prompted by this short profile in the Guardian upon its recent reissue, which has promptly sold out. And it isn’t available digitally, for some stupid reason. So here you go. #video
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Hmm, two letter-sized things from the US appear to have gone missing in the post in the last six weeks #aside
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I’m glad Formulas Fatal to the Flesh was my intro to Morbid Angel; it’s still a very good album #aside
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Got my bicycle back from the shop. Will hit the road for a long ride next week, I think #aside
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Jonathan Demme (RIP) never made another horror after The Silence of the Lambs, but it’s so good he might’ve thought he couldn’t top it #aside
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Bass lesson #2: screw chords, I'm sticking with intervals. Also I worked out the bassline for the Minutemen's 'The Anchor' without tab #aside
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Technically skilful and visually accomplished, with a great performance by the lead, but dubious themes indeed. #link
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Got a call from the bike shop: back wheel hub is bent, need a new wheel. That'll be the potholes Irish Water have left behind since October #aside
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‘Complicated’ is putting it mildly. [c/o LinkMachineGo] #link
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It does the remarkable job of making me want to watch his movies. #link
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On first glance, this Wikitribune idea seems naive, and misrepresents how ‘proper’ journalism is done #aside
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Left my bicycle in the shop this morning for a long-overdue service. Summer’s almost here #aside
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Fantasy baseball three weeks in: sixth in the league and only 19 points behind the leader. Not bad for a novice #aside
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Catching up on NXT this afternoon. New theme is better than the crappy remix of the old one. Tron graphics still poor, though #aside
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I had indeed been confused about this, and will keep in mind when reviewing my CSS, which probably has more PX definitions than is strictly necessary. #link
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Filing this for future reference. #link
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Hey, since when has the Trotsky Icepick discography been on Spotify? #aside
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The new Yowie album is out now and all. What a time to be alive: https://t.co/IfdAIeoeX2 #aside
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Lilo & Stitch:
What a treat this is: a genuinely funny, sweet and touching comedy-drama about a non-traditional family and the unique creature who shakes up their lives. But it arrived before most people cared about such things, and doesn’t fit neatly into the Disney canon, so is unfairly overlooked (even by me, hence why it’s taken me so long to see it).
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The Void:
The first ‘straight’ genre pastiche from the Astron-6 collective, The Void is a film very much in thrall of its influences in lieu of its own worldbuilding: it’s basically Carpenter’s The Thing, Prince of Darkness and a few others crossed with Fulci’s The Beyond, by way of Hellraiser and Stuart Gordon’s Lovecraft flicks. What’s more, the awful lighting makes it largely impossible to appreciate the practical effects, which are Empire Pictures weird-veering-on-hokey rather than other-worldly terrifying, so I don’t know why they bothered. I didn’t hate watching it, though.
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A Silent Voice:
Yoshitoki Ōima’s slice-of-life manga perhaps naturally loses some of its plot clarity and character development in the translation to the big screen, compressing an 18-month-long story into a two-hour movie and all that. But the spirit is intact, as a disconnected group of teenagers – one of them deaf – try to mend the wounds they inflicted on one another when they were younger and knew no better. Emotionally genuine, and beautifully animated. Very much recommended if you liked Toradora!
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Juicero is chindogu #aside
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Honestly forgot today is Record Store Day till just now #aside
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…and what it means for the future of ‘working stiff’. Headbutts and hard kicks to the head always make me queasy, anyway. What’s wrong with a good forearm? #link
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Missed the promo for Justin Walter’s Unseen Forces but it’s out today on Kranky and it’s beautiful: https://t.co/SSAGtao1VR #aside
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Bought postage stamps today that I had to lick to put on the envelope, like a barbarian #aside
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Ha, just spotted an egregious factual error in my Free Fire review. Err, not an error, I mean Easter egg. Yes, Easter egg #aside
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I was hoping that stupid juicer story would blow over but nope, it’s all over my feed. File under ‘solutions to problems no one was having’ #aside
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There has to be a Red House Painters cover band called the Brave Martyr Pilots, right? If there isn’t, who wants to start one with me? #aside
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Tim MacGabhann’s essay for Fallow Media on John Boorman’s 1967 noir Point Blank. Beware of spoilers if you haven’t seen the film (which I just watched for the first time tonight). #link
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Dublin at night, as seen from the International Space Station. #image
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Bass lesson #1: I have stumpy fingers and I cannot play barre chords #aside
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Finally saw an otter in the estuary! #aside
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Missing the Guardians of the Galaxy 2 press show right now as I had other work to do. On the road to see Mindhorn, though #aside
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RIP Rosey, who did not get a fair shake in WWE, not least that name #aside
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Just got the volume and tone knobs back on my bass. Picked up new strings earlier; need proper wire cutters to finish the job #aside
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Maybe it’s just me, but I have a feeling that genre filmmaking is a more welcoming place for women to get a foothold, whether telling their own stories or just telling good stories full stop. But I’m not a filmmaker or a woman, nor do I know any in the industry. #link
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Here’s a great audio interview with former Don Caballero band leader Damon Che: https://t.co/5TrM8obU24 #aside
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Repetition is the word in Enlarged Heart Radio 19, featuring Lungfish, Moon Duo, Ramleh and more.
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Buying new lightbulbs in 2017 is more difficult than I would’ve imagined #aside
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The Up on the Sun-style solos on this Moon Duo album are quite enjoyable #aside
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Almost finished with Legend of Korra. What are we gonna watch next? #aside
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Not at the big Irish wrestling show tonight because the promotion were dicks to me and I think their gimmicks are trash #aside
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Currently watching Wake In Fright, which basically depicts my worst nightmare. But I know I'd never make a rookie mistake like Grant #aside
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