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time with each other, Harris ran onto the stage with a pineapple on his head and mockingly danced along. He was immediately ejected from the venue and banned from any future X Factor events. And I'm sure he was absolutely gutted, cause his actions clearly demonstrate his immense love for the television show. However, the main lesson to be learnt here is that no one is safe any more. Harris is everywhere, and soon he might come for you...

plants and further enlargements to her breasts. Someone should probably tell her that its not best to simply swap one addiction for another. But to be honest I think most of us have simply given up on the girl.

HESTON BLUMMIN' MENTAL HESTON BLUMENTHAL has decided that cooking up snail porridge and parsnip cereal is no longer enough. Now hes looking to get involved in the world of music, with the help of musician Matthew Herbert. Blumenthal has agreed to slaughter a pig and use its bones to create a woodwind instrument for Her-

berts new album One Pig, which will chart the life of the pig from birth till death. Unfortunately, much like his food, most people will give it a look, comment on how crazy and quirky it is, and then listen to the simplicity that is JLS. And that is why JLS will conquer our charts for years to come.

IS THIS THE FACE OF AN EVIL MASTERMIND? PAUL McCARTNEY is apparently a dirty evil vegetarian whose word cannot be trusted. Or at least thats how Uk Independence Party member Paul Nuttall feels, accusing McCartney of propaganda in an attempt to spread vegetarianism. He argues that people should have a choice over the matter, and that one popstars view on how 'farting cows and

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loom menacingly over an audience anticipating a unique rock spectacle.

As the ferocious opening offering , Uprising kicks in , the tower's tarpaulin frontage falls to reveal the band perched above the audience, inside of the tower blocks. Three songs later as an apocalyptic New Born begins, Muse are lowered in order to adopt a more conventional stage set up. But 'conventional' is a word that was wiped from Muse's rock and roll lexicon a good while ago, and the song is accompanied by thousands of green laser beams darting across the cavernous arena. The entirety of the show never vacates the realms of the spectacular and the mind blowing , whether it be

pigs herald the end of mankind' shouldn't have any impact.

However, this does come from the group that David Cameron has previously described as 'fruit cakes' and 'closet racists'.

Tough one, can't really choose who to trust here. The warm, friendly, father like vegetarian, or the racist politician and his extremely right wing approach to politics.

SCRATCH PERVERTS FIBBERS

MUSE

onsidering the mixed critical reception that greeted Muse's symphonic rock opus, The Resistance, one would be forgiven for thinking that Muse's creative powers were on the slide. Their latest offering spent most of its considerable length tottering on the thin dividing line between genre-bending genius and self indulgent pomp.

Yet Muse have never done things any differently and their latest work has simply represented their final shedding of their paltry creative inhibitions, and fittingly the accompanying tour leaves no room for subtlety and intimacy.

The centrepiece of Muse' typically ambitious stage décor are three 20ft mock tower blocks that

LISTINGS

BECAUSE THE DRUGS JUST DON'T WORK AMY WINEHOUSE isn't addicted to crack anymore! Hooray!

Instead she's now addicted to plastic surgery! Hooray... Having recently had her breast enlarged, sources have suggested that she is now interested in bum im-

CALVIN HARRIS has been at it again, having had a go at GMTV Morning a couple of months ago. After being invited on to join the panel for 'The Xtra Factor', Harris felt this would be his best chance to mock another object of his hate, the X Factor contestants. He quickly made John and Edward his target, who have somehow become a nation obsession. And so, as the twins partook in their weekly routine of shuffling on the spot whilst trying to keep in

CULTURE

STEFAN PHILPOTTS reveals all the latest news and gossip from the music industry

MUSIC NEWS WRATH OF HARRIS: PART DEUX

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giant white confetti filled balloons that cascade onto the crowd during Bliss, or the Attenborough-esque film that accompanies a gorgeous rendition of Feeling Good.

The Hallam Arena might resemble an aircraft hanger, but on one bitterly cold Yorkshire night it was a cacophony of space rock histrionics capable of surprising even die hard Muse fans. For a band that consistently pushes the boundaries of contemporary rock music, it is a fittingly bombastic outing, and one that serves as a reminder that pretension aside, there powers are most definitely not on the wane.

MIKE REGAN

et’s face it, York’s nightlife is more likely to conjure up blurry memories of Alphabeat rather than Annie Mac, so the prospect of Tony Vegas and Prime Cuts of the legendary turntable giants Scratch Perverts playing in our very own Fibbers promised to be one of the most highly anticipated events of the term.

Resident York DJ Nik-L prepped the crowd for the night ahead with an energetic set before WAX:ON favourites the Eskimo Twins took the stage for

their third York appearance with their signature pounding dark electro.

The enthusiasm of the crowd didn’t go unnoticed, with Eskimo Twin Tim commenting that the atmosphere was better than most Leeds nights the duo had played!

After this energetic build up, the Perverts were ready to face their excited (and by now epically sweaty) audience. Although starting later than expected, the duo soon made up for lost time with some wall-shaking dubstep, alternating remixes of artists like Caspa and the Foreign Beggars off their Beatdown album with recent favourites,

including the massive Emalkay track When I Look At You. Their set followed the pattern of Beatdown as well, moving smoothly into some fast-paced electro with a creative remix of Pon De Floor as well as Jack Beats’ mixes of Kissy Sell Out, TC and La Roux among others. Finally they rounded off the night with a heady drum and bass finale, using tracks from Sigma and Dirty Harry to D*Minds’ epic mix of Warface and Spor’s classic Aztec. Although abandoning their signature scratching, the reaction of the audience showed that this was only a minor disappointment, with one particularly enthusiastic onlooker declaring it to be “the best electro night in York ever.” With Fibbers fast establishing itself as the place for electro, techno and house music acts, this will hopefully be one of the first of many unforgettable nights still to come.

CATHERINE SINCLAIR-JONES

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HIGH CONTRAST D

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Vision explores the frenetic musical world of DJ du Jour, Lincoln Barrett.

“DnB stands alone in dance music for a number of reasons", explains Barret "It’s around 170 BPM, which makes it unmixable with most other genres. House, garage, breaks, and techno are all around 120-130!.” a gaining Although more mainstream following, the image of Drum and Bass still remains inherent with a darker side. The perception of DnB has always been linked to a heavy drug culture and a night in Fabric is more than enough to confirm this suspicion. Far from embracing the culture though, Barrett has remained teetotal, “I am an anomaly. For me, drugs have nothing to do with what I do. Of course, I recognise that every musical movement is intertwined with a particular drug movement. But I think less and less drugs are being taken in the club scene, I try to make uplifting music so you don’t need drugs to get a rush.”

And perhaps this is the key to High Contrast.

Whilst much of Drum and Bass could be considered

only listenable on drugs, High Contrast infuses an accessibility into his tunes that has been rewarded with mainstream success, “People don’t feel they are getting bashed over the head with dark beats when they come to see me. There will be melody and vocals.

Plus, I rather like bootlegs of popular tunes, which is always good for the crossover.”

Benefitting from being brought up in a musical household with eclectic influences from 50's rock 'n' roll to movie soundtrack, by 17 High Contrast was beginning to find his calling in heavy beats, “I was just consumed by the Jungle scene”. The early years were spent MCing in various groups, as a means to an end, "I was even MCing in a metal hard core band!"

But Barrett soon realised he wasn’t cut out for a career behind the mic and returned to the decks.

Since then, Barret’s career has gone from strength to strength. High Contrast is a world renowned DJ

and a highly sought-after remixer for the likes of Missy Elliot and White Stripes – plus his own tracks are getting regular radio air play. Whilst his signature sound may have created a worldwide fan base, there is no danger of High Contrast going stale, “I think people associate me with an uplifting yet melancholic sound.

But I try not to repeat myself. I forget how I made certain sounds, sometimes that’s annoying but it keeps me fresh.” By Jim Norton

True Colours

High Society

ZIGGY'S 12/11/09

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think it’s fair to say that the prospect of Skream descending on Micklegate was pretty surreal and very, very exciting...At only 21, the Croydon born DJ has already established himself as one of the best dubstep producers in the world, so the chance to see the man himself on York soil was not to be missed. Herb-

Fabriclive

al Mafia and Breakz have brought a wide range of underground acts to Ziggy’s over the last few years, and with a varied support line-up of dubstep, mashup and DnB DJs including Signus, Brothers Grime, and Spoonfed to name but a few the night promised to be one to remember. After a diverse and energetic warm-up set mixing everything from Digital Mystikz and Loefah to darker material including 16Bit and Reso it was

Tough

Guys

reviews this week's...

SINGLES Ke$ha Tik Tok Out 30th November

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rushing your teeth with a bottle of Jack, smacking drunks, and blowing your speakers up because you are the party; it's all in a day's work for US pop rebel Ke$ha. Her sickly sweet overly-tuned vocal, juxtaposed with Dr Luke's electronic backing makes for an unsurprisingly awful, trashy dance track. Consider yourself lucky that Radio 1 aren't hammering this one.

Ian Brown Just Like You Out 30th November

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ock's mysterious man Ian Brown recently told fans "there's something for everyone" on his latest album My Way, however, it's unlikely that they expected a conglomerate of musical genres, rolled into one lyrically muddy mess. Everything is wrong, from Brown's Westwood pose on the cover to the somewhat random fusion of electronics, off-beat piano and panned guitars.

Brown writes as if he hasn't ever heard a song before, yet continues to plough on, somehow achieving remote success as he goes...

Discography

rum and Bass has had an unhappy past. Whilst the likes of Pendulum have been peddling a commercial and accessible, but somewhat diluted, version of the genre, the perception of hard core DnB has unhappy associations with intense frenetic beats that leave the listener soothing a sore head. But DJ du jour, High Contrast, has become the happy medium - keeping pop fans happy with his accessibility and giving hard core fans heavy beats and big bass.

Since the crossover success of his remix of Adele’s Hometown Glory, the man Contrast, High behind Lincoln Barrett, has been bringing a style of drum and bass that has the elements to give it deserved mainstream success. Whilst most DnB DJs seem to love a messy assault on the ears, High Contrast injects his tunes with a key ingredient; melody.

But despite how listenable High Contrast has made his style, the genre is still limited by what makes it unique; it’s frantic pace.

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Don't

Sugababes About a Girl Out now

Confidential

time for the man of the hour, and as expected Skream did not disappoint.

In a fast-paced and expertly mixed set, Skream quickly reminded the crowd of his incredible versatility, balancing subtler, softer tracks like I and Too Much Sushi with heavier hits Chest Boxing and Aggy Face. By the time he dropped the now iconic In For The Kill remix to an ecstatic audience. Everything was sweating on an unprecedented scale, even for Ziggy’s, with the glistening audience, DJ, walls and ceiling creating the feeling of an increasingly messy underwater cave rave. The end of Skream’s session was met with a great reaction from an impressively diverse crowd, with students and locals alike showing their appreciation for what was surely one of the best dubstep sets ever to be played in York. The follow up from Signus, although definitely a lot mellower, met with a good reaction and kept the crowd going merrily and sweatily along until close. With what had been a truly breath-taking range of dubstep over 6 hours, the night definitely rose to the challenge of living up to its much hyped expectations, and sent us home trying to get our heads round the fact that yes, we had just seen Skream in Ziggy’s.

By Catherine Sinclair Jones

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omplete with their new and oh so controversial line up, Sugababes are back with another rubbish song. After their last release, Get Sexy, you'd have thought that the girls would've learned their lesson about blatantly ripping off other artist's tried-and-tested formulas, in the hope of creating a wholly unique and successful track...but sadly not. The opening line, in true Gaga form, bursts "RedOne...Sugababes".

All we needed was Akon to chip in with "you're dropped". We should be so lucky...

Paramore Brick by Boring Brick

Out 23rd November

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op punk rocker Hayley Williams has an undeniable knack for churning out uncomplicated, chart dominating tunes, and Brick

by Boring Brick is no exception. She says: "life doesn't have to be some grand production.. you don't have to make everything frilly or prettysounding for it to be interesting" and the song definitely reflects this idea. It's your standard Paramore track; short and sharp with kicking riffs and vocals verging on shrill. It's no Innocence but it'll sure end up in your head.

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ROLL OVER BEETHOVEN? LAURA CRESS DISCUSSES WHETHER CLASSICAL MUSIC HAS WHAT IT TAKES TO ENTER THE MODERN AGE...

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ine kleine Nachtmusik. O Fortuna. Canon in D Major. Whilst you might not be able to connect these names to a song, if heard, 99% of people would be able to recognise them.

This seems to be the problem that classical music is facing – to know classical music, its names, its composers, appears like too much hard work for most people; it’s as if the cliché of classical music being listened to only by upper class snobs has penetrated into the public masses,until nobody can see anything different.

In his lecture at York University on 10th November, Tom Service, music critic for The Guardian, argued that there should be a place for classical music in modern culture, but that things needed to be changed if this was to happen.

However, as students, representing the very demographic that have such an effect on the shape of modern culture, do we want classical music to be a part of our lives? To put it in a harsh light, classical music has become the endangered species that people feel somewhat guilty for, but which they are able to soon quickly push to the back of their minds. But do we have a responsibility to listen to classical music, just to keep it alive and to show that the Youth of Today aren’t all yobs and chavs? Isn’t this just buying more into the cliché of classical music being an elitist art form?

The very act of trying to appeal to younger generations (as well as older ones who would

not normally listen to classical music) with shows such as The Choir seems to be perpetuating the same old tired stereotype that classical music is somehow better for you than other music genres, that there is a need to keep classical music “funky” and “cool” so that it doesn’t slip away forever. However, I’d much rather people fell in love with classical music for what it was,

than for some weird mutation of it, with voting and judges and dull presenter types.

Perhaps, instead of creating these kind of shows to try and generate a sudden interest in classical music, it would be nice if people stepped back and thought – is this the right way of interesting people in classical music? By force feeding us with ideas that classical music needs to be listened to, the media industry is driving people away from it – making them feel like the little child in primary school again, made to make up a random song with instruments

because it was somehow part of their musical education.

I’m certainly not saying that classical music should be forgotten or swept under the rug, but no other music form or genre has such a pressure behind it to be taken up or listened to – nobody in the rap industry is going around trying to promote rap as part of our modern culture, because it has naturally become that way.

In his lecture, Tom Service saw the answer as making musical activities and instrumental sessions free for children and not just for the rich and socially privileged – the logic being that a CD is generally too passive to make a child interested, but interacting with instruments is a much more active and exciting role.

This appears to be a step in the right direction, but unfortunately it still continues the problem of making people play classical music because it is classical music. Does classical music have to be subverted for it to enter our modern culture or is keeping it as it is just continuing the clichés? Why do both the young and the old have to become interested, when there are many other music genres that are happy to stick for a certain age group? There seems to be a confusion as to where classical music should be heading, and until it is able to justify itself in our modern age, it is hard to see a recognised place for it any time soon.

Laura Cress

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What the expert thinks...

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om Service is the Chief Classical Music Critic for The Guardian, and presenter of Music Matters on BBC Radio 3 since 2003, so who better to ask their opinion on the state of classical music?

Do you think that people have just bought into the idea of classical music not being for them and left it at that?

If they have, it's because they haven't been exposed to it enough - by exposed to it I don't mean just having heard it as part of a film soundtrack, but actually participated in it in some sense, by playing it or being part of it. It's that lack of participation that allows that perception to grow. That perception doesn't need to last - for example I talked to an indie pop band playing to an audience of 16 year olds in Camden a few months ago, and you'd think they would be people who wouldn't necessarily be interested in classical music, but they were actually very engaged with it.

What is your opinion of classical music in film soundtracks?

I think their is a positive angle to that, as cinemas are where most people can hear classical music on some level. People in a way are unwittingly being exposed to classical music and I think in that way most people actually understand far more about it than they think they do.

Is it possible for classical music to be appreciated in the same way as popular music when for many from a young age it's part of a mandatory education?

I think if you present people something in an educatory context they are not going to be

as interested in it as for something which they could explore themselves. The way I discovered it, I was taken to a concert and that's what first made me interested. In Music GCSE and A Level there is rightly a lot of pop, jazz and world music, so I don't think if you teach someone it in that context it will have a negative association, as the same happens with other types of music too.

Should classical music have to appeal to the younger generation? Won't this just dumb it down?

It depends how you go about it.

There are millions of people who buy Andrea Bocelli and Russel Watson CDs which are marketed as classical music but they aren't - that doesn't it dumb it down, it's just a different thing, it's actually almost a different genre. I think the mistake a lot of promoters make when they're trying to make classical music appeal to other people is dressing it up, for example thinking that you have to involve pop acts - you don't.

There's an inherent amount of drama when watching a classical music concert and listening together amplifies the musical experience , which is something that you can't get from a recording. However, most pop acts are not doing this in a trivial way, Radiohead, for example, are fantastic musicians who have learnt from contemporary composers and whose purpose is not a marketing one.

What you think...

"Classical music shouldn't be dumbed down just so it can appeal to mass audiences."

"To change classical music for the sake of accessibility is both counter-intuitive and a bit condescending"

"Classical music hasn't always been about studying, at the end of the day it's an art, not a science" "It's inevitable that people choose not to listen to classical music if they've never been fully exposed to it"

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CLASSICAL PLAYLIST

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f your looking to start listening to classical music, there’s always the option of getting a ‘best of...’ or other selection album. Whilst these are great for sampling various composers, there’s much more on offer than the snippets these provide. Here are a few Vision suggestions to get you started, with a mixture of things you’ll almost certainly have heard before and some less well known pieces.

Instrumental: Tchaikovsky:

JENNY McLARNEY interviews the conductor Harry Christophers

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fter 30 years of worldwide performing and recording. The Sixteen is recognised as one of the world’s greatest ensembles. With their own record label, a string of awards and nicknamed ‘The Voices of Classic FM’, the group have been lead to success each year by their conductor and founder Harry Christophers.

How did The Sixteen start?

Well that started right after I left Oxford, and again like so many things in the art world it seems to have happened by chance really. I was asked to put on a concert so I put together a group and again it really went from there, this was back in the late 70s very early 80s and everything was pretty experimental then.

And I think back then it was much easier to get friends to do something for a drink rather than having to pay them money or anything and it just progressed.

How has The Sixteen changed or progressed since you won the Classical BRIT Award in 2005?

Oh very much so, particularly in the UK. Back in the 90s most of our work was abroad, very few concerts in the UK, I mean in London we probably only did 3 or 4 concerts in a year. Then when the Choral Pilgrimage started in 2000 it was a great success and that built up awareness in the UK of The Sixteen. Then the classical BRIT award obviously has a more commercial appeal, I mean the biggest thing for us has been the music series we did on BBC 4 and a lot of people have watched us and so the next series is going onto BBC 2. I mean it’s a combination of all of those things and suddenly we’re doing about 30-40 concerts in the UK, I mean nobody does that, and they sell out.

What would you say is the best venue you’ve ever performed in?

It’s very tricky because there are several but I think in terms of acoustic sound the Musikverein in Vienna, I mean that’s where Beethoven symphonies was first performed and Brahms, I mean the history of that place. All the sort of modern concert halls such as Walt Disney Hall in Los Angeles you can electronically control the acoustics to make it acoustic perfect and they are staggering. But just in terms of beauty of sound the Musikverein is fantastic. Of course it depends what music we are doing, if we’re doing the sacred music just with the choir it

would have to be one of the cathedrals especially up in York. Actually York is one of the best; it’s fantastic for that sort of music.

What are your personal influences?

It would be Leonard Bernstein, he’s a great, great conductor of all types of music. When he conducts an orchestra or when he’s playing a piano, or composing he’s someone who music oozes out of. He someone who feeds off the musicians in front of him and they feed off him and an incredible power comes across to the audience. I try to do that.

How do you choose the people for The Sixteen to create the right blend?

Yeah it's an interesting one. Obviously everyone in The Sixteen have to sight read very well, they need the musicality and quick brain. That’s the sort of pre requisite, they have to sing in tune be rhythmic have good voices etc. But having said all that 50% has to have a good character, I mean that for me goes hand in hand in such a small group. So it got to have the right blend, it’s also like watching a good football team; it’s like watching Arsenal play. I mean when you see this fantastic really flowing football it’s the same with a choir because they know intuitively what each other’s doing, they know each other really well, they get on well. In the performance they know what each other’s going to do, and they listen to each other, it’s a real team that are working together.

One of The Sixteen auditioned for the X Factor but they didn’t get through

the preliminary stages. How do you think this reflects on these kinds of reality TV shows?

Personally I think now they have got completely and utterly out of hand.

Thousands and thousands and thousands of people turn up, and the publicity behind it is quite ridiculous. It’s wonderful of course for the people that get through and go on to win it but it’s the harm it causes. At any stage when they get through they have a feeling that they’re going to make it and the hope they put in to all these people, it’s pretty awful really. Of course there is scope for a talent show, one or two of them but you see shows like Britain’s Got Talent and the people that are on them and it’s just a joke, I mean you've got the Jed people on at the moment...What are they called?

Jedward Yes Jedward, they’re just ridiculous.

What are your plans for the future?

Yeah we’re doing a lot of education plans for the future. We’re hopefully gonna start a new generation thing, training up people from 18 to 23. I always think that these days the top universities like Oxford, Cambridge, Durham, York have wonderful core foundations. In the old days if you had a good voice you’d get in on that, now people have to get fantastic grades in A levels, so you’re losing a lot of natural singers. In terms of the bigger things what I’d like to do is a 16 piece opera on the stage. Also I’ve got big designs to commission a work from James McMillan in a few years time.

Check out my Piano Concerto No.1, it's instruMENTAL

Violin Concerto in Dmajor, and Piano Concerto no. 1 in B-flat minor.

Bach: Cello Suite no. 6 in Dmajor, the prelude especially

Shostakovich:

Tchaikovsky

no. 2 in E-minor

Piano trio

Quiet music: Ludovico Einaudi: some people love this as gentle, relaxing music, others think it’s only fit for being played in a lift.

Bach: Brandenburg Concertos Vaughan Williams: The Lark Ascending Choral music: Tippett: A Child Of Our Time. It’s inspired

by Herschel Grynszpan, the Jewish teenager whose assassination of Ernst von Rath was used by the Nazis as justification for Kristallnacht.

Requiem:

The lyrics come from the Roman Catholic mass for a deceased person. Two of the most famous arrangements are by Verdi, especially the Dies Irae, and Fauré, particularly the In Paradisum.

Elgar: I was Glad The dramatic orchestral pieces you've heard in films: I might be a Nazi but I've got some sick choons!!!!

Wagner

: Ride of the Valkyries

Saint-Saens:

Danse Macabre

Prokofiev: Montegues and Capulets

Bernstein:

Fanfare of the common man

Wagner

As with whatever else you listen to though, the best way to hear classical music is live. With Evensong services in the Minister most nights of the week, as well as many touring groups visiting, amazing classical music is not hard to come by.

KATE MISSENDEN

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Albums...

Them Crooked Vultures: Them Crooked Vultures Out Now

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he year 2009 might go down in music history as the Year of the Band Hook-Up. From the addition of Johnny Marr to the Cribs, to Jack White's latest side project The Dead Weather, to the frankly bemusing duet between Lady Gaga and Michael Ball, it seems everyone in the music industry is getting together. Possibly the most anticipated of collaborations comes in the form of the self titled album of Them Crooked Vultures the supergroup of: guitar and vocalist Josh Homme (Queens of the Stone Age), bassist John Paul Jones (Led Zepplin) with Dave Grohl (Foo Fighters and Nirva-

na) on drums.

In a music scene dominated by overbearing synthesisers, Joy Division wannabes and 80s influence, this album comes as a refreshing change as a simple rock and roll record. Them Crooked Vultures seems like a big mixing bag of influences, from the blues infused growling guitar and reeled off vocal of No One Loves Me And Neither Do I, to the almost funk-like bass line of Scumbag Blues or oddly experimental Interludes

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Julian Casablancas: Phrazes for the Young With Ludes. Meanwhile Dave Grohl's return to playing the drums gives the album a driving force and reaffirms him as one of the greatest drummers in the world today. But the band manages to pull their influences together into a coherent and dynamic collection of songs.

At the same time the album is not without its faults. Haters of Queens of the Stone Age are unlikely to be won over by the return of Josh Hommes trademark distorted guitar flourishes, which appear en-masse on this record.

Meanwhile songs such as Dead End Friends and Mind Eraser, No Chaser steer disappointing close to his tried and tested QotSA formula, detracting from their otherwise diverse sound.

Nonetheles Them Crooked Vultures's debut is a formidable rock record, which will no doubt prove to be one of the most important albums of the year.

CHRIS HOGG

Robbie Williams: Reality killed the Video Star

Out Now

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he extent to which New York indie maestros The Strokes transformed the face of guitar music in 2001 is often overlooked. With its inventive guitar lines and audacious arrangements, their first album, Is This It?, showed how spectacularly creative guitar music could be. It was indie pop perfection, blazing a trail for the sort of bands – Bloc Party, Libertines, Kings of Leon – for which the noughties should be remembered.

Given their influence, it is perhaps surprising that the first sortie into solo territory of front man and songwriter Julian Casablancas has not generated more attention. However, The Strokes ship has not been a happy vessel of late, with mixed critical acclaim greeting their most recent, 2006 offering, First Impressions of Planet Earth and a mooted release date of early next year for album four attracting more doubt than excitement.

But take all that away and it is possible to distil the secret of The Strokes’ success to one indisputable truth: Casablancas is a wonderful songwriter. And on Phrazes for the Young he not only proves that he is in no way a spent song-writing

force, but that the halcyon days of Is This It? may not be so far away after all.

Strokes aficionados may have had felt more than a twinge of worry that Casablancas would use a solo project to fully indulge his fondness for the massive, intricate arrangements that stretched the waistband of the New York band’s bloated last album. At fourteen songs First Impressions dragged on, but here Casablancas gets the recipe just right. Phrazes for the Young is filled with songs that fizz and sparkle and therefore skips along as an album, from the ravishing chorus of Left & Right in the Dark to the eighties bounce of synth-tastic standout track 11th Dimension.

Casablancas never fails to please with his trademark languid vocal, but what he has achieved is more than a hugely pleasing first solo album. By successfully fusing the raw, gutsy appeal of Strokes albums one and two with an almost electro vibe – while keeping it loaded with the arrangements of album three – is alchemy. If Phrazes for the Young proves one thing, it’s that Casablancas isn’t done yet.

WILL WAINEWRIGHT

Nirvana:

Out Now

Nirvana - Live at Reading Out Now

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ith the epic pop struggle between Take That and Robbie, I've always tended to take the side of Williams. I saw him as a Freddie Mercury figure, pumped full of testosterone. For a while I was repaid, Take That crashed and burned as Robbie achieved delirious heights, Along the way recording my personal favourite album Swing When You're Winning. Then back came Barlow with some huge power ballads and Robbie faltered (to put it kindly) with Rudebox.

Now after a three year absence from the music scene I hoped that he would prove his musical superiority and send Barlow back to fat camp (and whereever the nameless members went).

After hearing Bodies, the first single of his new album Reality Killed the Video Star, I could see Gary reaching for those ever so comforting pies. However, that's all the praise I can give this shambolic attempt at pop music.

I cannot believe that he has based what I expected to be

his massive comeback on such underdeveloped rubbish. To be honest, I wasn't expecting lyrical genius from Robbie, however, on hearing the opening lines of Blasphemy which consisted of the "inspired" lyrics "Egyptians built their pyramids, the Romans did what they did", I wondered how anybody can spend that much time on nonsensical shite and why I was wasting mine listening to it. The only point I felt when the dark prince of pop was anywhere near his former best, apart from Bodies, was the rocky track Do You Mind which provided a bit of fun in this dull and devoid album.

After hearing what little this album has to offer I can safely say that Barlow is not going to be needing that pie anymore and should be waiting for a call from a very desperate Robbie Williams who is obviously past his best. I'm still waiting for him to entertain me once again.

CHRIS CRADDOCK

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wo curious moments of judgement struck me when I heard about Nirvana: Live at Reading. The first was a melancholic thought: “They’re still milking that teat?

How many more godforsaken ‘early demos’ and live performances can Geffen release?”

Quickly after listening though, I was struck by knowledge I hadn’t prepared for: this may be the first live album to actually capture a piece of what I love about the band.

Technically, they’ve had two live-LPs before.

From the Muddy Banks of the Wishkah, a completely unremarkable collection of snipped together bootlegs from throughout the band’s career, basically only existed as a prelude to their Greatest Hits compilation being released a few years later.

I didn’t hate Wishkah, I just never found myself listening to it; it existed more as a novel

curiosity. Their other live-album Unplugged in New York was brilliant, yet existed as an entirely different animal to the band’s typical sound; it was beautiful, passionate, but not quite Nirvana kosher.

Live at Reading owes its success to two measures: first, it captured an entire performance of the band in one of their most legendary sets.

There’s a certain contextual enjoyment to this: although the show was already infamous for Kurt’s entrance (in a wheelchair and hospital gown, no less), this set may hit a little closer to home due to the “Holy-shit-I’ve-been-to-ReadingFestival-too” factor which is bound to be shared amongst a majority of their UK fans.

In this sense, it has an instant appeal – you’re able to immediately visualise the atmosphere of the crowd’s anticipation, and it’s contagious.

Secondly, the actual recording quality is reassuringly high (with occasional exceptions for the acousticelectric guitar tones), and it

features several near-definitive versions of their catalogue: Lithium is the standout though, showcasing the festival’s audience as a church-quire to back every word Cobain sings.

There’s more: Smells like Teen Spirit is probably the only recording you’ll ever hear of the band when they sound like they actually enjoy playing the damn song (which is a novelty in itself, truly), and Aneurysm – which is perhaps Nirvana’s best-yet-most-underplayed song – is played with strained fury.

But really, the enjoyable parts of this album are the unexpected touches: Kurt playing around with his voice on Sliver, fucking up various solos, and generally giving the impression that the then-25year-old wanted to be there.

This innate warmth shines through all the music’s doom: in this album (unlike any other) Kurt Cobain isn’t a ghost or a suicidal-genius. Instead, he’s a rock-star at his peak, and vital listening for any fan who hasn’t detached him from his death.

JOE BURNHAM

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wo time winner of the DMC championships Tony Vegas, a self acclaimed ‘Turntabalist’, is one quarter of Scratch Perverts, the collective known for creating many of the out-there DJ techniques taken for granted by our generation of clubbers. Taking time out of his ‘hectic’ schedule, he sat down with Maks Fus-Mickiewicz to bitch about amateur DJs, rubbish York University events and most importantly how do something about it.

How’s your day been?

It’s been alright actually, I’ve just been sitting in the studio and chopping up this track with a bit of bass but I’ve kind of chopped it into one million parts, so I’ve completely lost track of where I am.

You recently played a gig at York University. Did they cut the sound levels on your gig?

At these events that seems to be part of the course we had gigs in Cambridge and Oxford where we were handed a letter before going on, saying if you exceed this stated sound level then you don’t get pay bla bla bla you’re breaking your contract. I mean what’s the point of having music on if you’re going to have it at a level where no-one is going to be able to appreciate it. If you can hear a conversation in the room, its just f**king pointless.

You’ve got two decks and a mixer - but what makes you a Scratch Pervert?

I think the main thing is we play music quite quickly, we go from genre to genre really quick, the emphasis isn’t so much on the scratching, that was more so ten years ago.

So the scratching skills were something you needed more to win the DMC championships?

Yeah, we still do the freestyle things in our DJ sets now, but the emphasis is defiantly more on the dance floor, and that’s how music has become over the last five years really, the people you see in front of you at clubs want something different from what they used to want.

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Could you explain the feedback technique and the Euro scratch?

The feedback technique was just where you plugged the feeder back up itself, and it basically made an incredible f**king amount of noise, but you could actually control the sound within certain mixes, pass it differently through the equalizers and faders and such, it wasn’t just a ear-shattering sound, it was something you had control over. The Euro scratch was simply crossing two faders at the same time, so mixing up the volume on one deck at the same time as the other, so you’d create twice the amount of cut-out when you did it, so, it would just be the quickest scratch on earth It sounded f**king good!

How did all the of Scratch Perverts all meet?

We met at a record store called Mr Bongo, in Soho on Poland Street, I was working there and just about everybody who was anybody was coming in.

So the record store was more of a kind of social space where we met. There were so any record stores there, that’s where everybody went to hear their music and buy their music.

Are there still record stores like that today?

I think it’s changed, obviously everyone has found different places to listen to music. The only places left are places like Phonica and Wyldpytch , were there is defiantly new music and dance music. Two record stores left in the whole of London.

You’ve collaborated with MC Dynamite - at what point did you feel you needed someone on a live mike?

I think when it became more dance floor based; he can be out there at the front of a stage and command a crowd. He’s very interested in MC’ing over different types of music rather than just Drum and Bass, which is where we originally met, at a Drum & Bass night. If you’re doing a bigger festival you need an MC, someone to hype them up a little bit and if you don’t have that sometimes you can feel like you’ve fallen on your own face a little bit.

LTJ Bukem recently said he saw D&B as four tracks crammed into one...

There are always rumours as to how some people play drum and bass, people have always pointed an accusatory finger at each other. I was at a club and this particular person had them playing on the same dub-plate, he’d premixed his whole set, come to do his set,

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played the same track on both decks and created the illusion that he was mixing, which is for me is...well a big no no. The problem was he had eyes behind him and we were all saying "that’s not DJing".

What do you think about Serato Scratch software then?

Well, something I’ve seen more and more is where people have just gotten rid of turntables, you usually get turntables brought into these places with loads of other equipment and you plug it in and press play and you just get massive feedback. The crowd just run for cover and it’s because the turntables just get knocked about, it just sounds bad. It becomes a real pain and so going digital is fine because it gives you a greater deal of safety.

However, you can do anything with computers, bring in edits and mini mixes and stand there and act clever without actually doing anything, but it makes a mockery of the whole thing really. Getting two tracks and making something new, that’s the idea I’m interested in.

You’re also associated with Hip-Hop, do you find it odd that one of the first Hip-Hop tracks Africa Bambasta sampled was the classically schooled Kraftwerk?

No, I think it’s actually very much a part of what Hip-Hop has been, it takes from a lot of styles. One of the first hip-hop records that was ever made was ‘King Tim freaking my fat back’ around 79, instrumentally everything was sampled, it became a sam pled based music and it’s a good thing really, you listen back to those tracks now and there still bloody good Could you give us your three mixing tips?

Don’t pre-record you mixes, that would certainly be the first one...

Under no circumstances pre-record your mixes! Smile a little bit more, it would be nice, I saw a really po-faced DJ recently, how about a smile, it’s not too hard is it?

MAKSYMILIAN FUS MICKIEWICZ

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Interview: Roger Ebert

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Roger Ebert is a legend. His career spans more than forty years and his review column in the Chicago Sun Times (which he has been writing since 1967) is currently sold to over 200 newspapers in the United States and worldwide.

He has also hosted Emmy nominated TV shows, written more than fifteen books and become the first film critic to win the Pulitzer Prize.

Quite simply, he is one of the greatest film critics of all time and his name deserves mention in the same breath as

Vision: You review a considerable number of films every month and, as with any journalist, are constantly working towards the next deadline. Do you ever rewatch a film after you've submitted your review and wish you'd written it differently?

Roger: No, although I've changed a few opinions over a period of years. When I revisit a film after some years, of course

such icons of the profession as Pauline Kael, Alexander Walker and Judith Crist.

Since 2002 he has been battling thyroid cancer, a condition which cost him the ability to speak and means that he currently relies on a computerised voice box to communicate.

Through all of this he has remained dedicated to his work and continues to write reviews and essays with the same intelligence, warmth and wit that have earned him the love and respect of millions.

my perspective has changed and (I hope) improved. There are some great films I've watched dozens of times.

V: You champion films that perhaps haven't achieved the success that they deserve and in 1999 you launched an annual festival with this express purpose, 'Roger Ebert's Overlooked Film Festival'. What motivated you to do this?

R: I feel keenly that many people get no opportunity to see the films that a film critic sees.

Too much good work is lost. There are whole states that don't play some films. I wanted to create an event where audiences could share these treasures. We also show silent and 70mm films.

V: There is a lot of buzz around the recent creation of 3D cinema screens that don't require the audience to wear glasses.

What is your take on this so- called renaissance of 3D? R: 3-D is an abomination that has died many deaths. It failed in the 1950s as a novelty, and again in the 1970s as a device to breathe new life into exhausted franchises. It even fizzled as a promising innovation in porno. Somehow, audiences didn't find it erotic to witness the legs of The Stewardesses extending above them as they zeroed in on the money shot. In short, the process is an annoyance and a distraction.

Have you seen...?

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hen you think of Rio de Janeiro do you envisage images of the vibrant festival? Well, think again. The eponymous City of God is a slum on the outskirts of the city and is the setting for the film depicting author Paulo Lins eight-year experience there.

The film was nominated for four Oscars, including Best Director, and two BAFTAs, where it won Best Editing. The film also received a vast amount of press coverage, as well as a spin-off TV series and film called City of Men. Despite its cult-status in the Americas, it remains a greatly unknown classic in the UK. The film starts with the main character, Rocket (played by Alexandre Rodrigues), in the middle of stand-off between a gang led by Li’l Ze and the police. The raw, brutal nature of the slum is shown well by this sequence and the chicken amid all the chaos seems just as out of place as the viewer feels in this tense opening.

The film employs episodic-flashback and Rocket’s first-person narration in order to enlighten the audience as to how he became ‘piggy in the middle.'

V: You recently wrote a defence of controversial film critic Armond White, after his negative review of 'District 9' provoked hundreds of angry comments on (movie review site) Rotten Tomatoes. You retracted most of it the next day and concluded that he is indeed 'a troll'. Do you often read the reviews of other film critics?

R: Yes, I like to see how some other critics related to certain films. I admire Stanley Kauffmann of The New Republic and many others. I believe David Bordwell is a paragon: A brilliant academic who writes clearly and with passion; he's to film as Dawkins is to evolution.

V: How has your experience with thyroid cancer affected the way you work? Do you think it has altered your perspectives on films?

R: I'm writing more than ever, and have started blogging. I was struck, on returning to movies after some months, at how much I enjoyed them. A good one can take us somewhere else, and that's where I wanted to be.

Charles Rivington

City of God (2002) Li’l Ze starts off as a child-prodigy to ‘The Tender Trio’: the leaders and 'Robin Hoods' of the slums. The film shows Rocket and Li’l Ze as being two opposite sides of the coin: Rocket trying to escape the slums via becoming a successful photographer, Li’l Ze trying to rule the slum whilst becoming rich dealing drugs. The narration by Rocket also charters the the rise and fall of characters such as Benny, Knockout Ned and Carrot.

Subtle, dry comedy is used throughout the filmwatch out for the reference to a banana and a unique way of measuring clothes. Another example is when ‘The Runts’, young children aspiring to the gangster life, rob a local shop and the camera pans to a sign saying “Thank you for choosing us”. These quirks make the film more accessible and prevent it from becoming clichéd.

Complexities of gang culture are also explained, so the viewer is not confused as may be the case with gangster-based shows such as The Wire.

This film, simply put, is among one of the best films ever made. Think of it as a Brazilian version

dir. Fernando Meirelles of The Godfather. Do not let subtitles deter you from watching this film in all its glory.

Sarah green

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PARANORMAL ACTIVITY

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hot over seven days with a budget of only $15, 000, Paranormal Activity has made over $100 million and arrives on British screens already holding the title of most profitable film ever made (beating genre grandmother The Blair Witch Project). It is also being heralded, perhaps more interestingly and certainly less incontrovertibly, as the scariest film ever made, but does it really deserve this title?

The answer to this question is a resounding, 'quite possibly'. Paranormal Activity is bloody terrifying, not a bit creepy, not a little jumpy, but flat out balls to the wall, cry, scream and throwup scary. It's the sort of film that grabs you and shakes you around for ninety minutes before dropping you to the ground as a jumpy, sleep-deprived shadow of your former self. The premise is very simple, if not particularly original: a young couple (Katie Featherston and Micah Stoat) buy a video camera to film a paranormal apparition which is haunting them in their home. The genius of this set up is that not only does it dispense with any unnecessary expository scenes set before the haunting but it also confines all of the action to the couple's house giving the film a sense of unbearable claustrophobia.

The film is separated in to two types of scene: day scenes in which the couple talk about their experiences and try

to figure out what the hell is going on, and night scenes which are shot almost entirely by the static camera which the couple places in their bedroom in order to film them sleeping. This structure gives the film a sense of nauseating momentum as the audience lurches from relatively placid day time scenes to the steadily increasing horrors of the thing that goes bump in the night. By the third or fifth night time scene you will be begging for daytime to come, much like the couple themselves.

Katie Featherston is fantastic as Katie (both of the lead actors used their real names) and is never anything but utterly believable, embodying a character that we genuinely care about. Micah Sloat is also very good, playing the world's most insensitive boyfriend and providing many of the films early laughs. However, as the film progresses it becomes increasingly obvious that his character is little more than a plot device to keep the film going and his frustrating reluctance to switch off the

LAW ABIDING CITIZEN Anthony Hopkins, were he dead, would be spinning in his grave. Since Hannibal Lecter nibbled his way onto screens nearly two decades ago, cinematic serial killers have really let the homicidal side down. Insanity has become a depressingly, well, sanitized game of what-limb-shall-we-takeoff-first (here's looking at you, Jigsaw, you twat).

Now it's scary Scot Gerard Butler's turn to step up to the plate, though nobody seems to have thought that an actor still getting offered lead roles off the back of slo-mo splatterfest 300 might be a bit of a dodgy choice.

Regardless...

dir. Oren Peli camera even when it becomes obvious that filming the situation is only making things worse makes it very hard to care what happens to him.

This is nitpicking however, as the film really is an exceptional example of a genre which has become increasingly stale in recent years. By stripping away the clichĂŠs and excesses of horror, Oren

Dir. F. Gary Grey

Butler plays Clyde Shelton, engineer extraordinaire, whose wife and daughter are raped and killed during a rather horrifying home invasion.

Despite Shelton's appeals to hotshot lawyer Nick Rice (Jamie Foxx) to press the case in court, principal perp Clarence Derby (Christian Stolte) manages to exchange a confession for a criminally light sentence.

Ten years pass without incident; that is until Shelton, driven mad with grief at his loss and the failure of the justice system to do its job, begins to target those he held responsible, in increasingly gruesome and ingenious ways.

The film is tightly plotted and the script (for the most part) manages to keep up with it. Unfortunately, tight doesn't mean especially original, and the bastard love child of Silence of the Lambs and Prison Break was always going to be an ugly baby.

Gerard does the job well enough, even if his Glaswegian accent consistently pokes its head up like a Highland prairie dog; but it's hard to shake the feeling that, despite all the accolades, Jamie Foxx really is a bit of a wank actor. He does a fantastic line in grimaces, which erupt all over his face at regular intervals, but aside from that is completely unconvincing as Rice. Thank God then that the film possesses enough zip to speed over its many large, character-shaped holes, to deposit you safely on the other side, reasonably entertained, slightly more skint and utterly unimproved.

David Elliott

Peli has replaced mutilating clowns and masked killers with things that we are genuinely scared of like a door slamming in the night, a gust of wind that catches you off guard and the fear of the unknown in our own homes.

Charles Rivington

HARRY BROWN Dir. Daniel Barber Harry Brown opens with its most important merit: 'Michael Caine is Harry Brown' - and thank Christ for that. Caine is well, if not vitally, cast as the film's lead, and his performance is everything to be expected of the veteran. Less importantly, Harry Brown is an old man without anyone left but an estate's worth of gangs who kill geriatrics and film it on their mobile phones. He plans to get even whilst the local police launch a raid on the estate.

Newcomer Daniel Barber's direction is praiseworthy, but the grit he applies is misleading; the film is far too predictable. Despite a number of very decent acting spots from Caine and the younger cast in this film, Emily Mortimer is terribly out of place as some sort of champion for the elderly, leading an investigation that threatens justice to the killers of Harry's last friend, but generally ready to break like a twig. It doesn't help that the last role I saw her in was 30 Rock's Phoebe with 'hollow bones'... Her character should be played by a tougher, more physically dominating woman, the kind a filmmaker isn't afraid to kill.

Instead, no one dies in this film who the audience has any time to truly connect with or care for; the rest, unbelievably, are spared. The British youth are portrayed as animals, the riots echoing scenes from zombie-horror films (hell, Harry and co even hide from the chaos in an empty pub), and the good guys are too ambiguous and eventually too powerless to root for. The film remains worth seeing for its action, Caine's electric performance, and its reflections on today's ongoing British youth issues, but the idea of art imitating life is pretty preposterous here.

Tom Martin

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rob sloan reviews tv...

X-Factor Special!

“SOMEONE MAKE IT STOP” has been my inevitable weekly reaction upon witnessing John and Edward perform again and again on Saturday night’s X Factor.

I'll be the first to admit my tastes are anything but high-brow. For example, last Saturday's pre-drinking involved watching Merlin and playing Pokémon Monopoly.

With habits like that, it's no surprise that this year I finally succumbed to the pull of The X Factor's guilty pleasure.

The show is everywhere. If you aren’t watching it, your friends are, and every year it spreads a little further. I tried to abstain from writing about it, I really did. I had hoped I could come up with something original and brilliant. I failed, though with good reason, because one thing I can not comprehend has been the carnival of crap that is John and Edward Grimes. The controversies surrounding them are still being smattered across news pages, and with TV deals apparently being offered it seems unlikely that they will just GO AWAY. For me, watching John and Edward has been a bit like contracting a harmless

SO THAT WAS THE N****TIES...

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hat was the noughties. No I’m not saying that. I’m not. That’s such a crap thing to say. It seems as if a man who thought that they were right witty somewhere thought that associating the words naughty and the word “0”-ey can be used for associating everything that can be tied in with this decade. I bet these are the same people who market meerkats and thought that those bloody sofa adverts with the people dancing like they are rockstars were remarkable feats of modern broadcasting.

I don't think that they are just naughty, I think that they should all be punished.

Preferably with whips.

Anyway as it is the end of the decade, I want us to share together much more of a monumental look back. You can more or less sum up this decade in a couple of sentences: Millennium, Terrorism, Titty Channels, 24, Olympic Games and Saturday Kitchen. The problem right now is that I'm expecting dreadful “countdown” shows with various C / D / Q LIST celebrities fantasising and muttering about crap TV. (However to make it easier for you I'll let you know now that there shouldn't be a voice over man between the entries as I shot him.)

STI. It won’t cause you any ill-health, yet you’d still prefer it wasn’t there. Week after week I found myself staring in disbelief at the screen as they survived to sing another day. I use the term “sing” very loosely, and for those few of you who have not heard the noise these creatures create, I envy you. But of course there’s so much more to a “Jedward” performance than just the racket. With a cruel mix of horror and intrigue, I watch from behind my hands as their spectacle of karaoke, frightful dancing, and unjustified cockiness plays out. Even on that rare occasion when the judges agreed that a particular performance was by far their “best”, that didn’t change the fact that it was still shit.

You would wonder why people who can’t sing are kept in a singing competition for so long, but it’s likely executive politics played a part here: controversy equals publicity equals viewers. The twins’ selfassured arrogance has been a ratings winner, and for me, the moment that best summarises how deluded the twins really are came when the two were discussing Calvin Harris’ invasion of the stage during one of their performances:

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No. 84 - The BBC weather graphics: Next is number 84 in our list: remember when they re-did the weather graphics on the BBC earlier in the decade?

IT WAS A BIT CONFUSING WASN’T IT? Debbie (evicted housemate number 5 from Big Brother 3) agrees: “The map was slanted and nobody could see half of Scotland. Me and my mate Trix, like, watched it one day, and we didn’t, like, get what was going on with Scotland.”

Maily-ish Rail made-up columnist Tim Idiot: “Haha yeah when they updated the weather graphics they slanted Scotland completely off the map (laughs as if he let one go). They should have f***ing got rid of Scotland all together. Haha.” (He stares at the camera. You then realise that he’s serious.)

No. 75: The Channel 4 Graphic Idents: You know what, I quite liked them when they came out. There was the one with the sea, the one with the *beep beep*

New York Taxis driving by and the one when the pigeons self-combusted. But they have not been updated, since, like, when we were born. They’re not witty or original anymore. For goodness sake Channel 4 THERE ARE ONLY SO MANY ELECTRICITY CABLES AND BOWLING GREENS I CAN HANDLE. No. 72: The launch of E4: Oh god. I'm sorry. It has happened. Debbie (evicted housemate number 5 from Big Brother 3, of course): “E4? E4? Oh my god. Yeah like E4. Even though it seems to be an irrelevant point of time that it started and I cannot pinpoint the year nor the date that this really came on the air, now that the producer mentions this to me and tells me to talk about it I now remember that me and Trix saw the launch like and it, like, was just like stunning”. Dennis (who said three words in a branded cinema 2-41 offer advertisement for a generic mobile phone company in 2004): “Excuse me I’m just eating an Orange (pause). Isn't the announcer for this channel the same guy who now does the X-Factor?” Unfortunately this article cannot afford the XFactor voice over man, so instead we are going to talk about something cheaper.

No. 71: Michael Winner: Tina (traffic and travel presenter from the Swindon Bay area). “Calm down dear”. (Shrieks of laughter). “I tell you I’m going to really have to quote here something special because I f***ing love my agent for getting me a quote right here in such an article!

CALM DOWN DEAR! (snorts)”. We cut away as she draws a line on the table.

No. 70: The end of Ceefax: (The world famous band The Pixies'... catering manager Tony Stanza): “Ceefax has ended?”

No. 69: The closure of ITV Digital: Duncan (Council Estate Worker): “Oh my days how I loved that monkey in those ITV Digital adverts with Johnny Vegas before they closed”. Insert 2.1 second clip of said beloved monkey from that advert. Debbie: “Yeah I know he was, like, so unbelievably funny, I loved absolutely everything he did on the screen.” Insert another 0.23 seconds of monkey. Dennis: “He is a character that you can only enjoy in his entirety, not in a heavily-edited, watered-down clip that removes all sources of context and humour because they cannot afford a clip of the advert itself ”. Subliminal 000.32 seconds of Monkey. Tim Idiot: “They should have f***ing got rid of monkeys all together after that.

Haha.” (He stares at the camera. You realise he’s serious.)

No 68: I'm a Celebrity Blah Blah....: (shhh... Reader I've had it. When one of the contributors says the infamous “F” word then this article will just explode.

Please shield yourself). David McOrange (Fashion Editor: US Tat Weekly) “OMG I am just such a fan of this British show.

I mean I love Katie Price. Even though I know that most of you dislike her, I just want to say that she is a modern woman, an articulate woman, a women who has released several autobiographies to the world. Let me just tell you hun, she's faaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaabulou...”.

READER DUCK DUCK DUCK DUCK!!!!!

BAAAANNNNNNNNNNNNNGGGGG!

scott bryan

The Screen Grabs... by andrew nichols and martin williams

“Who is Calvin Harris?” one asks.

“Some wannabe” the other replies.

OH THE BLOODY IRONY! Noel Gallagher takes a suprise new musical direction

Subo-Jedward Ménage à trois proposal not taken well

Jerk in a box

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GAMES Callum's Classic Callum Douglas tells us why PARRAPA THE RAPPER busts rhymes way beyond Jay-Z and Co.

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he poor man's Singstar, or the rapping sensation of the 90's that scared Puff Daddy into a name change, opinion of Playstation game Parrapa the Rapper will always be split between the diehard faithful and the non-believers.

The brainchild of J-pop sensation Masaya Matsuura, the game lets players take control of a love struck teenage pup called Parrapa. They must negotiate their way through six levels of button-bashing, rap-ripping, madness to capture the heart of his love interest - for some reason a massive sunflower - called Sunny Funny.

Whilst the logistics in the bedroom boggle the mind, what is less complicated is the seamlessly simplist i c game play.

A scrolling bar at the top of the screen enables

a listen and repeat system, where the player will hear Parrapa spit some lyrics before offering their own version by pressing buttons when instructed to on the screen, with free styling a must in order to reach the highest level of rap seniority offered by the game; 'You rappin' Cool'.

Whilst the 2D paper animation graphics do make Southpark look like a George Lucas film, the game has a heart which no amount of Uncharted 2 or Wii Sports can match. Show me another game where you can train in rap karate under the tutelage of an Onion with a black belt, or take a driving test whilst being rapped at by an angry Moose and I might reconsider.

Should have played...

Laura Cress reveals the dark and twisted pleasures of classic game GRIM FANDANGO

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think I must have been a weird child.

There's not much other explanation why a cover for a video game, which featured a skeleton in a tuxedo smoking a cigarette with the tagline "an epic tale of crime and corruption in the land of the dead", appealed to me. But I'm glad it did, because it turned out to be one of the best games I ever bought.

With the comedy genius Tim Shafer writing the dialogue, Grim Fandango is a witty tale involving Manny Calavera, a travel agent at the Department of Death.

The DoD helps recently departed souls make their way to the resting place of the Ninth Underworld.

Manny, being an mediocre salesman, only has clients who are sinners and therefore unable to afford expensive travel packages. So, he decides to steal a client, Meche Colomar, whom he believes has lead a sinless life. Manny realises that something is wrong when Meche also gets granted the basic package, and so begins a journey to get to the murky bottom of the dealings of The Land of the Dead, and save Meche from the clutches of the criminal underworld.

The game has a definite film noir feel, with its saxophone-tinged soundtrack and dark comedy, yet the design is 1930s Art Deco, splashed with beautiful Aztec folklore motifs that rightfully won Grim Fandango an award for "Best PC Graphics for Artistic Design".

Too many games nowadays concentrate on fast paced set pieces to suck gamers into their world, but this stunningly original game uses supposedly old-fashioned ideas such as well-defined characters and plot to make gamers care about the world that they are in.

Grim Fandango was named the best game of 1998 along with Half Life, and whilst the latter is in some senses original, does it contain an obese orange demon that works as a mechanic called Glottis? Not the last time I checked, and for that and many, many other reasons, Grim Fandango will always have a place in my heart.

Call of Duty Modern Warfare Abandon your degree, as David Elliott explains how this game will fire a three inch shell straight into the head of your social life.

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f you have sensitive housemates: steer clear. Modern Warfare 2 is, by all accounts, extremely violent; a fact seemingly passed over in the stupendously idiotic decision to release it a day before Armistice Day. It's also, however, one of the most exciting and visceral games you'll play all year.

Modern Warfare 2 trades primarily in shock, even if to a large extent its scares are more vanilla than the massive campaign moments of its predecessor.

However, one (soon to be infamous) mission early on in the game is genuinely horrifying to play and has, perhaps rightly, provoked a shitstorm of protest among angry MPs and other moral crusaders.

It's not pleasant, but neither is it gratuitous or unnecessary; in fact it's pivotal to the game's complex, if often meandering, plot.

Speaking of which, the main pretext for all this child-

ish bang-banging is the Russian invasion of God Bless America, a scenario which leads to plenty of iconic attacks on famous landmarks - the Washington monument, the White House, Burger King etc etc. It's a shiny, daft and reasonably intelligent story that manages to propel the game along nicely.

Needless to say, Modern Warfare is huge fun. The campaign is pretty short, clocking in at about 6 hours total, but each level is so frantic and packed with cinematic detail that it's largely irrelevant.

Multiplayer is, of course, a big factor.

With the return of perks and an expanded map set, servers will undoubtedly be clogged for months, and the co-operative Spec Ops mode provides even more bang per buck. Emotionally draining it may be, but Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 is ultimately an essential purchase.

The Gaming Cookbook

Step aside Ramsay, Oliver and all you other pretenders; Nathan Blades is the only one with the recipe for a perfect game pie

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elcome to the Gaming Cookbook where we tell you the finest ingredients that go into your favourite gaming genres. In fact we're so popular, it's likely most games you've played use this recipe! Today we'll be making Fighter's Pie, a particularly speacialised dish that serves two players (and ONLY 2.

The Smash Bros 4-Tier cake is a different dish entirely). For this you'll need: 1 Female martial artist from the Orient with a habit for screeching 1 Ridiculously-muscled wrestler that probably eats steroids for breakfast 1 Extremely skinny male that you'll mistake for a girl until years later 1-3 20-year-old karate experts with 'back stories' that no one cares about 1 Character included for no reason other than to act as a model for pornography sketches by depraved fans 1 Character that's useless in every way, and you'll only choose if you're really

drunk.

To prepare: 1) Create a hackneyed plotline that involves a tournament of some description.

What the prize is, and why anyone would even want to enter doesn't matter.

2) Combine the back stories of some of the characters to create a silly, if not asinine, reason for anyone to actually be competing (aside from winning the tournament of course).

3) Throw all ingredients into a Character Select screen and stir vigorously. Add irritating, but amazingly catchy, music to taste.

4) Place characters in a location that's either extremely dangerous, is in a place likely to get you arrested, or both.

5) Spend 10 minutes reading about the complicated, in-depth controls and 'Dynamic Explosive Special Move' system.

6) Mash buttons randomly as characters flail about on screen like marionettes on Speed.

Serve to your hapless friend with a side order of whup-ass. Enjoy.

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DANIEL BLYTHE

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Natasha Holden talks to the Doctor Who writer about science fiction and the life of an author.

ou're obviously best known for writing the Doctor Who books but how did you actually get into that style of writing?

Well, the first things that I ever had published were for the Virgin Books Doctor Who range, back in the early nineties. I had various short stories published before that for magazines, which I got paid very little or nothing at all for.

After that I went off and did other things and got an agent. I was actually writing nonfiction when I was asked by Justin Richards at BBC Books to do a new Doctor tale 'Autonomy'. So I was quite pleasantly surprised to be asked back, after more than a decade away from Doctor Who. Of course, they're a very different style of books now from what they used to be when I was first writing for them.

Looking at your other books, you have a pretty diverse style of writing. Which style would you say is your favourite, that you're most suited to?

I think I do try to diversify, so I don't think I do have a particular favourite. I think all writers have to diversify; up until 2002 I'd only ever written fiction and then I started writing non-fiction about the eighties.

I try to sort of turn my hand to as many different genres as I need to be a professional, working writer. Most people I know who are professionally published seem to have lots of different aspects to their writing career, they're either mixing fiction and non-fiction, or their doing scripts and poetry and comics and short stories.

When I'm asked what's your favourite book I always say it's the one I'm working on at the moment which I think is the easiest answer! I mean it's a question of surviving as a writer really more than anything, I've been reading your book I Hate Christmas: a Manifesto to the Modernday Scrooge. With Christmas drawing closer I have to ask; do you actually hate Christmas as portrayed in the book?

It's a jokey book. I've picked up on various opinions that it is a bit over done, it tends to start in August and so on. But I'm trying to distance myself from that now; I've done so many radio interviews based on the book that I've got to a point where I'm now saying I won't do it anymore because I don't really hate Christmas!

As you can tell from the book I'm more tongue and cheek about it than that. Some people miss the point and think that I'm a kind of seasonal misery, so radio stations will try and get me on to be the 'bah humbug' person which isn't really what I'm about.

It was fun to do that at the time, a nice quirky anti- Christmas book and it did well, but I've kind of moved on from that now.

In your book Losing Faith, was there a particular message that you were looking to give out? Did you learn anything yourself when writing that kind of book?

I always learn something from my writing. All my characters are to people who are in situations that they're not entirely happy with, who have found themselves in lives that they never expected.

Losing Faith is a twentysomething crisis book. It's all about how people change when they have to go out into the real world and face the realities that their friends might not be the same people they had such a great time with at college, the way that relationships can change and people can become more cold and distant towards you. It certainly made me think of ways in which some of my friends and I have changed over the years.

My subsequent novel This Is The Day takes it a step further, when people have got settled into domestic bliss but find it unfulfilling in some ways too. The characters are not the same characters that are in Losing Faith but could easily be people who knew them.

Have you based any of your characters or settings on things familiar to you? Using family and friends or anything like that?

I try not to because I get into trouble for doing that!

Sometime I take ideas and I steal people's jokes. There was somebody's wedding speech that I used in Losing Faith; I think he's forgiven me for stealing his jokes now!

There are characters who are kind of aspects of people I know and there are some situations which I've taken from things which could of happened. For example, if someone had made the wrong decision at some point in their life or had met somebody different.

Do you have any particular projects going on at the minute?

I'm doing a couple of non-fiction books and I've

got a children's book which my agent is trying to find the right publisher for at the moment. I'm doing a lot of publicity around Doctor Who: The Autonomy, which only just came out last month. I've got a new book about politics aimed at new voters called X Marks The Box, which is coming out at the next election, though we don't know when that will be yet! I hope to be doing another Doctor Who but that might not be for a while- probably after the new actor Matt Smith has had some time to settle into the part.

Another novel which I have been working on, which has been an ongoing project for two or three years or so, may end up going somewhere, so yes, four or five different thing on the go.

Out of all of your books, if there was one that you could take back and rewrite a part of it, which book would it be and why?

I look back on my first Doctor Who and see bits of the plot that are quite clunky and parts that are quite naively written, but if I went back and tried to re-write it now it would be a totally different book.

I do look back at my old work and think of it quite critically; I say to myself 'Oh God who wrote this rubbish?!'

I think it's healthy for writers to do that.

Once you have that critical distance from your work and can tell when something isn't working, you have the courage to re-write it which must be good surely.

Who or what is your favourite Doctor Who baddie?

I do have a soft spot for the Cyber Men, because of their inhumanity and how they can transform human beings into themselves, and the catchphrase they had in the 1960's 'You will be like us, you will become like us'. I always found that quite frightening.

If you were an animal, what animal would you be?

A cat because they seem to have this ability to sneak up on humans and slink around, there's something quite sinister about cats, as your always wondering what's going on in their minds.

If you had to live by one rule in life what would it be?

'Treat other people how you'd like to be treated yourself'.

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Revolutionary Road

By Richard Yates Greenwood Press RRP: £7.99

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am a true believer in reading a book before watching it as a film. In the case of Richard Yates' Revolutionary Road, however, this was particularly hard to stick to when faced with the appeal of its leading man. But it was certainly worth it, as the reality and emotion of the book far outstrips that of the movie. Revolutionary Road is set in the 1950s and follows a young married couple, Frank and April, who have been forced put all their grand dreams on hold because of an unexpected pregnancy. They move from Manhattan Island to upstate suburbia and go through the motions of living the

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idyllic family lifestyle associated with post World War Two-USA, all the while trying to stay above the mundane society by laughing at the people around them. In a desperate attempt to keep their dreams alive, April comes up with a plan to move to Europe, where she will be the bread winner and Frank will have the liberty to "find himself". At first the plan reignites their passion for life and each other, but as more time passes and nothing is actually done towards the move, resentment begins to eat away at their relationship.

Another unplanned pregnancy leads to a complete breakdown between both

Fo r your older brother: "Watchmen" by Dave Gibbons and Alan Moore (Titan Books Ltd., RRP £17.99) He's probably the hardest person you'll have to buy for all year: too old for action figures, too young for socks and too male for pretty bath products.

He's probably unlikely to be much of a reader, too- but I guarantee that Watchmen will keep him hooked and stick in his mind long after the last page has been turned.

The plot revolves around a group of superheroes in New but don't let York, fool that you: this comic book is

decidedly not for kids.

The mood is set by the opening scene, the flat of a recently murdered ex-superhero, and the suspense and grittiness is consistently maintained throughout the book. There are scenes of sex, torture and violence- alongside some surprisingly tender moments. The beautifully drawn illustrations complement this with a grimly realistic view of the city- no city scene is complete without pieces of floating litter in the background.

Watchmen has been accused of being overambitious, with too many themes and a convoluted plot, but it makes for compulsive reading and is the perfect antidote to an overdose of festive cheer.

which makes the book seem all the more believable. Each of the characters is believable and interesting, so that although it frequently jumps between times and events every strand remains compelling.

As a mother of three herself, Jodi Picoult has brought vividly to life the things of every parent's nightmares in a thoroughly readable manner- and if you do happen to buy it, I'd thoroughly recommend borrowing for a sneaky read at some point over the holidays.

For your Gran: "River Cottage Everyday" by Hugh FearnleyWhittingstall (Bloomsbury, RRP £25) Putting food on the table for the family quickly and economically doesn't mean you have to compromise on quality.

This book shows how Hugh's approach to food can be adapted to suit any growing, working family, or busy young singles and couples for that matter.

Breakfast, baking, lunchboxes, quick suppers, healthy snacks, eating on the and weekmove cookend ing for the

week ahead - all these and more are covered in River Cottage Everyday. As Hugh says: "I have honed the River Cottage approach to food over a decade now, and I believe passionately that it is relevant to everybody, every day.

This book makes no prior assumptions about where you shop, what you may or may not know about growing vegetables or keeping livestock, or whether you can tell the difference between a cep and a chanterelle. All you will need to reap the benefit is a commitment to spend at least some time in the kitchen, with fresh ingredients, a few times a week.

Above all, I intend to tempt and charm you towards a better life with food."

By Angus Hill and Caitlin Potter

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characters, and the end of the book is raw and unexpected. Written in 1962, Yates called it a commentary on how the American obsession with conformity was at odds with the country's celebrated revolutionary spirit.

It's certainly not a cheery read, but it flows well and is a relatively short, tightly woven tale . If you couldn't resist the appeal of Leo and have already seen the film, don't let it put you off reading the book as the depth of the novel was impossible to portray in 120 minutes of film.

Fiona Tod

Books as Christmas Gifts

For your mum: Nineteen Minutes by Jodi Picoult (Hodder Paperback, RRP £7.99) A novel about a school shooting might not sound like the most festive of reads, but although heartbreaking at times Nineteen Minutes is much less depressing than it's subject matter would seem to suggest. The novel follows the struggles of the students, their parents and the community as a whole to come to terms with what has happened; interwoven with the events leading up to the shooting. At times it reads like a courtroom drama; at others it's a touching story of childhood romance and family relationships- and a terrifying image of what can happen when they go wrong.

The novel's portrayal of bullying and social isolation will be unpleasantly familiar to anyone who has ever been to school,

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For your little sister: "The Princess Diaries" by Meg Cabot (Macmillan Children's Books, RRP £9.99) Mia Thermopolis might be the princess of a small European country which no-one has heard of, but any teenage girl will easily be able to relate to her. Mia angsts continually, about everything: being in love with a boy who doesn't know she exists, the size of her feet, Greenpeace, her flat chest and the fact that she's failing at Algebra (which makes the knowledge that her mum is dating her algebra teacher a little awkward).

Meg Cabot pulls off the journal format perfectly: Mia's voice seems entirely real and uncontrived, so that reading the book is almost like talking to a slightly crazy friend. Additions such as lists and notes passed between Mia and her friends

keep the book interesting- while the algebra notes Mia scribbles at the bottom of the pages mean that you can even pretend it's educational! Mia's decidedly teenage vocabulary also means that the book is really easy to read, and even the most vehemently bookhating teenage girls will have no trouble with it.

Funny and believable, this is a perfect fairytale for modern times and probably the best piece of young adult chick-lit I've ever read.

For your dad: "Ashes to Ashes" by Andrew Flintoff (Hodder & Stoughton, RRP £19.99) This book is bound to entertain any father with even a vague love of cricket. Freddie Flintoff is by far the greatest cricketing superstar of his generation, and his tale of Ashes glory is bound to be a page turner. His magnificent spell of fast bowling at Lords and his electrifying run out of Ricky Ponting at The Oval were major turning points in the recapture of the Ashes by England in 2009. It was victory in the 2005 Ashes series that cemented Flintoff's place in the nation's heart, when his match-winning performances helped England regain the Ashes after eighteen years. In Ashes to Ashes he writes not only of his many highlights but also reveals his feelings of frustration

during his periods out of the game through ankle and knee injuries, and the anxiety that has followed the major operations he has had to undergo.

Andrew Flintoff's lively and very personal account of his last four years of test cricket is both informative and compelling.

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Christmas with all the trimmings!

When essay deadlines loom and the stuffy library becomes too much for you to bear, Iszi, Lizzie and Maryja have come up with a few ideas to get you into the Christ-

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Tis the season to be Jolly!

Or at least, it will be in a few weeks time, which is rather comforting news. On that note, armed with a premature dose of the Christmas Spirit and braving the rather wet and windy weather that Yorkshire threw at us the other Saturday, your dedicated Culture Sub-editor (I have to be careful I don’t call myself a SubCulture editor!) hit the streets to quiz both locals, tourists and students on their Christmas habits.

The aim of the game was to discover what is at the heart of people’s Christmas celebrations, the different ways in which people celebrate the festive season and what it was that they couldn’t live without around this time of year.

As I talked to passers-by it was as if a rendition of Joy To The Wo r l d

was being played out across the whole of York; I found those who loved Christmas because of the food, others who loved the chance to give and receive presents, others who prized the spirituality of the season (be it in the Christian faith or another, Jewish Hanukkah etc.) and others who cherished the family aspect of Christmas. Sadly enough, 0.05-ish % wished Christmas wasn’t so annual!

A grand total of 100% of all those asked said that Christmas just wouldn’t be Christmas if it were not spent with either family or friends. Which echoed the 100% who said that Christmas wouldn’t be the same without the customary present giving sessions either in the days leading up to the 25th, or on the day itself. 95% admitted that the cold, crisp and icy (well, snowy if we’re lucky) weather was crucial to enjoying Christmas. Along with 95% who stated that they always had a traditional sit down hot Christmas Dinner (with

The first of York's Christmas markets comes in the form of St.Nicholas Fayre situated throughout York’s main squares, including Parliament Street and stalls in The Guild Hall and Barley Hall. The famous four day market is a treasure trove of specialist, locally produced crafts and gifts. Warming punch will also be available alongside roast chestnuts and hot chocolate. As part of the fayre the St.Nicholas arts and crafts fair at St.Williams College ( a 15th Century building adjacent to York Minister,) holds over 50 stalls.

Opening times (Main Market)- Thursday 26 November - 9:00 to 20:00 Friday 27 & Saturday 28 November 2009 - 9:00 to 17:00, Sunday 29 November 2009 - 10:00 to 16:00 St.Nicholas Arts and Crafts Fair 26th-29th November 10am-5pm (6pm on Saturday).

At the Festival of Angels York’s streets will be transformed into a winter wonderland of ice sculptures, stalls, al fresco dining, street entertainment and guaranteed ‘snow’ showers.

It takes place on Saturday 12th and Sunday 13th December from 12 noon to 6pm and with free entry it would be silly to miss out.

crackers, if they were British…crackers don’t seem to have reached our European counterparts!).

True to the spirit of Christmas, and a figure to rival those who say we are becoming less religious, 71% said that they had some form of advent wreath in their homes, counting down the weeks to Christmas. 67% attend some form of Church service on either Christmas Eve or Christmas Day itself.

81% enjoyed keeping up the tradition of sending and receiving cards, noting the fact that a card from someone you hadn’t seen for years, was always a bonus!.

Only 76% confessed to enjoying Christmas Cake and Pudding…a number I expected to be a little higher.

Perhaps currants are out of fashion at the moment? A sadly small 19% watched Carols from Kings, although many hadn’t heard of it before. For our readers: Carols from Kings is a magnificent excuse to turn on the telly

Amidst Cliffords Tower, The Law Courts and The Castle Museum lays the much talked about Ice Factor. A 600sqm rink surrounded by rustic log cabins, a heated ice bar/café (to warm those cold hands and feet) and the home of York’s biggest Christmas tree.

Open from 14th November to the 3rd of January 10am-9:30pm.

Cost £7.95 (Students) £8.95 (adults) Go to *www.theicefactor.co.uk* for more information.

From the 2nd-20th of December York’s International Christmas Fayre offers festive treats, smells and tasty bites from around the world. A chance to get into the festive mood everyday from 9am ‘til late with a few surprises along the way. For more information go to www.york.gov.uk/markets For something a little bit different head to the York Castle Museum and experience Carols in Kirkgate, sung by the York Philharmonic Male Voice Choir and the Kirkgate Singers dressed in Victorian Clothing. Something to take your parents too?! Performances 1st-8th of December, 8pm, £12.50 adults or £10.50 concessions.

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on Christmas Eve to listen to a few fantastic Christmas Carols whilst peeling the spuds for the next day!

All in all, I rather enjoyed my day in town quizzing the inhabitants, tourists and students of our wonderful city. passing by shop after shop bedecked with red, gold and silver, I happily realised that, whilst most of York was jollying up to enjoy a religiously soulwarming Christmas with the family (and perhaps a touch of snow), the tiny percent who weren’t too bothered about the festivities could at least view Christmas as the season which brings mulled wine to our pubs and fruit punch to our streets!

And what better reason to celebrate!

You may also want to take the old skool approach to your run up to Christmas this year by heading down to one of the two pantomimes taking place in this magical city. According to the Guardian, ‘York boasts the most pant-wettingly funny pantomime in the country’ and The Sunday Times have consistently rated it as ‘one of the top five attractions to see anywhere in the UK during the winter season’. On offer this year is The Humpty Dumpty Christmas Pantomime at the York Theatre Royal, running from the 10th December until 30th January. There is also Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs at The Grand Opera House, running from 11th December to 3rd January with an all star cast- Lynn McGregor (Irene from Home and Away) and Martin Griffin (Trojan from Gladiator).

The Minster will well and truly provide you with some Christmas spirit this year with an assortment of musical treats including: an Advent Procession (29th Nov 6.30pm), York Minster Christmas Carol Concert (11th Dec 7.00pm) and Christmas Music by Candlelight (12th Dec 5.30pm).

If you wanted to stay a little closer to home, there is always the Annual Carol Concert taking place in the Conference Office at the University on Sunday 13th December from 2.30pm.

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UP THE DUFF WITH LISA EVANS

What not to miss...

Emily Hodges chats with the exciting new playwright whose newest play is premiering in York...

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hen I meet Lisa Evans, it doesn't surprise me that she is the writer of such a comic play as Up The Duff. We're talking about her newest play, premiering this month at York Theatre Royal, but after chatting for half an hour, where I genuinely laugh out loud at some of Evans' remarks, I can see she's one of those people who naturally sees the comedy in life. Evans admits humour is often her natural response to something.

'I see the comedy in situations. The inspiration for the play came when I was pregnant myself, and I found it so funny but no-one else did. That was my way to respond to it, this alien being growing inside me.'

Up The Duff is a play about pregnancy and the experience of four very different women. But before you turn the page in disgust at the idea of a play about six week scans and nappies, there's a lot more in the play than just childbirth.

Evans describes it as 'a play about expectation and loss. Not losing a baby, but the fear of losing your identity when you become a mother. It's a time of change, which always throws up interesting questions.'

And not just change with someone moving into your life; there's also a poignant moment about a son leaving home for the first time. I guarantee that for any students who've only recently left home this will make you think very differently about your mum back home!

Like much of Evans' work, Up The Duff is a play for female actors, with only one male character. 'Critics ask where the male parts are, but I say they're everywhere else in the country! There are so few roles for women in the canon, especially for older women, and I want to address the balance a little.'

After starting her career as an actress (in a modest way, she describes herself as 'another blonde-haired, blue-eyed okay actress - I was good but not spectacularly good!'), Evans moved into writing because 'I got paid more! And I always wanted to write anyway but it took me a long time to have the confidence to do it.'

I asked if it was difficult to be on the other side of the stage now, watching someone else perform her carefully constructed lines. 'It's heaven!' she says, 'as long as they do it well!'

Alongside playwriting, Evans has written for TV and radio, including three years as a writer for Casualty. She has adapted works by several authors, from Anne Brontë to Margaret Atwood. 'Adapting is much easier if the author is dead - they're normally much more compliant than the ones still living! However, Melvyn Bragg was brilliant and told me to do what I wanted with the adaptation.'

Evans is clearly most comfortable in

drama. She admits that although she has written a novel it was difficult 'because you have to put everything in! What the weather's like, what the characters are wearing; in theatre you have the set designer to do all of that!'

Evan's attitude to writing will be familiar to most humanities students: 'When I started writing it was scary not having deadlines and I thought I'd never get anything done without them. I have to set myself deadlines and tell myself I can't leave until I've written my scene for the day. And sometimes I finish early so I can reward myself by taking the rest of the afternoon off.' She deals with distractions by writing in her attic as 'it's a defendable space in the house' which is useful as she's easily distracted.

Evans seems to be truly passionate about writing and encouraging others to write. Her advice for writing a play, or even an essay, is 'make a plan and write the whole thing before you go back and re-write. You have to do this; otherwise you'll end up with fifteen Scene one's and nothing else!'

York Come Dancing

On the 6th of December (Sunday week 8) Central Hall will see 11 couples battling it out to be crowned champions of York Come Dancing 2009/10. Tickets are available now from www.yusu.org and cost £3 for dancesport members and £4 for non members. The action starts at 7:30pm.

Search for York Come Dancing to find the facebook event.

Sustain Me Fashion Show

Up The Duff is showing at York Theatre Royal, 07 - 28 November 2009

HIGH SCHOOL MUSICAL

WHAT'S NEW WITH NORMAN? Sarah Helen Bolwell reviews 'Graphic'. the exhibition reviving the Norman Rae Gallery.

Mary Greene

prints are an exploration of his experiences as a homosexual in con-

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urators Amy Tobin and Hannah Mumby have done a great service to Langwith's Norman Rea Gallery with their latest exhibition of prints and etchings. This, the first exhibition of the new academic year, shows the work of three local artists whose contrasting and wide-reaching themes are brought together through the medium of print.

Catherine Sutcliffe Fuller's large etchings are splashed with colour, helping to express the theme of 'conservation' which permeates her work. Her work seeks to echo the transient nature of our planet's resources through the limited number of prints each of her plates affords.

Mary Greene's Buddhism-inspired prints and Nathan Chenery's quirky pen and ink drawings contribute a more abstract vibe to the exhibition. Taking her inspiration from the musicality of Buddhist teachings, Greene aims to blur the line between music and image with her striking visual representations of religious chants. There is an undeniable charm to Chenery's work, affected through his simple, yet bold use Keeping the Rhythm of line. His sketches and

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Distant Nathan Chenery temporary society, but they hold their own through their pure aesthetic qualities and are not dissimilar to today's popular illustrative artists such as David Shrigley.

The exhibition's opening on Monday night saw two of the three artists visit Langwith College, mixing with students and members of the public alike, highlighting the universal appeal of this showcase.

Gradually the gallery is edging its way into the student consciousness through such innovative and professional spectacles as 'Graphic'.

Upcoming exhibitions at the Norman Rea Gallery include a spectacle of sculpture entitled 'Place-making'. Dramatically different to the current showcase, 'Placemaking' will push the boundaries of campus art with large scale installations in a variety of media. This opens on Monday 30th November, but I highly recommend a visit to 'Graphic' in the meantime, which runs until the 27th November.

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ringe is what you expect from High School Musical and cringe is certainly what we got. With a couple of dodgy America accents, questionably timed dance moves and (at times) rushed, inaudible dialogue, it was certainly not without its flaws.

However these are relatively minor quibbles with an overall energetic and entertaining performance that was a brilliant showcase for some of York Uni’s hidden talent. Jessi Black and Fraser Moyle brought life to Troy and Gabriella’s usually bland characters, their voices blending well on songs such as Breaking Free and Start of Something New. Jessi, in particular had a pitch perfect voice that rang clear through her ballad When There was Me and You, giving the musi-

cal a much needed breather from the fast paced action that loaded most of the other scenes.

These visually packed ensemble scenes that included songs such as Stick to the Status Quo were particularly well choreographed as the cast dynamically transformed the stage into the world of the Wildcats. Emily Hanbury and Tom Jones kept the comedy in full flow as Ryan and Sharpay pranced around the stage, while Will Booth took camp humour to a new level as his character Jack Scott gave regular innuendo filled announcements with matching actions.

Happily Ever After Soc certainly delivered spread their contagious enthusiasm; ensuring that even the most cynical of critics would be contentedly clapping along by the end.

Raising awareness of sustainable clothing, on Monday 7th December the Sustain Me Fashion Show, in partnership with Oxfam, where a group of volunteers will be re-vamping 'vintage' clothing, with live music and film. If you're looking for a bargain and some individual clothes as well as doing your bit for charity, it's one not to miss.

Tickets are £3.00 from Oxfam in Goodramagate and it will take place at Citadel Salvation Army on Gillygate from 19.30-21.30.

Arthur Rigby and the Baskervylles

At a time when the music industry have finally stood up and taken notice of the great talent streaming out of Leeds, URY proudly presents to you Arthur Rigby and the Baskervylles with the accompaniment of the University of York Concert Orchestra.

Saturday 28th November 19.0022.30.

Tickets £3.50 from Your:Shop, Purple Haze or www.yusu.org

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20 Questions Dawn Porter 3) Who would you least like to be stuck in a lift with?

Someone with terrible gas.

4) Who are your heroes?

My aunty and my sister.

5) What would you like to achieve in the next five years?

I would like to make enough money so that I am not always worried about it and I would like to feel really settled.

Whatever that means.

6) And before you die?

I wouldn't like to die before I get rid of the feeling that I have loads of things to do. I always feel like that.

Interview by Kelly Holt 1) Can you describe yourself in 5 words?

Tall, brave, inquisitive, naughty, hungry.

2) What's your favourite quote?

'I never knew a time I wasn't special' From the book Oranges Are Not The Only Fruit.

7) Who would play you in a movie of your life?

Someone who comes across as average and normal (although if they are getting a part in a movie they probably wouldn't be average and normal). I dunno, it would be way too weird, but maybe Billie Piper. I wouldn't want anyone crazy famous.

8) How has your TV work changed your life?

Not hugely. It has given me the chance to have a big voice that gets heard and

I have been on some wild adventures, but in my personal life I feel exactly the same as I always have. I imagine if I am ever very rich then the answer to this question will be very different. I mean, I live in LA because I worked out here once and liked it, but I don't really do any TV here so life feels pretty normal.

9) If you were a world leader, what would be the first thing you'd do?

All the obvious stuff, I would want to save the world, but I have no idea where I would start, there is so much that needs saving. If I was the prime minister I would close down the tabloid press or at least ban them from writing about celebrities. I think it is evil.

Wednesday 25 Thursday

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11) When were you happiest?

When I am in the arms of the man I love.

12) What are you most proud of?

The film I made about Breast Cancer this year. My Breasts Could Kill Me...I am not so much proud of the film, as I am of the people who spoke to me about what they had been through. I was proud of all of them.

YORK COME DANCING Central hall

X FACTOR Sheffield Academy

SILENT DISCO The Duchess

Can't get enough of the XFactor? Then here is your chance to be there at the real thing! See the remaining five acts sing their hearts out in a night of mediocre talent.

If you are wanting a bit of a change from the classic Gallery night then head over to the Duchess silent disco.

Tickets £5 from www.o2academysheffield.co.uk FULL MONTY York Opera House 25th- 28th November The Full Monty is a lively and poignant story of six unemployed, out of shape steel mill workers from Buffalo, New York, who need to pick up some extra cash. After seeing the popularity of a male stripper among the local women, Jerry Lukowski recruits his own troupe to put on a strip show of their own. Their gimmick is simple, they will go the Full Monty. Something they hadn't planned and are not sure they can deliver. Will they? Won't they? All will be revealed, well maybe...

Tickets from £10 from York Opera House

Sunday

Just like that well known TV show, York Come Dancing is an epic battle of talent.

11 pairs will wow the crowds (well maybe) with their amazing display of latin and ballroom dancing. The couples will be dancing in front of a panel of judges, but you still get the chance to vote for your favourite couple and help decide who will be crowned the winner of York Come dancing.

Tickets £4 in advance or £5 on the door.

Friday

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INGLORIOUS BASTERDS YSC in P/X/001

Tickets £4 from Your:Shop

Wednesday

Released in August this year, the new Quentin Tarantino film was an instant hit, and now it returns to York for one night only.

The WW2 film shows a group of Jewish-American Soldiers known as "The Basterds" chosen to scalp and brutally kill Nazis in order to spread fear through the Third Reich.

Already an award winning film, this is one not to be missed.

HANDEL'S MESSIAH Central hall The York Choir brings Handel's most renowned work to campus this December.

A popular piece to perform during advent and always well received.

Tickets £3 on the door

P

Tickets £3

9

As a popular Channel 4 and BBC 3 presenter, Porter has taken millions of people to the heart of modern issues with her ground breaking documentaries. Her four part series in 2008 tackled issues from free love communes in Germany to Ukrainian mail order brides.

Now living in LA this TV presenter/author/writer has taken time out to answer Vision's 20 most important questions.

13) What are you scared of?

Wasps. Hate them.

14) What was the last album you listened to?

Florence and the Machine.

15) And the last film you watched?

Oh God...Conair. It is so cheesy but I LOVE IT. 16) What's the worst job you've ever done?

Packing chocolates into boxes in a cellar for two months. Don't like chocolate anymore and that is a sad thing.

17) What's your most treasured possession?

My cat, Lilu.

10) What's your guilty pleasure?

Steak.

Picks of the week

LISTINGS

18) Favourite food?

Steak and chips.

19) What is your most unappealing habit?

I don't have one. I am a lady.

20) What do you do to relax?

Cuddle my boyfriend.

Scenesters

25th until the end...

Friday SNOW WHITE AND THE SEVEN DWARVES York Opera House 11th December - 3rd January A tradition of many British Christmas's is the pantomime.

All the classic ingredients for a slightly childish evening of fun are there at the York Opera House's Snow White and the Seven Dwarves. The beautiful princess, the ugly queen, the handsome prince and probably a load of people in drag. A great night out for you and your family (or flat mates) on the run up to Christmas.

Tickets

£9.50 from York Opera House

Scene Editor Jenny McLarney Music Editors Laura Cress Kate Missenden Music Deputies Stefan Philpott Jaime Riley Film Editors Charles Rivington David Elliott Film Deputy Thomas Martin TV Editor Scott Bryan TV Deputy Rob Sloan Games Editors Chris Craddock Nathon Blades Books Editors Natasha Haldon Caitlin Potter Books Deputies Angus Hill Isobel Shipp Culture Editors Iszie Chew Lizzie Liptrot Culture Deputy

Maryja Morrison