Ok, so we Brits are well known for making mountains out of death molehills (still mortified on behalf of my fellow countrymen’s ridiculous panto grief at Diana), and we do so love a conspiracy theory (read any front page of The Daily Express newspaper and you’d be forgiven for believing that Lady Di was offed by a combo of Arabs and paps / isn’t dead at  all but living in bliss with Dodi on a private island anchored to Elvis’ backlot), but the Jacko mania sweeping LA at the mo is threatening to put our paltry grey attempts at sensationalism deeper in the shade than Heather Mills’s career.

Having been in LA for over a week, and actually being moments away from UCLA on the day he was admitted, I’ve been more than well placed to witness the emerging theories and mongering at source.

OK, the dude was already on his last legs – did you see the nick of him at the online conference to announce his UK dates? Why can’t you accept that he was jiggered, knackered, riddled with drugs and absolutely beat by the relentless treadmill of his life and treatment by the very same clowns who are now filling our screens 24/7 with their simpering obits and fawning appraisals.

So ‘devastated’ are these news channels, that they’ve resorted to creating ridiculous theories about his final hours, hounding the poor doctor who was with him at the time of death and trotting out sorry assed career losers claiming to have the inside track on Jacko’s state of mind before his departure.

Can anyone explain why we need to hear Miley Cyrus’s thoughts on his passing? Why the promoters from the UK concerts could possible be interested in offing him? Why Kendra and her new reality show are allowed to have an opinion? And why there seem to have been 24 hour Jacko channels set up to ‘honour’  his name and shift advertising.

The man had a dodgy end to his career, but is that really a good enough reason to profit by association after he’s gone?  The view from where I’m sat in LA is not celebratory, but maudlin and tawdry. Let him rest in peace and MOVE ON guys…….

oh – and bets are open on how long liz taylor will stick around now….. nice.

Ah, it’s that time of year again – the smug/rain/commerco-fest that is the Glastonbury festival.

Celebrated by the inspid chunterings of jobsworth journos validating their freebies whilst jobbing bands phone in, on the whole, sub standard performances to whacked out goons in jester hats.

It seems that every cretin who can string a sentence together, and some who clearly can’t are now on the Glasto freebie bandwagon. Including what seems like the whole of the BBC. Surely a better use of our licence fee would be to take all the tickets wasted on the staff ‘working’ there and give them to the poor sods sat at home unable to afford a ticket, or locked out due to over distribution of said free tickets to all the journalists ‘working’ there clogging up the site to capacity.

so, in the last couple of weeks we’ve grabbed chats with Canadian wunderkinds Metric and Manchester based Magic Arm. Two very different artists, but both with a spangly future laid out in front of them, and both delivering great live performances for us.

First up Magic Arm filled me in on his laptop folktronica, he’s been described as a loop pedal troubadour, and when you check his live set in the show you’ll see what they mean. He’s got a new album, Make Lists Do Something and sits nicely alongside artists such as Adem or even Beck.

Then i swanned along to the Electric Ballroom in Camden and hooked up with Metric. great folk, whose runaway surprise hit, Help! I’m Alive has been setting blogs and radio alight for the past few months. They were charming, and delivered a wonderful outdoor acoustic rendition of a track from their new album, Fantasies.

The Century of Self may well mark …Trail of Dead’s return to the form we witnessed on their early albums, but Jason and Conrad had plenty to say about their Interscope years when we caught up with them before their recent London dates. I hadn’t sen the chaps for a good few years (not since they were road buddies by way of Snow Patrol and The Reindeer Section. For real) yet they were still as cranked, funny, and downright intense as they ever were. Even if Jason had developed a penchant for random snowglobes in the interim. We shot the breeze about times gone by, working with Yeah Yeah Yeah’s producer Chris Coady, ballpoint pen art (Conrad did the sleeve art ENTIRELY in ballpoint pen), live shows, kit swapping and festival plans. Plus some rather stoopid shit involving Jason’s big brass balls.

Then some crazy cool dude who loved all music offered to get involved in our filming, so we’ve got an extra special bit of live footage from the tremendous gig that followed our chat. All in all, a very special episode of Flyposter, coming soon…

It’s gotta be Talons from the brand new Bloc Party album Intimacy. Principally because it seems to really divide opinion between those who think it’s a studiously pretentious rip off of the mid 90’s sound with added plaintive wailing…and those who think it’s like Mogwai with melody. I fall into the camp of the latter, although many would rather I fell into a chemical abyss and never darkened their thought processes again. But that comes with the turf. Whatever, the point is, this music generates opinion and passion, which is more than you can say for The Feeling. So go listen and you decide. Whichevere way you go, it’s a valid opinion reached by an open mind. Well done you. Oh, and I’m open to love/hate mail…..

Ahh yes, Flyposter has indeed been shortlisted in the Best Podcast Category at the Digital Music Awards this year… We think its fantastic! But we need your votes! so please CLICK AND TICK and make us fabulous!

Well, we made it down and back in one piece, which judging by the nick of Ian Brown as we left the VIP area, is a feat unattainable by other sons and daughters of Manchester. What did we see whilst there? Well, for a kick off the one thing we hardly saw any of was any bleedin’ taxis. I know it’s not the most Keef thing in the world to moan about, but in the name of Drew if you’re gonna put a festival on, put some bloody transport on too. Minor, slightly uncool whines aside, IoW wasn’t half bad. Apart from the fact that there is an increasing number of folk who, like me, are slightly grossed out by Iggy, who still don’t get the fuss about The Zutons and who could go the rest of their born days without hearing another spew of spittle soaked mockney bile from Lydon and his deeply un Sexy Pistols. Yeah, apart from THAT, the festival wasn’t half bad. Now it may have been the liberal jugs of Pimms available on site, but we found ourselves actually enjoying a NERD set, with Pharrell managing to inject some humour and charisma into his tiny unsmiling frame, and at least four recognisable from the original songs making their way over the heads of the arena. Oddly, The Wombats also managed to reach the increasingly rowdy fans (I blame the free drink pavilions that looked over the arena crowd) whilst as usual The Kooks succeeded in taking an open and happy crowd and sending them all off to the burger stands during their set. One thing – if you’re the headline act who’s taken the lucre for an appearance, and justified it in some convoluted inversion of your original manifesto, surely you would at least repay your loyal fans by spending some of the fee on a few lights and a bit of a show? Given your vocal performance and staged bile no longer cut the mustard, a few strobes and bit of dry ice wouldn’t break the bank would it? So why did Lydon and co ask us to crown an otherwise great days’ music with lukewarm delivery and 8 60 watt bulbs framing the stage?…something to dwell on as you wait on your bus home….

Oh Sam, Sam, Sam…you were lovely, but our Lydia got a little bit over excited about his raffish good looks. Witness the growling and overly hormonal camerwork….Anyway, he managed to gamely continue having a chat with us about leakage, embracing, tara palmer tomkinson and his general media whoredom. His on the hoof ode toTara Palmer Tomkinson (with gill’s backing vocals) is a rare treat……

The whole musical world seems to have the east end of london and its’ bands shoved down its neck at the moment. Luckily, the only thing we were shoving down our necks in London’s east end the other night was mediocre canapes and Sam Sparro’s tongue (we wish…well, not really, given I’m the wrong gender…ewww). Anyway, the point is Flyposter slithered its way in and proceeded to entrance / annoy in equal measure. Firstly we had the dubious pleasure of talking to stick in shorts Tara Palmer Tompkinson. Now we’re not ones to knock folk when they’re down, but really TPT….I’ve seen drunk kittens steadier on their feet than you in your YSL tributes. Next up we heard from the lovely Dave Gorman, who just gets it, you know? Anyway, as the cocktails progressed, things loosened up a bit and we found ourselves on the roof by the pool with the aptly named Gavin and Stacey star Matt Horne. All going swimmingly (i know, punny eh?) until pop stalker and clothes horse Alexa Chung takes to the decks. At what point did it become OK to say you’re a DJ if you can whack on a knowing Elastica album track then slide a fader across to ‘Now That’s What i Call Indie 78′…? I know we’re all sick of the Peaches Geldof’s of the world besmirching the noble art of a DJ, but a semi famous TV presenter whose main show is the execrable Vanity Lair (Lord of the Flies for vain people) taking to the decks? It’s beyond the realms of my understanding. Suffice to say for the hour she was on, most of the party decamped to the bowling alley and the roof……

There’s more to be told, including some nice gobbets from Orange ad star Steve Furst, professional baldie and nice lady Gail Porter, Sam Sparro, Olympic torch mugging victim Konnie Huq, the killer of Barry in Eastenders, Janine and most importantly, Lydia’s breasts…..

we repay them with indifference…

…now that’s a Fair Trade!

boom boom!