Futtocks

There have always been a few around in a small way, but there are quite a few on the market at the moment. The old-fashioned Sony/B&O servo-driven tonearms are a long way away from these new ones, though, which mostly use air suspension for friction-free movement. Makers of parallel-trackers such as Rockport, Eminent Technology, Simon Yorke, Thales, Bergmann etc. are all at the higher end of hi-fi, though, which makes them 'somewhat' out of my league.

Mountain - Don't turn around. A blast of proto-metal from one of the original power trios. And while many hold a torch for John Bonham, Keith Moon or Mitch Mitchell, Corky Laing also could batter seven shades of snot out of a drum kit with considerable style.

These rips are my my first experience of the effects of a parallel-tracking tonearm. Given the difficulty in getting the final tracks on certain problem albums to play really well with a pivoted arm, I am impressed with the results.

From the site. I own the album on CD and comparing the two is a bit of an embarrassment for the silver disc.

Simon & Garfunkel - Bridge over troubled Water: a vinyl rip from the special edition 45rpm LP box set. The sound quality is superb, the guitar and percussion on 'Cecilia' was so dynamic, I almost jumped out of my skin.

Albums: Kraftwerk - Autobahn Peter Frampton - Frampton comes alive! I'd forgotten how enjoyable this album is. King's X - Gretchen goes to Nebraska Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers - Damn the Torpedoes Selda Bagcan - Selda. Lo-fi Turkish psychedelic pop-folk, with Eastern vocal melodies and fuzzed-out electric guitar. Strange, eerie, totally incomprehensible, but rather good. Tracks: Yusuf Islam - Roadsinger Zulu Spear - Chin up Judee Sill - Jesus was a Crossmaker Talking Heads - Life during Wartime John Phillips - Mississippi Beck - Tropicalia

Durian? Assuming you can get it. Ants, camel, crocodile, rattlesnake, scorpions... they even do ostrich egg ice cream.

Joni Mitchell - the Hissing of Summer Lawns, thanks to the 'Vinyl done right' link that ( think) Paley posted a while back. I've been comparing it to the recording I made using my own modest, but perfectly decent system, and the VDR version blows mine out of the water. Additionally the fact that the guy uses a parallel-tracking tonearm means that the difficult last half of 'Shades of Scarlett conquering' is beautifully clean and distortion-free.

Norah Jones' side project, The Little Willies. Relaxing, laidback country swing.

Kedgeree is a dryer dish, and uses a different kind of rice. Risotto uses particular breeds of rice (most commonly Carnaroli or Arborio), whose husk expands and goes softer. To be honest, a good risotto doesn't actually look all that nice. But it does taste good.

You can get confit duck legs from Donald Russell.com

Some tracks by Ben Harper's new project, Fistful of Mercy. Pretty good stuff.

Scarily bad likenesses, via the medium of tattooing.

Various tracks by Diunna Greenleaf. She's a big lady, but has a classic soul/r'n'b/gospel belter of a voice. There are some of her live performances available on YouTube - I recommend you check her out.

The thread was about players who never produced for their national team. Newlove had plenty of mediocre test performances, but he also had some very good ones, too.

Some kind soul has uploaded a Sharon Jones & the Dap-Kings gig to both the Dime a Dozen and eTree sites.

This is, may I remind you, the very same rag that reported the RWC thus: "Well done to New Zealand for becoming the champions. Shame it was the wrong Rugby World Cup." Which does rather give you the idea of where they stand. The magazine has slipped downhill since a quite promising launch. This week's pig-ignorant editorial by Simon Caney, about the Commonwealth Games is a case in point. To be fair, once in a while they put out an issue with some readable stuff in it... just not very often.

Like the Challenge Cup Final, this could go absolutely any way, from a narrow victory to a complete rout to either side. The only thing I'm sure of is that I can't wait!

Warrington weren't a major force at the time. Wigan was just for one season (IIRC) - I don't know why he left. I remember him best as Oldham's 'super-sub', when he used to change games, coming off the bench.

I've read very good reviews of that album.

He had a hell of a boot on him. I remember a televised Challenge Cup match against Warrington, when he took a drop out under the posts. It landed closer to the opposition's tryline than some of the kickoffs in that match!

Absolutely.

I think it was just a buildup of injuries.