27.2.13

Album review: Stoker score by
Clint Mansell

Published by Press Association

RELEASED 26 FEBRUARY

VIDEO: Clint Mansell — In Full Bloom



Some soundtracks aren’t worth buying, but Clint Mansell’s always are.

The composer who provided the music for the Requiem for a Dream and Moon movies continues his good work here on Stoker, a gothic mystery thriller directed by Park Chan-wook.

Mansell refuses to impose any single emotion on the listener in his finely nuanced score, which conveys the film’s fear, sorrow and beauty by subtly evoking the spirit of each instrument.

An epic pop collaboration with Emily Wells and a piano treat from Philip Glass make this decent record a great one – where orchestral, electronic and acoustic live happily ever after.


9/10


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24.2.13

My Video Game Hell: I Played 3000 Games of Funky Snooker


Published by Sabotage Times

How I ended up playing a ridiculous number of games of a Flash-based snooker game and told a multitude of people to bore off and screw a goat...


In my final year at university, I played more than 3,000 games of Funky Snooker. I lost my family, my friends, my house, my job… OK, it didn’t get quite that bad, but I sure as hell threw away a lot of my time.

It started with a click, like everything does these days. Pretty soon there were a few dozen twisted cigarette stubs in my ashtray, it was dark outside, and I was still clicking. I don’t know how many games I was getting through per day back then, but I knew it was pretty serious when typing F into my internet toolbar brought up its URL instead of Facebook’s.

I didn’t see the harm. Everyone has their own virtual vice, and mine wasn’t nearly as bad as poker or in-play betting – where money was at stake.

Funky Snooker is an online snooker hall where you can compete with players from all over the world. Each game affects your ranking – you start off on 675; if you’re half decent you’ll reach about 750; experts are around the 800 mark; the one-percent elite hover between 850 and 900.

To you it might sound as dull as hearing someone’s sphincter opening in a toilet cubicle at work on a Monday morning, but I found it challenging, invigorating, and exciting.

The site also allows you to converse with the strangers you’re playing against. One memorable chat I recall was with a guy who worked in a call centre. After quick one-off became a best-of-seven, he wished me all the best. “Sooner or later you’ll settle down,” he started. “But don’t end up like me – thirty years old, in a job you hate, playing online snooker games when your boss isn’t looking.”


It wasn’t usually this civilised. Far from it. In one of my first sessions, I was closing in on an unlikely victory against an 800-ranker. I’d adopted a tactical game that had stifled his blitzkrieg approach and given me a ten-point lead heading on to the final few colours. However, I got my angles all wrong on the blue, which rebounded agonisingly between the jaws of the centre-left pocket. He cleared up, wrote “BOOOOOOOOOOM YA TWAT ;)”, then left.

People fired insults like this all the time, but I never rose to it. If I happened to win a game in which I’d been on the receiving end of some abuse, I considered that a comeback in itself. If someone was being a dick and ended up beating me, I just flared my nostrils and carried on playing. What’s that? I should have been a sports psychologist? Don’t make me blush.

I think it was after a shopping trip to Lidl ended up a couple of quid more expensive than I expected it to be that I flipped. A guy was trying to put me off by saying stuff like “I hope your dad dies of cancer” and “has anyone ever told you your profile pic makes you look like a scrotum wart?” (It totally did – the only photo I had of myself under the 100KB limit didn’t quite catch my best side.) I threw everything I had behind winning that game, just to teach him a lesson. I was ranking in the 750s by this point, so I was pretty confident. It went down to a tense black ball re-spot, which I won.

Then I inexplicably fell to his level. “Haha, you cunt, fuck you,” I typed. “I do my talking on the table.” I went to hit the Leave Room option, determined to have the last word, before adding “BOOOOOOOOOOM YA TWAT ;)”.

This so wasn’t me. I’ve never had a fight in my life – but it was satisfying, I’m ashamed to say. And it continued. Many subsequent arguments would begin with the other player calling me “lucky”, to which I’d reply “nah, it’s called talent mate. Now go screw a goat”. I never wished death on anyone’s father, but I did try to wind people up at every opportunity. I don’t know why.

After graduating, I quit smoking and went travelling. I played a bit more Funky Snooker when I returned, while I was looking for a job, but it wasn’t the same. I’d peaked.

I’ll be honest – I might’ve had a couple of games in between writing these sentences, for research. My profile now reads: Wins 1,649; Losses 2,066; Abandoned 300; Highest Break 78; Half Centuries 49; Highest Rank 824.6. I’m now ranking in the 670s, so I’m back where I started. Which says a lot, I suppose.

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20.2.13

Theatre preview: Do You Nomi?
@ Tron Theatre, Glasgow

Published by Metro

20-21 February 2013, 7.45pm, £7-£12,
Tron Theatre, Glasgow. Tel: 0141 552 4267
www.tron.co.uk



Imagine a skinny Penguin from Batman, with vocal skills, in the weirdest dream you’ve ever had – and you’re still a million miles short of Klaus Nomi. The German performer was one of the most outrageous stars of New York’s avant-garde scene in the 1970s and 80s, when he became known for his operatic falsetto voice and synthesiser-heavy new wave music. Seriously, YouTube him.

In 1983, at the height of his fame, Nomi’s life was cut tragically short by the then-misunderstood AIDS virus. We lost a good one back then, but tonight we’re gaining a suitably lively theatrical tribute.

Do You Nomi? weaves a poignant narrative around dance and theatre in an emotionally driven journey into the life, mind and times of this enigmatic icon who hid behind a stage persona as the western world stood on the brink of change.

“It was in the Tron Theatre bar that myself and choreographer Alan Greig concocted the idea for the show,” said director and co-creator Grant Smeaton. “So we’re excited to bring it to Glasgow, and the Tron, where it all began.”

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11.2.13

Theatre preview: In An Alien Landscape @ the Arches, Glasgow

Published by Metro

11−13 February 2013, 7pm, £6-£9,
the Arches, Glasgow. Tel: 0141 565 1000
www.thearches.co.uk



Tommy McHugh was a Liverpool builder who, following multiple brain haemorrhages, became a prolific artist – creating acclaimed works in a variety of media that continue to astound the medical and art worlds. He died last year.

This month, Birds of Paradise Theatre Company – in association with the Beacon – is touring a production based on Tommy’s inspiring life. In An Alien Landscape tells the story of Albie Quinn, an ordinary man whose own brush with death unleashes a torrent of creativity. Showing at the Arches for the next three nights, the play explores the continuous white noise rushing through Albie’s head as he feels compelled to paint after waking from a coma.

In An Alien Landscape is penned by Danny Start – an award-winning writer renowned for his work with charities supporting people with neurological conditions and his commitment to disability arts. Tuesday night’s performance is BSL-interpreted.

We’re all a little short on inspiration this time of year, so it’s your duty to catch this truly hilarious and uplifting piece of theatre while it’s on your doorstep.

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7.2.13

Album review: Fact Finding Mission by Trichotomy

Published by Press Association

RELEASED 4 FEBRUARY

VIDEO: Trichotomy — Strom



It takes these young Brisbane lads just under an hour to demonstrate that a great piano trio is not just something from 1950s New York.

From the dinner-party joviality of Strom, to the contemplative ivory tinkling on Lullaby, and the hauntingly spare Brick by Brick – Trichotomy’s fifth album possesses a melodic and rhythmic variation that would’ve been applauded by the likes of Bill Evans and Thelonious Monk in jazz’s golden age.

The sampling of George W Bush on the title track aside, Fact Finding Mission is enjoyably imaginative, managing to convert musical abstraction into emotion with a maturity beyond the years of its creators – who are surely Australia’s finest jazz exports.


8/10


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