Transport For Lunatics

Comment piece written for music and culture blog Shoots Bands and Leaves on 4/10/2010

As any of you who while away your three score and 10 scurrying to and from work through London's vast network of underground caverns will know, there's a tube strike on today.

Being a right-on cyclist with my own Lycra and everything, the ructions between the RMT's subterranean rat-men and their awful overlords doesn't really bother me that much. Sure, the hordes of grey-faced commuters forced blinking into the weak October sunlight make the journey a little more fraught: the roads through the city are packed with bikes, mopeds and cars clearly piloted by the criminally insane and there's a far higher incidence of pedestrian lemmings hurling themselves from the kerb with frighteningly blank eyes. Still, it's helping Londoners engage with each other more than the usual commute does - even if the brief spark of human contact only seems to light a conflagration of communal moaning.

What's tickled me is the news coverage of the strike. The BBC covered it in the London local news section: fair enough. They also featured it as a headline story in the main body of BBC Breakfast, which made me wonder if we'd see similar stories if Nottingham's tram drivers took a day off in a huff. Is the Underground really national news, or is it just a parochial dust-up that's easy to send a reporter to?

The cries of 'union stooge!' that went up when Ed Miliband was elected as Labour leader have made industrial action more noteworthy. I'm looking forward to seeing how his relationship with the unions unfolds as the cuts start to bite, and curious to see how the coalition PR machine swings into action to fight a renewed opposition.

Whatever happens, I hope tube workers decide not to strike again in November, as all the extra people lurching around above ground do have one rubbish effect on my ride: I can't sing embarrassing songs to myself without attracting attention. And with an internal jukebox which inexplicably started playing 'La Isla Bonita' all last week, any involuntary singing as I peg down City Road can only end in humiliation.

Now playing! 'Nothing to See', Four Tet

A little bit of content written for music and culture blog Shoot Bands and Leaves on 4/10/2010

Going further down the glitchy rabbit hole than he did in There is Love in You, Four Tet's contribution to the new Soul Jazz compilation Future Bass is brilliant. 'Nothing to See' drifts on warm fuzz, burbling synths and chiming cut-up instruments, loosely anchored by the stomping, clubby kick drum than ran through his last LP and The Ringer EP.

Four Tet's post-house production sounds so organic you can imagine it growing on trees in a shaded, mossy forest. I love it - you should too.

Feature: review of Spooks, episode 3

Written for TV blog Watch With Mothers on 6/10/2010. It's the first review of a series that's been commissioned to run for the rest of season nine.

I love Spooks' blend of slick production, fast-paced action and brilliantly lunatic plotting. It's one of the few programmes I'll actively tune in to on the telly.

Check the review out in situ at WWM or read it in full below the fold.