Saab 9-3 or its bigger brother the 9-5 – both available in estate versions and second hand prices are excellent (for the buyer, not for the seller!) compared to new prices. I got a 2 year old 9-3 with leather, satnav & bluetooth for £13k; would have cost twice that for a new one

The BMW 3-series Touring, on the other hand, while a lovely car, does not have a big boot compared to some of the other "lifestyle estates". I had one of these before the Saab & although I really liked it, the boot wasn't big enough for my kit – but that was the old model, don't know what the new one's like

But if you want VFM & a big boot but don't care what it looks like, I reckon a mkII Vectra estate can't be beaten

call BT & get their number blocked – and report them as a nuisance call.

That's assuming it's your BT landline they're ringing. It is a BT line, isn't it?

who's ringing you up?

I was about to ask WTF is "math rock" but someone got there before me. How silly some of these labels are

but don't get me started on "goth" 😉 Marilyn Manson is not goth no matter how you dress him up…

I'd forgotten how good that was, cheers 🙂

somewhere in this house is a C90 cassette with Atom Drum Bop on one side and Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds "The Firstborn is Dead" on it…

They were well known but never huge.

I preferred The Three Johns

Good luck with the gig 🙂

my band supported Spear Of Destiny on Sunday, that was fun

not that noisy really. now 3 lots of 3x Typhoons + another one, that would have been noisy

Masterchef is poncy shoite*
Masterchef Australia is soooo much better. On Good Food channel

* my phrase of the month, first revealed when discussing the new Flake ad. I'm sure it'll be wheeled out again soon 😉

me too. I got mine on the NHS as a follow up from a broken leg – when I was having my physio, the therapist spotted it & referred me to the podiatrist.

Do you get groupies in your knitting circle then, Elfin? 😉

*edit: been a long time since I saw any either 😮

Learn a musical instrument & join/form a band.

Sex & drugs & rock'n'roll

I am slightly concerned about the forthcoming Dambusters remake.

lemme guess, the bombers will be B17s crewed by American airmen, and the commander of the raid will NOT have a black labrador named to rhyme with Tigger

Forbidden Planet is a classic, yet based (IIRC) on The Tempest

not a great picture & not complete either, but:

and an even worse picture, but at least it's complete:

Most of the Zildjian cymbals in the first pic have now been replaced – ZBT are ok at first but pretty soon you realise they're not that good.

I now have:
Zildjian A Custom 14in hats
Sabian Pro Sonix 10in splash
Sabian AAX 15in Studio crash
Sabian AA 16in Studio crash
Paiste Alpha 16in thin crash
Sabian Pro Sonix 18in China
Zildjian ZBT 20in ride – that's next for the chop… need a nice heavy ride with a good bell sound, can anyone recommend anything?

I'm quite partial to Remo Pinstripe batter heads on my Mapex M Birch acoustic kit. I'll post some pics later. My new Black Panther snare came with Ambassador coated batter head & I see no reason to change it

My electronic kit is on loan to a friend at the mo as I'm not particularly keen on it. It's an Alesis DM5 Pro. Not as nice to play as proper drums but is quiet. Apart from the thump of the kick pedal through the floorboards…

poncy sh*te

this looks like pretty good value to me.

5 piece kit including stands, pedals, cymbals (unspecified so could be awful) and even a stool

That XPK is just a shell pack – good value but a set of stands is going to bump up the price.

Compare with buying frame only vs a full bike

I can't disagree with any of that

However, you'll probably also need some cymbals, unless the second hand kit includes them; they're not cheap and at a minimum you'll need a hi-hat pair and 1 crash/ride. Again, try second hand. Good brands are Zildjian, Sabian, Meinl, Paiste and Istanbul. Pearl used to do a budget range but I don't know if they still do

Like with most things, buy cheap = buy twice, but especially cymbals.

Finally, remember that a drum kit is not a quiet – or small – instrument. You can get practice pads to help muffle the sound but if practicing at home you'll need to consider the neighbours. A full size kit can also take up 6ft x 6ft of floor space or more.

If noise is a consideration then it may also be worth trying a s/h electronic kit from Alesis, Roland or Yamaha. Again, not cheap.

Have a look at http://www.drumwright.co.uk to get an idea of prices

just adverts here

I have the same issues with the reuse of the term R&B

oh yeah

FWIW I grew up listening to SLF, Siouxsie & The Banshees, The Undertones & various other "new wave" bits & bobs.
Then I joined my second band & we did some Damned/Clash/DK covers, so I got into that stuff too.

Then we discovered Killing Joke, The Southern Death Cult, Bauhaus, XMal Deutschland, The Sisters Of Mercy, Theatre Of Hate, Sex Gang Children, Skeletal Family, Spear Of Destiny (who my very latest band supported only this weekend!) and so on…

but "punk" to me means the summer of 77, even though I was only 12

near Leeds

Green Day are ok but I've never bought any of their stuff. Nor downloaded for free either

I'm a bit old school when it comes to punk I'm afraid.

UK:
The Damned
Sex Pistols
The Clash
etc

USA:
Dead Kennedys
Black Flag
etc

Anything commercially viable since about 1982 isn't punk in any way shape or form.
It's all just rock music
IMHO of course 😉

Saw 2 punk bands in the old style last night; not impressed, The Clash did it better

There's pop and there's punk. Never the twain & all that 😉

But you could try The Undertones or The Buzzcocks 🙂

ok, I'll defer to the better informed

yeah that's the one 🙂

I was in a band in Wakey at the time, The Rejuvenation, and we played a gig (or maybe two) with them in about 85

The bass player, "Etch" went on to join up with Gary Marx (The Sisters Of Mercy) and Anne-Marie Hurst (Skeletal Family) to form Ghost Dance; our bass player bought (or maybe nicked) one of his basses

a card reader that goes into the dock port of an iPad or iPhone

but doesn't the iPhone take pictures?

I can't help thinking this is an application for its own sake; and how is lugging an iPad around any more convenient than looking a sub-notebook around?

Emperor's new clothes?

http://www.leedsmusicscene.net

click on the "bands" tab and search away.

There's so much good stuff coming out of Leeds these days, and I don't just mean my band.
although that does of course go without saying 😉

Tony, you live near Wakey; do you remember The Citron Girls' "Working For The FBI"?

From back in the early 80s

http://www.premdor.co.uk

hope not. Got one tomorrow, not sure if the FBI have jurisdiction in Leeds

hope they didn't resort to extraordinary rendition 😯

that's funny, my camera uses an industry-standard USB cable to connect to my industry-standard PC.

Does this mean Apple are going all Proprietary on us?

I've been with Natwest for over 20 years. No complaints

I have a deposit account with Santander (was Abbey). Useless bunch of bananas, especially the Shipley branch.

it could be interesting getting a drum track down…

I'm not well travelled

born in Leeds. School in Wakefield. Uni in Bradford. Still live in BD district now, nearly 30 years on.

Have worked in Bradford, Rotherham, Rossendale, Sheffield & Barnsley. Would like to work in Bradford again just to save the commute but there aren't any jobs that I can do any more local than the one I have. Unless the band takes off…

I had a 320d Touring, but TBH I don't know how much main dealer servicing cost as mine had a full service pack included – all servicing up to 3 years / 60k miles paid for up front by its original owner (the BMW fleet); when it passed 60k miles I started getting it done at a local independant garage and it wasn't too bad.

39mpg on average including a 30 mile each way commute across Leeds / Bradford; when I changed it to my current car, a Saab 9-3 diesel sportwagon, I was getting the same mpg until I changed my route to not go through the centre of Bradford, so the low mpg is more down to the stop-start nature of the route than my driving style

I don't remember any snow in the 4 & a bit years that I had it but having seen another RWD car sliding about last winter I can imagine it wouldn't be good.

Apart from the original purchase price and the fact that the boot is too small for my particular needs, I'd have another

But thinking again, if you're only doing 8-10k miles a year, do you really need a diesel?

but Asterix is French (well, a Gaul actually) so what does he know?

never tried it the Devon way. Either way is probably as good as the other TBH. 'tis a marvellous thing

as a northerner:

breakfast – between getting out of bed & dinner time;
dinner – between 11.45 and 13:00 (ish) depending how late breakfast was;
tea – between 18:00 and 19:00. Any later & it's fookin' late 😉
supper – just before bed.

the rest of you will probably know these as breakfast, lunch, dinner & supper respectively.

yes, Tech21 amp (sort of – powered speaker) and a 1981 Gordon Smith; somewhere on that stage is a Fender amp as well