‘Grim, it’s all just so utterly grim,’ Death stared out over the abyss of many furrowed brows. His long, bony fingers tangling and untangling themselves around the cold, gilded railings that bordered the great crevasse.

Those were the first two lines I wrote when, several months ago, myself and Frank first vaunted the idea of writing a children’s picture book inspired by the image above(which in turn was inspired by this cartoon). For a while we discussed the project, and Frank was very keen, but I know absolutely nothing about children’s books. I mean I doubt I even read one when I was a child.

Since then I’ve looked around and found some really nice looking ones - picking up a couple as Christmas presents (seeing as I had to do my own shopping this year). Now there are some really impressive ones, I was particularly taken by the works of Oliver Jeffers, but they are very much about the illustrations. The story is most often simple, a little surreal maybe, told in short easy sentences. That’s not a criticism but it’s just not how I write. Which begs the question (there might be few other issues that prompt this question)- is it really a good idea to write a children’s picture book about Death, the apocalypse, a corpse boy’s struggle to save the world and the life-affirming power of penguins? You just can’t tell that story without using a certain richness in your prose.

I’m thinking, of course, that maybe we’re moving slightly up the age-scale but I don’t want to go too far, it’s still first and foremost a picture book. I just wouldn’t write it as a novel, children’s or otherwise. I’m hoping there’s some sort of precedent because, well, it’s probably going to be difficult enough to sell people on the idea as it stands, without having to argue the toss over the prose style. For my mind, I believe it’s best to introduce children to as full a spectrum of the language as you can, while their minds are still at their most inqusitive. It won’t be too long before they’re too embarrassed to ask the meaning of a word.

When Nick Cave released ‘Boatman’s Call‘ it blew me away. I had been a Nick Cave fan for a long time when it came out, but Boatman’s Call felt like something had clicked for Cave and his songwriting had reached a whole new level.

The writing seemed more real, more honest, more personal and therefore more impactful because the emotions rang familiar. From that album forward he seemed to retain what he had found on Boatman’s Call and, for my taste, since then his work has simply gone from strength to strength.

When Beck’s ‘Sea Change‘ came out I had the same feeling - that Beck, already pure genius, had attained new heights.

Both ‘Boatman’s Call’ and ‘Sea Change’ are purported to be albums resulting from break-ups, and perhaps that’s where the raw honesty stems from that makes both albums so damn good.

However, to my disappointement, Beck did not seem to hang on to what he discovered on Sea Change and his next album ‘Guero‘ was a step backwards.

Don’t get me wrong - Guero is still better than most of the crap out there and it grew on me with time, but it initially plays like an assortment of cast-offs from various previous albums.

And now Beck has a new album. The Information .

I wondered if perhaps with Guero out of the way would The Information bring us to new Beckian heights? But the answer is ‘not really’. It may well be a grower, after all I only bought it yesterday, but it didn’t immediately excite or amaze.

Certainly it’s a more solid and coherent album than Guero, but it’s generally familiar Beck sounds with nothing to blow your mind like he has done in the past. But hey, it’s better than Guero which is better than most so that still makes it pretty damn good.

So far my favourite track is the very catchy, simple and effective ‘I think I’m in love’ who’s chorus goes ‘I think I’m in love but it makes me kinda nervous to say so’. Here it is:

Apart from the music, there is another remarkable thing about the album - the cover art. It’s DIY. The cover is a blank math paper type affair, and included with the cd is a sheet of stickers so you can make up your own album art. Brilliant.

If you consider that a significant portion of Beck’s audience will be the type to download music, how do you make a CD desirable? Who wants that plastic taking up real space when the music itself will most likely wind up on your computer and/or mp3 player?

The sticker idea gives the CD a new tangibility and hands-on appeal that gives it back that ‘I want one’ appeal. A quick search on Flickr shows that people have been having fun designing the album cover and sharing their efforts.

The version of the album I bought also comes with a DVD of videos for all the songs - lo-fi DIY type affairs that Beck and pals obviously had a lot of fun putting together, like the video for ‘I think I’m in love’ as seen above.

All in all, I’m glad I bought it - I dished out over 20 bucks for it and I’m not sorry, but I’m still waiting for the next Beck album that will truly blow our heads off.

Ambrand posted a set of Mario Lanza classics but forgot this, one of the greatest songs ever conceived, from The Student Prince. Edmund Purdom is lip-synching to Lanza’s vocals because he’d gained too much weight to play the part.

Not a lot of people know this, outside of Ghana that is, but the small West African country has a bit of a thriving homegrown movie industry. Dazed Digital has a collection of posters, some of which are their own takes on Hollywood blockbusters and what I assume are Honk Kong martial arts flicks, that Pascal Saumade discovered painted on sackcloth and posted to the walls of Ghanaian ghettos.

If someone asks you if you know about CSS, and you say ’sure, I’m a firm believer in web standards’ and they walk away disgusted it could be because they’re not talking about Cascading Style Sheets but about the band ‘Cansei de Ser Sexy‘.

I think they’re one of ‘those’ bands, you know, the ones everyone talks about and you have to get in early to be cool. Well, it’s started already, but if you hurry I think if you start mentioning them now you might still be considered cool.

Here’s an interview with them so you can glean some pertinent information and use it at parties to impress girls. And if it’s already too late and they’re passé, more fool you for listening to me - I haven’t a clue what’s going on.

Also check out the video for ‘Let’s Make Love and Listen to Death From Above‘.