Making tomato soup and doing it - controversial I know - by throwing tomatoes in a pan

This stat just doesn't sound believable - either it's just wrong or they've found a way to slice the data in a weirdly specific way to make an absurd result.

The most-streamed albums of the 1980s: The Stone Roses pip Michael Jackson

The Stone Roses' self-titled 1989 debut, a defining document of the Madchester movement, is the most-streamed album of the 1980s.

officialcharts.com

For the good of the nation I really think the BBC should follow 7 or so councillors around with cameras for a weekly fly-on-the-wall documentary as I don't think 99% of the nation, including potential Prime Ministers, know what councillors do.

Chris Terry-Enescu@cjterry.bsky.social · 9h ago

It's OK for criminal ex-neo Nazis to run your bins is a hell of a line.

*punches air that I'm a heavy reader and that constant guilt that I'm not reading enough is just bollocks*

Scott Pack@meandmybigmouth.bsky.social · yesterday

Back in my Waterstones head office days, there was some statistic or survey that defined a 'heavy reader' as someone who read six books a year. Which I think acts as a helpful reminder that people who read more than that are in the minority, as are people who frequent bookshops on a regular basis.

I've probably got people who follow me who've not read this incredible book, and you can right this wrong now. You don't even have to give a shit about the KLF, as yes it is about that, but it's not really about that, it's about the power of ideas to shape reality.

Kieran Wyatt@kieranstories.bsky.social · 2d ago

A few more chapters left to go of this wonderful book by @johnhiggs.bsky.social. I don’t want it to end. And a rare book that warrants the hype. Will finish it now facing the offing - which feels somehow appropriate.

My pitch would be to normalise releasing old movies at the same level of hype as new movies - I want to see Jaws in my local Vue and I want them to spend Odyssey money promoting it so we're all talking about Jaws (1975), and how it's relevant now, because it's a movie about capitalism will kill you.

weinberg@weinbergs.bsky.social · 7mo ago

let's pretend: Universal announces a screenwriting contest for Jaws 5. What's your pitch?

Someone, is getting dunked on this website. And I'm reminded how out of proportion these things are due to network effect / going viral. They need two people going "oh fuck off mate, you're talking crap" and they get 600 as everyone sticks a boot in a drive-by kicking.

Hot Take: Gary Barlow is also impacted by climate change, in that his bills will be larger this year from turning his air-con up.

Daily Mail complaining that Andy Burnham has gone on holiday leaving someone else in charge, and of course whatevs, but it made me think he'd be the same as anyone going on holiday now, running your business from your phone & laptop in a hotel instead. Holidays don't exist, they're just alt offices.

Is there a more overtly middle-class word than "ramekin"?

I've done it, I've thought of something nice to say about him. Rod Liddle at least was not a hypocrite. He said horrible things for money in national newspapers. And he said horrible things for free on the Millwall Online forum.

The best run of three albums by any band is, of course, The Beatles, and you you could make the case for starting anywhere from their first to their third from last, although I'm struggling to do it as you can't do a three run that gets both Rubber Soul and Abbey Road in.

The downfall was TV Tropes (and YouTubers lifting from it). It's a fascinating website yet, it's encouraged millions to scream at the telly, when they spot a recognisable thing, "TROPE!" You don't want stories without tropes, like you don't want music without a key, except as arty experiments.

Alasdair Stuart@alasdairstuart.com · 2d ago

And the point: 'Because to be able to identify the mechanism does not invalidate the mechanism.' That resonates with me because of my weird training. One part growing up with an English teacher parent, one part Radio 4 audio drama, one part close up magic

Just had reason to look up "Penderecki: Threnody to the Victims of Hiroshima" and it they weren't really victims of Hiroshima so much, not really victims of the city in which they lived, rather than victims the US military (with a UK thumbs up from Churchill too)

Listening to Monster by REM, for no particular reason, didn't bother listening to it at the time and... Crush With Eyeliner is a perfectly fine album track but it's insane that it was a single, it's just some chat over some looping chords, saved by sounding nice coz tremolo. A b-side studio trick.

The glorious days when "I'm a nazi" was a perfectly good punchline as it was an *absurd* thing to say, as the only people who were would be skinheads who represented a rounding error in the population. I want to live in a world where saying you're a Nazi is an unproblematic punchline again.

Josephine "beckbook.com" Riesman@josie.zone · 3d ago

Median UK voter in 2026, as predicted by Hugh Laurie some decades ago:

B3ta newsletter 992, out now "B3TA MOVES TO 'B3TA TOWERS NORTH' TO ENCOURAGE NORTHERNERS TO LEARN PHOTOSHOP" * BRYAN FERRY ALT NAME-GEN - 'Brylcreem Furry' * IMAGE CHALLENGE - the results of the dinosaur * ANOTHER DRUM MACHINE - b'dum tish b3ta.com/newsletter/i...

B3TA : NEWSLETTER : "B3TA MOVES TO 'B3TA TOWERS NORTH' TO ENCOURAGE NORTHERNERS TO LEARN PHOTOSHOP"

b3ta.com

My main outstanding question about COVID is why can't we have a mini lockdown every Sunday as a treat? I loved the roads being empty of cars, it was great for cycling.

Heard Queen II for the first time last night. It's a mad album and deserves to come out from the shadow of "no one listens to Queen outside of your dad's two Queen Greatest Hits tapes in his Ford Sierra". It's early Kate Bush bonkers, a distinct thing of a talented oddball in their own fantasy world

Overall it's probably ok to be on a website that spent ten days reacting to a film review in the London Review Of Books, rather than one where the world's richest man posts, "Hitler, what a leftie"

Obviously the Pet Shop Boys were/are great but we lost a very funny music journalist in the process

Was once in a student band for a month or two & would rehearse twice a week and we got what I thought was a couple of fans, two girls slightly younger, who would turn up at rehearsals. Turned out they didn't fancy us, but thought the singer was shit & could muscle in and make it their band. Respect.

I hope this is more than a signal. It is such a terrible solution to an admittedly difficult problem, the equivalent of "remove NHS waiting lists by abolishing the NHS"

Andy Burnham signals he will scrap plans to curb jury trials

Prime minister says he has concerns about one of most significant proposals from Keir Starmer’s government

theguardian.com

Ok. If you want some Swearclock moderation. Any of you, throw me money NOW and I'll do some. ko-fi.com/fesshole

A radio soap opera still going from the 1950s to now, is a weird anachronism isn't it? Just wondered if any other country has this and the answer is just Poland. And frankly the Polish equivalent to The Archers sounds incredible.

Went to the cinema & a couple sat by me, & were grumbling & then got up and moved & it made me feel paranoid. What had I done? Then they called the manager out and & pointing at the seat which had dry white stains. Manager scratched at it and tasted it. Ice cream not spunk. The bravery of that man.

True wisdom is realising everything you actually love is better sober, only add booze to things you basically don't like to make them tolerable.

I love capturing those moments where London Underground trains line up perfectly with station posters. With a little patience and a bit of luck, you can end up with some wonderfully amusing and unexpected shots.

This is bollocks , you have banana before chocolate as you always should order your foods with milder flavours first else they get drowned out.

Watching the Incredible Hulk (1977) because it’s turned up on Prime, and enjoying coming up with an instant fan theory that it’s about steroid abuse. There’s a roided up monster in all of us if we just took the drugs: big muscles and potential psychopathy.