veloman

There has been quit a bit of coverage this week regarding the anniversary of the Atlantic convoys and the merchant seaman who perished. Quite rightly too IMO; brave beyond belief; but that is another subject. If you have any interest in that period of World War 2 may I suggest reading 'The Cruel Sea' by Nicholas Montserrat. I had to read it for 'O' Level English but even back then found it both fascinating yet chilling. Just a suggestion. PS. At school, we had the 'abridged' version of the book, suitable for schools; I later found out that the full version contained slightly more 'lurid' accounts of the sailors pulling women whilst on shore-leave, getting VD etc. This would have been much more interesting !

Hang on a minute. I know Mr Mooney does not post banalities as a rule but this might be a little polemic. Surely there is room for someone who finds the act of homosexuality (without going in to visceral detail) fairly repugnant but does not go around 'queer-bashing', as it used to be called. If such a person exists are they automatically thugs, uneducated etc. Equally with racism; I would tend to think that the UK is a fairly crowded Country. There must come a point when the UK has to consider how it can cope with further influx of immigrants no matter where they are from or what colour they are and surely this is not racism - just realistic.

As a former paid-up member of the drummer's union I have to sympathise with your man. Little beats/accents like this can be a nightmare, which I certainly never mastered completely. I give you the example of the snare drum note in Born To Be wild - Steppenwolf; there is one little note just before the middle 8 comes in which use to drive me mad. As regards White room; I think those opening bars are in 5/4 time so if your man counts the beats from the opening chord, I think he will find that the accent is on the 3rd beat of 5. Hope that helps but I could be wrong of course. Baker was/is an ace player wasn't he ?

Any of you cycling fans watch Liege-Bastogne-Liege this afternoon ? The winner, Daniel Martin, isn't actually Irish but comes from Tamworth. He gets to ride for Ireland 'cos his mom is Stephen Roche's sister. His dad is Neil Martin, a very good British ex-pro. Wonder if he is a Villa fan !!

Well Warks are off and running; great victory over Durham and they would undoubtedly beaten Derbyshire if it hadn't been for the rain ! On a slightly worrying note, Chris Wright has picked up a load of wickets; we don't want to lose him as well as Woakes. Bell and Trott !!

I have forgotten the Economic detail of 'Terms of Trade', 'Comparative Advantage' etc. - it was many years ago since I had to learn it but .. I would be interested to see the figures to back up your assertion/suggestion. As an adjunct to bickster's post re. Hirwaun in Wales - if you went to the Stoke game you may have gone towards Longton and turned left at a Hungry Horse pub towards their ground. That used to be Hem Heath Colliery where my bother in law worked. He reckons they poured 100's of tons of concrete down there on £1000's of equipment and very large reserves of coal in an act of what can only be described as vindictive vandalism. I wonder if more details of The Belgrano affair will emerge now; I am led to believe there is more to that than has been made public.

That is very interesting Leviramsey; I thought I was the only person to think that Plant was the luckiest person alive to be in a band with such great musicians as Bonham and Page. Judging vocalists is very subjective I realise; for instance, it is easy to say that Steve Gadd is a better drummer than, say, Alan White(Oasis) or whoever is putting up that shed on U2 records, but who would be a better Rock vocalist than Plant and there's quite a long list ! (possibly starting with Paul Rogers or David Coverdale).

It seems that "The British Council" have conducted a survey in Pakistan prior to elections; widely reported on internet. The results showed that 38% of young Pakistanis didn't think Democracy was working/effective and preferred Sharia Law and 32% favoured Military rule. Hmm - is that slightly worrying?

Ford cars ! I inherited my late father's fiesta; it had done 11000 miles in 3 years. Took it to that Ford dealers in Perry Barr on the Aldridge Road for MOT, where he had it from and they gave me a bill for £500.New discs, new ball joints + God knows what else. Wrote to Ford complaining and they basically said "too bad". Got rid of it as soon as possible and had a Clio; no trouble with that !

Some really good news in the papers today; ant and dec have signed a new contract with ITV and thus will continue to entertain us with their subtle humour and hilarious antics for some time to come. All I want now is for harry styles to be knighted and my life would be complete.

My laptop came with this at a 'special price' and it could be installed on a number of computers so I had it. It has worked well and I don't think it has slowed the machine down; something I heard it was prone to do. Anyway - it is due up for renewal; I know there is quite a bit of free stuff out there, so is Norton worth having ? Cheers (about £30 to renew)

And Ian Bell second top scorer. Anyway back to more important matters; anyone noticed Warwickshire's performance v. MCC ? Excellent - but ... with another great performance from Chris Wright and Varun Chopra will England be looking at them for the summer. Warks look like being without Bell, Trott and Woakes already - we don't want to 'do a Lancashire' !

As it was Eddie Mair, I believe Boris was lucky that a SCUD wasn't the only thing he got up there.

Yep , Cryuff for me too; 1978 at VP. I have never seen a player so light on their feet; reminded me of a ballet-dancer.

Can't really add much to the discussion but ... when I played in the 70;s we had to fill-in a PRS return at certain venues, Mecca for one. At the same time, the Musicians Union, which we had to join, were running a campaign called "Home taping is killing music " .This ,in my opinion, was helping the 'big boys' not ordinary musos; what was really killing music was the use of DJ's instead of musicians at functions and cabaret acts using backing tapes instead of backing musicians. Would be interested to know if DJ's have to fill in PRS returns.

Hated that place. Tried to buy a single once for a quid but I only had a £20 note and the geezer told me I was taking the mick, and to come back with sensible money. I thought to myself "no wonder you've got a broken arm chap" and never went back. Idiot. I was glad they closed down in the end. As much as I hate seeing vinyl shops having to close, he was an idiot. Well I'm glad I'm not the only one who thought that ! Also, if you tried to sell them vinyl they offered you derisory money or 'credit notes'. Wish I had kept my vinyl now but one of the few I've got left is "Viva The Villa" issued after the 1975 League Cup final victory. Picture of Ray Graydon on the front. Any offers

'Bankers integrity' = perfect oxymoron.

re. above; I may have misunderstood this but I believe the EU want to cap bankers bonus levels . I thought I saw it reported that Cameron wants to resist this move in order to protect 'The City' and discourage 'talent' from leaving. Has anyone else heard this and is it entirely serious? Although we all know that it is the evil Public Sector, specifically teachers, who have caused our monetary problems I would have thought that the financial 'talent' had played some small part in this, LIBOR being a possible example. Any thoughts ?

Mr Mooney makes complete sense. Poliphony was perhaps 'jazz/rock', the band I played in before (who have their name on the wall of the Livepool Cavern) was heavy rock (for the time) and the band I played in after played everything - much of which I loathed. Birdy Dance anyone ? But . it made me versatile .. although it didn't make me into Carl Palmer ! So - by the time I was 30 I had a handle on pop, disco, strict tempo etc etc. If one wants longevity in music I reckon it is important to be versatile. As an example; we once appeared on the same bill as Brotherhood of Man (sorry !); their backing band were amazing, warming up playing Herbie Hancock's 'Chameleon' ! None of the above makes me any good or even an expert; it is just my opinion based on some experience.

Hey Xann - thanks for that ! I had been told that it had been on Ebay but couldn't believe what it went for. It's value may have increased 'cos of Dave Bristows' status in music . The bugger of it is that I had a box of these years ago and chucked 'em !!! The bass player, Bob Boucher, is still in Brum and was offered £70 for as many as he had; but he only had one copy too. We couldn't give the effin' things away when we were playing. On a very slightly 'smutty' note; can I just say that The Opposite Lock' club, off Broad Street, used to be packed with classy snatch on a Friday night.

http://youtu.be/etZ-JVFjQoo This was my band from 1972/73, recorded at ZELLA studios in Edgbaston IIRC. Probably sounds dated (or just crap) to many VT'ers now. We used to play at the Opposite Lock (now defunct I guess) in Gas Street on a Friday night. The keyboard player in the band went on to fame and fortune in that he worked for Yamaha and helped develop the DX7.

Very good - I should have known better than to ask ! Incidentally - 'moelleux' . I can never pronounce those French words with a diphthong though.

Hmmm - the Canterbury Scene ! Never really my cup of tea but featured some ace musos. Robert Wyatt = excellent drummer, Hopper = bass (?) and Soft Machine generally were very clever RIP Without Googling, where did Wyatt get the name 'Matching Mole' from Mr Mooney ?

So - the Bears have announced that Dougie Brown is to replace Ashley Giles. Warks through and through so is he a good appointment or should they have pursued a bigger name - Ottis Gibson was mentioned. Have seen DB at Edgbaston several times coaching a young squad and Warks tend to appoint internally; Ashley will be a hard act to follow I reckon. What do you Bears fans think ?

There has been extensive academic research, in cycling circles (well, with my mates anyway) re. fig rolls - it is an important topic ! The consensus is that they have the lowest fat for the energy they provide and digest easily when cycling (or running I guess) to help avoid 'the knock'. Far better than Mars Bars for example .