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Continuing my trip back through the 1981 album charts. 14/06/81 : Magnetic Fields - Jean-Michel Jarre Our fifth visit with JMJ and I've liked his earlier stuff but not liked the later stuff so much and this is chronologically in the middle - so let's see where this fits in, shall we? Hmmm - it's OK. It's obviously got plenty of repetition but he manages to prevent it being too repetitive so I didn't find myself getting too bored. I'd even go as far as saying I  quite liked Part 2, but Part 5 is very odd - it sounds like something we'd have done in music lessons on those little Casio keyboards (who remembers the VL-Tone?). I obviously didn't love this and will never revisit it, but it coulda been a helluva lot worse. We're at #6 in the charts this week on his third week of a seventeen week run with this being as high as it got. The top five this week were Stars on 45 (a dreadful collection of medleys which was insanely popular, having spent five weeks...

Continuing my trip back through the 1981 album charts. 21/06/81 : Face Value - Phil Collins Our sixth visit with Mr Collins and I'm sure I must have heard this one, but I couldn't tell you when - I know it's got "In The Air Tonight" on it though, so I'm at least going to like one track. Well, I think you can guess which track they started with - and yes, I still like it (and no, it's not a bout "that guy who coulda saved that other guy from drownin' b ut didn't" ) . And the rest of it was perfectly fine and all well put together, but maybe just a little bit bland (although there's an argument he could be applauded for his restraint). I'm desperately trying to think of anything more to say about it but I'm coming up blank - if you like this, then I can totally understand that but I struggle to imagine too many people come to it these days and are blown away by it. We're at #10 in the charts this week on his 19th week of a d...

Continuing my trip back through the 1981 album charts. 28/06/81 : JuJu - Siouxsie & The Banshees The women are staging a mini-revival after a fallow period with this being the fifth album  in the last nine with significant female input. And this is our first ever visit with Siouxsie & Friends - they've been mentioned a few times in year-end write-ups as having produced decent albums that we've never met, so it's nice to finally get a chance to write about them. I don't think I've ever listened to one of their albums but I like their general sound and believe this is supposed to be good, so I'm looking forward to it. Yeah, I like this - although I appreciate it won't be for everyone. It's got, to no-one's surprise, a goth/indie sound but it's got much better playing and production than you might expect - and Siouxsie as an added bonus on top. It also gives strong "I bet they were great live" vibes - I can imagine plenty of moment...

Continuing my trip forward in time through the album charts 06/10/26 : Perfecth - Queens Of The Stone Age Our fourth visit with QOTSA and it's fair to say I've not been overly impressed so far - and I've got very little reason to expect things are going to improve here. Actually, it's definitely an improvement - it has strong Bowie and Nirvana vibes to it, with enough variety to be interesting (and lack of variety has been a common complaint on our previous visits). I can't say I loved it on first listen, but it certainly feels like another listen would be tolerable and it might even go up in my estimation as a result.  We're at #1 with a new entry in the chart this week (their second chart topper) and the rest of the top five are Olivia Rodrigo , Michael Jackson, The Snuts (a new entry) and  Fontaines D.C. . And we've got quite a few other new entries to consider this week. The Snuts (#4) The Snuts are one of my favourite bog standard indie bands - they don...

Continuing my trip up Empire's top 20 TV shows of 2025 #12 : Dying For Sex A story about cancer, coitus and, well, lots of other words beginning with “c”, Dying For Sex summons heart and humour from the most morbid of situations. Michelle Williams stars as Molly, based on real-life writer and broadcaster Molly Kochan, whose podcast of the same name detailed her sexual awakening while being treated for cancer. The show begins with Molly leaving her overbearing husband (Jay Duplass) and moving in with Nikki (Jenny Slate), a scatty actor and fiercely loyal pal. What ensues is a deeply moving, tender, and sometimes raucously funny journey of self discovery that spotlights and celebrates sex in its many forms. Williams shines in a performance that requires her to rapidly pivot from deep-rooted vulnerability to BDSM-charged conviction. However Slate is right up there with her, as Nikki becomes a more grounded carer with struggles of her own. Emotional and erotic storytelling at its best...

Continuing my trip back through the 1981 album charts. 05/07/81 : Present Arms - UB40 This was my thirteenth birthday and I can assure you I didn't spend it listening to this album. I am however expecting it to be tolerable, unlike plenty of their later efforts. Yeah, it's at least tolerable with some nice bouncy reggae toons, although the lyrical content isn't always quite so upbeat. Easily the best track for me is "One In Ten" - they may have had three #1 singles later in their career (amongst SIXTEEN top ten singles in total) but this outshines them all because it sounds like they actually care about something. I think I'd go as far as saying as I actually like it - I wouldn't go that far for the album (I'm not really a reggae kinda guy) but I will say I'll be very surprised if I ever meet a better UB40 album. We're at #5 in the charts this week on their sixth week of a decent 26 week run, with it having peaked at #2 in its second week (anot...