In Michael Bay's 'Bad Boys 2', Martin Lawrence drops the unforgettable line SHIT JUST GOT REAL". It seems appropriate to recall that dialogue today as Faded Glamour v2.0 (Keep Hope Inside v54533.0) kicks off.
Over the course of the last two years or so, I've really developed a passion for film. As with music, I'm no practitioner. I have no real aspirations to become a film maker, a screen writer or anything like that. I just like films.
A couple of weeks ago, I had the pleasure of meeting some film bloggers. After that, I genuinely thought that this film blogging lark was something I could do. The following people have inspired me to get on with this: Peter and everyone at Slashfilm.com, the dudes on the Slashfilmcast, my good pal Katie at The Stories That Really Mattered, Alex at Firstshowing.net, Dennis and his menaces at ThinkHero and David at Heyuguys.co.uk. And obviously all the brilliant people involved in making films.
I will be writing a bit about film and maybe even TV, if I can be bothered. Largely, I won't bother with film news but I'll probably link to a couple of things. I'll drop some new trailers. Maybe I'll review films. Maybe I'll just moan. Regardless, it will be something different than what I've done for the last 3 and 1/2 years. The music posts will still appear.
And by way of showing you how both music and film can be intertwined to stunning effect, here are the opening credits from this year's 'Watchmen' film. A beautiful juxtaposition of Bob Dylan's 'The Times They Are a-Changing' and Zack Snyder's envisioning of the alternate future presented in the graphic novel.
In conclusion, Faded Glamour is now a music AND film blog. Do stick around, this is one of many new ideas I've got for the blog. The first step toward world domination. Indeed, the site's also undergone a facelift as well. So we're now on Faded Glamour v3.0 I guess.
Showing posts with label beginnings. Show all posts
Showing posts with label beginnings. Show all posts
Wow, two years of Keep Hope Inside. It's been a bit of journey. In fact, to celebrate the winding path I've led over the last two years, I'm having a selection of guest bloggers over the next week or so talk about their favourite British album of the last two years or so. I'll be kicking it off tomorrow. As for the time being, let us reminisce:
June 2007 [Archived Posts]
June was one of many sparse months on this blog, with only Jade McNelis and Ra Ra Riot being featured. RIP John Pike, the late Ra Ra Riot drummer.
July 2007 [Archived Posts]
Quality over quantity once again. But I did manage to sort out podcast #4, which had some quite frankly ace artists on such as 4 Or 5 Magicians and Elle S'Appelle. And a couple of posts focusing around summer smash hit Umbrella and the return of the Spice Girls. Good times.
August 2007 [Archived Posts]
This month saw me undertake a crazy indepth analysis of a 2006 tiplist for no apparent reason. In other news, I tipped Bat For Lashes to win the Mercury Music Prize (but Klaxons did) and gave Meet Me In St Louis a feature.
September 2007 [Archived Posts]
The beginning of my return to regular blogging, the main things that happened this month were a new podcast (ft. Jonquil, Make Model, Lo-Fi Culture Scene and a 12 minute These New Puritans track) and my You! Me! Blogging! feature. Unfortunately, many of those blogs are looking sadly comatose.
October 2007 [Archived Posts]
A blip in my so-called regular blogging, I only got around to posting the new Bloc Party track ('Flux') and the Lou Reed collab with The Killers.
November 2007 [Archived Posts]
Okay, okay, a double blip. But with posts on Los Campesinos! and frYars, it was high on quality at least.
December 2007 [Archived Posts]
December saw me point you toward plentiful song giveaways and assess the Christmas #1 single situation. I also gave the Johnny Foreigner EP a review of sorts, but with slighly less enthusiasm than the Drownedinsound.com reviewer who awarded it an outrageous 10/10. Oh and I turned 21, yay?
January 2008 [Archived Posts]
January saw me wilt under a mass of university coursework so all that was on offer was a small review of some of the features I did in 2007, including my tiplist. Jack Penate remains the only real success of that, although Foals, Laura Marling and Hadouken! haven't done badly in the 18 months or so since the original post.
February 2008 [Archived Posts]
The real beginning of the blog renaissance which has seen me complete as many posts in 4 months as I did in the whole of 2007. A really quality month of posting, from my Futuresounds tips column, a Brit Awards post to one of my best podcasts.
March 2008 [Archived Posts]
Another podcast dropped, with Frightened Rabbit producing possibly my favourite track to ever open one of my podcasts (even upending the previous month's amazing opening from The Joy Formidable). I amusingly talked about urban music and the new Feeder track, which evoked some expectedly difficult responses! Oh and I began my George Lamb Versus Music feature, which is still ongoing.
April 2008 [Archived Posts]
April saw unprecedented activity on Keep Hope Inside, largely as I was putting off revising for my uni exams all month. I guess the big posts were my White Lies interview, previewing a couple of new Weezer tracks and my Indie Idle analysis. But there were plenty of other highlights including ultCult, Banjo Or Freakout etc.
May 2008 [Archived Posts]
And now for this month, which has seen a fair bit of activity seeing as I had exams until the 22nd. The biggie was my post on a couple of new Weezer tracks, particularly 'The Greatest Man That Ever Lived'. But there's been other interesting stuff like the return of Longwave and an apparent Timbaland produced demo of Ebony Bones.
So yeah, my most successful year in blogging. Long may it continue. The new blog design seems to liked by most and I still have quite a few subscribers. Cheers for sticking with me and here's some mp3s from artists that I've featured over the last year as a thank you gift:
KOTKI DWA - LE BEAU CHARCUTIER
BLOC PARTY - FLUX (BBC ELECTRIC PROMS 2007)
4 OR 5 MAGICIANS - YOUR FICTITIOUS CHARACTER
June 2007 [Archived Posts]
June was one of many sparse months on this blog, with only Jade McNelis and Ra Ra Riot being featured. RIP John Pike, the late Ra Ra Riot drummer.
July 2007 [Archived Posts]
Quality over quantity once again. But I did manage to sort out podcast #4, which had some quite frankly ace artists on such as 4 Or 5 Magicians and Elle S'Appelle. And a couple of posts focusing around summer smash hit Umbrella and the return of the Spice Girls. Good times.
August 2007 [Archived Posts]
This month saw me undertake a crazy indepth analysis of a 2006 tiplist for no apparent reason. In other news, I tipped Bat For Lashes to win the Mercury Music Prize (but Klaxons did) and gave Meet Me In St Louis a feature.
September 2007 [Archived Posts]
The beginning of my return to regular blogging, the main things that happened this month were a new podcast (ft. Jonquil, Make Model, Lo-Fi Culture Scene and a 12 minute These New Puritans track) and my You! Me! Blogging! feature. Unfortunately, many of those blogs are looking sadly comatose.
October 2007 [Archived Posts]
A blip in my so-called regular blogging, I only got around to posting the new Bloc Party track ('Flux') and the Lou Reed collab with The Killers.
November 2007 [Archived Posts]
Okay, okay, a double blip. But with posts on Los Campesinos! and frYars, it was high on quality at least.
December 2007 [Archived Posts]
December saw me point you toward plentiful song giveaways and assess the Christmas #1 single situation. I also gave the Johnny Foreigner EP a review of sorts, but with slighly less enthusiasm than the Drownedinsound.com reviewer who awarded it an outrageous 10/10. Oh and I turned 21, yay?
January 2008 [Archived Posts]
January saw me wilt under a mass of university coursework so all that was on offer was a small review of some of the features I did in 2007, including my tiplist. Jack Penate remains the only real success of that, although Foals, Laura Marling and Hadouken! haven't done badly in the 18 months or so since the original post.
February 2008 [Archived Posts]
The real beginning of the blog renaissance which has seen me complete as many posts in 4 months as I did in the whole of 2007. A really quality month of posting, from my Futuresounds tips column, a Brit Awards post to one of my best podcasts.
March 2008 [Archived Posts]
Another podcast dropped, with Frightened Rabbit producing possibly my favourite track to ever open one of my podcasts (even upending the previous month's amazing opening from The Joy Formidable). I amusingly talked about urban music and the new Feeder track, which evoked some expectedly difficult responses! Oh and I began my George Lamb Versus Music feature, which is still ongoing.
April 2008 [Archived Posts]
April saw unprecedented activity on Keep Hope Inside, largely as I was putting off revising for my uni exams all month. I guess the big posts were my White Lies interview, previewing a couple of new Weezer tracks and my Indie Idle analysis. But there were plenty of other highlights including ultCult, Banjo Or Freakout etc.
May 2008 [Archived Posts]
And now for this month, which has seen a fair bit of activity seeing as I had exams until the 22nd. The biggie was my post on a couple of new Weezer tracks, particularly 'The Greatest Man That Ever Lived'. But there's been other interesting stuff like the return of Longwave and an apparent Timbaland produced demo of Ebony Bones.
So yeah, my most successful year in blogging. Long may it continue. The new blog design seems to liked by most and I still have quite a few subscribers. Cheers for sticking with me and here's some mp3s from artists that I've featured over the last year as a thank you gift:
KOTKI DWA - LE BEAU CHARCUTIER
BLOC PARTY - FLUX (BBC ELECTRIC PROMS 2007)
4 OR 5 MAGICIANS - YOUR FICTITIOUS CHARACTER
I can't really believe it's already been a year (well, a year and a bit now) since I started this blog, as a whimsical venture back in the day. Let's take a look back on what happened:
May 2006 [link to May's archived posts]
So I kicked things off by explaining the reason behind the name of this blog - it refers to the story of Pandora opening that box of hers and closing it, only managing to "keep hope inside". How mythical of me. Posts that month focused on Little Man Tate, Lily Allen and The National. As well a selection of Tony Yeboah's wonder goals.
June 2006 [archived posts]
I published my little 3 day review of Brighton's Great Escape Festival, which in its inaugural year suffered horrendous weather and some organisational problems. Nonetheless, Hot Club de Paris and The Spinto Band put in quite special performances and saved the day(s). The Rakes, Jamie T, Good Shoes and the now defunct Les Incompetents all had some love from me this month. And Peter Crouch, of course. I was also thankful to the much respected Sweeping The Nation blog for pointing their readers to my blog.
July 2006 [archived posts]
This was the month where I successfully predicted the Nationwide Music Prize winners (Arctic Monkeys), although noting Richard Hawley's high probability of success soon after. I discovered the song of the summer in 'Young Folks' by Peter Bjorn And John and also praised The Indelicates.
August 2006 [archived posts
I suppose the big news this month was the publication of my and only interview (and that's just because I doubt I can have a better one!), with Los Campesinos! who at the time had only done one other interview. And mine was better obviously. Although the big news personally was the addition to the Hype Machine, which meant lots of new readers. I found the time to talk about Ben & Jerry's Sundae On The Common where I saw Liam Frost & The Slowdown Family as well as The Pipettes amongst others. I got into a bit of a trouble posting a new Bloc Party demo ('Song For Clay' would later feature on their second album) and the new Monkey Swallows The Universe single. Oops. I predicted the death of Hope Of The States and they've now been joined by Shake My Hand (née Yossarian) whose demo I very much enjoyed that month.
September 2006 [archived posts]
A very good month for finding great new bands with Late Of The Pier, Cajun Dance Party, I Was A Cub Scout and Munch Munch all receiving nice write ups. Add to that favourable single reviews for It Hugs Back, Popular Workshop and The Longcut, safe to say this was the best month of my blogging career so far.
October 2006 [archived posts]
Despite very sporadic blogging due to my hard drive dying and my new tenure at university, I was voted 23rd in the BT Digital Music Awards 2006 which I was "chuffed about". Amazing tracks came along from DARTZ! and Nic Nell as well as an ace Girls Aloud megamix.
November 2006 [archived posts]
November yielded very little, which I apologise for. Nonetheless, we had some lovely new tracks from Tiny Dancers, Mystery Jets and Larrikin Love.
December 2006 [archived posts]
December shamefully yielded even less, which I doubly apologise for! But I did manage to mention Cold War Kids who now seem to have disappeared off the planet. Not that I really saw what the fuss was about anyway. I also noted how great Casino Royale was, and while we're on the subject, Science Of Sleep is a pretty great (if a bit bizzare) film too.
January 2007 [archived posts]
The new year brought my predictions for 12 slightly obscure acts with potential crossover success. Of them only Hadouken! and Laura Marling seem to have received any mainstream attention but the likes of Foals and These New Puritans (who signed to Domino not too long ago) could break through.
February 2007 [archived posts]
A lovely email meant I heard my favourite demo of the year so far, from Johnny Foreigner. I also managed to point people to a new Bloc Party track and live versions of tracks from the new Arctic Monkeys record. I still really like 'How To Save A Life' by the way.
March 2007 [archived posts]
March saw me get off my bum (in a sense) and publish my first ever podcast, featuring new singles from Distophia and Help She Can't Swim, great tracks from previously featured artists and a fantastic acoustic rendition of 'Hippy Jam Fest' from This Town Needs Guns. A shaky start recording wise but that didn't spoil a selection of great tracks. A sneak peek at new Manics material and reviews of The Black Ghosts and Polytechnic also made it onto my blog.
April 2007 [archived posts]
Podcast #2 made it out, with Bat For Lashes and This Et Al making appearances as well as a plethora of new acts. A more healthy month post-wise saw me write about The Libertines "re-union", the demise of Ladyfuzz and Action Plan (the latter seem to be returning as Rosa Fears though), Love Ends Disaster! and post about nice covers from Patrick Wolf and Maximo Park. I even put up a couple of fab radio sessions from The Wombats and Mr P-Wo.
May 2007 [archived posts]
So, we come full circle. A hectic exam schedule and having to cover people at work meant the only action May saw was podcast #3, with a more North American vibe to it. But with amazing tracks from Shut Your Eyes & You'll Burst Into Flames, Assembly Now and a dazzling cover of 'Disorder' from iamchemist, British bands hardly suffered.
All in all, a good year. Admittedly, a bit light on actual blogging posts, but with the advent of podcasts, hopefully you'll still get to hear plenty of new/underrated bands from my blog one way or another. Uni and my old computer dying didn't help much blogwise either but if you're reading this now, then thank you very much. It's meant a lot to me that people have been reading and listening to my podcasts and I hope people will continue to do so. And just for persevering to the end of this post, here's a few tracks by artists I featured in my early days of blogging...
Les Incompétents - Reunion
Les Incompétents - Much Too Much
65daysofstatic - Drove Through Ghosts To Get Here
Good Shoes - Ice Age
Add me on MySpace [link]
Subscribe to my blog feed [link]
Subscribe to my podcast feed [link]
May 2006 [link to May's archived posts]
So I kicked things off by explaining the reason behind the name of this blog - it refers to the story of Pandora opening that box of hers and closing it, only managing to "keep hope inside". How mythical of me. Posts that month focused on Little Man Tate, Lily Allen and The National. As well a selection of Tony Yeboah's wonder goals.
June 2006 [archived posts]
I published my little 3 day review of Brighton's Great Escape Festival, which in its inaugural year suffered horrendous weather and some organisational problems. Nonetheless, Hot Club de Paris and The Spinto Band put in quite special performances and saved the day(s). The Rakes, Jamie T, Good Shoes and the now defunct Les Incompetents all had some love from me this month. And Peter Crouch, of course. I was also thankful to the much respected Sweeping The Nation blog for pointing their readers to my blog.
July 2006 [archived posts]
This was the month where I successfully predicted the Nationwide Music Prize winners (Arctic Monkeys), although noting Richard Hawley's high probability of success soon after. I discovered the song of the summer in 'Young Folks' by Peter Bjorn And John and also praised The Indelicates.
August 2006 [archived posts
I suppose the big news this month was the publication of my and only interview (and that's just because I doubt I can have a better one!), with Los Campesinos! who at the time had only done one other interview. And mine was better obviously. Although the big news personally was the addition to the Hype Machine, which meant lots of new readers. I found the time to talk about Ben & Jerry's Sundae On The Common where I saw Liam Frost & The Slowdown Family as well as The Pipettes amongst others. I got into a bit of a trouble posting a new Bloc Party demo ('Song For Clay' would later feature on their second album) and the new Monkey Swallows The Universe single. Oops. I predicted the death of Hope Of The States and they've now been joined by Shake My Hand (née Yossarian) whose demo I very much enjoyed that month.
September 2006 [archived posts]
A very good month for finding great new bands with Late Of The Pier, Cajun Dance Party, I Was A Cub Scout and Munch Munch all receiving nice write ups. Add to that favourable single reviews for It Hugs Back, Popular Workshop and The Longcut, safe to say this was the best month of my blogging career so far.
October 2006 [archived posts]
Despite very sporadic blogging due to my hard drive dying and my new tenure at university, I was voted 23rd in the BT Digital Music Awards 2006 which I was "chuffed about". Amazing tracks came along from DARTZ! and Nic Nell as well as an ace Girls Aloud megamix.
November 2006 [archived posts]
November yielded very little, which I apologise for. Nonetheless, we had some lovely new tracks from Tiny Dancers, Mystery Jets and Larrikin Love.
December 2006 [archived posts]
December shamefully yielded even less, which I doubly apologise for! But I did manage to mention Cold War Kids who now seem to have disappeared off the planet. Not that I really saw what the fuss was about anyway. I also noted how great Casino Royale was, and while we're on the subject, Science Of Sleep is a pretty great (if a bit bizzare) film too.
January 2007 [archived posts]
The new year brought my predictions for 12 slightly obscure acts with potential crossover success. Of them only Hadouken! and Laura Marling seem to have received any mainstream attention but the likes of Foals and These New Puritans (who signed to Domino not too long ago) could break through.
February 2007 [archived posts]
A lovely email meant I heard my favourite demo of the year so far, from Johnny Foreigner. I also managed to point people to a new Bloc Party track and live versions of tracks from the new Arctic Monkeys record. I still really like 'How To Save A Life' by the way.
March 2007 [archived posts]
March saw me get off my bum (in a sense) and publish my first ever podcast, featuring new singles from Distophia and Help She Can't Swim, great tracks from previously featured artists and a fantastic acoustic rendition of 'Hippy Jam Fest' from This Town Needs Guns. A shaky start recording wise but that didn't spoil a selection of great tracks. A sneak peek at new Manics material and reviews of The Black Ghosts and Polytechnic also made it onto my blog.
April 2007 [archived posts]
Podcast #2 made it out, with Bat For Lashes and This Et Al making appearances as well as a plethora of new acts. A more healthy month post-wise saw me write about The Libertines "re-union", the demise of Ladyfuzz and Action Plan (the latter seem to be returning as Rosa Fears though), Love Ends Disaster! and post about nice covers from Patrick Wolf and Maximo Park. I even put up a couple of fab radio sessions from The Wombats and Mr P-Wo.
May 2007 [archived posts]
So, we come full circle. A hectic exam schedule and having to cover people at work meant the only action May saw was podcast #3, with a more North American vibe to it. But with amazing tracks from Shut Your Eyes & You'll Burst Into Flames, Assembly Now and a dazzling cover of 'Disorder' from iamchemist, British bands hardly suffered.
All in all, a good year. Admittedly, a bit light on actual blogging posts, but with the advent of podcasts, hopefully you'll still get to hear plenty of new/underrated bands from my blog one way or another. Uni and my old computer dying didn't help much blogwise either but if you're reading this now, then thank you very much. It's meant a lot to me that people have been reading and listening to my podcasts and I hope people will continue to do so. And just for persevering to the end of this post, here's a few tracks by artists I featured in my early days of blogging...
Les Incompétents - Reunion
Les Incompétents - Much Too Much
65daysofstatic - Drove Through Ghosts To Get Here
Good Shoes - Ice Age
Add me on MySpace [link]
Subscribe to my blog feed [link]
Subscribe to my podcast feed [link]
Ah the beginning of something beautiful. Or so I hope.
A brief overview of this blog would tell you that it will cover musical titbits and god knows what else I find interesting. But mainly music.
You might be wondering about the name.....I was struggling to think of anything and decided that good old Greek mythology was the forward. It refers to Pandora opening that box of tricks and letting all sorts of rubbish escape, only closing it in time to "keep hope inside".
Anyways, onwards and upwards.
A brief overview of this blog would tell you that it will cover musical titbits and god knows what else I find interesting. But mainly music.
You might be wondering about the name.....I was struggling to think of anything and decided that good old Greek mythology was the forward. It refers to Pandora opening that box of tricks and letting all sorts of rubbish escape, only closing it in time to "keep hope inside".
Anyways, onwards and upwards.
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We're a collaborative British music, film and TV blog. "Trying to find the perfect match between pretentious and pop."
