The Maccabees – Given to the Wild: excellent album, much darker than the brilliantly catchy lead single Pelican, which itself takes on a darker feel in the context of the songs. One that will be listened to again!

Florence + the machine – Ceremonials: warble warble, getting a bit interesting BIG NOTE, warbles, bit more of an interesting bit, going on a bit isn’t it? Oh we’re only half way through (repeat). Perhaps slightly over estimated the appetite for such a high number of tracks.

Howling bells – Radio wars: after stumbling on Golden Web on shuffle, I was looking forward to this, and it almost delivers eventually. Despite a pretty slow start, it does pick up towards the end. I reckon if I give it a couple more listens I’ll enjoy it more.

Mi mye – the time and the loneliness: as unassuming as he is talented, Jaime Mi Mye has crafted another wonderfully musical, witty, gorgeous album that you just want to give a big old hug to. There seems to be a pretty good rule of thumb at the moment – Scotsman in Yorkshire releases album = that’s an album you really should get.

Bon Iver – Bon Iver – a lovely gentle reintroduction to the daily commute, warming my cockles on a cold train platform. That last track weirded me out though, it’s like an 80′s soft rock tune tried to muscle its way in…

SBTRKT – SBTRKT – corking album, great blend of chilled out beats with some silky voices, without drifting into the cheese. Achingly cool nephew of the artful dodger.

Coldplay – MYLO XYLTO – what’s up with the capital letters, and general disregard for vowels? Never mind, this is a standard release with no huge surprises from the chaps with the moisturised faces and healthy tour schedule. A good reference for the singalongs in huge arenas.

Foster the People – Torches – Loved it. That “pumped up kicks” tune is bloody everywhere, being played to death, however the rest of album sounds like they’re putting in just enough effort to take it from standard drumsguitarsbasskeyboards into something a bit cleverer, without Trying Too Hard. Nice songmanship too. Perhaps I just expected them to be a bit dull, so they seem better because of it? Regardless, I’ll be giving this one a relisten for certain.

I hope you all had a magnificent night and are still hurting a bit from it. I stayed up far too late watching fireworks and forgetting I had a baby that would be awake 4 hours later. OUCH.

So. Resolutions! I usually make the same old ones that get screwed up within 48hrs of the year starting (no drinking, chocolate, winding up people on the Internet, yadda yadda yadda) but this year I fancied doing something a bit different, a bit more productive, and one I had half a chance of doing for the whole year.

This year, I am going to listen to 104 albums that I have not listened to before.

Me, not listening to any of these albums

That’s 2 a week. All year. Most of them aren’t out yet. Quite a few of them probably haven’t been writtenyet. But that excites me. I don’t have a favourite album from last year because I just didn’t hear whole albums… Which is a pretty big thing for me, I’ve had a favourite album of the year for every year since I was 14. Now a lot of that is the general life disruption of parenthood, and a bit of it is listening to a few songs and jumping off to something else like a musical hummingbird with ADHD. But no more. Concentrate Sean, concentrate!

I’m sure some of it will be rubbish, but some might be better than I expect. I’m trying to do this without any pre-judgements, in the same way Mark Kermode can go into a “big mommas house” movie to judge it a standalone piece…

I’ll keep a tally of what I’ve got planned to listen to and what I have listened to on this post… And if you have any recommendations, do tell me in the comments below!

To listen to:

SBTRKT – SBTRKT
Foster the people – torches
Laura Marling – a creature I don’t know*
Coldplay – Mylo xyloto*
Florence and the machine – ceremonials
The villagers – becoming a jackal
The decemberists – the king is dead
The black keys – el camino
Wild beasts – smother
King creosote & Jon Hopkins – Diamond mine
Lisa Hannigan – passenger
My morning jacket – Circuital

And what else am I missing…?

*yes, I KNOW I should have gotten round to these already. Sorry. That’s why I’m doing this.

I’ve decided to leave March of Dimes.

It’s been an extroardinary few years, and I’m very thankful for the time I got to spend with them, but it’s time to move on and do something new-but-I’m-not-sure-what with music and videos and things Thanks to everyone who’s been a part of it.

Right. Now what happens?

So, the Foxes and Convicts Christmas Special went out last week, and the acts were all brilliant! As a special thank you to everyone who’s listened in over the past year, here’s a special video version of the show – all the Christmassy songs in glorious high definition

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

Featuring:

Gary Stewart

Martin Plock

Silky

Steph Stephenson

and

Tag Team Preacher’s Steve Ward

Also, in a first for Foxes, we’ll be releasing a YouTube playlist of 5 featured songs from the show too, so you can see the Christmassy magic. It’ll be out on Friday.

Till then, enjoy this wee preview trailer for the show!

Merry christmas! Xx

That said, they just can’t get a handle on social media. I have some big problems with G+.

Running the trial almost successfully google-wave-style-choked it, limiting the people that you can share with to a small fraction of the amount of people you *want* to share with… So, they have brought together a group of people to sit and stare at their screens, asking “now what?”.

Also, because g+ has only just launched on google apps, I was using a seperate google profile to use it – now if I want to use my main email address, I have to start all over again… and I don’t fancy that…

I read that Google have canned Buzz, their version of Twitter, to focus on G+. This was after Google canned Wave in order to focus on stuff like Buzz.

Google’s like that chum you have who’s full of GREAT ideas, but stumbles a bit when starting them off. Google do some things brilliantly. Docs, Analytics, tools like that. They’re not that good at Social Media, but why should they have to be? in an attempt to widen their protfolio, they’re in danger of dooming their good work by association with their bad.

UPDATE: I think I’ve worked out what I’m trying to say here… (sorry, I’m very tired)…

By setting themselves up as “the next Big Thing” they have massive boots to fill very quickly – and unless they can claim some big successes (credibly) very quickly, they are inevitably going to suffer from cynicsm towards the hype that they founded.

By becoming a specialist sort of place, for techies and beardwearers, they are probably fulfilling what they should have set out to do in the first place.

Sean will be on the panel during one of this year’s Leeds Digital Festival Lunches, details soon…

So, here’s some of the stuff I have coming up that I’ll be blogging about soon:

Leeds Indie Radio

The Foxes and Convicts shows from the start of the summer were really popular, and thanks to everyone who listened to them! I’ll be recording a Christmas special in a few weeks, and recording a new series of interviews with Leeds Music types in the new year. Drop me a line if you want to be involved!

New Music

There’s loads out there! I’ll do a roundup of what I’ve been listening to, both local and from further afield…

March of Dimes

New Single Sleeping Giant has come out, and given me a bit of an insight into the music market… I have some misgivings about it all to share soon!

Online Tech

Google+ is pretty much knackered isn’t it? I’ll be posting about how Google have screwed up *ANOTHER* launch. (and possibly watching my SEO rankings dissappear…)

…and plenty more besides. So, stay tuned, sign up if you like, and may normal service(ish) resume!

We’ll be naming her soon. No, not CALLING her “Soon”.

All photos ©2011 murricane.com, and are not available for redistribution.

I sent my iPad to you to fix the microphone. You said it was absolutely fine and sent it back to me. It’s not OK, have a listen to this!

Please actually have a go at fixing it this time, rather than taking one look and popping it back in the post. Thanks.