i first came across youtube a couple of months ago when a friend of ours dropped a link to some snippets of his currently in post-production first movie.
wow could i do some namedropping here!
uncle ralphy, as he likes us to call him, is going to be very big news. the movie is going to be a hit, it's got real actors and a respected director to support james's (uncle ralphy, james, the less sexy of the Ks, whatever) undoubtedly fabulous script. i've read enough of his stuff elsewhere to trust him. there's also a short, a tv show and more goodies in the pipeline. so i am keeping in touch. oh yes. and that beermat he once threw at me - that's currently in a bank vault for when i fall on hard times.
where was i?
right, so youtube.com. his bit is no longer there, unfortunately, but let me tell you about the site, if you haven't heard of it already. you upload your videos, send the URL to all your mates and that's it, the essence of the thing. but what can also happen is that you spend a whole sunday afternoon reliving your youth and watching 1980s siouxsie and the banshees videos (wow, spellbound was pretty far ahead of its time if you compare it so what else was around then, even the money-no-object bands) and bits of the poll tax riots, and blondie, x-ray spex, joy division, lemonheads...
the one thing i found is that the quality of the videos uploaded varies wildly. the better quality, the better, obviously, but it does also take longer to stream and you may find it valuable to start the stream but put the video player on pause until you've downloaded half of the stream. then you can watch without it guttering at you every 30 seconds.
name dropping part two
and my sister pointed me to the item i've chosen to link to here. that petrol emotion didn't make a big splash in the world of commercial pop/rock music, but had a fairly hardcore following in the warm shores of peel-blessed indie music. i have, on a knackered old C90 somewhere, a copy of their song keen, taped off a peel show (in the days before you were scared to do such things for fear RIAA would shoot you in your own home.) it's been replayed to bits. and i've never found it on vinyl anywhere, as they pressed very few copies of it. years later i got to know three members of the group, in particular the truly lovely ray and ciaran, who are mates of my brother-in-law. even they couldn't get hold of a copy of the single for me. but they kept the video quiet. yeah, guys, we can see you've aged. but you've done so gracefully. some dark years followed that video but what counts is where you are and what you have now. this video shows you full of life, without a care in the world, on your way to achieving a place in the heart of many a young music fan. something to be proud of.
so, go, right now, without further ado, to listen to one of my favourite songs of the 80s. keen, by that petrol emotion
