Category Archives: Stuff I’ve listened to
Glastonbury 2014
I know, Glastonbury is so long ago you can’t even remember it happened. I’ve been planning for over a week to write my traditional Glastonbury-as-experienced-on-the-BBC post, but I found I was just feeling too uninspired. Partly that was down to … Continue reading
Some belated comments on Eurovision
A Eurovision post, a whole week late? That’s s-l-o-w blogging, even for you, Aethel. I know, I know. It’s a function of the way I like to experience the contest – which is to watch the grand final first, then … Continue reading
John Cole: what his death reveals about present-day political reporting
John Cole, sadly, has died. He became the BBC’s political editor when I was eight, and retired when I was nineteen; his was thus the face and voice of political reporting during the period of time when my interest in … Continue reading
The ultimate Pet Shop Boys quiz
Just a quick bit of throwaway fun, this. There might be some proper blogging in a bit, or there might not.* In the meantime, think of this as a small burst of coherent clicks in a sea of static – … Continue reading
Review: Pet Shop Boys, Electric
Like Walt Whitman, all great bands contain multitudes. Think of The Beatles: a skiffle band, a rhythm & blues band, a pop band, and a psychedelic rock band all rolled up into one. So it is with the Pet Shop … Continue reading
Glastonbury: lost in (too much) music
So, another Glastonbury weekend has passed. People have insisted that the unchanging “spirit of Glastonbury” has survived intact for another year, despite the overwhelming evidence to the contrary. Grumpy old people hilariously lacking in self-awareness have filled the internet with … Continue reading
Radio 2 listeners’ favourite albums of all time
The BBC’s “album season” (an earlier strand of which led to me counting down my 7 favourite albums of all time in February) reached its juddering climax last Monday, when Radio 2 announced its listeners’ favourite albums of all time–– … Continue reading
Sci-fi fans like Douglas Adams because he wrote good sci-fi
Today would have been Douglas Adams’ 61st birthday, if he hadn’t gone and left the world a smaller, darker place by carelessly dying in 2001. Google have a celebratory Hitchhiker’s doodle (currently on their search homepage, after today it will … Continue reading
Aethelread’s Great Album Countdown: What, no Pulp?
Yes, that’s right – my series of posts counting down my favourite albums of all time has now entered the afterlife. You’d think that, having told you yesterday that my favourite album of all time was Suede’s Coming Up, today … Continue reading
Aethelread the Unread 
10 songs to explain the 1980s
The Guardian recently posed what it called a ‘Playlist challenge’: to select 10 songs that would ‘explain the 1980s’ to people who were too young to experience them first hand. [Oh, ok, it’s not actually recent at all. The truth … Continue reading →