See also Mary Hopkin.

Delighted to get this for Christmas, a great excuse to revisit @themountaingoats.bsky.social back catalogue and the accompanying essays are as insightful and funny as you’d expect. Very pleased that The Cow Song falls on my birthday, that track was everywhere when I was growing up.

Just watched Die Hard for the first time. It’s great. Alan Rickman looks like Noel Edmonds and the really annoying hostage is the spit of Donald Trump Jr. Merry Christmas!

I’m not really ambidextrous but I write with my left hand and do more or less everything else right-handedly (guitar playing, signing my name on tablets, and so on).

New HMHB just turned up in the post. Excited!

Horror Clowns Are Dickheads YouTube video by Half Man Half Biscuit - Topic

New Half Man Half Biscuit song "Horror Clowns are Dickheads" on YouTube.

youtu.be/p6me60Tdm2g?...

Do repost! #HMHB

The truth has become basic. Trump is a fool who is fucking everything up. There's no more to it than that. But there's only so many times you can write that column. So people are forced to construct 'well actually he has a point' arguments and 'hidden strategy' think pieces.

He’s the dumbest person ever to hold a pencil, let alone political office.

Currently preparing a stir fry to the sound of The Temptations’ Ultimate Collection. I could be wrong, but right now it sounds like the best music I’ve ever heard.

September 5 was satisfyingly tense, focused, raw and tragic, with extra points awarded for only running for 95 minutes. Lovely detailing of analogue broadcasting equipment, too.

Hard Truths is brilliant and penetrating but my, it’s a tough watch. Some listings describe it as a comedy, which is reaching a bit I think. Marianne Jean-Baptiste deserves all the awards.

Did I really just hear a Jonathan King song playing over the credits of The Brutalist?

Went to see A Complete Unknown. It’s OK, very well made, convincing period detail, non-embarrassing portrayal by Chalamet, the two hours go by dead quick. But I can’t really see what all the fuss is about. It doesn’t give a fraction of the insight into Dylan that Don’t Look Back does.

Went to see A Real Pain and was totally floored, it’s funny and squirmy and moving and perfect. More films like this please.

It’s my birthday so I went to see Nosferatu at a cinema in a shopping mall. Genuinely chilling, but the effect was somewhat spoiled by the bold choice of facial hair for one of the main characters. Was constantly thinking “what? why?” during key scenes.

RIP Jimmy Carter, a truly decent man. Also, astonishingly, the first Democrat president to die in over fifty years.

Started watching the Netflix One Hundred Years of Solitude. Never really got the hang of the book but the TV version is ace - vivid, funny and strange.

Very much enjoying Francis Spufford’s Cahokia Jazz. Thick coatings of noir over an intriguing imaginary American city. Deserves a high-end HBO adaptation with a handsome budget for hats and overcoats.

Next time you’re in the UK you must try to see him, preferably in a ruined abbey or similar. He’s a lovely man, you could probably hire him to set a spooky tone at a post-show event.

Professor Calculus would devise some code that would prevent your computer from displaying untruths and there’d be some comedy business with Haddock getting wound up because the Thompson twins couldn’t work their mobile phones.

Wish Herge had lived long enough to do a book in which Tintin takes on an evil Musk-style tech bro who’s trying to take over the world by spreading misinformation.

Lauren Laverne says she has been given ‘all clear’ after cancer treatment Presenter of BBC’s The One Show, Desert Island Discs and 6 Music show says she is going ‘back to work’

Brilliant news! All the best to Lauren.

The line-up for Big Star was original drummer Jody Stephens, Jon Auer of The Posies, Chris Stamey of The DBs, Pat Sansone of Wilko, and REM’s Mike Mills, seen here bashing hell out of a cowbell.

I’ve not posted much recently or been to many gigs but this show is worth commemorating - the Big Star tribute/sort-of reunion at Hackney Church on Halloween. Variously rousing, spine-tingling and heart-melting.

Laughed out loud this morning at Adam Buxton's impression of Anthony Scaramucci in the introduction to his Patric Gagne conversation on the most recent podcast. Pretty interesting interview too, now wondering if I pass the test for being a sociopath.

To be honest, I don’t even know what IYKYK means.

This Conservative vote fiasco is an excellent illustration of the shortcomings of First Past The Post, where you’re forced to second-guess how everyone else is behaving. I’m sure they’ll learn the lesson and come out for PR now.

Thanks for this Alex, your devotion to prompt reporting is matched only by the incisiveness of your analysis. This one was worth the monthly donation on its own!