I dragged a few chums along to see Nine Inch Nails at the Astoria tonight, not sure what everyone thought of the band though - maybe a little noisy? maybe a little too much angst? Personally I loved it: the new live version of Nine Inch Nails as a band seem much more focused than the previous incarnation. There was no need for an encore as the length of the set was bang on, Mr Reznor looked in fine fettle and special mention must be given to the new mad guitarist who managed to invent a few new rock star poses - my favourite being a handstand behind a guitar amp whilst still playing the guitar. Better descriptions of the evening can be found over here, however one thing these descriptions will miss out is the character standing next to me all night. I christened him 'Disco Dave' - dreadlocks, leather gauntlets (for want of a better word), and a glowy ball thing which he seemed to like playing with... oh dear, oh dear, oh dear

It's been almost six days since my last cigarette, does that count as quitting? Strangely I don't have a huge urge to smoke, although I have been avoiding situations where I would normally spark up (ie pubs...), the only real problem is one of boredom. This should be handled by my shiny new handheld game consoles, however I've pretty much clocked all the original games I got for those. I've got a few more on order, hopefully they will last a bit longer...

The other problem I seem to be having is one of concentration, now what the hell was I about to write? Nope it's gone, here's some linkage to fill the space:

Rubber Johnny - Chris Cunningham's latest short film, look's very... troubling
My Upcoming.org profile - in case anyone is interested in what gigs I'm going to, looks like it could be very handy.
Left over pictures from Easter - your not missing anything
Some angry music from a new CD I bought on a whim.
Something special for any fans of The Authority.

Loud Music...

Alec Empire - The Futurist
Mildly annoying CD: Alec Empire, ex-head honcho of Atari Teenage Riot (I'm assuming they are no more since Carl Crack died) and head honcho of Digital Hardcore Records makes a slightly boring CD. Once upon a time he could make music far noisier than any 'rock' group. Now he appears to need 'real drums' and 'real guitars' - pah! What happened to the scary samplers and weird machines that go SKREEEEEE! and THLUNK! It's a shame really, this is the sort of album that Pitchshifter were doing about 10 years ago, not really something I'd consider being from calling himself a 'Futurist'. Still, when your in a really bad mood due to nicotine withdrawal it has a certain charm.

MP3: Make Em Bleed

Apparently it only takes two days for nicotine to leave the human body... I think this is a filthy lie.

Right, here are some pictures of Pac Man's big night out, he's off to Manchester for the rest of the weekend for the footy, as long as El Padgeto doesn't lose him.

I'm off home for a somewhat quieter weekend, I'm going to have a go at quitting the fags while I'm away, nothing like the calm atmosphere of a family get together to help get over the cravings - not. If this doesn't work I'm seriously thinking of joining some sort of support group since my friends are absolutely no help, I mean come on! Can someone just try to be disapproving once in a while? Saying something along the lines of... "put that stupid fucking fag out Phil, you're stinking the place out and you're going to die a horrible pointless death if you carry on like that" would help out no end.

Kicking it old skool with a bit of help from Pacman...

This is what happens when you buy a silly amount of videogame hardware and software from Lik-Sang, they start giving you free stuff - for free! This is a Neo Geo Pocket Color fact fans, quite nice really - think GameBoy Color with a nicer control pad and the ability to tell you your horoscope, could this be the world's only psychic console?

There's something to be said for returning home from a shitty unfulfilling day at work to find 3 new CDs, 4 new comic books (count 'em!) and a brand new shiny 2 Meg internet connection waiting for you. I've spent tonight greedily sampling all of them; here is something to listen to from Out Hud, The Perceptionists and Angels of Light. Yes I know there not exactly top 40 material, but I'm sure someone will enjoy some of the music.

As for the comic books I can heartily recommend Garth Ennis's Adventures in the Rifle Brigade, tally ho old bean!

first impressions...

The Perceptionists - Black Dialogue
Bit worried by the first two songs on this CD from hip-hop 'supergroup' The Perceptionists, they were a bit too "look at us, we rap better than you" for my tastes. Fortunatly El-P comes along on track 3 with some really sick beats and the rest of the album settles down into more political and personal fueled lyrics. Plus they do a luurve song, and Darth Phil is a sucker for those.

MP3: love letters

Angels of Light - The Angels of Light sing "Other People"
The Angels of Light remind me of Sophia, both groups are contain a collective of musicians lead by a frontman who has a past involving a well respected yet very noisy band - Robin Proper-Sheppard with The God Machine, and Michael Gira with The Swans - and both of these frontmen have now eschued there noisy past for quieter almost folk music influenced tunes. However Michael Gira was always the nastier one, his songs deal with the darker side of human nature - case in point Michael's White Hands on this CD, I wonder which twisted fallen superstar this could be about. Still this is possibly the most accesible work he's done, hopefully more people will be tempted to listen to him now. Oh, and his backing band on this CD definitely merit attention, he wasn't wrong taking Devandra Banhart under his wings and he's not wrong with Akron/Family.

MP3: My Sister Said

Out Hud - Let Us Never Speak Of It Again
I like this, I want to go to clubs that play this sort of dance music. It wears its 80's influences firmly on its sleeve, has the sort of tempo that doesn't require drugs to appreciate fully, perfect music for sunny spring time weather.

MP3: It's for You

So they made a film of my favourite comic book character John Constantine...

What did they do right? Well the devil was kind of cool, and Keanu's one finger bsalute to him at a certain climatic point was pure Constantine.

Bad points? Well where to begin? We'll the blindingly obvious one was making him American, then giving Keanu Reeves the main role; Neo just lacked all the charisma, wit and nastiness that makes the character so interesting. Then there was making Constantine some sort of freelance exorcist, what happened to the magic? The somewhat addictive relationship he has to the occult in the comic books was pretty much nowhere to be seen... I could rant on all night, well if I could be arsed - but I can't. Basically if you like the comic books don't bother with it, if you haven't read the comic books... erm, read them instead! If you don't like the comic books then I really can't help you.

I have some nicer music for you today, from Prefuse 73. It's a bit of an odd one which really needs to be listened to in the context of the whole album (hint: buy it!), but the last minute of the song is just too lovely to pass over.

OK, word on the street is that Japanese PSP's play American PSP games (and vice versa), but not movies. Oh no what will I do? I really wanted to be able to watch a tiny version of Resident Evil: Apocalypse on my pride and joy, that's obviously the main reason I bought it. /sarcasm mode off.

Seriously though, Wipeout Pure has now been pre-ordered so hard it leaves a stain, and Tony Hawks Underground 2 Remix better wipe that smile off it's face cos that's clearly hankering for a pre-ordering too.

...I may be getting too excited about videogames again.

glitchy hip hop soul thingy...

Prefuse 73 - Surrounded By Silence
Scott Heren aka Prefuse 73 has always made these wonderfully strange hip hop influenced albums, full of little tunes which threaten to fall apart at any minute, and almost impossible to listen to in discrete sections. I've always thought that to fully appreciate his music you have to listen to his albums in one go rather than picking your favourite songs out, something that the iPod generation (and I'm counting myself in here too) find difficult to do. This album is still best appreciate in one sitting, but he has a new trick: lots and lots of collaborators, well over half of the tracks feature a helping hand from some other musicians, mind you he can still really screw wity your head when he wants to.

MP3: And I'm Gone. (Feat. Prefuse vs Piano Overlord vs Broadcast vs Cafe Tacuba)

I've made it through another weekend without any injuries, which is always nice. This time the main event was the last Saturday home game for Spurs of the season, a good day even though I almost managed to fall asleep during the second half through drinking a little bit too much before the game - oops!

Also been playing rather alot of the new Resident Evil game, and rather good it is too. Gone are the slow George Romero-esque zombies and in comes a village full of Spanish psychopaths. Not really scary yet, I think games still have some way to get before they reach the same levels of films, but quite shocking in places especially the first time you see your character meet his end at the hands of a chainsaw wielding nutter. Very messy.

St Patrick's Day is over, and all I'm left with is a vague feeling that I want to kill about half the people in Woking. Especially those who think a mullet is a cool haircut, who wear sweat bands on there wrists as a fashion statement - Nathan Barley's basically, but with less finesse...

Anyway, on a pleasant sunny afternoon like this I expect you would like some pleasant sunny music? Well, tough! Life sucks, get a hat and then listen to some very harsh hip-hop from Dälek.

difficult hip hop...

Dälek - Abscence
Dälek are not for the faint hearted, they are a hip-hop group who have collaborated with people such as Techno Animal, Kid606 and Fäust, yet somehow make more noise when they are on there own. Some of the tracks on this CD approach levels of noise only found on albums by Japanese noise artists, the lyrics are bleak and delivered with a bitter sneer, if there is one weak spot I'd say it was the beats - a little on the 'whack' side rather than the 'dope' side. Although with all the glorious swirling noise surrounding each track it's a wonder that any beats can get through, never mind.

MP3: Ever Somber

I'll take it from you, homie, you'll see, cause you know the Leprechaun is the real O.G.

Happy St. Patricks Day Internet!

Brand new shiny NIN video for those keeping up... Right Click and Save As

::. Sonar2005 .::



In an ideal world, I would get off my arse and organise a trip out to Sonar this year. It looks like the sort of thing I would enjoy...

Oh my...

Just finished watching Oldboy, great film - quite touching in a really wrong way; ignore the quote on IMDB about it being "an average revenge film with an extremely weak payoff", whoever wrote that is clearly an idiot.

Pretty much guaranteed to put you off sea food though.

If you've been hanging around the right geek blogs recently (Engadget, Gizmodo and Boing Boing spring to mind) you may have come across the "what's in your bag" feature where people post pictures of all the crap they lug around day to day.

Flikr has a good gallery here; Laptops, iPods and hip reading materials seem to be the standard fare, although this one bucks the trend somewhat - iPod mini, wallet... Beretta 9mm with laser sight - wtf!!!

Anyway, I thought it was time I joined the trend, so here is my slightly less impressive selection of day to day necessities...

For anyone planning to mug me and put the contents up for sale on eBay what you have is:

• Ninjatune Wax Sack Mk3 with detachable 7" bag
• Japanese PSP with Ridge Racers
• Japanese Nintendo DS with Mario 64 DS and Warioware Inc.
• Lumines for the PSP
• Piopsaru Academia for the PSP
• 6 pens (various colours)
• Thumb Strap for DS
• Packet of berocca multivitamins
• iRiver H320 power adapter
• PSP power adapter
• Nintendo DS power adapter
• Sharp GX-30 power adapter
• Japanese to UK plug adapter
• USB 2.0 cable
• 32 assorted Gamboy Advance games

I haven't got a hope have I?

I have some more music for you to listen to. I feel that I should warn you that these songs should not be approached by amateurs - professionl music fans only please! Click here for some Old Man Gloom and the mighty Jesu.

serious metal...

Old Man Gloom - Seminar III: Zozobra
Old Man Gloom are a sort of doom/sludge/whatever-you-want-to-call-it metal super group. I know of them as they have members of Isis and Converge in there ranks which was good enough for me to start listening. They seem to me to be a very intense group, not bothered by conventions, taking a an almost primeval approach to music. This album is probably as intense as they get: one song, 30 minutes long. Obviously posting the entire album would be taking the piss, so here are the edited highlights taken from the tortuga recording website:

MP3: Zozobra(clip)

Jesu - S/T
Yes I know I already own the Japanese version and yes this version is basically exactly the same. /phil mumbles something about rumours of the UK version being mastered slightly differently. Still, it now gives me a chance to share some of there music. OK, here is Friends are Evil, if you can make it through the first 1:46 of brutal pummelling guitars you'll be confronted by a wall of noise that should take your breath away if you are in the right frame of mind. From then on the song piles on the atmospherics, whispered sad vocals, an organ line floating above everthing, there's even some vocal harmonies in the middle (you would never have heard that in Mr Broadricks earlier work), and all the time layer upon layer of guitars giving the song more depth than many bands could dream of. Fantastic stuff, although I doubt anyone else I know will like it...

MP3: Friends are Evil

I'm starting to annoy myself when drunk - I need a drink that is going to make me all swarve and sophisticated ala James Bond and his martinis, or at least allow me to get home and not fall asleep on the sofa with the TV on full volume using a packet of crisps as a pillow.

Right, as the owner of darthphil.com and a worryingly large collection of Star Wars Lego I am bound by law to comment on the new Star Wars trailer. Well, I am now officially excited by the next film, the bits in the trailer showing the emporer busting out some serious dark side skills have rekindled my interest. Of course I've felt the same way about the last two films and have been let down both times, but I can be a bit of an optimist sometimes (admittedly very rarely) so you never know...

Anyway if you want to watch it you have to join StarWars.com (yes, of course I'm a member) or you can head off to your friendly neighbourhood torrent site.

The old comments have been un-nuked, Blogger completely restructures archives once you turn there comments. This screwed the site up royally.

OK, went into London last night for drinks with a client. Stupid thing is it's a client I've hardly done any work for in almost two years, and they had this 'celebration' in one of the smallest pubs you have ever seen. OK, it may have had character but when I'm binge drinking I demand practicality: a large bar area with easy access, no stairs to deal with between the bar and drinking area, and a reasonable amount of space to make drunken gestures in. Went on to some bar in central London which was kind of OK, to be honest though what with all the trudging around between bars I kind of hit a 'I'm getting bored of drinking'-wall. Pictures are here if you are desperately bored and want to click on something.

w00t! It's Friday.

To help you through the afternoon, and as part of my continuing quest to get people to listen to the same music that I do, may I present a couple of tunes for you to listen to. They are from Mr Trent Reznor's Nine Inch Nails and Mr Ian Mackaye's The Evens, enjoy.

PS I appear to have fucked up any archive links by turning on the blogger comments, which may not be working properly anyway... arse!

old friends...

Nine Inch Nails - The Downward Spiral (Deluxe Edition)
I have absolutely no need to buy this album, I already have the normal version and two versions of the companion remix album (Further down the Spiral). All this has going for it really are 3 demo versions of songs that I don't own, and it's on Super Audio CD - not that does any good to me as I don't have a Super Audio CD player, so the 5.1 channel mix is wasted on me. But anyway, ignoring those facts what we have is an absolute classic album that still sounds fresh even though it's 10 years old. Written and produced during one of Nine Inch Nails more 'violent' phases hinted at by song titles such as Mr Self Destruct and Big Man with a gun it gained some notoriety by being recorded at the house where the Manson Family murders happened. Despite the violence and bleak subject matter there are some moments of beauty. You should all know about Hurt from the Johnny Cash video, A Warm Place sounds like a less harsh version of what M83 have started to do, and then there is Piggy - my sometimes favourite song on the album, which you can listen to here.

MP3: Piggy

The Evens
Self titled debut from duo comprising of Iam Mackaye from Fugazi and Amy Farina who was in The Warmers one of those short lived Dischord bands who release one or two brilliant albums and then disband. Anyway, we're into gentle Fugazi territory here, quite minimalistic at times which isn't suprising considering the line up. A very good album for grown up punk rock fans, my only issue with it is the non-inclusion of the brilliant Vowel Movement from Pancake Mountain (if by some minor miracle/misfortune I end up with kids, they are so growing up watching that program).

MP3: Shelter Two

The old comments have been nuked, comments are now running off Blogger ,like the rest of the site - the assimilation process is almost complete...

Darth Phil the lonesome Sith Lord has seen off those other pretenders who used to be on the front page. We're kicking it dual lightsabre style now baby! Not wanting to blow my own trumpet but I'm quite pleased with the new background, turned out alright with just a dodgy copy of Paint Shop Pro and an old(ish) camera phone.

I've also tidied up the menu a bit to get rid of the links that I don't think were being used. I've also added a search box in case you are wondering what that text box under the word 'search' is all about... /condescending mode off Changes will filter through to the rest of the site when I can be arsed.

OK, could this be the rudest thing to ever be shown on UK childrens television?

Fern Cotton and 'creamy muck muck' (dear god you can actually get a t-shirt with that on). Hands up who else is thinking Bukkake! No one? Oh crap...

I get paid a stupid amount of money (in my opinion) to mainly make crappy websites for companies/agencies who think making a button change colour when you hover over it is clever. When people come up with feats of programming like this I feel slightly embarrassed...

So, we're playing the new Doctor Who for laughs are we? A rampaging army of shop manequins controlled by a blob under the London Eye, man-eating wheelie bins and Chrishtopher Eccleston as a cheeky Northern doctor... Hmm, I know the old Doctor Who looks cheesy nowadays, but at least it was able to make me hide behind the sofa back in the day. Surely with today's modern special effects we can do a bit better than that? Not that I've downloaded a dodgy copy off t'internet - oh no!

In other 'slight disappointment news' and being the rampant consumer that I am I got a new PSP game today: Piposaru Academia, or Ape Escape Academy to give it its Western Name. Monkeys and Minigames, should be a winning combination. Well, compared to my other games (the white knuckle roller coaster ride that is Ridge Racers, and the almost zen like transcendental genius of Lumines) it falls a bit flat - not enough minigames that are a bit too harsh at time, doesn't help that being pretty much all in Japanese I haven't got a clue whats going on.

Just finished watching I heart Huckabees, a comedy about a team of existential detectives and all sort of deep probing questions that keep you awake at night. I'd love to be able to write something about it, but I'm not very good at writing about philosophy and to be honest I'm not sure I've got my head around the idea of exitentialism just yet, I'll leave it at "the film is very funny and will make you think" for the moment. Cop out or what?

I'm toying with the idea of some sort of nervous breakdown to avoid Mondays, the question is do I go for subtle sobbing at my desk or a full on 'Michael Douglas in Falling Down'-esque frenzy of violence and destruction? That is the question...



There is a new Battlestar Galactica that you may have heard of. I can't say I've watched much of it but I'm tempted to indulge in the DVD set partly because whoever is in charge of promoting it really really knows what they are doing. The whole of the first episode is available online (legally! *gasp*), along with DVD-esque extras, they've even started to offer podcasts with episode commentaries which you can listen to whilst watching the episodes. All of this is free, none of the normal overpriced premium content (yes stand up StarWars.com, I'm talking about you), I'm impressed.

Eh? I'm playing the new Metal Gear Solid game on my PS2 at the moment and I've just got to a bit where I need to save. To save the game you have to contact a character called 'Para-Medic' over your radio, OK fair enough I'll play along. Did all that and the game saves itself on my memory card, then for no apparent reason the main character Snake (or Naked Snake as his codename is in this game - Freud would have a field day with that) has just started having a conversation with this 'Para-Medic' about the 40th anniversay of Godzilla and how I should see the original in Japan...

I can't stop listening to Nine Inch Nails, it may be because of the small matter of these tickets:

Some of which are going for silly prices on eBay at the moment.

To the other people I'm dragging along to this gig you may want to point your browsers at this site or this site to download a track or two that has been leaked rather naughtily from the forthcoming album With Teeth.

If that piques your interest the visuals section on nin.com has tons of quicktime videos, the teaser trailer to the Closure DVD shows what they used to be like live, or head off to andallthatcouldhavebeen.com (named after there live CD/DVD) to find plenty of videos of there more recent performances - they have calmed down a bit over the years I think.