Really liking this new cut from The Hives, and the video is absolutely brilliant 😅

It was directed by Aube Perrier, and I highly recommend having a look at some of his other stuff.

One example is the rather wonderful video for Harry Styles' "Music For A Sushi Restaurant", and most of his other stuff is equally good 😊👍

My kids (4 and 6) were in charge of music during our morning routine today, and happened upon Radiohead's 'Paranoid Android'. Very picky listeners both, the song got a surprising full playthrough (no small feat at a length of 6:23, or ~24 attention spans!), resulting in one very proud parent.

It got me in a bit of a nostalgic mood, the memories of 'OK Computer' releasing in 1997 flooding back; for those of you who weren't around at the time, or maybe weren't at an age where you were hit by the full force of this groundbreaking album, it was a really, really special period.

I couldn't help thinking that this particular experience was something my daughters would never be able to have, and it's something I could never explain to them; I don't remember the particulars of my life at the time, apart from basic stuff like where I must have lived, what school I must have been at, and there's no putting into words the deeply personal feeling of being, well, me at that moment.

It's more like a taste you can almost, but not quite, recall, a scent, an ambiance amalgamated from every single impression you got from being alive at a certain time. I don't know how to convey that to others, and I'm not sure it's possible.

Anyway, it prompted me to go check if there was a documentary or similar about the release of 'OK Computer', and I found this gem. For those of you who were at just the right time in your life in 1997 for this album to have made an impact, I hope this takes you back in the best of ways.

For me personally, 'OK Computer' was like having my brains smashed out by a slice of lemon wrapped around a large gold brick; an aural Pan Galactic Gargle Blaster, if you will (1997 also happens to be the year that the leather-bound, guilt-edged omnibus edition of "The Hitchhiker's Guide to The Galaxy" was released, which I promptly purchased and subsequently swore to never lend to anyone, having lost all previous copies of the books to forgetful and/or careless friends; but that's another story).

Watching this documentary certainly managed to scratch my nostalgic itch. Good times. I'm curious to know what the rest of you think of the video, should you manage to finish it 🙂

Hi all,

I'm a big fan of having ebooks read to me while I'm doing stuff that prevents me from reading them myself (driving, working, doing dishes, etc.).

I've been using Evie on my Android phone for a few years now, and while it does what I need, the interface is a bit cumbersome, and I wouldn't mind a better alternative.

Evie offers paid Amazon TTS, which I neither like nor use, but also has free support for Google's TTS service (~~not sure if this is his API or just using built-in services on the phone~~ — looks like the voices are Android TTS voices), which I've gotten very fond of. I've logged 200+ books like this in recent years, and I'm very content with the quality of the voices (I use en-us-x-tpc-network).

Ideally, a FOSS ebook reader would support Android TTS, as well as controlling playback/reading speed. Does anyone know of such an app? 🙂

Incidentally, I was always "annoyed" that the only way to get money to Evie was through the Amazon TTS subscription, which I don't need or want. I'm a recent update, they added a new feature: paid background sounds to accompany your story, such as "rain", "train ride", etc. I bought them all, just to show my support, and actually ended up using one of the background rain sounds for the last book I went through, and quite enjoyed it. I think this is a very nice way for an app to allow users to spend a bit more to show their support; paid, non-critical features.

Also, just now discovered that they actually have a "donate" button 😅 Sent a few more $ their way.

I'm a huge fan of changing playback speed when playing videos, and finally got fed up with the cumbersome interface in the official YouTube app on Android (as well as the ads...).

I thought I read that there was a shortcut or gesture that would do it, but can't get anything to work 😥