I remember when grunge became big. Various bands had bubbled under since the mid-eighties, but once Nirvana had a runaway hit with their second album, it was everywhere. Kids that used to wear Champion sweaters and listen to Kylie were now growing their hair long and rocking ripped jeans and flannel shirts. It happens like… Read More

One of the only real memories I have of my granddad is sitting on his knee watching boxing on tv. This was in the days when you could watch a match on Saturday afternoon, and I’d sit there practising punching wondering what a real fight was like. I get boxing. Whilst it is still bloody… Read More

I think I’m still angry with the paleo diet. Before I knew how to spot nutritional bullshit, I fell for it hook, line, and sinker. It wasn’t that I couldn’t see the cracks in its logic, which says eating like our palaeolithic ancestors is the cure to modern disease; it’s that even though I was… Read More

Listening back to a live recording of yourself and hearing all the little mistakes you made is the number one way to get better at an instrument. Smashing something in a rehearsal is fine, and you can have endless takes to nail your performance when you’re recording in the studio. Live playing, however, takes no… Read More

Music was better in my day. The thought flashed across my mind and I quickly stamped the life out of it before the feeling could take root. I was standing in the Apple store waiting to get my next piece of overpriced technology, and I realised the music they were playing was going totally over… Read More

I’ve never been drunk on alcohol-free booze, and while might seem obvious, it turns out it’s not as ridiculous as it sounds. In 2003, a study took 148 students and split them into 2 groups. One group drank tonic water and one group drank vodka and tonic. During the study, the vodka group flirted more,… Read More

I’m not sure why celebrities are more gullible than normal people, but they seem to be; especially where their health is concerned. It seems that something like, I don’t know, eating less, just doesn’t cut it. Ask them to steam their vagina or tell them to drink their own urine, however, and they’ll be straight… Read More

On the 4th of June 1976, the Sex Pistols played to a room of 30 to 40 people in a tiny club in Manchester. After being subjected to jaded glam rock for most of the ’70s, the small number of gig-goers craved something new. They got it. They were so influenced by the performance that… Read More

Sometimes the claims made in advertisements don’t quite pan out. For instance, a few years ago, an advert for Kellogg’s cereal stated that “Eating a bowl of Kellogg’s Frosted Mini-Wheats cereal for breakfast is clinically shown to improve attentiveness by nearly 20%.” This was so wrong, that the brand had to pay out around $4m… Read More

I’ve decided it’s about time to lose a little bit of weight. Not too much, just enough to make me slightly less cuddly than I am right now. As you might have guessed, I don’t really need to put too much thought into how I set a weight loss diet up for myself, but it… Read More