is this music? has arrived...

Yes, that says update. Well, when even Kevin Shields is back in the recording studio and yet your site has had nothing added to it for ages, it's time to do something about it...

For the benefit of the curious, and for those who I've told already but have probably forgotten, "Paintbox" is effectively in mothballs for the moment. Well, sort of. The format had got a bit stale and limiting (from my point of view, I hasten to add, rather than that of the readers!) during work on the last couple of issues, and so it's time to try something new. As for the Elastica-magnitude silence that has followed the arrival of That Issue With The United States Of America On The Cover (which, for the record, I think is possibly the best of all), I've been tied up with a number of other projects that have been fun but utterly exhausting. Most of you, I assume, will have seen the fantastic SOTCAA Monty Python site - a staggering piece of work which I thoroughly enjoyed reading even though I'd written/co-written hefty chunks of it, but there have also been new features for Off The Telly, notably a mammoth piece on "Play School", and plenty of bits and pieces for TV Cream, but the big news is that I've been working on something very huge indeed for The Mausoleum Club. This has involved a flattening amount of work, but I'm happy to say that I'm absolutely delighted with the (now almost finished) result and can't wait to see it published. News of its arrival will be posted here first, of course! And speaking of which... the "Paintbox" site will still be here, and will actually have new stuff added on a more regular basis, but it will be a subsiduary to the forthcoming new site ":Is This Music?" which will be similar but better. Onwards and upwards. And buy Tim Burgess' solo album.

Some exciting new publication news! The Mausoleum Club have just published the first volume of a series of guides to the entire history of "Jackanory", the BBC's long-running regular storytelling show that ran from 1965 until, in the late 1990s, someone decided that child audiences were better served by Fabio and 'Grooverider' and those annoying twangly bug things that appear over the end credits of wholly inappropriate programmes (checks inbox for inevitable outraged self-promoting retort from someone in 'marketing' at the BBC). This first volume covers the 1960s, taking in everything from traditional folk tales told very sternly to Clement Freud cooking food live in the studio, and includes all production credits along with the original "Radio Times" billings (so, if you ever wanted to know what 'Sam Pig' as read about by Dandy Nicholls looked like, now's your chance to find out). This is a fantastic reference work, and in true Victor Kiam tradition, I liked it so much I wrote the foreword. Also over at the same site, you'll find a new section devoted to the online chronicling of the BBC's late lamented "Play For Today" strand, maintained by none other than Dave Rolinson. So, in one paragraph alone, that's two long-running BBC shows that were axed for no good reason and have yet to be replaced by anything equally worthy. Do they think the viewing audience are too busy watching "Dom Joly Does Nothing In Particular" to care? Well, the sad truth of the matter is that they probably are. Oh well, at least the BBC are bringing "Mastermind" back...

While we're here, a quick mention for The 365 Days Project, which aims to provide a new absurdist sound file for each day of the year. There are some fantastic works of sonic bafflement here, from singing celebrity dross to records that were probably originally made for a reason, but have lost all meaning, relevance and purpose in the mists of time. Highlights include Anthony Newley's cover of The Beatles 'Within You, Without You', an instructional disc on 'Picking Up Girls Made Easy', and Richard Dawson's 'Apples And Oranges' - not a cover of the legendarily chart-missing compilation-elusive Pink Floyd single, but arguably even more detached from conventional musical reality.

Those of you who read Fringeworld regularly will know already that there's a new issue out. For those of you who don't, the new issue has loads on The White Stripes, Buffy The Vampire Slayer, and a certain TV's Programme That Ran For Twenty Six Years And Which John Connors Has Never Seen. There's quite a lot on the latter, actually. You'll find more information on the contents at the Fringeworld site, but given that it's completely free and is packed with articles that are well worth a look, you should just send off for a copy anyway! Meanwhile, over at Off The Telly, you'll find the fascinating results of a survey of how adults feel that television influenced them as a child, along with my article on Rentaghost and another instalment of the fantastic Saturday Evening TV retrospective The Glory Game.

Some rather sad news from Fringeworld. John's father had been ill for a number of years, but what always amazed me was John's ability to keep smiling through what were often very difficult times. John's certainly in the thoughts of those of us who know and have worked with him, and I'd like to think that he would be in those of anyone who has enjoyed his wonderful writing here and elsewhere.

I apologise for the lack of substantial updates on the site recently - I have no excuse other than that I've been extremely busy with other projects. To make up for it, though, here's the article on Jeremy Beadle that originally appeared in issue 25, reproduced here to celebrate his imminent return to radio. Elsewhere, you'll also find a couple of new links. In particular, I'd like to plug Kamikaze Butler and Automation. Also, the final part of my massive overview of Channel 4 comedy is finally online at Off The Telly. And yes, I have changed my opinion on "jam" slightly since I originally wrote that...

Those of you in search of interesting reading matter could do a lot worse than check out the following publications. Kettering, 'The Fanzine Of Elderly British Comedy', focuses on the more obscure sectors of homegrown comedy from the 1950s to the 1970s. The first issue looks at the little-seen Spike Milligan film "The Great McGonagall", a stunningly obscure "That Was The Week That Was" spin-off album coinciding with the 1964 General Election, and the bizarre employment of both Kenny Everett and Vivian Stanshall on a Radio 4 children's show, alongside a great article on the underrated world of the UK Sitcom Spinoff Movie. If that's a subject that you're interested in, please have a look at I Hate The Clip Shows while you're here! If you're after a copy, mail Clinty (he of wonderful Peter Cook website The Establishment fame) for details. Over at The Mausoleum Club, issue one of the soon-to-be-regular Gazzette has just been released. This has tons and tons of information on long-forgotten television dramas, and an interview with noted TV historian Dick Fiddy. Also recommended are the new features on TV Cream, which cover the now-outlawed eccentricities of tobacco advertising, and the history of the "Now! That's What I Call Music" compilations up to 1991. I still say volume seventeen was the best...

A quick update to let you know that there's a new Zombina And The Skeletones website. And also that I've fixed a minor formatting error on this page. But come on, none of you noticed that, did you?