A random stab into the shelf of vinyl nominates this as the first taxi off the rank. 

1991 was a cracking year for music and this was crowned the best of the year by many including the NME and the Village Voice.

I actually prefer Kurt and Co’s debut ‘Bleach’ to this as it just feels more raw and distinctive, but this is still a solid-gold classic and was pretty much the soundtrack to my university years. In those opening bars of Smells Like Teen Spirit I am taken back in time 20 years, my long hair in my face, my plaid shirt across my back and a pint of Caffreys in my hand.

It still makes me laugh seeing the little emo kids wearing brand new, matt-black Nirvana t-shirts who were not even a glint in their rather’s eye when this was unleashed on the world. :)

On his show on the London, UK radio station Resonance FM, producer and writer and Joe Boyd selects tracks from every thirteenth record in his vast collection. He essentially jumbled them all up one day and now sees what comes up as the thirteenth choice. A great idea that I am delighted to pinch! Stay tuned for my first selection!

Aha! A tease!

This page is silent.

Still lovely though  :)

Songes: Coraline is a graphic novel written by Denis-Pierre Filippi and illustrated by Terry Dodson, yep, the bloke from the X-Men. It was published in 2006.

It is a beautiful book that is set in Edwardian period France and tells the story of a young lady called Coraline Doucet who is hired as a governess to a small temperamental boy who lives in a grand château in the countryside. All is not what it seems in the house and at night she has vivid dreams that take her to strange places full of fantasy, mystery and sensuality that seem so very real to her that surely they cannot really be happening. Could they?

In my opinion it is Dodson’s finest work, full of his trademark detail, humour and of course Coraline herself is pleasing to the eye and often careless with her clothing ;)

The book is in French and there have been rumours of an English language release for years, yet nothing have materialised. It’s a real shame.

So, using my rudimentary French knowledge, dictionaries, websites and magic itself I am going to translate and re-set the pages in English and post them a page at a time. As anyone who has suffered badly translated videogames and movies will know, a literal translation never works, so I am going to re-write to make it flow better whilst keeping the spirit of the original text very much alive.

If this works, I’ll translate some more of my Bande Dessinee into the Queen’s English.