What To Do Tonight
Interact... with Coldplay’s new video for upcoming single Ink, which begins with you picking either a knife, compass or fountain pen for your protagonist. Apparently there are over 300 journeys possible, but good luck trying to find one that doesn’t involve chasing around a phantom girl with bits of her body falling off.
See... Curtis Harding at Electrowerkz. The self-baptised ‘slop ‘n’ soul’ star has collaborated with both the Black Lips and, weirdly, Mastodon, and will play the Islington dungeon tonight - and he’ll be touring the UK until next Tuesday.
Watch... Channel 4’s Music Nation. The series has been busily profiling UK music scenes over the past few weeks. Previous episodes have covered grime and ‘Asian rave’, and tonight at midnight Belle and Sebastian and Bobby Gillespie will contribute to a look back at the scene surrounding the Glasgow School Of Art.
The More You Ignore Him
It’s always difficult knowing at which exact moment to make a swift exit during a stage invasion. Despite Morrissey having more practice than most (it’s practically tradition for gigs to end with a mass of prostrated bodies on stage), this video of the latest crowd bungle from Monday’s gig in Essen is a brilliant insight into the decision-making process of when to very hastily put down your mic and scurry offstage.
Clue: it’s when audience members seem to be more interested in fighting each other than looking at you...
Two Steps Back
Britain likes to look over its shoulder every now and again. In fact, let’s face it, these days it doesn’t do much else.
In the grand tradition of everything, Sherlock is based on quite a good idea somebody had in the 19th century - but at least in Cumberbatch and co.’s version there was a smartphone or two knocking about the place. Not for much longer, it looks like. The BBC have done a full 360 and revealed this publicity still from an upcoming special, in which the pair’s dress code seems to be ‘the past’.
Although, to be fair, when the BBC originally tweeted the picture, they did give a nod to the relatively recent art of bad photoshopping by cutting out Cumberbatch’s left shoulder.
Over on ITV, Downton Abbey creator Julian Fellowes - never one to be caught looking future-wards - has revealed the Crawley family will be getting a new dog to replace their previous pet Isis. Isis miraculously vanished from screens soon after Islamic State came to the world’s attention in one big old coincidence.
Fellowes touted Tutankhamun as a likely name for the next generation canine, in keeping with the Ancient Egyptian theme (Pharaoh was the family’s first pet). As I said: the past.
Sunday Bloody Sunday Candy
Whether you thought Chance The Rapper’s Arthur theme tune cover from earlier this year was a twee nightmare or long-overdue reworking of a lost classic, it certainly seems to be the sound he’s committed himself to. Here is the latest offering from the rapper’s group The Social Experiment (also comprising of Donnie Trumpet, Peter Cottontale and Nate Fox) entitled Sunday Candy.
Now somebody just needs to create a series of inconsistently anthropomorphised cartoon characters to go with it.
Lunchtime linkage
Some pop culture to imbibe along with your carton of strawberry Ribena (which everyone knows is the best Ribena):
- Remember when Mark Owen went indie? From Rock’s Backpages certainly does, as this 1997 interview with the elfin Take That chap proves.
- Craving a Serial fix? Slate have their own podcast about the podcast, which you can listen to here. (No podcast about the podcast about the podcast as of yet, sadly.)
- And, ahead of Thanksgiving, here’s John Oliver’s typically John Oliverish take on the tradition of presidential turkey pardoning:
TV's commissions and recommissions: from crime-solving vicars to Scientology
To paraphrase Woody Allen, TV is like a shark: it needs to keep moving or it will be eaten by a giant aquatic dinosaur. With that in mind here are a few of the latest commissions and recommissions from both sides of the pond:
Grantchester
A show about a vicar who solves murders? On ITV? Well, obviously Grantchester was going to get a second series. In fact, it’s amazing it took this long for it to get renewed, given that it was the biggest show on Mondays outside of soaps across its first run.
My Mad Fat Diary
Also recommissioned is MMFD, returning for a third series. Doesn’t quite match Grantchester in the ratings, but makes up for it by being great. Huzzah!
Comments Section
The great Joel McHale is making a show that looks at the always-charming interactions [is this right? - Ed] that go on below the line. Sounds slightly similar to Adam Buxton’s Bug, but with The Soup’s trademark snark. Hopefully it will turn up on British screens at some point (or if not we’ll have a massive whinge about it).
Untitled Scientology Thing
Finally, Alex Gibney is making a documentary film based on Going Clear, Lawrence Wright’s tome on the history of the Church Of Scientology (which we have absolutely no opinion on and please don’t sue us thanks bye). Going Clear actually isn’t available to buy in the UK, as the Guardian’s Steve Rose explains, so it remains to be seen whether anyone will have the cojones to air a documentary on it over here. What is certain is this: that Scientology is, without doubt, a REDACTED REDACTED REDACTED and also a complete REDACTED REDACTED REDACTED.
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Jurassic World: a proper artery-clogger of a trailer
Now this, on the other hand, is the real deal: a proper full-fat, artery-clogger of a trailer. There are a few nice callbacks to the original Jurassic Park - mosquitos in amber, galloping Gallimimus, that big gate - but also some new stuff: most notably A DINOSAUR EATING A SHARK!!
In fact, all that’s really missing here is Jeff Goldblum’s maniacal laugh, and there are enough versions of that on Youtube to last you a lifetime anyway:
Shame they couldn’t include the superior melodica version of the original theme tune, mind:
How are you feeling about Jurassic World? Confident? Pessimistic? Aroused? (You probably shouldn’t be feeling aroused, to be honest.) Let us know in the comments or on Twitter @guideguardian
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Like short, uninformative teaser trailers? Then you'll love this short, uninformative Game Of Thrones teaser trailer
Follow the Three Eyed Raven. Gain the power of #TheSight: http://t.co/9fNrrJIGHG https://t.co/4RhAiTR9tw
— Game Of Thrones (@GameOfThrones) November 25, 2014
Game Of Thrones won’t return until spring, which means you’ve got months and months of ambiguous teaser trailers to look forward to. Here’s the first, which lasts for about a millisecond and has absolutely zero new footage. There’s also a website, where you can sign up through Twitter or SMS to receive The Sight which, in non portentous fantasy speak, seems to just mean spammy updates from HBO. Come on guys, at least show us someone’s head getting squished or something.
