Franz Bieberkopf

Last of the truly great Bowie albums, 27 Mar 2014

"Scary Monsters" was the last of a run of fantastic albums which commenced with "Stationtostation" in 1976. I suppose it had to end sometime, but now,any half-good Bowie music is always proclaimed as "The best since 'Scary Monsters'".
The fact that pundits so regularly reference a 30 year old plus album shows how good it is.
Great guitar work, less of the weird electronics, good songs with hummable melodies, and, for me "Ashes to Ashes". It sounds like Bowie is conciously saying goodbye to the weird and wonderful music he produced in the late 70s-early 80sl
Like I said,nobody could continue at the quality Bowie turned in in the five albums… Read more

Great fun, 25 Mar 2014

This is two stories melded together.First up is the events of 2001, starting with Simpson trying to get a visa from the Taliban government in Afghanistan and ending with him marching into Kabul with the victorious rebels a few months later.
The second is the history of newsreel and later TV journalism in the 20th century, complete with various reprobates as well as some heroes.
I thought he was a bit soft on Sky News-admittedly it isn't in the same league as Fox News for flag-waving jjingoism,but it is right-wing crap, not remotely comprable to ITN or BBC.

Unusual for Banks,but still great, 31 Dec 2013

Iain Banks (RIP) was a master at novels, either sci-fi or his own twisted view of the late 20th century.
This is unusual as it is,as far as i know, the only collection of his short fiction.The best part of it is the novella in which the Culture arrive here in this solar system in 1977,and dismisses us as being too primitive to be of any note and decide to leave us alone.
Well worth it at this price.