Marvellous

I hope it's a top one. Sultans of Ping eh? Not heard of them in a while, I am jealous! Saw The Fall at Ashton Court festival a couple of weeks ago.. they were nothing much to write home about though. Much shambling about stage, random turning up of guitars to 11 and singing into 2 microphones (when one was more than adequate) - and that was just Mark E Smith. The rest of the band were really tight though, as one might expect after a reputed 57 lineup changes ! Oh well, he was probably pissed. Kid Carpet was the high point earlier in the day and was very entertaining with sampler based sillyness constructed from sampling & bending the sound from electronic kids toys whilst singing over the top. Oh and sampling choices phrases from the local radio station was a definate crowd pleaser !

It's a crying shame that after many many years of exceptionally hard work by the organisers the festival has ended up finally folding anyway. Ah, Bristol Community Festival - I salute you ! Gone but not forgotten.

27 Jul :: 2007 :: Comment / reply

Venice hoofs Folkestone out of the record books

Venice has hoofed Folkestone out of the record books, now a Turner painting of the Grand Canal in Venice has become his most expensive work, at over twenty million quid. Previously it was a view of Folkestone, sold in 1984 for somewhere around nine million dollars.

The Times reports:

Giudecca, La Donna della Salute and San Giorgio, a view of the Grand Canal in Venice from the island of Giudecca in the Venetian lagoon, had not been in seen in public for more than 30 years when it was put on display at Christie's in London last year.

Expected to fetch around £11 million, the painting easily surpassed the previous record sum paid for a British work: the $21,153,800 (£12m) that purchased John Constable’s The Lock in 1990.

2006 :: Comment / reply