Instagram update: St Paul’s Cathedral (evidently the most photogenic building in the world), Suffolk (also known as The Shire), football training with work collleagues; Andrew McMahon live in concert (in a church, no less).
How a terrible misidentification of two people with no connection to the Boston bombing spread so far, so fast.
One can only imagine the awful ordeal that befell the already stricken family of Sunil Tripathi, a Brown University student missing since March, as he was misidentified as a suspect in the Boston bombing. Sunil’s body was recovered from Providence Harbor on April 23rd. The Facebook page set up by his family to raise awareness continues to receive messages of condolence from across the world.
Is seeing the same band twice in the space of six months a little pointless? No way! Not when my appreciation for The Gaslight Anthem’s songs has soared in that time.
Everybody’s baking now, even me. This was my attempt at millionaire shortbread. Paul Hollywood eat your heart out.
The View from The Shard.
What is about humans that we insist on climbing to the top of things? It must surely come from some primal instinct from millions of years ago to find higher ground. Clearly, some part of that instinct remains, if people are paying £25 to go atop the Shard, tallest building in the EU.
For me, having spent most of the building’s construction in nearby New Cross I saw the less grandiose parts of the building, including its time as the tallest concrete stump in the UK. So really, I never had much of a choice but to eventually fork out the money. I just wish it had been on a calmer evening with gentler wind.
At the top, the visibility was thankfully quite clear. Planes flew quite close within what could only have been a few hundred metres. Above the open-air deck were the building’s radiator floors; the noise they made very much similar to the passing aircraft. Having followed the progress of the Shard since the very beginning, it felt incredibly surreal to be standing at the top of a building that I had first laid eyes on in the form of Renzo Piano’s original sketch.
My iPhone’s camera didn’t handle the night conditions too well, spectacular though it was to the naked eye. I plan to go back, maybe in the summer, for better pictures. Is it worth the £25? I suppose it is, given the main viewing decks in New York charge the same in dollars. Would I buy anything from the gift shop? Absolutely not. The main downside of experiencing The View from The Shard is losing the ability to appreciate the exterior beauty of this building when you’re standing inside.
Had a blast over the weekend. Having suffered the personal ignominy of moving out of London and back to Suffolk (no offence), I’ve really come to cherish the times that I get to steal myself away to the city. A couple of weeks off work presented just the opportunity.
Seeing Sigur Rós in Brixton occupied my Saturday night and really, if you’ve waited as long to see a band as I had to see Sigur Rós, normal concert expectations tend to go out the window. As they played songs from Takk… andthe untitled album - ( ) - I was transported back to the first times I heard those tracks, over six years ago. Let me just say it’s difficult to forget the first time you hear certain songs. And, by quite an impressive coincidence, I learned that a friend-of-a-friend was in fact the band’s merchandise manager. Furthermore, two more friends will be seeing Sigur Rós in two different cities before this month is out. Everyone loves Icelandic post-rock!
If Sigur Rós on Saturday was an ethereal spectacle, The Lumineers on Monday night turned out to be an altogether more upbeat experience; their songs so upbeat that even the band members without mics could be seen singing along.
I’m looking forward to closing out the month with Gaslight Anthem in a venue other than Brixton Academy and I’ll be snapping up tickets for Band of Horses, Tom Odell & Jake Bugg come payday. Which reminds me, back to work soon…
So begins March, the month of many concerts.
Is this the future of the beautiful game?
That’s the question Jogabo is asking with their new Foursquare-esque app for footy. The goal is clear: find games in your city in a simple, effortless manner.
The idea grabbed our interest, but the video seized our attention. More specifically, “Jogabo connects you with the players in your city and allows you to find, organize and share games.” We’ve had a look at the app, and we like where this is going. Maybe you’ll do the same so we can get kicking. [Posted by Eric]
Looking forward to using Jogabo. Social media and football coming together? I’m all over it. And, as everyone knows, uptake is everything.
I did intend to update more than once a month. That would be easier if I had more interesting things on my plate than work. Anyway, this is January so far.
(West Ham Utd vs Manchester Utd, Cutty Sark, a portrait of Jarvis Cocker; snow)
Before we move forward, let’s take a step back.
2013 will bring new stories, and writers will continue to unveil value in the context of our day-to-day lives. But before we jump ahead, we really should take a step back. The internet is a wonderful place, but our constant consumption of content allows us to forget which stories were truly compelling, creative, well-researched, and told with conviction. For the second year in a row, I have compiled what I consider to be a list of the best writing in football. This year, I called upon some of the game’s most influential voices to reflect on how writing best interpreted, dissected, and brought meaning to the beautiful game.
Consider this project to be a sort of anthology. The games will be remembered in history, but our reactions and our stories could have been forgotten. Instead, they’re here.
View some of the best football writing that 2012 had to offer:
(Note: Titles in the PDF link to their respective URLs. For the sake of continuity and accessibility, we did not feature pieces that were only available offline or behind paywalls)
Thanks to the list’s contributors: Laurent Dubois, Richard Whittall, James Tyler, Gwendolyn Oxenham, Chris Mann, Tom Dunmore, Robert Langham, Musa Okwonga, Jeff Livingstone, Ed Malyon, George Quraishi, Maxi Rodriguez, Kevin McCauley, Elliot Turner, Dominic Vieira, and Stefan Bienkowski
Design by the amazing Dan Gribbon, of 3nil
Compiled by Eric Beard
Finally, thanks for your support throughout 2012. Here’s to another year full of vibrant conversation.
So pleased and humbled to make it onto AFR’s list of the best football writing of the 2012. I find myself in tremendous company.
