well it’s a bit foggy and i’m only just beginning to thaw out after scootering in to work this morning in the super-bitterly cold morning chill. but it’s not all frosty, toast reopened last night!
30th bday drinks for bryan – the owner – the bar has fallen off the whole being-closed wagon and there’s a cool place to hang out in the capital again.  i was back playing records there last night.
 
highlights of the night for me were:
 
playing new stuff from dego, joakim, madlib, freeform five and having people sit around nodding their heads. even had someone come up to ask about the new horsepower productions track!
as i left the bar at the end of the night, seeing bryan with a big smile on his face…
those killer super strong james squires. tasty!

in the best possibly unfounded news i’ve heard in a while, the rumour mill is turning with reports that toast may be set to reopen.

meanwhile, the newly appointed editor of bma mag has quit after less than 1 issue! is that a record? spurned applicants from the first round of interviews are furiously reapplying.

it’s been a while since my last post.
the canberra winter got me… i thought i’d managed to avoid a canberra cold this year, but i was sadly mistaken. going out to lexi’s housewarming in the freezing cold on saturday can’t have been the ideal treatment either.
so basically i’m just posting to stay in the swing of things. i was beginning to wonder whether i would just lose interest in this thread, but it looks as though it still has a bit of life.
i’m pretty busy at the moment – have to finish stories on bebel gilberto, koolism and gm cotton by tonight. plus i really really need to get around to doing my itm column, it’s getting on to several months since my last one.

music i’m enjoying at the moment… well charlemagne’s self titled album is great – kinda like the stone roses doing alt. country. some of the singles coming out on botchit & scarper are great too – deekline & wizard’s bushpig vip, the lawgiverz mix of don’t i feel. prince po’s record is cool. i finally got a copy of the youth group album as well, which i love. shadowlands has to be one of the best pop songs of the year.

so it’s the second day in the life of fortune grey.
where will it go from here… will it be one of those serious blogs where you compile and filter news and interesting stories from all over the place?
or will it be one of those confessional ones, all dark confessions depressing paranoia and seedy corners?
maybe it will end up one of those random blogs. like. this. all stream of consciousness.
i don’t know.

i do know that i love madlib, bit by bats, william gibson, murakami, charlemagne, squarepusher and horsepower productions right now. by the way, does anyone know anything about tim wright?

does anyone read this?

the toast bar above electric shadows in civic was shut down unexpectedly last week. it’s a real blow as it’s one of the coolest venues in the city and has a real vibe compared to the other sterile stainless steel rooms about town. more importantly, toast gave an outlet to some of the cooler music being made in canberra and an important stepping stone for emerging promoters.

and i was just starting to settle into my thursday night gig there, 3 hours of freedom to play broken beat, hip hop, drum’n'bass, garage, house and electro (and whatever else).

the same week, bec paton and i played what was supposed to be the first gig of a residency at gay night cube in civic… despite people getting into the music and keeping the dancefloor packed all night, the night was canned by a manager desperate for more j-lo, britney and kylie.

aaargh canberra!

the smh has been trawling through it’s back issues for the last time they ranked the 50 most influential people in rock. but the gauntlet has been thrown down, who are the most influential in electronic music?

obviously it’s only ever going to be subjective, but here goes (no specific order).

larry heard
timbaland
larry levan
paul oakenfold
andy weatherall
kraftwerk
juan atkins
mad mike banks
jeff mills
afrika bambaataa
negativland
aphex twin
autechre
brian eno
basic channel
jedi knights (tom middleton & mark pritchard)
plastikman
edgard varese
karlheinz stockhausen
can
wendy carlos
coldcut
john peel
cabaret voltaire
giorgio moroder
moodymann
severed heads
snog
premier
madlib
steinski
gilles peterson

who else should be on this list? anyone who shouldn’t be?

how to vote cards are one of the most inane frustrating parts of election time – does anyone follow them? even worse this article suggests that the major parties’ cards are funded by the taxpayer…

my friend lex and i do a radio show every friday night on the canberra community radio station – 2xx 98.3 fm. it’s called therapy and goes for 2 hours, but the second half gets syndicated by the cbaa on their comradsat network to about 50 stations.

it was a mostly music show on friday, lex was slumped in the corner recovering from exams, so there wasn’t too much talking. here’s what we played…

koolism with rodney p – warm & easy – invada
prince po feat raekwon – bump bump – lex
slaughter mob – scavenjah – rephlex
dot-o-dot – vital distraction (track 2) – cdr
bigg jus – suburban nightmare texas size new world order – big dada
acen – dirty raver – tcr
miss kittin – allergic – emi
groovescooter feat quro – my spine (is the bassline) – groovescooter
sun ra – saga of resistance (theo parrish mix) – white label
wagon christ – quadra y disco – ninja tune
orange lozenge – takin it back – cdr
jason sparks feat pauline taylor – don’t i feel it (lawgiverz mix) – botchit & scarper
nick holder – player 1 – nrk
max sedgley – happy (fatboy slim mix) – sunday best
mark rae – mind, body and soul – grand central
tim wright – the ride – novamute
the upbeats – psyesta – loop
squarepusher – tundra 4 – warp
ollo – the lunatics (have taken over the asylum) – groovescooter

this is the first post for fortune grey… will it be viewed in the future as a seminal moment for online communications? who can tell.