After a little under five years, the honeysuckle I planted on my city balcony is in flower - the sweet smell of consistent watering.
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Items by deek
deek deekster: innit
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Honeysuckle
Posted: July 25th, 2008, 11:57am BST by deek
Enclosure: [download]
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Whatever it was I said before, don’t believe it
Posted: June 22nd, 2008, 8:00pm BST by deek
Enclosure: [download]
Driving in the Troodos mountains, Cyprus, with GGF, breathing clean, pine-scented air, soaked in mediterranean sun, I saw tree-lined valleys falling away before us into a heat-haze distance, and instantly asked that we stop and take in the view. I felt the unmistakable urge to listen to what this place might have to say. I took a few pictures, and then I started to make a video. I didn’t prepare this little sermon on the mount - it was spontaneous. Speaking mirthfully of the truth, I was taken by surprise when the truth was actually revealed to me.
As a result of making this video, and being so simply reminded about what matters, since returning from Cyprus at the end of April I have completely and systematically revised my work methods and returned to some long-held but temporarily obscured aims. I’m still not 100% certain of how it happened, but I am bloody glad that it did. It won’t show for a few months yet, but the pieces are now in place, and I am happy to post this video to sort of explain why I have changed, if not quite how.
Wish me luck, I might just need it.
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Whatever it was I said before, don’t believe it
Posted: June 22nd, 2008, 8:00pm BST by deek
Enclosure: [download]
Driving in the Troodos mountains, Cyprus, with GGF, breathing clean, pine-scented air, soaked in mediterranean sun, I saw tree-lined valleys falling away before us into a heat-haze distance, and instantly asked that we stop and take in the view. I felt the unmistakable urge to listen to what this place might have to say. I took a few pictures, and then I started to make a video. I didn’t prepare this little sermon on the mount - it was spontaneous. Speaking mirthfully of the truth, I was taken by surprise when the truth was actually revealed to me.
As a result of making this video, and being so simply reminded about what matters, since returning from Cyprus at the end of April I have completely and systematically revised my work methods and returned to some long-held but temporarily obscured aims. I’m still not 100% certain of how it happened, but I am bloody glad that it did. It won’t show for a few months yet, but the pieces are now in place, and I am happy to post this video to sort of explain why I have changed, if not quite how.
Wish me luck, I might just need it.
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Pompidou, Pompidon’t
Posted: June 13th, 2008, 11:08pm BST by deek
Enclosure: [download]
A muse in front of the Paris temple of modern art, the Centre Pompidou, on being an artist, or not.
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Naturist Camp
Posted: May 17th, 2008, 2:00pm BST by deek
Enclosure: [download]
To all my good friends at MediaCamp Bucks - my apology for absence.
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Bunhill Row - Hill of Bones
Posted: May 11th, 2008, 11:03pm BST by deek
Enclosure: [download]
Bunhill Row, London, an old Quaker burial ground, dating back to the sixteenth century is the resting place of great author and artist William Blake, and Daniel Defoe, creator of the seminal castaway, Robinson Crusoe.
I dropped in to pay some respects to these great architects, on my way back from celebrating Bangladeshi New Year.
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Flat 34 #10: Thinking Twice
Posted: February 8th, 2008, 3:36am GMT by deek
Enclosure: [download]
In this episode, I question the whole deal - to move, or not to move? and visit Brighton to make up my mind.
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Flat 34 #9: Shit and Philosophy
Posted: December 21st, 2007, 2:20am GMT by deek
Enclosure: [download]
Shit happens. Shit hits the fan. Shit gets stuck to your shoe and makes a bad smell. It’s how you deal with it that counts. Do you clean your shoe or blame the pavement? Do you shoot the dog or insist the owner gets training?
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Flat 34 #8: Food
Posted: December 17th, 2007, 8:39am GMT by deek
Enclosure: [download]
Islington Farmers Market happens every Sunday behind the town hall. Good quality fruit and veg make all the difference to surviving the city.
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Flat 34 #7: Holloway Road
Posted: December 14th, 2007, 5:33pm GMT by deek
Enclosure: [download]
The Holloway Road, the A1, red river of metal that cuts through Islington like a molten tributary, runs from Highbury Corner up to Archway, whence it continues to Edinburgh, Scotland. After 24 years, I have mixed feelings about this place, as this episode of Flat 34 explains.
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Flat 34 #6: Underground
Posted: December 10th, 2007, 10:44pm GMT by deek
Enclosure: [download]
I discuss the roots of my caring for the domestic environment, and then engage with the real world by going underground, traveling to work on London’s tube.
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Flat 34 #5: Holes
Posted: December 8th, 2007, 11:00pm GMT by deek
Enclosure: [download]
London in the rain: an exploration of the holes of Islington. Contains less trees than it did when I made it.
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Flat 34 #4: Clean
Posted: December 4th, 2007, 2:12am GMT by deek
Enclosure: [download]
Getting down and dirty means keeping it clean and tidy… episode 4 of the Flat34.com podcast.
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Flat 34 #3: Deek Central
Posted: December 3rd, 2007, 1:11am GMT by deek
Enclosure: [download]
Deek Central, Benchcam and more from the Art Lavatory.
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Flat 34 #2: Coffee
Posted: December 2nd, 2007, 1:01am GMT by deek
Enclosure: [download]
Friendship makes personal demands upon us, even as it generously donates its rewards… episode two of the Flat 34 video podcast. Contains coffee.
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Flat 34 #1
Posted: November 30th, 2007, 10:03am GMT by deek
Episode 1 of my new video podcast, in which I begin the long goodbye to my home for the last 24 years.
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Islington / Book / Cover
Posted: November 26th, 2007, 7:44am GMT by deek
Enclosure: [download]
I’ll be moving out of London in less than a month, all being well, and I’m starting to muse about being here, leaving here, and how to mark the passing of this major phase in my life and the beginning of a new one.
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Boston: Behind the Scenes
Posted: October 31st, 2007, 8:42am GMT by deek
Enclosure: [download]
I went to Boston, USA, to visit my friend Sonia, and to attend PodCamp Boston. It was an entirely different kind of new media affair from PodCamps EU, UK or Ireland. Three days long, very populated, highly sponsored, over-organised, situated in a huge convention centre in the old dockland area of South Boston in a remote, cavernous modern building devoid of any decent nutrition, much of the presentation was well-meaning and educational, but the event was nonetheless mostly about people self-consciously attempting to produce meaningful content which will vie with the Big Boys and wondering when that is actually going to happen. (Stage whisper: not any time soon…) The highlight was Lolsaurs, in which the lunatics took over the asylum.
I kept a pretty low profile, which suited me this time, and was pleased just to hang out, catch up with old friends, and make new friends.
This is a 54 minute camera phone movie, shot on my (now elderly) Sony Ericsson k800i, best served with a squeeze of lemon.
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Everyday Haiku
Posted: October 11th, 2007, 9:33am BST by deek
Enclosure: [download]
what a lot of fun
writing haiku ev’ry day
while i blog elsewhere -
Kilkenny
Posted: October 3rd, 2007, 1:12am BST by deek
Enclosure: [download]
I went to Kilkenny, Ireland at the end of September, hung out with a bunch of friends and generous new media people, and made this 30 minute movie about the experience.
Check out the photos here.
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Sheringham Road Light
Posted: September 27th, 2007, 11:29pm BST by deek
Enclosure: [download]
At this time of year the angle of the sun changes and Islington’s long Victorian streets look quite astonishing.
I made this video in Sheringham Road, N7.
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The Islington Bubble
Posted: August 13th, 2007, 9:18am BST by deek
Enclosure: [download]
“Why, Sir, you find no man, at all intellectual, who is willing to leave London. No, Sir, when a man is tired of London, he is tired of life; for there is in London all that life can afford,” quoted Boswell of Samuel Johnson. But he didn’t live in Islington, 2007, with the lifestyle becoming ever more precarious.
This weekend, a long muse on the mixed feelings I have about where I live, the London Borough of Islington, an idyllic urban bubble in the middle of the insane British capital.
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Duck Weather
Posted: July 20th, 2007, 9:06pm BST by deek
Enclosure: [download]
We haven’t seen such dark, water-bearing summer skies as this for a long time. It’s difficult to concentrate - we’re not used to this monsoon weather, at this latitude.
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They The Wedia
Posted: July 10th, 2007, 4:03pm BST by deek
Enclosure: [download | play]
A mysterious pregnancy. May contain broadcasters.
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Girls Of Today
Posted: July 6th, 2007, 9:19am BST by deek
Enclosure: [download]
I was cycling back from the party last night, and I had not one but three song ideas one after the other. Of course, I recorded them all on my phone. And then, as I came past Mount Pleasant sorting office, where brave postal workers have recently been striking for a living wage, I found myself spontaneously articulating a poem about girls, boys and glitter. Quite why it arrived in a Scottish accent beats me - perhaps it’s a sign of long-held regard for the great William McGonagall.
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Chinwag: First and Second Life
Posted: July 5th, 2007, 11:46pm BST by deek
Enclosure: [download]
Camera phone walk through the Big Summer Party held by Chinwag. At the same time, we’re throwing the virtual version in Second Life.
The Count of crookula 23:56
i had at least five comments saying it was the best sound quality they had ever heard -
Denial: The Nicotine Addict
Posted: July 1st, 2007, 7:05pm BST by deek
Enclosure: [download]
In the first day of the smoking ban in England, Norwegian bass player, nicotine, sex and coffee addict Sjur Opsal discusses his addictions in the pub, smoking his last cigarette.Contains explicit sexual references and scenes of drug usage: not suitable for the innocent.
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Two Bikes
Posted: June 30th, 2007, 10:05am BST by deek
Enclosure: [download]
You can’t point a camera anywhere these days without people noticing - they are too switched on, especially kids. Whether that’s because their protective elders have terrified them into paedophile paranoia, or whether it’s just because they are naturally smart and observant, I cannot tell.
Still, there I was a few days ago, framing some sun-and-shadow which was looking particularly nice from my study window, and on cue, a couple of bikes came into view, propelled by the legs of children. I kept the camera still; I was four floors up and silent; but as the second child passes through the frame, notice how she waves for the camera. I didn’t notice her noticing me, but then, I was busy with the camera.
I’m now wondering whether either her parents, the police or an invoice is going to show up.
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George Square, Glasgow: One Statue Worships Another
Posted: May 27th, 2007, 12:50am BST by deek
Enclosure: [download]
Glasgow, 2007. Inflatable statues bend and sway in the May sunlight in George Square, amid tents celebrating Swedish football. I stared at them; their movements seemed bizarre, as if retching, drunk, the elbow crease of escaping air resembling a stomach convulsing, heaving. Conversely, the arms waved as if in perpetual supplication, in a slavish dance of worship. Such is football.
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Is This Message Any Good?
Posted: May 18th, 2007, 4:02pm BST by deek
Enclosure: [download]
I’m in this short film for Google’s Zeitgeist event which is going to be held this weekend in London. You can spot me easily enough - I’m the one not talking about new media democracy.
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Alpen What?
Posted: May 5th, 2007, 2:56pm BST by deek
Enclosure: [download]
Blinking heck! I thought. There’s a young girl handing out food bars to people on the corner of High Holborn, London. She was with a young man who had a logo emblazoned plastic box on wheels and who like her was passing out dozens of freebie muesli bars.
Or were they muesli bars? Was I witnessing an attack? Was the girl even human?
I thought I’d better ask her.
“You just need a uniform,” she said, “and a trolley like this one.”
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Freightliners Farm Video
Posted: April 14th, 2007, 8:16pm BST by deek
Enclosure: [download]
I found this rather wonderful community-made video on FiveNews website.
Four youngsters report from an eco-friendly city farm.
Jamie Craig, 13, Bethany Scott, 11, Maryam Akerbousse, 6, and Sophia Anderson, 9, from the organisation Children’s Express, took a trip to Freightliners Farm in north London.
They find out what sort of things it does to stay environmentally-friendly.
They also got the chance to meet some of the animals and interview manager Mary Whiting.
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Fabregas Freightliner Fun
Posted: April 14th, 2007, 7:52pm BST by deek
Enclosure: [download]
We were walking in the local city farm, Freightliners, and we could hear the Arsenal Stadium roar as Fabregas delighted the faithful.
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Being Googled
Posted: April 13th, 2007, 6:44pm BST by deek
Enclosure: [download | play]
I went to a studio in Islington, north London, and recorded a green-screen interview session for Brand Fuel a local company who are making a series of short films for the upcoming Google Zeitgeist event in May.
Warning: this is relatively boring. It’s the
uneditedslightly edited recording of your localheropodcaster attending a film and photo shoot. Please look away now. Actually I find myself cringeing on playback at my slight but obvious nerves going into this unusual situation, but it went fine, I enjoyed it. We were all professionals.There are three remarkable things about this event, however.
1. I made the podcast from the studio, which was fun.
2. I got paid £20 just for being Deek Deekster
3. I met Seb Robertson.Seb introduced himself as the “YouTube Guy” and then showed me his video craziness. Kind of like a less-nasty Jackass with Mighty Boosh costumes. Watch Seb’s antics here. I did an interview with him, I’ll get around to uploading that video eventually.
Download Being Googled
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Alien Footprints
Posted: April 7th, 2007, 12:59pm BST by deek
Enclosure: [download]
Found alien footprints in my kitchen, and followed the trail to their craft.
Download Alien Footprints
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Learning to Sing
Posted: April 5th, 2007, 5:41pm BST by deek
Enclosure: [download | play]
I finally got a look at the bird, decided out of pity to help it out, and so we had a jam.
Download Learning to Sing
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Impermanence
Posted: April 5th, 2007, 9:10am BST by deek
Enclosure: [download]
This spontaneous outpouring came as I realised very strongly that all the wealth that surrounds us in the developed world makes us believe in the illusion of permanence…
Download Impermanence
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Boring Spring Bird
Posted: March 23rd, 2007, 9:14am GMT by deek
Enclosure: [download | play]
Sometimes even the glorious annual upsurge of nature can be tedious and irritating. You decide…
Download Boring Spring Bird
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Spring Bird Song
Posted: March 18th, 2007, 2:45pm GMT by deek
Enclosure: [download]
Barnsbury bird sings loudly.
“It’s a combination of spring bird song and waste disposal truck that will always remind me of London.”
Download Spring Bird Song
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Marilyn, by Unio and Petitio
Posted: March 14th, 2007, 7:59am GMT by deek
Enclosure: [download]
I was on the tube yesterday returning from Chiswick, and got stuck at Victoria. “There is a problem at Green Park,” announced the public address system. Certainly there was, I could smell the smoke! So I exited and walked past Buckingham Palace, and into Green Park where the shadows were long and the commuters bundled past royal banks of daffodils. It felt surreal.
When I got back home, I found that Unio and Petitio, my favourite fictional band had uploaded two new tracks, so I made myself a frothy cocoa, and made the lovely magic musicians a nice cheap pop video from my touristic camera observations, before bed.
Download Marilyn, by Unio and Petitio
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Testing The Alarm
Posted: March 8th, 2007, 10:50pm GMT by deek
Enclosure: [download]
Gunnersbury Station, West London.
There was an announcement over the public address system: the alarm in the large building nearby was to tested - do not be alarmed.
The alarm was tested. We were not alarmed.
Phew!
Download Testing The Alarm
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Liverpool Street, Petticoat Lane
Posted: March 5th, 2007, 11:03pm GMT by deek
Enclosure: [download]
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Getting Out, Staying In
Posted: March 4th, 2007, 4:03pm GMT by deek
Enclosure: [download]
You know how it is. You feel couped up, so you go out and get drenched…
Download Getting Out, Staying In
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Birthday Muse
Posted: February 27th, 2007, 9:14am GMT by deek
Enclosure: [download]
Yesterday morning, on the occasion of my 45th birthday, I went and filmed in my local park. I ended up recording a valediction for this green space.
Download Birthday Muse
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Blackfriars Bridge
Posted: February 20th, 2007, 10:56pm GMT by deek
Enclosure: [download]
Got the Thameslink train back from Brighton. I love the view as the raised railway line runs from London Bridge along the South Bank and over Blackfriars Bridge. My cameraphone was facing upriver.
Download Blackfriars Bridge
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Kenwood Bathhouse
Posted: February 17th, 2007, 8:01pm GMT by deek
Enclosure: [download]
Tired after a hectic week, visited Hampstead Heath to refresh myself, and recorded this in the old marble bathhouse adjacent to Kenwood House.
Download Kenwood Bathhouse
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Wagon Wheels
Posted: February 13th, 2007, 6:51pm GMT by deek
Enclosure: [download]
Now we all know that the west was won because all the buffalo were slaughtered, and not because of the miraculous invention of wagons whose wheels rolled backwards whilst moving forwards, don’t we?
These are church railings in the rain, but the effect at 10 frames a second in this 3GP video is the same. It’s a weird feeling, going in two directions at once, one we can all relate to, I’m sure.
Download Wagon Wheels
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Funch Of Twucking Bats
Posted: February 12th, 2007, 12:07am GMT by deek
Enclosure: [download | play]
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Oslo Train
Posted: February 11th, 2007, 4:46pm GMT by deek
Enclosure: [download]
Made this mobile movie from the train returning to London from Oslo. You can see the suburbs of Oslo as the train travels north.
Download Oslo Train
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Brighton to London
Posted: February 10th, 2007, 7:14pm GMT by deek
Enclosure: [download]
I am in the habit of recording my journeys… this is the first of several, which should be seen as a series. -
Islington Woodpecker
Posted: February 10th, 2007, 11:08am GMT by deek
Enclosure: [download | play]
I recorded this woodpecker early one freezing February morning… -
Cold
Posted: February 9th, 2007, 7:19pm GMT by deek
Enclosure: [download]
This is my podcast for everything that isn’t, innit. Stuff that isn’t music, isn’t necessarily topical, isn’t necessarily scripted. This first piece of audio isn’t even an MP3 - it was recorded on my Sony Eriksson k800i mobile (cell) phone and so I’ve kept it in the 3GP format. You should be able to play this on any modern computer, especially if you have Quicktime installed.
