Happy Birthday Mini!

Today is the 50th Anniversary of the Mini! It's a fantastic little car, one that has been revolutionary in terms of engineering and marketing, with broad popular appeal. As usual with things like this, I've done a writeup here.

I absolutely love my car, as I’ve written about before. The entire experience of driving it differs from anything that I’ve driven before, and I often will break out into a grin when I’m driving along. I love throwing Maxine into corners at speed, accelerating along straits and simply enjoying owning a car. I don’t believe that a car should be boring, or simply just to go from point A to B during commutes. That just seems dull, and that just seems like a waste.

Happy Birthday Mini. Here’s to another 50 years.

Here's a playlist of some good driving songs that I've collected for the occasion. I've always seen the Mini as fast and quirky, and I think that these songs fit the Mini's character quite well.

The Shock of Lightning - Oasis
Mercy - Duffy
She Sells Sanctuary - The Cult
Shuffle Your Feet - Back Rebel Motorcycle Club
Queen Bitch - David Bowie
Young Folks - Peter Bjorn and John
Venus - Shocking Blue
You Get What You Give - New Radicals
This Time Tomorrow - The Kinks
Hazey Jane II - Nick Drake
On Days Like These - Matt Monroe

Hype - Drive

Power! Top Gear Returns

One of my favorite TV shows, Top Gear, has come back on the air, in the UK on Sundays. There's quite a bit of Jeremy Clarkson hate out there, but I love the three presenters and their style of reviewing, their rediculous analogies, and the absurd amount of fun that they seem to have with their jobs.

The thing that the show has really done for me is instill a love for driving. I've posted up a couple of driving mixes on here, which I always get a kick out of putting together, and it's a pastime that I really enjoy, despite the rising prices of gas... er... petrol. Driving is supposed to be fun, more than just going from point A to B.

This season has been fun thus far, and from the opening preview of the season, it looks like they're just going to have a lot more fun with the remaining episodes.

No Cars Go - Arcade Fire

The Shock Of The Lightning - Oasis

Grounds for Divorce - Elbow

Hype - Buy - Look

LOST

LOST returned last night - something that I've been really waiting for for something like 8 months, ever since the last season finale back in May. A long, worthwhile wait. LOST has had a bit of a mixed record, mainly with Season 2, but I thought that Season 3 redeemed it nicely. Now, back to the weekly grind of waiting to see what happens next. I'm a little annoyed that they have only 8 episodes filmed here. It's a good run, but I'd like my proper season back!

LOST is also one of the few shows with an absolutely perfect taste in music. They don't really go for the hugely popular songs of the moment, but really have a nicely varied mix of songs. Here's a couple from it:

Main Title - J.J. Abrams
You All Everybody - Driveshaft
Downtown - Petula Clark
Wonderwall - Oasis (Charlie Covers the song in Season 3)
Wash Away - Joe Purdy

Hype - Buy - Look

Cover & Original - Wonderwall

This is a song from my high school years that I've rediscovered recently for some reason. And along with that, two cover versions that I've come across recently that are both quite good.

The original is a raw version with a good amount of energy and sound that still has a good ring to it, even after all these years.

Cat Power recorded a version in a studio session with the BBC, which slows the song down a little as most of her covers tend to do, and she does a good job handling the lyrics. Between her guitarwork and voice, she really makes the song her own, and it doesn't sound bad.

Ryan Adams has done the better cover here, with some fantastic guitarwork and he changes up some of the pacing. It's similar to Cat Power's cover, but much better.

Wonderwall - Oasis

Wonderwall - Cat Power

Wonderwall - Ryan Adams

Hype - Buy