the london 2010 olympic mascots were unveiled yesterday. the online backlash and negative reaction was enough for me to get to know the little creatures a little better, and i discovered that there is more to the mascots than meets the eye

after the release of his much anticipated movie, banksy is total hot property right now! it’s nearly impossible to get your hands on a print…well, unless you are a thief, they have been making off with pieces left, right and centre! 

i think we can all agree that the lesson here is – get your hands on a banksy now, before thieves steal them all!

it’s a fact, and i’m pretty sure you have noticed by now, sunshine makes me happy. i dont know if its a genetic or human or just an orsi thing, but when the sun is out everything seems better and life somehow feels a bit easier. as some of you might have noticed, today is one of those enjoyable days when the sun is blasting it’s wonderful rays on us. so i have compiled the most amazing little power-chart for your pleasure only, consisting of happy sunshine music only. it includes tunes from nina simone, fats weller, ella fitzgerald, glenn miller and plenty of other artists who’s music will put the biggest smile on your faces (oh yes, smiles are guaranteed with this one! just like the duke ellington video above). you can find this weeks chart here, and if you like what you hear, you might want to check out my swinging in spring mix i did about a month ago below. enjoy!

what’s your name and where d’ya come from,
cilla style?  cilla style ? as in cilla black? well it would have to be
our graeme chapman all the way from the north east in a little town called
hartlepool

now that we’re up close and personal, tell
us something about yourself that most people don’t know. i’m an outgoing
type of guy don’t really keep anything to myself. but i guess i’m a big softy
for old school disney films

we like meeting the drinkers, if you could
meet anyone in the world and have a vitamin water with them, who would it be? tough
one. would have to be dallas green from “city and colour” and “alexisonfire” we’d
guzzle down some dragonfruit and i’d introduce him to a parmo (a north east
delicacy)

you’re obviously a trendy vitamin water drinker, what kind of
music do you listen to? all genres really, but mostly hardcore/metal

and now that you are part of a pretty stylish crew, what’s
your favourite brand / designer to wear while drinking vitamin water i
wouldn’t say i’m a big style freak really. give me a band t-shirt and some
jeans  

if you could choose your dream job, what would it be and why?
an architect so i could build my dream house how i want it, and everyone else’s would have a fridge full of vitaminwater in every room

we all like to know our stuff, if you could be a
connoisseur/guru/demi-god of something what would it be? i guess most people would
say everything, so i’ll stay away from the norm.  i’d love to know everything about the tech world, gadgets and
geeky stuff

with
the whole world obsessed with social networks, where do you hang out online -
not that we want to stalk you or anything ? the usual. facebook, twitter,
flickr. i haven’t really branched out that far.

vitamin
water is newish to the uk, what is your favourite place here, where should we
go and hang out?  depends on what you’re looking for really we have
lots of sea and sand when the weather is kind to us, there is a nice museum
called beamish which is how the north east used to be like back in the old days
: 

and
finally, what are your “famous last words”?  take care and watch the roads
^_^

hello my friends! you all ready to rumble as a new week tumbles on? (gotta love my rhyming skills haha or not…) either way, i hope you’re ready as I have something pretty awesome to share with you today!

a couple of weeks ago i had the pleasure to sit down and have a chat with svetlana industries, a great indie label from belgrade (who i’ve mentioned before here on the blog with their first release by filtercutter). the reason behind our little chat was not only because i am a massive fan of their work and think they are fantastic, but also because they made a great guest mix for my little miss sunshiine radio show on laid back. you will be able to read the full interview and listen to the entire show on the laid back website tomorrow. however, the mix that svetlana made was so brilliant that i simply couldn’t wait another day to share it with you guys. it only features svetlana industries artists such as teebs & jackhigh, 8bitch, 1000names plus many more and it includes plenty of yet unreleased tracks that will probably make you drool of excitement (yes, it really is that good!) so stop wasting anymore time and have a listen and/or download it (for free!) below:

Svetlana mix for Laidback radio by Svetlana Industries

another week, another blog to love. we are sure that many of you will already be aware of this one, but we in case you haven’t…take a look at le cool!

as a new ice age seems to be sweeping over the uk i have decided to reinforce spring on my own through the sounds of good music. my friend amelia from put me on it sent me the latest oddisee release “odd spring” a couple of days ago and i have been dying to share it with you all. it’s a free release and you can have a listen and download it below:

oh, and if you haven’t copped the previous releases, “odd summer“, “odd autumn” and “odd winter” i highly recommend you to get it whilst you’re on your good music download spree to make your odd seasons collection complete happy friday!

you may be aware of the glaceau v-teams, they are our very *special* members of the glaceau family dotted all over the uk spreading the vitaminwater love. you may have virtually met some of them before, today we are introducing leanne and her glaceau north east team.

what’s your name
and where do you come from? (cilla style) my names leanne and I come from newcastle
(flick of the hair and flutter of the eye lashes!

describe yourself
in 3 words tall,
chatty and organised

who else is on the
team? on the promo side of
things we have; matt who has been with us forever, gavin the footballer, kevin
the fireman, kim the old school promo girl and danielle the little loud one!  helping us as insiders we have; jessica
at durham uni, natasha at northumbria uni and daniel and newcastle uni!

tell us something that no one else knows
about you? i
was a contestant on as ‘are you smarter than a ten year old’ with noel edmonds
and wasn’t!

what do you love
about spreading the glacéau love? i love the drink, i love the idea of it, i love the brand, i
just love the glaceau way of life! 
i also really like the freedom i have to do my job the way i think it
should be done.

what’s
your favourite saying/team motto? ‘orange – orange so good they named it twice!’ and ‘turn
that frown upside down!’

what flavour
would you be for a day and why? it has to be the naughty one xxx.  then surely i’d be picked by cilla and
get lots of kissing on my holiday!

where’s
your favourite place to spread the glacéau love? we like being on
the quayside on a sunday morning when the sun is shining.  so many different types of people just
wandering around with time to chat. 
some out running and need spark for energy and others desperate for
revive after a night out.

what is the
biggest flavour in your region? power-c
for the long time glaceau vitaminwater drinkers. 
the newbies trying it like xxx – triple berry the best.

and
one more for luck…. if you were an animal what would you be and why? it would have to
be a fish, as they only have a thirty second memory.  then anything horrible I would forget about, and anything
good I could keep doing over and enjoy it as it was the first time!  mind it would have to be a pretty fish
like an angel fish!

any one heard of that beyonce tune above? haha, yeah i thought so, quite a catchy song to be honest. i’m not a purist in any way or form when it comes to music, but I do find it important that people know about the heritage of the music they are listening to. for example, that beyonce song sampled one of my favourite chi-lites songs:

sometimes artists (or their producers) get it right, because lets face it, there are countless of hiphop tracks that have sampled old songs and managed to do it brilliantly. there are also artists who have sampled really bad songs and managed to make them sound good. and then we have the artists who sample and/or cover songs only to completely ruin them. so on today’s power-c[hart], i thought we could have a listen to some of these songs. first i only wanted to focus on beyonce and destiny’s child, but i got a bit carried away. either way, tune in here, and let me know if you have any other suggestions.