Welcome to this week's Pop Essays, as I continue my new weekly series which profiles favourite songs and artists of mine from years past that I am revisiting and shining a well deserved light on that may not have had it before. Thanks for all the lovely feedback on last week's first essay - it's … Continue reading Pop Essays #2: Ladyhawke, ‘Paris Is Burning’
Firstly a happy new year to you all, albeit one that seems to be starting suspiciously just as the last one did globally speaking. But no matter, I'm a firm believer, in the words of D:Ream, that things can only get better. Especially as today, I write both my first blog post of 2021 and … Continue reading Pop Essays #1: Ultra, ‘Rescue Me’
Goodness me that time of the year is upon us once again - so a hearty welcome one and all to this, our annual End of Year Prizes blog post! Regular readers will know what this is, but if you're newly joined, then here's the skinny; every Boxing Day, we round off our blog posting … Continue reading Alex’s End of Year Prizes 2020
Love In All Things by Alex MacGregor When life hands us lemons, there is lemon drizzle cake When life hands us confusion, understanding and helpful ears are there When life hands us endings, new starts begin When life hands us despair, hope springs up When life hands us darkness, there is light within When life … Continue reading A poem for Christmas Day.
Now I must confess that, under ordinary circumstances, I am more a savoury man than sweet man. But there is one exception - and that is Christmas time. Call it the time of year, but suddenly I am drawn to all things sweet. And suddenly, for someone who only occasionally entertains a brownie for the … Continue reading Our definitive ranking of Christmas chocolate.
For all my yearly rewatches of Bernard and the Genie, The Holiday and the Christmas episodes of The Vicar of Dibley, there are some Christmas films or shows of yore I'd maybe forgotten about but loved at the time, and I am only just now rediscovering. Such is the case with Robbie the Reindeer. Partly … Continue reading Robbie the Reindeer: Hooves of Fire – the lost gem of Christmas films
The race is on, even as we speak, to discover who will be the identity of this year's Christmas number one single in the UK. Regular readers may remember that back in 2017 I did a blog recounting my favourite Yuletide chart toppers of yore. But of course, this being the UK, for every 'Do … Continue reading #CrazyStupidPlaylist: The “Should’ve Been” Christmas Number Ones
Over the last 12 months, we've bought you the weekly retelling every Thursday of all the big hits from the UK singles chart of 20 years ago with The Story of Pop: 2000. Today, we make our final stop on our nostalgic pop journey - with the extraordinary story of one of the most bonkers … Continue reading The Story of Pop: 2000 (Chapter 51)
I don't even know where the time has gone since I started The Story of Pop: 2000 exactly 51 weeks ago (rapidly, that's what). But doing that and the 1999 series in 2019 have genuinely been, as a retro 90s/00s pop geek - some of my most favourite blog posts I've ever written. And this … Continue reading The Story of Pop: 2000 (Bonus Tracks)
When I wrote my review of Little Mix's current album Confetti last month, I mentioned in my parting words that I wouldn't be surprised if this ended up being their last album for a while. Little did I realise that statement I made would come to fruition quite so soon after the fact. For the … Continue reading Our thoughts on Jesy Nelson leaving Little Mix – and why the music industry still needs to change
