Paloma Faith - Do You Want The Truth Or Something Beuautiful

Been listening to Paloma Faith's album - Do You Want The Truth Or Something Beautiful quite a bit over the last few days. The title track is great. She souds like a cross between Eryka Badu and Amy Winehousee. Big loud funky rock sound with some catchy lyrics. I'd only really heard one of her previous tracks and wrote her off as more bubblegum like Katie Perry but after giving the album a chance I really like most of it. Just my cup of tea.

Save The Hackney Hare

 

The council in Hackney are trying to force the removal of this piece of art from the side of a shop (which had given permission to the artist). If you go here
you can see loads more similar work by the same artist and if you go here
you can sign the petition to help save it.
If it was a big cock or something then fair enough, but this looks cool and anyone who objects needs to get a life.

Cee Lo Green/The Lady Killer Kid Cudi/Man On The Moon II (The Legend Of Mr.Rager) N.E.R.D/Nothing

Cee Lo Green - The Lady Killer
New album by the big guy from Gnarls Barkley on Elektra. From the start it's well produced by the likes of the Smeezingtons, Salaam Remi and the UK's own Fraser T. Smith. With contributions from singer Lauren Bennett, Earth, Wind & Fire's Philip Bailey and a new one to me Selah Sue. Cee Lo's voice is smooth and soulful, the tracks are intelligent and funny in places and the album as a whole leaves you with a chilled out, loved up vibe. The retro sound with it's trumpets and horns isn't for everyone but stand out tracks Bodies and Wildflower as well as the fantastic F*** You / Forget You make this album of love songs a relaxing listen. 8/10


Kid Cudi - Man On The Moon II (The Legend Of Mr. Rager)
The second album from the troubled rapper, and it's not going to endear him to many. Hip Hop isn't usually my thing but this guy doesn't give off a Look At Me And My Money aura. His dark  and melodic tunes are more cerebral than that. Kanye West features as does the big man from above, Cee Lo Green and even Mary J Blige gets in there so the kid can obviously has some big name fans. He is not going to be famous for his vocal range and the oohhs and aahhs and whispered lines could have been more melodic. Erase Me is the most radio friendly but my favourite is Mojo So Dope. Overall though it has the feel of a disjointed experiment and is hard to categorise or compare. 5/10


N.E.R.D - Nothing
I've always liked N.E.R.D. It's not as cool as Pharrell's usual stuff but is obviously done for the fun of it rather than to make the money. His falsetto on Hypnotize U  (produced fittingly by Daft Punk) is sleazy rather than loving. Victory could be by Queen. I've listened to this album non stop all day and love it's lazy beats and easy listening lyrics. It's like The Flaming Lips for the Trip Hop crowd. Funky and smooth without being cheesy. Hot-n-Fun at the end features Nelly Furtado and could have brightened up the middle of the album but would remix into a great club track. 7/10

Nokia BH-217 Bluetooth Headset Review

Recently the nice people at Nokia’s WOMworld sent me one of the new Bluetooth headsets (BH-217) to try out. It was one of a number of new products announced at NokiaWorld 2010, Nokia’s annual get together and to be honest I found it surprising that something as insignificant as a Bluetooth earpiece would get even that much attention. I remembered it though because I thought it looked ok for what it was, a minimalist headset with a hook and a funny looking earbud thing.

So anyway the box arrived and after opening it up and checking out the contents I could hear a voice, which turned out to be the headset itself giving me the first time set up instructions. I found this pretty cool, as after about a minute I had followed the simple instructions and had connected it to my phone. Connecting it to a second phone was just as simple. This really was the easiest pairing I have ever done with a Bluetooth product.

In the box along with the headset were two leaflets containing the instructions in a long list of languages, two cheap clear plastic ear hooks of different sizes, three white rubber new shaped earbuds (again of different sizes), two slightly different holders, and a standard small pin Nokia charger. The selection of hooks and earbuds make it easy to find a combination that will fit you perfectly but I’ll admit I did go through every combination more than once to find the one for me. The new ergonomically shaped earbuds take a while to get used to as they fit just inside your ear but not in your ear canal. I found this a much nicer way to wear a headset as you won’t end up with earwax all over the tips, which in turn attracts dirt when not in use, so yeah, they stay cleaner this way. The one I got was silver with a bit of white and blue but you can get it in a much darker grey/black again with the white and blue bits around the ear piece.

The two holders mean you have somewhere to put the headset when not in use. You can stick one somewhere in your car, preferably in reach of your charger as there is a hole in the bottom for this. The other one comes with a clip which you can fix to your clothes or desk or anywhere else you wish to attach it. Once put in the holder the headset automatically turns itself off and when you want to use it again just one press of the single silver phone shaped multifunction key on the headset turns it on and connects it to your phone again.

 

The design is very simple with just the one multifunction key on the outward facing side and a single indicator LED on the other side at the top. It feels well made in your hand with a smooth anodized feel and rounded edges but the best bit is the weight. The whole thing is so light you can barely even feel it in your hand or you ear. It comes in at 7.6 grams or 0.268oz. Certainly the lightest headset I’ve ever used. When you factor in the 3 month standby time and 5 hours of talktime, you wonder what the little pixies inside are living on. I haven’t tested the 3 month standby time as I’ve only had it for a couple of weeks but in that time I have only just recharged it and it only needed a five minute top up to show a green light, meaning full charge. The 3 months is if you keep it in the holders when not in use, otherwise they claim 100 hours. It’s about 5cm long, just under 2cm wide and just over 0.5cm thick.

Being Bluetooth 2.1 you can connect two devices at the same time pretty simply and the instructions tell you how to juggle calls on the two devices as well as how to get voice activation set up. If you only have the one device though a single press on the multifunction key answers and then cancels calls. To turn it off you just hold the key down until you hear the three descending beeps. Pretty much each function gets a small audible notification. The instructions tell you about all the different specs such as EDR (Enhanced Data Rate), Handsfree profile (HFP) 1.5, Headset profile (HSP) 1.1 but I have no idea what these mean.

The sound was perfectly acceptable for making calls. The sound is clear and crisp and the people I spoke to had no problems hearing me. There is no volume rocker but this wasn’t a problem as the headset automatically adjusts. I didn’t use it in high wind but walking along and sitting on a busy bus was fine. It apparently has DSP noise reduction which is all to do with digital sound algorithms as far as I can tell and as I said I had no problems hearing anyone but the one time I listened to some tunes the sound was tinny and horrible (maybe I was just too used to using a good pair of cans). I wore it for about 4 or 5 hours one day and often forgot it was there. 

There are cheaper headsets about but this one is incredibly light and comfortable, small and unobtrusive and has great sound. It has the feel of something much more expensive and not at all towards the cheaper end of Nokia’s range. At just £25 you get a lot for your money. You could spend a lot more for a lot less so these come highly recommended. Nokia aren’t yet selling them on their website but you can get them from Amazon for £24.95 in both colours. Everyone I showed them too was very impressed with the size and weight and when I told them the price they asked where they could get them.