BBC children’s programming now apparently features cactus puppets singing “Mo Money Mo Problems”

The fact that I can’t embed this  is close to being a straight-up tragedy. Taken from “Ed and Oucho’s Excellent Inventions” (the puppet in question is “Oucho”, not “Ed”), and as wonderful as this all is, do the kids really need it? If Chris Langham hadn’t have gone down for a two-stretch, would Boobah have tackled something from side one of “Illmatic”? Does Miss Hoolie need to break that Scottish slang shit down for us one time? Or (third unfunny gag about kids TV characters doing a mid 90s rap classic)? Probably not. Nice how the cactus does go directly for Biggie’s verse. Ma$e marginalised yet again…

That one Cassetteboy/Apprentice thing you’ve already seen everyfuckingwhere else

So anyway, I got the first “lol have u seen this lol” message about this video around 10:30am this morning, and thought to myself “Oh, that’s an idea, I can just throw that up on ILB, shove some old Cassetteboy MP3s underneath it, and somehow pass that off as content.

Some music we’ve been listening to while not bothering to update this thing

We may as well close this blog down now. I think Phil Brown won music this weekend. People go on and fucking on about George Jones on Hee-Haw as some sort of gold standard of vocal performances, but the KC crowd got treated to something that made GJ need to go and play the back for a while. Pretend you’re a UK-based broadsheet football columnist here by writing your own played-out string of punchlines revolving around Cuprinol, Britney Spears’ microphones, call centre employees, or Tango adverts. And then collect a £75k a year minimum salary.

Howl do you like me now?

So, anyway, yeah, in yesterday’s little post we didn’t really mention the band in question much, but rest assured they are fucking amazing and if you’re that desperate to read more about them you can check this review from The Independent, written by Simon “Not Grimy” Price, where in a fantastic bout of “reviews mainly in character”, the 90s journalist says that the band are reminiscent “primarily of unjustly forgotten 1990s heroes Orlando”. I know, right?

Napoleon – I Try To Despise The Ugly People (But The Beautiful Ones Keep Turning Me Down)/I Love My Baby (But If Anyone Touches Her I’ll Kill Them)

As long-time readers will be aware, we here at ILB are pretty much dead inside and experience pleasure in very little these days. The occasionally lingering touch of the hand of some bitch who’s recently friendzoned us, andPhileas Fogg’s Salsa With Mexican Chilli Tortilla Chips, are pretty much all we have left. That and last.fm confusions about two bands who have the same name.

Wolfram Alpha is a crock of shit

Obviously we’ve all been busy on the internet today frantically hitting “refresh” on Patrick Swayze Wikipedia entry to see if he had crapped out and we could finally unleash all those “I’m ghost like…/Put him in the corner” zings we’ve been saving up since he first dabbled with the big C, but some other shit has been going down as well. WolframAlpha is “some science nerd bullshit”, a Google for the few people around who wouldn’t like to see Ben Goldacre’s smug self-satisfied face kicked in by a gang of Fundamentalist Christians.

10 Reasons Why Rap Doesn’t Suck

Longtime readers of ILB will now be expecting me to say something like “And even after all that, he’s still more learn’ed a writer about rap music than Hattie Collins”, but recently I’ve started getting bare hits on this blog for just my name and then the names of random Guardian music hacks. So either a) you, the readers, are desperately trying to remember “Oh, what was that funny thing the fat Italian dude said about George Monbiot’s review of that Gigi D’Agostino gig or b) I’m actually about to be murdered and Farringdon’s hitsquad are just gathering of all the slurs committed against Louis Pattison’s name.  I am not going to die of natural causes, unlike Pimp C or Big Pun.

Afterlife lookalikes

Baby got Rybak: 10 conclusions from this year’s Eurovision

• If we’re being fair to the guy, and if we can leave off the played out eyebrow zings everyone was tossing around like so much confetti last night, Rybak clearly deserved to win. You can piss and moan that he didn’t deserve to win in such a crushing, Taylor versus Manley fashion, but if you cast your mind back to the other 24 songs that got played out yesterday, try and pick another one that came equipped with a marketable personality (Middle Earth Jonas Brother lookin’ boy that he is) and also came equipped with classic Eurovision tropes (some backflips, some “ethnic” “folk” “pop” that actually sounded a bit like the Bluebells if we’re being honest). Plus this level of victory means that Lordi no longer hold the Eurovision points record, so hopefully we can put that sad and tawdry episode of Europe’s musical history to bed.
  Talking about Eurovision tropes, we voted for Azerbaijan last night, because it seemed the most “Eurovisionny” of all the half-decent songs there, a duet between what appeared to be a sales representative for wholesale halal meat and his layabout, spoilt brat daughter. The guy even busted out the running man during the semi-final stages of the tournament, so we gotta pay homage.
  The UK finished, you know, high at some point or other or something with some bullshit “track 13 on the ‘Tracks From And Inspired By’ soundtrack CD from some forgotten 1998 Disney movie” tune. Well done all involved. If Jade goes on to ever get any TV coverage ever again outside of her appearing on The Games in mid 2011 I will lick Andrew Lloyd-Webber’s taint.
  The incongruity of Germany’s performance, featuring as it did possibly the worst song of the night and Dita Von Teese occasionally grinding away in the corner of the camera shot, resonated with me strongly. Therefore, we propose that from now on Ms Von Teese dances alongside all other utter abject no-hopers facing up to a clear degree of failure and humiliation because they’re quite clearly not up to the task, and as such we hope to see her on Match Of The Day shaking her pasties by Alan Shearer’s head as he goes “The lads in the dressing room are all disappointed clearly, but they all know this is the time of the season to stand up and be counted”.
  Graham Norton was annoyingly acceptable as a host. Like most people, I was annoyed that Wogan got gassed from his presenting role before he could enter the full-scale Big Ron moment breakdown that he had been quite clearly building up to for the past 15 years, but what are you gonna do? Norton actually seemed to be pretty clued up on his Eurovision history: whether this was due to an actual fandom of it, or whether he had a Gillette Soccer Saturday-esque team of researchers knocking out facts for him to read out in real time, I dunno. Actually, maybe get Thommo, Merse and Le Tiss to cohost next year’s? Us hetroes need to reclaim this damn show, man…
  Wise words from YouTube
  KRizma93 (6 minutes ago)   0    Reply | Spam
  damn I’mma black american rapper and i also love this song somehow it got da special somethin and it doesnt get out of my ear i listen to that song day n nite 4 real damn he deserved to win respect
  As for your wooden spoon winners, it was wonderful of Finland to turn the whole piece into a “Where are they now?” spectacle for that kid from Bomfunk MCs, but we’re now at least 15 years on from River City Groove, and surely people have worked out that rap has zero place at the Eurovision. Unless some country hires the “black american rapper” from up-post.
  Unsurprisingly, the in-show entertainment didn’t provide anything in the way of joys, but why was there a massed singalong orchestrated backstage to “Not Gonna Get Us” by taTu and not, say, “All The Things She Said”, which was actually their biggest hit? Or even, if we have to karaoke a Russian pop smash from the past decade, get motherfucking “Resurrection” by PPK up in that place. Let’s see the hatchet-faced Celine Dion-alike France sent for some reason croon her way through those Yuri Gagarin vocal samples.
• If we’re being fair to the guy, and if we can leave off the played out eyebrow zings everyone was tossing around like so much confetti last night, Rybak clearly deserved to win. You can piss and moan that he didn’t deserve to win in such a crushing, Taylor versus Manley fashion, but if you cast your mind back to the other 24 songs that got played out yesterday, try and pick another one that came equipped with a marketable personality (Middle Earth Jonas Brother lookin’ boy that he is) and also came equipped with classic Eurovision tropes (some backflips, some “ethnic” “folk” “pop” that actually sounded a bit like the Bluebells if we’re being honest). Plus this level of victory means that Lordi no longer hold the Eurovision points record, so hopefully we can put that sad and tawdry episode of Europe’s musical history to bed.

Hey guys let’s all play a Facebook game based on the world of pro-burlesque

Over the past few years, burlesque has seen a major revival across the world. Stars like Dita Von Teese and Immodesty Blaize have taken burlesque out of the dingy pubs and delapidated theatres and tassel-twirled their way onto the world stage.

AND NOW IT’S TIME TO FOLLOW IN THEIR FOOTSTEPS WITH THE NEW ‘BATTLE OF BURLESQUE’ GAME FOR FACEBOOK!

Starting off as a lowly newcomer with little skill and less stage presence than a bag of frozen peas, you must progress through the burlesque ranks by learning new performance techniques, performing at events of increasing prestige and taking on other burlesque performers head to head.

You’ll also be able to build up your burlesque empire too. As you rise up from wannabe to celebrity, you’ll be able to invest in more entreprenurial pursuits than performing alone.

Will you become a venue owner and receive income from your portfolio of bars, clubs and theatres or will you decide that the world of fashion is for you? You can even choose to go down the route of ‘Internet Entrepreneur’ and invest in performer websites, podcasts and communities.

Do you have what it takes to become a celebrity and reach the Battle Of Burlesque Hall Of Fame, or will you be destined to be just another face in the crowded club circuit?

Only time will tell!