Welcome to my annual round up of all things great, funny, thought provoking and generally excellent!
It's fair to say that 2022 has been a bloody weird, frequently sad, often farcical kind of a year. Who knows what future historians and cultural critics will make of this peculiar omnishambles.
That said, there have definitely been many memorable moments, at least some of which will no doubt last the test of time. So, without further ado...
Albums of the year
12) Raveena, Asha's Awakening
11) Hatchie, Giving The World Away
10) The Regrettes, Further Joy
9) Wet Leg, Wet Leg
8) Helen McCookerybook, Drawing on my dreams
7) Ibeyi, Spell 31
6) Hinako Omori, a journey...
5) The Linda Linda's, Growing Up
4) Zola Jesus, Arkhon
3) Aubrey Haddard, Awake And Talking
2) Harkin, Honeymoon Suite
1) Florence + The Machine, Dance Fever
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| Photo by Matt Seymour on Unsplash |
12 books I've read and loved this year
(For reasons of space, I haven't included the two books I've reviewed this year. You can read about them here though)
Viv Albertine, To throw away unopened
Tracey Thorn, My rock'n'roll friend
Ellis Peters, Brother Cadfael's penance
Lemn Sissay, My name is why: a memoir
Neil Gaiman, The ocean at the end of the lane
Mercedes Lackey, Take a Thief
Phillip Pullman, The Secret Commonwealth
Ottessa Moshfegh, My year of rest and relaxation
Nicola Upson, Two for Sorrow
Vikas Swarup, The accidental apprentice
Kate Adie, Fighting on the Home Front: the legacy of women in World War I
Eliot Higgins, We Are Bellingcat: an intelligence agency for the people
Podcasts and radio from 2022
I've probably listened to more radio than podcasts this year and would like to give a special mention to Radio 4's serial/podcast The Boy In The Woods, which proved to be a more hard hitting and sensitive take on the True Crime oevre than is often the case. The follow up discussion programme was an often uncomfortable, but very necessary, listen.
An equally necessary, but also often uncomfortable listen was Andrey Kurkov's Letter from Ukraine which took a very simple programme idea (we can safely assume the inspiration came from Alistair Cooke's Letter From America) and used it to great effect.
The return of Alfie Moore's It's A Fair Cop has also been a highlight, as has Natalie Haynes Stands Up For The Classics and Marian Keyes and Tara Flynn's gentle, thought provoking, often hilarious Now You're Asking. The much needed More Or Less meanwhile has really been earning its keep over the past two or three years. Also worth a listen would be the dramatisation of a very unusual lightly satirical historical novel, Three Fires, which has a lot to tell us about the world today and the Florence Pugh episode of the always great This Cultural Life. A much more poignant radio moment was Roger Bolton's final show presenting Radio 4's Feedback programme.
In a similar vein, the big radio news this year for me has been the BBC's baffling decision to bin Radio 4Extra at some point in the next three years. Jake Yap did a particularly excoriating rant on the station about this decision a few months ago, complete with War Of The Worlds style sound bed, and while I'd very much like to hear it again internet searches have not turned it up. In recent months, it's begun to feel like the long term strategy is to spend even less money on this cheap as chips station than usual in the hope that all the listeners will gradually switch off, thus justifying the original binning off of the station. The recent scrapping of Podcast Radio Hour confirms this, and you can listen to their final episode here. For a station that began as BBC7 and which provided us with Ben Moor's Undone, this is a tragedy.
In podcast land, Private Eye's Page 94 very much continues to deliver and I fully intend to catch up on We Are History and Best Pick over Christmas.
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| Photo by Enis Yavuz on Unsplash |
7 articles I've found interesting/enjoyable this year (Quirky)
Crossrail: High risk security breach as first 'customer' rides train (Ian Weinfass, Construction News)
Man 'reunited with false teeth... 11 YEARS after vomiting them into a bin in Benidorm' (Thomas George, Manchester Evening News)
Train hits trampoline after Storm Dudley blows it onto tracks (John Jones, Wales Online)
'Free Creme Eggs' and the smell of McVities: Why the 192 Bus is a Greater Manchester adventure (Saffron Otter, Manchester Evening News)
The etiquette of returning Tupperware: 'It always comes back with something in it' (Jennifer Curcio, The Guardian)
'My childhood dream to become a bus driver came true' says drag queen (Ruth Mosalski and Kirstie McCrum, Hull Daily Mail)
The wet lettuce that lasted longer than Liz Truss (Ethan Davies, Manchester Evening News)
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| Photo by Magnet.me on Unsplash |
12 articles I've found interesting/enjoyable this year (Not so quirky)
"Adults are banning books, but they're not asking our opinions" meet the teens of Banned Book Club (Adam Gabbatt, Hannah Yoon, The Guardian)
How residential developers are quietening culture (Lily Gordon Brown, Salt)
ImillaSkate: An indigenous Bolivian skateboard collective - photo essay (Luisa Dörr, The Guardian)
Musicians Are Begging Fans to Mask Up at Concerts. Here's Why (Nina Corcoran, Pitchfork)
Among Europe's Ex Royals (Helen Lewis, Jelka von Langen, The Atlantic)
How to Win the Abortion Argument (Helen Lewis, The Atlantic)
Florence Welch: 'Who am I kidding? I'm a showboat!' (Kate Mossman, The Guardian)
David Oliver: My personal pandemic experience is just one of many (David Oliver, British Medical Journal)
The perfectionism trap (Josh Cohen, 1843)
WFH 101: Tips For Navigating The Future Of Remote Working (Hannah Bradfield, Journo Resources)
What Working at a Used Book Store Taught Me About Literary Rejection (Carl Lavigne, LitHub)
The Winners of China's Housing Bust: Burnouts and Beach Bums (Jiang Xinyi and Fan Yiyang, Sixth Tone)
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| Photo by Daria Volkova on Unsplash |
6 articles I've found interesting/enjoyable this year (Ukraine)
Ukrainian artists on the Russian crisis: "Now is the time to push for change" (Andrew Trendell, NME)
Ukraine's tech community rallies to support refugees and battle misinformation (Masha Borak, Rest Of World)
Shopping lists from Ukraine's frontlines: Manchester's response to Putin's war - video (Maeve Shearlaw, Alex Healey and Katie Lamborn, The Guardian)
Pasha Lee went from Ukrainian screen idol to volunteer (The Economist)
In the war room with Volodymyr Zelensky (Oliver Carroll, 1843)
Fleeing Putin, Russian tech workers find a home in Armenia (Masha Borak, Anush Babajanyan, Rest Of World)
Songs of the year
The countdown of my favourite songs of the year will begin on this blog from Saturday 3rd December. You can also find the playlist, which will be updated in real (ish) time, over on Spotify.
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