“The Simpsons Movie” | Dysfunctional family on the move | Economist.com

AFTER 18 years on prime-time television, “The Simpsons Movie” brings to the big screen all the qualities that have made the Simpson family superstars. That should reassure pundits who have been fretting over the question Homer Simpson poses at the beginning of the film, after viewing an especially Aesopian episode of “The Itchy & Scratchy Show”, Bart Simpson's favourite ultraviolent cartoon-within-a-cartoon: “Who's going to pay for something they've been getting for free?”

The answer is another question: how many smart, satirical, uproariously witty comedies did Hollywood make this year? “The Simpsons Movie” fills a niche in the major studios' release schedules that has lately become a void.

Critics were shown the film just before it opened to keep the audience's enjoyment of the rococo plot twists from being spiked by internet killjoys, a policy deserving of support. Briefly, an ecological disaster befalls the town of Springfield, brought about by Homer's involvement with a new love and his weakness for doughnuts.

The dysfunctional cohesion of the Simpson family is put to the test. Bart starts wishing he had a father like Ned Flanders next door, who practises family values with a wise serenity that is horribly off-putting. Marge doubts her love for Homer. Lisa meets a musician named Colin whose green politics is matched by his lilting brogue. And baby Maggie breaks 18 years of silence by speaking her first word, which audiences will have to stay through the final credits to hear.

But it is Homer who really evolves, after an Inuit medicine woman teaches him his “throat-song” and sends him on a spirit journey to an epiphany about human interconnectedness based on enlightened self-interest. Strangely, we come to care deeply about all of them.

“The Simpsons Movie” Dysfunctional family on the move Economist.com

The Hair - Disco/Retro | Single | Record Box

The Hair have been making big waves in Leeds for well over a year now building a strong following and wowing crowds with a number of brilliant support slots, before recently stepping out at The Faversham as headliners themselves for the launch of debut single Ghosts.

As with Ghosts their follow up single Disco / Retro is an ultra limited edition 7” release and download only, so you’d be advised to move quickly to get hold of one as these four Yorkshiremen are likley to be hot property over the coming months.

Disco / Retro is a a four minute salvo of electro dance hooks mixed with indie guitar and vocals that remind you of why you fell in love with The Rapture when they released House Of Jealous Lovers. Also worth checking out is Sidney Betts on the b-side, again it’s another punk funker, which is if anything even more raucous than the a-side.

The single is out on the 23rd July through Louder Than Bombs Records.

The Hair - Disco/Retro Single Record Box

http://www.hairmusic.co.uk/pressCuts/

This year's dozen best albums? - Telegraph

The 12 acts on the shortlist for this year's Mercury Prize were revealed this week. Neil McCormick assesses their chances ...


A leading contender of course being these lads:


Arctic Monkeys - Favourite Worst Nightmare - Melody, wit and rhythm again prove an unstoppable force. Last year's winners, the acerbically cynical Sheffield quartet consolidated their position as band of a generation with this more muscular, energetically syncopated and passionate follow-up. Even music-biz prizes, multi-million sales and Gordon Brown's endorsement can't dent their counter-cultural cachet.

Watch interviews with the nominated artists



This year's dozen best albums? - Telegraph

Business.view | A Tiger in the boardroom | Economist.com

HIS firm may have been flirting with disaster, but that did not stop James Cayne from playing his usual round of golf. Last month, as the boss of Bear Stearns pondered launching the biggest-ever hedge-fund rescue, which ultimately cost the investment bank $1.6 billion, he did so from the fairways and greens of the Hollywood Golf Club in Ocean Township, New Jersey. According to the New York Times, during the summer he regularly flies there from New York in a helicopter that has permission to land at the club.

At key moments during the crisis—during which Bear Stearns says he remained in “constant contact” with his office—Mr Cayne shot rounds of 96, 98 and 97, reports the newspaper, citing scores posted on an online database, GHIN.com. That is impressively consistent, although given his handicap of 15.9, “his scores during that stressful time certainly ballooned a bit higher than normal”, says law and golf blogger, Tom Kirkendall. “But think how bad this could have gotten for Bear Stearns if Cayne had not been able to get his golf therapy.”

Indeed. Golf Digest has published a 200-strong list of the top golfing chief executives in the Fortune 1000. Perhaps, to add value to this, every chief executive should be required to post his or her golf scores, for unusual volatility could be a useful indicator of trouble at work. On the other hand, a relatively calm performance like Mr Cayne’s might reassure investors that though things are worse than usual, they are not getting out of hand.

The central role played by golf in business life is under-reported—except maybe in Japan—perhaps because journalists can’t afford the green fees let alone the membership dues of the swanky clubs to which chief executives belong. Nor are bosses exactly rushing to draw attention to yet another perk.

Yet, “no matter how sophisticated business becomes, nothing can replace the golf course as a communications hub”, argues a new book, “Deals on the Green”, by David Rynecki. “It’s where up-and-comers can impress the boss and where CEOs can seal multibillion-dollar deals. Its no coincidence that many of the most admired people in business—Jack Welch, Bill Gates, Warren Buffett, Sandy Weill—always carved out time in their busy schedules for golf.”

“Golf brings out a person’s true character”, argues Mr Rynecki, who then provides various business lessons illustrated with examples of famous bosses “at work”. Messrs Gates and Buffett deepened their friendship by playing golf, not least because (perhaps in contrast to when they play bridge) “they don’t take themselves seriously when they are on the course”.

Stan O’Neal, now the boss of Merrill Lynch, got noticed because “some of the more influential Merrill people got to spend time with [him] on the course and saw a different side of him”, enabling him to go on to be the first African-American to lead the firm.

Mr Welch, arguably the best golfing chief executive ever, is the “patron saint of corporate golf”, argues Mr Rynecki, stripping the traditional holder of the title, John D. Rockefeller, of his halo. Rockefeller took up golf when he was nearly 60, and played nearly every day for the next 33 years, even claiming (wrongly) that his quest to shoot par would enable him to live past 100. But although he played with such corporate titans as Henry Ford and Andrew Carnegie, he banned all talk of business from the course.

Mr Welch, by contrast, regarded golf as a key part of his managerial armoury, which he deployed with great success during his long, glorious reign at General Electric (GE). The firm was already known as a “golf company” when he took charge. But under Mr Welch, “golf became an essential tool for any manager looking to move up”. Golf “was a litmus test for character. It showed whether a person had the guts to work in Welch’s GE.”

Not everyone is convinced. The other week, reports DealBreaker, two veteran Wall Street tycoons railed against the game. Hank Greenberg, the former boss of AIG, complained that golf was a distraction from business: “A lot of people like to get away from their work. You have to wonder about whether they like what they’re doing.” Carl Icahn, the legendary corporate raider, sees golf as a symbol of all that is wrong with the clubby higher echelons of American business: “These guys would rather play golf, slap each other on the back. I want a guy running a company who sits in his tub at night thinking about the challenges he faces. The guy who can’t let it go. The focused guy.”

But enough about guys.

The most troubling aspect of “Deals on the Green” is that women are almost entirely absent from it—except as wives, girlfriends or even groupies—until chapter 16, which is all about how corporate golf may hold back female executives. The chapter makes a strong case that the biggest obstacle to women getting to the top in business is less a glass ceiling than a “grass ceiling”. On the rare occasions when women get to golf with their male counterparts, they play off a different tee. Augusta, Pine Valley and most of the other prestigious male-only clubs, says Mr Rynecki, are “like majestic, genteel proving grounds for business deals”.

John Mack, the boss of Morgan Stanley, “has made a habit of appointing golf friends to the board”, says Mr Rynecki. Apparently more open-minded than most bosses, Mr Mack, then boss of CSFB, organised a series of events to introduce female executives to golf as a tool for business. Yet his enlightenment proved quite limited. When they arrived, the women found themselves confined to the driving range and the short course “while the men played the real course”.

There are currently only 11 female chief executives of Fortune 500 firms, and, tragically, nobody thinks that number will increase much any time soon. Could the male monopolisation of corporate golf be to blame? Mark Twain famously dismissed golf as a “good walk spoiled”, but sadly for many promising female executives a more apt definition of the game may be “a good career spoiled”.

Business.view A Tiger in the boardroom Economist.com

Cinquecento reborn | Test Drives | Motoring | Telegraph

I. WANT. ONE.

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All that drinking and dancing celebrated one little car. Dante Giacosa's new Fiat 500, or Cinquecento Nuova, was first presented to the Italian premier 50 years ago on July 4, 1957. Like Britain's Mini, Germany's Beetle and France's 2CV, the Cinquecento was the Italian "People's Car".

But the celebration must be a uniquely Italian thing, because I don't recall reading about an all-night party in Birmingham to celebrate the original Mini in 1959, or a 24-hour Mardi Gras in Oxford to wassail BMW's new MINI in 2001. Perhaps Italians celebrate their industry more than we Brits do - go on, tell me something I don't know. Anyway, happy birthday, Cinquecento.

Fiat might be almost back in the black these days, but it doesn't just throw massive parties out of teary-eyed nostalgia for a much-loved car that provided most people of a certain age with some sort of amazing adventure - mine involved a blonde, a bottle of Haig whisky, a sunny afternoon on Dartmoor and a pig… (That's enough - Ed)

In fact, Fiat has another nuova Cinquecento to sell. With the possible exception of the first Audi TT, the new 500 is the most successful transmogrification from retro-styled concept car (the Trepiúuno, shown at Geneva in 2004) to production model. Just look at it - from its wide-eyed headlamps to its pert bottom, doesn't it just remind you of whisky and a pig?

(Full review via link, below)

Cinquecento reborn Test Drives Motoring Telegraph