Simon Rumble’s blog

I've used allmusic.com to find out information about musicians, albums and songs for years. It's always been a clunky, slow web site. The most annoying thing was that they used Javascript instead of a href for links, so you couldn't open another window to explore something else later, couldn't bookmark individual pages and it was difficult to send a link to a friend.

Well now it's got even worse. Their recent "upgrade" to the site has made it slower and even dodgier. They now state that they only support Internet Exploder on Windows platforms. Outrageous!

So does anyone know of an alternative that is as good and comprehensive as allmusic.com for information about artists? I can imagine some online project like IMDB for music would be great. A Wiki type thing would be perfect, with strict templates.

I brewed a Coopers Canadian Blonde kit on Sunday night with 500g glucose and 500g pale malt. This morning the yeast foam was all gone and I was worried something was wrong, so I chucked in another dry yeast packet just to be sure. Tasting it tonight, it actually seems to be completely fermented out. Amazing!

I guess the glucose really is easier than sugar for the yeast. This is a 48 hour fermentation. Incredible stuff, and tastes alright too. I guess doing a nice big yeast starter helps too.

Now I have to find enough bottles to get it into bottles.

Spoke to a very helpful woman at the AEC and it turns out Holly and I are enrolled to vote, just not at the address we expected. I'm sure we enrolled and registered as overseas voters from my parents' address, but it turns out we're enrolled at our old place in Stanmore. This probably means that all our previous votes were discarded.

The good news, however, is it means our votes are a bit more use in lower house elections. At my parents' place, it's super-safe Liberal whereas Stanmore (Grayndler) is somewhat less safe Labor.

Yesterday Holly, Kev, Marg and I went out to Oriental City in Colindale. This is a huge asian (or, as they say here "oriental") food complex with a massive multicultural supermarket, food court and shops selling asian stuff. Holly and I ended up spending about £30 on various yummy food stuff.

Loads of fun! Can't wait to cook with some of the sauces and things we bought.

I bottled the Belgian Wit yesterday. It's tasting great already, and can only get better. I must have messed up my measurements of the original and final gravity, as they make no sense. Either that or I've just bottled way too early. Erm...

Final recipe was all malt, with curucao orange and coriander seed. The White Labs Belgian Wit Ale yeast is just amazing. Goes off like a firecracker!

Just started up a Cooper's Canadian Blonde kit. Added 500g pale malt and 500g glucose. This should be a light, quaffing beer. Chucked in some boiled Fuggles hop juice to improve the aroma. Just waiting for the wort to cool to pitch.

I just checked on the AEC web site and it seems I've been dropped off the electoral roll in Australia. This is despite the fact that I registered as an overseas elector before we left the country.

I have certainly voted in every State and Federal election since we left, so there's no excuse for removing me there. I've sent them an email and will be phoning them tomorrow night if I haven't heard from them by then. Bastards.

Fortunately there is another way for me to get back on the roll. I was in Oz for more than a month last year, which means the three year limit starts again. However, I wanna know why they removed me in the first place!

Over the weekend I made up a Hoegaarden-style belgian wit ale, in the style of Graeme's fabulous recipe, the results of which tried while we were in Oz.

• Muntons Connoisseur wheat beer kit
• 1kg light malt
• 250g cane sugar
• ~12g dried curucao orange peel
• ~15g crushed corriander seeds
• White Labs WLP400 Belgian Wit Ale yeast

The spice measures are somewhat inaccurate because my scales aren't very accurate below 20g or so. If the spicing ends up all wrong, I might need to invest in some more accurate scales.

This is also my first experience with liquid yeast and I'm impressed! The yeast has tried to climb out of the bucket and goes off like a firecracker!

I'm following Graeme's suggestion and have made a 1.5L starter which I'll bottle and use for later brews as well.

Looking forward to drinking this one. Hopefully it'll be ready while the weather is still warm enough to require such a refreshing brew!

Well we're back home. I'm waiting for Holly to finish in the shower so I can get clean, at last. Sad thing is, I have to go to another gig tonight. I booked tickets for Tortoise without realising it was the day after Glastonbury. Ack!

Goldfrapp was the best band we saw, followed by Orbital. Quite enjoyed Franz Ferdinand and Suzanne Vega too. We didn't actually see many bands because they seemed to have scheduled all the ones I wanted to see at the same time.

Now we have to clean the mud off the tent and get some clothes clean.

Orbital. Oh yeah!

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Rainbow during Supergrass.

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