J Dilla

I suppose one of the things about being forty is that you give up trying to be cutting edge – if I ever was. So new things hit you about a year after they were new things. Bouncing a few emails with my good friend Carlos (erstwhile flatmate of the Chemical Brothers at University) he must have remembered that I loved DJ Shadow’s album ‘Endtroducing’ album from 1996. I felt cutting edge then – I must have been one of the first to own it and recommended it to about fifty people all of whom loved it too.

Anyway in classic ‘if you like this then you’ll love this’ mode he suggested a listen to J Dilla’s ‘Donuts’ album released last year 3 days after his death from a rare blood disorder. I ploughed through 30 second bites of each track on itunes (each track lasts around 1 minute 30) and then downloaded it. The man knows his soul. Buy it now.

I suppose one of the other things about being forty is that you learn to look after things that you have paid for. What I mean by that is that you paid outright for rather than on credit card, loan etc. So recently I bought a swimming pool which I am now cherishing like my first born. Hell I am even making people wash their feet before they get in it. 5000 euros. It is the luxury item of my life and I shake at the thought of the money I spent on it. But 3 swims a day and the almost instant lightening of my usually angst ridden state suggest that a 5000 euro investment equates to five extra years of life.

Particularly useful when trying to write books in post 30 degree southern French heat.

Album of the day is ‘Donuts’.