Wanna know how the UK got fucked over by big business? This is your book. Wanna know why more money is going into public services but things aren’t getting any better, yet the companies contracted to do the services are getting richer? This book explains the why and the how. Wanna know why the proliferation of identikit towns across Britain and why we’re all under siege to the suburban supermarket sprawl? Read it and weep baby.

Wanna know what you can do to put a spanner in the works and remind those in power that people will not put up with being ripped off, screwed over and then told it’s all good for them? This is the book for you.

Read it, understand it, get angry and then act.

I have to say I was a bit disappointed with this album. After reading the great live reviews Ms Lewis & Co. had received, as well as descriptions of the sounds as melancholy C&W meets bummed out gospel, I thought this would be right up my street.

Sadly, the songwriting is not strong enough. Although “Happy” is awesome and “Born Secular” and “Melt Your Heart” hit the spot too, I just haven’t felt compelled to play the album much.

I wanted to like it, I really did, but something just aint right. I have a feeling though that there is a killer album in Ms Lewis, and I look forward to being blown away by it, when it arrives on the earth.

I love this album. I dug it out again recently and had forgotten how creepy and engaging Ms Garbarek’s creaking jazz world was. Imagine Laurie Anderson transported to Scandinavia and given a depressed jazz band into slowed down samples, to sing over. That kind of gives you a sense of the vocal intimacies carried out on (and in) your ears for 45 minutes or so. Just give in and enjoy.

This book is an hilarious read, especially if you’re an effete knock kneed pale type like me. That’s because it’s written in jock-speak, and assumes that its readers are all middle aged, male, heterosexual stockbrockers or white collar workers with back problems who want to be American Football stars or top class wrestlers. Y’know, ‘cos that’s what us men wanna do with our lives right?

However, the exercises are excellent and the various regimes provide a robust introduction to basic yoga moves without all the New Age guff. Personally, I like New Age guff but still got a lot out of the book. So read it with a pinch of salt (especially the section on Yoga Butts) and all will be well.

I hate to admit it, but I’d list this book as one of the very few that have actually changed my life.

A patchy compilation of space music from the usually excellent Hearts of Space crew. A bit too Muzaky for my liking. Approach with caution.

I first downloaded much of this album as part of a Hearts of Space podcast many moons ago. It was my introduction to “yoga music” and I used it all last Summer 05 when I began learning Yoga. It’s a great album, very cosmic and carries a lot more depth in terms of electronics than some other Yoga compilations I could mention…

Stick it on, throw a pose and watch your mind melt away!

A bit too squiglyistic in terms of “soulful” guitar squeals but nice, fluffy ambience for Yoga exercises. Yum!

Ugh! The worst kind of New Age fluff; full of trustafarian bass lines and mock Indian muzak. Yuk, Yuk, Yuk. Avoid.

Hilarious dissection of Blairs government and its attack on civil liberties and political life in Britain. Tariq Ali writes like a man possessed (which I guess he is) and all the better for it.

If you ever wondered why The Guardian pursues the direction it does, then Mr Ali is the man to wake you up to the horror that we’re sleep walking towards.

It takes a couple of hours to read but provides you with many salient points to argue withpeople about.

Two thumbs up!

Like the man says, you may not agree with everything he has to say, and God knows I don’t, but unless you can come up with anything better, you’d better engage with it.

Mr Monbiot recommends a global parliament, with one GMP per 10 million people (that’s a lot of constituents), an international clearing bank, a shift towards contraction and convergence so that carbon units can be bought and sold by the worlds nations, a debt strike by the poor countries against the rich to level out the unfair rules that the IMF and World Bank play by, a challenge to US dominance of the UN and most of the global decision making mechanisms in the West and a robust defence of genuine democracy.

And that’s just the beginning. This book is so thought provoking, and well written, that it makes the history of The World Bank read like a thriller. Once you read it, you can’t claim you don’t know what’s going on, why the world is so messed up or what you can do to change it.

I read this immediately after Captive State which documents in considerable detail the way in which the British State has become entwined with corporate interests. I felt helpless after reading it. The Age of Consent on the other hand, gives an indication that there is still a possibility of change if enough people are engaged enough to participate in a reclaimed Civil Society.

It’s a tall order, but then many of the significant social changes that have happened over the last 200 years or so seemed that way too.

Give it a read; it’ll make your brain steam (in a good way).