Number One on Podiobooks (today)

Just a quick one. I noticed that I'm number one on podiobooks.com's 'Most Subscribed To Books of The Last 30 Days' chart. This is only because 'One Among the Sleepless' was added in the last month and such a surge of interest is natural under the circumstances, but still, it's nice while it lasts.
If you aren't a member of Podiobooks yet, why not join? (It's free and easy). Then you can go to my page and give me some stars: obviously 5 for everything would be nice. You can even write a review of the book and start a discusion of it, the reading, the whole thing. It's your big chance to break into literary criticism - and a great opportunity to give me a late Christmas present of 5 stars all the way. So much nicer than socks.

Windfarm
Phew! I've had a hard day's editing and swearing at different video editing software programs. My second 'One Among the Sleepless' video promo is now online at YouTube:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=-TTQATGj1Rc
My nephews-in-law (though both are grown men and could doubtless thrash me in an arm-wrestling match) and I shot this against all odds - high winds and no thermal undies - on Dec 26th while you were all eating cold turkey sandwiches and watching 'Chitty Chitty Bang Bang'.
Now remember folks, this is a promotional video, so if you like it (or the podcast) do me a favour and send the link to your friends and anyone else you think may enjoy it. If I can pick up just one new listener as a result of this promo, then all that standing about half naked in a stiff northerly wind was worth it.

Episode 10: It’s Erotica, Jim: But Not As We Know It.
Already live on Podiobooks.com and due to click into life on Libsyn at 6.00 pm Tuesday December 26th 2006 (GMT), Episode 10 kicks off part two of One Among the Sleepless.
Obviously I can’t go into story content here due to the fact that some of the blog readers haven’t heard episode 10 yet, but I can say that it’s the first episode with a ‘sexually explicit’ warning slapped on it.
What does this mean? Well, I personally don’t think it’s going to set pulses racing: the presence of Wayne completely puts the kibosh on that. But one has to warn people all the same; there’s the real possibility that some people may be offended. There’s also the more likely possibility that they may be listening in public, and that may cause certain… responses. Clothes are shed and various bits of the human anatomy are mentioned in a somewhat perky condition. I don’t think anyone is going to find themselves in a perky state as they listen to it, but you never know. Obviously if you’re listening at home, this shouldn’t prove too problematic either way. However, if you’re intending to listen to this on the train or on the bus commuting to or from work, be warned. I don’t, as I say, think that gentlemen will need to discreetly place their bowler hats on their laps, but you may feel a certain reddening of the cheeks. After all, it’s not every day that you find yourself on the 7.30 train to Paddington listening to a bizarre sexual entanglement. Or is it?
As the waiter says with a sly wink as he plonks a plate of oysters in front of you… ‘Enjoy.’

And by the way, the Christmas pudding was delicious.

Christmas Day 11.00 am

'It's Christmas!' as Noddy Holder screams from the radio so often at this time of year. I'm sitting at my brother in law's computer in Wexford while my wife struggles downstairs with a home-made Christmas pudding she started work on about seven weeks ago. Neither she nor I have ever had a home-made Christmas pudding. In fact I don't think any of the people coming here later today have. Have you? I don't even particularly like Christmas pudding; it's too rich, so sweet it's almost bitter. I usually drown the thing in about a gallon of custard or cream or whatever neutralizing liquid happens to be lying around on the table. Still, my wife's a good cook and she's followed Delia Smith's recipe, so I'm optimistic that it'll be nice.

My brother in law is also a good cook. He loves cooking, and he loves sixties-type garage punk too. He's downstairs right now listening to the Garagepunk.com Christmas Podcast and fisting a dead bird. What better way to start the day?

As for me, I've phoned my parents over in England (they're very well and having a jolly time). And now I'm sitting here writing this and wondering what to expect later. I think about five more people are coming: my brother in law's parents, my other sister in law and her daughter, and another brother in law. Add to that my father in law and you have quite a table full. I don't know what time the drinking is going to start, but I imagine that by the time the Christmas pudding hits the table, we should all be in a fit state to enjoy it - whatever it tastes like.

OK, I'm going downstairs now to loiter around the drinks cabinet looking both innocent and thirsty at the same time. Merry Christmas

Oh Brilliant! So I noticed that gaffe on ep 9 last night at about 2 am, I was consequently up till 4 am fixing it and uploading the fixed version. I didn't have time to listen to the complete thing, just the bit that had the mistake. Now, the mistake was, in my opinion, significant to the story. It was important that it be fixed and it is fixed. Good.
So we left Dublin this afternoon to come and spend Crimbo down here in Wexford in the south of Ireland with various branches of my wife's family tree. I'm on the bus and I decide to listen to the 'fixed' version of ep 9 that I uploaded at 4am this morning. What do I hear about two-thirds of the way through? A mistake! OK, this is only a typo, a flubbed line, but for Christ's sake! What I've done - I realize - is fix an early mix with the flubbed line that, ironically, is repaired in the first version of ep 9 that made it online.
Now what this means is that, since I can't get back to Dublin for a week or so, I can't fix it. So you have a choice of the episode 9 that was there - the one with a genuine error in it; or the one that's now - the one with a flubbed line. Of course, if you're a real enthusiast, you could have both and just rename them so they sit differently. But if I were you, I'd go with the one that's there now. My wife thinks I'm mental because I actually give a s***. She says I should just forget it. I think she's right, the problem is... I am mental.
(Sigh), oh forget it. I'm just sharing my madness with you... and I don't want anyone emailing me and saying 'Oh, Mike, actually you've flubbed a line...'

(Update January 20th 2007: all errors and flubbed lines etc are now fixed and #9 is as it should be)

Episode 9 - Editorial Slip

Hi there, Mike here. I noticed last night an editorial error in Episode 9. I've fixed it and it's now as it should be. It's a line of dialogue, but I feel it's an important one. If you downloaded Episode 9 before Saturday morning (4.30 am GMT), you may want to delete your existing '9' and download it again - especially if your podcatcher got it automatically and you haven't listened to it yet. If you have listened to it, no worries, but I'd still delete and download again, just so as your collection is as it should be.
Sorry for any inconvenience caused. Have a good Christmas.
Mike

(Update January 20th 2007: all errors and flubbed lines etc are now fixed and #9 is as it should be)

Episode 9

Episode 9 is a turning point for the central characters and is the episode that the story has been building up to. It marks the end of Part One of the novel and sets up the events of Part Two. At the end of the episode there's a promo for Jack Wakes Up by Seth Harwood.

Since creating the promo video mentioned in the previous blog, I've discovered that MySpace has a video showing facility for your homepage that allows WMV files, so I've uploaded it there too. I've also uploaded some pictures of me to my MySpace page, which it displays in a groovy slide show, again on the MySpace page. So if you'd like to see those, or even if you'd like to be a MySpace friend of mine, click here.

I start recording episode 10 today; it'll go up on Dec 26th. Fortunately I can preset that release time so I don't have to hang around here in the flat while all my chums are off stuffing themselves with Christmas leftovers or down the pub swilling back the pints. I know that a lot of you will be doing that too, and not in the slightest bit interested in One Among The Sleepless. But for those of you who really are what Scott Sigler calls 'Junkies', episode 10 will be released on schedule.
Until then, have a Merry Christmas. Cheers for now.

One Among The Sleepless: Promo Video 1

So I decided to throw my anonymity out with my dignity and freak out in a pair of jim-jams on YouTube.
I got the camera - and the jim-jams - at the weekend.
Then I freaked out and my wife filmed it all. The result is at the end of this link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7pepBMmd6wM

If you like it , do me a favour and share it with someone by copying this link into an email and spamming everyone you know.
The pyjamas cost €10.00 at Penny's (Primark), so if you're really taken with them, you know where to go to get a pair.
I had a mad job getting the editing done, the stupid software that came with the camera (Ulead video studio 8) didn't recognise the video it had just spent all day editing. After five hours of f******* about with that and 'Movica' (free download), I looked kind of like I do in the photo. Today I downloaded Windows Movie Maker and finally got a result. OK, so it's not smooth as silk, but it works. Stupid Ulead! Grrrrrr!

Episode 8: Half Bricks, Hancock and Vincent Price.
I've noticed that my blogs come up when I do random searches on the book title. Consequently I've been wondering about what phrases I might include in the text of the blog to draw in completely random web searchers. So if you see the odd completely unrelated
'hot pics of Britney Spears'
statement in this week's blog, don't be alarmed.
This week's episode features a trip to a recreation ground and some speculation about half bricks (see? Sentences like that like that last one don't bring anyone in. Who wants to read about 'half-bricks'?)
'Naked half-bricks - hot photos'.
For a while back in the mid-late nineties, I worked a string of jobs for agencies that specialised in supplying gardeners, refuse collectors and street-sweepers. I worked contracts in Slough, Brighton and Haywards Heath.
The half-brick thing was totally true in the Slough area: half-bricks everywhere all over recreation grounds and council estates. 'Why?' Good question. I could never figure that one out.
'Free anti-virus protection'
I remember I used to work with a gardening crew maintaining various cemeteries around Burgess Hill and Haywards Heath. I'm one of the gardeners that Dusty sees when he gets up in the morning as they start their machines and start mowing and stuff. I enjoyed that job: I got to listen to about a million audio books while I was working.

'Increase the size of your penis by inches overnight'.

Lots of old BBC tapes too: Hancock's Half Hour especially. I bought a load of Hancock's HH cassettes. The Poetry Society has to be my favourite, that and The Sleepless Night. Another BBC cassette I practically wore out was an audio drama with Vincent Price called The Price of Fear. Fantastic.
'Mike Bennett - hot naked pics xxxxxx'

Couple of technical gaffes this week with sound levels. Everything sounds fine till you upload it and then listen to it on an iPod, then you can hear the great surges and dips of volume every ten seconds. I had to re-edit it after uploading and then re-post again. If you got one of the first thirty or so downloads from libsyn, congratulations - you've got a collector's edition with genuine sound surges. Be happy, not sad, someday it might be worth something. Er...

'Naked cows - hot pics - Manchester United'.

Episode 7: Not Quite Gone With The Wind

This one took a long time. The ‘Meredith House’ story was written using a different font when the novel was published; this gave it a ‘not of this text’ look. But how was I going to do that with the podcast?

I felt that the most important thing was to find a different piece of music to intro-outro the text. In this episode, we start with Meredith House, but in later episodes (there will be another two visits to Leanne’s world) we’ll possibly arrive mid-episode and so a whole new segue would be needed. Something romantic beyond the stuff my mates have thus far contributed; something full of desire and mystery. Now where would I find that? I thought about trying to sweet-talk a busker on Grafton Street in Dublin - you see the occasional harp-player or violinist plucking their catgut. But it was all too vague, too conditional. Instead, I went to the Podsafe Music Network at Podshow.net. I searched under ‘romantic’ and I got Jim Richmond’s piece first time. I immediately knew I had what I was looking for. But surely there must be a fee for this usage? I checked with Podshow, and no. Just acknowledge the artist and the site. Artists like Jim want to share their work with the world; and podcasters – who have the same motivations – are able to help them achieve that. It’s symbiotic, innit? As Glen might say.

Thanks again to Jim and to Podshow. And to any podcasters who find themselves in a similar dilemma – you now know where to go.

Also, I’ve put a ‘guestbook’ on my homepage http://www.oneamongthesleepless.com . So you can go there, leave a comment about the podcast, and leave. You don’t need to sign up to Blogger or anything, just leave a message. So what are you waiting for? Go now.

Files Re-named
I had to rename my files on the Libsyn site following my gaffe of earlier on today. I've spent the last few hours re-loading the lost files, then, since I was using a proper FTP and not Propaganda (which names your files by the date you upload - that's right, it wasn't me that came up with that dumb naming system) I uploaded the files with a proper naming system 'Sleepless-01' etc. Of course, I now had a mixture of sensibly-named and Propaganda-dated files. So to prevent further confusion, I renamed the lot. I now have no stats on PodcastPickle. Arse! It also means that when you get the next episode, it'll be named 'Sleepless-07', which might confuse your iPod or whatever. Sorry about that. But it's all for the best, I needed to get that sorted out anyway. So, from now on, we have an agreed name format. So, you can relax. I mean, I can relax. For all I know, you aren't even reading this. Are you?
In other news, I can't believe David Gest got the heave-ho from 'I'm A Celebrity Get Me Out Of Here!' I really thought he had that in the bag. Tonight's show is just starting, so I'm off to watch the final.

Disaster Strikes The Tired Driver

OK, well here's a blog entry! Today, while half asleep, I managed to access my Libsyn site via an FTP that I rarely use because my usual FTP device was being weird. However, I was trying to get into my website (oneamongthesleepless.com), not my Libsyn site. Now if this is all sounding boring and nonsensical, let me rewrite this in English...

I accidentally went into the place where I store my podcasts online.

Then, when I got there, I thought (I stress again that i was half asleep) 'what's all this stuff?' and don't ask my why, but I then thought, (add Homer Simpson voice) 'Stupid crap, what's this doing in my homepage?'. I then proceeded to delete about two thirds of it before I noticed exactly where I was. Then, Homer-like, I shrieked aloud. Too late. It was all deleted. So if you tried to download episodes 2, 4, 5, or 6 today, you may have had some problems. Sorry about that. I was really pissed off to see that all my podcast pickle stats are nuked: my libsyn stats are nuked, and my files now have different names. Terrific. I'll try and mend what I can, but it'll never be quite the same as it was before.

The moral of this story is, don't drive - or mess with FTPs and website files when you're half asleep. Doh!

Episode 6

This is a Brighton bus in action. It is, as you can see, a red and cream bus. This is the same type, though perhaps not the same colour, as the bus that Peter and Dusty go riding on in episode 6. This one is actually on the Western Road, which is part of Peter's bus route in episodes 3 and 6.

I used to ride Brighton busses almost every day when I was writing One Among The Sleepless. I even wrote a lot of the book's plot and dialogue in notebooks while I was doing so. I remember taking photos of the interiors of the single and double deckers, noting down the details of how people behaved and generally used busses.
Obviously what happens in the novel with Peter and Dusty is totally fiction. But you do see some characters on busses. I actually saw the character that Dusty's appearance is based on from the window of a bus much like the one in the picture. I was sitting, just as Peter is in episode 3; head bumping on the glass and staring gormlessly out of the window. When suddenly, on North Street, I saw this big tramp with fuzzy hair and shades sitting at a bus stop. The guy came with me from that bus stop - but unlike Peter, when I say he came with me, I mean in my notebook - I wrote him down for future use. As for Peter, well, I guess he was the future use.
Spot Brighton
Palmeira Square is the stop where Peter's stop. Dusty checks out the view of Hove Lawns and the open sea. The houses are converted Georgians. We are indeed in the Brunswick region of Hove.

Episode 5: Live and Ugly

So, episode 5 is live and ugly. It took ages to do that scene outside Gaz's house, but I think it was worth it in the end. The worst thing in this one for me was when I realised I'd misread a word. I'd said 'physically undressed' when I'd written and intended, 'Psychically undressed'. Unfortunately I didn't notice until I was on the verge of posting it. Arggg! I had to take apart all the music bits and the vocal bits and then graft a SINGLE word onto the finished thing. Now for some of the more technically proficient among you, this wouldn't be difficult, but for me it was a 'mare. I use different programs for different processes and, well, let's say it was an assault course. However, it was , I think you'll agree, necessary: 'physically' and 'psychically' look similar on the page, but the buttons they push in our heads are hugely different. It's like the difference between ordering a bowl of spaghetti bolognese and a pig's head. If you intend one and somehow manage to communicate the other... well, it's confusing for everybody.

What else? I just bought a new microphone. It looks very cool, but I'm not sure yet how cool it actually is. I'm fiddling about with settings and stuff and trying to get the best out of it without actually reading any technobabble online about hertz and megahertz (have I even spelled that right?) For my lazy sins I'll probably end up sounding like a drunk dalek. That'll teach me.

I Was A Teenage Numanoid

In Episode 4, we learn that Wayne is what used to be called a ‘Numanoid’, that being a fan of British synth-rock pioneer, Gary Numan. The reason that Ellen is so familiar with Numan’s videos is because I have the video in question, ‘New Man, Numan’, which was released by Palace video yonks ago. I got it in a charity shop; I was thrilled. I ran home and played it endlessly, much to the annoyance of my wife. I then grabbed my copy of ‘I Die You Die’ waved it at her and said...

Well, actually this last bit didn’t happen. But I’d just like to state that I’m with Wayne on this one: Gary Numan, from 1979 – 1981, ruled my world. And ‘Replicas’ is one of the best records ever made by anybody, at any time, anywhere... in my humble opinion.

Oh, and a big hello to 'Country Girl'. Thanks for the comment, it was great to hear from you again. Tell that old man of yours he owes me an email.

Episode 4

So, after last week's farce, I wanted to get a guaranteed no-hassle upload, and if there was going to any bother, I wanted to deal with it before Wednesday - not during and after. Fortunately, #4 went up without a hitch and is available now.

Yes, I know I should find a day and stick to it: going out regularly, like a favourite TV or radio show, but these things take time to find their groove. When I find a time that really suits me, I'll settle into it. I aim to be up between 23.00 Tuesday and 23.00 Wednesday (GMT), ideally Wednesday morning UK / Ireland time.

Yesterday, my former band mate, Chris Hurst, sent me a piece of music he recorded a few years ago as, 'Lost Dog', called 'Disturbance'. I love it; a subtle sense of menace: the ticking clock, a child's sinister clockwork toy, and then the relentless 12-bar riff. I've tweaked it a bit for use in the podcast; you can hear it on the outtro, and will from now on.

It's nice really. All the music on the podcast comes from my old bandmates: we used to be in a band called The Premonitions. We rocked (well rocked-ish) Windsor and Slough in the late 80's and early 90's. We're still all good mates and whenever we get together we talk about doing a gig again. Although, outside of our wives and girlfriends, I can't think who else would want to come and see us.
Besides Chris, who played the guitar, there's Steve Chapman (bass), he's now living in Westport, Ireland, and playing in an on-going and ever-changing project called 'Blahfishend'. He provided the opening piece of music, 'Bitch', which you can download (if he's got his act together) from www.myspace.com/blahfishend
And then there's Luc Woods, who played the drums and was, for a time at least, known by the sobriquet, 'Zero Pilot'. He gave me the dreamy background piece and the various music for the scene sigues.

Spot Brighton
Brighton-spotters don't have much to go on here: Richardson and West doesn't exist. It's a mish-mash of various 'kill-me-now' data entry temp jobs I had in the nineties. As for Wayne and Lucy's house, I can't say yet. I've given no clues in the text, and shan't spill any beans here either.

OK, time to go to bed. This has been fun; I really must do a kind of back-blog and write comments on previous episodes.

Cheers, for now.

Mike

Sirens, Bells and DER DER DER

Saturday in Dublin. I went to the north side of the river and poked around in charity shops before taking a deep breath and plunging into the teeming hell that is Henry Street and Mary Street. There must’ve been a billion people swarming about in dense, chaotic streams that were almost impossible to break out of once you became entangled in them. It was nightmarish; I struggled through the crowd, trying not to get swept past the shops I wanted to visit and flung out at the far end of the street. I managed – somehow – to clamber through the bumbling bodies to reach the Apple shop. Here I stood with my face pressed to the window like a street urchin outside a cake shop. Oh, Garageband, how I long to run my fingers through your wondrous new podcasting functions that I’ve read so much about in ‘You Want It But Can’t Afford It’ magazine. I went home with a newspaper and birthday card for my dad... and a price pamphlet from the Apple store. Who knows, maybe I’ll shake out my piggy bank yet. O

nce home I started thinking about Episode 4 of One Among The Sleepless. Due to the flap around getting Episode 3 up and running earlier in the week, I’m a few days behind in my schedule. I usually try and get the lion’s share of the recording done on Thursday and Friday, then do editing and re-takes on Saturday on Sunday, and any bagging and tagging on Monday and Tuesday. The problem with recording the whole thing on Saturdays is that everyone else in the apartment building is off work. And when people are off work, they like to play their music loud and share it with the rest of the city. Add to that the police / ambulance sirens that go past every two minutes, the church bells (Sunday is impossible – it’s like a herd of Quasimodos having a beer and bells party), people shouting, people chucking trash into the skips outside, people slamming doors; it’s endless. We live in an apartment in the centre of the city. Good for getting to work; bad for peace and quiet. Still, somehow I’ve managed to get most of the recording down despite the cacophony.

I’ve had to call it a day now because the chap next door has decided to share his music with me. It sounds like someone rhythmically pressing a big bass button that goes DER... DER... DER. Now we don’t want that on the podcast do we?

I’ll obviously try and get all the sirens and bells out of the final recording, but there may be a few left in the final edit. Sometimes you say something just perfectly and you can’t improve on it. So, if there’s a bell or something in the background, it’ll just have to stay there. Think of it as ambience. After all, what book about noisy neighbours would be complete without a bit of neighbourhood noise?

Until the next time...

OK, so there I there I was, tying the noose around the light fitting and getting all set to kick the chair out from under me when an email arrives from Libsyn. They’ve found the problem and have sorted it out: ‘Episode 3’ is go.

I was relieved to learn that my file isn’t in the pay of The Mob – it wasn’t a corruption thing. It was all to do with service upgrades and technical stuff that picks other stuff up - or doesn’t. Fortunately whatever needed doing is done and the Milky Bars are on me!

(For readers outside the UK, that’s a TV ad reference. Basically Milky Bar is a small bar of white chocolate that gets dished out by a blond kid with freckles in a cowboy outfit whenever things go well for him.) (OK, so I’m not blond or freckled, but I look as good in a cowboy outfit as the next man, especially when I’m biting down victoriously on a bar of white chocolate.)

‘Episode 4’ - in which Gaz eats a grape, Wayne eats a banana and Peter eats a slab of 100% pure terror in McDonalds – will be online (God willing) when the world wakes up next Wednesday morning.

Thanks again for your patience and understanding.

Mike

Hi, Mike here

If you're here reading this then youprobably came via my website, which you went to to get 'Episode 3' and found you couldn't. Well you're not alone. Neither can I.
I've uploaded it to Libsyn, deleted it, uploaded it again... still nothing. I'm now waiting for the guys at libsyn to get back to me with some kind of solution to the problem.

If anyone has any practical notions on why the hell 'Episode 3' won't download, I'd love to hear them. itunes suggest the file may be corrupted. What the hell does that mean? Is it taking backhanders from The Mob? Is it defective? If so, why? Argh!

What can I do? I can, and am going to carry on recording. 'Episode 4' is going into production today.
Please bear with me while this thing gets sorted out. I'm powerless to change anything at my end and can only wait for Libsyn to come back to me.

If necessary, I will move the location of the Podcast to another server, but I obviously hope that won't be necessary.

In the meantime, keep the faith, I'm not going to let anybody down and abandon this project; I will get the rest of this book up and online soon. When, where and how remains to be seen, but keep tuned into this blog for details. If you need to hear more One Among The Sleepless before then, why not listen to '1' and '2' again? You can't get too much of a good thing, can you?
OK, maybe too much whisky might be a problem. And cigarettes, heroin, chocolate cake, sunlight... in fact when you come to think of it, maybe the problematic good things are many. But hey, 'One Among The Sleepless' isn't one of them (at least until you get to Chpter 14, then things start to carry a health warning).