Jack White can play the guitar

Stating the obvious perhaps, but sometimes songs come along that make you wish more than anything that you could play the guitar. Jack White's new track Sixteen Saltines is definitely enough to make me regret not asking for guitar lessons for my birthday this week.




We can rest assured they'll be more where that came from when the debut solo album Blunderbuss is released on April the 23rd. He produced it himself at his Third Man Studio in Nashville - a dream holiday destination if ever there was one. Until then tickets for his London show are on sale tomorrow. Finger's crossed!

Luckily Jack's way with a guitar has also been enough to make me stop listening to this Eugene McGuinness track (or the Black Keys album) for at least 5 seconds. I'm trying to wean myself off before I hate it. It just works too well for its own good for a London walk into work....

Adele / Daft Punk mashup = no more New Boring

I have always been a big fan of Adele. The lady, the voice, the talent, the laugh. Long before she was dressing in Stella McCartney, enjoying worldwide album success and flicking the finger to "The Suits", I got to interview her as an excitable, scruffy and hugely talented teenager and an Adele-shaped soft-spot was born. It's big enough that whatever anyone says, I can't even blame her for any of the New-Boring-ness that followed.

But to those people - I think you'll like this! Carlos Serrano's done a lovely mash up of Set Fire To The Rain and Daft Punk's Something About Us. Just the thing for some subtle desk-dancing to see you through till home time....



And while we're at it, let's have a shout out for last year's amazing Rolling in the Deep remix by Jamie xx. Way too good not to mention... and nothing boring about that.


Adele + Jamie XX Rolling in Deep from BurnsDesign on Vimeo.

*Weepy alert* aka The Now Is Good trailer

I have to confess I do like a good cry. Which is handy, what with the over-productive tear ducts I seem to have been saddled with. Sleeping in, a hangover, not being able to find anything to wear or do up my jeans because of post-Christmas podge have all been known to result in a mascara-stained face with matching puffy eyes.

Sometimes crying really isn't fun (in a job interview /when something bad happened/ that hyperventilating type of crying when it takes ages to regulate your breathing): but crying at a movie is without a doubt one of my guiltiest pleasures. The Diving Bell and the Butterfly (inconsolable), Terms of Endearment (was for some reason expecting a comedy), Green Mile (obvs), Stepmom (every time), One Day (nowhere near as much as the book, but still a fair bit of mascara movement) and just last weekend Love and Other Drugs (again, doubly effective as I had wrongly assumed I was watching some kind of Rom Com) have all had me weeping into my popcorn.

And here's a film which looks like it should come with a "crying guaranteed or your money back" sticker....

I'm already feeling emotional. Now is Good stars Dakota Fanning as a teenager with a terminal illness who decides to fill every last moment of her life with activities like trying drugs and losing her virginity. Enter the quite beautiful (in a cradle-snatchy way) Jeremy Irvine. And - I imagine / fully expect - cue the tears. It's out on the 25th of May (with the brilliant Paddy Considine playing Dakota's dad). I'm off to bulk-buy some tissues.