Looking Sideways: 10 Things

This week: some new music to discover, our Covent Garden rail jam, and the 'lie' around blue zones.

1. Last night was fun - as part of my role as one of the judging panel, I gave one of the keynote speeches at the Adventure Writing Prize award ceremony on London. It was a true privilege to play a small role in this year’s awards, and in Saltblood, we’ve chosen a winner I really can’t recommend highly enough.

Find out more about the Adventure Writing Awards here.

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2. Two things I’ve come to believe are so important when it comes to creativity and friendship.

• If somebody shares a creative project they’re worked on, ALWAYS give the feedback. I was reminded of the importance of this yesterday when my pal Dan Burgess took the time to listen to an advance copy of The Announcement, and then sent me a really thoughtful and helpful note which has been massively encouraging and insightful. Thanks Dan

• AND - always share their work! Or back the Kickstarter. Let’s face it, being an independent creative person amid this onslaught of algorithms and homogenous content is bloody hard and endlessly soul-destroying. Sharing your friends’ work is good for the soul, hugely encouraging for them, and a vote for the type of creative world we actually want to live in.

It always amazes me how few people do this. I mean, we’re all sitting on Instagram, Substack and other platforms 24/7 anyway. Why not embellish the timeline with something independent that your pals made?

If we don’t, then who will?

With all that in mind - HUGE congrats to my pals Les Seddon Brown, Si Belson and Will Bremridge on their brilliant first Tallboy release. And bonus chapeau to Will Stapleton for the subtle, spacey production, which is right up my reverb-filled boulevard.

Les is one of my oldest and dearest friends who has been fitting this around his incredibly busy life for a few years now. To see the lads come out the other side with such a lovely piece is great to see.

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3. Next Friday! My brilliant

All Conditions Media

team are organising a ski rail jam in the middle of Covent Garden to celebrate the opening of the new Peak Performance store!

We’ve got very-close-friend-of-the-show Tim Warwood on the mic, some of the best skiers in the world in the house, and it’s free. Hope to see some friendly faces there.

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4. My pal Lauren Hill is asking the women’s surf community to help her shape the future of women’s surfing:

“Help us understand how the surf industry can and should be doing a better job at connecting with women. Your responses are an important part of this work. Thank you for your time and feedback”.

Take part here.

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5. Headz showcases Brighton street skating in all its grubby, fish-eyed glory.

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Use LOOKINGSIDEWAYS for 15% off any Db Journey purchase.

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6. The brilliant Tremula Festival begin today! There are still a few tickets left for sessions on the Saturday - click here (and I will see you there).

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7. Friend-of-the-show Katie Moore has made a really interesting short about the work of the cage-rattling Re-Action collective. Watch it above.

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8. This lengthy read about the Prince documentary ‘we may never get to see’ is right up my strasse. Big thanks to listener and reader Chris Baker for the share.

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9. Have been chatting to Arto Saari about coming on the show, so I enjoyed this James Brand short about his practise as a photographer.

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10. “The epitome of this is blue zones, which are regions where people supposedly reach age 100 at a remarkable rate. For almost 20 years, they have been marketed to the public. Okinawa in Japan is one of these zones. There was a Japanese government review in 2010, which found that 82% of the people aged over 100 in Japan turned out to be dead. The secret to living to 110 was, don’t register your death”.

Finally, a really interesting and provocative piece on the ‘rotten’ data on extreme human aging.

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What did I miss? What did you think of this week’s list?