Web stuff wot we like

Naturally enough we would prefer that you only ever logged on to the world wide web to pick up your mail and check out all the latest updates at the TM website, however we grudgingly accept the possibility (however slight), that you may not find everything you are looking for here and point you towards other like minded people dotted around the ether, or in some cases just odd places that made us laugh

Cats Eye Creative Services
The more observant amongst you will doubtless have seen this lot dotted all over the TM website (check out all the cool free full colour PDF downloads for a kick off), and that's because we wouldn't trust anyone else with our design work. If you're in the market for some world-shattering, zeitgeist defining artwork or just need a little help with a local flyer campaign why not drop 'em a line, they're dead helpful and as friendly as a room full of teddy bears.
www.catseyecreative.com

Net Rhythms
has been around for some time now, and is a hugely valuable resource which has been reviewing, listing and archiving acoustic roots music for nearly four years. Described by co-founder Sue Cavendish as a “lo-fi, low-profile, pickin' & twangin', 12-bar rockin' & jammin', fiddle and mandolin folky kinda thing for us music fans who loved the Byrds, Emmylou Harris, Bonnie Raitt, Richard Thompson, The Grateful Dead and Little Feat.”
www.netrhythms.co.uk

Pete Lockett
Not content to regularly pass on his many years of experience in the papery pages of TotalMusic the ‘hardest working percussionist in the UK’s website features something in the region of one hundred articles, tutorials, videos and audio lessons all free to download and explore, covering everything from Indian rhythmic systems, Hand drum techniques, dozens of percussion instrument tutorials, master classes, Indian techniques for drum set and much more in PDF, MP3’s and streaming video formats.
www.petelockett.com

Shifty Disco
If you have yet to make the acquaintance of the inimitable Shifty Disco Singles club then log in here to find out how, after 7 years of monthly CD single releases, the bods at SD headed online with the Shifty Disco Weekly Download Singles Club, where a piffling 12-month subscription of £12.00 buys you 52 weekly releases (yup, that’s fifty two different songs, in fact it’s rather more than that because most are at least two cuts and many are EP’s).
www.shiftydisco.co.uk

Oblique Strategies
Fans of the great Brian Eno can indulge in their own Oblique Strategies here by visiting an online version of ‘The Oblique Strategy Generator’. Created in collaboration with painter Peter Schmidt the Oblique Strategies concept (which involves a series of cards designed to promote lateral thinking), has lurked in the back of studio control rooms of everyone from David Bowie to U2.
http://eno.sb.org/oblique.html

John Peel
The much missed DJ prompted many a chuckle during his long and illustrious career, and you can extend his influence beyond the grave with this wonderfully daft game invented to help while away the many happy hours spent in the great mans company on the wireless. Even more entertaining than all those Bogshed and Extreme Noise Terror sessions.
www.planetbods.org/radio/peel.live

Hammerhead
A nifty TR-909-like software drum program which you can use to create techno loops, jungle patterns, house beats, hip hop, industrial in fact almost any damn music you can think of. Featuring six separate channels, 29 built-in drum sounds and an import samples function, you can save your patterns to completely noise-free CD-quality wave files and then use them with your sampler, tracker or sequencer program, and, get this, it’s only bloody free!! We would however suggest that you send programmer Bram a donation as we’ve been using this for a while now and it’s ace and we’d like to see what he will come up with next
www.threechords.com/hammerhead

Ape Studios
In these heady days of digital recording and bedroom based number one hit singles it’s easy to forget that many people still love that cool, classic, big production sound popular back in the day when recording was analogue and tape was king. If this is you then you could do a lot worse than pop along and have a squizz at A.P.E. studios website and discover more about their residential studio set-up built around a positive museum of vintage recording equipment. If you want it old skool this sounds like a cool place to start.
www.apestudios.com