Brazil Bliss

I've spent the last hour or so listening to Azymuth's latest album "Butterfly".
The title track happens to be the Brazilian band's take on the Herbie Hancock tune from the mid 70s which I can remember being played just over 18 months ago on one of our long gone shows, "Jazz Etc" presented by Sefura who really didn't get the sort of encouragement she deserved.

That particular version on her show was one that had vocals by vocalist Kimiko Kasai and had the late 70s signature sound from Herbie Hancock found on tunes such as "You Bet Your Love" and "I Thought It Was You" which for me was the finest era of the muti talented performer.

Some of the other tracks are good as well containing moog-esque synth effects which oddly enough don't date the tracks at all although I'm guessing they're aiming for or more retrospective sound harking back to their 70s routes.

However one of them which is called "New Dawn" sounds very similar to "My Petition" from Jill Scott's second album in 2004 although that's not to say that it's poor in comparison.

With regards to getting my feature completed I'm happy that it will be done but rather sad as well because it will be the last piece of assessed practical radio work that I'll be doing on this course.
Others however seem to be in the mind of getting away from it all together, especially Sam who asked me if I was getting fed up with being here and just wanted to move away from University overall.

My response to that would be absolutely fucking not.

Although I will try and look out for possiblities of work and placements in the New Year,
there is no way I'm distancing myself from the goings on at Uni for the rest of this year, and especially my radio show as unlike most of the others, I actually enjoy presenting on the radio each week and as I'm very unlikely to do what I do on Smoke, in the real world.

And that's not having a go at everyone as I understand that a lot of them are more interested in other areas of radio, but for something like that to come from possibly one of the best presenters on the course is disapointing.
And it shows how genuine they really are when the microphone's switched off, as they're not the uptempo personality they perceive (or decieve) themselves to be on-air.

If there's one role model I continue to look up to from the radio course, it has to be Tim who's now at BBC Radio Jersey, as he kept himself involved in Smoke in his final year by doing an hour long sports show once a week, as well as doing work experience at the Sportsmedia, BBC Radio 2 and writing his dissertation, and this continued until he left to return to Devon in a well deserved job at Lantern FM.

And all this still didn't stop him from getting a first for his degree, so who says you can't get great results as well as having a great time?

I doubt I'll end up getting as high a result myself but in this day and age employees in radio aren't really interested in high marks as opposed to practical experience and overall enthusiasm.

Talk Talk were right when they said "Life's What You Make It" and the way others seem to be taking that is by making it as difficult and depressing as possible.
Although if you take into account what happened to me last year, it can sometimes be beyond one's control.

If I don't start planning ahead after Christmas, then I may not even live to see in 2010.