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The most successful Formula One race driver retired yesterday.

Unlike former legends such as Senna and Prost, I have witnessed the whole of Michael Schumacher’s career.

From his first race in the now-defunct Jordan team, through the Bennetton years and to the Ferrari glory days.

Schumacher has always divided opinion – his tactics on the track have been as shady as he has been talented. Damon Hill has criticised Schumacher quite openly of tarnishing his legend with moments such as Adelaide 1994, Jerez 1997 and even up to this year where he was accused of deliberately positioning his car to prevent the title leader from getting Pole position.

The Adelaide incident has been analysed so many times, and I don’t believe it was pre-meditated, merely Schumacher acting on instinct. He knew he’d messed up, knew the car was damaged, Hill came upon him, saw an opportunity to pass, and Schumacher moved to block him.

A combination of Hill’s opportunism, and Schumacher’s survival instinct meant that the collision occured. Fault will always lie squarely at Schumacher’s feet – he knew the car was broken, and had Hill known, I’m sure he would have held back from overtaking him.

Jerez was a completely different matter… in Martin Brundle’s infamous words “That didn’t work, my friend… you hit him in the wrong place!”

As for Monaco this year, it is debatable whether a driver with Michael’s skill would have locked up into the corner, or even deliberately left the back of the car hanging out onto the racing line… He was penalised, so therefore was found guilty.

That aside, the history books will always show Schumacher as the most successful driver of all time, with 7 world driver’s championships. However, in all that time, he has had no real competition… Senna and Prost won 7 world titles between them, however, they drove in a time where they were each other’s competition… and drivers such as Piquet, Mansell and Keke Rosberg were also scoring wins.

Formula One in the 1980s was a lot more competitive, with the drivers (and cars) being more equal. the 90’s and early 2000’s saw only minor competition for Schumacher (Notably Hill and Hakkinen). Only when Schumacher has been in an uncompetitive car have the competition got close to him. (with the exception of 1999, when he was out for 3 months with a broken leg).

While the history books will show Schumacher as the most successful of all time – only time will tell if he will be remembered as the greatest. How many of today’s F1 fans have seen Fangio racing? (I haven’t).

But love him or hate him, Schumacher has always brought some entertainment to the sport, and now we have a new face flying the flag for Ferrari: Kimi Raikkonnen. Kimi does not have anywhere near the charisma of Schumi, but for the first time ever, he actually cracked a joke on Sunday (Maybe he’s trying to get a personality in preparation for joining the italian team?) When asked why he’d missed a presentation ceremony for Michael, Kimi (never one to really show adoration to Schu) replied with typical deadpan: “I was having a shit!”.

Funniest moment of Formula One for many years!

last week, I made a post, admitting to uber geekhood, and linked to a great Star Wars site that advocated what we all knew – The famous scene in the first Star Wars film, where Han Solo ruthlessly shoots the bounty hunter Greedo should never have been tinkered with.

For both dramatic, and character-arc reasons, Han Solo should have no problem killing a bounty hunter in cold blood. As an audience, we don’t know if Luke and Ben can really trust the man who has agreed to smuggle them to Alderaan, and when Han redeems himself at the end of the film, shooting Vader’s Tie Fighter and allowing Luke to destroy the death star, we have seen him turn from someone who only cares about saving himself, to saving his new friends.

Anyway, I digress…

The owner of the site contacted me, and asked me what cards I needed to complete my ‘A New Hope’ card collection – and has actually found and is sending me 9 of the 10 I needed!

So, many thanks, you’ve made a geek very happy

But the story doesn’t end there – in a subsequent post, I asked about the missing card list, and the Star Wars Fan Boi came up trumps again! The cards from the Premiere two-player introductory game are now listed over at his site! Just goes to show, sometimes a question asked without expecting a response can sometimes surprise you.

The White Room The KLF
As an ardent Heavy Rock fan, you might be surprised to find The White Room in my collection, but it is one of my favourite albums of all time.

At the time, I had no idea what Stadium House or Ambient House music was, and to be honest, I still have trouble with the differences between House and Garage music. I just knew that I liked some of The KLF’s songs, and most of those were listed on the track list of this album.

Pidgeonholing and labeling aside – this record was released at the peak of The KLF’s popularity, having just released the single “Justified & Ancient” with Tammy Wynette. The single peaked at #2 in the UK single charts, but this album is a complete departure from the radio-friendly commercial material that The KLF had been releasing.

Perhaps as a departure from the commercial world that Caulty & Drummond aped so much (to the point where they were to eventually delete The KLF’s back catalogue and burn the £1M royalties they still had remaining). This album is a mixed selection of ambient chill-out and loud ‘Stadium House’ – House music mixed with crowd noises and a large ambiance, making the music sound as if it was being played in a large stadium.

I remember being somewhat underwhelmed by the album, as the versions of the chart songs I was familiar with were different. In fact, if you’re used to the source material and listen to the album with those expectations, it feels like a collection of outtakes and ‘b-side’ mixes.

However, for some strange reason, I keep coming back to this album…
You can only listen to it as an album – individual tracks flow into each other, and the vocals reflect various themes across songs – prominently the Justified & Ancient melody, which opens the album, and also features on track 7 “No More Tears”.
Unlike a lot of music from the late 80’s/early 90’s, this album still sounds as fresh as ever. I know it’s a cliche, but it’s true… Perhaps because it is so unique it has stood the test of time.

Lyrically, it is nothing clever, witty or cerebal, but musically it is something else.

I’d highly recommend getting this album, listening to it a couple of times, and then leaving it alone for a couple of years – putting it on when you’re a bit bored with your record collection and rediscover it as opposed to just listening to it.

I’m hoping that I’m wrong about Bat out of Hell 3. Using one of my free iTunes downloads, I downloaded the first single from the album: It’s All Coming Back To Me.

Most people will know it from the Celine Dion version, but that itself was a cover. The original was written by Jim Steinman for his girl-band project Pandora’s Box.

This version sees Meat Loaf duetting with Norwegian singer Marion Raven, and I must say it is quite stonking.

Raven’s voice takes a while to get used to – IMHO, her voice is a little child-like and nasal, but after the first couple of listens, it doesn’t grate as much. For the time being (at least until Google notice it!) you can watch the video at YouTube. It’s not the best of his videos (that place is reserved for the Michael Bay epic “Objects in the rearview mirror”) but it’s quite good.

Featuring all the trademark overblown operatics that characterise any Meat Loaf song, it certainally whets my appetite for the forthcoming album. With Desmond Child (Bon Jovi, Def Leppard, Aerosmith) producing and writing, perhaps it is in safe hands…

What is it with Celebrities adopting children from Africa?

Now Madonna has jumped on the bandwagon. Are we supposed to celebrate her compassion by taking one child out of his environment and bringing him into her world, which is frankly so far removed from ours that she believed that Swept Away was a great script.

I’m not denying that she is doing it out of compassion for the child. Having visited a school in the Dominican Republic and meeting some of the children there, you get a real sense of how lucky you are. However, if Madonna really cared, she would take the money she would spend bringing up the child and donate it to the orphanage. She could use the money to improve the living conditions there, or even set up a school, or training college herself to help these children get a better life.

If she were a real philanthropist, she could cement her legacy in history by helping the wider community, as opposed to selfishly taking a single child out of a world where wealth is measured in grain, and into one where wealth is measured by how many magazines you can sell.

And what of the child?

Granted, he will get a life that many of us dream of – never having to struggle, driving lessons in a Ferrari, one-on-one tuition with the best music teachers money can buy… But what happens when he grows old enough to understand where he came from?

Will he look down on his former countrymen, thankful that he didn’t have to grow up in that hardship? Will he be proud of his heritage, or feel a traitor to his roots? Will he ever go back to the country of his birth?

Only time will tell, and his upbringing will have a lot to do with his attitudes.

I really hope for everyones sake that Madonna is adopting for the right reasons, but why Africa? I am sure that there are just as many Orphans in America or the UK (where she lives) that would benefit just as well from her charity.

Geldof looked to help Africa for the greater good of the country, he did not look to help individuals, and that is what makes him a greater person.