David Lammy is apparently on very friendly terms with him - “apparently” as Vance is someone who appears to see everything as conditional, just like the orange one - and Labour just took an absolute battering in the Welsh and Scottish elections. Admittedly this isn’t the same kind of direct contact, but I hope he meets Wes Streeting in the near future as they’re both birds of a feather and he’d be an appropriate direct target of the Vance Curse.

Personal favourites:

‘Endless, Nameless’ / The Wildhearts - from the fake-out beginning (don’t turn the volume right up or you’ll get a surprise) to the fade at the end, it’s perfect to me. Joyously and gloriously noisy.

‘Dreamweaver’ / Sabbat - complex and clever thrash that gave young me a lot to think about; it’s loosely based on a book about a mediaeval Christian missionary and the lyrics are incredibly dense, yet so skilfully done that you don’t realise until you look at the lyric sheet and it’s huge.

‘Dopethrone’ / Electric Wizard - for those bad mood days

‘Mclusky Do Dallas’ / mclusky - inventive and slightly surrealist lyrics, noisy guitars and a great drummer.

‘Nothingface’ / Voivod - still sounds like it was recorded five years from now despite being around 30 years old. Best description I can give is ‘prog thrash’ and that’s not really very accurate.

‘The Big Roar’ / The Joy Formidable - noisy indie rock. Not going to win any awaawards for innovation but it’s so well done.

Like most people’s favourites, these were mostly released when I was starting to develop my own taste in music, and the release dates of most of them will tell you that means I’m getting old!

Does that controller work with one of 8bitdo’s wireless dongles? They’re pretty cheap - I paid around £8 for mine a few years back - but it will need a USB-A port free. Might be a stopgap so you can decide if something else better suits your needs.

He always looks like he’s received a surprise prostate examination and the doctor had cold hands.

Looks like the unholy outcome of breeding a Smurf with a Womble…

Which is to say that it looks much better with the eyes in place.

Every actor in ‘Still Wakes the Deep’. I don’t usually like that type of game - you don’t really have a great deal of agency, you can’t fight only run, there are sudden deaths in some sections - but the overall atmosphere, the design, and that perfect voice casting drew me in. I think it’s still on Game Pass if you want to see and hear it for yourselves.