Future Sound Of London hog the limelight. I'll be in my bathroom.

The Future Sound Of London are a bunch of selfish bumholes.

By my reckoning, they've had seven album releases in the last 12 months. Seven. I don't think I achieved seven of anything in the past year.

I probably had more than seven poos, but that's about it.

Here's the evidence. They started with the Pulse EPs, an album-length rerelease of old things they did under different names before Coolio was in the charts.

Secondly, they continued the blowing-off-the-dust theme with From the Archives Vol. 4, which boasted more than a smattering of tracks from old LPs (ISDN, Dead Cities and Lifeforms).

Environments, their long-awaited album in July, was a shuffling of old material that did a pretty good impression of the classic KLF album Chill Out.

About the same time, Amorphous Androgynous released The Peppermint Tree And The Seeds Of Superconsciousness. What's that got to do with Future Sound Of London? They're the same band.

The fifth album of the year was Yage's world-music offering The Woodlands Of Old, featuring an ex-Propellerhead on drums. Yage is FSOL's engineer. Except Yage isn't, because Yage is actually the guys from FSOL pretending to be their engineer. Confused yet?

They followed this up with the fifth volume of From the Archives Vol.5, alongside a second volume of Environments. That's seven albums, people. They are the James Pattinson of the music world.

I think they are being selfish. Hogging a whole year like that.

They also released a recording of oscillators that reacted to the movement of clouds across the Sun. They are working on a musical remix of a film directed by an Oscar-winning animator. And their gig later this year, as I mentioned in my recent 2009 preview, opens up the possibility of them performing their first new live material for 12 years.

Despite all this, I still think the only guaranteed pleasure in life is having a poo. Think on, FSOL.

mpSunday: In the latest of a series where I give away free music (now not necessarily on a Sunday), get your teeth around this Wipeout 2097 classic. PING!  This mpSunday has now expired.

Max Tundra does Prince while, by the look of the picture wot I edited in Microsoft Publisher, the Von Trapps do LSD

The bejewelled crowd bustles and hums in a room glistening with gold carvings and low-slung chandeliers.

A woman in white announces, "Ladies and gentlemen, the children of Captain Von Trapp wish to say goodnight to you." She raises her hands in awkward invitation and the hum foams up into chatter and gasps.

Down the stairs of the grand hallway descends a music sensation that will be remembered for generations.

It's a topless Max Tundra balancing a huge tooth hat on his head.

Yes, the master of bizarre pop and lord of the 8 / 16 / 4 / 0.5-bit opus is back with a busy electro-fuzz single (see the video featuring the tooth hat here) that boasts the Sound Of Music's So Long Farewell as a b-side.

He's done well: he's gone for the obligatory cowbell, but I'm not sure how that thumping 808 snare would sit with the delicate Von Trapp kids (pictured).

It bodes well for Tundra's third album next week, Parallax Error Beheads You. Expect the usual suspects saying it's messy and as busy as an OCD bee, and there should be the usual stampede of comparisons to Nintendo / Sega / insert generic bleepy video game console here.

Time for an mpSunday, where I give away my record collection (but only on a Sunday, mind). This track was the first glimpse we had of the potential brilliance of Max's new album. It's him doing an uncomfortably straight approximation of a geeky Prince.

mpSunday (right click and save as): CRAASH! This mpSunday has now expired.

Which reminds me. If anyone is hoarding an mp3 of Tundra's version of the KLF's What Time Is Love, cyber-slap me. And yes it is okay to use the 'cyber' prefix again.

It's not a pie chart but I called it a Bri Chart because that was the only pun I could think of

This chart shows why I'm worried about Brian Eno. (Click here for large.)

I should have posted this months ago, when Eno told Radio 4's Front Row that he would be producing the latest LP from tapioca-flavoured, whinging popmunters Coldplay.

He said their new material "will be very original and very different from what they've done before."

It wasn't.

Viva La Whatever was released by Coldplay this week and, like past albums from James and U2, you can see the Eno sheen dripping from every note.

But what was Eno thinking of? What was the former producer of U2's sunglasses era and Talking Heads doing anywhere near a band I consider so bad, I'd rather trim my toenails with a chainsaw than listen to Chris Martin's Bluntesque mediocrity.

That's why I created my Bri Chart, above, showing the collapsing milestone's of Brian Eno's production career.

On a more delightful note, listen to Islands covering Eno's The Big Ship (you'll need to scroll down a bit).

Of his Eno cover, Islands' Nicholas Thorburn said "It doesn't matter if it's sloppy. Things can be a little rough around the edges if they have heart."

Or they can be as neat and tidy as a Coldplay song and have absolutely no pulse whatsoever.

Just time for an mpSunday, the series where I use the internet to give away music. Clever, I know. It only seems relevant to bust you some Eno, so here goes:

mpSunday: Brian Eno's Big Ship (this mp3 has now gaaawn - click here for the latest mpSunday.)

What's that coming over the hill, apart from a lyrical cliché? Clue: not a monster

What's that coming over the hill, apart from a lyrical cliché? Is it a monster?

Niet. It's a three-headed dog. The Black Dog, in fact, with an album of sparkling ambient techno called Radio Scarecrow.

Amid a cacophony of remixes and rereleases (Book Of Dogma artwork remixed above), I reckon this is their first new material for a while. It lopes over that brow with certain intent: to be nostalgic, to be minimal, to be ever-so-slightly Detroit.

Word on the grapevine says the basslines are so intense, the band had to take scheduled breaks from recording.

Health and safety, you know.

The Black Dog dates way back, before music had invented all the notes, and so does Meat Beat Manifesto.

MBM is headed by arthritic vegan Jack Dangers, and they have thrown another LP of breakbeat-rolling distorto-dub in the shape of Autoimmune.

Dangers is meant to be a magpie when it comes to gathering samples, but it sounds like he's avoided nest nicking for a while considering how old some of these samples sound ("say whaaat" and the like).

Instead, why not befrend Bochum Welt's ROB (Robotic Operating Buddy)? This album is out now on the legendary Rephlex imprint.

Third track Saint (Dmix) is a spit for a New Order track, but don't let its synth-pop tendencies put you off.

ROB is an acidic Atariesque throwback to early Aphex and catchy analogue (kraft)work-outs.

I leave you with an mpSunday, where I slowly give away my music collection. It's a rather low-key single from Black Dog's Radio Scarecrow.

mpSunday: *plop* this mp3 has expired. Click here for the latest mpSunday.

DEEPER FRIED FAT: REPEAT REPEAT, IN SOUTHPORT

Shorts and a little helicopter hat - they're this season's essential radio accessory

Edit: This post makes Lee look like my tech monkey while I'm the big presenting ego. This isn't balanced. Lee is a fully fledged second half to my first half, and together we present as one. A bit like a blubbery Ant and Dec.

Every night this week, I have spent two hours blithering into a micromophone like an idiot possessed.

The first five days of the Theatre Of Noise (explained concisely here) have fizzled to a close. Thanks to a clever use of scripting and flaggelating ourselves with cutting self-criticism, the output's been a few notches above our usual fare.

Monday's show, our first since our 2007 podcast, was like an old shed in Venice: stilted and ever-so-slightly rusty.

Thanks to an image of me dressed in shorts and a little helicopter hat (cheers, Lee!), Tuesday's show exploded into merriment. Our production values on this show were probably tighter than anything we had done before.

Wednesday's show was a slow-burner, measured and steady.

Thursday's was a stonker. It trod the wafer-thin line between proper comedy silliness and filling the airwaves with spluttering giggles. It is my co-presenter Lee's job to drive the desk and give me just enough space for my adrenaline-fuelled comedy rants, and to use his charming form of grumpiness to reign me in when the show needs more control. You could say I was "on one", and Lee coped admirably.

We even managed the health and safety nightmare of Friday's Chainsaw Challenge, which saw our resident toolman Fil The Destroyer let rip with a jigsaw on Michael Bolton's 1991 hit single Time Love And Tenderness (results pictured above).

This is how Lee steers our ship:

INT. STUDIO - EVENING

ME: We're two minutes ahead of schedule. What are we gonna do? What are we gonna do?

LEE: That's pretty good. Don't worry about it.

ME: WHAT ARE WE GONNA DO?

LEE: It's only two minutes.

I bounce up and down, sweating profusely.

ME: Whaddawegonnadoo, whaddawegonnadoo, whadwegondoowhadwegondoo--

LEE shoots me in the head.

All in all, then, we're pretty relaxed about the whole thing.

On an unconnected note, Portishead are about to drop their first album for 360 years. Here's a startling hymn to rhythm from Beth and co, and like all of my mpSundays, it will only be available until the very next mpSunday. And yes, I know it's Monday.

mpSunday (right click and save as): *plop* this mpSunday has now gone. Click here for the latest mpSunday.

DEEPER FRIED FAT: LITTLE BIT, T SHIRT

Reviving my shrivelling grandma and getting out of my depth with Mahler

Just because I've been adjusting to a new job for the first time in nine years, that's no excuse to leave my blog shrivelled on the edge of the pavement like an old forgotten grandma.

Still, there's nothing better to distract you from your blogless disappointment than some nice charts. Above is a bar chart interpretation of Jay Z's 99 Problems, and you can see plenty more here. If anyone can tell me the collective noun for charts, tell me using a graph.

Because blogging is the way I speak, I've kept silent about lots of music. Not least Sun Electric's Lost & Found (1998 - 2000). The tracks were rediscovered on an old CD-R, as the title suggests, and it's a welcome reminder of a band that have been dormant for donkey's.

Sun Electric always lacked the crunch of their techno peers Orbital, and perhaps the production talent of some-time Orb dabbler Thomas Fehlmann lent their music too much whimsy.

When it's not trying to be Brian Eno's Nerve Net on a little too much horse tranquilizer, Lost & Found works wonderfully, not least in the flapping rhythm of Echelon which sounds as though the whole thing was recorded inside a pipe.

A hop over to the Leaf Label now, and Murcof have thrown a curve-ball with their new album Cosmos.

Their glitchy precision has been buried in favour of ambience sweeping from Mahler-inspired moodiness to Wagner-inspired pomposity. (All the other reviews have mentioned György Ligeti, but I don't know who he is and I'm bloody useless at classical comparisons).

It's either quiet, or it's the ambient equivalent of a guitar solo. It's certainly not worth buying it on its own, which is good because apparently it'll be fully realised as an audio-visual project.

In fact, stuff all this lot. Screw it. If you're looking for something on which to spend your hardcore pimp wage, plump for Luke Vibert's Chicago, Detroit, Redruth. Playful acid rave has never been so listenable, and it's the first album I've owned dedicated to a Cornish town.

mpSunday: Pole's Stefan Betke remastered the newly found gems on Sun Electric's Lost & Found. Pole are seriously underrated, so here's a free track. Grab it while you can, because as soon as I post another mpSunday, this mp3 will be kicked to the kerb like gran. POW! This mpSunday is no longer available - click here for the latest mpSunday

mpSunday: Mouse On Mars' Do It

So many chaffinches to tar, so little time.

In between abusing small creatures, I like to make a few tweaks to my Fatblog. So I've put all the photos from the right hand column into a metal bin and burned them (along with a baby budgie) because they were adding nothing of value just sitting there for months comtemplating their digital naval.

Instead, I have nailed a blogroll onto the side of this page (using bunnies as hammers) and given it an utterly pleasing name: Fat Roll.

I don't want to list every one of the 60 sites I store in my electronic reader sprocket machine, so I will list ten at a time and rotate. And after I have turned myself 360 degrees, I will rotate the blogroll. Oh, the humour.

So a million apologetic camels if your blog isn't there yet, especially if you link to me; you will get on there, honest.

Time for a free ditty. mpSunday is my semi-regular series of free mp3s. I am slowly giving away my entire record collection, although you have to be snappy because as soon as I post a new mpSunday, the mp3 from the previous mpSunday is deleted.

Twiggy-fantasist Patroclus said I have "awful lot to teach the world about Autechre and Mouse on Mars (pictured)" on the Tim Footman blog post that inspired me to install said blogroll.

So here is a five-year-old Mouse On Mars track that had the crowds a-bobbing and a-picnicking (on chaffinches) at a festival gig about a month ago.

mpSunday right-click and save target as: PLOP! This mp3 is no longer available. Click here to see the latest mpSunday.

mpSunday: Gescom's Keynell Mix 1

Glitchbelt hit the buffers before it started. Am I complaining?

Let me tell you my Greenbelt story.

Greenbelt Festival is an annual Christian arts event in Cheltenham. This year it featured Billy Bragg and Coldcut, and in the dark, distant past has accommodated Lamb, U2, Bill Drummond and, er, Midnight Oil.

My task was to present programmes on Greenbelt FM, the on-site radio station, and help run the main Sunday morning communion service.

Me and the radio got on like a house on fire, without the screaming victims. I did five hours of showing off, otherwise known as presenting, plus various reporting bits and several hours of editing. I also teamed up with Lee to host games in a live radio show with a real audience, the highlight of which was Lee mopping up like a loon after a spectacularly messy game while grasping the mic because we were still live on air.

My Glitchbelt gig was cancelled as a favour to that venue's programmer Ben. I was busy enough anyway, although I felt sorry for friends who said they were looking forward to it.

But the good Lard taketh away and the good Lard giveth back in spades...

Greenbelt's main communion service has a congregation of somewhere up to 15,000. As the festival grew, they set up an 'overflow' Arena stage with big screens so you could partake in the main event albeit from a distance.

My job was to 'remix' the service for the Arena with the hugely talented Spir (pictured) from Fuse Factory. We messed around the dry feed with extra audio and visual elements. For example, during the collection, the main stage sang something hippy, while our stage rocked out (correction: nodded out) as I played a Gescom track while VJ Spir produced some trippy visuals.

The ambient backing we gave to the rather traditional communion service seemed to be appreciated by most people on the Arena stage.

The best bit came when the guys running the stage asked us to do an impromptu half-hour gig at the end. So Glitchbelt hit the buffers before it started, but instead I DJed with Fuse Factory to a crowd of somewhere between 1,000 and 2,000.

Am I complaining? You can't complain when you're on cloud nine.

Thanks must go to Sanctus 1 for letting me do the service in the first place, and to the Arena personnel for putting the cherry on top with the gig. Respect to Spir too; it was a pleasure working with you. Oh and big up to the Greenbelt FM massive for making the weekend so much fun.

Here's my first mpSunday freebie for ages. It's Gescom's Keynell Mix 1 remixed by Autechre. I used it during the service, and it was the first moment I thought "damn, this is going down really well, it's sunny and hot and I deserve a 99 after this".

>Right click and save target as for the mpSunday download: GUTTED! This mp3 has gone according to my rules of mpSunday. Click here for the latest mpSunday instead.

mpSunday: Puzzleweasel's Shrtwv Lkage

The truly European Puzzleweasel is the latest subject of my occasional free mp3 series, mpSunday.

Just a couple of days ago, I enthused about this artist by using clumsy shredder and typewriter similes. Now it's time for you to feast your ears on Puzzleweasel proper.

Peter Dahlgren is a native of Switzerland, Sweden and Holland, depending on which slice of his life you look at, and he now he lives in Denmark surrounded by bacon. He's always been a bit of a raver, but his music is a kind of un-rave.

It is the anti-rave:

PTAAANG! This mp3 is no longer available. Click here for the latest mpSunday.

mpSunday: Last Step's Baby Powder

Here's another free mp3 which will only be here until my next mpSunday post, so nab it while you can.

Venetian Snares has made his name from producing tricky electronica that has ranged from the orchestral to the ridiculous. He is a punk revelutionary amid a largely anodyne genre, hence his insane time signatures, harsh percussion and frenzied samples.

So imagine my surprise when I came across his pseudonym Last Step. It's melodic, quite beautiful and not at all what you would expect from Snares.

So I'm including Last Step here. Here's a mid-paced electro track called Baby Powder from Last Step's eponymous album on Planet Mu records. The revolution is on hold for now.

YARGLES! This mp3 is no longer available. Click here for the latest mpSunday.

PS - factoid: Venetian Snares is apparently known as Gonk The Eight Legged Viking. Oh and Last Step is a secret pseudonym; you're not meant to know it's Snares. Don't tell anyone, will you?

mpSunday: Luke Vibert's remix of A Little Bit More

It's been like a ghost town round these parts recently, so let me warm your chilled heart by swaddling you in free music.

In the second installment of my occasional series of free mp3s, here's a singer who has one finger on the pulse of electronica and another on the pulse of classic soul. Probably with separate hands.

Jamie Lidell (pictured) is 36 days younger than me and sounds 62 times better than he normally does thanks to this stupendous Luke Vibert acid remix of his A Little Bit More track.

The jabby, almost ADHD synths match Lidell's frenetic performance style. Consider yourself swaddled:

ZOIK! This mp3 is no longer available. Go to the latest mpSunday here.

mpSunday: Clark's Ted

Every few Sundays, I'll pop an mp3 onto the site which you can download and listen to until you sick up noise from the very depths of your ear drums.

The series, which may or may not last, will be called mpSunday. Every time I post a new mp3 for mpSunday, I'll delete the previous mp3.

So get 'em while they're hot.

The first track is Clark's Ted. He's signed to Warp, his first name is Chris, he's from St Albans and he played Futuresonic last night. Ted seems kind of upbeat, almost dance-floor friendly, but it's just.. a little squinted.

PING! This mp3 is no longer available. See here for the latest mpSunday.