Recent additions: Video With National Characteristics is a compilation of numerous small documentary films made during my stay in southern China from August 2007. Watch my collaboration with Joe Magee, Hypnomart, in full online at the new Animate Projects site and read more about Hypnomart here.

If you thought the Trip-Hop tag was annoying in the late 90s, imagine how irritating it must have been to be Portishead. And with every passing year without new material there must have been mounting pressure- if only from themselves- not to come back with a load of old dinner party soundtrack material. It's unlikely that anyone will be chilling out to their latest crop of songs, which owe rather more to the obsessive synth lines of 80s horror film soundtracks and head-nodding Krautrock than to any of Portishead's previously displayed influences. It's still unclear what most of the lyrics are about, if indeed they're about anything, but clearly Beth Gibbons is a lass of profound emotions and she always sounds pretty intense about whatever it is she's on about. There's still a wonderful and vaguely creepy timelessness about Portishead. 'Third' could be a record from thirty years in the past or thirty years in the future. One thing, though: 'Deep Water' is ghastly, just randomly and grauitously bad. What's going on?

My new book 'Uncanny Valley' (ISBN 978-1-4092-1113-6) is now available as a print-on-demand title and PDF download. It collects most of my published short stories from the past ten years or so, a few from the now offline 'The Nothings' fiction project, plus several completely new and previously unpublished ones. In early August it will be available at book shops and worldwide at online stores including Amazon. You can preview some of the stories by going to the fiction page at this site.

BUY THE BOOK OR DOWNLOAD VERSION OF 'UNCANNY VALLEY' HERE.

A book of images from my 2006-2007 residency and digital video installation Three Times True was published in August 2007 by the Genomics Policy and Research Forum at the University of Edinburgh, and launched at Talbot Rice Gallery in Edinburgh during the Festival. You can now obtain copies of it from Amazon.

My series of mission to Mars webcasts, Nowhere Plains, is one of the works in the exhibition Broadcast Yourself at Cornerhouse in Manchester from 13th June-10th August. Broadcast Yourself looks at artists' work on, in and about television over the past thirty years. Broadcast Yourself is the dedicated site for both exhibitions, in Newcastle (now finished) and Manchester.

My 2001 online necro-micro fiction 100 BLACK BOXES has been reborn as a blog; one hundred words by one hundred different characters about the moment they died.

This one, as with the band's previous 'Neon Golden', is like being wrapped up warm and walking through a city in winter with an eloquent friend whose relationships never quite work out. I enjoy Radiohead as much as the next person of that certain type who enjoys Radiohead, but while their fusion of guitars, solid songwriting and electronic foundations is highly skilled it's rarely subtle. Compared to 'The Devil, You + Me', 'In Rainbows' is like getting punched in the face. The Notwist are also not afraid of catharsis, both lyrically and musically, conveying the feeling of suffering and passing beyond, as at the end of 'Gloomy Planets' or the cheerful/rueful acknowledgement that everyone in town hates the couple (or trio) of the title song. Radiohead seem so traumatised by popular affection for the likes of 'Street Spirit' or <gasp> 'Creep', that they don't want anything more to do with catharsis. Plus as a chorus the menacing/pathetic phrase "I would never beat you up" is more Radiohead than Radiohead, but simultanously tells you just about everything you need to know about the unique personality and lyrical world of this underrated band. Get your catharsis here.

As promised, PULP.NET is back with three new stories and a few other developments. You can also catch up with the huge archive of short stories from the past five years, my own Multi Medea and Googlehead among them. These two stories are also in my printed short fiction collection 'Uncanny Valley'.

LITCAMP: A WRITERS' UNCONFERENCE

Pulp.Net is also offering pre-registration for LitCamp which will be taking place in London on the weekend of 12th September, 2008. It'll be an opportunity for writers, publishers and agents to meet each other, for learners to find out what they really need to know and most of all for everyone to be involved. This is not an academic conference or a marketing exercise, and it's not about worshipping star writers. Anybody can go to the site and suggest a writer or publisher they'd like to lead a session, or offer to lead one themselves. Participants can suggest matters they'd like to see discussed, practical craft-related education they need or questions they'd like answered. The site, and the event itself, will grow as suggestions come in and participants join up.

'LPT BNB GDD LGN JPN' is a short film and miniature installation I've recently made for an exhibition called 'Journeys', which is part of the Hastings film festival, Shot by the Sea. My film and four others will be on show daily at Claremont Artspace No. 12, 26th July-1st August. 'LPT BNB GDD LGN JPN' is the first in a series of films about a Lilliputian explorer of domestic settings, inspired by 'Gulliver's Travels'. The festival launch starts 8pm on Friday 25th July at the Electric Palace Cinema. There are lots of other exhibitions, screenings and events going on at the same time. There'll be a new page on the site about this film soon.

VIDEO
Digital video and animation works for galleries and broadcast, including Hypnomart for Channel 4, Three Times True for the Genomics Policy and Research Forum at the University of Edinburgh, and my most recent film made in the city of Shenzhen, China: Video With National Characteristics.

INSTALLATION
Other visual, sound and performance art including underwater storytelling in the Sea House, Werewolves in the New Forest and my attempt at being the first man to land on Mars.

PHOTOGRAPHY
Digital images, updated regularly.

FICTION
Published and new short stories, and my novels Their Heads Are Anonymous and Monkey Boys.

INFORMATION
More about me and my work.

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A new book has been published by Art Editions North and English Heritage, featuring an interview with me and critical text on my Phantom Power films, along with some nicely produced images from them. The book's called The Berwick Gymnasium Fellowships: An Archival Record and documents the work of all the Berwick Fellows from the beginning of the scheme in the early 90s. The book is now available from your local art book shop or from our evil overlords at Amazon.