Week Forty-Eight Reviews Really Matter!

I’ll keep this little column a bit brief this week as the Morel Monday Aston Martin has left me sad.The only tragic consequence of covetousness at that Deadly Sin level is how bad it makes you feel for NOT getting that which you covet. That the object in question is without question hard-earned by unique talent and skill is undeniable. Still hurts. Like the time I went to see the McLaren F1.
Anyway, I also write a very small amount for a fishing magazine, as a sort of show tech reporter as I can look at the engineering of a serious stainless steel ‘˜rod pod’ and exclaim that the machinery that was used to make it, must have been megabucks! I also explore to find new ‘˜places to fish this weekend’ for them for the whole of the south east. Lovely fun.
Anyway, that means I get to look into another industry bitching like crazy about the recession but which in reality has NO IDEA what it’s like to exist in an industry that has been shrinking. But the issue of editorial and advertisement is the same. Thing is, there is a lot stranger politics in the world of fishing, as it is huge by comparison. Here, in car electronics, everybody knows everybody or they are fibbing about being ‘˜in’. And the boss of the publishing group that puts out the trade magazine of the shootin’ and fishin’ business has a column in said organ. Unlike the big publishing houses that put out the weeklies, they publish a collection of specialist fishy things.
I’m reading this gent’s column and realise what a decent lot we all are. Get this. A maker of a kind of thing known simply as a pole, took great exception to another maker’s pole getting a raving review. This maker felt slighted, and withdrew all advertising for a year (only a year, stated, mind!) and said they will not be sending anything in for review to their titles. It was breath taking. It’d be like one headunit maker sacking Talk Audio for reviewing a unit from another manufacturer.
So, I offer up thanks to the deeply sane folks of our gently bonkers industry and am just thrilled to still be here. And talking of thrilled, this is also a deep-buried only-for-true-Raynerians who read this far into my piffle, is that the car electronics pages of Fast Car magazine are once again to be MIIIIIINE!
And the really sweet part is that despite my wanting so badly to be like, down with the kids again and be called the Ice EditorNO. They are gentle on mebut it is Talk Audio itself that shall get the profile. This means we WILL get a slew of boys Alexei Sayle used to call Turbo Nutter Bastard, appearing all Ice-Nooby but probably knowledgeable about Scoobies, on the Forum boards. If you find one, be nice. They will be Fast Car readers.
I think it’s a case of hero’ products, three pages one per page. Hmmmm, what SHALL I play with? I fancy a nice top brand affordable bass box, a sexy lexy headunit with some big old real estate and a hugemungerous OH MY amplifier!
Adam Rayner On Line Editor