Horse racing and fashion go hand in hand. Events like Royal Ascot and Glorious Goodwood are attended by celebrities and socialites from around the world, all sporting the latest seasonal garments.
Many will assume that, when the mud starts flying during the National Hunt racing season, that fashion becomes less important. On the contrary, selecting the right outfit for the Cheltenham Festival is vital.
Known as “the greatest show on turf”, the Cheltenham Festival is the flagship event in British National Hunt racing. The best hurdlers and chasers from around the world make the trip annual pilgrimage to Gloucestershire in March. Punters and party goers join them in their droves, and four days spent at the Cheltenham Festival is truly unforgettable.
Obviously, in March, the British weather can be rather inclement. The weather forecast plays a huge role in what outfit racegoers will wear each day, so practically should be at the forefront of your thoughts when planning your ensemble.
The stands at the Cheltenham Festival often look like a sea of tweed. Tweed is the chosen material of most racegoers, as it’s warm, traditional and aesthetically pleasing. Men tend to combine a three-piece tweed suit with either a paddock coat or a cashmere jumper. Women usually opt for softer woollen tweed, brocade or crepe. Some form of scarf is a must if the weather takes a turn for the worst.
Hats are an important accessory for female racegoers during the summer, and it’s no different at the Cheltenham Festival. Percher and Pill Box are the most popular selections during the week, and many add either a feather or a veil to their chosen headwear. Cossack hats are also a popular choice, especially if temperatures are due to be low during at the week, while fashion conscious men often opt for a sophisticated trilby.
If you plan on spending most of the afternoon outside, then a pair of gloves are an essential accessory. Those lucky enough to hold entry into one of Cheltenham’s many luxury boxes will want to layer up, combining a stylish coat with a lighter outfit geared more towards comfort.
When it comes to footwear, over-the-knee boots are very fashionable, while heeled shoes are worn with skirt and tights. Brogues are the most popular footwear with men, with stylish loafers another common sight in recent years.
So, when it comes to fashion at the Cheltenham Festival, traditional and practical is the order of the day. The exception is Ladies’ Day – day two of the meeting – where guests are encouraged to wear more colourful outfits, and prizes are handed out to the attendees who turn the most heads.
Singer-songwriter Tamar Aphek has been a prominent figure in Israel’s underground scene for over a decade. After joining her first band as a law student at Tel Aviv University, she went on to form Carusella and Shoshana, two duos she formed with drummers Guy Schecter and Jonathan Harpak respectively. In addition to touring across Europe and the US and sharing the stage with the likes of Deerhoof and M. Ward, she also helped organize the country’s most prestigious festival, Indie Negev. Though already recognized in different places around the world, her music found a new international audience when her debut full-length album, All Bets Are Off, was released by the legendary Kill Rock Stars at the end of January. Following her 2014 EP Collision as well as her score for Asaph Polonsky’s acclaimed 2016 dramedy One Week and a Day, the LP serves as a staggering display of Aphek’s wide-ranging influences, melding soaring guitars, fuzzy bass, and shape-shifting percussion that attests to the artist’s boundless creativity. Recorded at the funk and soul imprint Daptone Records and mixed by Daniel Schlett (War on Drugs, DIIV), the result is dynamic to the point of being at times deliberately overwhelming, but Aphek possesses an almost cinematic understanding of space and atmosphere that turns the album’s conflicting textures into a cohesive yet rivetingly chaotic whole.
We caught up with Tamar Aphek for the latest edition of our Artist Spotlight interview series, where we showcase up-and-coming artists and talk to them about their music.
I read that before you turned 18, you weren’t really interested in rock music and had a very classical musical education. How would you describe your relationship to music during that time?
My mother used to tell me that when I turned 7, she asked me if I would like to play the piano, and I immediately answered yes. And I remember that while some of my friends used to tell me that their parents forced them to play the piano, for me, practicing the piano was never a problem. I feel like I didn’t choose to do music as much as music chose me. When I turned 13 I went to the Academy of Music in Jerusalem, where I joined a children’s choir. It was a wonderful experience, I had the opportunity to meet huge conductors and musicians. Practically I was dealing with music most of the day and I think this was the biggest enjoyment for me.
You’ve said that it was artists like Fugazi and Slint and Sonic Youth that changed or broadened how you view music. How did you come across these kinds of bands, and what was it that drew you to their sound?
At the time, when I started the service in the army, there was this very cool venue in Tel Aviv called The Patiphon, which means “The Vinyl”. And I learned a lot about all these bands in this club. And once you start hearing one thing, you start hearing everything you can grab. And also, I started playing guitar with a teacher and he too introduced me to some stuff. At one point, it just got out of control. I started buying albums like crazy – you know, bands like Fugazi and Blonde Redhead and Unwound, these bands caught my attention, because I remember listening to bands like Fugazi that have a lot of punk songs, but they also had an album like The Argument. And all of a sudden I discovered that there was jazz in it and all these cool time signatures, and you know, these guys do have musical education. They opened new horizons for me. And for me, coming from classical music where the sound was so clean, and suddenly hearing these distorted sounds, it was like entering a magic world of distortion with a lot of nuances. The distortion of a band like Pantera isn’t like the distortion of Nirvana, isn’t like the distortion of Shellac, there are a lot of kinds of distortion.
I’m curious to hear more about your thoughts on the underground scene in Israel and Tel Aviv specifically and how that has evolved over time.
Well, around 10 years ago I did a festival in Israel, which was the first alternative music festival in the open air which I did for 3 rounds. It was kind of a pioneering project. At first came 700 people, then 1500, and finally 2000. At that time I finished my law degree and I started planning tours abroad with my band. By the time I was touring and got some hype in Europe I was not involved that much with the Israeli underground scene. People in Israel took the torch and continued with open air festivals in different places which attracted between 10,000-12,000 people. So I think a lot of people in Israel helped build the alternative scene. On the whole, I don’t think there is much difference between the Israeli underground scene and all the other equivalent underground scenes all over the world. Especially when with the development of Spotify and social media, sometimes it is very difficult to tell the difference between Israeli underground music and any underground music abroad. I don’t see any Israeli specific features of the underground scene even when the Israeli bands sing in Hebrew. The Israeli underground music scene is part of the global underground scene. I think there are a lot of influences from the global scene. Basically, I think it’s so amazing thatpeople from all over the world can listen to what you’re doing, and vice versa. So I think these mutual influences are fantastic and did help to develop the Israeli scene.
You mentioned being involved in the music scene in different ways before this album, but why did you feel like this was the right time to record a project under your name?
I had a couple of bands, and I think it had to be a different name because it was a band that did one thing, like it was one concept; on the musical production side, it was pretty much all hell breaks loose. It was like a war, you know, we would come to a venue like soldiers, carrying these crazy marshals and opening this really loud volume and performing in the middle of the floor. It was supposed to be this crazy physical experience. And I feel like in that sense, it was like a movie I did. And I think I just realized I don’t have to invent a lot of bands now, you know, I don’t have to invent a band for every movie I want to do, but rather treat an album like it was a movie. Recording my album was like creating a movie about the soundtrack of my musical experience and my interactions with audiences and partners during the last years.
I’m interested in something you mentioned in the press release about how there was a lot of space for improvisation during the making of the album, but the post-production process was very calculated. Could you elaborate on that and tell me more about what the dynamic was like during the different stages of making the album?
When I spend time with musicians, producing a song, I tend to encourage things that maybe other people wouldn’t tend to encourage. For me there was no problem with working three months with a drummer,and I think my only instruction was “Play as crazy as you can.” I encouraged my bandmates to use the song as a platform to fulfill their imaginations, and not to be afraid to improvise and take risks not to abide by basic rules When we finished recording, besides overdubbing some instruments, I sat a lot of hours with the materials and edited them. And at one point, I started feeling like I created my own samples, and I started playing with the samples in different creative ways.
So when I finally entered the amazing Strange Weather studios, you know, Daniel Schlett ended up mixing the album and he was amazing, and he brought a lot of himself to the process. But when I met Daniel, I had in my mind at least 10 ways the song ‘Crossbow’ would sound like. But still I was very flexible and I was willing to accept Schlett’s interpretation. I feel that I came to Daniel so prepared that it was not difficult for me to understand what is the way he was going to take each song.
I’m also interested in how the theme of uncertainty is reflected both musically and lyrically throughout the album. I’m thinking of especially of the song ‘All I Know’, with lyrics like “all I know is that I’m not really me.” Could you talk more about the idea behind that and how those themes came about?
Well, I chose the name – I’ll answer you, but I’ll start a little bit before – I chose the name All Bets AreOff before the pandemic. And the name was meant to describe situations in which we have all these uncertainties in life, and it creates this cognitive dissonance, when you struggle with all these different contradictions and you don’t know how things are going to develop. And for me, it’s like this prophetic thing because nowadays we have this virus, this small factor, you know, just a little virus that changes realities and all the former expectations are not relevant anymore. And that was the idea of the album, how all the assumptions you had before aren’t relevant anymore; that’s the meaning of “all bets are off”, but people also use it when they want to say, like, everything is open, all the possibilities. And I felt I wanted to create this feeling throughout the album, the feeling of stress and panic and loneliness that most people feel when things are not going the way they planned.
‘All I Know’ was a song that is meant to bring one of those feelings, trying to capture – you know, there are many songs about love, but many times these songs are like, “I love you and I miss you.” And I didn’t want that. I didn’t want an “I love you and I miss you” song. I wanted a song that deals with a deeper issue. When we talked about Carusella, it was like hell breaking loose, this was a band that was like going on war – many times I feel like I’m an actor in my song, or the people I play with are actors in my play. Sometimes I get into a character for a song and I try to understand what motivates this character. And the thing I think that bothers the character in ‘All I Know’ is more the question, “What does she know?” Like what can she say say she knows for sure? She doesn’t say, “I love you, I want to be back together,” you know, she says, “I’m not really me and there’s a problem here, like obviously if I’m not really me I can’t be with you.” So eventually nobody knows who is who in the song.
With that in mind, I was wondering about your choice to end with a cover of ‘As Time Goes By’, especially in relation to what you said about inhabiting a character like an actor in your songs.
‘As Time Goes By’, I think it’s a very special song. I chose it because I wanted a love song, and Casablanca is considered to be one of the most romantic movies of all time. And you know, the plot of the movie is not like this boy meets girl, happy kind of story. In the end, they sacrifice their love for the greater good, whether you agree or not, but that’s what they believe. But then you have ‘As Time Goes By’, and that’s like their song. It was written by Herman Hupfeld, and I feel like this is more like a love song about the concept of time itself. That’s what really caught me. I wanted a love song, but also, it has an edge. For me, this song is a celebration of time and how time can heal wounds, and what an amazing thing time is, it’s so beautiful.
This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity and length.
If you really want to quickly move up the career ladder, you should invest your time, energy and money in education. Getting new skills and knowledge is what helps the professionals open broad avenues for their career growth. Obtaining the relevant credential is one of the most effective ways of ensuring that you are conversant with the latest trends in the industry. Talking about the top and most popular certification providers, several names come up, but in particular, Amazon AWS Certified Solutions Architect Associate Practice Exam Dumps stands out. It provides numerous certificates and Amazon AWS Certified Solutions Architect – Professional is one of the most sought-after among them. Here we will talk about the peculiar features of this credential and the associated exam.
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The Amazon SAP-C01 exam is a professional-level test that lasts 180 minutes. The exam is available in the English, Japanese, Korean, and Simplified Chinese languages. The question formats of this certification test include multiple choices and multiple answers. You will need to get 750 points or more from 1000 available in order to pass this qualifying exam. The candidates have to pay $300 as the registration fee. They can visit any testing center located nearest to them to take this test after scheduling it. Alternatively, the exam can also be taken by the applicants online from the comfort of their offices or home.
When it comes to Certbolt Dumps , there are several relevant AWS training courses besides many other resources that you can choose from to acquire additional competencies measured in the SAP-C01 test. So, you can learn the topics of the exam with a qualified instructor or just use self-study tools depending on your knowledge and experience level. During your preparation for Amazon SAP-C01, you should always use exam dumps as a priority as these materials contain the real exam questions with the verified answers for a AWS Certification Exam Dumps of the content. In the end, you can also evaluate your readiness with the help of practice tests.
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Throughout the week, we update our Best New Songs playlist with the new releases that caught our attention the most, be it a single leading up to the release of an album or a newly unveiled deep cut. And each Monday, we round up the best new songs released over the past week (the eligibility period begins on Monday and ends Sunday night) in this segment.
This past week, slowthai dropped the final single from his new album TYRON, the Skepta-assisted ‘CANCELLED’, a hard-hitting banger that sees him directly addressing last year’s incident at the NME Awards. Taylor Swift announced the first of her re-recorded albums and released a new version of ‘Love Story’, staying true to the spirit of the original while making subtle improvements both instrumentally and vocally. Jana Bahrich delivers an impassioned performance in Francis of Delirium’s cathartic new single ‘Let It All Go’, while Madi Diaz’ latest is an evocative, slow-burning ballad. Arcade Fire’s Sarah Neufeld announced her new album Detritus with the meditative ‘Stories’; BABii celebrated Lunar New Year with the mystical ‘SHADOW’; and finally, Bon Iver’s ethereal ambient textures accompany Ross Gay’s effervescent spoken-word track ‘Catalog of Unabashed Gratitude’.
Unless you’ve been living under a rock these past couple of years, then you probably know about how large the cannabis industry has become. In the previous years, the only variants of cannabis that we know of are the recreational and medical variants. Through the power of science, however, comes a potent variant derived directly from the plants themselves.
If you want to uncover the secrets of cannabis in more ways than one, then you should consider concentrating the next time. Before we dive deep into the benefits of concentrates, let’s first talk about what they are.
What Are Concentrates?
Concentrates are basically something that’s derived from a certain product. As the name suggests, a concentrate is jam-packed with what you’ll usually find in that product but in smaller doses. As such, these are more potent than what you’d usually find on the market.
For cannabis, concentrates are powerful doses of usually one of two compounds found within cannabis – THC or CBD.
If you want to get high or if you are hoping to find a sense of euphoria, then you’ll have to choose THC or tetrahydrocannabinol. THC concentrates are potent meaning even in small amounts, you are going to get intoxicated already. Do keep in mind that THC is usually the compound in marijuana that congress speaks up against. As such, THC concentrates are not legal in states where recreational marijuana is prohibited.
Alternatively, if you want to experience the medical benefits of marijuana, you may want to try CBD or cannabidiol. Often referred to as the miracle compound, CBD is known to have various health benefits such as its anti-pain, anti-inflammatory, and sleep-inducing properties. It’s also known to treat symptoms related to epilepsy.
Concentrates come packed with CBD, THC, and in some cases, a mix of both. It’s up to you which one you choose and which ones are legal in your state. These aren’t your typical doses of marijuana though. Concentrates can be consumed in more ways than one and you are free to experiment.
How Do You Consume Concentrates?
Concentrates are available in various forms. What’s even better is that manufacturers are always looking to develop more and more ways to consume these concentrated products. The most common form of concentrates comes in oil tinctures. These can be taken directly by taking a drop or two in your tongue. You can also use it to damp cigarettes or even your regular marijuana roll with.
Believe it or not, concentrates can be used for cooking. You can find countless CBD oil dishes online. That’s all on top of edible concentrates which come in the form of sweet treats such as cake pops, gummies, chocolates, and more. Some beverage manufacturers are also making THC or CBD-infused drinks.
If you want to take the concentrates in their form, then you’ll need to invest in an intricate rig. We are, of course, talking about the nectar collector which is basically like a dab rig used to vaporize hash and concentrates. The resulting vapor from the process is what you inhale.
Inhaling vapor is much more preferred as compared to inhaling smoke. Even if it’s marijuana or concentrates that you are smoking, the smoke can still cause serious lung issues that you may want to avoid. Dab rigs offer the safest alternative to smoking and more people are trying it out already.
Why Choose Concentrates?
Next comes the important question, why should you choose concentrates over regular marijuana or other forms of it?
For starters, these products are more potent than all other cannabis products. For instance, potency levels of a THC concentrate are usually at around 50%-90%. On the other hand, cannabis flowers are at 8%-25% only. If you want to get the most out of CBD or THC without having to take copious amounts of it, then concentrates are the way to go.
Another benefit is that concentrates come in more forms as compared to regular marijuana. This means you are free to choose whichever way you want to take your CBD or THC. Marijuana is often mostly smoked. Not everyone is a smoker but thanks to concentrates, you can eat, vape, and even rub them on your body.
Concentrates are perhaps the best evolution coming from the cannabis industry. Whether you want THC or CBD, there’s bound to be a concentrate product that’s just for you. If you’re still worried about the effectiveness of these products, then it is a must that you try out some products first.
A quick glance through the self-penned notes for Chuck Johnson‘s latest album, The Cinder Grove, is enough to tell you that this is an artist who not only takes his craft seriously, but who approaches it with thought and ambition. Take the fact that, for this record, Johnson dug through archival recordings to extract reverb and echo qualities from specific physical locations that he wished to sonically recreate. It also says much that the composer and pedal-steel guitarist has performed at both the Liverpool Festival of Psychedelia and the San Francisco Electronic Music Festival. Based in Oakland, CA, Johnson’s long list of works include solo guitar albums, a collaboration with the multi-instrumentalist Thrill Jockey artist Marielle V. Jakobsons, and a host of film and TV soundtracks.
Released via the wonderfully adventurous Glitterbeat Records, The Cinder Grove is presented as “a suite of requiems for lost places.” It features Johnson on pedal steel, synths and organs, alongside the aforementioned Jakobsons on violin, Hilary Lewis on viola and violin, Crystal Pasucci on cello and Sarah Davachi on piano. ‘Raz-de-Marée’ opens the set with a mantra-like organ refrain which loops softly as the music evolves to incorporate steel guitar lamentations and otherworldly overtones. It is no wonder that Johnson’s work is so sought-after by film producers; this meditative yet highly-engaging piece evokes a grab-bag of human emotions, from yearning to acceptance. There is nothing ‘ambient’ here, as Johnson breathes life into the track through subtle shifts and sparkling nuance.
‘Serotiny’ echoes the best of Michael Oldfield and Terry Riley, transforming electronic sound into a visceral and expansive expression of beauty and hope. Johnson finds the perfect balance between stability and advancement as waves of reverberating synth spread like ripples in the metaphorical pond of humanity. The lightest of touches steers this track here and there, opening bright gaps in the clouds, uncovering pathos in the rain.
‘Constellation’ succinctly outlines with its title the scope and breadth of a piece that flings itself over a deep blue blanket of resonating sound, displaying pin-pricks of shimmering loveliness. It breathes in and out like some fantastical and benign cosmic beast. By the time you reach ‘Red Branch Bell,’ a track “inspired by the harmonic language of Estonian composer Arvo Part,” you will find yourself completely under Johnson’s spell. Titanic blocks or icebergs of vibrating magic rise and fall as glittering circles of strings circle around them.
Album closer ‘The Laurel’ brings us gently back to ourselves with a miasma of slowly-pulsing bioluminescence under which meadows of synth roll and flutter, and over which floats Johnson’s pedal-steel. It is one of the most delicate tracks on this album, an unfolding vista of sound-shapes and tones. “In California, the laurel under-brush that grows throughout the coastal redwoods, pine, and oak woodlands represents resilience to fire and hope for restoration,” writes Johnson, “I felt like this image and the uplift of this track was the appropriate one to end the album.”
The sheer amount of detail contained within The Cinder Grove is astonishing. On this album, Johnson’s mastery of musical time and space is coupled magnificently with his talent for blending acoustic and electronic sounds, rendering it a grand statement on a human scale. Fans of Riley, Eno or John Surman’s works for ECM will find much to treasure in these expansive, mesmerizing explorations.
A popular question has arisen in a new Netflix series: marriage or a house? Netflix’s latest series Marriage or Mortgagedives into the question through the eyes of a wedding planner Sarah Miller and real estate agent Nichole Holmes. Both will compete to persuade couples to do what is best for their relationship through this ten-episode series.
Netflix (NFLX) is currently trading at $556.52 on NASDAQ.
Marriage or Mortgage will be available on Netflix the 10th of March.
Over the past couple of decades, a dwindling number of mainstream rock bands have made dependability an essential part of their band. But even with Dave Grohl having fully assumed the role of rock’s chief ambassador, you’d be hard-pressed to argue that this strategy has ever been a survival tactic for the Foo Fighters – now twenty-six years into their career, the band has pretty much always traded in the most reliable qualities of rock n’ roll, recognizing that its successful recipe lies less in the intricacies of flavor than the simple pleasures of familiarity. Their latest string of albums have effectively toed the line between consistent and formulaic: they’ve yet to top 2011’s Wasting Light, a garage-inspired album with enough bite and hooks that remains their strongest case for a defiantly classicist approach to the genre.
In the decade since, the Foos have stuck to their guns, but their trick has been a refusal to dial down the ambition even as their formula has largely remained the same. Every record since Wasting Light has come with a PR campaign that’s big enough to overshadow the music itself: 2014’s Sonic Highways came with an accompanying HBO documentary series showing the band traveling around America’s key rock cities, though you could say the album came with the series. For its follow-up, 2017’s Concrete and Gold, they announced the launch of a massive festival, bringing back the name of a mostly forgotten festival from the 70s. It seemed that every few years there would be a new Foo Fighters album, and every time it would double as an act of reverence for rock’s lost past.
Medicine at Midnight makes little effort to change from this recurring pattern, but it doesn’t really come with any accompanying grand gestures either: All it offered was the tenuous promise that it would be “kind of like a dance record” with David Bowie’s Nile Rodgers collaboration Let’s Dance as a primary reference point, and even that was based on a single interview rather than a coordinated roll-out strategy. And sure, you can track some of those similarities on the album’s grooviest tracks – lead single ‘Shame Shame’, ‘Cloudspotter’, the title track – but at the end of the day, it should come as no surprise that Medicine at Midnight pulls from its influences in the same vague way that its predecessors did; Wasting Light was no more a garage record than it was an arena-rock record, and very few of the most interesting inspirations behind Sonic Highways seeped into the actual music. But at least both of these albums had enough sprawling ambition or memorable ideas to keep them nominally interesting.
The new album sees the band reuniting with Concrete and Gold producer Greg Kurstin, and you’d expect some of the more personable touches that he brought to that album to carry onto their latest – and they often do – but Medicine at Midnight simply doesn’t break the monotony with as many occasional highlights. ‘Holding Poison’ is a possible exception, a track that offers a glimpse into what the album might have sounded had they fully committed to a concept rather than having to preface it with the obligatory “kind of”. But at least sticking to their formula also leads to some predictably enjoyable moments, like the hardcore-leaning ‘No Son of Mine’ – at least a single spot is always reserved for one of those – which interpolates Motörhead’s ‘Ace of Spades’ riff as a tribute to Lemmy. ‘Waiting on a War’ could’ve easily been taken from the band’s 1994 debut, but it manages to deliver the kind of anthemic songwriting that fans have to expect – even if it does so in a way that feels antithetical to the song’s sentiment.
Medicine at Midnight might be the Foos’ most underwhelming album in over a decade, and it certainly doesn’t raise the bar very high, but that still doesn’t make it any less of another solid outing, as impossible to love as it is to hate. Because the band never relied on theatrics or interchangeable guest appearances more than they believed in rock’s basic formula, the music still comes out sounding pretty much the same, only the hit-to-miss ratio is more skewed to the latter this time around. As Grohl sings “Is there more to this than that?” over and over on ‘Waiting on a War’, however, more and more listeners might find themselves pondering that same question.
With approximately 1.6 billion people worldwide participating, the online gambling industry has really blown up in the last few years. The proof of this is just how many new online casinos are being launched every month in order to cater to the needs and desires of all the players.
There has always been the question about “can you make money from gambling”, this is a concern in both the traditional gambling setting and the online gambling setting. However, the answer for both remains the same, yes, but only if your practice and choose the right games.
Many people worldwide have taken on gambling professionally or do it for a living, meaning that it is absolutely possible to make money from it, but it require practice, patience, and dedication to the game. Here are a few tips to follow when trying to make money from online gambling.
Use welcome bonuses
One of the best things about online casinos is that almost all of them offer some or other kind of welcome bonus. This can come in the form of free spins, a certain amount of free money to start you off, or free round on games, and sometimes a combination of them all. Not every online casino offers the same bonuses, so you need to search high and low to find the right one. There are sites that help out with this by reviewing the top-rated real money online casinos, such as Casino Reviews, and provide accurate wagering requirements for each bonus. These welcome bonuses can be used to the player’s advantage because it is essentially free money with a potential to win even more free money. Just be sure to check to the wager ad this can be a bit tricky.
Choose the right game
Casinos offer a plethora of different games to play, and online casinos have taken it a step up and offer so many more. With table games, such as baccarat, blackjack, and poker, to stand alone games like slots, to even gamified games that are designed to be played in a video game style, there are so many different games to choose from, all with different odds of winning.
Some games are purely luck based, like slots, while other games require you to have a certain level of still in order to play and actually win anything, like table games. In the long run, it is better to put the effort in to practicing a skill based game as this will allow you to predict the outcome based on the hand you have been dealt and you can choose how you want to win rather than putting it down to chance. Of course this is not going to be a guarantee that playing a skill based game with skill means that you will win every time though.
It is important to remember that the house (the casino) is still trying to make their own money from this and they do this by having edge over the players. With a bit of research you can choose which games have the lowest house edge, mean that the players winning potential is maximised. If you need a recommendation, check this poker site with good software for not only a good time, but a safe time!
Don’t just bet
If you are serious about making money by playing ta an online casino, don’t just randomly bet your money away without knowing about the games? The great thing about gambling online is that you have the ability to research the games right at your fingertips and discover what will be the best game for you to play in order for you to receive you desired outcome. While researching the games, make sure to look for statistic and percentages of winning, as well as the volatility of the games and calculate the RTP or return to player percentage.
Before playing any skill based game it is important to know exactly what you’re doing by practicing with the free games that are available on most gambling sites, and also pay attention and have a look into what the house edge might be on games you are wanting to play.
Avoid slot machines
Slot machines may seem tempting because of the big jackpot prizes but these should be avoided. Sure they are fun to play, but you can only get some money out of it if you play games with low volatility and high RTP, and even then, this just allows you to play for much longer and you don’t get much out of it. Playing games with massive jackpots have an incredibly high volatility and low RTP which means that it’s next to impossible to win the large sum of money. And not to mention, these slots usually have a minimum bet requirement that is quite high, it is basing a black hole for your money.
In a year marked by uncertainty and isolation, Cj Pandit emerged like a beacon of goodness and optimism. His layered debut ‘Karelu’ – a masterclass in production and tempo control – was released at the back end of 2019 and served as a promising introduction to the Leicester native’s art-pop sound. With a crystal clear falsetto and a honey-sweet sensibility, his power sits in the combination of swelling jangly guitars, feel-good keys, and the cracked and vulnerable tone of his voice. He followed his debut track with a trio of singles, honing his signature sound; ‘Digital Love’ plays like an 80s anthem that wouldn’t be amiss at the end of a John Hughes classic, ‘Eventually’ exudes a discernible warmth with its textured vocals and swathes of drums, whereas ‘Talk Talk Talk!’ relies on sharper rhythms and an overall punchier sound. Cj Pandit’s music is reminiscent of classic Peter Gabriel enmeshed with Declan McKenna in the way that it’s quintessentially 80s-inspired but rooted in the present, toeing the line between nostalgia and futurism. Rather fittingly, his 2020 ended with a stripped back reimagining of his debut ‘Karelu’ as part of 247 Studios’ ‘Presents’ series, gearing him up for a productive 2021 – the fruits of which we are already bearing witness to today in the form of his latest single, ‘Right Person, Wrong Time’.
We caught up with Cj Pandit for this edition of our Artist Spotlight Q&A series, where we showcase up-and-coming artists and give them a chance to talk about their music.
The most important question in all times, but specifically in these most bizarre ones; how are you? What’s been helping you tick along and keep your head on straight?
I’m pretty good thank you! I think if this last year has taught me anything, it’s to sit in whatever or however i’m feeling, be present in it, and engage with it. I think going from constantly being at 100mph to having no choice in slowing down has actually been kind of helpful. It’s given me clarity on things in my own life I couldn’t quite work out and given me time and space to learn and be more considerate about other people’s battles too! Creativity has ebbed and flowed, so I’ve just harnessed it when it popped up and tried not to worry when it hasn’t. Keeping my head on straight has been tough at times, but I guess running a lot, reading, and writing as much as I can in the day has kept me sane! Also, plenty of comfort music, Talk Talk and Duke Ellington!
What’s your favourite thing about being part of the Leicester music scene? As a born and bred Leicestershirian myself of course I’m biased and believe that there’s something special about it, but in your opinion what makes the music scene here specifically so unique?
I think everybody has a special and kind of unbreakable bond with wherever they grew up and come from. I spent a lot of time here, then felt like I needed to dip out and go and explore for the past few years. Now I’ve moved into my studio spot in 247, and really put some roots down. I think it goes way above and beyond just the music scene, it’s the will for independent endeavours, whether it be bands, venues, bars, restaurants, designers, photographers or artists, the support that we all give to one another is so beautiful! I’ve had countless amazing conversations and experiences, with so many people in this city and it makes me very proud to feel a small part of. I don’t know about you but it feels like some kind of underdog spirit is everyones through line, this little small city in the midlands that always somehow punches above its weight. Circling back to the music scene itself, it always felt like something special was going to happen to somebody at any time. I think that comes from self belief and a lack of rivalry (for want of a better term) we all seem to want the best for each other.
What’s been your personal career highlight so far, something you’re really proud to have achieved or participated in?
So far, I think the launch party for the debut single, ‘Karelu’. Me and Joe Vozza put together an exhibition all around the meaning of the word Karelu. It means the mark left on the skin when something is worn too tight, and we liked that as a metaphor for the marks we leave on each other. The whole thing was immersive & interactive and we did a real small run of zines to accompany it. Then we played a show in the exhibition itself at Graff HQ, an amazing Art Space and paint shop in the city. The whole thing felt so human and so connected. I think I’ve come to appreciate it more and more over the past 12 months or so. I think I miss connecting and having shared experiences and memories with new and old faces more than anything.
Has there been an artist who has been especially influential in shaping the way you approach making music?
Mark Hollis, I’d say is number one. The main songwriter in Talk Talk. There’s a restraint and power in the spaces he creates. The Colour of Spring is my favourite record of all time. I think it’s perfect. So percussive, so textured and there’s this undeniable weight to his words and delivery on the whole thing. It blows me away every time I hear it! I’m in a real André 3000 obsession at the minute too. Absolute genius. Performance wise, I think Christine and The Queens and FKA Twigs are on a whole other unattainable level, and I keep thinking that’s something to shoot for and work towards, and enjoy being bad until I’m better! All about the process.
Was music something that was important to you growing up? Who indoctrinated you into the world of music and encouraged you to pursue it as a career?
You know what, I speak to my Mum about this a lot. It’s only recently that we’ve realised we have such common ground in music taste, but my memories of growing up were super top 40. Nelly Furtado & Ronan Keating really stick in my head for some reason. Maybe that explains my leaning towards writing pop songs? Who knows. But in terms of a specific person, I don’t think there was or is one. I realised at like 16 I was intrigued by this thing that could explain so many complex emotions in a relatively simple way, without words, and then played in bad bands, learnt my craft a little bit and started to chase people I admired in the hope that they’d work with me in trying to get my own silly little ideas out of my head. I guess curiosity was the thing that indoctrinated me. It still does. That wild pursuit of perfection and the knowledge that we’ll probably never arrive at it keeps me coming back…
Not necessarily a question, but it would be amiss for me to ask you some questions and not mention that your single ‘Eventually’ embodied my lockdown summer last year, it’s an absurdly sunny, breezy track. What was the inspiration behind it, how did it come about?
No way! That’s so cool to know, thank you! I do feel like that track embodies every hazy summer I’ve ever had. Pretty proud of it actually! It started as this kind of pseudo-breakup song and has taken on a bunch of different meanings. My current leaning is the cyclical nature of friends and lovers and the patterns we all fall into. You go do your thing, I’ll do mine – then we’ll realise if we need or want to be in each others lives. I think this lockdown has had some strange effects on people and kind of solidified the meaningful relationships in our lives, I mean, in mine, I could be very very wrong that’s just my experience! And the initial inspiration came out of a meeting with a Major label who said I didn’t have enough good songs, so maybe I wrote it out of spite? Not saying it’s good either, that’s not really up to me is it?
Your latest single ‘Right Person, Wrong Time’ acts as a response to heartbreak. Does most of your songwriting come from lived experiences or does it vary depending on inspiration at the time?
It sure does. I think that’s the reason I’ve struggled to be incredibly creative for extended periods of time recently. I LOVE being around other human beings and learning and swapping stories. The songs do normally come from some kind of lived experience. This whole EP feels really visceral and definitely the most publicly open and vulnerable I’ve ever been. It’s a direct correlation to the most intense feelings I’ve had in my life about a wide range of situations. I just tried to not hide away from my truths at that time and I think it’s an honest reflection of where I’m at as a human being. For now anyway….
