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Let me start by saying that as an Arsenal fan I’m a disgrace. Yes I admit it. A few years back I was going to most home games, but (bearing in mind it’s been the home of the Gunners for over a year) this was my first visit to the Emirates Stadium. Having said that, that’s still one more time than most ManUre fans have been to Old Trafford. To make matters worse, I didn’t even pay for the ticket - it was courtesy of one of the best things about being in a sales role… corporate hospitality. Food, entertainment, more food, some free goodies, a bit more food, and then see the match. Lovely.

The itinerary told us to be at Highbury House for 17:30 and make our way to the Board Room. The actual Board Room where the Arsenal directors meet? Yep, apparently so. The itinerary also stated “Champagne reception with Arsenal legend” - and they weren’t kidding. We walked through the door and were met by none other than Charlie George. During drinks Charlie (see, we’re on first-name terms) talked about his playing days, and after some excellent food Charlie talked to the party about the success of the club (both financially and on the field) under Arsene Wenger. He then posed for photos, autographed programmes (I have one, and no you can’t buy it from me), and presided over a prize draw for an Arsenal pennant signed by the first team (which I didn’t win - one of our customers did, which was probably a good result).

Soon it was time to go see the match, so we said our farewells to Charlie and made our way to our seats in the Emirates Stadium (see the Wallpaper page for some photos). It’s an incredible place, and of course more spacious than the cramped Highbury in every respect. To cap off an excellent evening, Arsenal battered poor old Slavia Prague 7-0 (with two goals for Theo Walcott, even though it was past his bed-time).

Okay readers, it’s time to get high-brow and discuss modern art. And not for the first time on dadams.co.uk… oh no, we’ve explored this subject before, and I’ve dug into the archives and resurrected postings one and two for your delectation.

What makes me come back to modern art for the third time in the illustrious history of dadams.co.uk is the 2007 Turner Prize, which is described as “a contemporary art award that always provokes debate and is widely recognised as one of the most important and prestigious awards for the visual arts in Europe”.

“…provokes debate” - yep, I’d say so. It also leaves most of us scratching our heads and wondering if some sort of abstract parallel universe has temporarily collided with our own. Or is it just that there’s a bunch of jumped-up media types trying to pretend they’re better than us by getting us to believe that there’s some hidden value that they can see but we can’t, presumably because we’re just not clever or artistic enough?

Example: Mark Wallinger has been nominated, and one of his pieces is an ‘installation’ which comprises of numerous protest posters and placards. According to the judges his work “evokes a heightened sense of reality that communicates an unpalatable political truth”. Eh? I noticed that the people present at the poll tax riots some years ago didn’t get nominated for their signs, but in Wallinger’s favour he has never (to my knowledge) burnt cars, lobbed petrol bombs at the police or thrown a dustbin through the window of McDonalds. Although if he did, the results would be pieces of art.

But now let’s have a look at another piece by Wallinger which really allows us to have a good scoff at the world of modern art’s expense. Entitled ‘Sleeper’, it’s a video filmed over ten nights in a Berlin art gallery. Interesting? Maybe. The main subject was Wallinger dressed in a bear suit. That’s art, is it? Dressing up as Bungle from Rainbow. Genius. No doubt it evokes a heightened sense of ursine loneliness suffered by a tortured soul on a nocturnal quest for honey, or perhaps his friend Geoffrey. I once went to a fancy dress party in a similar costume (although it had a space for my real face) - does that make me an artist? All I can really tell you is that it seemed like a good costume until I had to visit the boy’s room.

It’s simple… if you want to see real art created by someone with a real talent, take a look at Julian Beever’s pavement art. Meanwhile if you fancy your chance at the Turner Prize, acquire a bucket of vomit, dangle it from a wire coat hanger, and get yourself down to the Tate. They’ll lap it up (but only if you went to art school and regularly have Damien Hirst round for dinner).

Update: given the past history of cleaners throwing away ‘works of arts’ the BBC News web site have rather amusingly interviewed Vera Montgomery, a cleaner at the Tate Liverpool. “What about the bear?” she says, “please explain it to me”. Yeah, and me please. She goes on to say “to me it’s just a guy dressed up in a bear outfit, walking round an empty vacant building”. This rather accurate description (and I’m not being sarcastic Vera) is followed up by “am I being ignorant or what?”. Ignorant Vera…? No, just honest. The short video end with her asking the BBC’s David Sillito “what does it represent?” - Sillito responds with another question, which would seem to imply that he doesn’t have a clue either, but unlike Vera isn’t prepared to admit it.

In another video Sillito asks Vera for her opinion of ‘Untitled Threshold Sculpture’ by Nathan Coley. Let’s be clear about what this is… it’s a piece of wood laid on the floor. Vera is not impressed and thinks it’s a health and safety hazard.

According to Coley, this is part of exploring physical and psychological boundaries, and marks his temporary ownership of part of the gallery. According to me, you can pop down to B&Q or Homebase, make a purchase and ‘hey presto’ you’re a modern artist. But beware, Vera has got you sussed and won’t be impressed.

Make sure you come back in a year’s time, when we’ll be discussing some very clever arty person who will be displaying a bottle they’ve either p*ssed or farted in, while several art critics marvel at their genius.

I’ve been dreading this, but actually I don’t think it’s turned out too bad. A few weeks ago our Marketing team asked my frolleague Brendan Tutt and me to record some videos for ZDNet, and we had to choose four pertinent subjects. The tricky thing was we couldn’t mention any product names… just speak on that hot topic.

The first of mine hit the web today, so you can see me talking about Unified Communications and Collaboration. I wasn’t allowed to mention IBM Lotus Sametime or IBM Lotus Notes 8, but obviously a lot of what I talk about pertains to these two products.

I optimistically thought the recording session was going to be easy - after all, the videos were supposed to be just 3 - 4 minutes long. I do so many presentations and stand-up routines that I don’t usually think about it, I just stand up, open my mouth and some sort of verbal auto-pilot takes over. This was a different kettle of aquatic life - I wonder if writing a script that I tried to stick to hampered me rather than helping me. But with a bit of editing it worked out okay.

Anyway, see what you think… and stay tuned for the other three which will be just as much fun.

I should first explain that these two bands aren’t in the middle of a feud or planning a ruck (as far as I know). Having said that, you’d have to think that although the members of Radiohead outnumber that of the Foo Fighters, Dave Grohl could probably take both Thom Yorke and Jonny Greenwood with one hand tied behind his back and a beer in the other. No, this is more about their approaches to being part of the music business.

Radiohead produced what was quite simply one of the best albums ever made, ‘OK Computer’. Following that critical acclaim and commercial success, they basically disappeared up their own backsides with their next two albums, and re-emerged partially for ‘Hail to the Thief’. Thom Yorke said of their fourth and fifth studio albums “If you look at the artwork for Kid A… well, that´s looking at the fire from afar - Amnesiac is the sound of what it feels like to be standing in the fire”. But the reality was that ‘Amnesiac’ was the sound of what it feels like to be listening to something that really wasn’t any good. Or what it feels like to have wasted £9.

So, I was interested to hear that Radiohead are trying to be too clever and too different all over again. Their new album ‘In Rainbows’ is not available on CD (yet). Instead, you can download it from their web site having paid a sum of money which you decide upon. It would seem fair to say “okay, average price of a CD is £9, so I’ll pay them £9″. However, since I paid a combined £18 for ‘Kid A’ and ‘Amnesiac’, and given that the two of them spawned only four decent tracks, I’d say Radiohead owe me money. So when I do download ‘In Rainbows’ I reckon £2 will be fair.

Let’s turn our attention to the Foo Fighters. While Radiohead were trying to reinvent the world of music and music-based commerce, the Foo Fighters have followed a more traditional approach… write an album, record an album, tour, play festivals, tour some more, and repeat. While Radiohead brood in a studio somewhere, Dave Grohl, a man with almost God-like status in the rock world, will cheerfully give interviews and guest-star on other artistes’ works. Maybe that’s why the Foo Fighters’ new album ‘Echoes, Silence, Patience & Grace’ is so damn good.

Every Foo Fighters album so far has been reliably excellent, although in my opinion ‘In Your Honor’ was a slight dip. ‘Echoes, Silence, Patience & Grace’ puts them well back on track, and it’s never been so evident that Grohl is an excellent song writer, a vocalist with a huge range (from silky crooning to screaming), and a talented musician (guitar, drums, and now the piano).

The album starts with a typical Foo Fighters offering, the single ‘The Pretender’, and roars along until it gets to one of the stand-out tracks, the mainly acoustic ‘Stranger Things Have Happened’ - and here’s the prime example of Grohl’s song-writing skills. Back to the guitars with ‘Cheer Up, Boys (Your Make Up Is Running)’ and then back to the mellow with the radio-friendly ‘Summer’s End’.

‘Ballad of the Beaconsfield Miners’ is the only skip-over track, and towards the end comes the outstanding piano and vocals of ‘Home’ - an instant classic on the first listen. £9 well-spent would seem to be better than £2 badly-spent.