Ian Malcolm
LightNews LightNews
banner
ianmalcolm.bsky.social
Ian Malcolm
@ianmalcolm.bsky.social
1.5K followers 580 following 7.1K posts
Melbourne-based writer, editor and proofreader for books, publications and web.

Game designer from Star Wars on NES to Need For Speed: Shift on iOS, with dozens of titles in between.

Bass, uke and low whistle player. Unrepentant folkie.
Posts Replies Media Videos
ianmalcolm.bsky.social
“Pump up the jam, pump it up
While your feet are stomping
And the jam is pumping
Look ahead, the crowd is jumpin'”
The Pope at a microphone. The suggestion that he was really singing Technotronic’s 1989 techno anthem “Pump Up The Jam” is purely for humorous purposes. Much the same as any suggestion that the lyrics, if rendered into ancient Sumerian, can be used to summon a dread eldritch abomination from another dimension.
November 23, 2025 at 8:17 AM
ianmalcolm.bsky.social
What perfect album came out the year you turned 16?

(Even restricting it to #ausmusic releases I had to cheat and go with four.)
Cover of Midnight Oil's album, '10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1'. Cover of Goanna's 'Spirit of Place' album, with stylised illustration of airline in front of Uluru. Cover of INXS' album 'Shabooh Shoobah', with black and white photo of a person holding a small dog. Original Australian (monochrome) cover for Men At Work's 'Business As Usual', showing a guitar lead plugged into an illustration of the top part of an amp cabinet, with mountains above it.
November 18, 2025 at 4:52 AM
ianmalcolm.bsky.social
I only just woke up, but the forecast is for wild.
The wild rumpus begins, with several wild things and Max (a boy in a wolf costume wearing a crown) dancing and leaping in a forest, in an illustration from Where the Wild Things Are, by Maurice Sendak.
November 15, 2025 at 1:12 AM
ianmalcolm.bsky.social
We could infinitely recur! 😜

Repot with an iconic ficitonal band.
Sex Bob-Omb, from the live action adaptation of Scott Pilgrim vs the World. L to R: Stephen Stills (Mark Webber) - vocals and guitar, Kim Pine (Alison Pill) - drums and Scott Pilgrim (Michael Cera) - bass. Not pictured: Young Neil (Johny Simmons) - biggest fan and understudy bass.
November 13, 2025 at 6:56 AM
ianmalcolm.bsky.social
Happy Circulatory System Walking Through the Kitchen Day to all who celebrate!
Panel from the Watchmen graphic novel by Alan Moore. Text reads "It's November 10th now. There is a circulatory system walking through the kitchen." and the artwork (by Dave Gibbons) depicts this.
November 10, 2025 at 9:47 AM
ianmalcolm.bsky.social
Lovely! We have just the one rose bush, seen here intertwined with our only grapevine.
Rose bush with several mainly white roses, intertwined with a grapevine. An out of focus silver car is in the background.
November 10, 2025 at 6:30 AM
ianmalcolm.bsky.social
Slimmer pickings at the op shop today, but found a Ross Noble double-DVD and a hardcover Bryson I hadn't seen before -in excellent condition - coincidentally both published in 2010.

#books #dvd #comedy #PhysicalMedia
Boxed Ross Noble DVD for 'things' tour, and a hardcover of Bill Bryson's 'At Home'.
November 4, 2025 at 5:29 AM
ianmalcolm.bsky.social
#Last4Albums

(Apart from The Cure I've been on a bit of a 90s female singer/band kick.)
Cover of Jack Off Jill's 'Sexless Demons and Scars' debut album. Image shows three Barbie-type dolls without any clothing, with the three band members' heads superimposed on top of them. Cover of "The Head on the Door' album by The Cure. The image is a manipulated photo of Porl Thompson’s then-girlfriend Janet Smith – who is also younger sister of The Cure’s leader Robert Smith. Cover of Veruca Salt's 'American Thighs' album. Image shows a pale frock-type dress with a vertical row of red love hearts, on a clothes hangar. Cover of 'Fontanelle' by Babes in Toyland. Images shows a child's baby doll held up to a mirror.
November 1, 2025 at 11:19 PM
ianmalcolm.bsky.social
Apart from these four, everything else I've seen this month has been a rewatch. #movies
Poster for Nosferatu, showing a reclined woman's head embraced by a hand with long fingers and pointed nails. Poster for Barry Lyndon, with a playing card, flintlock pistol and a rose. Poster for A Better Tomorrow. A man points a gun ointment the foreground while in the background a second man in dark glasses lights a cigarette with a burning US bank note. Poster for Shadow of the Vampire, with the titular vampire casting a shadow.
November 1, 2025 at 12:08 PM
ianmalcolm.bsky.social
A few days ago I finished 'Amongst Our Weapons' by @benaaronovitch.bsky.social. I love how every successive entry in the Rivers of London series evolves - characters, world building and the mechanics of magic in-universe are always changing and building on previous outings. Highly recommended! 💙📚
Cover of 'Amongst Our Weapons' (yes, a Python reference) by Ben Aaronovitch. Image is a monochrome drawing of London buildings clustered together, with the Thames depicted in blood red flowing through. Also pictured are a lane, interlinked rings and a canal boat - all pertinent to the story.
November 1, 2025 at 2:35 AM
ianmalcolm.bsky.social
My name is Ozymandias, Queen of Queens: Look on my Works, ye Mighty, and despair!
Album cover for Queen's 'The Works', featuring the four members of the band sitting on the floor casting shadows on he wall behind them.
October 31, 2025 at 8:06 AM
ianmalcolm.bsky.social
#Last4Albums
Cover of Derelicts, by Carbon Based Lifeforms, showing rusted/decayed industrial infrastructure. Cover of Iron Maiden's first, self-titled album, with an early version of band mascot Eddie (a skinny corpse-like creature with a shock of grey-red hair) drawn in a nighttime street. Cover of Jurassic Shift by Ozric Tentacles, showing a man with long hair dressed in robe and hat walking on bubbles suspended in mid-air. Cover of the CD edition of The Goon Show Compendium, Volume One, Series Five, with black and white images of Spike Milligan, Peter Sellers and Harry Secombe.
October 29, 2025 at 11:25 PM
ianmalcolm.bsky.social
Last night wound up doing a double-feature for #spooktober; the OG 'House on Haunted Hill' along with... 'Carry On Screaming'... 🤪

So now the two have now become a gestalt entity in my mind, wherein Vincent Price and Kenneth Williams are having a sort of arch camp-off, and it's oddly glorious.
Poster for House on Haunted Hill (1959) with Vincent Price holding a severed woman's head by the hair and I skeleton holds a hanged woman with a house (nothing like the house in the movie) in the background. Poster for "Carry On Screaming' (1966) with a vaguely Frankenstein's monster-like creature carrying a blonde woman, with another dark-haired woman in the foreground. Also there's a kind of cauldron with green liquid and green steam coming out of it, which doesn't appear in the film.
October 29, 2025 at 10:28 PM
ianmalcolm.bsky.social
Quote with a vampire that isn’t Dracula.
A de Havilland Vampire jet fighter, in Royal Australian Air Force markings.
October 29, 2025 at 9:05 AM
ianmalcolm.bsky.social
Out walking the dog this afternoon when we heard the rumble of thunder and looked up to see this. Now back at home as it absolutely buckets down.
#melbourne #weather
Dark blue-grey clouds over the local cricket/footy club and oval, ahead of an oncoming thunderstorm.
October 26, 2025 at 5:40 AM
ianmalcolm.bsky.social
Popped into the local op shop at lunch today on a whim and my finds were distinctly timey-wimey flavoured.

#DoctorWho #books 💙📚
Three paperback books:'Doctor Who and the Three Doctors', by Terrance Dicks (1984 reprint); 'Doctor Who 50th Anniversary Collection', aka '11 Doctors, 11 Stories' (compilation of 11 single books), and 'Doctor who Heroes and Monsters Collection'.
October 24, 2025 at 4:45 AM
ianmalcolm.bsky.social
Upon reflection, I've come to realise that GenAI is absolutely fantastic and I will be making daily use of it from now on.
TITLE: You've been kidnapped Body of text: Your kidnappers allow you to keep posting on social media to pretend everything is alright. What would you post that would alarm your followers, without the kidnappers knowing you're asking for help?
October 16, 2025 at 7:19 AM
ianmalcolm.bsky.social
Popped into a local op shop during lunch for a quick browse, and thought I'd come up empty-handed for a change, til I spotted this on a bottom shelf on the way out.

Mine for the princely sum of $4 - appears to be brand spanking new/unread too - bonus!
#IainMBanks #TheCulture #books 💙📚
'Matter' (a Culture novel) by Iain M. Banks. Cover illustration shows a humanoid figure in part-silhouette with flowing cloak or long coat, on the orange-tinged surface of a planet.
October 15, 2025 at 6:26 AM
ianmalcolm.bsky.social
My #LastFourWatched movies could best be summarised collectively as… actually I’m not sure. Erratic? 😜🤷‍♂️
#movies
Posters for the last four movies I watched, from left to right: Barry Lyndon, Astérix & Obélix contre César, Hot Fuzz and Spider-Man: No Way Home.
October 10, 2025 at 10:39 PM
ianmalcolm.bsky.social
What's a great movie image that is ingrained in your head? 🎥
John Turturro as Jesus Quintana, licking a pink bowling ball in a close-up scene from The Big Lebowski.
October 10, 2025 at 7:51 AM
ianmalcolm.bsky.social
I swear my kids will remember that Thomas ep as their first horror ever watched.

That, or the similar-vibed ep where an engine that derailed too much was converted to a sentient boiler, never to move again, as punishment.

And yep, "LLMs are people" folk likely think peek-a-boo makes you vanish. 🙄
The front half of a former steam engine with a face, hidden away behind the engine shed in Thomas The Tank Engine, where it is trapped and used as a sentient boiler/generator.
October 5, 2025 at 1:20 PM
ianmalcolm.bsky.social
Bit academic given it’s GenAI slop, but if anything it’s a shitty approximation of 3.5” floppies, rendered too thick.

The metal cover on Zips is tiny relative to the rest of the case, with no “slot” like a 3.5”. Zips are also tapered at that end, unlike the slop image ones.

Just GenAI bollocks. 🤷‍♂️
An actual Zip disc with small cover slide and two tapered corners, and an actual 3.5” floppy disc with larger slotted slide and 90 degree corners.
October 1, 2025 at 1:53 PM
ianmalcolm.bsky.social
Today's op shop (aka charity shop/thrift store, for UK/US folk) treasure haul.

Only Forward by @ememess.bsky.social (OG 1994 edition, replacing a copy loaned out 25 years ago and never seen again), a Palin travel book I've not read, and three DVDs not on my streaming services. All for $13. 😎
Two books: 'Only Forward' by Michael Marshall Smith in paperback and 'New Europe' by Michael Palin in hardback, and three movies on DVD: 'The Lost Boys', 'Lock, Stock and two Smoking Barrels', and 'Bill & Ted Face the Music'.
September 26, 2025 at 4:49 AM
ianmalcolm.bsky.social
Just checked the letterbox and found this waiting for me - woohoo! (And still nursing fond memories of the gig last Saturday night.) 😎

#NotDrowningWaving #AusMusic
Gatefold CD of new Not Drowning, Waving album, 'Malira', along with handwritten note from drummer Russel Bradley, which reads, "Hey Ian, Thanks for the order, Enjoy! Russel"
September 24, 2025 at 6:00 AM
ianmalcolm.bsky.social
Sorting through some photos of our trip to Queensland last year and found this one taken at Hervey Bay, looking NW towards the 868m long Urangan Pier on a dramatic sky day.
#photography #landscape
View along an otherwise empty (of humans) sandy beach towards a rather long pier in the far distance. The sky overhead is largely blue-grey clouds of the tropical "maybe there will be a storm, maybe not" variety. (There was not.)
September 17, 2025 at 12:24 AM