I took Mrs Smudge to Las Vegas this week as a "big" (i.e. ending in a zero...) birthday present and our nicest dinner was in Todd English's "Olive's" restaurant at the Bellagio hotel.

I mention this only because the "mood music" around 11.30 p.m., which had hitherto been very late-80s & early-90s based, revealed the unmistakeable tones of BF. I didn't recognise it at first, but it was one of the slower remixes of Alphaville.

It actually sat very neatly within the genre/era the restaurant seemed to favour, but then the song was born many years before its official release, I guess. To my ears it would have sat quite happily on Bete Noire or Mamouna.

A nice surprise nonetheless...

Vegas in July! Whew. That sounds HOT HOT HOT! Especially this year.

BF's music will show up at odd times in US venues but almost nobody in America has any notion that the song being played is a Bryan Ferry Track.

I hope you and Mrs S had a chance to get out of Vegas and maybe drive over to to Zion National Park in Utah. The desert outside Vegas can be beautiful, but in the summer it cane be just too damn hot to enjoy...

As far me, I spent the day on the computer while listening several times to Disc 1 of the 2001 Roxy Tour (I skip the first two tracks and start with Ladytron). I wish they had played Prairie Rose in 2001... Now THAT is Desert Music!