Max Sefton

A legend. RIP

Great thread

Some extracurricular writing from me, this time on two very fun indie rock bands in my favourite Edinburgh venue.

YouTube video by Oasis Oasis - Cigarettes & Alcohol (Official HD Remastered Video)

Still in the market for an Edinburgh Oasis ticket, any night, if anyone knows of one going spare #Oasis #Murrayfield

www.youtube.com/watch?v=SaeL...

Alba's Ash Regan says 'many politicians' avoid the issue of prostitution in Scotland The sole Alba MSP bringing forward plans to make the buying of sex illegal has said she will not let the issue of prostitution fall ‘into the…

Asked about concerns her bill could drive prostitution underground, Ms Regan said:

"If you even think for one second, you cannot possibly drive prostitution underground.

"If you had a lot of women in underground cellars with a locked door, how would the punters get to them?"

Iconic

Siobhan Miller @ Traverse, Edinburgh: live review - The Skinny Siobhan Miller cultivates a sense of community through music and storytelling on Edinburgh Tradfest's closing night.

Siobhan Miller cultivates a sense of community through music and storytelling on the closing night of this year's @edinburghtradfest.com

www.theskinny.co.uk/music/live-m...

[review by @maxsefton.bsky.social ]

The big day arrives. Stage one of @orkneymsp.bsky.social’s Assisted Dying bill. Time to give terminally ill Scots the choice of a compassionate death if they want one.

Lib Dems back ban on playing music and videos on public transport in England Under the plan, those who flout the prohibition could face a maximum fine of £1,000

I lost the internal party debate about upgrading this to instant death penalty

www.theguardian.com/politics/202...

Oscar-winning Palestinian director attacked by Israeli settlers and arrested No Other Land’s Hamdan Ballal attacked by armed settlers in West Bank and handed to Israeli military, witnesses say

This is absolutely horrific. www.theguardian.com/world/2025/m...

Right now, Kemi Badenoch is doing more to defend JD Vance than the US is doing to defend Ukraine.

They’re playing Natalie Imbruglia and The Cranberries before the Touché Amore show. Pretty sure that wasn’t the intro playlist I was expecting.

Two-thirds of the Earth’s surface experienced record heat in 2024. See where and by how much – visualised In oceans and on land, from the north to the south pole, records were smashed for the monthly average temperature

Two-thirds of the Earth’s surface experienced record heat in 2024. See where and by how much – visualised 🌎❤️‍🔥

www.theguardian.com/environment/...

THE BUG CLUB: THE VOODOO ROOMS, EDINBURGH The alternative view - live reviews and musical meanderings

One of my new New Year’s resolutions is to write more non-work stuff, so in that spirit here’s some word on very fun Welsh rockers The Bug Club and humour in music for @resoundonline.bluesky.social

re-sound.co.uk/the-bug-club...

Bolton Wanderers part ways with manager Ian Evatt after four-and-a-half years Ian Evatt's tenure as manager of Bolton Wanderers has come to an end after a 2-1 home defeat against Charlton Athletic.

Big thanks are due to Ian Evatt. The past four years have rarely been dull - we’ve had a promotion, a trophy and two playoffs - but clearly time for a change #bwfc

Kenny MacAskill to challenge Ash Regan for Alba leadership The former justice secretary has been endorsed by Moira Salmond, widow of the late party founder.

Quite impressive that they have more leadership candidates than parliamentarians.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

Approximately 6-7 years ago, the New Statesman had a host of rising journalistic stars and an excellent podcast before the medium reached saturation. There’s a centrish Labour government in power, it should be an essential read. Instead it is publishing nonsense like this.

Good morning. I hope you were able to have a good restorative break. My thanks to Jim, Robert, Miranda, Lucy, Jen, Jude, Chris and Georgina for minding the fort while I was on holiday.

This is a superb piece of writing and analysis by @stephenkb.bsky.social in which he takes apart Tory opportunism and pandering to Elon Musk over the grooming gangs and compares it to Farage’s consistent red line on Tommy Robinson. Compulsory reading.

25/30

Despite generally reading 25-50 books a year I actually can’t think of that many fiction authors where I’ve read 5+.

Terry Pratchett (about 50)
Cormac McCarthy (about 10)
Stephen King (about 10)
Jane Austen (6)
Ali Smith (5)

Abuse victim’s ‘final’ message after anonymity denied by inquiry Kevin Sutherland begged chairwoman of the Scottish Child Abuse Inquiry to remove his testimony and wrote on social media: If you are reading this it means I have died

This is another shocking turn in the perplexingly long-running Scottish Child Abuse Inquiry, after other victims said they had lost confidence in the chair herself - by Marc Horne @timesscotland.bsky.social www.thetimes.com/uk/scotland/...

Appealed to the Information Commissioner in December 2022 over the Scottish Government's refusal to give me information relating to Crown Consent on dubious grounds. Just had an email that the staff member handling my case is leaving. Still no sign of the information. A broken system #FOI

In the final week of term the Scottish Government are going to give a statement today on their highly suss use of WhatsApp and deletion of messages. They’ve been sat on the relevant report since July. Burying bad news season has arrived.

I’d read a deep dive on why Labour loves centralising things so much.

She is so lucky this happened on budget day

A list to keep even music nerds humble. I listen to a bunch of new releases every week and I’ve still only played 23 of these and heard tracks off a handful more.

Glad to see Richard Tice taking such care over UK fishing. It is just a shame that neither he nor any of his Reform colleagues could be bothered to show up this afternoon to my debate... on UK fishing.

Over the past year, SNP ministers have chosen to remove funding for affordable housing, mental health and drug services. When you do that, there are inevitable consequences.

This has been one of those low-key annoyances that has bugged me for about five years. Good work @dvdhmltn.bsky.social #HolyroodFOI

Edinburgh at 'sharp end' in Scotland's homelessness crisis as Cyrenians launch winter campaign The Scotsman has joined forces with Cyrenians to raise money for people experiencing homelessness

🔴 The number of homeless people in Scotland's biggest cities has rocketed by almost 10% since pre-pandemic.

@thescotsmanpaper.bsky.social has joined forces with Cyrenians to help raise essential funds for people experiencing homelessness this winter & beyond.

www.scotsman.com/news/scottis...

Since I've been here for a while… here are some useful features on Bluesky that you might not have discovered yet! 🧵