WeatherWatch

If you’re a late TV watcher, you will no doubt, have come across “WeatherWatch” on SBS. It’s not exactly the most…um…eventful of programs but if you are a keen follower of meteorology and/or an insomniac then it may just be your favourite show (I’m waiting for the DVD box set). It also happens to be the cultural hub of music in Australia. The likes of Norah Jones, Il Divo and Aled “it’s all gone wrong for me” Jones are all headline acts on the WeatherWatch stage. It’s a more soothing (or perhaps “numbing”) alternative to Rage. If you’ve got no idea what I’m talking about, it’s a map, much like the one pictured, accompanied by a CD that plays over and over again (Yes I have checked. They don’t change the CD when it finishes. Obviously there wasn’t much else on TV that night.). You can order the CD from Dymocks, if you really like it.

So far, I haven’t really been tempted to ring up the hotline and place an order. Only two albums have come close to making the grand claim of getting me to consider a purchase; one, a compilation of French Café tunes (I think it may have been titled French Café, appropriately enough), the other, Madeleine Peyroux’s album Half the Perfect World.


Madeleine is, in my opinion a “rich man’s Norah Jones” and her album contains delightful covers of Tom Waits’ (Lookin’ for) The Heart of Saturday Night and Joni Mitchell’s River, amongst others. I’d probably pick it up on special but not at Dymocks.

Have you ever watched WeatherWatch? Have you ever bought anything because of it? Or have you ever been turned on to some music from an unlikely source?