Lisa works tirelessly around Cardiff to make fun things happen and people smile. She’s part of wordy goodness team Scrabble Sunday, and comedy goodness lot the Junket Club. Join in.

Recorded music highlights of 2008
Beach House
Devotion
It’s just a delightful record. My friend Carl seems to find gems before they’ve even been signed. A few months later, you hear them all about the place (by which time, he’s bored with them). That’s what happened with Devendra Banhart. And Joanna Newsam. And Fleet Foxes. And now Beach House. I reckon he’s the gem.

Bonnie Prince Billy
Lie Down In The Light
I love his upside down face. Oh, and his music. I didn’t hear many people say much about this album, but I think it’s incredible. Maybe he’s just too prolific to keep up. You listen to the twiddly tunes you think they’re probably songs about barn dances and his mum and dad, but then his rudeness (blowjobs for example) brilliantly sneak in… hehe.

Times New Viking
Rip It Off
I probably wouldn’t have liked this record had I not seen them live first. As soon as something is a bit too shouty I tend to run away. But I saw these three in Clwb this year and their amp blew up and they knocked things over and they just carried on regardless in their fantastically ramshackle way. And I loved it.

Live music highlights of 2008
Sŵn was my music highlight of 2008. It seems to bring all the best bits of Cardiff together in a weekend.
Best bits:
Euros Childs in the Museum. He was incredible. And mocked my friend Anna-Marie for snoozing during his set.
Agaskodo Teliverek – Clwb Ifor Bach. Pregnant japanese lady going mental. Awesome.
Right Hand Left Hand – Clwb Ifor Bach.

Other festival highlights
Amadou and Mariam – Latitude festival.
Bon Iver – End Of The Road.
Richard Hawley – End Of The Road.

What else did you enjoy this year?
Daniel Kitson – The Impotent Fury Of The Privileged at the Sherman in May. This was another installment of Daniel’s step by step, show by show plan to make us better people and blow our little minds. What a good egg.

Ben Moor – Not Everything is Significant at the Edinburgh Festival. We spent a week in Edinburgh for the festival and my friend Paul came too – the self confessed hater of comedy. He’d seen a racist, an audience hater and a goat – he wasn’t having a good time. I forced him to come with me to see Ben Moor because I knew he was a genius. Curious, mind-bending and very funny. And Paul liked it too. Hooray.

Maeve Higgins – End Of The Road. One of the funniest people I’ve ever seen.

Starting Scrabble Sunday with my buddy Paul Barnett (the comedy hater) and getting to go to all the festivals for free with a boot full of Scrabble boards. It’s been exactly what we wanted it to be – a lovely thing with nice people playing the best game ever (bar boggle, which is on a par) whether that’s in a café in Cardiff, in a field in Suffolk or under an umbrella in London.

Meeting my friend Benjamin at the very first Scrabble Sunday. He’s become one of my favourite people in the world and we’ve started The Junket Club together. The Junket Club makes me happier than I can even start to explain. The idea is to bring brilliant comedy to interesting places. It’s about the whole experience from getting your ticket through the door to the performance itself. We want it to feel like a wee bit of magic. Can’t wait for the next one – Josie Long and Mike Wozniak in the Planetarium. Bloody brilliant.

2008 was…
A bit happy. A bit sad. A bit joyous. A bit loved up. A bit lonely. A lot lovely.

2009 will be…
Played out on Facebook.