Football Australia: Aus-Soccer's governing body
The World Game: Australia's SBS TV's site covers everything
Soccernet: All the latest news and scores from around the world & interesting articles
Metacritic: An encyclopedia of reviews from various sites. Not just games, but films and music too
GamesRadar: First with most ISS/PES news
IGN: Covers all gaming platforms and most comprehensive reviews
Hyper Magazine: Australia's leading multi-format gaming mag. Large forum.
My new love. From Estonia, started as a four member "girl band" before graduating to a four member "real band", and are now a trio. Performed at Eurovision 2005 for Switzerland with "Cool Vibes", finishing eighth. Group highlighted by outstanding vocalist Lenna Kuurmaa, who has the smoothest "rock" voice you could imagine. Not that I'd call it rock. It just has an edge and there's so many shades and tones to her range. Their music could be classified as "retro pop rock" and their success includes much of Europe and also Japan. As of October 2008, have released four albums, with Love Is War the most recent (May 2006). Went through a period of dispute with former manager over the rights to use their name outside Estonia. That eventually saw the bizarre situation of the name being sold off, then the new owner putting it up for sale on ebay (for 44,500 USD). Eventually sanity prevailed, and the band managed to re-acquire their own name. In June 2008, they had a successful tour of Estonia as a part of a radio station promotion. I did the insane thing and went over, seeing the last three concerts, lucky enough to meet the band, and enjoyed the country in general as part of a month-long stay in Europe
vannillaninja.ee: Official site
vanillaninjamusic.de: Fansite from Germany, again with extensive range of everything
love-ninjas.com: Another leading fansite
Topshop is great for games; Sanity for CDs. Local stuff is cheaper in the stores for
locals, but for overseas, the Australian dollar is usually good value against the
American. Australia also has a 10% GST included in prices, which is not payable when
importing. In fact, such sales taxes are generally not paid when importing from any
country.
topshop.com.au sanity.com.au
The world renowned Amazon. Fast (just over a week to Australia). Shipping can get
expensive when ordering many items.
amazon.com
HMV and 101cd are fast (less that 2 weeks to Australia). CDWow can be a bit
sluggish getting the goods out. All have good ranges, including imports, with HMV also
excellent for video games. With non-UK CDs, just like the Australian sites, being the
middle-man makes them expensive. Best to import from the country of origin. Note that
Britain has a 15% VAT included in the listed price that some sites will deduct from the
price.
HMV UK 101cd.com cdwow.com
All Amazons are linked, so enter your personal details in the US site. Makes buying in
German easier, not that it's that hard to navigate. Just double-check the ship-to country
because they're often spelt differently. Great site for mainland European releases.
amazon.de
Exchange rates make it very cheap, products frequently and quickly discounted, and
their should be the removal of the 20% Swedish sales tax. They're fast (just on a week to
Australia). Shipping is a set rate (10 euros as of October 2008) regardless of number of
items ordered.
megastore.se
If you want Vanilla Ninja, this place has it all - including their first Estonian-only
release. Latter albums were released far wider through Europe and also in Japan. English
translation link is at the top of the page.
cdmarket.eu
Japan is great for releases because often there's bonus tracks, special double-CD
versions and even CD/DVD combos. Always check for your favourite bands. There's English
translation, which can be set permanently in your defaults once signed in. Fastest
experience so far. Just three days to Australia!
HMV Japan
TheForce.net: Your daily dose of Star Wars. This maybe the best site anywhere.
Star Wars.Com: The official site