Category: music

Going thru some old stuff today I came across this photo. In case it’s not entirely clear what’s going on here, here’s a blow-up of the central section. Yes it’s me. Taken in September 1982. All is not quite how it seems however. I wasn’t in a heavy metal band. Maybe one day I’ll take… Continue reading Blast From The Past

Been a while since I went to see someone I really like live in concert. So I was very interested to see that David Bowie has announced a world tour that will take place this November. I’ve seen him four times (Serious Moonlight 1983, Plastic Spider 1987, Sound+Vision 1990, Outside 1995) and whilst he can… Continue reading Ticket Prices

Busking has always been illegal on the tube. Until recently London Underground hav taken a very dim view of people playing music in their stations. It’s only a few years since they ran a poster campaign that portrayed buskers as sinister criminals who should be avoided at all costs. But all that has changed. They’ve… Continue reading Busking

I was flicking randomly through some music channels this morning when I came across what I suppose is the video to Sinead Quinn’s new single. In my opinion Quinn is one of a very small number (maybe two!) people to emerge from the recent plague of reality TV music shows with any kind of credibility.… Continue reading Devil Gate Drive

Doing the whole Bowie completist thing means that you have to buy some pretty dodgy CDs. A prime example is the Labyrinth soundtrack that I picked up on Ebay last week. I expected that I’d play it once to check that it was undamaged and then file it away forever, but I reckoned without the… Continue reading Labyrinth

There’s an interesting article in today’s Guardian about a group who are proposing a new music chart which would take account of internet downloads. One throwaway line caught my attention. The author mentions that 7″ vinyl is a thing of the past. I hadn’t really thought about it before but that’s probably true. You don’t… Continue reading Vinyl Fetish

I’m trying to complete my collection of David Bowie CDs. This isn’t as simple as you might think. In 1990/91 most of Bowie’s albums (from Space Oddity to Tin Machine) were re-released with extra tracks. These are generally singles and B-sides which were released at the same time as the album in question and many… Continue reading David Bowie

They say that “the devil has all the best tunes” but that’s just not true. A lot of spiritual music is very good too. As an example, the song currently stuck in my head is Down To The River To Pray from the soundtrack of O Brother, Where Art Thou? It’s a fabulous piece of… Continue reading The Best Tunes

A lot of nonsense is talked in some quarters, when referring to us, about “The First Family of Folk” or even (God help us) “The Royal Family of Folk”. People who do that, in my view, want their backsides kicking – hard. If there is one family who deserve such a title – and I… Continue reading First Family of Folk