It’s been a busy couple of weeks for gigs. On the assumption that at least some of my readers have similar tastes to me, here are brief reviews of the three gigs I’ve seen in the last couple of weeks. Fairport Convention, Union Chapel, 20th FebThis is the second year running that I’ve seen Fairport… Continue reading Gigs for Old Gits
Category: music
The Learning Guitar
I don’t play the guitar very well at all. I’ll sometimes say that I play it better than average, but that’s a claim that can only be justified by pointing out that the vast majority of people don’t play guitar at all so anyone who knows two or three chords is already well above average.… Continue reading The Learning Guitar
Twisted Christmas
As I mentioned yesterday, last night I went to the Barbican Centre to see their Twisted Christmas show. The show was definitely a mixed bag. Most of the musical performers were good. I particularly enjoyed Alasdair Roberts’ “The 12 Days of Yule” (On the first day of Yule my druid brought to me a crow… Continue reading Twisted Christmas
Very Cellular Songs
On Sunday evening I was at the Barbican Centre for Very Cellular Songs – The Music of the Incredible String Band. This featured a number of performers singing and playing Incredible String Band songs. The performers included Mike Heron and Clive Palmer who were original members of the band. According to Joe Boyd, who curated… Continue reading Very Cellular Songs
Hard Rock Calling
On Saturday I was at the Hard Rock Calling festival in Hyde Park. It’s a pretty good idea to have a three-day festival in London over the same period as the Glastonbury festival as it’s easy for the acts to play both festivals over the weekend and those of us whose camping days are long… Continue reading Hard Rock Calling
The War of the Worlds
Last night I was at the O2 Arena to see one of the 30th anniversary performances of Jeff Wayne’s War of the Worlds. For some reason it was a year late – the 30th anniversary was actually last year. I wasn’t entirely sure what I was expecting. I wouldn’t have been surprised if it had… Continue reading The War of the Worlds
War of the Worlds
I’ve always had a massive soft spot for Jeff Wayne’s musical version of The War of the Worlds. I think that the album must have originally been released pretty soon after I read the book for the first time. And it must have really struck a chord with me. I borrowed a copy from the… Continue reading War of the Worlds
Rip It Up And Start Again
Yesterday I mentioned that I had recently read Rip It Up And Start Again by Simon Reynolds. It was a really interesting read, but (at least in part) not for the reasons I expected. It was interesting because it was full of bands that I had never listened to and had always meant to. This… Continue reading Rip It Up And Start Again
KT Tunstall
Bugger. I’ve just seen some photos of KT Tunstall playing in my local pub last night. It’s all very well living so close to such a cool music venue, but I really need to find a good way to keep in touch with what’s going on there. Their web site really doesn’t seem to be… Continue reading KT Tunstall
Sex Pistols
On Saturday I went to see the Sex Pistols at the Brixton Academy. Don’t really have a lot to say about the Pistols themselves (they’ve become a pretty tight band over the last thirty years I enjoyed them a lot) but there were a couple of things that interested me. Firstly the support acts. We… Continue reading Sex Pistols