2008 and all that ...

The global credit crunch, Jay-Z at Glastonbury and economic catastrophe all started as minor issues. The almost total lack of a summer in the UK, and the usual music industry machinations, surely made this, overall, the worst festival summer in living memory?
It had its flaws of course, like every other, but I just think that it was what made it matter. I'm more inlined to think that, after a decade of almost uninhibited growth, 2008 was the year that started a change of direction. Leeds/Reading remain fairly unreconstructed but even they are, increasingly, becoming less appealing. This does not apply merely to those who have been regulars since their teenage days but are now getting older. [I am older than all those that I am referring to!]
Music is changing and of course it always does; now it is changing in surprising ways. As I was wandering though ASDA today I was struck by this headline on the cover of 'Guitar Magazine'...

Seasick Steve - hobo to hero.
I'll fully admit that a year ago, had I had even noticed it in the first place, I would not have taken a second glance and that it would have been a huge mistake. As luck would have it I got another chance...

Seasick Steve live at Latitude 2008.
He was just jaw-dropping good: I almost forgot to take any photos and it shows!


I Started Out With Nothin' and I Still Got Most of It Left

This is his latest album. If you like blistering acoustic blues performed by an inspired and inventive, yet very much livin' and original, traditional artist this is for you. This was for me, and clearly very many others, one of the defining revelations of Latitude 2008.