My Music in 2017 - Albums - Part 2

Is it easier to continue something than to start it?
I'm not quite sure where this is heading; hopefully straight to the heart of music that was new and important to me in 2017, or at least in my mind.

• Ags Connolly - Nothin' Unexpected
• Jason Isbell - The Nashville Sound
• Margo Price - All American Made
• Paradisia - Sound Of Freedom
• Scott H Biram - The Bad Testament
• Secret Sisters - You Don't Own Me Anymore
• Slowgold - Drömmar
• Steph Cameron - Daybreak Over Jackson Street
• Vukovi - Vukovi
• Wildwood Kin - Turning Tides

This list is possibly more eclectic than the last. Of the ten four are British, four are from the US and there is one each from Canada and Sweden.

Of the acts/artists I have seen seven of the ten play live at some point in the past. I have seen one of them live five times but not once in 2017! Only one of them have I seen live in 2017 and that was a serendipitous mistake on my part.
Leaving my lair that was The Saloon Bar stage I braved the mud but paddled to the wrong stage at the right time.  I saw this band, a four-piece from Scotland...

Vukovi, The Nest stage, Truck Festival, 21 July 2017.

I'd never heard Vukovi until this happened. A good result I have to say. As for the band that I was intending to see and were playing the Market stage, well that worked out for the best later in the summer in any case. That was 'Goat Girl'.
Vukovi was however far from the only remarkable gig of Truck Festival 2017. Tired now, late on Sunday evening, who could imagine a full band set in the Nest stage with just twelve of us in the audience when it started?

This was the time to forget about Monday morning and how I was going escape from all of this and return to something approaching normality. Sometimes you need to dig deep into the moment.

I think that would be a suitable subject for another post. This idea has got a hold in my mind now.

My Music in 2017 - Albums - Part 1

Right then, the time for year-end lists is with us once again. This led me to consider that it is my twelfth year of doing such things. The first was posted on 10 December 2006 and that was just three months after starting this blog. It was also before I started attending music festivals. It was to be the driving force for that, and attempts at music photography soon followed.
That list of ten albums from 2006 is here.

The rules have changed little since: there will be several lists of albums as well as other categories. All entries in each list are alphabetical by artist and inclusion in a first list does not imply that I regard these releases to be superior to those in a later list of the same category.
Why do I do this? The answer to this question, which I have been asked surprisingly often, is that it serves to crystallise my thoughts on all the music that I have heard in the past year. That is more important than ever. I don't have exact numbers but I am in no doubt that in 2017 I have listened to more music than in any previous year. That includes approximately 150 live acts.
Music by artists that I have seen live at some time or another continues to have a profound effect on my listening habits. To make that point this list consists only of albums released in 2017 by artists that I have also seen live in 2017.
The reverse is also holds true; I have made an effort to see a number of artists in 2017 as a result of falling for their music in recorded format. John Moreland is a very good example of that. His LP 'High On Tulsa Heat' was on this list last year. The follow-up 'Big Bad Luv' is on this one and therefore here he is...

John Moreland, Garden stage, End Of The Road Festival, 2 September 2017.

• Angel Olsen - Phases
• Courtney Marie Andrews - Honest Life
• Holly Macve - Golden Eagle
• Hurray For The Riff Raff - The Navigator
• John Moreland - Big Bad Luv
• John Smith - Headlong
• Otis Gibbs - Mount Renraw
• Pumarosa - The Witch
• Rosie Hood - The Beautiful and The Actual
• Stevie Parker - Blue

Less than an hour later...

Courtney Marie Andrews, Garden stage, End Of The Road Festival, 2 September 2017.

I guess it is fair to say that I have rather indie-traditional leanings in the music I favour but in fact I have listened to a surprising amount of pop and electronic music this year too. I'm neither proud nor embarrassed about that.
The highlight is possibly that the last few years of political turmoil have re-energised the whole gamut of narrative music based on protest, hardship and (voluntary or otherwise) displacement.

My first attempt at seeing Pumarosa live, at Truck Festival 2016, was entirely successful. Taking photos was not however, thanks to a tetchy memory card. With a new memory card and as it happens a different camera I fared somewhat better in 2017.

Pumarosa's Isabel Munoz-Newsome, Walled Garden stage, Green Man Festival, 18 August 2017.

John Smith, Tipi stage, End Of The Road Festival, 2 September 2017.

If there is a curve-ball it is the inclusion of 'Phases' by Angel Olsen because it is in a sense a compilation. My reason is this. I first saw her live at Green Man 2014, knowing next to nothing of her or her work, and was blown away. In great part by the music but also by her faintly diffident approach. Three years on, and after the release of 'My Woman' in 2016, she returned to Green Man in 2017. I was interested to see what might have changed. Quite a lot to tell the truth and much as I expected to be honest. Totally amazing and still playing that 1979 Gibson S-1.

Angel Olsen, Far Out stage, Green Man Festival, 18 August 2017.

New Music 2017 - Part 1 - Holly Macve - Golden Eagle

A break from lists and an opportunity to start looking forward to 2017 releases.
I actually started to write this about a fortnight ago when the schedule became clear but I soon ran into a problem. I saw Holly Macve live during the summer but could I find the photos? No!
I knew they were not amongst a few lost to a faulty memory card because the issue was resolved by that time. Just now I had an idea - by this time I was using two cameras interchangeably, one much more than the other and it was the first time that I had such luxury. It turned out that these pictures had been taken with 'the other one' and I hadn't looked for them where they were to be found even though I had downloaded all the images from both devices. Mea culpa.
With that little mystery solved here she is. As I said ten years ago, when this blog project commenced, I don't have the time or the inclination to review things that I don't care for. My listening tastes may have changed over time but that is a completely different matter. 

Holly Macve, Garden stage, End Of The Road Festival, 4 September 2016.

Her début album 'Golden Eagle' is released by Bella Union on 3 March 2017 and this is the track-listing.

White Bridge
Corner of My Mind
Heartbreak Blues
Shell
All of Its Glory
Timbuktu
Fear
No One Has the Answers
Golden Eagle
Sycamore Tree

Taken from the album, this is 'No One Has The Answers'.

My Music in 2016 - Albums - Part 1

It is time for the first of several lists of my favourite albums of 2016. As ever releases are alphabetical (articles, whether definite or indefinite, are included in the list entry but ignored for alphabetical purposes) by artist within each list and inclusion in a given list implies no preference over ones in a later list.
Artists that I have seen live tend to feature highly in these lists and it is true that this applies just as much in 2016 as in previous years. In order to try to prevent that bias affecting opinion I have decided that this first list will include only artists and acts that (performing as such) I have not seen live this year or previously. The result of doing that has, as it turns out, transformed into something of a 'wants-list' for 2017 festivals!
Be that as it may, and with no way of knowing how it might pan out, here it is:

Billie Marten - Writing of Blues and Yellows
Case/Lang/Veirs - Case/Lang/Veirs
Dori Freeman - Dori Freeman
The Drive-by Truckers - American Band
Elizabeth Cook - Exodus Of Venus
John Moreland - High On Tulsa Heat
Layla McCalla - A day for the hunter, a day for the prey
The Moon and You - A White Light That Shines
On Dead Waves - On Dead Waves
Red Moon Road - Sorrows & Glories

All but two are acts from North America but this isn't actually an accurate reflection of my listening in 2016, be that live or otherwise. I think that my subsequent lists will make that clear. Indeed if you know me then you will likely have already spotted a few very glaring omissions of North American artists that have released LPs in 2016 from from this list. What is certainly true is that it has focused my attention on artists that I would very much like to see live in 2017.

[This is just the bare outline of this post but having started just earlier and on a whim, I decided I wanted to get something published this evening. More details, links (those other than to my own comments) and so on will follow shortly. If you find some music new to you and that you like then I'm a happy bunny!]

Comments are always welcome.
They are moderated only for reasons of law, order and decency.

New Music 2016 - Part 57 - Frida Hyvönen - Kvinnor och barn

I have posted about my forays into listening to music sung in foreign languages a few times in the past. On the other hand I don't think that Swedish (a language that I don't understand a word of) has ever before been one of them.
Frida Hyvönen the artist I was well aware of through her three English language LPs:

• Until Death Comes (2006)
• Silence Is Wild (2008)
• To The Soul (2012)

In addition to songwriting and singing her principal instrument is piano and this album is no exception. One thing I have discovered is that its title 'Kvinnor och barn' translates as 'Women and children'.

Frida Hyvönen - Kvinnor och barn (4 November 2016).

 The twelve tracks are as follows:

• Sjön
• Imponera på mig
• Balkongmannen
• Förlotat dig
• Alla vet att det är vakert i Paris
• Vänner i vardagen
• Kommer du?
• Drömmer om dig
• Min stad
• Kvinnor och barn
• Fredag morgon
• Amors förkastliga pilar

I have as yet been unable to divine the label by which it is released (on vinyl, CD and d/l) but it is available to stream on Spotify (here in the UK, at least at the time of writing).
Sometimes not understanding the lyrics allows one to appreciate the melody and structure of the music more easily. This was one of those times for me and I very much enjoyed it. It has also reminded me that I really must revisit all the earlier albums. 'Silence Is Wild' tackles some rather unusual subjects in popular music, if I remember correctly.

New Music 2016 - Part 51 - Bel Blue - Our Places

Not very often does this happen. I'm delighted to share it when it does. This is self-released on Wild Dog Rose and all nine tracks are self-written. It is almost entirely acoustic, a smidgen of electric guitar features on two tracks, but more importantly it is astonishingly whole.
This time last week I'd never even heard about Bel Blue or, if I had, I had forgotten all about it. Hearing three songs from it on Monday evening made me think that the latter scenario is very unlikely indeed.
It was bought to me by the twin powers of local radio and the worldwide access to it via the internet. In this case the distance between Hailsham FM (in Sussex, England) and my location in Frome, Somerset, England is barely 125 miles. The result was I purchased the LP there and then - on that slightly old-fashioned format that is CD. Royal Mail delivered it to my door today.
Here it is:

Bel Blue - Our Places:

• Longing's Gone
• Our Places
• In Its Time
• Waterfall
• Wild Dog Rose
• River of Dreams
• Somewhere
• Nant Ddu
• Along the Way
• Our Places (live by the River Ely)
• In Its Time (radio edit)

Bel Blue - In Its Time (radio edit, official video).

It is a début album but I suggest that if I had told you otherwise then you might well have left the fact unquestioned. It is also independently released. I'm not, although a few may think otherwise, out to denigrate major labels. They have made a few steps to attempt to rescue their tattered corporate reputation but thus far only a fraction of what might be required, if that is indeed possible.
That is not what really excites me and makes me want to go to certain festivals. This sort of music is exactly the kind that does.

My Music in 2015 - Albums - Part 1

So, with December 2015 almost upon us, it is time to kick off the season-of-lists. I'm not really convinced how important this all is despite the fact that so many of us take part in it. My rather simple reason is that it helps me take stock of the year and also that I rather enjoy putting the effort into doing the same.
I was going to keep this back for the start of December but since it was essentially complete I thought that I would share it now.

There are no systemic changes from last year. The acts in each list are grouped in alphabetical order and the number of entries in each list is ten. There is no attempt to 'rank' acts in each list, or indeed between lists (there will be at least three such lists of LPs). One thing that has changed not a jot is the influence that music I have seen live during 2015 or previously has had on the overall outcome but then perhaps remarkably there are actually four in this list that I have never seen live. Needless to say all those are very much in my sights in 2016.

• Danni Nicholls - Mockingbird Lane
• Don Gallardo - Hickory
• Flo Morrissey - Tomorrow Will Be Beautiful
• Free the Honey - Fine Bloom
• Gwenno - Y Dydd Olaf
• Hattie Briggs - Red & Gold
• The Honeycutters - Me Oh My
• Jason Isbell - Something More Than Free
• Lindi Ortega - Faded Gloryville
• Marika Hackman - We Slept At Last

I am happy if people would like to make comments and suggestions. I will be equally so if this leads anyone to find music of which they were previously either unaware of had forgotten about. If it tempts you to head out and see some live music then that is a real bonus. It is also, truth be told, quite simply the music that I really liked.
Here are the photos that I promised - one each of four artists that I took at four different festivals this summer.

Don Gallardo and Friends - Saloon stage,  Truck Festival - 18 July 2015.

Flo Morrissey (solo) - The Den stage, Cambridge Folk Festival - 2 August 2015.

Gwenno - Far Out stage, Green Man Festival - 20 August 2015.

Marika Hackman - Garden stage, End of The Road Festival - 6 September 2015.

It is fair to say that Jason Isbell comes very close to the top of the list of artists that I wish to see live in 2016. If the recorded music is not reason enough then this is why.

If you wish to look further into the music of 2015 that is in my mind then, following on from these and as I promised, here is Tracks of 2015 #3.
The second selection of LPs will likely be preceded by a selection of EPs and mini-albums sometime later this week.

New Music 2015 - Part 79 - Lanterns On The Lake - Beings

Once upon a time, not so very long ago, the release of new studio LPs in the two months before Christmas was something of a rarity. That is not so much the case now and for a variety of reasons.

A band that I have followed, both live and recorded as well as with mentions in these scribblings, for almost as long as I can remember is Lanterns On The Lake. Hailing from Northumberland, Lanterns On The Lake comprises Hazel Wilde, Paul Gregory, Oliver Ketteringham and Bob Allan.

Beings - Lanterns On The Lake. Released  13 November Bella Union (UK) and PIAS (N. America).

The second and latest single taken from it is 'Through The Cellar Door'. Theirs has never been music to party to and probably never will be. It is perfect to share with a small group of friends and then remember that some of the best in things in life are the simplest and least extravagant. That approach, as beautiful as it is, doesn't square with the cult of ruthless self-promotion that the top-end music industry regards as normal.


It is certainly none the worse for that.

New Music 2015 - Part 47 - Don Gallardo - Hickory

I can't promise that he is appearing here but unless I'm wrong he will be one of the artists at Truck Festival that I most look forward to seeing live.  This is the follow-up to 2012 LP 'Art of Troublesome Times'.

It was released in the UK by Clubhouse Records today.

It has its roots in Americana and indeed country but it spreads its wings rather more than that simplistic diagnosis might imply. I can see that having listened to it right through several times already, I'll be doing that plenty more over the coming weeks. I can honestly say that there isn't a track that I dislike on this - that there are keyboards and brass on some songs only shows evidence of a deft touch at work and are only there for the benefit that they bring at any particular moment.
As an interesting comparison I have also been listening to another album released today (in the UK by Sub Pop Records) and that is 'Carnation' and the latest release by Daughn Gibson; I have chosen to link the label's artist notes here quite deliberately. I haven't listened to the album or indeed his earlier ones enough as yet to venture more than to say that I rather like that which I have heard. There may well be more from me on this subject before too long.

'P' stands for Paddy, I suppose...

Given that it is St. Partrick' Day, and only yesterday I decided to return to the subject of live LPs...
Ireland has for centuries, and still continues to be a treasure chest of music of all sorts. I like a great deal of it too. I could certainly name a few (famous) exceptions but to do so would, however, go against one of the very earliest policy statements I made when starting this blog.
This was actually not something I forethought, even yesterday, but if you don't believe me then it really doesn't matter to me or alter the idea here.
If I listened to one band's recordings more often in the late 1980s than those of Thin Lizzy I don't know what it was. If you wish to condense as much of it as possible into just an hour-and-a-half then 'Live and Dangerous' is that which you need. It was recorded over a period of time and at different venues and there are rumours of over dubbing.
Do not worry yourself about any of that for now - just take it as it comes and let it wash over you. In one sense it doesn't matter how it was imagined and then realised given the technology of 1978. It is astonishing even thirty-seven years later because, played loud on decent speakers, and not through even reasonable earphones, it feels real. That is the best that a live recording can hope to do, howsoever it was recorded and mixed. It was and it remains one of the true classics of its kind. In this case P stands for Philip, without a shadow of a doubt.

My 'P' initial does indeed stand for Patrick so, from the more traditional side of Irish music, comes my favourite version of 'P Stands For Paddy I suppose'. It is taken from the 1974 Planxty LP, 'Cold Blow and the Rainy Night', which I also have on original vinyl.

For your convenience here is a link to that version of this classic; also listen to the lyric about what W. stands for.

Of course there is so much more where that came from and this is without mentioning the Irish influence on American music or vice-versa.

Kelly Richey - Live at The Thirsty Ear --- one of the best live recordings I have.

Anyone except newbies here, and you are indeed most welcome to my curious world, will probably realise that I like much music, new and not-so-new, live music and especially music on physical formats, including vinyl. You may also notice that I'm certainly not averse to availing myself of legal on-line sources, especially for increasing my exposure to and therefore knowledge of, new music. I have indeed mentioned that I have been using Spotify to just that end for some months now.
Whilst doing this over the last few days, primarily thinking about artists at festivals that I am attending this summer, it has come to my attention that such sources do not find all things, even some recent ones. 
Then it is time to dig deeper, sometimes digitally or alternatively into my collection of physical recordings. This is a good example of a live CD that, although less than a decade old is not that easy to track down though if you can it is not actually particularly expensive. It is also one of the very finest live albums I have. Kelly Richey - Live at The Thirsty Ear (Columbus, OH, recorded 2006, released 2007).

I have no real expectation to see Kelly Richey live. She rarely tours outside the US and then only fitfully and in a fairly limited geographic range. LPs are distributed on her own label, Sweet Lucy Records. This live set consists of only eight tracks:

• Tears Like Rain
• Red House (Jimi Hendrix)
• I Don't Feel So Good
• The Longest Road
• Nobody's Fault (Nina Simone)
• Hey Joe (Billy Roberts)
• Is There Any Reason
• Crossroads (Robert Johnson)

That might seem short change, indeed four of them are covers, but it really isn't so. The covers are quite something but then so are the originals and it isn't a short CD either - only the third and fourth tracks are less than nine minutes long. Much guitar is indeed shredded, but not at the expense of the overall mood and the more reflective aspects in particular. 

I have several of her studio LPs, which are easier to source, of them  Sweet Spirit (2013) is the most recent and at least in my view slightly underwhelming. Taken in counterpoint to the live album that is perhaps not surprising. If I might recommend another studio album to try in particularly because it is stronger and more plangent, even political, than Sweet Spirit that would be Carry The Light (2008). It is easy to source physically (CD) and also available to stream on Spotify and elsewhere.

A pressing problem. The Times They Are a-Changin'

I have never made any secret of my love for the archaic music format that is vinyl even when extinction, in the sense of new releases, looked inevitable. An obituary after the towel was thrown in, maybe.
I certainly never expected to write a post including an apologia like this.

Even before it got to this point, with almost no investment made in new capacity and equipment, the strain that was being placed on the remaining presses of which many are forty years old would prove to be a limiting factor.  Just keeping them running at all, but now almost flat-out, was causing issues all of its own. Spare parts were a physical one but so too is the knowledge of how to maintain and repair such equipment in an efficient manner. The rate of change is quite astonishing as this article, written about the problems facing the industry shows. It was written late last year and first appeared in The Wall Street Journal. It was probably behind the curve even then...

Independent label Fat Possum Records had already taken a big decision... to enter the manufacturing market by establishing its own pressing plant, as Memphis Record Pressing, in Bartlett, TN.  To do this it sought and purchased redundant presses and then found ways and means to restore them to full working order. It wasn't easy.
To write off the CD, as this article conjectures, looks like a mistake to me. Many of us have have about a quarter of a century of music stored on nothing else and I can't see us giving up that aspect of nostalgia either. What is more is that CDs are (now) cheap, light, transportable, ubiquitous and often surprisingly robust. That is not to mention the home-recordable aspect that was lacking, at least in readily affordable terms, for the first twenty years of their existence.
This is as true now as it was then:

• The Times They are a-Changin'

It was released by Bob Dylan fifty-one years ago today and only on vinyl (monophonic and stereophonic).

New Music - 2015 - Part 6 - Salwa Azar - Black Feather Wooden Chair

I shall maintain the acoustic theme of my last post with LP 'Black Feather Wooden Chair', which is the début full-length from London-based Salwa Azar on which she writes, sings and plays ukulele for the most part.

 Release date: 15 January 2015

Quite a long time ago I mentioned her  'For America EP1', which is available to stream here and will give you an idea of her background. The first track to be released from the album is 'Clouds'.

New Music 2014 - Part 41 - French For Rabbits - Spirits

It is one of those late autumn days where it is raining outside and the best bet, if one is able to do that, is to stay in and try to keep it all at bay. Thus I find myself in front of the fire, with a bowl of home-made leek and potato soup, listening to this LP. It is just about perfect for days such as this and I'm a sucker for this kind of dream-pop anyway. Where they come from it is, however, spring.

Spirits is the début LP by New Zealand duo French For Rabbits. I don't know enough about music from New Zealand, nevertheless that which I do find I tend to like. This next might be a myth but I don't want it spoiled now, thank-you: the band-name apparently came during a discussion as to whether lapins, presumably a possible band name, was indeed the French word for rabbits.
'French For Rabbits' was, in any case, a far better choice.
Originally from Christchurch, but relocated to Wellington, the duo of (nominatively-determined) Brooke Singer on voice and keyboards and John Fitzgerald on guitar do a fine job of evoking the subtle wisps of autumn that try to sneak in wherever there is a chink in the defences. I believe that Brooke is also the principal songwriter too.
The album is very much a thing to be listened to in toto. I purchased it as a download but it will soon be released on vinyl too. I'm now more than tempted to upgrade to real.
See what you think. Have a listen:

New Music 2014 - Part 29 - Lily & Madeleine - Fumes

It is rare that I write two posts in one day and rarer still that I try and write two concurrently but needs must. You could invoke the 'First Aid Kit' factor here, and that would be quite reasonable. Again two sisters, Lily and Madeleine Jurkiewicz, but this time from Indianapolis.
The comparisons are interesting - both were spotted and signed by small independent labels, in the case of Lily & Madeleine that is Asthmatic Kitty Records, and seemingly the work ethic comes with that too. They are playing at End Of The Road 2014 on Saturday and needless to say are on my must-see list (of which more soon).

This is in anticipation of the release of their second LP 'Fumes ' on 27 October in the UK. It is worth mentioning that the first, the eponymous 'Lily & Madeleine' was released only last year, 26 October, and was preceded by EP 'Weight of The Globe' just a very few months earlier. This ambition is indeed part of their mission - to release three LPs in three years.

Cyclical thoughts on music

This post started with a comment I wrote on Facebook yesterday. That was itself born out of a question somebody asked me the day before and, therefore, put me in mind of something that I had half-remembered a few months ago. In some ways it has to do with the forthcoming Record Store Day 2014 (19 April) [RSD] too:

I've just been exploring the dark (often only metaphorically but sometimes also musically), dusty depths of my music collection. I have found plenty of dead woodlice and even more albums that I had forgotten that I owned. This is good - the albums that is, not so much the moribund crustaceans.
To tell the truth a few of the albums would have better remained forgotten in the sense that ignorance (or merely forgetfulness) is bliss and I shall not dwell on them. Libraries should not work on that principle. 
Some of the LPs I was truly glad to discover again; 'Songs About People I Know', Stricken City's 2009 début album, was just one. The small dead spider stuck to the playing face of the CD was easily removed. It really shouldn't have gone there anyway. It did make me wonder, when listening to the CD after its removal, what has happened since the band split in 2010...
That is also how new things are found.

Whilst I am thinking about the direction this theme is heading, be aware that the direction of music was never very predictable when observed in retrospect. With RSD fast approaching, consider this article - 1o UK independent record shops to visit before you die. Of course I was going to mention this; one of the ten, Raves From The Grave, has its original store in my home town of Frome. It has more recently opened stores in Warminster and Bath too.
To be quite honest I got bogged down with this post for a couple of days but, just now that problem evaporated when I remembered about this. It also reminded me about just why the small stages at festivals, as well as support bands in general, are always at the top of my list of things to see. This is Oklahoma City based band Horse Thief playing End of The Road Festival 2012; Cameron Neal on guitar and vocals.

The début album, Fear In Bliss, is released today by Bella Union and Horse Thief is booked to play at End of The Road Festival 2014.
   

It is, of course, available on vinyl.

Record Store Day 2014 - old favourites

I thought I'd go back to the future with my thoughts on the forthcoming Record Store Day 2014. What are your thoughts, perhaps from RSD past, and what you would like to see in 2014?
To take it all back a step, what are the possibly unusual records from years ago that you own and treasure? There is no need for these to be rare or valuable... I own 5 copies of Thin Lizzy's - Black Rose (A Rock Legend) on vinyl but the one I am listening to right now is Vertigo 60 63 169. It sounds just the same as any other but is, in fact, the original Spanish release (1979).
To own a few curiosities, even if they have no particular pecuniary value, is appealing for some of us.
Rather soon after I went away to university, in the autumn of 1983, I was exposed to much new music some of which I liked and some not. Some of both still always reminds me of that time. Another factor is that time more or less coincided with the renaissance of Radio Caroline. As I was in North Kent and MV Ross Revenge was not that far away the station was almost receivable with the radio turned off! 
It also had, and still does, the tendency to play albums. It is arguably, along with my decision to go to festivals from 2007, one of the defining moments of my music-listening life. I credit it with, amongst others some of which I did not appreciate at the time, introducing me to the work of Bob Dylan.

I don't recall this album from that time, maybe it was deemed old even then, but I doubt that was the reason as I certainly remember the station playing Free, which was again largely new to me but just as old.
I actually have some rather strange memory-evidence for this assertion. Another artist that Radio Caroline introduced me to was Jimi Hendrix and while I well remember hearing his version of 'All Along The Watchtower' back then it was probably twenty-five years before I actually realized that it was a Dylan cover, from the aforementioned album of course. How naïve was I?
You could reasonably pin a great deal of my musical taste on that which I heard in my time at University. I still hate Phil Collins' music, for example.

This is becoming rather more "Thoughts On Music" than I planned (because I didn't actually do any planning for this post) but I'm rather enjoying it. None of this endeavour was planned anyway, and I did say that in the event that I reached 100 posts I would retire.
I'm sorry. I changed my mind: this is the 838th.

The EP and me.

Around about six years ago I had a problem concerning music.
I had started blogging about six months previously, and discovered that liked doing so, but now I had a shortage of new material.
This was soon to presage my conversion to festivals, but I didn't yet countenance it at this time; that would take another three months or so. It did however turn my mind towards looking for new music beyond that which could be heard on the mainstream radio or learned about in the traditional music press.
What this means is that, for me at least, music changed forever. Way back then I thought that the EP - in any format - was a thing of the past although I had a few from back in the day.  That was only one thing that I was totally wrong about!
If I were to put all the (physical) EPs that I have accumulated since then in a pile it would be quite impressive. I shall continue by mentioning a few more that have very recently come to my attention...
The first is very recent and, as far as I am aware, currently only available as a download. It is from an act that, while dividing its time between widely spaced parts of our island, pulled this out of the bag.

It is their début release and I owe it to For Folk's Sake for bringing it to my attention and needless to say there is plenty more great stuff on show there.

The next one is very real, in a CD sense, and it arrived this week. I have mentioned this EP and the artist Pip Mountjoy before. This is the follow-up to the 2012 Lousiana EP. I have, more than anything, Deer Shed Festival to thank for letting me find out about this artist.

Still unsigned, I believe, but for how much longer? Certainly BBC Introducing have her locked on the radar and she's playing at venues and supporting better known artists as each month passes.
This next artist I have to thank Folkroom Records for bringing to my attention, courtesy of their first compilation.
Salwa Azar works a line surprising, and works it very well indeed. This EP is also download only and, oh my goodness, is it worth it.

It also provides a pivot on which to turn to a new album, but not her own although she has mentioned a forthcoming Kickstarter project, that has caught my attention very recently. In fact an artist that became known to me via another valuable resource for discovery - Amazing Radio.

Here is a taste of that; 'Between Destinations' is the first single from album 'The Story Of Me'. This is the début album by Laurence Made Me Cry aka Jo Whitby. It is available now as digipack cd here or widely on mp3 from the usual sources.
  

Music from the past - discovered (Part 1).

The history of this; it became something of a project that in essence goes back a long time and to 1977, at least for me. This is the first post on that, and it involved this album originally released in 1971:

As I mentioned then, back in early 2012, it had taken me almost thirty-five years to actually track this down. For some reason, in early December 2012, I decided upon a more ambitious project. That was (to attempt to) track down the two albums that preceded 'High Level'. The proviso was threefold:

• it would be done on a tight budget, with no particular time limit therefore
• the albums had to be playable (not mint or wrapped, as I fully intended to play them)
• the albums had to be the original vinyl releases

You might wonder about this, as did I but a little searching it proved what recordings I was actually looking for. Knowing what you are trying to find is always a good place to start.  It turned out to be this trio:

• Northumberland For Ever (1968) - Topic Records 12TS186
• The Lads of Northumbria (1969) - Trailer Records LER 2007
• Keep Your Feet Still Geordie Hinnie (1970) - Trailer Records LER 2020

I was already aware in essence of the first two of the above, which are studio albums, but not the third and that is how it turned out to being a search for three albums. The last was the final one to succumb and also the most expensive although not by much. Keep Your Feet Still Geordie Hinnie is a live album recorded in a single take at Balmbaras, an old-time music-hall pub in Newcastle.

Here are the covers of the three albums that I purchased, as taken by me just now:

  

  

So there you are. The total cost for all three, including all delivery charges, was £33.71.  In Part 2 of this post I shall try and comment on the music and also the history behind some of it, not least that of Balmbaras.

Looking Forwards :: Listening Back

Yes. It is true that I have just had the better part of three weeks away from posting.  That does not however mean that I have lost interest in music or even writing about it.  I have also now gone three whole weeks without seeing any live music! There comes a point where, in order to assimilate that which I have seen and heard in the last few months of new music, both live and recorded, I have to pause :: rewind.  I need to listen to it again, when I can, think about it, read other people's thoughts (something that the internet has totally revolutionized) before I can establish some kind of personal equilibrium with it.

This is important for several reasons.  Like it or not the end of the year is approaching and with it come those "Best of" lists which, to be honest, I love thinking about (my own) and reading (those of others) and also, of course, what to expect in 2013!
There are of course many albums/artists that I have wanted to listen to but have failed to do so for one reason or another. A few of the most obvious ones that I have come to notice in the last fortnight are however currently winging their way to me in time for possible inclusion and one of them falls in a category that I'm not going to include in such a list, because my selection is going to cover the period from 2010 onwards, the renaissance of which I'm detecting and a genre of recording that I'm delighted to see coming to attention again. The proper 'essentially single concert' live LP (with minimal editing and over-dubs). This conveniently has some cross-over both with my own "Best Of" lists and also new music that I am anticipating the arrival of in 2013.

While writing this it is all too much like complicated to listen to new music. I have instead been listening to a slice of wax released forty-two years ago this month in the UK as CBS S64087 ---  Abraxas - Santana. It contains another recently discussed topic, that being an example of a cover version that widely becomes assumed to be the original. This is something that I have been guilty of on many occasions but not, as it happens, this one: Peter Green's 'Black Magic Woman' (1968) is the case in point here. 

Very early on in this adventure, in 2006, I mentioned that I had no particular wish to review things that I don't much like, especially to the extent of acquiring them for that purpose. I have, however, just succumbed to something rather akin to the opposite - buying an album by an act that I saw live this summer (and have mentioned in a post here) because of the negative review that it was given in The Guardian a fortnight ago today... Either things went very pear-shaped on the album or the review was harsh --- I shall let you know my verdict in due course. (That is enough information to work out the identity, if you want to try!)