Well, it’s pissed down for 24/24, the farmers fields are a quagmire, the main stage is “broken” and out of use/bounds. Yup, the british festival season is upon us, after a two year fallow period. Along with the rest of the near-zombie army of the pensionable, drawn inexorably to sticky mud, “interesting” toilets and last minute timetabling substitutions, I have pitched my tent, so you don’t have to. More to follow………..

Prompted by Moose’s Jaco Post-orious (o, my sides!) , it set me a wondering. I confess bass solos are seldom my bag, especially if everyone else stops playing or goes for a pee. But there are instances of where bass plays to the front and is delightful. Here are a couple of my favourites. First the bass in the studio of Song For Europe is exquisite, at 3.23, John Gustafson, I believe. (A live version is pretty tidy too, by Sal Maida, on a boot I have.)

Jingsaroonie, knowing Ms Gilmore a popular artist, this has taken me aback somewhat. No overt mention of Mr Stonier, but doesn’t sound good…….

https://www.folkradio.co.uk/2021/07/video-album-afterlight-thea-gilmore/?fbclid=IwAR3mgh3CUK5YS26eCHHKN3IOYNAEg_wItDdNXashEpGzfxpHYHj5hvbt7S8

Old chum Fraser has good news about the reclusive singer, beloved of all on this site.

https://www.loudersound.com/news/new-gerry-rafferty-album-to-be-released-a-decade-on-from-his-death?fbclid=IwAR3bSExmCAxZbSn9tpUHF8mCqBbbtPVnim7cR1qShL_yXLF5YIdsjHb46tIDr

At last you allow some recognition for your writing, too! (Disclaimer: I found this on the Graun, which has put up some readers additions to their best of the year so far list. All submitted by grimy kneed whippersnappers under 60 too, unless the last one, age of the suggester unmentioned, which sounds the most interesting of the lot…….)

https://www.theguardian.com/music/2021/jun/22/readers-albums-of-2021-so-far

Half way mark, and is this the best they can come up with? I have access, let’s say, to many of these, and it is an uninspiring shower. Ok, I have yet to listen to Cave/Ellis and the Kemerovo boys, but feel I have enough by each already. Am I wrong? I have found the year no better or worse than usual, but it is mainly folk that is plotting any interesting new directions. I may suggest a few in due course, but what do people think of the woke inevitables here?

https://www.theguardian.com/music/2021/jun/14/the-best-albums-of-2021?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

Sometimes, just sometimes, a bit of melancholia is all that will hit the spot. (OK, then, quite often.) I have always felt a good dirge enough to raise any flagging spirits.What is your go to low key misericord? I heard this for the first time a couple of days ago and I am smitten with it, it worming through my higher centres incessantly.

…. I don’t see why you shouldn’t.

Pleased to see an expansive array of organisations in receipt of funds and/or loans and grants. Amongst all the theatres and venues, I note a lot of lighting, sound and rigging companies seem to have been included. Uncertain if inclusive but one for @davebigpicture or @fentonsteve to give their opinions around. Glastonbury gets 900k but another 100k goes to Cropredy and Towersey Folk, left out last time, has this time been rewarded. Loads of decent small band venues too, as well as 1.5mill (!!) to the Roundhouse.

A few months ago I put up an appeal for any of our musicians out there to do me a cover version of a particular song, with Twang coming up trumps, as in the vid included here. This time I am looking for a version of “Lies”, a Rolling Stones standard issue boogie from “Some Girls”. So any bedroom gurners or garage studio whizzes out there willing to fulfil the challenge? Please. Happy just for a file, I can do a rudimentary youtube if needs be, but @Twang rose effortlessly to that challenge too. Polish up your battered acoustic, your analog synths or even, thinking of no-one in particular, your best acapella.

OK, this is to all the budding superstars out there, and i know there are a few, as well as some bona fide ones as well. As some may know, I have a bit of a pash for cover versions, collecting them and writing about them, over on https://www.covermesongs.com/author/seurasog1. Well, rather than this being any self-promotion, I need a favour. I have been struggling with an all-covers of Armed Forces for six months now, mainly as there is nowhere a cover of the above track. Or, shall we say, a decent one: Erich Sellheim, a german Costello fan seems to have done translated into german covers of nearly every Costello song, and I have already used him, if reluctantly, for another song on the album. So, here’s the deal, and I don’t care what the style or genre is, electronica, rockabilly, prog or acoustic, reggae or drenched in pedal steel, let me have a file. DM me, or, for the brave, post a link here. I can’t guarantee any cash, but be assures of kudos aplenty. Or, at least, my thanks. I will then tunes to tube it and make you able to bask in your own glory. Please? Or » Continue Reading.

More first world problems….. I have a Sonos system of 3 linked speakers in different room. They are brilliant for spotify and used to be brilliant for my own library, which resides on i-tunes (I know) on my MacBook. 60k tracks. Earlier issues I had were, I thought, down to my old 2012 dying MacBook, but, since up getting a new one this year I cannot play from my own library thru’ the speakers: it says my library is too big…… Reading around the issue it seems that Sonos cunningly make no mention of their limited capacity at time of purchase and consider people with that size of personal collection to be niche and of lesser concern than the streamers, who make the bulk of their market. My 60k means, again apparently, that either my tags are too big(?!) or that my wife buying me a smaller 3rd sonos speaker for the kitchen, a couple of years back, has stymied me. (The 65k may be smaller with smaller units, the trio then subject to the smallest component….) Solutions? So far they seem to be use Plex, whatever that is. How? And would it help? Or to transfer my i-tunes to » Continue Reading.

Seemingly not. Mojo has had to delay due to border issues with their cover disc, made in Germany. (Uncut seemed to manage, I note.) R2R should be fine as they use Scots firm Birnam.

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2021/jan/16/brexit-delays-mojo-magazine-as-cover-cds-remain-stranded-in-eu?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

Now we are a posh grown up forum of adults, rather than a sniggering and juvenile blog, tempered by the talk about rationing the izal for guests, I have been wondering what you’d all call it, in your house, when you have ‘been’. Is it a number two, have you paid your respects, have you been excused properly or, as the wife’s mother puts it, done a dirty today?

https://youtu.be/aqm0MZP4Xbo

Anyone keeping up with these, liveinthestudio fun from Ms Williams, 4 so far, 2 more to come, each 45 minute sets, with her band, tackling a different theme. So far it has been a tribute to Tom Petty, a set of Dylan songs, some southern soul encompassing Ann Peebles thru’ to Joe South and, just out, some 60’s country weepies. She and the band sound relaxed, and, sure, her voice is wracked but not as wrecked as it can be. Recommended, at $10 a shot, more for hard copy.

It’s bin a long time, bin a long time etc etc, as I sit here, in my cups, headphones on. Soooo…. Random on the comp. Let’s have your infiltered five.

1.The Wind Cries Mary/Cassandra Wilson/Crossing Jordan OST (languid jazzy Hendrix) 2.No Figas/Flor de Toloache/Indestructible (Jings, that’s good, an iberian version of Don’t Speak.) 3. Road Trip/Brad Senne/Aerial Views (Country’n’dreamy) 4. Keep Yourself Warm/Ben Gibbard/Tiny Changes:a celebration of Frightened Rabbit’s The Midnight Organ Fight (“It Takes More Than Fuckin’ Someone To Keep You Warm”……. ouch) 5.Forging/Xylouris White/Black Peak (Indie goes greek)

Paste’s turn now, with a schizophrenic mix of cuddly AW favourites, weird left field stuff, arcane US pop acts and unknown UK collectives. Some unusual bedfellows but the best list yet.

https://www.pastemagazine.com/music/best-albums/best-albums-of-2020/?utm_source=PMNTNL&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=201130#19-u-s-girls-heavy-light

Absolutely stunning. Feels creepily like an epitaph.

My email feeds are full of shows for next year and I confess to be on the cusp of thinking about a time when gigs return to normal. So I clicked on the Damned, with the original Vanian/James/Sensible/Scabies line up reforming for shows next summer. Now I know the biz is in a right old state at the mo, as income has all but dried up, bands, venues, promoters, roadies, crew etc etc, but 75 quid to stand in the shitty O2 Academy? Think I’ll pass. Is this indicative of pricing for the future, or is it based on distancing still being a thing? Which, without fixed seating might be, um, optimistic.

Intrigued by the list of festivals given a bung by the exchequer. By and large it seems to include those I go to: Cambridge, Shrewsbury, Cropredy and even Bearded Theory have all had some assistance, with only , of those recently frequented, Towersey missing out. Could it be that Sunak compiled his list from this site. “If retropath2 has done more than a single nights out review, kerching!”

A week ago, both Jed and Ward, on Ireland’s Late Late Show. Coulda been worse. (Coulda been better, but, hey….)

Alerted by @beany ‘s post on FB, I learn that C.P.Lee, esteemed Dylanogist and front man of Alberto Y Los Trios Paranoias has left us. I was lucky enough to be in London when Snuff was at the Royal Court Theatre in Sloane Square, getting a ticket as a gift for a chum using my room for a spell. I also caught the Albertos a number of times as a support act and at Reading 75.

Jings, I just can’t stop listening to this. Yes, that nice Ross Wilson, aka BRC, has just released his latest, ‘With Healings of the Deepest Kind’, and it is a cracker. Thanks again to @Tiggerlion for introducing me to this fella, a couple of years back. Once more it is his lilting merge of Van M and J Martyn that underwrites the vocals, with, now, if anything even more added Van via the exquisite playing of his band, culled from the pool of Scotland’s all-genre finest, playing like an even better Caledonia Soul Orchestra. Senaid Aitken, at home in folk, classical and jazz, is, effectively bandleader, her violin an exquisite frame for the music, both as a sole instrument or, more often, leading the string quartet. None of yer mantovani massed strings, the separate players weave in and out of the whole, giving a tapestry of beauty. And Scotlands finest trumpet player, Colin Steele, plays like a giant: his solo on this track is up there with Miles’s in Scritti’s O Patti for inducing a goosebumpy shiver. The whole album is good, give or take a couple of up tempos for tracks 2 and 3, which » Continue Reading.

I know there are fans of the Penistone Piaf here, and I discover she has been gainfully occupied during lockdown, making the now time honoured folkie covers ye olde charts album. Dusty in here, innit….