Uwinds like a hot afternoon on the porch with a pitcher of something potent shared between friends.
Friday, October 23, 2026
200 Albums for 2026 It Starts With a Birthstone # 65 Jenny Gillespie Morton - In The Saftey Of The Light
So many album like these come out on a regular basis these days. Albums made by willowy artists in flowing dresses summoning back the golden age of Folk.
A Song(s) of the Day # 4,549 Michael Kiwanuka
Michael Kiwanuka's latest album Fudge is immediately a sunlit meadow and a great way for the weekend to begin. Soul flecked utopian semiments and melodies. I'v never really found a Kiwanuka' album to wallow in.
i'm doing just this as four closes in upon five .. It's a record that sends the message that labour is done and its time to restore .Fudge is staggering mellowness.
Thursday, October 22, 2026
Important Gigs in My Life # 1 The Thompson Twins & Tears For Fears - November 2nd 1982
Another day, another series. I plan twenty of these and haven't made my list yet. Just a set of evenings and experiences that stick out in my mind for one reason or other. Starting with this, my very first gig, and ample evidence that this is not some late bid for credibility. I was seventeen when I went, a late developer emerging from a spotty undistinguished teenage phase, looking for ways of constructing a self.
Hammersmith was a bus ride away from my family home in South West London. Still my favourite part of that city. Even now, I dream about being on that and other local bus routes. I went to this on my own. Not ready for a girlfriend to share a particular teenage rites of passage with at this moment. Thompson Twins and Tears For Fears were both set to embark on what turned out to be sustained assaults on the British and global pop charts which would bear decidedly mixed fruit though we were none of us to know that at the time. The pop world, particularly in Britain was about to change, reflecting the times. Undoubtedly for the worse. I'll brook no arguments with that
Tears For Fears first. I had quite a bit of time for them at round about that point. Their debut album The Hurting was out and I'd bought it. All exaggerated teenage mannerisms and psychodramas but I was a bit like that at that moment and still have the diaries to prove it. Late developer as I said.
I'm listening to it now. I'd maintain it's a reasonable record but that may be my teenage self confusing me. Still, some fine melodies, magpie thievery and the title track, Mad World and Pale Shelter, some opening salvo. The singles are generally the ones that stand the test of time best. I stood a few rows back from the stage in my John Lennon specs and curly mop of hair, probably swaying slightly. Lost in irredeemably teenage thought.
The record overcomes me now eventually in terms of it's non-stop angsty projections, particularly when the pace drops. Some tracks actively repel me. I no longer have a Holden Caulfield fixation. They had tunes but little depth. Still, they were right for me at the time. I enjoyed them and they were probably one of the best support bands I've ever seen, all these years later.
Now, after a tea break to come down from Orzabal and Smith's emotional contortions I'm back to reflect on Thompson Twins. They had just made one of the most remarkable transitions in all of pop history. From a seven piece, Talking Heads fixated political seven piece to a mop haired trio of almost cartoon-ish quality, probably better suited to their name, derived from the moustachioed detectives in Tintin
I was unaware of the complete nature of the band's metamorphosis when I bought the ticket for this. I think I would probably have preferred to witness their earlier incarnation. Listening to the record this gig presaged, their breakthrough album Quick Step & Side Kick now is frankly a much more harrowing experience than getting through The Hurting, which is at least supposed to be distressing. The pop version of the Thompson Twins were one of the most conspicuous attendees of the garish pop party of the early Eighties. Duran Duran and Nik Kershaw were also there along with numerous other fortunately mostly forgotten arriviste ghouls. It was an unedifying spectacle. As for Quick Step & Side Kick, it was at the time and is still a deeply vacuous and frankly upsetting listening experience. I'm not a snob. At least not completely. There is always space for pop records that don't appeal to Velvet Underground fans like me. Some of them are just fabulous. But this is an affront. Listen to it yourself if you don't believe me. On second thoughts don't. I wouldn't wish it on anyone.
I think I enjoyed them well enough. The sound was certainly impressive for a trio. Then they put down their instruments and started dancing around the stage. The music continued. It was an early lesson for me, both about the nature of the music business and about life itself. Thompson Twins and I pretty much parted company when I left the venue. Tears For Fears and I a couple of
years down the line when I heard the singles from their world conquering second album Songs From the Big Chair and they left me utterly cold. Still, for better or worse, these two were my first. Oh good, I can take Quick Step & Side Kick off now. The things I do for this blog...
200 Albums for 2026 It Starts With a Birthstone # 66 TV Buddha - Hallelujah Anyway
Cometh the hour, cometh the sound and the scene. Chicago's TV Buddha's debut album Hallelujah Anyway is unhinged on any number of levels but rather loveable. Garage Nuggets if you're looking for a peg to hang this on. Beach Boys meet 13th Floor Elevators down by the corner. Post Pandemic Pop of the kind that young Chicagoans like National Photo Committee Horsegirl, Sharp Pins are highly conversant in.these days. Urgency, abandon and slightly tone deaf joy. This is loads of fun ! Playing New York next March. Be ahead of the herd.
Coveted # 25 Badly Drawn Boy - The Hour Of Bewilderbeast
I find myself coveting albums I never imagined myself coveting. And in vinyl form. The act of ownership is something we couldn't really explain to ourselves or anyone else. I'm long past the point of buying records because the NME tells me to. Or because I feel the need to impress anybody. This just strikes me as very good. Something I had no real realisation of when it came out. I wasn't really interested.
The Hour Of Bewilderbeast seems easier to place within a context now to me than it did when it came out in 1999. Things seemed to be slowing down in the UK after Brit Pop and the great, slightly depressive and mordant slabs of OK Computer, Urban Hymns and Mezzanine.
This was a smalller statement. Homier. A Baby Bird with a stab at the Mercury Prize which it won in 2000.. Something to buy alongside Travis, Belle & Sebastian and Elbow. Now it feels significant and bold and slightly poetic. Damon Gough. An Elliott Smith who would stay the course.
500 Greatest Albums of the 2000's # 24 The Killers - Hot Fuss
You see it quite often in Rock & Roll. Quite a lot in life. John The Baptist and Jesus Christ. Two thousand years down the line Television and The Cars. Echo & The Bunnymen and U2. Orange Juice and Haircut 100. Pixies and Nirvana. The Strokes and The Killers.
It's how the record companies and the music business works but its how bands work too. Hot Fuss is Hot Stuff. It keeps the executive behind the desk happy and the kids on a first date at the back of the Midwest Arena happy too. You can't fault this. It hits its marks. It rings the cash tills. It's great Pop Muisc.
A Song(s) of the Day # 4,548 Meryl Streek
Stories They Don't Teach You At School where should we start. How about Meryl Streek's latest. A one man rant from Dublin. Twelve songs. Thirty eight minutes. Motormouth mindest . This will more than do for Donnerstag.It's not quite clear what the message is but a great time is had by all !
Wednesday, October 21, 2026
Coveted # 24 Bernard Cribbins - A Combination of Cribbins
Sometimes only Cribbins will do. A mainstay of many British lives. A reminder of the nice stuff. Listening to this and you're at home, school is over and Jackanory is on.
500 Greatest Albums of the 2000's # 24 Boards Of Canada - Geogaddi
What I'm in need of right now I need somewhere to escaps at the end of a work day and I
am coming to the conclusion that there are few better avenues of escape for me than Boards Of Canada . They're like the wardrobe to Narnia with additional servings of Millennial dread and terror.For Edmund's turkish delight, help yourself to infinite wonder. Smart, space.
200 Albums for 2026 It Starts With a Birthstone # 67 Kim Gordon
Kim Gordon's Play Me is a textbook 'how to' guide on growing older on your own terms and thereby staying young. It' came out last week but I'm only just listening to it. A week ahead on Courtney Barnett's latest and a day ahead of the weekend.. I'm rather taken by it.
A Song(s) of the Day # 4,547 Flora Hibberd
Mammoth the latest album from Flora Hibberd is rich fare. A playful Poppy and literate record that dances between the raindrops. It's all rather classy and serene.
* Thanks again Darren Jones for the nudge,
Tuesday, October 20, 2026
Coveted # 23 Trees - On The Shore
Listening to records like these in 2026 genuinely feels like a visitation to a vanished realm .Some of this obscure British Folk stuff which frankly isn't obscure anymore due to the Great Vinyl Collectors Phenoenon of the last decade or so is beyond sensational. Certainly this,
Fairport of course were incredible but you realise if you refine your search that there were actually hundreds of bands like this operating all over Britain and the European heartland at the time. .It feels like it must have been a rather weird and wonderful place. Touched by magic and creative inspiration. .
On The Shore is a staggering record on every level. Its cover alone is breathtaking .Trees second album from 1970 and then they were gone.This is frequently shiver inducing stuff. The band is muscular and brave. You get the sense that a spell is in the process of being cast.
500 Greatest Albums of the 2000's # 25 Bob Dylan - Love & Theft
Bob Dylan started the new millenium with Love & Theft. He sounded like Ezekiel after having over indulged on the communal punch. Plenty of wisdom to be gleaned here mind.
200 Albums for 2026 It Starts With a Birthstone # 68 Bevis Frond - Horrorful Heights
Bevis Frond have become an Indie standby over the last few decades. Something to check your watch by. A speaking clock with lilting power chords and wistfulness Latest album Horrorful Heights which is Nick Faloman and pals 30th or so and counting is more of the same.and no one is likely to complain because he's damned good. Neil Young if he'd hailed from Walthamstow not Winnipeg and been born a bit later.
Song(s) of the Day # 4,546 Fontaines D.C.
Understanding ourselves and the reasons we do the things that we do. The great sturggle and journey of life. Never mind understanding others. We apply modern labels like 'Dopamine' or 'Boundaries' to help us assert control of our thoughts and environment but nothing really changes I suspect. The road we're is the same. Going back to the dawn of time.
I'm at a desk and preparing to start work.. I'm listening to Fontaines D.C.'s latest album Dopamine Chamber.. I've been listenining to it for days and I suspect I'm going t continue doing so. Much anticipated as every record by this band is now. It has plenty of Rock & Roll precedents. When I was sevnteen I was listening to Echo & The Bunnymen, The Doors and Joy Division. If I were seventeen now I woul be listening to Fontaines D.C. They have all the invitation promise and mystery of youth.
It's a fine record and will shift units. There is also top ollar resting on the record though the times have changed. They'ree rolling forward. They have momentum. What's great about Fontaines is that they continue to push the boat out and releaase records that make you want to read interviews to discover what they're listenining to and reading, where they're coming from. Where they're heading next.
Monday, October 19, 2026
Coveted # 22 Stereolab - Cobra And Phases Group Play Voltage In The Milky Night
Sterolab, Broadcast and Tortoie toured together in 1996. Of course I wasn't there. But perhaps I will be. In anothe life. I have a few Stereolab records. But their fabulous packaging process encourages you to rob a bank and become a completist.
500 Greatest Albums of the 2000's # 26 Broadcast - Tender Buttons
With time Broadcast's albums sound more and more significant statements. Swimming against the tide of time..Static Attack .
200 Albums for 2026 It Starts With a Birthstone # 69 deathcrash - Somersaults
deathcrash are a four piece slowcore band from London. Labels such as these seem spurious to me but new album Somersaults reminds me most of all of early Radiohead and the way their early songs could connect through a cultivated though slightly unholy mix sense of disconnect, dread and ennui.
It's a powerful album of skillfully constructed and slightly depressed songs but there's almost a sense that deathcrash are choosing this stance because they enjoy the state and know they are skilled at constructing morose edifices. They certainly are. But 'three years and no heroin'.is a key line. Somersaults is a fine record. but I suspect the next album will be better still.
Song(s) of the Day # 4,545 Angele
I fell in love last night. With Angele's Instinct. Big in Belgium, toasted in The Guardian and appreciated by It Starts With a Birthstone. It's Angele Van Laeken's third album and she switches between French and English on whim looking to break to a global market. I'm a sucker for big emotion and Instinct is just drenched in it. This record plays you like a harp.
Sunday, October 18, 2026
200 Albums for 2026 It Starts With a Birthstone # 70 Rostam - American Stories
The variety and quality of great albums I'm coming upon this year is gathering momentum. Rostam Batmanglij's American Stories is an elliptical record with plenty of the sparkle which its author contributed to Vampire Weekend before his departure and plenty to say to the confused, embattled age we all live in.
It's a warm and mysterious record that cherry picks from the Great American Songbook and draws from the World that America is currently plundering and in some quarters attempting to shut itself away from though of coursee it can't . Records like this may not provide all the answers but they direct you towards the light and a life spent on golden mountain pathways
500 Greatest Albums of the 2000's # 27 Robert Plant & Alison Kraus - Raising Sand
This feels like a listening to reading from the Old Testament if that's your bag. And why shouldn't it be ! the sage statement. Sometimes its worthwhile listening to the seers. The sages. The ones who come down from the mountains carrying tablets of stone.' Walked out of the desert. Been a long time since Rock & Roll...; ? It's even longer now. But nothing in the scheme of things.
A Song(s) of the Day # 4,544 The Avalanches
The Avalanches remind me of being in Katowice, Poland a quarter of a century ago.. Since I Left You, a genuinely significant and innovative album that has become commonplace since. Twenty five years on, I'm still trying to write shopping lists on my smartphone but here am I listening to the Avalanches fourth album No Bad Memories on my laptop. These are slow Avalanches but their albums are certainly worth waiting for worth waiting for. I love it.
It's a record that foregrounds technology. There are a floppy disc and an I Phone classic hand in hand on the album sleeve. All our yesterdays ! The album itself features appearances from the likes of Karen O, Carly Simon and Mike Patton. According to the press release it's about how 'advertising and brand name technology wraps itself around our memories.' . Gulp! It's fun and might take you back if that's what you want.
There's something implicitly nostalgic about the album. But comforting regardless of the deeper intent and message. It revisits childhood jingles and through them reimagines emotions It's inherntly positive and upbeat .Feelgood. Onwards towards the summit !
Saturday, October 17, 2026
500 Greatest Albums of the 2000's # 28 Wilco - A Ghost Is Born
In another lifetime Wilco would have been the band for me I find I can choose pretty much any of their albums. Grab a mug of tea and a slice of cake and just let the record spin. I've known bad tempered people who have been to see Wilco and been unhappy that Jeff Tweedy was rather bad tempered during the concert. This strikes me as slightly rich! The man can do what he wants as far as I'm concerned.
A Ghost Is Born is instilled with holiness and grace.Tweedy takes over the lead guitarists role here as encouraged by Jim O'Rourke the album producer. You can hear the Television in the mix.But there's plenty else besides. I like listening to music by people I sense appreciate poetry
200 Albums for 2026 It Starts With a Birthstone # 71 The Loft - Badges
I've had an emotionally bisy day. Sometimes circumstance dies this to you and you deal with it as best as you can. Still it's early evening now, I've put the day to sleep and I'm listening to The Loft's second album Badges as evening's fading light beckons.
The Loft are an interesting story in themselves. They reformed a couple of years ago after splittung in 1985 under the most dtamatic circumstances imaginable. They modus operandi us simple in essence. Twin guitars. The Byrds, The Velvet Underground, Television late middle age. Reflected wryly on the vicissitudes of live. The curveballs fate throws ys.
It's just short of half an hour of Glory and Beginning to See The Light. A few miles high on cruise control. It stays true to its script. Doesn't fuff a line or miss a beat. Blue Peter badges all round
A Song(s) of the Day # 4,543 Arab Strap
I kind of dig Arab Strap. They come from Falkirk .They're drawn to the darkness. The bleak. The disturbing and uncanny. .They drag me relentlessly back to te Nineties . The vibes and moment of Trainspotting. But they have a voice that endures. Latest album Half-Told Tales (their ninth I think) sticks to the script . It's a minimal, relentless, pulsating record which will make few converts but appeal to admirers.
Friday, October 16, 2026
Coveted # 21 Teenage Fanclub - Grand Prix
Grand Prix was the moment when Teenage Fanclub proved themselves. And ensured they were here for the duration. I played this so many times for so many years on CD. The CD years !!!It makes me feel slightly forlorn for some reason. I may not listen to my CDs much ever again. I suspect I might need Grand Prix on vinyl. It sounds like a vinyl record in the same way as Revolver, Younger Than Yesterday and #1 Record do.
There are plenty of bands with pairs of sonwriters. Go Betweens, XTC, Husker Du. Teenage Fanclub likeThe Beatles have three. There's something about the way Blake, Love and McGinley dovetail on Grand Prix. The way the production, sequencing and sheer quality fall into place. Pole position to chequered flag.
200 Albums for 2026 It Starts With a Birthstone # 72 Teenage Fanclub - Do Not Dare To Dream
'Straight off the door to the factory door...I was looking for something to do.'
Teenage Fanclub are a wheel that just keeps turning. If you buy into what they're doing and have done you'll buy into this. I ido and I do. They're old school in some ways. Do Not Dare To Dream sounds like a record that might have come out in 1972. That's not a slur on any level. It's intended as high praise.
A Song(s) of the Day # 4,542 Steff Chura
Steff Chura has a good pedigree. She's from Detroit, Michigan.Tight band .Neat formula. Three or four minute New New Wave songs that hark back to the sharpest parts of previous decades. Chrissie Hynde, Liz Phair. Steff Chura.
She first made a record because a good friend died and she decided she needed to do so. This strikes me as a good basis for decision making, She's on Saddle Creek Records which also seems a fine idea. Dancing Alone On The Concrete is her third album and her first since 2019.
She exhibits control of the form and how she wants to project it on all of her nine innings here.She has the Art and the Smarts. Peter Buck and Mike Mills contribute and everything shines. Songs of the street. Songs of how broken hearts have a remarkable knack of healing.
500 Greatest Albums of the 2000's # 29 Cat Power - The Greatest
Cat Power to me feels like an artist who understands the times she lives in. The transition between Rock & Roll as a living process and road and Rock & Roll as a curation with a shared awareness of where this all comes from. A museum piece with matching his and her cocoa mugs and egg cups and slippers and Jack Daniels nightcups.
This is not intended as a shot across the bow by any means. The Greatest is pretty... err great. It has a measured sense of time, pace and place. It also has great taste. But you can't actually fault that iin itself n a record I'd suggest.
Thursday, October 15, 2026
Coveted # 20 The Mamas & The Papas - The Mamas & The Papas Deliver
There's an incredible melancholy to almost everything about The Mamas & The Papas . Chreck out their Wikipedia Page. That band was not a bunch of happy campers. But the records are woven gold. They're something that everybody needs.
Deliver was clearly thrown together. The band didn't have a Sgt.Pepper in them in 1967. But they did curate The Monterrey Festival to me a happier idea than Woodstock. Here you get their take on My Girl and it sounds like chiming bells. Creeque Alley. every band worth its salt should write thei memoirs in song. Nothing feels out of place.
500 Greatest Albums of the 2000's # 30 Boards of Canada - The Campfire Headphase
Boards of Canada invariably supply the 'headspace'.. This is their third album and came out in 2005. It features more organic musical instruments and slightly more conventional song structures than they're usually associated with but still is heavy on the 'whirl'. There's a more explicit connection with the traditions of British Pastoral Folk.Plenty of crypticism for those seeking clues and conspiracies but also space.
200 Albums for 2026 It Starts With a Birthstone # 73 Baby Rose - Yearnalism
I like music which takes risks. Baby Rose's third album Yearnalism will do me for today. It's cimematic and soulful and aches. Reminds me of Nina Simone one moment, and having a broken heart the next, It's a beautiful, sensual record that reaches for the stars as all good records should .and makes you feel you're wishing on one.
Coveted # 19 Dion & The Belmonts - Live At The Madison Square Garden Reunion 1972
A John Cooper Clark eulogy to this record in Mojo Brought me here now. It's a glorious historical document. 'The state of the Doo Wop art.' Lou knew it John Copper knows it. Dion DeMucci's first performance with the Belmonts for twelve years.
There's something about the whole record. It feels like a forgotten memory, A whole world of innocence opening up before you on the first day os Spring. A golden meadow. An unknown memory. Those of us who missed the initial years of Rock & Roll and what that must have felt like, can listen to this and wonder.
A Song(s) of the Day # 4,541 Andrew Chalk
As I grow older I find myself more open to the posibilities of Noise unadorned by lyrical concerns. It's it a good way to calm myself before I slip into darkness and easeful sleep.
But it can also prepare you for the coming day. I'm listening now as the sun rises to Andrew Chalk's Mystical Obscurant. Chalk is base din Hull and has been active musically since the mid - Eighties. It's clearly an act of accumulation. Of bearing witness.
Keeping an eye on the tiller. The shoulder to the plough. A hand on the wheel. Choose your own synonym or metaphor . Head towards the distant horizon. Towards the sun. Perhaps there are things behind it. Mystical Obscurant is powerful trance for Thursday in October as the light gathers and collects.
Wednesday, October 14, 2026
200 Albums for 2026 It Starts With a Birthstone # 74 Gun Outfit - Process & Reality
Gun Outfit occuply the same emotional territory as Allah Las, Mazzy Star and The Paisley Underground bands and the likes pf the Doors, Love and Buffalo Springfield. They live on the saddle and their records invite you to join them. Out in the prairie. Under the stars.
Latest album Process & Reality takes it's time and stretches it's spurs on the blanket on the ground. It all feels rather 2026. Rather Wes Anderson on the Range. But I ain't complaining cowboy !
500 Greatest Albums of the 2000's # 31 P.J. Harvey - White Chalk
An artst not 'of the herd'.One who in another lifetime would have written novels or poetry or produced other kinds of artforms.P J Harvey wants to cut deep and inspire others to engage in art. She's consistently inpirational and other worldly..
Song(s) of the Day # 4,540 Elizabeth Cook
Great Television. Surely a contradiction in terms. An oxymoron. A thing to pass the times when there's nothing better to be done. Some love to be made. Some alcohol to be drunk. A real conversation with someone that matters. Building an understanding, fellowship and bond.
Great Television is non coincidentally the latest record from Elizabeth Cook. The kind of album I would never have listened to when I was fifteen. I associated such stuff with Terry Wogan. And although I bought myself a C&W best ofs which round about that time which told me about Tammy and Dolly and George. I beg your pardon I never promised you a Rose Garden. I didn't delve much deeper until the NME told me to pursue the Gram and Big Star trails in the following decade. I was growing up in South West London and never imagined myself in Memphis Tennessee or Tuscon Arizona.
I'm more open to that now. (Don't Go Back To) Rockville was my first true brush with and initiation into this way of thinking and living.Now I'm a little more atuned to where this comes from. The kind of C& W album / Americana record Uncut Magazine quietly has kittens over it. I listen to it now and it passes the time amiably as this kind of record does. A voice that chimes and emotes like a heart that is ready to break but puts the bottle back on the bar and heads for home.
Gigs of the Year # 1 Horsegirl & Nightshift at Mono in Glasgow
A day can be a very long time when you're travelling. Emotionally and physically. As I write I find myself in the famous and rather marvellous Astoria Hotel. A two minute stroll from Copenhagen Central Station in one of the most interesting and certainly thoughtful. cities in the world right now I'd say.. London? You must be joking mate ! Yesterday morning I woke up in a slightly corporate hotel off Sauciehall Street in Glasgow. Sunday was pretty full on and I saw a sensational gig at the end of it. So let's start there.
Sunday I actually woke up in another hotel further down Sauciehall Street. Glasgow's a pretty remarkable place, it's 'steeped' in something intanguble, a set of 'values' and it's nice just to regain consciousness there propped on plump pillows knowing you're not obliged to work and there's a prized event at its close to look forward to. But first you might as well make the best of the hotel you find yourself in.
So I get up yesterday, shower and shave. Go down in the lift. to the lobby. Pay at the reception desk and make my way to the dining area through a warren of darkened and confusing corridors..Dystopic labyrinth. I heap myself a plate of sausages, eggs and mushrooms, pass a table of babbling Chinese students and make my way to an empty table in front of a large screen television.
An orange man in a loud tie, devoid momentarily from his customary large and ridiculous baseball hat is making vacuous pronouncements upon the screen for the Industrial Military Complex which he momentarily acts as frontman for. About the bombs that he or others in his name have dropped on Iran.
A country far far far away, of which he knows nothing. .I hear the expression 'Make Iran Great Again' and am momentarily taken aback. But nothing shocks you for long these days. Dylan's Masters of War comes to mind. I exchange words with a couple of fellow diners who are preparing to wolf down their own breakfasts in a state of numb shock.
All of our mouths are agape which makes it easier to shovel our breakfasts into them I suspect..Horror is served up for breakfast on a regular basis these days. Whenever I make the mistake of watching the news it seems. Then I'm back to my room and I pack my bags. Go down to the lobby once more and call a taxi by pressing a button on the bar. . I'm out in the street and presently the taxi arrives to take me to another hotel further along Sauciehall near Pitt Street. Don't ask !
The chat with the taxi driver as he gets me there is worth the fare in itself. You cannot beat Glasgow people I'm deciding. They are what they are. Reality. The older I get the more I appreciate reality. After a great chat about what makes Glasgow what it is he wishes me a good day in thick but plain brogue and I'm in a corporate lobby with a smart bespectcled lady at the desk. It's all very corporate but she's clearly a human being and a nice one which is a great bonus. .I get a ticket for my luggage which I can redeem and get access to my hotel room by three.
I'm back off out into Sauciehall and it's raining. Not men. And not Casablanca type end of the world global torrents which I've already experienced yesterday afternoon on the way to the hotel when I arrived in 'The Dear Green Place.'. yesterday afternoon I find myself in Watertsone's to avoid another downpour and momentarily I'm in heaven and my heart beats so that I can barely speak.
Sauciehall Street Waterstone's is utterly fabulous. Several floors, Books, Books, books of every dimension and description and ample sofas and cafe areas. You feel like you're off for an extended tour of Mr Wonka's chocolate factory but you won't get far and might learn lots instead.
I grab Luke Haines latest extended moan about the perceived telling of what happened to Rock & Roll and who the Heroes & Villains actually are. Gene Vincent, Jim Morrison, The Fall, The Velvets and Television and aparently he never cared for Blondie much. .I suspect he might not be much of a feminist. Anywhow, reader, I bought it, and will get round to it on It Starts in due time. I bet you can't wait.
I head onwards shrugging off more rain and make my way into The Willow Tree Cafe half way down Buchanan Street. Willow Sreet Cafe has all you need. momentary shelter from the downpours whuch punctuate most days here regardless of the time of year. Attentive Glaswegian waitresses who give as good as they get. Rennie Mackintosh wherever you look. Scottish Rarebit for less than a tenner. A sieve for your China Rose Petal.
I text my Polish friend who I'm remaking a great friendship with after not seeing her for the best part of twenty years. She has been in Poland for a week with her younger daughter. It all sounded heavenly and she was in bliss. Sending photos of everybody down coal mines in fetching yellow helmets. Wining and dining in Katowice where we'd first met and attempted to drink dry on a regular basis. We're both taking things a bit more sensibly and soberly these days.
Now she's at Krakow Airport and feels like crying so she's got herself a beer. I console her with pictures of cake and advise her to plan the next holuday. We resolve to do just that and I head back to Pitt Street to get my room and freshen up. I call Mum and say I won't be in touch for a week. Then I'm back into the fray. I ask directions for Argyll at reception and I'm off again. Into the late afternoon.
Argyll Street is nt the easiest destination today clearly. A JJ Abrams Samuel L. Jackson film is being shot in Glasgow this summer and many main thoroughfares are closed for filming purposes at no little expense and no little inconvenience for pedestrians and tourists. Glasgow is a street of long thoroughfares and reminds me of New York which its standing in for in this film because it's cheaper. I feel like I'm in a movie myself as I inch my way downtown. Past the taxi rank outside Glasgow King Street.This is a place that I find I fall in love with just by walking its streets. Like the best cities.
I'm not sure I trust my Google Map skills to get me to the Mono Club in King. Fortunately I'm in Glasgow which I'm beginning to suspect may be the friendliest city on earth. I go into another Waterstone's this one not so much like Willie Wonka's Nine to Five and an assistant in cool Pinz Nez gives me detailed directions. I'm clearly in my way from misery to happiness today.
But I've got a bit of time to kill. So when I get to King Street, between Merchant City and Trongate if yu're taking notes which I imagine you are, I duck into a bar. Avant Garde. It's full of elderly well dressed Glaswegians. They're playing Gang of Four and Specials in here and the main attraction hasn't even arrived .
He soon does. An elderly fella in a dapper suit so sharp you could cut your loaf of bread with, should you wish. And a line of patter to match. 'My kind of town Chicago is....' I get momentarily confused but he's damned good. A Nightingale Sang in Berkely Square. By the time he gets on to his Tom Jones and Cliff numbers the couples are bobbing and weaving on the dancefloor in front of him and a fine time is being had by one and all.
But I'm not here for The GoodFellas Experience. I'm here to see Horsegirl. The kind of band making small but important stands against the Orange Man because we all must. I get further directions form more cool and laidback Glaswegians and I'm at Mono, just up the road. It's immediately the kind of venue I feel most at home in. Another spiritual home.
It's a beautifully spaced venue. Comfortable tables. A well stocked bar . A low stage placed at the front of the venue. A relaxed air . A terrace out front where the Glasgow Indie Groovers are beginning to gather .Cool looking, relaxed people. The kind of place where people like me feel relaxed because we're in our element and with our people. I'm immediately enchanted.
I have a look through the ineffably cool record shop at the back of the venue. Monorail Music. It was apparently set up by Stephen Pastel has row upon row of rare classics I would love to buy immediately. I don't have anything by Sebadoh or The Field Mice on vinyl. These issues probably need to be addressed. Immediately.
I resist and move back into the venue and wait for the music. I text to my Polish friend but my flesh is weakening. I'm tired. It happens at my age. It's been a long day. My legs are tired. Will I last the course of the evening. Thankfully help is at hand. The support group, an impossible assured looking group of young men and women I heard doing a soundcheck for earlier have climbed back onstage and started to play. My ears prick up. If you've been listening to this kind of music as long as I have you know what you're going to like and I know I'm going to like this. A lot. I get up and start to make my way through the crowd looking for a better vantage point.
They announce themselves as Nightshift. That figures. I've long liked Nightshift and appreciated their records on It Starts for some time. They're the kind of band that appreciates the essence of the Underground. Park their charabanc in the vacant lot between The Velvet Underground, Au Pairs, Girls at Our Best and Young Marble Giants and would have done John Peel Sessions and sold precisely no records at all back in the day. They're playing to a set of people they've played to any number of times and will love them unconditionally every time. Not because the audience lacks discretion. But because they have it.
They're energetic, kinetic, laugh a lot between themselves between tracks and have no fear of showing commitment to the Palestinian cause, and what I conclude is wrong with that. I thank the singer after the set for speaking out. I think it's important to speak out, She's excited when I do and keeps babbling effusively. I think she and they are great. They've been on tour with Horsegirl and clearly bonded as the best double bills do. They make this kind of lifestyle feel like a calling. I'm glad it still is for so many. It allows the rest of us to follow more conventional lives but still wiggle our toes in more bohemian ponds.Of an evening !!!
Half an hour more and we get Horsegirl. It's darkening outside but there's something ripe about the night. It belongs to lovers. This is why I still do this. The venue's sold out but sensibly it doesn't feel cramped. There's consideration from the venue in that respect. I've learned through a lifetime of experience that these are the best venues and the best nights. It speaks of values. Of a lifestyle where genuine respect for others is the common currency and people go home happy with a sense they've got their money's worth.
Horsegirl play the best set I've seen any band play for mlany years. They have a brittle but inspiring edge and actual swagger. The band is clearly a democratic colective but I realise tonight that if they have a lead it's probably Pemelope Lowenstein when previously I'd thought it might be Nora Cheng.. Lowenstein has cut her hair and she speaks a lot tonight and I get the sense if the group are following anyone's lead it might be hers.
Anyway Horsegirl strike me as having that cerain ineffable and difficult to quantify essence that marks the great bands out from the merely good ones. They don't hold back. They're riding their wave. Their first record was good but this is a huge march onwards from that. Ive seen a handful of bands at the time when I felt it was just the time to see them. R.E.M., The Go Betweens and The Triffids at the time of their imperial albums. Pixies and My Bloody Valentine later in the decade. There are more but I wom't bore you.
Anyway they have an elliptical quality tonight.. .Sure they take a lead from The Raincoats and The Feelies. But if you're going to steal, steal from the best. .A few songs in a set of pretty young girls slide past me at the lip of the stage and it's a wonderful moment. Something I'll remember . It's inspiring. The true meaning of girlpower not a marketing exercise. It's been a wonderful night and I'll ride on its wave of positive energy for some time.
I'm back into the night and off to catch a taxi in the rain.......
Tuesday, October 13, 2026
200 Albums for 2026 It Starts With a Birthstone # 75 Seefeel - Sol Hz
Seefeel are a band that graced the pages of the Melody Maker every week in the early Nineties when I used ti buy it and The NME pretty much every week . They regrouped in 2007 and find themselves on the cover of the latest cover of The Wire. Not great for their bank accounts perhaps. But fortunately not all musicians are primarily guided by their bank accounts. .
Their new album Sol.Hz is electronuc hiss. It sounds great In their early days Seefeel used to be loosely connected to the Shoegaze scene but now their sound is perhaps best described as electronuc, atmospheric noise.
This sounded most in place as I was listening late last night. It sounds huge too as eight becomes nine on Monday morning . 'Oceans fall and mountains drift.'
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