It Starts With a Birthstone...

And in this series from one of the best singles ever made to another.

Last year I discovered Los Saicos, a great Peruvian Garage band from the Mid-Sixties. Here's another. Not quite as 'rediscovere...

 Lester Bangs in a famous interview, (posted above), discussed the malaise in Rock Music in the Mid-Seventies. He said something alon...

Frank Black is fifty!

To one of the best Rock and Roll records ever made. This was the song my sister and brother in law played just after their wedding vows...

' 1984. I was hospitalised for approaching perfection.' At the Courtney Barnett gig last week at Newcastle University, (it ...

Record not bad either.

Also today. 5 April 1980 - St. Mary's Episcopal Church, Athens, GA ... support: The Side Effects supporting: The $windle$ po...

In no particular order. Though the best are naturally shuffled to the top in the order that I thought of them. The criteria became one artis...

Reading an anniversary article about Cobain's death and the writer states: 'The tortured rock star is only the most recent...

Kurt Cobain's body was found. I watched the news unfold at a friend's flat in Dortmund on MTV in 1994. Still missed.

The Jon Spencer Blues Explosion are one of the tightest, most driven Rock and Roll bands I've ever seen. They're almost an acad...

  Dangerous hearing Jazz like this before midday. The temptation is to go to bed (not a slur on its greatness). I once played Kind of B...

  His biggest hit. #5 in the Billboard chart in 1964. Written by Curtis Mayfield.

A pint in another local yesterday and they played this Faith No More song which took me back twenty years to when I was living in Dortmund. ...

Couldn't find a direct link to Johnny and Patti's version so here's a link. Jeff Buckley also did a version

And while we're in the Eighties. This is just out from a French Singer-Songwriter. The opening song from an album that is unashamed...

A few days off for Easter, so like the unimaginitive soul I am afternoons are spent in Rosie's. Found this. An underrated band. Pos...

One of Elvis's finer, lesser known tunes. Joe Strummer was also a fan.

For those who like scale. More than a touch of Kashmir about the early section of this. But then Kashmir hardly came out of a void. And...

A long afternoon session in Rosie's yesterday. The first day of my holidays. Pretty empty pub. Lucy the barmaid didn't turn my ...

A Spanish Black Lips according to the NME. That will do me.

From the quite wonderful Chambers Brothers

'Keening' is a great word. It's particularly helpful when trying to describe music sometimes The place it takes you to. A w...

Co-written by Conley and Otis Redding.

'I've forgotten how long I've been sitting here Watching my reflection in a disappearing beer The loneliness is so thick yo...

    Proper Rock and Roll.  

From his album from 2013 Time Off. Last year's record Way Out Weather also much recommended. So as an afterthought here's some...

  French Garage from 1966. Rumoured to feature Jimmy Page. Thanks to Green Gartside for playing this and drawing it to my attention. ...

  The second song by The Chanters posted today. This isn't just thrown together you know.    

  On the day she arrives in Newcastle, she's finally made it onto the Jukebox at Rosie's which may mean she's arrived full ...

A # 9 American hit in 1961 after the band's demise. From Queens, New York.

A thing of beauty.

Spot the Pop Star!

Well of course! Painted by computer programmer Barry Godber who unfortunately died of a heart attack in February 1970 shortly after the...

Thank you Jarvis!

Began a four week run at Number One in the US.

So one day away from her getting to Newcastle, here's my obligatory daily Courtney Barnett post. My brother-in-law, who's a gra...

David / Williams / Bacharach

Now I'm surprising myself. I've always found Arcade Fire to be an enormous amount of sound and fury signifying very little. At ...

Somewhat kitschy, but I remember it being Number 1 in the early Seventies and my older sister liked it. Of course I had no idea then  i...

  'Just then a song comes on. You Can't Always Get What You Want.'   Two days before Courtney lands in Newcastle. Stran...

  And while we're on the subject. Gary US Bonds brings me to Johnny Thunders great Eighties album where they paid tribute to some o...

An artist I only really investigated for the first time yesterday. I'd long associated him with Bruce Springsteen who'd always ...