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Very curious. In the (with hindsight) odd and innocent world of early 1970s Scottish evangelical folk and rock (now THERE’S a niche!) Paul Openshaw was someone spoken of with reverence and a degree of awe. He was the first person I had ever seen who owned and played a Dobro (a proper one, too, none…
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Everything is coming together for the Mull2Muckle/Fairly Long Ride, which pedals off officially from the Mull of Galloway lighthouse on the evening of 8 June. But today, I started with the first 10 miles. Plus 13 for luck. I’m taking a week off broadcasting to do the mainland Scotland section of the ride, but I’m…
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I I first played the guitar in public when I was 12. That was 44 years ago. A lifetime of dreams in wood and wire. I still have that first guitar, a little Selmer. I still play it. But, oh, how I used to fantasise about a ‘proper’ flat-top, jumbo, something exotic and glamorous like…
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Sl 378 Cover Corrections
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I don’t like – to paraphrase the excellent Santa Fe singer songwriter and art activist Joe West – jam bands. I dislike sessions, noodling, showing off, and virtuosity in the service of itself. For me music is about the song or the tune first, and it is in the creation of that work and its…
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…in my humble opinion… Tom Waits: Bad as Me Gillian Welch: The Harrow and the Harvest Frank Turner: England Keep My Bones Babybird: The Pleasures of Self Destruction Laura Marling: A Creature I Don’t Know Josh T Pearson: Last of the Country Gentlemen Ryan Adams: Ashes and Fire British Sea Power: Valhalla Dancehall Arcade Fire:…
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That was my Christmas present two years ago, that weather station thingy. There’s a wireless connection to a screen inside, but frankly, I’m not sure how it works or what it means. The wind is always worse than the weather station says, because the anemometer is too sheltered. If it weren’t, it would be in…
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If there was one record that set my feet upon the path of rock’n’roll, it was…Prodigal, by The Gospelfolk. Released in 1969, we had one of the first copies to see the light of day, as the lead singer, one John MacCalman, was my mum’s wee brother and a hero to me and my sisters.…
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Just back from Pisa (it has a tower that leans) and Lucca, wherein I got lost, in a car, in streets that grew ever narrower, until it was just me and this tiny wee old woman in a red oilskin…or am I thinking about somewhere else? Anyway, here’s a thing: Glen Grant Five Year Old,…
