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CALAMITY! Friday was Brae Up Helly Aa, an event much anticipated by young (14 year old) daughter Martha, who had planned for weeks to attend with her pals. She had worked out that, despite having to get up at 5.00am to catch a flight to Inverness (school council duties, the glamorous modern lifestyle of the…

…there’s another video at the band’s website. Someone described them (I paraphrase) as Springsteen if he’d got Hungry Heart recorded by The Ramones. The album (The 59 Sound)I have learned to love, but I had to get beyond the Springsteen references, (music and lyrics) not to mention quotes from actual Boss songs. They do come…

Some snaps from a day so nice it lent magic to every part of Lerwick. Well, most bits. People were in a good mood, everyone was chatty, the coffee at COPE (freshly roasted on the premises) tasted wonderful. It takes about 40 minutes to walk from the BBC Radio Shetland studios down past the amazing…

Every piece of advice I’ve received about taking up running can be summed up in two words: Don’t. Walk. Or, at the very least, walk with short periods of almost-jogging. More sort of…joggling. Or jiggling. In my case, these tend to last a maximum of a minute and a half before exhaustion sets in. I’ve…

As you will see if you check out my booze blog over at Drinking for Scotland, I’m currently engaged in 30 days of alcohol-free existence. Which is proving both surprisingly easy and oddly irksome. This is today’s post: Third fierce coffee of the day. Dave Hammond and his German TV producer colleague arrived aboard the…

Lovely trip back to Shetland in bright sunshine, and a nice smooth flight. A very short trip away – two nights – and a great time was had in Alva, as part of the BBC Radio Scotland Soundtown project. Hugely impressed with the musical quality of the pupils…watch out for Gamu Nhengu, who will be…

It’s years since I’ve been in Alva…I’d forgotten how spectacular the setting is, with the Ochils soaring behind the town. Fine day, too. Tremendous enthusiasm here at Alva Academy for the show – three school bands are set to perform, we have a quiz between teachers and pupils and some other teachers are being sent…

It was a brutal old day yesterday (Sunday), with 80mph winds and enormous seas crashing onto the Zetlandics. With an offshore wind, the top of the cliffs at Eshaness was no place to venture from the car, or even stay for long. A Citroen C4 was probably safe enough, but I wouldn’t like to have…

According to Norrie (cheers!) and The Sunday Mail (Billy Sloan) Springsteen is to play Hampden on July 14th. Which means a potential expenditure for the dedicated live music fan of, oh, lots. Because you could very possibly go to Ry Cooder/Nick Lowe/Flaco Jimenez (9/10 July)T in the Park (10/11/12 July) and then Springsteen the same…

…Festival Theatre, 9th and 10th July, which is right on the edge of (and indeed into) T in the Park territory. Evening News story here. Tickets available from Monday, and it’s only an 1800-seater so be ready. And be ready for vast prices, too.