May The Fourth .... Be With You ..... Star Wars Day

Today is a very sunny May 4th to start the Bank Holiday Weekend. Peter Mayhew who played Chewbacca died this week aged 74, he was 7'3" and played Chewbacca in all th elive action Star Wars films.

May blogging is a lot more leisurely, this being my second May post in four days. The song I'm going to play is "Take It Easy On Me" by Irish band A House, just because it came on The Chain just as I started to write this, and it's just one of those moments when one of those great records you had forgotten about comes on the radio (This time RadMac on 6Music)

So today is going to be a mowing the lawn and posting things day, assuming that the weather holds but we shall see how that goes.

I know this is a very short post as I can't really think of anything more to say at the moment so will leave you with A House, and have a good weekend.

#AprilSongs #9 Tuesday Morning

I'm still waiting for my roof to be sorted, and need to have a shower before work, but after last week's "Tuesday Afternoon" by The Moody Blues we will go with "Tuesday Morning by The Pogues.

I don't know if you know that the Pogues take their name from the phrase "póg mo thóin" which is apparently Irish for "KIss My Arse" but at the time no one was sure if "Pogues was Kisses or Arses and "Pogue Mahone" was the seventh album by the band (wiki entry here) , but the Oxford English Dictionary lists Pogue as "Kiss" here.

"Tuesday Morning" is up there with The Pogues best and if you have never heard it take a couple of minutes not and enjoy it. There is so much music we never even hear, often by our favourite artists, and often we concentrate on two or three albums, and this is a discovery for me thanks to me doing the #AprilSongs sequence.

This proves that it's good to set up the tiniest of projects to force yourself to do things, and the main reason for doing this is that I want to hit two thousand posts on Seven Days In (Not Seven Day Sin as some people have pointed out) and I wasn't really posting enough this year, and April should put me ahead of the curve. I've also been nominated for #TenAlbumsInTenDays and am posting those as well, plus my appearance on The Chain, so there is every possibility that I may hit fifty posts this month, unlikely but you never know.

#TenAlbumsInTenDays #4 - #1 - Bardo Jordan Reyne

I've been nominated for the #TenAlbumsInTenDays by my friend Tim Barlow and this is my fourth nomination and I'm always up for it but each time I want to take a new angle on it. Now generally we always probably hit our teenage years between 14-18 but I am wondering if I can do ten albums from the last decade. Too often people limit themselves to a particular time, and that doesn't mean that the albums of that time were bad or less good, but maybe they did hit us with more impact because we had a lot less experience of what was available to us.

So I am kicking of with Jordan Reyne's "Bardo" which is more hypnotic dark Celtic mood pieces, and a welcome return as she had said she was retiring from music. Ever since I first saw her, she has been the most striking artist I have have experienced, combining so much talent in one person.

When "Bardo" was announced I immediately pre-ordered it because I knew it would be brilliant, and I was not disappointed. Yes it is more Jordan Reyne, but that is more musical adventure and perfection , tinged with her antipodean Celtic menace, although I believe she is now based in Poland. That also brings  a connection with my Chain post yesterday which was the actual pronunciation of "Warszawa" from David Bowie's "Low".

I do hope to get to see her again, but will share the opener from "Bardo" with you "Exiter".

My First Chain Appearance

Well I was chosen for The Chain once before but pulled at the last minute for what was deemed a better connection. I gave up when I heard a connection that was basically "Ronnie Wood or Keith Richard had a similar hairstyle", What? That week Mark Radcliffe and Stuart Maconie were away so not to blame for that aberration.

Anyway yesterday I got a text from Sarah at 6Music as I had put in a suggestion that I had then forgotten about. I then remembered it was the Peter Schilling song "Major Tom" which is the theme song used in "Deutschland 83" (and 86 and 89) , the eighties cold war  German drama (with some very funny dry comedy).

The song is perfect eighties a la Flock of Seagulls, although I originally that it had been especially commissioned. It wasn't, but I had never heard it before in my life.

Then I met my friend Katie for a meal at Bohemian (now Junk It Up) which also had a vinyl section (yes I know, unusual cross selling) and the single that was at the front of their section was "Major Tom" by Peter Schilling, so I had to buy it.

While the lyrics sometimes hit the creakiness of Abba's (it is their second language after all) the very short chorus is wonderful and the overall song is great and sticks in your mind like all great pop music.

The Chain link is from Bowie's "Warszawa" from "Low" part of the Berlin Trilogy. The two connections are Berlin (via "Deutschland 83") and "Major Tom" with the "Space Oddity" connection. The show will be available for a bit here and my appearance is around 72 minutes in, 1.14.26 according to my friend Nigel.

So this is just to mark that I've been on The Chain. and my entry is recorded here, number 7868.

#AprilSongs #6 Saturday Night Fish Fry

SIx days into this and this morning I'm on https://www.thechain.uk/The Chain with by suggestion to follow Bowie's "Warszawa", but today's choice for #AprilSongs is Louis Jordan's "Saturday Night Fish Fry".

I am not sure when I first discovered Louis Jordan, but was almost shocked when I heard "Ain't That Just Like A Woman" because the main riff (played in alternative versions by brass and piano) is the same note sequence as Chuck Berry's signature guitar riff. So Chuck didn't get it from Michael J Fox in "Back To The Future" but from Louis Jordan back in the forties. Musicians always "borrow" from others but it would be nice to see a little acknowledgement (Led Zeppelin I'm looking at you).

Also the brass section reminds me of Frank Zappa's take on  "Stairway To Heaven" (which was the subject of a copyright claim for it's similarity to Spirit's "Taurus") on "The Best Band You Never Heard In Your Life" where the brass section play the guitar solo perfectly.

So I need to shower before I get my phone call from 6Music.

The Last Few Days

Has been sore and painful, and I'm not talking about that pair of morons Trump and May leading our nations into oblivion. Monday was and work and having to go for a wee about every fifteen minutes, but felt ok, Tuesday morning was  lots of horrible bodily stuff resulting in me be unable to eat, and feeling like I'd been punched from the outside and the inside, Tuesday night was unable to sleep but finally decided to take a couple of Ibuprofen which seemed to ease the pain. I've not slept so much for ages as I have over the past two days.

I was in bed but had 6Music on and in a really weird turn Stuart Maconie talking about The Chain entered my dream and I was just about to say something to him when I woke up about 3pm. The dream involved me working at BT based in somewhere that was vaguely familiar, meeting a lovely girl called Kiki and Stuart Maconie and moving desks and being on a rather odd bus ride that involved being covered in a protective tarpaulin, you know the average sort of dream that I have.

While I am not back to 100%, I have managed a tomato sandwich and some pea and ham soup and toast, so hopefully I will be fit and raring to go tomorrow.

Was wondering what song to put on this and somehow Randy Newman's "Putin" came up in my feed. I didn't even know this song existed but it's Newman at his satirical best,  I sure Vladimir would agree.

I didn't intend this post to have any political content, but I managed to mention Trump, May and Putin and that makes them sound like a firm of bailiffs, which I suppose they really are.

Some Random Tangentiality and Pigeons

Spot The Pigeon

A friend was surprised that I could find a elucidate about stuff related to Peru , and set me a task to find a song about pigeons. Two immediately sprang to mind "Pigeons" by Genesis from their Spot The Pigeon EP and "King of Rome" which I have only heard as a cover by Half Man Half Biscuit, but found this live performance by The Unthanks at the 2012 Folk awards. So here's a thing , leave a comment if you want me to write about some random thing and supply an appropriate piece of music. That could lead down an interesting trail similar to Radcliffe and Maconie's The Chain.

Here's the Wikipedia guff on pigeons:


"Pigeons and doves constitute the bird clade Columbidae, that includes about 310 species. Pigeons are stout-bodied birds with short necks, and short, slender bills with fleshy ceres. They feed on seeds, fruits, and plants" See here for  the RSPB definition.

Also pigeons play a part in the history of the Happy Mondays , but I'll leave you to look that up or you can watch this:



Sorry this is just a short post , although I noticed my last post was the 900th on this blog , so I've probably written enough to fill a book, although it would be quite incoherent but filled with interesting stuff. Anyway I hope you comment and leave your suggestions for the next post.