Here's a great way to start a cool week. Liz Fraser performing Tim Buckley's Song to the Siren earlier this month in Berlin (via @nedraggett.bsky.social). www.youtube.com/watch?v=eOOc...

This is great. Has Dylan ever changed the lyric of a song as dramatically as this @michaelgray1.bsky.social ? I doubt it. The rest of the footage is also well worth watching or bookmarking.

This is great. Has Dylan ever changed the lyric of a song as dramatically as this @michaelgray1.bsky.social ? I doubt it. The rest of the footage is also well worth watching or bookmarking.

Here's a great way to start a cool week. Liz Fraser performing Tim Buckley's Song to the Siren earlier this month in Berlin (via @nedraggett.bsky.social). www.youtube.com/watch?v=eOOc...

The Great Work. Terrific new poem by Martin Stannard on Litter. www.littermagazine.org/2026/06/mart...

Remembering my dear friend, John Lucas, poet, professor, publisher, essayist, memoirist, novelist, anthologist, critic & jazzman (not necessarily in that order), who died last September. He'd have been 89 today. davidbelbin.substack.com/p/rememberin...

Remembering my dear friend, John Lucas, poet, professor, publisher, essayist, memoirist, novelist, anthologist, critic & jazzman (not necessarily in that order), who died last September. He'd have been 89 today. davidbelbin.substack.com/p/rememberin...

Hot music for a hot evening. Bruce Springsteen & Tom Morello cover the best song on 'London Calling' and you can guess which line gets the biggest cheer. Working for the Clampdown. www.youtube.com/watch?v=VxIi...

Hot music for a hot evening. Bruce Springsteen & Tom Morello cover the best song on 'London Calling' and you can guess which line gets the biggest cheer. Working for the Clampdown. www.youtube.com/watch?v=VxIi...

BBC Four have shown many Screen Two films over the past 3 years. They would do well to remaster & rescreen Stephen Lowe's FLEA BITES (1992), a poignant, obscure delight where a mixed race lad in Nottingham becomes obsessed with a flea circus. Anthony Hill & Nigel Hawthorne are superb! boxd.it/eTGch5

Watching Starmer resign and reminded ofThatcher, then wondering what would have happened if he'd actually governed on the pledges he made when he stood as Labour leader, rather than veering to the Reform chasing right. www.theguardian.com/politics/liv...

Our greatest living Yorkshireman is gone. What a life’s work, what a legacy. R.I.P. www.theguardian.com/artanddesign...

Thanks @vslyke.bsky.social This was debuted live last night, a song that Dylan might have sent to Elvis, then lost interest in after The King turned it down, yet crept back into his head for whatever reason 60 years on. Will he ever play it again, I wonder? Seems too slight to become a set regular.

Thanks @vslyke.bsky.social This was debuted live last night, a song that Dylan might have sent to Elvis, then lost interest in after The King turned it down, yet crept back into his head for whatever reason 60 years on. Will he ever play it again, I wonder? Seems too slight to become a set regular.

No recording yet, but Bob Dylan last night performed the Basement Tapes song, Baby, Won't You Be My Baby, in Troutdale, Oregon. Here's how it sounded nearly 60 years ago. www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fv_t...

A happy 81st birthday to the great jazz composer and multi-instrumentalist, Anthony Braxton, WKCR is running a birthday broadcast of Braxton's music all day today. 1440 minutes! www.cc-seas.columbia.edu/wkcr/story/a...

Sad, sad news. RIP.

A not so shaggy dog story, and news about this year’s Graham Greene festival in Berkhamsted. open.substack.com/pub/davidbel...

Online booking now open for the 26th Graham Greene Birthplace Trust International Festival on September 24-7 in Berkhamsted. Always a lovely weekend, with lots of great speakers. Honoured to be giving this year's closing talk, about Greene in Nottingham & 'Greeneland'. grahamgreenebt.org/festival/

'The risk of insolvency is real, and that happening would be devastating not just for students and staff but for the institution’s local community, the UK’s research footprint and our international reputation.' Buried parliamentary report on HE funding. committees.parliament.uk/work/9012/hi...

Fascinating stuff. Best viewed in fullscreen on a big screen.

This sounds tempting so looked it up. Reed’s last completed film is based on a play of this name, but the actual (terrible) title is ‘Follow Me!’

Browsing 1966 issues of The Beatles Book, as you do, I came across this interview with Paul McCartney, asking why the US LPs and UK ones still had different track listings. I hadn’t heard this answer before (everything changed after Revolver anyway). Is it true? (see third image, others for context)

Browsing 1966 issues of The Beatles Book, as you do, I came across this interview with Paul McCartney, asking why the US LPs and UK ones still had different track listings. I hadn’t heard this answer before (everything changed after Revolver anyway). Is it true? (see third image, others for context)

On Gen-AI and literary fiction. On metaphors, jokes and the ineffable. On monkeys with typewriters, and monkeys zip-wiring across the road. tinycamels.wordpress.com/2026/05/27/a...

Squadrons of Pigs: “Universities are obviously not a priority of this government,” says Stephan Collini in a depressingly accurate essay on the state of Higher Education & why many Humanities courses face a ‘death spiral’. www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v4...

Lovely launch @fiveleavesbooks.bsky.social for 'Devils in the Details', essays around Lincolnshire Folk Tales by @rorywaterman.bsky.social with short readings by two great Lincolnshire poets, Rob Etty & Kathryn Daszkiewicz. Well worth it for the packed house who braved a thunderstorm to get there.

Lovely launch @fiveleavesbooks.bsky.social for 'Devils in the Details', essays around Lincolnshire Folk Tales by @rorywaterman.bsky.social with short readings by two great Lincolnshire poets, Rob Etty & Kathryn Daszkiewicz. Well worth it for the packed house who braved a thunderstorm to get there.

Squadrons of Pigs: “Universities are obviously not a priority of this government,” says Stephan Collini in a depressingly accurate essay on the state of Higher Education & why many Humanities courses face a ‘death spiral’. www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v4...

Congratulations, County. 11 years after dropping out of the league, Notts County are promoted to the first division after outplaying Salford and winning 3-0. Outstanding.

42,000 word Encyclical from Pope Leo XIV, principally on the dangers of AI (or so it appears, haven't begun it yet). I'm a lapsed/atheist Catholic, but it's too hot to go outside, and this may prove to be a cool read. www.vatican.va/content/leo-...

Tonight on one of those tucked away freeview channels, what appears to be the full length version of one of the greatest films ever made, Sergio Leone's masterpiece Once Upon A Time in America. If it is (4+ hours I've only seen on a bootleg print) definitely worth setting your digi-device to record.

Ten acts you've seen more than 10 times. In my case, 10 = 10+ while 1-3 = 30+. Only play if you're old & have nowt better to do over the bank holiday. 10. Billy Bragg 9. Gallery 47 8. Sleaford Mods 7. Squeeze 6. Bruce Springsteen 5. R.E.M. 4. Bob Dylan 3. Richard Thompson 2. Elvis Costello 1. Gaffa

Ten acts you've seen more than 10 times. In my case, 10 = 10+ while 1-3 = 30+. Only play if you're old & have nowt better to do over the bank holiday. 10. Billy Bragg 9. Gallery 47 8. Sleaford Mods 7. Squeeze 6. Bruce Springsteen 5. R.E.M. 4. Bob Dylan 3. Richard Thompson 2. Elvis Costello 1. Gaffa

Overnight the name ten acts you’ve seen live has become ten acts you can no longer see (because one is dead) but rather than wallow in that, I’m going to raise the stakes. Ten acts you’ve seen ten times or more. A thread where you need to be old to compete, which I probably can’t complete. 1. Gaffa

Maria Taylor and Alan Baker reading at Five Leaves Bookshop at a lovely, packed launch for Alan's new 64 poem pamphlet, A Book of Psalms, from Shearsman Books. About to read it.

Oh, go on then. Ten acts I’ve seen live: no festival sets, starts with my first gig, ends with the most recent. Pink Floyd Can Leonard Cohen Millie Jackson Kevin Coyne Stevie Wonder Broken Social Scene Little Simz Amy Winehouse The Lemon Twigs +6 people on Andrew’s list but not, sadly, Al Green.

August 1, 2007, my late partner, Sue Dymoke, surrounded by poppies in Yorkshire Sculpture Park, where there’s a path with our names on it.

There's a terrific new album out by the late, great Carla Bley. Some thoughts here… geoffandrew.com/2026/05/20/j...

Glorious, exuberant opening night of the UK tour from The Lemon Twigs at The Rescue Rooms in Nottingham. Their new album is so good, I would’ve happily heard them play it all. Those hooks, those harmonies and those crunchy, catchy riffs!

Glorious, exuberant opening night of the UK tour from The Lemon Twigs at The Rescue Rooms in Nottingham. Their new album is so good, I would’ve happily heard them play it all. Those hooks, those harmonies and those crunchy, catchy riffs!

A rare appearance by Nottingham's finest, Gaffa (+ many others & a side project or two) at Hedley Villas, Forest Fields, on July 4th, in memory of Jenny Snell, 2-7pm. Free. And Pizza! My memoir, Don't Mention the Night, with a long chapter about Gaffa, still available from Five Leaves Publishing.

Not a Londoner but I do like Sadiq Khan. Serious leader. Troubles me that Labour supporters aren’t pushing to get this guy into Parliament, evidently preferring a better looking empty suit pumped up by oleaginous ambition. If the Tories can install a black PM, why wouldn’t Labour even consider it?

The early show at Peggy’s Skylight. Packed for ‘Dennis Rollins & Tony Kofi play Bob Brookmeyer & Gerry Mulligan’. Subtle swing & contrasting moods from fantastic musicians. What a treat. Such a diverse audience too, with great food and drink. How lucky we are to have this unique venue in Nottingham.

The early show at Peggy’s Skylight. Packed for ‘Dennis Rollins & Tony Kofi play Bob Brookmeyer & Gerry Mulligan’. Subtle swing & contrasting moods from fantastic musicians. What a treat. Such a diverse audience too, with great food and drink. How lucky we are to have this unique venue in Nottingham.

A good read. Get a cuppa and settle in for insights into environmental politics and bookselling over the last few decades. (I used to work at Five Leaves. It's a real hub for good reads, proper discussions and friendly chat. )

29.2.68. Ornette Coleman appears at the Royal Albert Hall with guest appearance by Yoko Ono. 'A Leap Year Special.' A friend who was at the gig kept the programme. Here it is (minus the 4 ad pages). Lovely photo on the cover. Very few people at the gig, Dave tells me, but a really memorable show.

Not only is Makerfield going to go Reform, but if Burnham quits the job he's been elected to in order to try for a job he won't be, so will the Greater Manchester Mayoralty. All because of one man's ego.

Friend of Peter and Palantir, Wes Streeting, the only member of the cabinet to make Starmer look ok by comparison, has resigned. Which begs the question below. Https://www.newstatesman.com/politics/labour/2026/05/is-it-too-late-to-choose-chaos-with-ed-miliband

29.2.68. Ornette Coleman appears at the Royal Albert Hall with guest appearance by Yoko Ono. 'A Leap Year Special.' A friend who was at the gig kept the programme. Here it is (minus the 4 ad pages). Lovely photo on the cover. Very few people at the gig, Dave tells me, but a really memorable show.