Vale Claudia Cardinale, woman of many talents ⚜️💙⚜️Or how an appearance initially meant to promote her current film transforms into a magnificent, precisely calibrated exchange between her and the RAI orchestra (excerpt from Canzonissima, December 1971).⚜️🎶⚜️💙⚜️🎶⚜️

It's a case for the BISHOP #niche

Title track of not just one of the best compilation albums of all time but one of the best *albums* of all time, the Kent LP "Right Back Where We Started From". If you want a gateway drug into the wonderful and occasionally weird world of Northern Soul, that album is it. Every track a winner.

Pointer-outer accounts who don't follow me-or aren't followed by mutuals- that say things like "Yeah but people still make things it's stupid to say nobody has hobbies any more" are weird. What drives them? Who knows? Who cares? Any that turn up in reply to my posts will be blocked without mercy.

Simon makes a really important point. It's something I keep going on about. The mid 70s were the last knockings of the golden age of the hobby. People with disposable income to spend on whatever leisure activity they fancied because the cost of living (esp housing) was so much lower.

So this is the first of the 50th Anniversary things I was going on about the other day. I was 5 when I saw this on Tomorrow's World which was one of my favourite TV shows at the time. The year 2000 seemed a very long way away then. It's a very long way away now in the other direction-

There's a connection between this record and Sweeping The Nation by Spearmint. Anyone know what it is? No? Well, it's the drum kit. The same drum kit, a white Rogers, that was used on the recording of this, was later acquired by Spearmint's drummer and used on their recordings. So there.

The existence of narrowboat Argo implies the existence of narrowboat Cadet. Or Topic in the UK #niche

If you *really* want to know what drove Britpop, both sides of this record sum it up. Disillusion with the rave scene, a desire to reconnect with something a bit more culturally stimulating and intellectually challenging than the mainstream, an urge to get down with like-minded souls. -

I mean, come on. The bloke was an absolute genius youtu.be/31KgtDly4lM?...

Danny Thompson has died. I asked him once if he remembered being on this. He said, "Honestly? No." But he was, unmistakably. He'd play with anyone. He even played with my old Weller band comrade Steve Pilgrim. A totally awesome player and lovely bloke youtu.be/I68Hw0QktUI?...

Originally issued as European Queen, it sank without a trace. A quick lyric change and Boom! A worldwide smash hit. The idea that you could substitute "European" for anywhere else in the big wide world and have a massive success became the foundation of British trade policy, so far unsuccessfully

If you own a cat, play this-the new remastered version of Guess Who's Coming To Dinner by John Howard- and see what happens when the Moog comes in. Probably works with dogs too but lack a suitable test subject youtu.be/3aylSPEADlU?...

If you have not seen this, clear some space in your busy lives and get stuck in. London was still dotted with real scruffy areas in 1987/88 when this was filmed. There's a fantastically up-it's-arse hotel where their offices were nowadays. Always makes me giggle.

Anybody in the Stevenage area have available an accessible room or studio flat to rent? My daughter is starting a PhD next week and the flat that we hoped she be in by now looks like it is going to fall through. Thanks

Sharia Law and Lambchop backstage at the London Palladium.

I am not a natural guitar player but I am prepared to give it a go when needs must. I've just been reminded of this particular tour in Italy with Il Senato, when I thrashed the flip out of a Squier Telecaster Custom DeLuxe kidding on I was Wilko instead of merely shopping there occasionally.

Flying in light aircraft. Shooting. Wearing a tailor made tweed overcoat.

@andylewis.bsky.social @philippeauclair.bsky.social This is getting yet another play. So beautifully put together and so many memorable little flourishes. A gem.

Fucking hell, that broke me. Well done, Brighton.

Lime's chief executive is Wayne Ting. I think more should be made of this wonderful bit of nominative determinism,given the noise the stupid little bell on his sodding bikes makes as an inexperienced rider who can't control it hurtles towards you frantically ringing it & expecting you to jump clear

Staggered by the news that an I*n Lev*ne thing from the early 00s, to wit This Time I'm Loving You by "Venicia Wilson" has been discovered by Northern Soul fans and is now going for £100+ on 7". It's all right, as Lev*ne things go. -https://youtu.be/cMGAtkhj1E4?si=UQMDrtjGiQkdOAGV

What if we've already had the Rapture, and only one person actually met the required standard for ascension, and that was Grocer Jack? The clues were all there.

Issue 18 is out now. This autumn, Detail shines a light on the new generation carrying the Mod torch into 2025. Meet the young trailblazers redefining the look, sound, and spirit of Mod for a new era.

We’re gonna smash their brains in, cos they ain’t got nothing in em.

When I was a kid, Blaster Bates's records were on sale at Past & Present in Watford. At age 7 I had no idea who he was or what he did, only that his name made me laugh. Anyway, if you too saw Blaster Bates LPs as a kid, this is him youtu.be/O-gt7QzUy5M?...

My old cat Biggles, dead since 2010, has been in touch from the spirit world to say that when he's Prime Minister he'll give all EU citizens living here a million pounds each and an "I hate King Charles" hat. Should we be worried? I mean, he's got more chance of being PM than old Nigel F. -

“Now is The End! Perish the world!” “It was GMT wasn’t it?”

Without a doubt one of the strangest tv shows I ever saw-and that wasn’t until 1992 when I got a bootleg vhs of three episodes. The Rev. Unwin looked a lot like my grandad, who was also a vicar with a lot of books any of which might’ve contained Professor Humboldt’s Minimizer, but sadly didn’t.

Things that are more reliable than a Tascam DA88 or an election pledge by a populist politician. Number 94- a wax cylinder Dictaphone

Autumn's really here now, you can feel it in the air. Birds are gathering all along the telephone wires. It's almost time for eiderdowns, velvet curtains and roaring fires... youtu.be/Qd3YL7BSE0s?...

What do you think is the best episode of Mr Benn? Why do a massive percentage of brilliant Northern Soul records get released with yellow labels? What was the point of the Lockspeiser LDA1? Was 1972 the best year for pop singles? These, Helen, are the great questions of the age.

Niche but absolutely brilliant.

I haven't found any photos of my old cat Biggles, who isn't going to let his death at the ripe old age of 22 stop him from being the next Prime Minister, but a family friend did do a painting of him and his brother Ginger (of course). Ginger died in 1997. Biggles lived until 2010. I miss them both.

In the Record Room tonight - I tip my hat to Billie Davis, one of the greatest UK female singers of the 60s. What a look! What a sound! Billie Davis! patreon.com/bobstanley www.youtube.com/watch?v=-27p...

Nice to see Meta's Live AI coming out in sympathy with Jimmy Kimmel

One night after a Weller gig in Dublin I was DJing in a club in town. Just before I went on to play records, I was trying to get to the bar, but couldn't for all the people trying to tell me how much they'd enjoy the show. Then this enormous bloke got right in my face-

"Music suffused with solipsistic gloom, made by stars obsessing over the nature of stardom..." For your pleasure, the ten best glam rock albums, as selected by @alwynturner.bsky.social. thelionandunicorn.com/2025/09/18/t...

Usually I'd be posting something really upbeat an positive about the anniversary of a record that totally changed my view of pop music when I was growing up. Not today. I bloody hate this. I hate what it did to Amy Winehouse. I hate what it did to the song. -

There will be people who think that this is a waste of time and money and that we ought to be tooling up with drones. But (with reference to my pinned post, obvs) nothing cements the importance of teamwork more than having to do something important with basic resources with people you don't know.

As an early reader (1988) of Neil Postman's Amusing Ourselves To Death, it's depressing in the extreme to see so much of what he warned against coming true. The more often he's cited-as in James B's excellent piece below- the more rubbish modern life feels (even though a lot of it really isn't)

Possibly the best value 12" single of all time, not so much for the extended mix of The Lodgers which is OK, but the live mini-LP presented to us on the flip side that shows just how good the musicianship of the Style Council was.

I was once a roadie for a band who launched their single with a guerrilla gig on the roof of a canal boat that sailed round Camden lock one Saturday afternoon. As we passed this building, a bloke on the roof terrace turned a hosepipe on us.

Anyone want to see the film Quadrophenia but condensed into less than a minute and made thirteen years earlier? The music is absolutely banging as well. Be a Picnicnik! youtu.be/4vLsNMwXrQc?...

One of my favourite songs by one of my favourite people has been remastered for a fresh release later in the year. Originally out in 1974, Spellbound by John Howard is an absolute belter, as you will hear youtu.be/ndglZQmK77k?...

*makes noise of an ascending tone on a Swanee Whistle*

These are a weekly treat. I'll see you all at the bottom of a Ron Geesin rabbit hole later

Brilliant piece on the casual erasure of of a female artist from a landmark moment in pop culture. And the answer to the question, Why don’t Peter Blake’s other album covers have the power and impact of Sgt. Pepper?

Putting it out into the world that I would love to be put in touch with a musicologist knowledgeable in 17thc English Music. I’m doing a project and I’m interested in the relationship the Separatist Puritans had with music, and what music came with them to the American colonies Thanks!