The best medicine...

Playlist
Alice Cooper - Welcome 2 My Nightmare
And So I Watch You from Afar - Gangs
Bidiniband - In the Rock Hall
Brian Eno - Drums Between the Bells (Instrumental Disc)
Cloudland Blue Quartet - Starlightnight
Coldplay - Mylo Xyloto
David Guetta - Nothing But the Beat
Dream Theater - A Dramatic Turn of Events
Elbow - Build a Rocket Boys
Explosions in the Sky - Take Care, Take Care, Take Care
Field Music - Plumb
Fountains of Wayne - Sky Full of Holes
Ich + Ich - Gute Reise
Lady Antebellum - Own the Night
Levin Torn White - Levin Torn White
Mogwai - Hardcore Will Never Die, But You Will
Paul Buchanan - Mid Air
Peter Gabriel - New Blood
Portico Quartet - Portico Quartet
White Denim - D
Young the Giant - Young the Giant
Tangerine Dream - Phaedra
Tangerine Dream - Rubycon
Tangerine Dream - Ricochet
Tangerine Dream - Stratosfear

Five months gone...



More rain...



Continuing to be entertained by the top 20...

And working to the sounds of T Dream...

Respite with comedy - "Big Bang", "The Bitch in Apt 23", "Two Broke Girls"...

Takes my mind off things...

Lights out...

Highlight of the day : Laughing...

Twenty good things...

Playlist
Alice Cooper - Welcome 2 My Nightmare
And So I Watch You from Afar - Gangs
Bidiniband - In the Rock Hall
Brian Eno - Drums Between the Bells (Instrumental Disc)
Cloudland Blue Quartet - Starlightnight
Coldplay - Mylo Xyloto
David Guetta - Nothing But the Beat
Dream Theater - A Dramatic Turn of Events
Elbow - Build a Rocket Boys
Explosions in the Sky - Take Care, Take Care, Take Care
Field Music - Plumb
Fountains of Wayne - Sky Full of Holes
Ich + Ich - Gute Reise
Lady Antebellum - Own the Night
Levin Torn White - Levin Torn White
Mogwai - Hardcore Will Never Die, But You Will
Paul Buchanan - Mid Air
Peter Gabriel - New Blood
Portico Quartet - Portico Quartet
White Denim  - D
Young the Giant - Young the Giant
Tangerine Dream - Box Set 1970-1980 (3CD-R Version)

Playlist today of my current top 20 albums plus the latest CBQ...

A day of work (with the evening of same soundtracked by T Dream)...

Meg the Black Cat was black...



A smidgen of TV lightened matters with the latest episode of "Silk"...

Lights out...

Highlight of the Day : Good music in the cans on shuffleplay...

The adoption agency fails in its vetting...

Playlist
UK - Last Gig 1979
Meg doesn't like the rain...



Me neither...



In the evening, I ventured out with Anne and Lynn to the local Odeon cinema, where were three of around a dozen or so people in to see "Avengers Assemble"...

An enjoyable piece of hokum with splendid special effects and with Iron Man stealing the show - although the best line went to Thor on being questioned about his brother Loki's propensity for killing large numbers of innocent people...

"He's adopted"...

On getting into the car, my wallet inside my pocket got caught on the steering wheel and proceeded to rip my trousers right up the seam...



Oh how we laughted...

A good night out...

Highlight of the Day : Pointless nonsense on the big screen...

Damned...

Playlist
UK - Night After Night 2012 Setlist
UK - Night After Night
Asia - Pheonix
Asia - Omega

The trees at the end of the road in the morning...



Another sunny day...

Much of it spent working whilst listening to UK...

Meanwhile...

Dr Prog is securing tickets for Asia...

Count Brodski is securing tickets for Sparks...

I have secured tickets for The Bad Plus...

Late on, a good documentary about the "dambusters" squadron and their raid on three German dams - two of which the Exec Producer and I have visited and, indeed, walked along the top of...

Half the squadron, over fifty men, for the most part in their early twenties, were killed...

But  - it turned the tide...

The work the Nazis had to do to restore them took men from the Atlantic defences - which, in turn, eased the success of D Day...

Stick that on your Facebook kids...

Highlight of the Day : UK...

Over...

Playlist
Little Girls - Concepts
You Say Party! We Say Die - Xxxx
The Revolutionaries - Green Bay Dub
The Revolutionaries - Outlaw Dub
The Low Anthem - Smart Flesh
Deus - Pocket Revolution
Deus - In A Bar Under the Sea
Deus - Worst Case Scenario
UK - Night After Night
King Tubby - Father of Dub
Various - The Spirit of Radio
Various - Balance 013 : SOS

No more Cloudland Blue Quartet Track of the Day for now...

I've posted up almost 150 tracks since 1 January, giving you the whole of...

"Callingstill"
"Doveloveshawk"
"Ampersand"
"Anotherhappyday"
"Deeperdown"
"Erstazreal"
"Soundingfall"
"Splinterheart"

...ten discs in all - my song-based work from 1997 through to 2010...

I could now start posting up the soundscape/instrumental albums - but that's for another time...

Now you can look forward to the release this summer of the new album "Starlightnight"...

It is finished but I am working on it...

If you see what I mean...

This afternoon to my mum's where we were joined by sister Sheila and took a huge weight off her shoulders...

The ability to do this stemmed from our sister Pam leaving us now almost six months ago...

It does not get any easier to take that...

To Anne's mum's for tea with the family...

How do you watch television with children?

I guess you record it and watch it once they're sleeping...

They're lovely but having my own would encroach too much on what I want to do - once you have children, your life is over...

When I say that to people who have kids, they usually retort, "no no, your life is just beginning"...

Maybe they're right but I'm sticking to my guns...

Which isn't to say I don't appreciate my mum and dad's sacrifices to have me, Sheila and Pam...

Another sunny day - the trees at the end of the road, at the end of the day...



Highlight of the Day : Removing a weight...

The tall man coincidence...

Cloudland Blue Quartet - Track of the Day
"Never or Now" from "Splinterheart" (2010)


Playlist
Little Girls - Concepts
You Say Party! We Say Die - Xxxx
The Revolutionaries - Green Bay Dub
The Revolutionaries - Outlaw Dub
The Low Anthem - Smart Flesh
Deus - Pocket Revolution
Deus - In A Bar Under the Sea
Deus - Worst Case Scenario
UK - Night After Night
King Tubby - Father of Dub
Various - The Spirit of Radio
Various - Balance 013 : SOS

Much of the morning spent listening and ripping...

In the aftermnoon, out to Cramond in the hot, hot sun....









 



Lovely coffee and scones at a new cafe...







The two ladies sitting outside turned out to be my mum's old neighbour Janette and her auntie...

A natter was undertaken - mostly about the loss of sister Pam - although Janette also told the story of how, as a teenager in the mid fifties, the tall man by whose passing of her house every morning she used to time her departure for work was, in fact, Anne's dad...



As we left, the tide was coming back in...



Back home and a stroll around the building site nearby...





Trees appear to have been saved...







In the evening, started watching Eurovision but gave up to watch a new Swedish detective two parter on BBC4...

Watched the voting for Eurovision though, with Sweden overcoming the politically motivated point awarding by winning with a genuinely popular song - though it didn't do it for me...

As ever the original version is better than the performance was on the night...



To bed...

Highlight of the day : A new cafe at Cramond...

I love to go a wandering...

Cloudland Blue Quartet - Track of the Day
"The Apple of Your Eye pt 2" from "Splinterheart" (2010)

Playlist
UK - 2012 Setlist
UK - Night After Night
Charles Mingus - Ah Um
The Mars Volta - Octahedron
Various - Rock & Pop on Shuffleplay

Took ages to get to sleep and I woke at 5 - snoozed till 6:45 then, up for a tasty breakfast...



Checked out and onto the street towards St Pancras...





..and Kings Cross...



Picadilly Line...



...to Covent Garden...





...not yet set up...





Blue, blue sky above the National Opera House...





Walked towards Trafalgar Square...



...past the National Portrait Gallery...



...to St Martins in the Field...





...to check on today's lunchtime recital...



...enjoying Trafalgar Square...



..and the sculptures around the church - Odyssey by Robert Koenig...



Back through Leicester Square - still only 8:30 am...



...and into Soho but too early for the record shops...



...so continued up to Oxford Street and spent an hour in HMV from 9 till 10 - buying nothing...



...then, back into Berwick Street...



..to Sister Ray...



..and Reckless Records...



...in both of which, a haul was collected...

Unlike at Fopp - which did not entice...



...back to St Martins...



...for the Liszt and the Chopin...



I managed not to snore but must admit to dropping off a couple of times, despite the superbness of the music...

Back out into the sun but did not venture into the National Gallery...



...instead, made my way back to Covent Garden...



...now fully set up...



...and a gift for the Exec Producer was procured from this French lady...



Deciding against the Tate Modern, as I was running out of time, I took a walk through the environs...







...ending up back at Fopp where a couple of discs and Charles Mingus' autobiography this time enticed...

A rest in the gardens of this Soho church...



Before heading back to Kings Cross from Picadilly...



Back on board at 5:30...

Leaving London...



Reading and listening to Mr Mingus...



First stop, Peterborough...



Then, a change at York and my connection was half an hour late...



Eventually back underway, having to move seats to avoid a very annoying drunken Geordie using his mobile in the "quiet carriage" and smoking in the toilets...



Such small things can ruin a journey...

Darlington...


Durham - on the wrong side to view the cathedral thanks to the drunken oaf...




Newcastle...



Happily, said oaf alighted here, giving everyone some long longed for peace at last...



On into the night...



...and Morpeth - a further delay due to a beer can being stuck in one of the doors...



Onward as the sun was setting...







To Berwick Upon Tweed...



Over the river into Scotland...





Second last stop, Dunbar...



..and, finally, into Edinburgh only around fifteen minutes late...



Picked up by the Exec Producer and very glad to be home after an enjoyable 40 hours or so away...

Seemed a lot longer...

Highlight of the Day : Wandering in London...