Plain Or Pan

Mike D barreled his way through the UK last week on a four date mini tour that took in Brighton, Glasgow, Manchester and London. The shows were part of a wider European jaunt, booked to support the release of Thank You, the first album of new music to include Mike’s voice since Adam Yauch passed… Continue reading The D Is For Diamond

I noticed Gaz Coombes celebrating an anniversary this weekend. Nope, it wasn’t the 20th – or (stops…counts…yep…) even 30th – trip around the sun for any one of those great Supergrass records. Gaz was delighted to confirm he has now been nicotine and weed-free for a full year, something of a milestone for a guy… Continue reading Gaz Top

A trip to London, November 1989. We were there for the Stone Roses show at Alexandra Palace, the group’s biggest gig in a year that had seen their unstoppable rise from Manchester’s margins via Glasgow’s Rooftops to a room full of 8000 zeitgeist-surfing music fans. Such is the need nowadays to be seen – and… Continue reading X. Rated.

I ain’t no mariner. Approaching ancient maybe, but these legs work best when firmly planted on dry land. I don’t need the stars to guide me (I wouldn’t know where to start), yet without even the use of an iPhone app, I know my norths and souths. If I stand on Irvine beach with Arran… Continue reading Flying Vs

Next time you’re having a wee night in – just you, a bottle of whatever and a pile of 7″ singles – make sure you take the time to flip Dexys’ Geno over (we’ve all got it, right?) to its b-side. There, you’ll find a real breakneck run-through of The Bandwagon‘s Breaking Down The Walls… Continue reading Bandwagonesque

Wire‘s Pink Flag is, as you know, essential listening. Twenty one tracks in little over half an hour trip over themselves in a rush to the finish line, skinny-waisted, free of flab, fighting fit at flyweight…or I Am The Flyweight, if y’prefer. Drums, bass, guitar and vocals meld as one; shouty in parts, pseudo-menacing in… Continue reading Strange Couple

Our first house was a two up, two down, easy to keep semi in a quietish part of Ayrshire. We decorated as we went, wallpapering here, painting there. We did up the kitchen, sorted out the bathroom, replaced the front door and got a professional carpet cleaner in, watching in mock coolness – “Ach, it’s… Continue reading Speeding, Fine

See if you’re going to crawl around on top of a slag heap in yr birthday suit, with only a giant turtle shell on top of your back to protect you from the elements, you don’t really need to signpost your everyday state of mind to the uninitiated. For emphasis though, you might, should a… Continue reading Movin’ On With My Very Best Friend

The uncracked, ochre-washed spine of a book leapt out at me from the shelf of an Irvine charity shop recently, followed immediately by a shuddering Proustian rush of deja vu. The offending novel, David Coventry’s The Invisible Mile was something I’d tackled – slowly and painfully – a decade or so ago. Based on a… Continue reading Pédaler en Grand Braquet

“Bill! BILL!!! Stop! STOP!!! The bassline, man… What you playin’ at? Disco’s been over for six whole months. Get your mind off the 13-year olds in Tramp and focus on the task in hand, man!” “Mick…Mick! It ain’t disco…it’s John Taylor, innit?” 1983 was a strange year for your chart-friendly heritage rock acts. Paul McCartney… Continue reading Loud Enough To Bust Your Brains Out

I’m a sucker for a well-sung harmony. You know the sort of thing, a radiant Gibb brothers burst of aural sunshine, a California-coated Mamas and Papas heart melter, a slow-ooze of Bellshill Beach Boys triple-stacked greatness from the three original Teenage Fanclubbers out front with the mics and the guitars and the great, great tunes.… Continue reading E Harmony

I’ve been asked a few times the past week where folk can pick up copies of my Trashcan Sinatras books. The Perfect Reminder was initially available through Last Night From Glasgow, but it seems they have no stock left. If you’re so inclined, you’ll find the last dozen copies at that most obvious of retailers.… Continue reading Weller-Approved

John Douglas 1963 – 2026 “How’s it gaun? Y’awright?” These were usually John Douglas’s first words, whether one or two songs into a set with the Trashcan Sinatras, or more recently out front on his own, but also any time you met him. Throwaway (and maybe even insincere when spoken by anyone else), but delivered… Continue reading Everything Was Enhanced By You

The boy always had bikes. From the moment he spied his big sister’s, he wanted one of his own. He had a wee yellow Halfords-made thing, a Stinger, all go-faster stripes and cartoon wasps with helmet to match, and it wasn’t long before he was cycling death-defying circles on the front grass, the stabilisers dispensed… Continue reading The Freewheelin’ Blog Thrillin&#821...

Brian Epstein, in possibly one of the first genius music marketing moves, had The Beatles record a couple of vocal tracks in German, the idea being that the fans in the country where the group had served their musical apprenticeship would be rewarded with a Beatles hit or two in their native language. Abba did… Continue reading Silly Billy

American groups – like any number of those Nuggets bands you can reel off in your sleep – or The Turtles or The Byrds (‘animal’ name, weird spelling – coincidence?!?) grew their mom’s apple pie American boy crewcuts out the moment The Beatles first yelled ‘yeah!‘ They adopted the instruments…the stance…the harmonies…everything they...

There’s a La’s story I was party to a few years ago. It concerned the recording of their album – I mean, it would, wouldn’t it? The gist of the story involved a conversation between Lee Mavers and a producer – Mike Hedges, maybe, Steve Lillywhite, perhaps (whichever one they’d been encouraged to work with… Continue reading Gerry Synonym

We’d spent our formative drunken teenage years falling out of lofts, falling through hedges and falling out and in with each other through a holy triumvate of sounds; New Order’s Blue Monday, Simple Minds’ I Travel and the entirety of Talking Heads’ Stop Making Sense album, so when Alex Aitken one day thrust a copy… Continue reading Swamp Thing

When you first attacked that plank of wood you had the cheek to call an electric guitar, if you were like me you were in immediate need of something with which to amplify your clunky chord changes and morse code ‘solos’. If you were in luck, you might’ve found yourself in possession of a wee… Continue reading Speakers Corner

David Bowie‘s Low is an album with its own split personality. On side one you get the interesting guitar stuff, heavily treated and effected tracks that cut against the punkish musical landscape of the era. On side two you get the icy cool of Bowie’s (and Eno’s) mainly vocal-free take on Kraftwerk and Tangerine Dream… Continue reading When I Put My Foot Down To The Flo...