The Corona Diaries

Well that was a rum do. We had quite the epic trying to record Chapter 146. If it wasn't the microphone with the mind of it's own, it was the Zoom connection, and if it wasn't the Zoom connection it was the sound of mi goretex (and yes I know I've taken liberties with the spelling of rustle in the title...) And the fact I was struggling a little with the ol' synapses was just the cadburys flake on...

The scene takes place in the kitchen of a traditional country cottage. A door at the front of the room opens into an entrance porch, and the back door opens to a garden with more than adequate quantities of lavender. There is a table and chairs, a Cappuccino maker and the the front window overlooks a village green. There is evidence of cricket, but no match is currently taking place. (sound of a f...

There are a couple of moments in this weeks chapter when I tried my hand at improv. Whilst answering a question about Pour My Love I decided (in the moment no less) to illustrate my point by playing a bit of the keyboard part. Not a bad idea you would have thought, especially as I had the piano on front of me - and do you know what, I absolutely nailed it. Boom. No more than five minutes later, an...

A chance exchange in this weeks TCD (sorry Lucy) resulted not only in an episode title, but also a little digital stroll where I chanced upon a whole new internet experience. The website in question is called RhymeZone and it is quite simply inspired. You merely tap in your chosen word, in this case Cowell, and before you can say "high waistline" you get the following response; Words that rhyme wi...

There's a point in this weeks episode where we find ourselves trying (and subsequently failing) to recollect the name of a particular procedure of chemical analysis. It will be blatantly obvious when you reach that point in proceedings, and as it would also be hard to class it as a spoiler, I will tell you it's that one with a splodge on a bit of blotting paper. Now the point I am trying to make i...

For the purposes of reference this week (you may need to read back after you have listened). Staithes - Staithes is a seaside village in the borough of Scarborough in North Yorkshire, England. The name Staithes derives from Old English and means 'landing-place'. Staithes has numerous narrow streets and passageways; one of these, Dog Loup, with a width of just 18 inches (45.7 cm), is claimed to be...

I am not lying when I tell you that I learnt three things this week, whilst recording Chapter 140. And it wasn't just me, Ant picked up a couple of new nuggets of information as well. On the surface this would seem a good thing, however the danger of all this enlightenment is that when you have a limited amount of spare capacity (cranially speaking) you run the risk of discarding something importa...

If memory serves, we haven't ever recorded an episode of The Corona Diaries between Christmas & New Year. Obviously I haven't gone to the trouble of actually checking that fact, I am relying purely on gut instinct and the lingering after-taste of industrial-strength descaler. Of course the beauty of this period of the year is that it's a bit like the twilight-zone, with nobody really quite sur...

For this years Christmas special episode we decided to unburden ourselves from the shackles of pre-episode preparation and exacting production standards and show our rarely-seen playful side. And what better way to get the party started, than by welcoming Linette to TCD - even if that did mean distracting her with a glass of Kylie's Prosecco, whilst simultaneously placing a microphone into her oth...

*excerpt from production notes, TCD chapter 137 1: Preamble - use a bit of the Zoom audio from Tuesday, the audio quality isn't great but it sets the scene and if it turns out the episode is late for the purples it will add credibility to the excuse. 2: Intro - try and 'Christmas' it up a bit, after all it's half way through December 3: Main Section - we might be struggling for time a bit this wee...

Listening back to Chapter 136 of TCD (sorry Lucy) it struck me that maybe a few explainers were in order. Now that isn't because I think that any of you are anything other than fully-rounded citizens of the world, broad of knowledge and generous of spirit. Rather that there are a few references this week that may only resonate with a person of a certain time, from a certain place. So here we go......

Well we tried... Ant had a look under his bed, but couldn't find any mention of Less Is More in the back copies of The Web magazine he's been hoarding. And as promised I gave the album a listen through...but alas, it didn't provide the aural kick to my synapses that I had hoped. Of course we are nothing if not a pair of old pro's, and so when the red light went on we gave it our best shot anyway (...

After all the excitement of bus drivers and percussionists, long haired sound men and keyboardists this feels like a very run of the mill chapter of TCD (sorry Lucy). So for 134 Ant and I pick up on our semi-regular album chat feature, and for those of you who have been paying attention that means Less is More. Of course in our case it's a little bit more Less is Less as there is, at this point, a...

For those of us that lived through his achievements in real time, it's easy to close my eyes and be taken right back to the moment when Seb Coe lined up in the final of the 1500m at the Los Angeles Olympics in 1984. Middle-distance running took on almost rock'n'roll stature at the time in Britain, as Steve Ovett, Steve Cram & Seb Coe dominated both the centre piece events of 800 & 1500 bre...

One of the purples mentioned in the comments for a recent chapter (I think it was Paula Collewijn as it goes...) 'just curious, who is the creator behind these funny episode titles?' Well Paula it's a bit of a mixed-bag. Sometimes it's Ant, sometimes it's me, but more often than not they kind of come up in conversation - and when this happens it's because we follow a secret and special formula. He...

Recording The Corona Diaries on the road is a little challenging to say the least. You are always at the mercy of the local wi-fi connection, the rooms are often a bit lively (from an audio perspective, obvs...) and I am constantly a bit tight on time. There is however one definite up side, and that is the fact that a ton of interesting, funny and genuinely lovely people are also in close proximit...

It's only taken 130 episodes, but we have finally completed the set. Backstage at the Tivoli Vredenburg in Utrecht, resplendent against the magnolia painted breeze-block walls, Mark Kelly himself became the final member of Marillion to pop his TCD cherry. As you would expect he was top value, fizzing between his take on the current tour, the development of the tech that drives the show and how he...

What a joy it was to hardly say anything on this weeks Chapter of TCD... One of the highlights (if not THE highlight) of the new album, and the current tour has been having the legendary Mr Luis Jardim in the building. And to top it off he only went and agreed to come and share the love on the podcast. What a guy... I managed to cobble together some microphones, and Ant squirrelled himself aw...

No time to chat this week because I am busy packing for the European Tour, so I am just going to leave the episode highlight in a succinct, bullet-point, stylee. Linette still has those amazing jugs, in fact I just reached up and grabbed 'em. Check out my instagram feed if you don't believe me. I do often think of myself as a victorian water-closet. Just because it has a key-hole, doesn't mean you...

After what Liz has managed to achieve in her first week on the job, we felt the least we could do would be to finish the backstory to the Dry Land Album. So for your delectation and delight, and not least as a reward for your patience, we will cover the last tree tracks on the album proper as well as a little curveball that Ant casually tossed in my direction to check I was paying attention. And t...

On location in the Steel City. Perched on seven hills like Rome, and with a river running underneath, it is the home of football (according to Ant), the only place to get a Hot Roast Pork sandwich and the place that gave me the moment I realised, NOTHING could be better than being in a rock'n'roll band. Of course when you take your recording studio and plonk it in a crowded restaurant you do place...

The band-breakfast-names seem to be reaching a climax, and it’s all gone a little bit Strictly. “What?!” I hear you cry. Well, you know in the early rounds of Strictly, (or Bake Off for that matter) all the offerings are kind of OK. You know the kind if thing, a solid 5 but not much more. Well with the exception of Ian Muesli that’s where we were at with this. But by the time you have finished lis...

If you are a regular then you will have heard me mention Lord B. He was the press guy who used to make the special rabbit drawings in an attempt to get me to stop rambling in interviews. It dawned on me whilst we were recording 124 that, in fact, he had got it all wrong. Take the chapter you are about to listen to. The idea was to continue discussing the Dry Land album. We had covered the first fo...

With a gentle breeze, and fair seas we head off in the direction of more How We Live chat. This week its an in-depth look at the lyrical inspiration behind the first four tracks on the album, which conjures up lots of memories that may have otherwise have been forgotten. Cue, tales of Joe Cocker, flaming arrows, military grade smoke grenades and the first of many attempts to have a hit with Dry La...

We nearly got underway on Wednesday, but in the end problems with mi plug-ins just kept coming in Waves and we had to reconvene on Thursday. At times there's no Logic, and you have to take a deep breath and re-group. Although we started a little late on Thursday it looked more promising, only to stall before we got out of second gear. But then, when all seemed lost, a miracle of sorts. The stars a...