Therapy For Me

W/C 3rd February 2025 Whatever we thought was going to happen when the world became more connected, this absolutely ain't it. I have spent the last few weeks speculating on the 'end-game' for the sector I work in. Not quite existential, but certainly diminished to a point that would have been unthinkable when I first wandered into a guitar shop back in the mid-eighties. Of course it is part of a b...

W/C 27th January 2025 You may well have heard of Rob Thomas, and if so it is entirely possible this is down to the Santana tune Smooth. Not only did he sing on that track, he also rewrote the lyrics and melody. My Rob Thomas story starts in Durham, on a Sunday afternoon and the purchase of the first Matchbox Twenty album from a little independent CD shop just this side of the bridge. It is a crack...

W/C 20th January 2025 I just need to accept the inevitability of not sleeping when I arrive here. But no, for the first two nights I tried to outwit my old LA nemesis by every single combination of pillow and bedding known to man, in the vain hope that I would unlock the mystical elixir of deep and unbroken sleep. You are aware in an instant, on awaking at 03:17, that sleep as an option has been p...

W/C 13th January 2025 Because I am not sure what to write this week, I am going to back fill a few bits of extra information on some of the stuff that came up... Duke Special was born just a few weeks before me in Northern Ireland, and the song of his I am banging on about was released in 2005. There is a Marillion tie-in as he often works with Ben Castle Pride and Prejudice (sort of) has just beg...

W/C 6th January 2025 It's always a little strange that the first couple of episodes of the New Year also mark the end of another year of TFM. Here we are at episode 52 of season 5, which means that next week will mark the beginning of my sixth year of banging away at whatever this curious little podcast actually is. Anyway, whilst searching to see if `I had used this weeks episode title before (wh...

W/C 30th December 2024 Having made the decision to go with Old December as the title track, it turns out I have already used it - way back at the end of December 2021. That left me with the dilemma of what to do, should I consider something different and if so should I re-record the final bit of the podcast? Of course that would have meant selecting another tune as an episode title, and nothing wa...

W/C 23rd December 2024 Here we go then, the Christmas TFM. Over the last couple of weeks I have been watching a lot of Christmas specials, you know the kind of thing Not Going Out, Gavin & Stacey, Frasier, Click & Collect, etc, etc. I have been over indulging in them for the reasons we do anything at this time of the year; they are there and they make you feel good. And I think some of tha...

W/C 16th December 2024 The biggest problem I had trying to replicate my Chrissy Mix playlist on Spotify came literally at the start of the process. Since my very crack at that particular selection, the first track had always been Gabriels Message by Marillion. No ifs, no buts, no negotiations. Of course that particular version started out life as a fan club only release, and still to this day is n...

W/C 9th December 2024 I am going to mention Love Actually in this week's TFM, and even though it is a bit of a passing reference, it prompted me to search out a video clip that I had seen a snippet of earlier in the week on instagram. I have therefore just watched the full speech that Hugh Grant made, as he introduced Richard Curtis at a recent awards ceremony. I draw it to your attention because...

W/C 2nd December 2024 Of course there are flip sides to everything. As you will hear I am going to make a plea for more impromptu conversation, and also talk about an epic gig in an epic venue. In both cases near disaster was only just averted. Take note; a) Whilst helping the Australian Lady with her bag as we all got off the train, I put down my rucksack because her case was quite heavy. I reali...

W/C 25th November 2024 I am currently sat in the McDonalds car park just off J35a of the M1, waiting for Josh to return with £8.08 of food. I literally have no clue what he has ordered, I was merely required for payment. This is one of those times when you are most certainly a piece of flesh connected to a credit card. After a fairly nail-biting game we are driving home with three points. Two send...

W/C 18th November 2024 I am dedicating this week's TFM to the person I sat next to on the train travelling to Manchester on Wednesday. You are going to hear all about it (obvs) but just to be clear the naming of the episode is most definitely for you. Which brings us to the album that particular track originates from, which is of course Full Moon Fever by Tom Petty. As it happens I had been listen...

W/C 11th November 2024 Where are we all at in terms of Christmas Lights? Don't get me wrong I am a big fan, but I went for a run in London on Thursday morning (around 06:15 so still very much dark) and as I stepped from the hotel I was met with the full twinkly, majestic force of the display as I proceeded toward Russell Square. I found myself wondering if the middle of November wasn't just a bit...

W/C 4th November 2024 The simple fact is that irrespective of whether the outcome is the one we wanted or not, we just have to keep going. It's fine to feel the way we all feel at the moment, and it's fine to try and make some sense of what just happened. It's also fine to want to distract your self with other stuff, take comfort from something that might seem a little irrelevant, or unimportant a...

W/C 28th October 2024 A bit of 80's pop you say? Go on then how about this banger from Erasure.... And it does talk to at least two things I have mentioned in today's TFM, albeit loosely, so I am on point in a roundabout kind of way. Other than that not much to say in way of set-up for this week, partly because it will detract from the content, and partly because I am late for my morning run. Stay...

W/C 21st October 2024 Here we are then, episode 250 of TFM... Yes, you could say it has gone by in the blink of an eye. But then again, if you think about what we have lived through in the backdrop to those 250 episodes, it has been a crazy ride. Whilst the COVID pandemic dominated the first couple of years, how could we also forget the transition of Presidents in the U.S, the nonsense around Brex...

W/C 14th October 2024 Although I will mention Keir this week, the episode title is not meant as a comment on the whole Taylor Swift affair/gate/scandal. Admittedly the idea that a politician meeting a famous pop star, and the police ensuring her safety doesn't take me to quite the same place as say illegally proroguing parliament, or breaking your own lockdown laws. But I will leave that one alone...

W/C 7th October 2024 However I was also very wrong, though as it turned out probably not because of a well thought through plan. The fact is that the Tories are now going to lurch to the right, in a desperate and misguided ploy to try and regain some of the votes they have lost to the Reform Party. One group of headbangers try to appeal to another group of headbangers, all with the zeal of the con...

W/C 30th September 2024 You will hear me talk about the Penshaw Monument in this weeks TFM, and pretty much everything I said about it was (on further investigation) wrong. It is in fact a memorial rather than some sort of Victorian Folly, and was built to commemorate the death of John Langton, the first Earl of Durham and the Governor-General of British North America. It is indeed officially know...

W/C 23rd September 2024 I am writing this at 10:02 on the 27th September. By my reckoning it is the 54th time I have witnessed this date, and would imagine that for forty-odd of those occurrences I should have some recollection. Except I am not sure I have. I have probably done many interesting things on this day through the years, for example it's possible it is one of the first days I spent at U...

W/C 16th September 2024 So I sat outside the British Library for a bit this week (as you will hear) with my face in the sunshine, and it was bloody lovely. There was a place to get coffee, one of those horse-boxy, old caravan style ones, and so I ordered a flat white. The coffee they were serving was 'origin' and it took me right back because the first time I had origin coffee was in Padstow about...

W/C 9th September 2024 Jarvis is so cool. And it doesn't matter what you think of Pulp as a musical force, he is just very, very, cool. As you will hear the choice of today's title came very much in the moment and as such I wasn't expecting to be listening to this song, or indeed watching the video. And it is so Pulp, so Jarvis, so bloody cool. Stay safe. Help the Aged - Pulp Cabin Pressure Therap...

W/C 2nd August 2024 As a slight departure from the norm I have chosen the live version of this song, taken from the Secret World tour. The reason being that it is one of the best live DVDs I can remember having seen. Back in the early noughties I was working for a music instrument retailer called Academy of Sound. I was working in the purchasing team, and every so often I would get little special...

W/C 26th August 2024 I don't actually follow the crowd on this album, I loved it then and I love it now. Yes it is over-blown, and pompous and so, so, impressed with itself, but do you know what I really like that about it. There was still other good stuff to come, but this was Oasis at their swaggering best, and this is why they still hold a fascination for some many people. For once I am going t...

W/C 19th August 2024 This has to be one of the nicest spots I have published a podcast from. I am sat overlooking the sea at the Cafe Iconic in Sant Antoni de Calonge, for no other reason than I need to immerse myself in there Wi-Fi gratis. We are getting to the back-end of what has been a fantastic time in Catalonia, firstly in Girona and latterly at the coast around Palamos. This really is a ver...