bluesshow bob's blues show blog |
A Blog is described as "a regularly updated website or webpage..." so I've signally failed as this is my first selection of ramblings since August. My son-in-law, west Walian artist Guy Manning, puts me to shame; he writes a daily Blog about the new oil painting he creates every single day under his 'Postcards From Pembrokeshire' initiative. ( www.postcardsfrompembrokeshire.com)
Well, it's been a busy few months. Since my last blog, I've compered the second Abertillery Rock and Blues Weekend - an event which has become so successful that contracts have already been signed for next year and the line-up looks superb (and includes an appearance by my old jamming buddy Danny Bryant). The organisers of the weekend are local music fans who decided they should try running their own festival after local council spending cuts saw the demise of the Abertillery Blues Festival just a year short of its 10th anniversary. I applaud them for their efforts and I know I'm not alone in this. I've also continued to 'air' the Blues Exclusive every week to four internet stations and (for those who are into statistics) can reveal that in the first six months of the show's existence, I have played tracks from 218 new albums in addition to lots and lots of Bluesic which already has its place in Blues history. A couple of the shows included lots of interview material - Blues Exclusive #23 has Andy Fairweather Low chatting informally about his fifty years in music and Blues Exclusive #28 has lots of conversation with Albert Castiglia. These episodes - along with all previous shows - are now accessible on my Playlists page a week after initial broadcast. So, if you missed the first broadcast, you can now listen in at any time. I'm also involved in the organising committee for the eleventh Tenby Blues Festival (unlike some festivals which are arranged by out of area 'for profit' companies, this is another event run by local music enthusiasts and is a real fixture in the British Blues calendar). The line-up for the event can be found at www.tenbyblues.co.uk where you can purchase tickets and, exclusively, this year will include the announcement of recipients of European Blues Awards for 2016. The event is now just a few weeks away and I'm really looking forward to it. My daytime role during the festival weekend will be to ensure that the Trail performers are set to go at the published times and to announce them. This will require so much rushing about from one side of Tenby to the other that I'm having to take on an assistant. More of that later...
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I've just created a new Facebook page 'The Blues Exclusive' to promote my shows as well as to accept your feedback, views and suggestions. Please send me a 'friend request' so we can build a meaningful dialogue.
End of blog! Quicker than usual... Today's blog will be about the letter 'P'. What's the letter 'P' got to do with Blues music? Well, apart from maybe Parchman Farm, Pinetop Perkins, Ian Parker or Paul Lamb. Read on... Back in the 1980s, one of the most popular television quiz programmes in the UK was 'Blockbusters' a tea-time offering which pitted a pair of teenagers against a single contestant. In essence, whoever was in control of the hive-shaped board selected a letter and was given a clue to a specific word beginning with that letter. We frequently saw a giggly youngster smiling conspiratorially and with pseudo-embarrassment before asking 'Can I have a 'P', please, Bob..." This stayed with me for years. On learning my name, people who didn't even know me would throw in the line as if they'd just thought of this wonderfully childishly-ambiguous amusing question. Then they'd fall about laughing and nudge each other to ensure everyone benefitted from their incredibly amazing spontaneous humour. How I laughed. Every time I heard it... Every single time... In truth, I was relieved when Bob the Builder became popular - it was, at least, something new... The letter 'P' can also, of course, save us from the frustration of trying to find somewhere to park when visiting an unfamiliar town so full marks to it for its useful intervention in this context. The letter 'P'. This story, which did the rounds a few years ago, is, apparently, true. For those unfamiliar with the game of rugby, when a scrum takes place the opposing teams hunker down, grip the opposing team members and push whilst waiting for the ball to arrive between the crouched mass of mankind. There have been many strategies developed over the years designed to give the team putting the ball in an advantage like spinning the ball, for example, so it would bounce towards their own players. But my favourite story involves the letter 'P'. To inform their own team members exactly where in the structure of the scrum they would be throwing the ball, the scrum half would shout out a word which would have no meaning at all to the opposition. The word would begin with either a letter 'S' where the ball would be pitched to the far side of the tunnel or the letter 'P' where the ball would be sent to the near side. (In fact, I've just wondered for the first time, as I'm writing this, whether they represented the nautical 'port' and 'starboard'. Maybe I'm just over-thinking this). So, if the scrum half shouted 'Sugar' or 'Spike' the hooker could anticipate the ball arriving on his right, a call of 'Priest' or 'Paper' and the ball was expected on his left. This system worked perfectly until one scrum half shouted 'psychiatrist!' And nobody moved... Which brings me to my final (and most important) letter 'P'. I mentioned on Facebook the other evening that I had been given a gift by James Oliver, the guitarist with Glas, (see my previous blog re: the recording of their new live album 'Just A Stage We're Going Through'). I said that I would reveal the nature of the gift over this weekend. One of my Facebook friends decided to second guess me and suggested that it could be a copy of the new album for review. In this, he was partially correct; it was a copy of the album. The first copy of the album. BUT: It's a copy for Preview not review. Never was a 'P' more important (apart from, perhaps, when driving through an unfamiliar city centre with a desperately full bladder and seeking a car park). It's actually a great album which demonstrates not just the capabilities of the three musicians but also shows how they just love to play. I will be Previewing several tracks from the album on this week's Blues Exclusive. Check out the broadcast times on my Home page. |