I am, or have been, a playwright. (Let me get back to you on that one.)
More certainly, I am the ghostwriter of Funny Bones, the autobiography of British comedian Freddie Davies, published in 2014.
I recently worked with another writer on a ghosted showbiz memoir, completed but as yet unpublished, and am currently engaged on a solo project: the biography of a songwriter mentioned in these pages, written with his active cooperation. I hope to have finished this by the end of 2024. A publisher has expressed an interest and, all being well, it should be published in 2025.
This blog was set up in order to preserve a dialogue which I had with the DJ Clarke Davis (Top Shelf Oldies) on the messageboard of Steve's Kewl Doo Wop Shop, a long-vanished Yahoo Group.
Over a few weeks in the autumn of 2000, and with occasional contributions from others, Clarke and I compared notes (he's American; I'm Scottish, and younger) about we grew to love doo wop. Pismotality, a word coined by Vernon Green in the Medallions' classic The Letter, was my username for that forum, hence the blog's title.
What's here is limited to the messages I had the foresight to print out at the time; if anyone else has access to more I'd be grateful to hear from them.
After I'd posted everything I had, however, I didn't want to stop. Rereading our exchanges, written at a time when I didn't even have a home PC - I was using a primitive internet TV, laboriously typing with a remote control - I remembered how exciting it had felt to be able to share my love of doo wop with like-minded listeners for the first time - the UK isn't that big on the genre.
So I began to post newly written pieces, initially about doo wop, then about my musical passions generally. Then other interests, such as comedy, crept in.
Some degree of personal reminiscence is built into most pieces, which explains the blog's subtitle: "Rummaging Through the Record Shop of Memory."
This may all be a form of displacement activity to avoid the serious business of playwriting ... (Let me get back etc.)
I can be contacted here.
Copyright:
I have included pictures and extracts from lyrics to illustrate my posts. If you feel I have violated your copyright let me know and I will remove the material or add a credit, as you wish. Please note there is no copyrighted music to download on this blog, which only contains embedded youtube clips and links to streamed audio on spotify.
