Have just finished watching the above BBC TV documentary about Ray Davies and a review in the Independent, readable here , gets it roughly ...

As a reluctant nod to the season, herewith Christmas Prayer, a lesser-known Valentines track from 1955 - at least it isn't on th...

 I see from the magic of statcounter that someone who googled the above question today was directed to the Gnome Though...

I can't pretend I listened to every single edition of Mark Lamarr's BBC Radio 2 show Shake Rattle and Roll - too much non-Carl Perk...

This is to alert readers that Ian Whitcomb's peerless radio show has moved from Luxuria to XM 24. My post about his Luxuria programme, ...

For a while I though it was so obscure there might not be an image of the above album cover online, but of course there was. I bought it,...

If the title of this post has already made you think of Dion and the Belmonts' Teen Angel ("Our love is young,/Now we are one...

I started writing this blog one year ago tomorrow, which prompts a post-length period of reflection: is there anything I have learnt? Any wi...

As a postscript to recent entries linking rock'n'roll to the atomic age, here's a doo wop recording well known to me which is b...

This clip from last night's episode of the UK sitcom Peep Show demands a wider audience. And it's music-related (after a fashion)...

With the thirtieth anniversary of John Lennon's death coming up, I'd like to share my memories of that time, even if this turn...

This is a very simple, not to mention infantile, idea which could be catching, if any Beatle people are reading this. Hey, maybe it could e...

This series started as an exploration of David Bowie's early influences ("Gnome" as in The Laughing Gnome) but has dri...

By way of an extended footnote to the previous post, more about repression in fifties Britain, this time through the prism of radio comedy,...

You can find out more about the the Britain in which John Lennon, Alan Klein and so many others grew up in Humphrey Carpenter's book Th...

  Listened last night to another of the very highly recommended LENNONYC "Beyond Broadcast" podcasts discussed in post 29 , this...

Only one more volume of the Fabulous 50s to go, but if you're not so keen on the tracks which don't come straight from the fridge (...

Here's the tracklisting (including some youtube links) for the 1958 volume of the Fabulous 50s series, plus some brief notes made at th...

Talking of those darlings of the Cold War, a current British TV comedy show has a regular sketch based on a very simple premise: the Beatle...

"C'mon, lads - let's reck not of the morrow!" One thing I haven't yet addressed in this scamper through the 1950s UK ...

Below is one of the few clips from Lipstick On Your Collar currently available on youtube, though I don't know how long for, so hurry. ...

The main point of looking at those 1950s CDs was to see what was in the charts before rock'n'roll, but I'm going to reproduce th...

As we cruise into the second half of the fifties in this series rock'n'roll is really kicking in, though big ballads and old-fashion...

As this compilation series heads for the mid-fifties there are one or two portents of what is to come: the Sinatras and the Mario Lanzas may...

  As 1955 approaches this world is not set to last much longer. Johnny Ray, the final artist on this compilation, is not rock'n'rol...

Having talked in recent posts about the sickly nature of the pre-rock'n'roll British charts, now seems a good point for a quick loo...

 I have just seen Stop Dreamin' at the Yvonne Arnaud Theatre in Guildford, where it's running till 6th November. Sad to report t...

Further musical connections, presented in more fragmentary a form than usual; an explanation will be furnished for the above image in due c...

Have just listened to, and thoroughly recommend, "Right", Said Ted and Myles, which can be heard until October 26th on BBC Ra...

Further investigation into JP Long takes us back to Stratford East as, along with M. Scott, he wrote Oh It's a Lovely War, the 1917 mus...

Have just found JP Long's lyrics for the original version of My Old Man's A Dustman, actually entitled What D'Yer Think of ...

This is to alert readers that a programme about the writers of Bernard Cribbins' comedy songs, Myles Rudge and Ted Dicks, is going to b...

Consider this post a Guardian-style Corrections and Clarifications column for earlier entries, as this is the first opportunity I've...

More information about Alan Klein, thanks to Spencer Leigh , author of Halfway to Paradise ...