John Martyn

John Martyn died today, aged 60. I could choose I don’t know how many songs to share to remember him but here is one of his most famous and best. I love this version. It’s from the Transatlantic Crossing series – so many wonderful performances in those programmes. Here he’s joined by Kathy Mattea, Danny [...]

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Plants, music and sacred places

I wandered into the Cathedrale Saint-Saveur in Aix en Provence the other day. It’s one of those awe-inspiring spaces. In fact, it’s a multiple of spaces inside, some vast, and some small and intimate. I’m always interested in the way plants are used by human beings (enthobotany is the correct term!) and so it was [...]

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Glasvegas

Oh I like this!
A lot!

Very Scottish, very Glasgow. Great wall of sound music. And such great lyrics (know any other songs about social workers?) -
I`ll be at your side to console
when your standing on the window ledge
I`ll talk you back from the edge
I will turn your tide
be your shepherd and your [...]

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Music from the heart

Last night I went to see Aly Bain and Phil Cunningham in concert at Falkirk Town Hall and, oh, how I enjoyed it. What a great evening’s entertainment. To be quite honest I’ve always had a bit of a love/hate relationship with Scottish music which can be everything from twee to tear-jerkingly emotional but I [...]

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Better. Tom Baxter song.

The Beatles were the band I grew up liking. One of the first “singles” (yes, the little, black, vinyl things!) I bought was “She Loves You”, closely followed up by “I Want to Hold Your Hand”. I don’t know how significant that is but maybe it explains a little why I am such a sucker [...]

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Music and the geography of the spirit

I’m enjoying a series on BBC Scotland just now. It’s called Scotland’s Music with Phil Cunningham. Phil’s an amazing contemporary Scottish traditional musician and each part of this short series examines the relationship between some aspect of Scotland and Scottish music. This week’s episode (Part 4) was entitled ‘Heaven and Earth’ and explored what Phil [...]

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The Water Experience

A big part of the debate about homeopathy centres on the issue of ultra-high dilutions of medicines. One of the explanations wheeled out is something called ‘the memory of water’ – it’s a catchy phrase but very problematic. Does water have a memory and if so, how does that work? The anti-homeopathy campaigners say it [...]

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Ben Ledi Grey and Pink

Ben Ledi Grey and Pink, originally uploaded by bobsee.
The view from my window…….I find this very soothing.
I can’t see and a grey and pink scene like this without having one particular song play through my mind…..

 

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Tangled up in Bob

OK, so this is how the web works. I sat down at my iMac and typed “Jack Kerouac writing tips”. Not sure why that came to me right at this moment but it did. I started clicking through some of the finds and came across a lovely blog called “myinneredge” where I read a post [...]

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“I’m happy basically. But before my stroke, I wasn’t really” Edwyn Collins

Last weekend’s Sunday Herald carried an article about Edwyn Collins. The headline spread over two pages was “I’m happy basically….but before my stroke, I wasn’t really”. Well, as you might imagine, that caught my attention.
Edwyn Collins is a singer. You maybe remember his 1994 hit “A girl like you”

Just over couple [...]

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