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Cud - 'Rich And Strange'. They don't make 'em like that any more!

Don't know it. I've been plagued by 'Shout, shout, let it all out' by some 80s band.

Gill the Piano wrote:Don't know it. I've been plagued by 'Shout, shout, let it all out' by some 80s band.

That was Tears For Fears, biggest British hit was 'Everybody Wants To Rule The World', though they also had the original of 'Mad World', which I think plagerises a little of Yusuf Islam 'Matthew and Son' from the 60s.

'Wyvern' by Boone and Murfin. It goes 'Home is a place where you always turn to, and if you want you can really learn to fly'. It was written and recorded as a theme song for Radio Wyvern which served the two counties of Herefordshire and Worcestershire between 1982 and 2012. It really is a great song - pity I can't find it anywhere on fileshares or YT. Sammy Southall, who is a photographer based in Kidderminster and also happened to be the first voice on Wyvern in 1982 (which I heard as a 12 year old in Smethwick) might be able to point me in the right direction. He has a website.

Summer of 69 by a darn good Canadian musician (something Justin Biebersley will never be even in his dreams!!) Someone in Aldis Bromsgrove earlier on had it as a ringtone and Ken Bruce played it yesterday!!

The attempts at pulling myself out of the doldrums continues in earnest, with a degree of uncertainty as to how long they'll last, or even whether they will work if my soul does not respond to them. The latest medicine comes in the form of 'Sunchyme' by Dario G, named after one of the longest serving British football (boo) managers in history, sampling 'Life In A Northern Town' by Dream Academy which in itself was mistakenly written about the bands' biggest influence, Nick Drake.

Good Day Sunshine. Which is odd because although it has been sunshiny, it has also been v. breezy with horizontal rain.

A sing along in Welsh is another good remedy and my favourite song by my all-time favourite Welsh vocal group Hogia'r Wyddfa: Safwn Yn Y Bwlch. Gyda'n gilydd, fe safwn ni, dros ein iaith, gwlad, pobl, plant.

In The Hall Of The Mountain Kings. I picked up a Naxos of both the Peer Gynt suites that doesn't have the Piano Concerto no1 on it also just to fill in time.

Naxos are a midprice label, however many charity shops either underprice or overprice them. Whenever I see them underpriced, I always buy. When I see Chandos, Hyperion and Deutsche Grammophon for a pound a go, I definitely buy.

I Am The Beat by The Look. Simon Hayfield always used to sing this in school.

I know it's early but I found it last night, Cwcwll by the band Beganifs, from the Gwyrfai valley in north Wales. 'Alaw sy'n newid y donfeddi'r donfedd...' Quite a psychedelic track too, remember it from when I was learning Welsh.

Moving by Supergrass - from Oxford.

Last night it was Nice Legs, Shame about the Face for some reason or other. Which carried over into this morning. Possibly to do with the Boat Races?

The theme tune from WKRP in Cincinnati. I used to love this when it was on English TV in the early 80s, it was about a badly-run radio station in the American Midwest. I asked everyone what WKRP stood for and they didn't have a clue, but this was before I understood the system of three and four letter callsigns for radio and TV licenses in the USA. Stations east of the Mississippi have the callsign W--- or W-- and in the west it's K--- or K--. We had a radio station called BRMB and I was never sure what that stood for until much later (BiRMingham Broadcasting)

After fixing a ceiling rose in.....There Is A Rose in Spanish Harlem by, among other artists, The Drifters.

Not had it 'on my mind' per se, but I've been thinking about it a lot in recent days; Paul Evans - Hello This Is Joanie (The Telephone Answering Machine Song). Not least because Joanie was my mother in law - from Farrock in Essex.

Don't you wish your girlfriend was hot, like me! I can imagine Arthur Mullard and Hylda Baker doing a cover version of that, or maybe Wilfred Pickles and Doris Hare!

Marigold by Billy Mayerl, an English piano genius and a bit of a comedian to boot. Here he is:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Aaq0bS_lxYo

Today it's been 'Can you feel it all run deeeawn (x2) in the place where lost is feeeawnd, That Great Love Seeeawnd' by The Raveonettes. A trifle wallpapery but catchy.

Started off today with 'He Who Would Valiant Be' to the tune Monks Gate, and then New York, New York. Oh, the lovely lovely Margarita Pracatan.....I LOVE YOU, PRA CA TAN!!!!

She was wonderful, wasn't she...I wonder if she's still going? Had a google, she seems to be still with us but very tight lipped about her age, bless her!

Those Saturday Night Clive shows were awfully predictable, banal and highly managed, but that all went out the window when Margarita Pratacan sat at that piano and afterwards, her conversation with Clive James could produce anything! He also had Peter Cook on his show and that was equally as spontaneous (ly combustible).

I cannot stop whistling 'Enola Gay' by Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark (or OMD as they later became). Who'd had thought a song about the destruction of a Japanese city by an atomic bomb in 1945 and subsequent superpower arms race could be the basis for a catchy pop song? Like Maxwell's Silver Hammer sort of thing (The Beatles - serial murder).

When I was a 6th former the music A level lot were given a junior choir to do 2 songs in a competition. We won with 'Leaving on a Jet Plane' and 'Maxwell's Silver Hammer'. Guess which one the kids liked best?

A blooming brilliant song and very well sung:- Charlie Dore 'Pilot Of The Airwaves':

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AUAo6kMD3vg

Peter & Gordon 'Knight In Rusty Armour'. No, I don't know why either.

The hymn 'When I Needed A Neighbour' as it was sung today. I am probably to blame for that as I passed on some unused sheet music to the Director in Music in church that contained that one, which was nice to hear again after all these years. Also, TOMS was sung also which I've long regarded as a service-closing belter.

Unfortunately we had 'Give Me Oil In My Heart; today - gah! Couldn't play along with the vic;s gitbox as he was a good quarter of a tone flat to the organ...

...and we also had 'When I Needed A Neighbour' at the dedication service to the local Foodbank, to which my wife and I had two referrals and food parcels for in the time I've been away from this page - and so it will always be my 'own' charity:

https://b30.foodbank.org.uk/

run by the Trussell Trust:

https://www.trusselltrust.org/

The harvest stuff today went to the One Can Trust in High Wycombe. Apparently they're knee deep in tins of soup, bless them.

Not the sort of tune to have on your mind really, but 'Einstein On The Beach' by Philip Glass was on the radio this morning as I was walking along the road into work, the '1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8' repetition is perfect to give your sense of rhythm a workout.

I have the same piece on now in binaural stereo and it's even more infectious.

250 years too late for my taste!

Does that make Brian Eno about 150 years too late???

Fraid so...

High Hopes a la Frank Sinatra.

At work, 'Magic Fly' by French techno outfit Space came on the instore radio station. I haven't heard it for years! I used to have it on a K-Tel compilation.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P_ukfGAd8T4

Loved that one. My niece as a kid had an obsession about Popcorn and made my brother play it every day. I liked the Crunch by the Rah Band too. There were some good electronic instrumentals in the 70s.

The Crunch was also on the same K-Tel compilation as Magic Fly that I had, called Disco Fever:

https://www.discogs.com/Various-Disco-F ... ter/105079

Not singling any track out, every one was a boster. 'Don't Walk Boogie' was another one I had too.

A bit of old Arnie today. Not Schwarzenegger, however:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7DKvTTMsoBc

Another new one on me. Today's earworm; the dreadful sax music from the now tv ad. Yech.

Only Pink Floyd could release a single about a bloke who pinches lingerie from ladies' washing lines and tries them on, even in the 60s!

10CC did one about a weirdo on one of their albums but I can't remember which. And Radiohead did 'Creep'.

AC DC did Night Prowler, on the Powerage album.

Today, with thanks to Co-Operative Radio it's been 'A Girl Like You' which sounds like Edwyn Collins is sur la toilette and not having a great deal of joy whilst he's singing it.

Bohemian Rhapsody on a loop today. Good job I love it.

Whilst Telemann's Viola and Recorder concerti was playing as I've been preparing a spaghetti bolognese on the hob and roasting a honeyed gammon joint in the oven, I was actually thinking: Telemann, Telemann, who wanna be a Telemann....

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nhLQO4JWeu4

(great stereo on this one)

Shirley Ellis' Clapping Song. You know the one, my momma told me if I was goody that she would buy me a rubber dolley. The Belle Stars covered it in the early 80s.

Today: Woo-ooo Black Betty, bam-a -lam.....

and here, 'In The Hall Of The Mountain Kings' from the Peer Gynt Suite by Grieg, with a bit of Barwick Green and Kaempfert's 'A Swingin' Safari' thrown in.

Still early in the day, but a wonderful well-written track courtesy of an American man named Donald:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w58E2S315a4

He said on his new tablet, Substitute by Clout, who were a South African girl rock band. The song was a cover of an old Righteous Brothers track.

Caribbean, by Brian Bonsor. Young Musician Concert tomorrow morning and it's one of the pieces my P7 class are playing. I am accompanying five pieces so had better try to fit in some extra practice today.