The aptly named Home Again is the sixth solo album by Edwyn Collins.
Initially recorded in late 2004 it was not completed until early 2007 and was released on 17th September 2007 on the Heavenly label.
The reason for the delay was, as I'm sure most of you are aware, because Edwyn suffered tow brain haemmorhages in February 2005 leading to a long period of hospitalisation followed by rehabilitation.
Initially the only things he was able to say were yes, no, Grace Maxwell and the possibilities are endless the latter of which became the titel of a documentary film on his recovery in 2014
All his solo albums are consistently good and Home Again is no exception, Critically well received reflecting both the quality of the record and the joy and relief to see the great man back making music again.
Your September Gurl albeit a day later than expected is of course none other than Ms Julie London.
It looks as though she is fishing this month and appears to be sensibly attired just in case she falls in.
September may by the 9th month but I make it this is the 11th installment from her Calendar Girl album with only October to go.
Some of you will probably be familiar with this months song September in the Rain..Controversially it is actually dry for once in Glasgow as I write this.
A popular song about nostalgia (which ain't what it used to be) it was written by Harry Warren and Al Dublin and first turned up in the 1937 film Melody for Two where it was sung by James Melton.
Wiki lists at least 50 versions from the likes of Frank Sinatra and Doris Day to Annie Lennox, Rod Stewart and Jools Holland & Paul Weller
According to the sleevenotes Julie's version is pleasing enough to make you go out and buy your own raincloud..... or maybe not
This week's Vintage Country Vinyl artist is the man with the guitar shaped swimming pool honky tonk artist Mr Webb Pierce.
He graces one side of an album with the previously featured Jimmy Dean on the other side.
The man who had more number one hits than any other country artist in the 1950s
Best known for In the Jailhouse Now and the man who wrote the epic There Stands the Glass.
Needless to say neither of those feature today.
There is however a song about Panhandles just to please George.
Not content with a tacky swimming pool Webb also had a honky town car.Those small circular things are silver dollars!
Michael Weston King is an English Americana/country singer who has enjoyed a solo career as well as having been the main man in The Good Sons and who is now one half of the country duo My Darling Clementine with his wife Lou Dalgleish.
His 7th solo album A New Kind of Loneliness from 2007 and on the Floating World label.was my second recent charity shop purchases.
I'm pretty sure that I have seen him a couple of times in the early 2000's when he was somewhat more hairy.
I have a couple of his songs on compilations but this is the first of his that I have ever owned.
I'm not sure whether to file it under W or K. Given there is no hyphen I'm thinking K
The album contains what I think may be a first for CCM - a Gilbert O'Sullivan cover!
Confession time and here is where I loose the little credibility that I have left.As a young lad I was a huge Gilbert O'Sullivan fan and even kept a scrapbook full of cuttings!
I'll get my coat
Mrs CC is currently having a bit of a clear out. This involves countless trips to the tip and to charity shops.
She made a school girl error the other day when she was content to sit in the car while I struggled into the charity shop weighed down by a large mirror and two large bags of clothes.
I was there longer than she anticipated as my instincts kicked in and I felt obliged to check out the CDs.
I came away a pound lighter but two CDs heavier.
One was Going Back Home by Wilko Johnson and Roger Daltry on the mighty Chess label. It has featured here before . Previously my brother had lent me it and I thought that I had it on the shelves. It turns out that I downloaded it but never got round to producing a physical copy. That has now been sorted.
Maybe not the oddest of couples apparently they bonded after sitting next to each other at an awards ceremony and finding that they shared a mutual love for Johnny Kidd & the Pirates Wilko Johnson & Roger Daltrey - Sneaking Suspicion
It was really sad to read that Americana singer and guitarist Neal Casal has taken his own life at the age of just 50.
I saw him play as a solo artist on a number of occasions and as a guitarist with Lucinda Williams.
He was also a member of Hazy Mallaze and then one of Ryan Adam's Cardinals. He subsequently played guitar with both Hard Working Americans and the Chris Robinson Brotherhood.
For those interested in his solo work the anthology Leaving Traces: Songs 1994-2004 is a good place to start. On hearing the sad news the first album I reached for was 2000's Anytime Tomorrow on the Glitterhouse label and the song Willow Jane.
A fine singer and song writer and a great guitarist.
If you were to travel directly west from where we live the first state of the USA you would reach would be Maryland.
Baltimore is in Maryland. I believe that when Lincoln was on his way to Washington DC to take up residence there he travelled through Baltimore at night to avoid possible assassination. And Baltimore is the setting of the tv show “Homicide: Life On The Streets”, which ran for 7 series. SEVEN? Man Alive, there’s over TWENTY of Midsomer Murders! Ten of that complete balderdash Stargate SG1. Just what is the world coming to? Not only is Homicide Life On The Streets very well scripted, it invariably features great songs in every episode. And it’s opening tune is by Miles Davis. Watching it now (that and Due South when we stay at the farm) I am struck by how much less macho posing, fewer ridiculous action scenes (car chases, violence), there are compared to (no, not Midsomer Murders) Chicago PD or the Chicago Fire, for example.
In series one of Homicide: Life On The Streets, Ned Beatty was often sporting a tangerine and black scarf. I got terribly excited, thinking that someone involved in the show was a Dundee United fan and had somehow sneaked the scarf on the set. Alas no, it’s a Baltimore Orioles scarf.
The state itself is named after Henrietta Maria, wife of Charles I of England, Scotland and Ireland. For some inane reason the obvious choices of Henriettaland, Henriettania, and Henriettucky were all rejected.
Did you know that 80s synthpop band Go West have a song called Baltimore to Paris? Did you know that Twiggy duetted with Tim “If I were a carpenter” Hardin? No? Here you are:
Time for Gram Parsons, and his always slightly vulnerable-sounding vocal, and of course a fine country song:
Maryland has a total area of just over 30 000 km2, making it just less than a thirtieth of the size of the west African country of Mauritania.
Next song is by the Counting Crows. I have just listened to, and I kid you not, a song that goes “good morning, Baltimore, each day’s like on open door, every night is a fantasy, every sound’s like a symphony”. ALso, the offering by the ex Mr Julia Roberts is rejected.
Looking at the shape of the state I wondered if it had a panhandle (as mentioned in the Florida article). And it does! At number 6 (out of 10) in the chart of Best American Panhandles, according to National Geographic. The panhandle bit of Maryland contains the site of the Battle of Antietam.
I looked up famous people from Maryland, and in the Only In Your State website’s top 20, at least ELEVEN were not born there. But there are some notable people who were born there, such as David Hasselhof. And some more infamous, such as mudrerer John Wilkes Booth and the convicted felon and morally obtuse ex-vice-president Spiro Agnew. Maryland is the birthplace of record producer and SideShow Bob lookalike Adam Duritz.
No, that is NOT SideShow Bob.
And track 2 is from the second Jayhawks album Blue Earth, and it’s almost as good as the Gram Parsons track:
Baltimore is the birthplace of famous moothie-player Larry Adler. And it is the city in which it is illegal to take a lion to the cinema. Tigers? Yes, Leopards? No problem. Panthers? Of course. Lions? FORGET IT!.
That’s Maryland. Another one next week. And you might be in for a musical surprise.
CC writes:
Bugger - I had the Jayhawks lined up or failing that Bobby Bare's version of The Streets of Baltimore.
