For reasons I can neither fully comprehend nor explain in any coherent way, I decided a couple of weeks ago to dive into Instagram. Having had a Tumblr account since the dawn of Vinyl Connection I largely ignored the world’s largest image sharing social app, a choice that says much about my ability to pick […]
49 JOHN MAYALL — Back To The Roots Eric Clapton, Mick Taylor, Keef Hartley, Don ‘Sugarcane’ Harris, Harvey Mandel, Johnny Almond… a selection of the musicians John Mayall called when he decided to make an album celebrating past alumni of his bands. The name and roster tells you all you need to know, really. Eighteen […]
A recent late-night on-line buying bonanza netted this re-issue of Hawkwind’s 1980 album Levitation. Part of the attraction—apart from it being Hawkwind, of course—was the inclusion of not one, but two bonus records: a concert recorded at that world-famous venue, the Lewisham Odeon, on the 18th of December 1980. The studio album has retained some […]
55 ROY HARPER — Stormcock Roy Harper could aptly be described as a poet-troubadour, a storyteller and wordsmith who uses music as the carrier wave for his images, thoughts, and observations. This fascinating album consists of four extended songs in the progressive folk style and is considered amongst his best works. Listeners may hear connections […]
When Vinyl Connection began in 2013, I knew that a cross-platform presence was important. I just didn’t know what social media was. Or were. Or are, for that matter. Accounts on Tumblr, Instagram, Linkedin and Twitter were duly created, but the only one I paid any attention to (other than this venerable blog) was Tumblr, […]
* PAUL McCARTNEY — Paul Is Live [1993] VAN MORRISON — Days Like This [ 1995] NEIL YOUNG — Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere [1969] JAMES TAYLOR — One Man Dog [1972] JONI MITCHELL — Dog Eat Dog [1985] JIMMY SMITH — Back At The Chicken Shack [1963] JACK BRUCE — Things We Like […]
* ANIMAL LOGIC — Animal Logic [1989] RUSH — Signals [1982] ERIC CLAPTON — There’s One In Every Crowd [1975] BLUR — Parklife [1994] THE CRUEL SEA — Three Legged Dog [1995] WEEZER — Raditude [2009] RICK SPRINGFIELD — Working Class Dog [1980] THE CHURCH — Priest = Aura [1992] PAVLOV’S DOG — Pampered Menial […]
The last time Nick Saloman and I spoke he had just sent off the digital files for the next Bevis Frond album to his record company, Fire Records. We spoke about his hopes for the two-dozenth Frond opus. As always, the songwriter was phlegmatic about the record’s future. “I write songs,” he says. “I record […]
FROM 33 ⅓ SUBMISSION CHAPTER ONE — “Introduction” You are now the owner of the latest His Master’s Voice radio gramophone and you have at your command all the pleasures to be found on His Master’s Voice records. To show you how lovely modern records sound on a modern radio gramophone, here are extracts from […]
Back in May of this year I was immersed in a project that occupied my waking hours (plus a few more besides) and left little room for other activities. The best I could manage at Vinyl Connection was a pictorial post that hinted at the topic. It was called, with coy indirectness, “What’s Going On […]
