The year I undertook a part-time theatre/drama/acting course at the National Theatre Drama School was, without doubt, one of the best for quite a while*. Yet at the end of the year I was uncertain about the future. Was it worth trying to further develop my acting skills? Could I sandpaper them into something that […]
For some blogs, fifty-five thousand page views is an average week. For Vinyl Connection it is the culmination of over two-and-a-half years of posts. That’s OK; a mass audience was neither the goal nor expectation. Still, it is a little milestone worth marking, so I dipped into the VC catalogue and pulled out spreadsheet entries […]
* ADDED TO THE VINYL CONNECTION COLLECTION DURING 2015** ** And whose music is terrific too! This is the second part of what was going to be a quicky but quickly became an epic. * Having the double CD did not deter me from snapping up this 4 LP live set on beautiful blue vinyl, apparently a […]
* ADDED TO THE VINYL CONNECTION COLLECTION DURING 2015** ** And whose music is terrific too As album cover art is something of a passion here at Vinyl Connection, I thought I’d share some of the covers that have given pleasure on their arrival at Vinyl Connection headquarters, and include a word or two about the music. […]
In 2001 David Bowie released what is without doubt the oddest compilation of his career. Which is saying something, there having been over 40 collections of his music across five decades. This one was called All Saints, with the subtitle telling you exactly what you were getting: Collected Instrumentals 1977 – 1999. The story goes that […]
It was late in 1979, and the shop was closing. Naturally, there was a closing down sale. While un-tempted by appliances or transistor radios, I remember having my eye on one of the albums reclining in the slowly thinning racks of records. Over the course of a few weeks I’d um-ed and ah-ed. Not weeks […]
Chuck Berry records his first single, “Maybelline”, for Chess Records in Chicago [May 21]. Despite the vitality of his early songs and his significance as a writer/performer, surprisingly few of his singles crossed over from the R&B charts to the upper echelons of the pop hit parade. * “Rock Around the Clock” becomes the first […]
From the woozy fanfare opening ‘The Barbarian’ to the final swooping moog solo panning between the speakers at the end of ‘Lucky Man’, via the stroked grand piano strings of ‘Take a Pebble’ and the dystopian drama of ‘Knife Edge’, I know the first Emerson Lake and Palmer album very well indeed. But it wasn’t […]
After sending off my questions to Nick Saloman, I continued listening to Example 22, the new Bevis Frond album, and wrote a tight three-hundred word review to follow up the interview. How organised was that? Assuming Nick came through (which he did, entertainingly and with astonishing promptness) I’d have a feature and a follow-up post in […]
A new Bevis Frond album is cause for celebration. So when Example 22 arrived in the post recently, there was a surge of excitement in Vinyl Connection land. Surfing a wave of Bevis energy, I contacted the band’s founder and enduring mainspring about an interview and was delighted by his prompt acceptance. What follows, then, […]
An opening electric guitar chord, solo-strummed, then the drums and bass kick in. It is a simple, powerful rhythm that is instantly inviting and enveloping. If it was a concert, you’d be on your feet already. You could sway to this intoxicating rhythm forever, but Steve Marriot’s voice enters, There’s wheat in the field […]
Over a decade ago my friend BB introduced me to The Bevis Frond. This was both a blessing and a curse. The blessing part was simple: enjoying Nick Saloman’s psychedelic-infused, guitar-driven songs has been no chore at all. In fact, my respect for his extensive songbook has grown steadily over the years. Which leads us […]
vinylconnection.com.au 