Strange Sunday

Sunday evening found me and Mr F in the basement of the Spice of Life public house just off London's unfashionable Charing Cross Road, hanging out with the mighty Richard Strange and his pals.

The last time I saw Richard Strange perform live was 12 years ago at the Royal Festival Hall when the original Doctors of Madness reformed for one last gig as part of an event he had curated to mark the centenary of the birth of William Burroughs. My in-depth review described everything apart from the good Doctors as "utter twaddle" which in hindsight was a bit harsh. But only a bit.

There is quite a contrast between the Festival Hall and the basement bar of the Spice of Life - the former has a capacity of 2700, the latter 50 at the most - but it worked in our favour. It was a real treat to see the great man up close in a virtually twaddle-free environment. 

Mr Strange was in fine form. It was a largely acoustic set that featured material from both the Doctors and his solo career - including the song about shooting smack with Cilla Black that got him banned from the BBC - and some highly entertaining anecdotes. He was accompanied on some songs by his daughter Lilybud, who opened the evening with a set of her own and has a powerful set of pipes on her.

Richard's recording career began fifty years ago this year. We will start today's selection with a track he played on Sunday that first appeared on "Figments of Emancipation", the second album released by Doctors of Madness in 1976. The other three tracks date from 1981, 2005 and 2022 respectively.

"Marie And Joe" - Doctors of Madness

"God Is Science" - Richard Strange

"Howl" - Richard Strange

"A Dffrnt Wrld" - TV Smith & Richard Strange

And now over to Twiggy.

Pun Fun 4: The Theme

After a break to allow you all to refresh your punning pituitaries and to rest your wordplaying wrists we're back with another round of Pun Fun, in which you are invited to rework the title of a well-known song to fit a theme. And the theme this time round is:

PARTS OF THE BODY

Bones, organs, joints, glands or valves, anything that goes to make up the human body is in scope - from the biggest belly to the smallest villi (stop sniggering - honestly, some of you are so juvenile).

As for previous topics you can enter one title only. Entries should be sent to leggies27@hotmail.co.uk by Sunday 1 March. Voting will open next Monday.

I'm looking forward to receiving your collective body of work. If you are struggling for bright ideas just follow Leee John's lead and unleash your imagination.

The Harp Returns

An old friend of the blog - and former guest host - has a brand new record out. I am referring to the Artist Formerly Known as Asthmatic Harp, now trading under the name Hannah Lou Larsen.

Hannah's new "Peach Pine Ocean" EP is her first release since the single "Buddha On A Shelf" in 2023. In the interim she has been keeping busy doing things like growing her family and relocating from Glasgow down to Oxford but has now resumed recording and performing live.

As regular readers know I am not very good at explaining why I like the records I like, so I don't tend to make inadequate attempts to describe them when you can just listen to them yourselves and hopefully agree with me. If you are looking for insights in this specific case you would be much better off reading Hannah's recent interview with the good folks at Postcards From The Underground.

Suffice to say there is something about Hannah's sound and sensibilities that has always connected with me, and it is no different with "Peach Pine Ocean". The whole EP is excellent but at a pinch my favourite track may be "Memorials".

You can find the EP and "Buddha On A Shelf" at Hannah's Bandcamp page. While you are there why not check out her old Asthmatic Harp stuff as well.

"Memorials" - Hannah Lou Larsen

Eccentric Exit

While I was strolling around the Salt River district of Cape Town last week I chanced upon a local thrift shop. It had a small selection of CDs among which I found a volume of the Numero Group's 'Eccentric Soul' series of compilations. With 40 tracks over two CDs and an asking price of five rand (roughly 25p) I thought this was too good a deal to resist. 

And so it has proved. This particular volume is devoted to the Way Out label from Cleveland which operated from 1963 to 1973. Here is a small selection of the many fine tunes you can find on the album, starting with a band whose name is crying out to be featured in Rol's Namesakes series if it hasn't already. According to Discogs there are at least 14 of them - this lot are #3.

"Its A New Day" - The Sensations

"What About Me" - The Exceptional Three

"She Didn't Know" - Sammy Jones

"Honey Coated Loving" - Betty & Angel

What I Did On My Holiday

Apologies for my absence here in recent weeks but until yesterday I had been in South Africa since the beginning of February, having managed to tag a holiday onto a short work trip so that I could catch up with all the local Gogginses in Johannesburg, Cape Town and Stellenbosch.

I also took myself into Cape Town one day - the poor family had earned a break from me - and checked out the street art in Salt River and the second-hand record and book shops in Observatory. Some examples of the former below, some of the spoils of the latter will follow when I get myself sorted out. 

I caught a couple of shows while I was over in SA including the premiere of a revival of the play "Marabi" at the Market Theatre in Johannesburg which featured some very strong performers. But the highlight was a big family outing to see the Ndlovu Youth Choir in Cape Town.

The Choir started as a community project in the small town of Marapong about 15 years ago - and all the members are still recruited from there - but has grown to have an international reputation, in no small part as a result of making the final of  "America's Got Other People's Talent" a few years back.

The Choir put on a great show with some excellent vocal arrangements and lively dance routines. The photo below shows the smallest choir member attempting unsuccessfully to teach some moves to a confused elderly audience member as a form of community outreach.

The set was a mixture of reworkings of hits by the likes of Queen, Adele and Toto and various local musical styles. The latter were more to my personal taste, and one of the highlights was their version of a song by the late great Busi Mhlongo. So here are a couple of tracks from Busi's 1999 album "Urbanzulu" and a couple of clips of the choir to see us out.

"We Baba Omncane" - Busi Mhlongo

"Ngadlalwa Yindoda" - Busi Mhlongo 

Southbound And Down

This is the last you will be seeing of me for a little while. I'm hopping on a plane to Johannesburg tonight for a few days' work before catching up with local branches of the Goggins clan.

I'll be back here some time in the third week of February, and Pun Fun 4 is provisionally scheduled for the 23rd. Until then, stay groovy.

"Flying South" - Hank Locklin

"Southbound" - Thin Lizzy

"Outbound Plane" - Tom Russell

"Johannesburg Hi-Lite Jive" - Hugh Masekela

"Johannesburg" - The Julian Laxton Band

Guyana (Slight Refrain)

Last Friday's post about the music of Guyana kicked off with a track from "Fighting For Survival", the 1981 album by the Yoruba Singers. I mentioned in passing that their 1974 debut album "Ojnga's Own" was also available on Bandcamp.

While "Ojinga's Own" is not quite as splendid as "Fighting For Survival" - the band's sound had not yet incorporated some of the influences that made the latter so special - it is still a very enjoyable record with an agreeably funky rumble throughout. Here are a couple of prime cuts.

"Ojinga's Own" - Yoruba Singers

"Masacura Man" - Yoruba Singers

All together now - Yoruba, Jamaica, ooh I wanna take yer, Bermuda, Guyana, come on pretty mama...