Flags and why the British one so often drives me nuts.
Author: N. P. Ryan
From Flags to Fags and Buck-a-Beer: the Biggest Differences Between the UK & Canada Part II
Part II: BEER!
(in which many misconceptions from both sides of the pond will be utterly destroyed!): Continue reading
Welcome to the Carnival known as DUIR!
A substantial aspect of DROME is the matter of time, so appropriate then that its first listen transports me back to the mid seventies and a trip up North to see relatives which included a visit to the fabled Yorkshire Dales.
Nothing of the actual visit remains in memory beyond it being uneventful. It’s all the things said about the place by family members beforehand that spring to mind. The potential for heavy mists to suddenly descend and leave anyone there disorientated on the vast expanse of open land hard enough to navigate at the best of times.
Continue readingOther People’s Children
Thoughts on Climate Change, an ever increasing world population and the conundrum it creates, expressed via the pressures of social media:
Rich Brown: the new shining light of Folk?
Rich Brown’s EPs Pandemo and The Misinformation Age get their first listens with my customary no attention paid to any of the review package notes.
Brown genres as Folk, something that as a rule is only enjoyed by me when live in a pub and drunk enough to think I know the lyrics.
Continue readingIt’s not a style I know much about and what I’m hearing puts me in mind of a low-key Greenday or a smooth Pogues.
Mr T and the Art of Profiting from Snow
In the early 90s I worked London’s markets; the following is an account of true events:
There we were, early hours of the morning, the market having been snowed off, in an illegally open workingmen’s club, surrounded by every one drinking there, having been led to a dark storeroom by the barman on account of our walking in laden with stock I didn’t want to risk leaving in the motor and T, in his quest for a sherbet, didn’t want to unload before going to the club.
They thought the gear was nicked; hot off the back of a lorry; perhaps one driven by a workingman mate and he’d get grief for it. Perhaps, in being workingmen who normally did an honest day’s work (allegedly), they simply didn’t like types who cut corners, did things at other’s expense in the name of a few bob.
Continue readingMeeting Edgar Broughton
The following is an account of true events: the names of those involved have been changed (including the dog’s).
My introduction to the Great Edgar Broughton started in a pub said to have once been frequented by highwayman Dick Turpin.
Aged fourteen, me and a couple of mates found we could get served in the Schooner, located—though no longer there—where Streatham High Road meets Hermitage Lane.
Bumble Bee: the Sting in the Tale of LaVern Baker!
Artist: LaVern Baker
A.K.A.:
- Delores Williams
- Little Miss Sharecropper
- Bea Baker
From: Chicago, Illinois, U.S.A.
Song: ‘Bumble Bee’
Recorded: 1960
Walking with Jimmy McCracklin
Artist: Jimmy McCracklin
From: a point of contention; either Elaine, Arkansas or St. Louis, Missouri.
Song: ‘The Walk’
Recorded: 1957
Two Gods
Re July 1st with mention of one event taking place previously:
N. P. Ryan 