Warriors!

It’s been a hectic week on the road with my memoirs tour, and it’s been going great…I have met a few of you on my travels, and it’s fab to say thanks to the very people who keep this site alive, and we really do appreciate your subscriptions. 

I have been going backwards and forwards myself all over the country on the memoirs book tour seeking fellow music fiends, and there have been some great events like a sold-out show in Belfast, which is one of my favourite cities with a great crowd and a city full of music . I’m hoping to return there in the autumn with a new festival idea! 

The Ealing book festival was really good as well - it’s an annual event, and they have great guests, and the other shows in Colchester, Carlisle, Galashiels and Newcastle were thrilling to do as well. I’m back out again this week in Leek, Dorking, Corsham, Stroud, the Isle of Wight and Southampton… all ticket details and a chance to order the new memoirs book are here…

Meanwhile, back at home on the LTW site, all manner of noisy stuff has been going down. When I was in Colchester, I caught Meff Fest, the punk rock festival put on by fast-rising punk scene favourite the Meffs, whose new tunes pack an almost Killing Joke power welded to their melodic intent. The day event was a triumph of punk rock DIY, and there were 1000 people at the show to witness it. 

When in Belfast, Kneecap come up in the conversation often, and the band have released a new album that went to number 2 in the charts. It’s a powerhouse affair with a big bass end that establishes them as serious contenders, and our reviewer checked them out live in Liverpool, claiming, ‘fresh from a year of controversy, political backlash and rising momentum, KNEECAP arrive in Liverpool for two intimate launch shows celebrating new album FENIAN, via Heavenly Recordings and produced by Dan Carey. Tonight, the Belfast trio transform the room into a collision of rave culture, protest, comedy and chaos, proving once again that no one is doing it quite like KNEECAP right now…’

We’ve been championing House of All from their inception and have been thrilled by the quality of their many albums released in a short amount of time, as well as their well-earned cult status. The band have been back out on the road recently and have truly emerged from The Fall’s ashes with a head-expanding sound increasingly their own. Steve Morgan enjoyed a phoenix night with Martin Bramah and his band of drummers…

Walking on the dark side and heavily helped along their way by the mighty Cure Scotland's Twilight Sad are getting a well-deserved spotlight on their crafted dark energy. 

Seventies underground music legend, the late Andy Clark, was a man who had it all: effortlessly charismatic, fantastically talented, a man who played the keyboards as if he were wrestling a rattlesnake, a multi-instrumentalist with a chameleonic voice that was uninhibited and soulful.  His death this week saw this beautiful eulogy written for him by his stepson.

 Remember the iconic, symphonic, synthesiser textures on David Bowie’s 1980 hit ‘Ashes to Ashes’? That’s Andy.  He shared stages with Jimi Hendrix, Desmond Dekker, Gary Holton, Phil Lynnot, Glen Matlock, Jimmy Cliff, Sam Gopal, Nico, and of course his close friend Jeff Beck.  Beck also produced Andy’s band Upp, taking them all over Europe and the US.