Most of the words published on this Blog have been drafted on a Mac Book Pro which, all being well, will celebrate its fifth birthday early next year. It has had its troubles, mostly related to hard drives, documented in this piece from last year. In September the charger started playing up. The thin white… Continue reading The price of things (November 2017)
Ari Up, singer in punk band The Slits, died seven years ago today. May she rest in peace. She and the band had been on my mind in recent weeks, and when starting to draft this piece yesterday I discovered that the anniversary was upon us. Back in 2010 I read the news of her… Continue reading Ari Up and The Slits
Last weekend I began a rather long piece about the 1979 movie “A Nightingale Sang in Berkeley Square”, which features Gloria Grahame, one of my favourite actresses. I noted: “She died in 1981 and her relationship with a young actor, Peter Turner, is recorded in his book “Film Stars Don’t Die in Liverpool”. You’re likely… Continue reading Gloria Grahame and me
Rest in peace Tom Petty, another singer and songwriter taken from us too soon. His first UK hit “Anything that’s rock ’n roll” in 1977 was the first 12” single that I ever bought and I was privileged to see him at the Marquee Club in London a year later, a semi-secret gig for which… Continue reading Tom Petty RIP
Last weekend I wrote about browsing through my old pocket diaries and mentioned a TV commercial (for Bird’s Eye Supermousse) that my brother and I appeared in back in the 1970s. Over the years I have attempted to find the commercial online, without success. We only saw it a handful of times when it was… Continue reading A 1970s TV commercial featuring me and my brother
Two days ago, in my Birthday Musings, I mentioned digging out my 1991 pocket diary. As I wrote in this piece last year I have an unbroken run of diaries from 1979 to 2001, “available any time if I want to check the dates of holidays, meetings, gigs, exams, Film Festivals, and very occasionally how… Continue reading More about diaries
Happy birthday to me, and also to singers Liam Gallagher, Faith Hill, Jason DeRulo and Corinne Drewery, West Indies cricket legends Curtly Ambrose and Chris Gayle, authors Stephen King and Shirley Conran, actor Bill Murray and BBC Radio 2 DJ Simon Mayo. I caught the start of Simon Mayo’s show just after 5pm this afternoon… Continue reading Birthday Musings 2017
20 years ago today Diana Princess of Wales died, after a car-crash in the Pont de l’Alma tunnel in Paris. Dodi Fayed, her boyfriend at the time, and Henri Paul, the driver of the limousine they were travelling in, pursued by photographers, also died. You probably knew that already. The newspapers and TV schedules have… Continue reading The night Diana died
In two earlier pieces this month I have mentioned members of my family remembering things differently from how I remember them. My brother has no memory of watching the 1987 movie “Black Widow”, which starred Debra Winger and Theresa Russell and featured the line “I can’t believe you’re buying this”. My father put down the… Continue reading Pepsi, Coke and faulty memories
Does anyone remember a 1987 film called “Black Widow”? It starred Debra Winger and Theresa Russell and was directed by Bob Rafelson, as you can see here on this IMDB page. There’s certainly one person who saw it back then and has no memory of it: my brother. We were discussing it earlier this month… Continue reading “I can’t believe you’re buying this”
The Compartments 