Anyone going to see Lau tonight at Cargo in Shoreditch High St?

I adore the new Tracey Thorn album. I wholly agree with Joe's Night In review. I reraise it because I just bought it again (!) to get the limited edition 5 track Berlin demos extra CD which, unlike many CDs of "extras", is well worth it (the spare copy is off to a mate as a pressie). Get it while you can here:

http://www.buzzinfly.com/store/merchant.mvc?Screen=PROD&Store_Code=TBS&P....

I am not a religious man but today I found myself repeatedly humming "Hills of the north rejoice". What a cracking tune. Full of majesty and power. While the devil is supposed to have the best tunes, the Man upstairs has a few too. "Jerusalem"! "To be a pilgrim"! Never mind the great gospel performances. Any other faves? Halleluja!

...or would have been. The man who invented rock 'n' roll.

6 Music are broadcasting a live Nick Lowe gig all the way back from 1984 next Friday at 4am!!!! I imagine it will feature songs from his Cowboy Outfit album which was released then which is fine with me! So set the recorder I think.

Fab gig by Stacey Earle and Mark Stuart at the Stables last week (...see My Night out with...) but they have quite a bit of the tour left to go and I heartily recommend them to anyone liking a bit of country/bluesy/harmony/great songs and fantastic guitar playing from both parties. Being geeky for a moment, Mark is yer typical fantastic Nashville soloist, able to drop in a blues lick, country run or western swing phrase. But it it Stacy who confounds - she seems to be able to strum, tap, flick and pluck the guitar at once, providing a complete rhythm section whilst also singing like an angel.

Whatever, wonderful music by any measure and FPO friendly.

Don't miss 'em Massive.

Watching the Dr. Feelgood doc made me reflect on the magnificent "Down to the Doctors'" and its missing piano solo - apparently Lee growled "8 bars of pianna" pending said pianna being added later, then they couldn't come up with 8 suitable bars so they left it as it was, sans pianna. I can't think of any other examples of blatent "bollocks that'll do" arrangements. Can you?

Anyone had / solved problems with HDMI sound and the iPlayer? My laptop happily plays DVDs with sound through the telly via an HDMI connection, but iPlayer won't for some reason. I assume it is an iPlayer problem as other audio pops out of the speakers OK. Any thoughts?

Muchas gracias amigos.

No one has mentioned the lovely packaging of the new Joanna Newsom album. It is a 3 CD set in a very tactile heavy card box containing the discs in individual slip sleeves, each with its own cover pic - one of which I show here in the interests of completeness.

Oh, and the music is just as good.

Under no circumstance use this service. I am shocked it's allowed personally. Automatically downloading audio from YouTube. Should be banned.

http://www.video2mp3.net/

Dull dull dull but I need some Windows/PC based fax software to be able to scan documents and send to fax machine. Any recommendations?

To avoid Turgid Post Of the Week Award here are the Beat Farmers doing "Powderfinger".

Ta all!

I love Martina. One super perfect new country weepy, and one left field performance with the Chieftans which, I venture, shows she actually means it. Both highly recommended after a few drops of the good stuff, for maximum Kleenex effect. Finally, for fun, a duet with her hero, Pat Benetar. And not an autotune in sight.

The second and third videos are in the comments.

Never really bothered with it, but sort of wish I had. Is it too late?

Can anyone place these lyrics:

"Maybe love grows in the heat of the summertime,
Maybe it dies when the weather gets cold,
That's what you get girl,
I've fallen in love for the very last time"

Gracias amigos

Just discovered a load of interesting looking podcasts in a series called Voiceprint Web Radio. Oddly you have to subscribe to them individually, but still. Mostly 70s proggy/folk people such as Man, Deke Leonard, Keith Christmas, Bill Bruford, Trevor Rabin, Anthony Phillips, Martin Stephenson, Gong, Francis Dunnery etc tec. There is even Hawkwind and Gong! Pass the teapot, I'm going in.