a music blog
I was reading some old interviews with Gillian Welch recently and in one she mentioned the important influence of her college professor Pat Pattison. Intrigued, I went on to do some further research into how this iconic songwriter learned her lyrical trade.
Continue reading “How Gillian Welch Writes Better Lyrics”
Hopefully I’m not the only one out there resisting Christmas music until next week and leaving my end of year lists until the end of the year. Instead I’ve been searching out lots of great new music and looking at upcoming releases for next year.
Continue reading “New Music Playlist 14/12/25”
A couple of years ago now I started to notice a buzzing, pounding and whooshing in my ears. It felt like I was in a boxing match underwater. Sometimes I would also hear a high pitched noise, like a radio frequency out of tune. Mostly it only bothered me at night, which was annoying but I could cope.
Continue reading “Dealing with Tinnitus as a Live Music Fan “
As it’s December I am beginning my end of year posts with a little round up of the most read new articles of the year.
Continue reading “Most Read Posts of the Year”
This week I started using Substack for the first time. I know I’m seriously behind the times but after looking at the abysmal current state of social media, I thought an app focused on writing would be worth investigating.
Continue reading “Women in Music to Follow on Substack! “
Since starting Blogmas earlier this week, I’ve been thinking about my blogging strategy going forward into 2026. The last few years I’ve only been reviewing sporadically but now I’m looking for new writing motivation and different ways of sharing my posts.
Continue reading “Why I Finally Started a Substack Newsletter “
Earlier this year I noticed a new pattern under my blog referral statistics. Social media referrals had plummeted due to well noted algorithm changes, search engines were thankfully staying strong and I always had a collection of random scattershot ways people found the blog. One of these was a new ‘referrer’: ChatGPT.
Continue reading “AI and the future of Music Blogging”
Since the Grand Ole Opry is 100 years old this week, I thought I’d dip into the archives (well what is currently on YouTube anyway) to find five stand out performances from women who have stepped into the iconic golden circle.
In no particular order here are my choices – share any classics you’ve found in the comments!:
Continue reading “Favourite Opry Performances! “
Back in 2019 I visited Nashville for the first time and secured a ticket for the legendary Grand Ole Opry, which turns 100 this week. As a quite recent convert to country music at the time I was still learning about the institution. As a music fan, however, I knew the idea that there was a venue where every week you could see a varied line up of different quality artists playing live was something to treasure.
Continue reading “Why the Grand Ole Opry Still Matters”
Highway Queens 