Presumably, without Rod, there won’t be the incentive or the will to play the material from his albums, and what with Ronnie Lane regrettably not around to sing his songs, this will surely leave them with a chronic lack of material.

Unless, of course, The Faces chance their arm on a few Simply Red songs. Oh dear…

One, two part in the cany dial
Prison in the stand they forgot the wale
When this job is none
The job began to swing
You should have to rock
Dead jail bird sing let’s rock
Everybody let’s rock
Everybody in all say oh! Bob
You stand till Jail our rock

Start a marble place in the saxphone
Little Joe in blow in old sax trombone
Climb across the matter
You gonna track oil band
You hold a red sax
You wanna purple game

Now I’m part of seven
Said my mamma three
You use cute this Jail further ever did see
I show I’ll be alive when you call for me
Come on and do the Jail
Let’s rock it wanna be

It said sax is secret on the block stone
You call in the corner we are not alone
You want to say
Nobody don’t be no square
You can’t by a part
It used to worry in Jail

She forgot her sad about for heaven sake
It want look matter just to make a break
Brother turn his shirt
To empty sad Mrs Smith
I want to stick around
Or wanna give my kick

Later she wrote four books for Omnibus which I commissioned and edited, on The Damned, Hawkwind, The Pogues and Madonna, and all of them reflected her superlatively professional work ethic. Until she moved down to Kent we saw one another about once a year to discuss projects, and I was last in contact with her in January, wondering why she hadn’t delivered a promised update to the Hawkwind book that was slightly overdue. She said she was sorry but she hadn’t been well. My God! But that was Carol – 100% professional even if she was in the throes of a fatal illness which, bravely, she kept to herself.

I will miss her a lot. RIP Carol. One of the best of us.

Henry Kissinger, who I believe is still wanted for war crimes in parts of south east Asia, was awarded a Nobel Peace Prize in 1973.

John, whose song ‘Give Peace A Chance’ has become the anthem of peace campaigners everywhere and will likely remain so until the end of time, and who with Yoko did more to promote peace than any man alive and continues to do so through the ongoing poularity of songs like ‘Happy Xmas (War is Over’), was to the best of my knowledge never considered for a Nobel Peace Prize.

Does anyone know whether it can be awarded posthumously? And if so might not a campaign for such an award on the 30th Anniversary of John Winston O’Boogie’s passing be a worthy cause for RBP’s contributors and readers to get behind?

This book contains 145,000 words over 336 pages and in the course of his research Richard interviewed around 50 people, fellow musicians from the Blockheads and Kilburns, business associates of Ian at Stiff and elsewhere, and many personal friends. He also met Ian and through him was granted access to an elderly relative who filled him in on the Dury ancestry. Ian was aware of the book and though he declined to be interviewed himself gave the green light to others to be interviewed.

The book has done very well. We sold almost 15,000 in hardback and it’s now done slightly more than that in a B-format (small) soft-back edition. It continues to shift around 25 a month. By rock biog standards this is pretty damn good.

In many ways this isn’t surprising. Richard, an experienced journalist on a regional daily, did a very professional job, as reflected in the reviews. Q: “This splendid bawdy account grips right from the start”; Time Out: “Very thoroughly researched…. indispensible”; The Times: “Grips right from the start”; Uncut: “A refreshing, honest, moving account”. The reviews by readers on Amazon vary from 4 to 5 star.

I mention all this because it has come to my attention that in January Sidgwick & Jackson will publish a book entitled ‘Ian Dury: The Definitive Biography’ by Will Birch.

Now I have nothing against Will Birch who by all accounts is a grand bloke and his book on Ian certainly won’t be shabby. However, its publishers are promoting it with blurb that opens with the following statement:

This groundbreaking and authoritative book gives the first in-depth and compelling account of the life of this charismatic yet complex artist.

The implication here is that this new book is the first decent biography of Ian. This is an outright lie. Richard’s book was and remains the first in-depth and compelling account of Ian’s life. It is and remains definitive.

There are some who might accuse me of sour grapes here, but it seems iniquitous to me that when a reasonable length of time has elapsed between biographies, in this case a decade, publishers seem to think they can make claims for the merits a new biography while ignoring the existence of a previous (equally meritorious) biography. The hope, of course, is that reviewers of the new book will be unfamiliar with the previous work, regurgitate the blurb and fail to note that – and I’m guessing here, of course – it reiterates biographical information that has been readily available for a considerable period of time.

Here’s hoping that those who bought ‘Sex & Drugs & Rock’n’Roll’ – and there’s well over 30,000 of them, almost all in the UK – won’t make the same mistake.

The number of songs on my iPod fluctuates but at the time of writing there are 7,477, almost full but enough for any one time I think. I have experimented with creating my own temporary ‘on the go’ playlists, but the two permanent ones (Top Rated and Most Played) tend to be used when I’m lazy. There are 554 ‘Top Rated’ songs right now, and the regulation 25 ‘Most Played’. Of course the Most Played tend to be songs which have been on the iPod the longest – anything new won’t have reached this level yet – so although the list might appear to condemn me as someone who wallows in nostalgia, this isn’t strictly true. There is plenty of newer stuff on the iPod but it hasn’t been played so much because it hasn’t been on as long, and when I delete old stuff to make way for new I won’t delete all time favourites.

Here Is my current 25 Most Played, with a comment or two. There’s an element of randomness to this list but mostly I’ve pressed play because I simply want to hear them again and again. The actual number of plays vary from somewhere in the high 40s down to the 20s, and some might be tied.

1) There She Goes – The La’s
Just perfect pop I guess. A song I never tire of.
2) Walking The Long Miles Home (Live, from Austin 2/7/01) – Richard Thompson
The first of five Thompson songs in the list including one with Linda, making him the most played artist on my iPod. This live album is terrific.
3) How Can I Tell You – Cat Stevens
Mrs C is a big fan and I’m partial to this song too. One of the most romantic songs ever written.
4) Brown Eyed Girl (Van Morrison)
More perfect pop.
5) Don’t Worry Baby – Beach Boys
My favourite BB song. It’s quite possible that this ought to be higher on the list as another, newer, re-mixed version is on the iPod too, and this has been played a lot as well. It could even to be number one on aggregate plays.
6) Going’ Back – The Byrds
Just a great version of a beautiful song.
7) Teach Your Children – CSN&Y
Another Mrs C favourite. We never miss Goldrush, a CSN&Y tribute band, when they play at our village pub. Something – The Beatles
This is the version from the Love album, remastered. Up there in my top five Beatle songs, along with Don’t Let Me Down and their spin through Long tall Sally.
9) Waterloo Sunset – The Kinks
Everybody’s favourite Kinks song.
10) Going To California (Live from Earls Court, 1975) – Led Zeppelin
Mrs C’s favourite Zep song, beautifully played.
11) Dimming Of The Day – Richard & Linda Thompson
A live duet from the Life & Times of RT box set. I adored this version when I first heard it and for a long time it was number one most played. Somehow it’s slipped down the chart.
12) If Paradise Is (Half As Nice) – Amen Corner
An odd favourite of mine that I never tire of. Another in the same category – random 60s pop – that’s probably hovering underneath the 25 is I Can’t Let Maggie Go by Honeybus.
13) I Want You – Dylan
Tambourine Man is my favourite Dylan song but that doesn’t make the list somehow. This is a pretty good substitute.
14) Highway Patrolman (live, Dublin) – Springsteen & Sessions Band
I loved this ‘story’ song when I first heard it on Nebraska but this version is the best.
15) Make Me A Pallet On Your Floor – Gillian Welch
A guy at work turned me on to GW about six years ago and I now play her a lot. Her take on this old blues song by Mississippi John Hurt is as good as she gets.
16) Rockin’ Chair (Live, RAH, 6/2/21) – The Band
Probably my favourite Band song, and much played because of the counterpoint vocals during the last verse. From that 5-CD box set/book with a knockout version of Slippin’ & Slidin’ which is almost certainly hovering just under this list.
17) Positively Fourth Street – Dylan
Probably the best put down song ever written. Glad it wasn’t about me.
18) In My Command – Crowded House
I love Crowded House but I’m not too sure why this song of theirs has been played more than any other. Distant Sun and Into Temptation are up there too.
19) Mother Knows Best – Richard Thompson
Thompson on fire.
20) Nothing Compares To You – Sinead O’Connor
Another favourite of Mrs C.
21) In My Hour Of Darkness – Gram Parsons
My favourite GP song.
22) Cooksferry Queen (Live, from Austin) – Richard Thompson
Opening song on this live CD, a real belter.
23) Twist And Shout – Beatles
I gave a talk on John Lennon earlier this year but before I said a word I played this loud. It said everything there was to say really.
24) Roy Orbison Knows – John Wesley Harding
Wes was a pal of mine years ago and this song has stuck in my consciousness ever since. This version is from his first ever (live) album which has a picture of my old Gibson guitar on the back.
25) 1953 Vincent Black Lightning (Live, Austin) – Richard Thompson
Probably my favourite RT song, and what I said about Don’t Worry Baby applies to this too, though in this case there’s two other versions on the IPod, both of which have been played a fair bit too, so the aggregate total of all three will put this much higher.

Those who know me might wonder why there’s nothing by The Who or R.E.M. (or more Springsteen) on this list and I have no explanation other than that if I listed numbers 26-50 they’d probably be there. (There’s more Who tracks on the iPod than anyone else actually – 347!) Maybe another time…

Olivia and her three friends couldn’t stay awake in the car on the drive home but before they all nodded off there was a fierce discussion on the relative merits of the sets performed by Radiohead, Arctic Monkeys, Prodigy, Jamie T and more. I wished I could have joined in and, indeed, tried to at one point but Olivia gave me the sort of look that communicated, “Shut up dad, just drive.” So I did.

We formed around 1963 and hung together for almost three years, strictly covers only and semi-pro in that we accepted a pittance for the handful of dates we got. We had a card printed – “The Rockin’ Pandas – Available for Dances, Parties and Special Occasions” – and in keeping with the name wore black shirts and white jeans. We had a picture of a panda on the front of the bass drum.

Our repertoire consisted of instrumentals by the Shadows and others, songs by the Beatles, Rolling Stones and Searchers, and some older R&R and R&B songs, most especially Chuck Berry, almost all of which we’d discovered on early LPs by the Beatles and Stones and their contemporaries like the Animals, Searchers, Hollies etc. Indeed, we played no fewer than 10 non-originals that appeared on the first two Beatles and first Stones albums. I remember mastering ‘Saturday Night At The Duck Pond’, a variation of the theme from Swan Lake, by The Cougars, and ‘Hall Of The Mountain King’, a favourite of instrumental bands, whose theme is borrowed from Greig’s Peer Gynt, but gradually we dropped the instrumentals in favour of songs. We always began our first set with ‘I Saw Her Standing There’ and closed the final set with ‘Twist And Shout’. I suppose we had about thirty songs in all, and my favourites were ‘You’d Better Move On’, ‘Bring It On Home To Me’ and ‘All My Loving’.

John had the best amp, a Selmer 30 watt affair, and a Vox guitar; I had a Futurama 15 watt amp, selected no doubt because it had the same black and gold livery as the celebrated Vox AC 30s used by the Beatles, and a red Futurama III guitar which looked a bit like a Strat, but somewhere along the line I swapped it for a real bass guitar, a Hofner violin like McCartney; and Terry had a Hofner f-hole guitar with a pick-up he’d stuck on himself. Bob’s drum-kit was white with the Pandas logo, make unknown, which he tended to hit it very hard and drown us out. We ‘borrowed’ a hopelessly inadequate PA system from a local youth club and I cannot be sure if it was ever returned.

We rehearsed in our homes, creating a terrible din. We had one or two fairly regular ‘bread and butter’ gigs locally, at Skipton Rugby Club and at the RAF Club. We played at private parties and occasional dances in church halls in the surrounding villages, sometimes supporting older, better-equipped groups, and once – memorably – at a dance at the local comprehensive school in front of about 200, probably our biggest ever audience

Terry was a handsome Lothario with a roving eye but he could be an awkward, arrogant sod. He missed rehearsals, preferring the company of girls to us three, and didn’t maintain his equipment properly. He was always breaking strings and having no replacements and his amp was crap, an old radio that he’d somehow transformed into a piss-poor, tone-free guitar amp. Hence he was always wanting to plug into the superior amps of John and myself, and cadging strings. Nevertheless he was crucial to the group’s line-up as for all his faults he had heaps of confidence and reckless enthusiasm, ‘punk’ qualities that only later did I come to realise were just as important as musicianship in any successful group.

Predictably, Terry was first to leave, the consequence of him having finally and inevitably impregnated one of his many girlfriends. He fled to Leeds where he worked for an insurance company, and rented a flat there with the mother-to-be, but although his departure decisively weakened the group and hastened its demise, in one respect it had unforeseen benefits for me. In his wake he left several despairing girlfriends, two of whom, on the rebound, briefly stepped out on my arm. After Terry left, Bob, John and myself held a few half-hearted rehearsals as a trio with me on bass but it wasn’t the same so the group disbanded.

After that I played lead guitar in a group from Cross Hills called Sandra & The Montanas who played Working Men’s Clubs around Leeds and Bradford, a far more disciplined outfit than the Pandas with a strict rehearsal schedule (and a driver/roadie who owned an old coach), but I was never that friendly with them so I left after a few months. My best memory of them was playing support in some big WMC in Leeds to Bob Monkhouse who told the most outrageously filthy jokes I’d ever heard. Then I played bass a few times for a local soul band, The Black Sheep, whose speciality was a note-for-note duplication of Geno Washington’s Funky Butt Show album. We drove around the Yorkshire Dales in an old hearse. That was fun, but by now I knew I’d never make it as a muso so I packed those dreams away and decided I’d do better writing about it. By now I worked for the Telegraph & Argus in Bradford and it was around this time I suggested to the editor that a rock and pop column, written by me, would boost sales. I don’t know whether it did or not but that was my first step to MM.

Pete Frame dedicated one of his books to ‘anyone who’s ever got into the back of a van to play a gig’, and I’m proud to be say that includes me. Does it include any other RBP bloggers?