Christmas 2022

Okay Christmas entry here we come as I woke up super excited and put on white shirt, blue and  white tie, grey jumper with blue trim, grey shorts and grey with blue bands sock to go to my parents for the day.

Yes really!

There will be a full entry on this at some point but basically it is the four cd book form set of songs from 1980-84 Now didn't include the the individual yearbooks and extra volumes.

We'll see in late January/February where the series goes having issued the Extras set for 1985.

Call Rupert the Bear an addiction going well into boyhood, a name some used to describe my dress style back then and this is this years Rupert annual with a nexture of reprints and fresh material that makes me feel great.

This is card wrappers worth of books starting with this years Beano annual which like the comic is firmly set in the modern day even if some characters we grew up remain as does Bash Street School.

Then we have the Dandy Annual, the comic outside of the Summer Special no longer exists so we have fresh stories based on our favourites such as Korky the Cat, Winker Watson, the Jocks And The Geordies, Keyhole Kate and Desperate Dan.

The modern world is around them but things are more as they were. Love it!

Then we have the compilation with the theme Things That Go Bump In the Night which draws from old stories from the Beano, Dandy and others in the old D C Thompson stable around that theme which pulls you into the past well.

I enjoy this series of compilations a lot for that.

I'll splice an entry in for this which was a Big Present, a three lp version that takes three concerts from San Francisco's Fillmore undertaken in 1997 by Tom Petty that go beyond the greatest hits and the new album but into songs from artists such as the Byrds and Grateful Dead that aren't in their recorded catalogue otherwise and in any event were some the best concerts the band ever did 

I liked Duran Duran a lot and have a many albums of thiers but this only came out last record store day comprising of a whole show from 1982 on the Rio tour with the band on fire.

(Come Up See Me) Make Me Smile was issued in 1984 as the b side of the Reflex (remix) single.

There was a dvd and cd set issued several years back but this is the first time its been on lp record.

Christopher Robin and Winnie The Pooh are heros and this is my new diary.

I had some money and vouchers besides this plus some grey and blue socks.

A Pause for Christmas

Christmas is almost here dispite the odd unexpected challenge here and there this year which was different to what we had experienced last year never mind the dark isolation we all went through in twenty twenty trying to manage Covid.

Supply chain issues coupled with industrial dispute have made trying to sort out presents, get cards sent to people we don't see often, try to get the basics of a traditional Christmas Day dinner in or booked for those who like to go out with family for a meal.

As difficult in some respects as the year has been, we'll have a Christmas, the time spent with and communicating with our families and friends enjoying each others company.

As I pause this blog to try to get some of the spade work to make that magic happen this year I wish you all a very happy christmas  and all the best for twenty twenty three.

We should resume at some point after boxing day, probably a DuoPost tm with the other blog before we start a New Year in the forever a boy world That Uniformed Schoolboy inhabits.

A week and a day to go

Cor, it's really cold, has been pretty much Thursday with temperatures down as much as minus ten degrees c so the long thick layers have had to come out to try to survive these untypical conditions.

Certainly the coldest I can recall here in the Midlands in my lifetime and having lost four lads in Solihull at the start of the week coupled with reports of others doing the same at nearby Westport Lake in this district, please stay off iced over lakes and the like.

Hyperthermia kills.

I mean I'm typing this with my gloves on even it's that cold!

Apart from Sunday's excitement as Santa made his appearence here, something else that marks this time of year has made its appearence too.

Rather like Summer, the beano produces a special christmas themed edition involving all its cast of legendary characters with a common story running complete with sheet of stickers you can peel off and use.

As ever there are quize's, jokes and puzzles to read and have a go at beyond the regular editions we get including the Christmas Eve one with sixty eight pages in full colour.

In a year that has had its own challenges, having  comics is a real joy.

The community tree paid for by us, the residents by donations is up,much appreciated and used for carol singing and illuminated for good measure.

Just eight nights to go!

Stepping into Advent edition

 We're between the football action with the match with France this weekend a sensational win on Sunday against Senegal by three goals to nil which was just great given how good their players were.

The weeks are moving ahead as we count them down towards Christmas with the advent calander which ended up being ordered as the local shop was out of the one I wanted and talking of which a few things ordered for Christmas have yet to arrive.

Last Friday's Blue Peter showed how to make Christmas cards and the famed Blue Peter Advent display was out that I recall from my earliest days of watching the show as a child which was good to see again.

At least on Monday the Christmas edition of Monster Fun, the bi-monthly comic arrived with it's christmas themed ghoulish stories including a one page story based upon a idea submitted by a young reader.

Tuesday with temperatures at one point being minus one degree, I did have my thick woollen slipper socks on designed to keep your feet as warm as toast as much as I was in my three inch inside leg shorts as ever.

We did have a few problems on the forum in middle of last week ith posts not taking and images not loading but they appear to be fixed now.

The Roar of the Lions

 

If you haven't noticed there is quite a loud noise about at the moment on the tv and the radio that is very hard to escape from, taking up chunks of The News and perhaps excessively the morning breakfast shows almost as if there's little else to talk about.

The men's football World Cup with things on the pitch and much wrapped around politics outside of it.

It's probably true much of the country is in need of good cheer what with strikes galore - so 1973 it hurts - shortages in the shops, and the whole business around rising food, fuel and housing costs and maybe that's where the intensity is coming from.

Things seem to be going well for England since qualifying with a 6-2 win against Iran and a draw with the U.S.A. where the game the World plays is becoming much more popular which as much as I love Ice Hockey and Baseball is just great.

There was a match on Tuesday that did divide the UK, something I can understand given my boarding school was in the Marches, had a sizable chunk of Welsh staff and I was iniated in Welsh Culture too although my family are very much Midlanders. 

Well after a fairly evenly matched first half, England came ALIVE with two goals from Marcus Rashford and one from Phil Foden victory was assured.

Cymru did very well to get into the competition after just over a half century absence with a side of great players helping to spread the awareness of Wales being distinct home nation of the UK but the superior playing of England showed.

Let the battle to move towards the play offs begin!

The life changed

 After last weeks excursion into different topics from the norm on here, we do get back to more core things this week which has been a pretty much wet and cool one with temperatures only just about 6 degrees out on one day.

One thing that you cannot entirely eliminate is the possibility of either being spotted by people who know you while out or perhaps people who just turn up while passing which in any kind of life that some people can be judgemental over might concern you.

A good chunk of my family are within our city region with many within a five mile radius, legacy of the days when people here worked in the local pits, potteries, steelworks and engineering concerns that were on our doorsteps.

Anyway I do have a good number of surviving aunts and uncles as much as in recent years the number has been thinned out as it were and quite unexpectedly my Uncle Len called while at my parents who are very used to seeing a "boy" in their company.

He called really for Dad cos he's know a lot around electronics and mechanical engineering repairing  things like vintage radios of which Uncle Len had just bought one from an auction house nearby.

He also has quite a collection of clocks.

It is several years since I have seen him, before covid for sure and within that time I have moved very much away from any meaningful adult presentation either by attire and by social position too within the family and with other adults.

He had not for several decades at least seen any version of me that wore grey short trousers, long turn over top socks and school tops and even if I had the inclination to, there was no time to change.

All I could do is just get on with it and be prepared answer anything.

He was talking mainly with my father and then mum as prompted by that universal habit of parents to show photographs of family, he remarked on how much "your son takes after you" and "how is he" which probably a reflection on the deferental child to parent relating style where by I only join in adult to adult conversations when invited in which I was to talk a little about what I had been up to only then taking direct supplimentary points.

I'm generally expected to read or "play" entertaining myself unless I'm in on the conversation or event.

Suprisingly the very altered physical presentation from when I last saw him didn't seem to faze him nor did the clear lack of relating to him as adult as mentally at least this could of been a conversation between a teenage me and him if not a couple of years younger.

As it came to time for him to be off, I shook hands with him.

Things had gone better than I had thought they may of and on reflection that I am at one with being this adult in law but child.

Revolver remade

Regular readers of this blog know we don't talk much about "affects" on here such as toys or records because it's really more a personal blog rather than the blog of a person however I was that boy and so some records are in their own way important within that.

It's also true that some artists and composers are very much connected with me so exploring them coincided with personal journeys of self exploration.

The last time I wrote anything on here about the Beatles was February 2017 which was looking at the records by them I owned, a good number from childhood around significant birthdays and christmas's part of reason was one you have a collection then, unless you collect variants and world-wide issues, you've pretty much have all you need and the last core albums of interest were issued in the autumn of 2012.

Recording technology today, indeed ever since the early 1970's was radically different than it was for much of the 1960's when these albums were recorded having far more individual tracks and in recent years attempts at remixing them for better stereo sound has been the focus.

Recently I bought the new remixed edition of the Revolver album of 1966.

This album was recorded using four tracks on a tape recorder working on one part of the song using up to all the four tracks to get all the elements wanted such as any instruments and then mixed to a single track of a new tape on another machine before starting again to build up the drum tracks, lead,bass and rhythm guitar in many sessions before a final tape with everything to be included in the final mix is made.

Back in 1966 the main aim was to make a mono record from those four tracks as that was then norm for pop music especially targetted to teens and young adults for playing on single speaker systems.

A stereo mix was made but the way it was recorded by design limited what could be done when it came to where in a stereo spread everything could be placed which coupled with the rather dashed off approach taking much less time than the mono left a less than satisfactory stereo version.

That version was the one I heard around 1977/8 when I was starting as a young teen to get into the Beatles and back then stereo versions were all you could buy as the mono deemed "old hat" in 1970 had been deleted from the catalogue.

Recently new computer artificial intelligence but steered by humans technology that enabled separating out some of the parts of the four track mixes into effectively separate tracks that could be mixed and placed within the stereo image in the manner many popular albums from the 1970's were by design using multiitrack recording systems has become possible and this album was treated to it.

What you could do to fix some of the errors of the original stereo version intrigued me

As some may recognize on the disc label they have gone for a more authentic 1960's label design although the copyright is 2022 presumably for legal protection and as the record is made not in the UK but the Czech Republic "Made in the EU" is printed,

Take Taxman for instance, there are many periods of near silence on the right hand channel as the vocals are just there or the errors in the double tracking at the start of Eleanor Rigby and the string quartet is now spread between both speakers.

The sea effects on Yellow Submarine originally from a sound effects tape have been remixed into the track in stereo adding atmosphere while the seabird effects on the psychedelic Tomorrow Never Knows are panned from left to right.

This remix centres the vocals more providing the immediacy and drive of the mono but with a more spacious feel spreading the instrumentation around the left and right channels.

Personally I feel the process has worked well producing a more enjoyable mature stereo sound spread without departing too far from what the album sounded like.

Critics have complained that the record sleeve doesn't have those folds around the edges originals had but my last original copy from the mid 1980's lacked them too and the only modern versions to feature them were the 2014 mono editions now deleted.

Sometimes it's good parts of the past have gone

 Slowly recovering here so with any lucky by next week i should be back on my feet again.

As might be inferred by that I'm on enforced rest here more able than usual to be decending very much in time with the rituals of Tie fastening, getting your socks on and supported neatly which is as well as in many respects I love that older, less tech driven and less planned  boyhood with play and a cheeky grin.

That said not everything from then stands critical examination today.

Today, smoking for adults is very much a taboo thing with lots of restrictions where one might while back then my family smoked around me, the parents of friends who gave me lifts smoked in the car and many places we went into like cafés, fish and chip shops and public houses reeked of smoke.

As kids we had candy shaped like cigarettes with pink tips and yes we had them in our mouths trying too look sophesticated pretending to smoke. Today they're gone.

Toys like those Hanna-Barbara cartoon characters Yogi Bear, Huckleberry Hound and co were made to invite children to practise lighting up and enjoy watching the smoke drift.

It seems incredible really such habits known to be harmful were being encouraged in us in underhand ways - I hung out with the smokers and was only detered by the threat of a spanking if caught - and while it's fanciful to look back at things as if everything in the past was fine, the exposure to and encouragment of smoking to us a boys and girls is something I'm glad to see has gone.

November: A month of colour

So it's another month in the history of this blog but we are still in autumn although the storm I can here as I type this up suggests to me many leaves will soon be gone until next year having notice a lot while out walking this weekend in the woods.

One thing I like about leaves is not just the rich colours at this time of year but their very distinctive shapes.

No doubt today and especially tomorrow many of us will see and hear the bonfires with accompanying fireworks of Guy Fawkes Night that always a great boyhood memory.

Here is a Catherine Wheel in full spin spreading colour into the night sky while the air smells very much of smoke.

Stay safe and have fun this Bonfire weekend.

Meet Joel on Friday

Spookiness is very much in the air this week providing a much need respite from more challenging adult concerns this week in a very fast moving period in our countries political history.

Regular readers of this blog know I'm a superfan of Blue Peter from a very early age and so today I'm reporting on it.

On Tuesday it was announced County Down, Northern Ireland magician and social media star Joel Mawhinney has been appointed as the newest presenter of the BBC's Blue Peter.

The 25-year-old content creator, who was born in Bangor, becomes the 41st host of the long-running CBBC children's show.

Mawhinney will start in his new role on Friday 11 November, co-hosting alongside Richie Driss, Mwaka Mudenda and Henry the Dog.

He effectively replaces Adam Beale who left the show on July 15th as the third presenter.

He said: "Becoming the 41st Blue Peter presenter is a surreal and - dare I say it - magical experience.

"I've always loved making people smile with my magic and I want to do the same for the Blue Peter audience.

Having seen him fill in during the summer months on the show I am sure he'll succeeed on what is the shows 64th year that was marked earlier in the month..

Spooky preparations and music

While I should be off at the end of next week for some spooky fun that I'm sure will include making Pumpkin Lanterns other things are on my mind like Monday's Covid booster rocket I'm due for that I had expected my GP Practice to contact me about but they didn't so I booked mine at the local Pharmacy electronically like you do.

Also as a twisted spin leads to problems getting a good fit in short trousers to avoid the about to fall down feeling I now have a pair of braces to hold them up.

Just feeling them takes me back in time and I feel so much that young boy in what are quite short short trousers just like it was 1974 all over again.

In halloween colours this four compact disc box set should be with me today that takes in the main works of the French composer Maurice Ravel in a set of acclaimed recording from the early nineteen eighties a few of which I have on record from the days I listened mainly to them.

This set apart from obviously being a bit more convenient adds a few more works such as his Paino Concertos and Schehérazade that at one point I had a record of on Decca's Jubilee series and is recorded digital as most recordings from the early eighties onwards were.

There's a lot happening in the politics with polly tricks galore but I'm leaving that stuff to the grown ups!

 

This space reserved...

While that space for ones tooth must last 63 years we also need to keep that space for a boy to be boy for at least that long with his inquisative, curious spirit and his love of adventure recognizing that life is really like that rather than to put down life as downpayment for those things you never truly get back.

Some people find ways of allowing that side out as parents although demands are such that money and possessions often leave spending time with your child takes a backseat, uncles and leaders in community programs for children.

It introduces children to the idea that things need not be structured or results centred but more about what you gain from the experience such as fun, friendship and being a good leader of your group and BEING ALIVE.

Far too many adults of both sexes are just going through the motions to be seen to have what mainstream society sees as most important but finding and holding on to that joy of living enriches you more.

That some of those things may be found in your own childhood isn't a new idea but it's more the question if you have the courage to bring back those things that really gave you a buzz and the zest for life before talk of school options, exams and applying for a job marked a full stop in having a satisfied life.

 

Hifi magazines featuring Hifi World

 Nothing really lasts forever even if slices of it remain unchanged.

I've always been interested in sound and music ever since I was originally a little boy and one thing growing up in a household of Dad who was into electrical engineering was having access to his magazines.

He also liked reproduced music so from the early 1970's onwards I had a free run of his magazines that covered the then burgening interest in high fidelity stereophonic sound as like many we moved from a restrictive stereo radiogram, an all one wooden piece of furniture with stereo record player , radio and built in speakers to the exciting world of hifi seperates and speakers with real distance between left and right.

That, better quality seperates, with a turntable, stereo amplifier  and speakers later joined by radio and 8 track tape player allowed us to hear more of our favourite recordings but like most things you are interested in, seeing if you can do better comes in so he got magazines like Popular Hifi and Hifi News that reviewed the latest equipment and records.

They also reported on short lived developments such as quadraphonic sound in the home, Elcassette the jumbo sized mash up of cassette handling and open reel tape and the battle between DCC, the digital compact cassette and Sony's radical rival, the MiniDisc.

As time went buy I started to buy my own magazines and some of the old ones went and newer; more lively presented ones started.

One I loved from the very start beginning in early 1991 was Hifi World which was edited by Noel Keywood.

Unusually it did not just feature the latest and greatest new turntables, compact disc players and so on but did have features on older equipment comparing them with more recent models because not all that glistens is gold.

Coupled with this it did look at tubed (british term: valved) amplifiers which had been declared obsolete by the very early 1970's but had started to creep back in during the mid 1980's as people realized they tended to have a richer, more warmer sound.

That was the very opposite of early compact disc, I might add.

They also went back to where this Hifi thing began in the 1950's by launching kits based own bespoke designs offering the functions you wanted and higher quality per pound than mainstream mass produced equipment.

I bought and built a tubed power amplifier in 1994 from them that when assembled looked just like a shop bought model for a lot less than they went for.

They also were the first to do features on computer based audio with portable digital players for Mp3 and Lossless Flac files and "needledropping" -copying your records to files to play anywhere and "ripping" copying your own cds to play on the go.

That inspired me to get a series of Fiio portable players that offered excellent sound for the money and even the ability to hook up to the main hifi for playing High Defination better than cd quality downloads.

That was the September 2022 issue showing among other things a new turntable as records close to extinction in 1992 had bounced back in thirty years with considerable sales even among youngsters who grew up with cd only owning parents.

Sadly shortly after that issue came of the printing press, missing the chance for a official Goodbye Issue, it was forced to close as the publishing group went bankrupt having been seriously disrupted by covid as many sales came from airports, train stations and news stands even though in 2019 before all this crazy stuff started it was very profitable.

There were many memorable issues of this publication that I'll miss but one that was the August 2014 issue that previewed the all analogue sourced re-issue of the Beatles mono albums on vinyl, which were and still are acclaimed as the very model of how to do a vinyl re-issue series properly.

R.I.P Hifi World.

Keeping the records clean

 The week might of started better for missing both the weekend football and a story reading site online I like wasn't good but the thing was actually I felt pretty off and so had to be resting and very much off line.

Usually I tend to have a bit of background music on when I'm like that as apart from being soothing it does mask a bit of the general noise indoors from next door and outside as I really don't need that when I'm unwell.

I did mention on the other blog about having a new record, well the thing is records do demand a bit of maintance such as putting away properly and keeping the surfaces clean to get the best they can offer.

Indeed I often find even new records need a clean if as seems to occure these days the places that make them don't seem to a clean as you might expect.

Thus yesterday this cleaning kit came with some stuff to fetch any debris out of the groove and off the surface and some stuff to take away everything it had removed so it doesn't end up on your stylus.

I find this stuff by Vinyl Revival is really effective and doesn't leave anything behind unlike some I recall from the past.

Reflections upon the Funeral of HRH Queen Elizabeth

 Week is almost over with things moving more towards where they were before just over a fortnight ago following the sad but beautifully executed funeral of Her Majesty on Monday, choreographed to a tee with immaculately turned out people performing the ceremonial roles. So british.

I was with my parents who could remember George VI's funeral in February 1952 reading accounts as at that point neither had television at home although by June of 1953 and the Queen's Coronation Dad had got television with pictures on the one and only BBC channel from Birmingham and Mum saw it at a cousins who had a set.

This time sat together having prepared a light midday meal so no one would miss much I was in my green jersey, grey shorts and grey with green bars turn over socks, a nod towards Cubs without going the whole nine yards just looking like a kid following it as they talked about the past.

For me it didn't just bring back memories of the Queen Mothers Funeral on April 9th 2002 but Prince Philip's outside of those family funerals I attended when I was younger so I could understand what Prince George and Princess Charlotte would of been feeling.

These things are a bit hard to get your head around when you're young.

Photo credits: BBC/PA

A nation mourns

We did not touch upon the developing news on Thursday as last weeks entry went to press simply because things were changing that rapidally so it was on the other blog earlier this week we touched upon the death in the afternoon of thursday September 8 of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth at Balmoral.

There was a special on CBBC by Blue Peter looking at her role and her appearences on the show itself such when she was awarded the Gold Badge.

Indeed reports since showed even some of her family were not able to arrive at her bedside before her reported death and that in effect there was a news embargo upon issuing it until the royals all knew having a family member working at ITN News.

As a Monarch she was very hard working, well prepared knowing who about the people she was to meet and the topics that would be discussed and very friendly even where sometimes protocol can trip one up when it comes to how exactly you engage with her.

She was the longest serving monarch we have had - many of us have only known her - seeing out some 15 Prime Ministers in her time.

The Royal family is just that - a family whose only major difference to us is they are born to serve - and I prefer to look upon her death as that of a girl who became a woman who reigned, who had a family we all followed, making scrap books of as children who themselves had children that we all knew.

In later years we saw the girl within with her jokes, those timeless expressions as things just turned comic and not least the great Paddington Bear sketch she recorded for her 70th Jubilee we only celebrated in early June.

Today we have our new King, Charles III having been proclaimed across Great Britain and Northern Ireland plus the realms and territories who will do his very best to follow in his Mother's footsteps and we give our thanks to her.

God Save the King.

Why best friends?

Seeing the difficulties some people are facing I thought the wisdom of Winnie The Pooh seemed rather appropriate because the kind of friendships we formed initially at school, then our home circles and later on college or work do go a long way in meeting our needs.

The company of those who may be connected around a cause or hobby by itself seldom enough because it lacks the depth being focused on the role and not actually about getting to know and understand the whole you such as what really matters to you, the times you may struggle with confidence or in need of emotional support.

Yes boys and men do have emotions and need to let them out as much as to let in others they trust for their own emotional wellbeing, talking through things.

Memories of the school bus

 

This time of year brings back memories as next week, school is back in England and I suspect for some of us the school bus is one possibly the best and the worst rolled in one.

If you were very lucky you may of had a escort in addition to the driver to deal what often happens when a group children are all together in a confined space.

One starts whispering things in the ear of another as the other soon enough works out they are the subject and dispute breaks out, meanwhile another starts pulling a girls braids or pony tail which is followed by screams as typically one boy starts a fight with the other over football or a girl.

Soon enough the bus stops and everyones told to "cut it out" and you're all back in your seats.

Some of the things I had was travelling all the way down to London and back sat on a upturned bin as we has insufficient seats, holding on as the bus would sway to side to side and vibrate as we went over potholes.

Another was trying to stop an unsecured wheelchair sliding in the back of bus coming toward me in those days where modern health and safety seemed eons away.

Somehow travelling on train was just a bit more civilized.

Back to school 2022 edition

September,eh? Not so far way now as we think about how the Hols have been for going out with extremes of burning hot sun and heavy showers that are so unusual for our Country and indeed this region that concern me as we look towards next summer.

Looking a bit at the past we have made five years more or less uninterupted at the Uniformed Regressors site although we had our worries  earlier in the week when it looked as it it had gone  but as it happened some wierd techy stuff with servers and Cloud force had knocked out a good number of sites including the users support site at TapaTalk!

We're doing things our own way there, always sfw, always the boys we were and remain intereacting as we are.

Of course September is when school is back as we look back to those days with our new uniform kit and just what our new teachers were going to be like  and at least with some of us who was going to be first standing outside the headteachers door looking sheepish.

In with this terms replacements is this Grey with Royal Blue jumper/sweater from Mr P and I might add photo credits Albert Prendergast Ltd before the fingers beckoning me are waving,lol!

High quality stuff that you feel great to be in as that schoolboy all over again, looking smart.

Toss in suitably short grey shorts and turn over top socks and we're as happy as larry.

Sports bags of the cylindrical shaped short were verboten for putting exercise books in never mind ones text books.  Some of us still recall the chastisment we had for getting our Geography classwork  books covered in oily crisp stains!

Happy new term!

Jackson Brown collected

 Beyond the 45 rpm pop singles I grew up with in early to mid 1970's  which tended to by people such as Gary Glitter, Showaddywaddy, the Glitter Band and obviously the Bay City Rollers I did hear on radio shows a lot of Southern Californian with the exception of the Eagles, singer-songwriter based such as Linda Rondstadt usually on Asylum or Elektra records  I enjoyed.

Probably the biggest with my was Jackson Brown whose songs were covered by the Byrds, Jackson Five and the Eagles and it is telling these albums are all on record in my collection.

The first album from 1972 features Doctor My Eyes and Jamaica Say You Will which covered by the J5 and Byrds respectively.

My copy is a UK first issue which like all until 1976 was cut at Abbey Road and pressed by EMI Records.

The second album featured Take It Easy co written with Glenn Frey of the Eagles and featured on their first album and These Days.

These early releases used a white label on the disc with the Asylum Records logo in colour which was estblished in 1972 by David Geffen.

1974's Late For The Sky is regarded by many as a classic of the reflective singer-songwriter genre and actually I have two copies, my 1974 white label original and the 2017 remaster  which is marginally more open.

It features For a Dancer", "Before the Deluge", and "Fountain of Sorrow".

It was nominated for a Grammy-his first.

The Pretender from 1976 was issued at an difficult time for Jackson Browne personally, losing a girlfriend to suicide.

It features Here Come Those Tears Again and the title track which sizable hit singles.

1977 saw many things, for me musically I was starting to by more albums and these typically showed more maturity thematically and musicaly than the mainly 45's I had bought following bands as singles having only the Rollers albums and odd Greatest Hits set bought for me.

Running On Empty was an unusual album for having songs recorded in hotel rooms on the road and the odd live track and this captured for me the vitality of this performer.

This remains his biggest selling album to date with the title track being a sizable U.S. Hit and has its original booklet.

Fair sized pauses between albums were not unusual but such was the trust in him we'd buy it straight away and Hold It from 1980 was a good example of that

December 1983 saw Lawyers In Love come out with  its clutch of singles such as Tender Is The Night, For A Rocker and the title track and had that on Chomedioxide tape and lp as soon as I heard it on Paul Gambaccini's BBC US Chart show on Radio One

1986's Live In The Balence concerned itself with the Cold War, the impacts of Reaganomics and the decline in the smokestack economy.

Beyond the musicianship, one thing he has been involved in for a long time is environmentalism and the threat to our welfare from not being a responsible steward of our planet taking part in campaigns.