It’s a very exciting week of releases with a brand new album coming – Space Summit’s Life This Way, my collaboration with sessioneer Jed Bonniwell from magical Minneapolis. This will be the first full sessioneer album release where we have worked together from the early days of the Songwriting & Guitar Guidance project, Jed was the first person to get in touch and now we are releasing an album. We wrote the songs together, Jed wrote the lyrics and sings and I play all the guitars and bass. Dare co-produced, engineered, and played some keys and some slide. Eddie John, who played on Noctorum’s The Afterlife and MOAT’s Poison Stream, plays the drums, Olivia’s on violin and backing vocals on two tracks with Phoebe Tsen from Borneo on main backing vocals (yes, from Borneo). I’ve been so impressed with Jed’s lyrics, melodies and vocals and the album will be available as a download from Wednesday as part of the CD and vinyl pre-order. The album is ten tracks and the vinyl will be available as a gatefold in a very limited blue pressing. There have been some serious problems with pressing plants this year due to the pandemic but the CD will be released on September 3rd with the vinyl coming early next year. There will be a premiere of the first single I’m Electric on Jammerzine on Tuesday, June 8th from midnight East Coast time. We hope you enjoy the album as much as we did making it from dust to gold.

Also this week, we have Noctorum’s Sparks Lane released on RSD Drops, June 12th. First time on vinyl, also a gatefold. It only took 18 years to get a vinyl version but hopefully, it’s worth the wait and you will be able to find a copy of it in a store near you.

I went for a mega-swim today and managed 92 laps. I’d already gone a little over time but Phillip, one of the staff there pointed out my bent arm and told me to do two more laps without the bend and showed me the technique! I’ve discovered in recent weeks the true pleasure of swimming, trying to silently cruise through the water is the goal, hardly seeing a ripple in the water despite having a body that is attempting to propel itself forward. I remember being on holiday as a kid sitting on the side of the harbour in New Quay in Wales and seeing an adult glide through the water like a silent fish. Somehow it took me till my mid-forties to learn how to swim freestyle and now in my early sixties to try and get it smooth.

As I left for the pool today and walked through the Marquês park, there was a man on one of the benches with a huge belly uncovered, sunning it I suppose. The park is always full of a mixture of characters at this time. Teenagers coming out of school, some homeless people who go to the church opposite for food. The teenage girls are also showing their bellies as is the fashion and the contrast made me think about how different people’s bodies actually are despite the arms and legs and everything else being the same. This is why we need the aliens to come, green ones with lots of eyes and arms and legs so we can also realise that we humans are all the same. Then, if the aliens are friendly we can live next door to them and have them as friends and goalkeepers.

One of the forgotten Greenwich Village Folkies died last week, May 26th. Patrick Sky was something of a lefty with satirical lyrics, a contemporary of Dave Van Ronk, Buffy Sainte-Marie and of course Bob Dylan. Somehow Van Ronk and Sky didn’t seem to break out of the sixties despite some well-reviewed albums into the seventies and beyond.

Music today is the 7th track from Noctorum’s Sparks Lane, Things To Do And Be, something of a conceptual list song, the title speaks for itself, the juggernaut that is the music careers along (get it?).

Song Of The Daze

THINGS TO DO AND BE

A moment a second a minute an hour a day a week a month a year a decade a century a halfpenny a penny a shilling a florin a halfcrown a pound a guinea a monkey a ton a grand a pfennig an öre a centime pesetas and lire and Deutschmarks sterling dollars cents nickels and dimes francs and kronor guilder and roubles yen and Mazda Toyota Datsun Mitsubishi Mercedes Audi Simca Peugeot Renault Citroën and Buick and Dodge and Cadillac and Oldsmobile Pinto and Pontiac Dusenberg Studebaker Mercury Saab and Volvo and Fiat and Ferrari and Maserati Lambourghini De Tomaso De Lorean Jensen and Jaguar Daimler and Wolsely and Riley and Hillman and Singer and Humber Bentley Rolls Royce Marcus and Lotus and Holden and Maton and Fender and Gibson and Rickenbacker Hagström and Burns and Shergold and Hayman and Cayman and Scilly and Haiti and Jamaica and Fiji and Bali The Maldives Madagascar The Isle Of Man The Falklands The Isle of Aron England and Ireland and Bronson Pacino Keitel De Niro Lake Bergman Hayworth Davies Crawford Camus and Sartre and Cocteau Venus and Mars and Pluto and Saturn and Jupiter Mercury Uranus and Neptune Earth Sea Sun the Moon and wolves and foxes squirrels and badgers and otters and rabbits and hares crows magpies finches sparrows and eagles and vultures lions and tigers and elephants giraffes gazelles rhinos hippos cougars panthers and cheetahs hyenas and pigs foxes cows sheep cats dogs ostriches emus camels and llamas love and pity and war and tears and fear and happiness sadness mystery intrigue Typhoon Lancaster Wellington Spitfire Mosquito Kitty Hawk Heinkel Messerschmidt Dornier Zero 12345678 hunger obesity bulimia anorexia starving gluttony and Kings and Queens and Queens and Princes Earls Counts Countesses banks butchers bakeries bedrooms cloakrooms black and white photos posters pamphlets prisons judges and policemen murderers and vicars and nuns and guns and knives and forks and spoons trains and planes and caravans and spaceships buses and taxis yellow and green blue and red vermilion orange apples and peaches pears and cumquats and lime and lemons Muslims and Arabs and Jews and Christians Buddhists Agnostics Presbyterians Anglicans Children Of God