2AM

Waking up at 2AM is not good when you have a 5AM start. Last night I had a bad (for me) 2.6 Hypo and felt awful but went to sleep listening to the Oysterband and Billy Bragg. Anyway today I will be going down down to London and for the June's tunes I'm choosing The Oysterband covering New Order's Love Vigilantes and favourite of mine by two of my favourite bands!:

Woke Up This Mornin'

I'm really tired , but have been posted songs relating to the day or what happened on that day . A friend of mine had lost her Alabama 3 CD which she wanted on her iPod , and I'm still in shock from the death of Jame's Gandolfini , so there can only be one song to day , and it is :

Joe Strummer and Vamos in High Bridge

Just a quick post , as well as the events at The Schooner this coming weekend Vamos is taking over High Bridge. This will mean lot's of street food , salsa music and fun . So this weekend is going to be packed with events Friday , Saturday and Sunday. I suggest to get into Newcastle for the Vamos stuff and so I need to think of something salsa flavoured for today's June's Tune . Then I realised that it's post number 101 so , instead I'll go for "Keys To Your Heart" by the 101ers , what else could I have.

I remember getting the original Chiswick single , the Joe Strummer left and joined the Clash !!

Glastonbury .... It's Just a Tesco and Wal-Mart of Music ... but we have The Mighty Slack Babbath To Save Us

Before I start my rant about this , I first must congratulate Michael Eavis on his vision , borrowing £5000 in 1972 to fund the initial festival I believe opened by Marc Bolan doing an acoustic set. These are the sort of people we need and I am so glad that he has been successful probably beyond his wildest dreams as Glastonbury. I read somewhere that there are 2,000 acts on over the five day festival this year , I thought I'd check and looking at the line up page here that could be right. I'm not counting. Tickets this year are around £205 , not sure if that includes a spot for your tent but say you see five acts each day then that's less that £10 a concert (remember what The Rolling Stones charged at the O2). There's a download of the original festival here which gives a feel for what it was once like.

So back to the rant, Glastonbury has just become like a supermarket, lots of products to satisfy every taste , but make sure you keep to the designated areas , have your clubcard on hand , make sure to you conform to the requirements of the supermarket. Their marketing is so good that people happily give up lots of personal information just to enter the lottery to get a ticket. Even twenty years ago people went to Glastonbury to see a particular group of acts , now people go to Glastonbury because it's Glastonbury. While this is not my scene (I actually like music) , it is a huge number of people's idea of heaven. Michael Eavis could have sold another half a million tickets for this year's festival. That's £100 million pounds more he could have made , more than the GDP of some countries.

So if you are going enjoy the music , enjoy your time there , I'll be frequent some much smaller events sch as "Slacktonbury" featuring Strange Bruise and the mighty Slack Babbath and their lead singer Ozzy Ouseburn at The Schooner on the 29th June.

Anyway the June's Tunes choice is possibly my favourite Glastonbury song "Glastonbury Revisited" by The Cosmic Rough Riders  from their brilliant album "Enjoy The Melodic Sunshine":

"Where have all the angels gone,

Now that all the acid's done .....

We made love under the sun....... "

Those days are long gone

Oh and just realised this was my 100th post this year , a friend had to point this out !!

Music For Glaciers

I've been trying to maintain a post a day in June by posting a piece of music vaguely relevant to the day or something that's happened . There's obvious ones about June and the number of the day and what happened on this day , but I've tried to keep the music eclectic and maybe end it with a full Grooveshark playlist of all the June's Tunes.

Glad to see the weather is keeping up , raining at night and sunny during the day , so managed to mow my lawn today and fill the brown bin with lots of garden detritus.

Anyway was talking with a friend who had never heard of Sigur Ros , they were interested when I described it as Music for Glaciers . They are Icelandic , and make up their words so it doesn't sound like an auspicious start , but they are one of the most amazing bands you will ever here. So because of that conversation today's June's Tune is Hoppipolla by Sigur Ros with images from BBCs Planet Earth:

Summer Solstice

Well the longest day is here and light is fading , celebrations are taking place and I was struck by a pause for thought I heard today on BBC Radio 2. The guy said that rather than celebrating the longest day and  midsummer and the light , lots of people see it as the return of darkness and it's all downhill from here.

There are many ways to view things and when the weather is good certain people seem to focus on the fact it will soon be raining. Celebrate the moment , and remember when it rains you don't have to water your gardens. Usually the positives to take from every situation but it's not always clear what the positives are. Anyway the guy talked about shining the light and I'm going to choose this video I did of "Illuminating Hadrian's Wall" soundtracked by my daughter Juliet's favourite band Ash playing "Shining Light":

Almost Midsummer .... Next

There's be druids about , and celebrations at Stonehenge, and it's still hot but looking like rain. My cough is still here so off to docs tomorrow in the home they can suggest something. Just listening to some very old Alex Harvey stuff and very impressive it is , apparently he won a competition to be Scotland's very own Tommy Steele .... a very mixed blessing though Rock With The Caveman was all right.

Anyway there isnt that much footage of Alex live despite being one of the greatest live acts of their time. This is the band that opened at Donington with a cover of The Osmond's Crazy Horses , very daring at the time. Anyway this seems an appropriate song for the June's Tunes as I keep looking for the next song.