A few years ago a friend came to see me about an idea she had. She was asking various chums what they thought about a new venture she been dreaming up. I remember her sitting at my kitchen table and outlining her vision for The Glad Cafe. A space where beautiful things might happen in a creative way and where all kinds of people could find a common meeting place. I remember thinking how great a vision it was but shaking my head quietly at the hurdles she’d have to clear to realise it.

Sitting at the bar in The Glad Cafe on Saturday night I thought about that conversation and where it led. For me the beautiful vision was brilliantly incarnate this weekend. A bar/cafe full of creative chat and a venue packed to the rafters to see one of my oldest, best friends. I’ve said this before about gigs and records where friends are involved; it’s a hard call to be objective. But on Saturday night when I went to hear The Pearlfishers perform there I didn’t even try. I was swept along by the energy emanating from that stage. To see the songs of Davie Scott re-imagined again with the barest of bands and a string section is to felt like being in the room before Turner added the varnish or the paint was barely dry. These songs were complete, yet fragile and brilliantly crafted in such a way that, like those vast Victorian seascapes, we were able to understand the way in which they’d been lovingly assembled.

Quite simply this was a night where we, the audience, felt so comfortable to be included in a song writing masterclass, by turn poignant, funny and brilliantly sentimental. At the heart of the night was the coming together of a band, audience and venue all united by a love of music. What that has got to do with Another Country I can’t honestly say but I know but for me, it seems a natural extension of all we love about the scope of the music we celebrate each Friday. That music, as our good friend Rab Noakes would point out, is often not just what we strictly might call ‘country’ but is part of a popular music tradition that has been nudged, bent and wholly informed by country music. Put simply, had it not been for Hank, Dottie, The Louvins, Stanleys and Dolly (add your own name here) it’s doubtful whether our world would sound as good as it does.

That’s why this Friday we will get a chance to play you a wide range of great music that is available to you right now. There will be The Pearlfishers and some beautiful new music from Neil Young’s Storytone album. Listen out for for a new song produced by Justin Vernon for this artist:

She’s called Pieta Brown…and we’re quite excited about a new song we’ve just heard.

There will be so much more but safe to say it all kicks off this Friday at five past eight on BBC Radio Scotland

On Sunday…I’m back.

We’ll talk to Eric Kabera about a unique film festival he’s created in Rwanda as well as think about the ethical dilemmas of whistle-blowing in the light of a new documentary about Edward Snowden which comes out this weekend.

I’ll also be talking at length to John Boyne, author of The Boy In The Striped Pyjamas about his life  and in particular his new novel, ‘A History of Loneliness.’

And we’ll be playing some great music choices from John and a few of mine too. It’s the place to be. So do join me this Sunday from five past seven if you can on BBC Radio Scotland.

Hear’s a story for you: In Nashville every September the Americana Awards take place. It’s a heady week apparently. All the usual suspects are there and there’s a performance or two to be enjoyed. Last year there was a young man slotted for a club appearance during the week’s festivities. His name was Sturgill Simpson and the show he performed at the The Basement that week became one of THE talking points of the week. A few weeks later I received his debut album and we started playing it on the show. By January of this year he was performing at Celtic Connections and recording the first of two sessions for the AC within 9 months. I don’t think that has happened with any previous guest.

Such was the energy of Sturgill that we were playing his second album a few months after we’d introduced the first. For many country fans his Meta-modern Sounds in Country Music became an essential soundtrack to the year. Fusing influences of Traditional Bluegrass, Bakersfield, Outlaw Country and Trucker Bluegrass Sturgill is the current keeper of the country flame. And for that we are very grateful. This Friday you can hear Sturgill and his band perform songs from that album and more and also hear about his extraordinary year where he’s taken country back to his Kentucky roots and everyone…well those people wise enough to have listened….is liking it very much. If you’ve ever looked at the massed stetsons decorating record sleeves and worried that country music might have lost its soul, then I suggest Sturgill may well be the musical physician you most need.

Last week I visited New York City for a family holiday and over the ‘three eggs, fried green tomatoes and corn muffin’ southern breakfast one fine morning I spied across the road from our corner bakery a distinctive thrift store sign. No shop worthy of that description could not a vinyl section I surmised. I was right. On Friday evening I’ll bring you the fruits of my discovery on our vinyl rediscovery.

We’ll hear some thing from Bonnie Prince Billy – though what that is yet we’re still not sure. As ever there is more than one Bonnie Prince Billy release to play – but they are all fab, so fear not. We’ll have some Isley inflected soul from our Montreal friends The Barr Brothers whose album Sleeping Operator is essentially a thing of joy. We’ll play more of that Memphis tinged Frazey Ford album which is a real delight too and we’ll introduce you to the music of a young man from Dunblane called Aaron Fyffe. Sound good? Not convinced? We’ll also have Patty Loveless singing Tia Sillers favourite country song of all time. I thought that might work.

Join us if you can on Friday evening from five past eight on BBC Radio Scotland.

It’s now my intention to fill in the missing pieces on my country collection. When I was growing up Radio One stopped just after tea time. Going back up to my room to switch on the transistor radio brought a little disappointment but also some pleasant surprises. After the day time fun was over Radio One’s 247 Medium wave band would automatically revert to Radio Two. Here we would find Humphrey Littleton playing Jazz and folk and country programmes buzzing about names that were…well only just names. Box Carr Willie, Conway Twitty and Melba Montgomery. Could any of the music be as exotic as the names?

I remember 70’s pre-Habitat houses and rifling through record collections to see be-jewelled starts smiling up from below stetsons, caressing guitars. Themed albums on Mexico, Hawaii and Texas; seasonal offerings, hymns and hoe downs. It seemed to me a bit like being a horse racing commentator; how would one ever learn all this back story?

In truth I never have. When I started by deputising for Brian Burnett on Brand New Country (only once) I bought my trusty Country A – Z and it’s always served me well in a crisis but mostly I’ve relied on being led by my ears. If it sounds good I’ll be listening.

I thought of these feelings this week as I stumbled across a name I’ve seen many times but never fully known about. It is only now I realise how wonderful that is. Like a football fan who has only just hit on the George Best Youtube section it pleases me to think there are days of discovery ahead. This Friday I want to bring you closer to two of the names that have been only names. One is this man.

Hoyt Axton was a folk and country singer as well as being an actor. Primarily he was a song writer and his massive song, “Joy To The World” was a radio fixture when I was a young lad when it was cut by Three Dog Night.

The other name will remain a secret but he’s going to sing something by one of our AC friends, Mr Darrell Scott. As well as all of that we will play music by the biggest country star on the planet right now. Having never played a Garth Brooks song ever before we’re changing all of that thanks to our very special guests Blue Rose Code.

Blue Rose Code is essentially one man. He is the very gifted Ross Wilson – Edinburgh born, but resident in Peckham London. His album however is a beautiful long hymn to his home city and perfectly mashes together Ross’s own original voice with his three big influences; Van Morrison, Tom Waits and John Martyn. On stage and on the record he’s backed up by some wonderful musicians including legendary bass player,Danny Thompson.

I saw Blue Rose Code recently at The Glad Cafe and can tell you this will be a remarkable session. Steel, second guitar stand-up bass and beautiful backing vocals from Eliza Wrenne Payne makes this a great sounding live act and they brought all that touring experience and dynamic to the session.

We’ll have new songs from old friends The Barr Brothers, Chuck Prophet, Peter Molinari and an excellent new name to introduce to you in the form of Haley Bonar. We think you will like what she does and I humbly suggest Friday’s show may well be one of these nights you don’t want to miss. It all starts from five past eight this Friday on BBC Radio Scotland.

‘We’re more of an albums band,’ they said as they loaded up the van that night. It used to be the great 70’s get-out-of-having-to-have-a-hit retort. It worked then too. Bands we now consider to be the masters of their own particular universe have built careers and country piles on successive records with 3 songs per side and tracks which never troubled day time radio stations. Looking back now we’re all slightly jealous of them…at least I am. Recently someone decided to pick a fight with a retailer on twitter who was selling our album at a very competitive price. If I said the price was realistic I’d be lying. If the album price was realistic it would be more than double what it costs now. But that’s another story…..what really bugged me was how little someone thought they should be playing for that beautiful delivery van of continuous music – the album.

Sometimes we have forgotten how great a piece of art it really is. Up there with the play, the film and the novel, the album has been kicked around, derided undersold/oversold and misrepresented (the prerecorded cassette!) but still survives.

This week I’m thinking a lot about albums. In the 1970’s this man was thought to have gone off the rails.

Marty Robbins – in my opinion one of the greatest country singers of all time moved labels and made a slightly mystifying couple of albums. They’ve now been rereleased and we will be listening again. On a more contemporary theme we will introduce you to an album which follows in the footsteps of the music Marty made in the 50’s. Clint Bradley has made an excellent album which channels his inner Marty, Bob Wills and Lefty Frizzell. It’s Western, it’s swinging and it’s very good indeed.

But let me come to the point. Occasionally an artist makes an album which reminds you why we all own the dam things in the first place. The album is there to gather a brood of songs together as naturally as a mother hen. Isolated, sometimes  they won’t stand up but put them together and they can make you feel like your world is spinning a little faster. It’s always great when someone you know and love makes the record you firmly believed possible of them.  Charlie Dore (who has visited AC towers at least twice already) has done just that. Milk Roulette is the album of her life. Achingly sad, poignant, funny and gloriously musically uplifting it will remind you that great songs can be written and put together to make that thing we are celebrating here – the album. Thank you Charlie, sometimes it takes a friend to show you the way. Value your friends my friends…..  and your albums.

This week on the AC we’re only a week away from the start of the Glasgow Americana festival. So we’re going to be nodding affectionately at some of the key artists soon to be coming to town. Step forward Mary Gauthier, Anthony D’Amato and Sturgill Simpson. Don’t forget you can find all the details at http://www.glasgowamericana.com.

We’ll also be playing you new records from Justin Townes Earl, Parker Millsap and Bela Fleck and his wife Abigail Washburn. That’s all before the main event….

Willie Watson’s debut LP is called Folk Singer Vol 1 and it’s safe to say it’s made a mark already. Produced by Dave Rawlings and released on Dave and Gillian Welch‘s label Willie’s album lays down a serious marker about the roots of Americana music. The songs themselves are lovingly assembled from the canon of people’s music over the last century and Willie himself is a real troubadour whose love of Leadbelly and Woody Guthrie shines through each performance. Here’s the interesting bit…..Willie is making his debut solo album having quit Old Crow Medicine Show – you’d kind of expect him to have his own story to tell, his own songs to sing. Why he’s chosen this path and how much he loves the music will become clear in a fascinating interview you can hear this Friday. As if that’s not enough you will hear fresh performances of the songs from the album recorded exclusively for the AC. It’s going to be good.

As ever we’ll have some vintage records that will have you scurrying around wishing you could hear them again….Mr Murdoch is away but he’s left me the keys to his record cupboard and I have to say it’s particularly well stocked. So there will be the crackle of vinyl, the warm hum of valves from the new Ryan Adams record ….some of us may still have ringing ears from tonight’s show and there will be the beautiful high and lonesome plucking, picking and singing of one of a great troubadour starting out on a solo path that I’m pretty sure is going to prove very interesting.

Finally let me mention Blue Rose Code aka Ross Wilson who will be joining us next week. We’ll be playing the new single this Friday and welcoming Ross to AC land next week for an exclusive session and interview. His current single is a reimagining of a poem by this great Scottish poet… If you don’t know who this is we’ll enlighten you on Friday, as we always try to do.

It all starts at five past eight this Friday evening on BBC Radio Scotland. Join us if you can.

It’s been an amazing time in Scotland. This Friday night many of us will have had a long day and a long night. I don’t know about you but for me the thing I’m going to need on Friday evening is the thing I always need, music. There will be many listeners happy and many disappointed so I think we can all unite for a couple of hours around some songs I know you are going to love. As ever on the AC we’ll try to take you on a journey of discovery that coasts past some significant places on the Country map. This week we’re going to spend a fair bit of time thinking about this man.

Chet Atkins is one of these names we all know. When you arrive in Music City you quickly get a sense of how big a character he was. Downtown Nashville has a statue of him and streets  are named after him. He’s hard to miss. A few weeks ago a brilliant compilation of his music came out on what would have been his 90th birthday. Sadly Chet died in 2001 aged 77 but he left behind a huge legacy of his own recordings and amazing guitar playing but also a catalogue of recordings he produced for some of the greatest names in country and popular music. On Friday we’ll take you on our own mini tour of Chet Atkins for beginners….. Once you’ve done it you’ll be listening to your country music all over again.

Jim Reeves, Elvis Presley, The Louvins and The Everleys as well as Kitty Wells all feature in what should be a wonderful hour of music.

Despite everything else that’s going on here the AC found time for a wee night out as we met up with First Aid Kit before going to see their wonderful show at The Old Fruitmarket in Glasgow. We’ll be playing out a First Aid Kit two hour special in December and we think you will rather enjoy all of it. On Friday we’ll bring you a song we recorded at the show too. We discovered that Klara and Joanna really dig Jenny Lewis….so we thought we’d play some more from her and while we’re at it…….

We’ll be playing you new music on Friday from Bela Fleck and Abigail Washburn, Lady Antebellum, The Lost Brothers and CW Stoneking as well as having a beautiful vinyl rediscovery to crackle your speakers. If you want to hear it all we start at five past eight, Friday on BBC Radio Scotland.

Dear Listener,

It’s been a long summer and here in Scotland – it’s not over. But that’s a whole other story. Given my diverse timetable over the last few months I though it wise to rest the blog until after the Harvest was in and the colours were turning. So it’s back with a new paint job and we’re back and this Friday to welcome a man who is a great friend of the show.

If I am correct in my memory Ben Glover has visited us twice before and we’ll be delighted to see him again. I first met Ben at the Belfast Nashville festival and since that time he’s taken up residency in Music City but returns to his Northern Irish roots often enough for us to encourage him over the water for a visit.

His excellent new album, Atlantic was recorded near to where the mighty ocean meets the land in County Donegal and he’ll be playing some songs live and telling us all the latest news of what he’s been up to. One thing I can promise you is we’ll hear a Mary Gauthier song or two as Ben and Mary now collaborate on each others records – to great effect.

As well as all of that some wonderful new records from Parker Millsap, Ward Thomas, Daniel Meade, Barr Brothers, Gillian Welch/Dave Rawlings with an extremely long but magnificent song and our dearly beloved First Aid Kit who will be playing THAT special show for us next week. There are some significant anniversaries this week which may well inspire some music you’ll find hard to resist and Richard Murdoch went shopping in the city of Dundee last weekend and I fully expect him to have brought something which might break your heart on our Vinyl re discovery. Two other fabulous things to look out for which deserve special mention: Firstly Beck Lanehart who has a fabulous voice you might well have heard if you’ve travelled on the London Underground over the last couple of years…….I have to say a busker always sounds great in those tiled, mini concert-halls….I can only imagine how good Beck sounded as on her debut record she has one of the strongest voices I’ve heard in a long time. Finally I’m excited to tell you we’ll be playing anew song from the ever fabulous Anais Mitchell. It’s going to be great and it all starts this Friday from five past eight on BBC Radio Scotland.

I remember the night. It had been a strange call in the middle of the night. A friend needed me to be there and I drove over to see if I could be of any use. Habitually the CD player in the car just started up and in the dark gloom of this winter night the Delines album came on. I think I understood then this was how this record should be encountered.

From the man who made the beautiful analogy of the freeway sounding like a river comes an album full of songs celebrating the ordinary reimagined as a holy other. (The golden light from the oil rigs at night……) On Friday we catch up with the Delines in session and talk extensively to Willy Vlautin from Richmond Fontaine about this new project. If you’re unfamiliar with the album you might need to know the background. On the last RF album Willy had included Amy Boone as part of the Richmond Fontaine live ensemble and it occurred to him one night he’d like to hear her sing songs written for her. So we get The Delines featuring the songs of Willy, the odd Decembrist, the voice of Amy all coming from that creative corner of America’s North West, Oregon. For those of you who don’t know Willy is the author of four beautiful novels and his latest, The Free, like the other three is also set in that northern landscape. Since he was last with us The Motel Life, his first novel, has been made into a movie featuring Kris Krisofferson. So there’s a lot to talk about…..

One of the interesting things Willy says is that this is in fact a late night album inspired by the likes of Bobbie Gentry and given Willy’s ability to write stories from the perspective of others it’s, as ever, a compulsive listen. I’m not sure that listening to Willy speak isn’t sometimes as hypnotic as hearing him sing or reading his prose. So I say only this…….it will be a very special night on the AC this Friday. Miss it at your peril.

We will celebrate some great new records…Old Crow Medicine Show, Holly Williams, Barr Brothers and something rather splendid from Nick Hakim. We will share all the country news worth sharing and, for those of you like me who haven’t had time to catch up with ‘Nashville’ on the TV I’ll give you Mr Murdoch’s ‘Nashville Facts you need to know.’

The blog is going to take a short summer break for the rest of July and August  as my weeks are getting more and more irregular with the arrival of our new album but fear not, the AC will carry on all year long. Country Music Never Sleeps.

To be honest…..there will be so much more but for that you’ll have to join us on Friday all starting from five past eight on BBC Radio Scotland.

On Tuesday night I accepted an invitation to see Dolly Parton at the Hydro in Glasgow. Her publicist had kindly asked us to come early so we could ‘say hello.’ I went along with my old buddy Davie Scott (of Pearlfishers fame) and we duly waited back stage to see at first hand the full Dolly machine in operation. We stood in amazed awe as Dolly stood for a good 30 -40 minutes meeting and greeting numerous fans. To each one she was patient and courteous and inquisitive. Photographs were taken and warm exchanges given. In this age of the VIP pass and the ‘added value’ ticket this was the first lady of country spending the best part of her pre show prep time with her fans. Like many things that come as surprises to me these days I found it quite moving.

I was slightly worried about the gig. The first time I’d seen Dolly was one of the great nights of my life. Up there with the best gigs of all time it had been her bluegrass show and the playing and singing had been exemplary. It had been at the Armadillo and I remember feeling slightly guilty that we’d been given tickets when people around us were spending huge sums of money just to be there. The next time I tried every available blag I know to get a ticket and failed…..(should have bought them early!) So I’d jumped at the chance of going to the SECC show a couple of years back. I enjoyed this less as it seemed to be more about the phenomenon (and she is folks) of Dolly than about the great singer/songwriter I know her to be. Nevertheless…there is always much to enjoy.

This time it was The Hydro – now one of Glasgow’s best assets – and the fit was perfect. Dolly was sublime. She played new songs, told brilliant stories – always with that knowing undercurrent of acknowledging exactly who she is and what her audience wants to hear – and reminded us in two brilliant hours why she is still at the top of her game. One telling moment was when the back projections reeled out a discography. It went from the sixties until now and it was incredible to think there really had been no time since she first broke through when she hadn’t been a major star. But more than anything else it was the songs….she did Jolene three songs in….that’s confidence! She played brilliant versions of Coat of Many Colours, Here You Come Again, Little Sparrow and great versions of Blue Smoke and Banks of The Ohio from the new album. She finished the show with I Will Always Love You and she graciously paid tribute to the late Whitney Houston – even though millions of people loved the song before Whitney’s world dominating version.

This Friday I will give you more reasons to love Dolly but for now let me say this. A cliche is a cliche because it’s true and certain artists are massively successful because they are actually really great.

This Friday we will also let you hear new records from Jenny Lewis, Blue Rose Code, Peter Mulvey, Lindsay Lou and The Flatbellys and Strand of Oak. None of this should be missed it if you can help it. Join me if you’re free from five past eight this Friday on BBC Radio Scotland.

I remember standing in a pub in Belfast as a very good cover band did a very credible version of a current hit. I found myself splurging out to my near neighbour, ‘Great song.’ He smiled knowingly, like he’d had this conversation a million times, ‘ Well, good record.’

My friend was Ralph Murphy, British Nashville exile, songwriter and ASCAP point man. I nodded….Very true. There is a big difference. The difference perhaps is best exemplified when you leave a song bare. No harmony, no other instrument, just the piano or guitar and a voice. It’s melody words and a few chord changes and sometimes, if you’re lucky a killer riff…but often it’s just the melody and the lyric. It used to be a salutary exercise when a song was handed over to a remix ‘person.’ They’d take off everything – all your favourite twists and turns and voicings – and sit the bare vocal over something completely different. Hell they’d sometimes change the chords ….the were often not over fussy about the key! (viz You Got The Love, Candi Staton). Perhaps the best explainer of all of this is Randy Newman’s Songbook albums where he re records many of his songs with only his voice and piano accompaniment, in much the same way as he performs his repertoire live. It’s stark, honest and powerful and often very moving to have the emotional dissonance of the string lines removed to make the poignancy of the lyric slightly harsher and, often, crushingly brilliant.

So why the long recitative, Ricky, I hear you ask? Well, it all brings me to this man.

John Fullbright’s new record is called Songs, and although he self-effacingly suggests that he’s not good with titles he also admits that the key to the record was the many songs he has left unadorned. It’s similar to that moment when you put the Christmas tree up and it looks and smells beautiful; there’s always a moment with me when I think, ‘it might be nice to leave it.’ You never do though. In this case John is made of stronger stuff and the aching simplicity of some of the fine songs on the epoymously titled album are repeated this Friday in session. Look out for some brilliant singing and playing too and listen in as John tells us all that has happened since receiving a Grammy nomination for his debut record.

Also new and wonderful things from Old Crow Medicine Show and their former singer, Willy Watson,The Howlin Brothers and something spectacularly from the great new Jack White album.

Mr Murdoch has found a great vinyl rediscovery which picks up a theme from last week’s show. There will be so much more….did I mention that Aoife O’Donovan will make a rather lovely guest appearance? Thought not.

It will all start at five past eight this Friday evening on BBC Radio Scotland. Join me if you can.