The leaves are falling down….well the ones in my garden are. It’s been a long time coming but there have been a few trees which needed taking down a metre or two. As I write there’s a chipping machine in front of my window drowning the new Langhorn Slim album…it’s driving me nuts. It’s doing a power of work though. Trees have become dead limbs and those same limbs are being chipped into tiny bits of bark. What Tony Soprano couldn’t do with this machine doesn’t bear thinking about.

This Indian Summer we’re having isn’t confusing any of us. Summer has passed and we know that winter will come sooner or later. By nine it’s getting dark and the thought of being indoors and listening to the radio begins to make a lot more sense than it did in those high days of summer. As you can imagine that excites here on the old AC as we have a rather tall pile of records we need to prune a little too.

I’m quite excited by some of these and want to get a chance to play a few things this coming Tuesday. That new album by Langhorn Slim is called The Spirit Moves and I’ll be playing something to you without the noise of chainsaws to get in the way.  I’m hoping I’ll find time for something from the new Alela Diane record. You may well remember her from the Pirate’s Gospel a few years back. This time round she’s working with Portland Oregon based writer/producer, Ryan Francesconi. As well as Alela we will revisit the new album by Joan Shelley which really is very fine indeed. Like Alela, Joan is collaborating beautifully and in Joan’s case it’s the voice of Will Oldham we’re loving here. I’m also going to play more of that Jason Isbel album. Jason’s return to sobriety and subsequent solo albums have been a revelation and it seems that people are responding. This new album charted for the first time in the UK and went into the top 10 on the US Billboard Album chart. Not that we’re counting of course…

What else you say? We know you love a bit of bluegrass and, as Kirsten is working with me on the show we share a love of Cahalen Morrison and Elis West and want to play you a bit more from their album and a few Bluegrass treats. Look out for Jim Lauderdale, Crooked Still and Roscoe Holcombe.

We’ll be playing you some Neil Young on vinyl and heck yes we’ll certainly have some lovely old things which will remind you of why we all love country music.

On Sunday

With the Scottish Governments plan to prioritise education, we’ll be exploring what we want from our schools. What kind of citizens do we want our schools to produce; should schools be divided along gender or faith lines; is there any place for religion in schools – these are some of the questions we’ll be asking.

And I’ll be speaking to Justine Roberts, the co-founder and chief executive of the phenomenally successful parenting website Mumsnet.

Music from Soak, Paul Simon, Trembling Bells and Gurrumul.

All from 10 this Sunday morning on BBC Radio Scotland.

As I recall we were looking forward to one more of these summers we thought we used have as children. You know the ones; we left the house early and didn’t come home till our parents cries were heard over some sun-blessed meadow where larks and butterflies had flown around all day. Yeah….me neither.

The reality was that, in those days we saved our films and our rather expensive development costs for days when the sun was shining. We always took pictures with the sun behind us and very few of us took any photos indoor as we didn’t have these pesky flashbulbs. This summer, I suspect, may turn out to be no different when hazy memories are stirred many years on. ‘Look.’ we’ll point…’it was lovely that year.’ If you look at my photos you’d think we’d had a heatwave. At one point – and pretty well sober – I went swimming off the outer Hebrides with nothing between America and me but a pair of underpants and 5000 miles of ocean.

It was, in short, like so many summers full of wonder and joy. My children came home and we got to be together as a family for a glorious summer week, sharing stories, jokes and, of course music. So many nights we ended up outside our rented holiday house looking up at the stars and listening again to familiar songs. Some of those songs had arrived in the dead of winter but were now made to ring out loud on warm July nights where no one but us and a few bats could expect to hear them properly.

For us the joy was returning to a familiar haunt. It reminded me of one of my favourite poems by Norman MacCaig where he says,

‘So many summers, and I have lived them too.’

So, sooner or later, we accept that August is over and we embrace the changing season. It seems right that the Blog should return and once more we stay indoors to enjoy the wireless bringing music from across those 5000 miles to pierce the darkness. This coming Tuesday we’ll spend a fair part of our allowed two hours in the company of Angaleena Pesley. This year’s ‘American Middle Class ‘ album has made a very strong impression with us over at the AC. Perhaps it’s the honesty, perhaps it’s the reminder that country is at its best when it truly is the music of ordinary folk and over and above this perhaps it’s the high percentage of excellent melodies and carefully constructed performances on the one album. As well as all of this Angaleena is one of three Pistol Annies, she writes with some excellent collaborators and she gives a great interview.  We’ll play all of that as well as some great Angeleena associations including those Pistol Annie solo projects from Miranda Lambert and Ashley Monroe too. We’ll have Loretta Lynn and Townes Van Zandt on vinyl and we’ll play more from the new Langhorne Slim album and we will introduce you to a new voice who we like very much: Frankie Lee.

We’re live on Tuesday evening from five past nine on BBC Radio Scotland.

On Sunday I’ll be talking to self-styled social philosopher Charles Handy and getting to chat to Gerald Russell about his fascinating book ‘Heirs to Forgotten Kingdoms – Journeys into the Disappearing Religions of the Middle East.’ I’ve gone on about this so much in the house there’s a queue forming to read it next. If you want to understand what’s happened in the Middle East in the last 25 years and put that into a religious and historical context that stretches back to the earliest civilisations then you could do a lot worse than start with this book. The book is recommended highly by Bill Clinton…but don’t let that put you off if you don’t dig Bill. Have a look for yourself if you don’t believe me.

All this as well as some great music from 10 am this Sunday on BBC Radio Scotland. Do join me then if you can.

(photo by Kit Carruthers)

I’m sitting in our extension looking out at the garden as an apocalyptical rain storm beats down on the roof. It’s wonderful. In fairness I only say that because I’m not under canvas and I fear for those who are on this high summer night. It’s what I often have to tell myself is ‘song writing weather.’ Perfect for staying indoors and dreaming up another world where a different story unfolds.

You’d imagine we’d get enough rain in the winter to make any surplus summer downpours feel a little, you know, superfluous? But no. They have a magic all of their own. I remember a thunder, lightning and rain storm so dramatic  it kept me awake on one of my first ever sleep-overs in Carnoustie as a youngster. Years later I was staying with a pal at his auntie’s house in Inverbervie when it seemed the rain might wash the pillars of the viaduct away and all of us would be swept out to the raging North Sea. Sleep? We kept a watch all night, and it was as exciting as exciting gets in these parts for boy of my age.

Sometimes it takes a change in the order of events, time or place to write a song. It may be that different thoughts occur to the author when they are removed from all normal assumptions.   As a rule I experienced more rain and wind of summers than sunshine. I didn’t travel far, even as a student. I was working by the time I visited Greece for the only time in 1985. It was a package holiday to Crete and the time spent by the pool seemed to hang heavy on me. It seemed easier there to think about the place I’d just left rather than spend much time imagining how people there lived their lives. How different that might be had I made that trip 30 years on from that July holiday. Then I half dreamed and half remembered a story I wanted to tell. I wrote the words down on a jotter from the school where I taught. The song was called, ‘Dignity’ or maybe a Ship called Dignity. I don’t remember exactly now. But sometimes an unexpected turn of weather – in this case previously unimaginable heat – can make you do something different.

On Tuesday night we’ll find you a perfect mid summer soundtrack mostly imagined in far away places. Step forward Shelby Lynne, Tyler Farr, Buck Owens, Willie and Merle. We’ll introduce you to Flo Morrisey, Pharis and Jason Romero and remind you how good Valerie June sounds. Sound like we’re beating the weather?

It gets better. We have these fine gentlemen in session and conversation.

Cahalen Morrison & Eli West will tell us exactly where that phrase, I’ll Swing My Hammer With Both My Hands came from. Like their fine album they’ll do the whole thing with the help of wood, some wire and fine voices. It’s beautiful and it all starts from five past nine on Tuesday evening on BBC Radio Scotland.

On Sunday….

I’ll be with you for the last time until later later in the summer. I’ll spend the first part with the great poet, broadcaster and now seeker. Ian McMillan is has written Neither Nowt Nor Summat: In search of the meaning of Yorkshire and he’ll be talking about this and so much more on Sunday. It’s one of the most enjoyable conversations I’ve had in a long time.

I’ll hear from Jonathan E Brown about his most recent book Misquoting Muhammad, we’ll hear some more Ramadan Diaries and, as ever enjoy music ranging from Richard and Linda Thompson via Blur to Alabama Shakes. Al from five past ten this Sunday morning on BBC Radio Scotland.

The Blog is going on a summer holiday. See you later in the summer.

I have busked once. It was a disaster of epic proportions. We had a rehearsal room just off Buchanan Street in Glasgow underneath the street level in an old print room. One day, when I really should have known better, I said to the rest of the band, ‘Why don’t we go out and busk some of our songs?’ There were ten good reasons why this was not a good idea. I refused to hear any of them. The other nine reasons were never needed really……the reason it was such a bad idea is that we really pretty awful at the busking lark. It’s a learned trade.

I was working with a young artist recently who told me he was about to give up his regular job so he could concentrate on his music. His plan was support himself through busking. He could, he’d noticed, earn quite a good income at this. I think that was because he was rather a good singer and sang the songs people wanted to know. If I’d listened to my wife that fateful afternoon I’d have known better. She pointed out that repertoire was of some important in all of this……mine was limited and obscure.

One day we emerged from our basement to see Lorraine in Buchanan Street busking with another band. The irony was they were doing one of my songs…but the secret was they delivered it with a punch. I guess there are some lessons you just learn the hard way.

I was thinking about this as this week’s AC majors in on the ultimate busking band, Old Crow Medicine Show. They were ‘discovered’ by Doc Watson while they busked outside a pharmacy in Boone, Norton Carolina. The rest, as they say, is history.

We’ll play the OCMS themselves as well as some of their offshoot projects – Gill Landry, Willie Watson – a version of their most famous song and something wonderful from the man who witnessed that busking gig back in 1998, Doc Watson.

We’ll thbe introducing you to some new names including this man  ….Rayland Baxter,

Margo and The Pricetags and Daniel Romano as well as show some considerable excitement about the new, excellent record from Jason Isbell. Enough already? Gather round your wireless and chuck a few metaphorical coins into our cap from five past nine on Tuesday evening on BBC Radio Scotland.

On Sunday……..

I’ll be talking about to playwright Jo Clifford, hearing more Ramadan Diaries and talking to some wise guests about what happens when organisations and businesses lose direction.  How do they keep, lose or steer an ethical path for themselves, their coworkers and the people they seek to serve? As ever music …this week look out for Sly Stone, Sigur Ros, C Duncan and Ladysmith Black Mambazo.

There’s a song that’s been going round our house. You probably know it – especially if your listened to our show last week. Really I can’t get it out of my head. It’s Landslide by Fleetwood Mac. Last Wednesday at the Hydro it was performed by Stevie Nicks and Lindsay Buckingham as a duet quietly and beautifully to an audience that were in the palms of their hands. It was great. I went home to listen again and, as well as listening to the Dixie Chicks version I listened to that 1975 original version once more again and again. It’s the slight crack in Stevie’s voice that does it for me. Is it the note or the emotional truth? I’m not sure. She know longer has the same voice and though she does a great performance I there is something about the original that haunts me.

It was one of a night of individual moments that really proved the opposite to the old saying that the whole, in this case, is not bigger than the sum of the parts. In The Mac’s case this is simply due to egos that are stranger and bigger than most we would hope to encounter in any part of life as we normally know it. But, in their defence, it is also because they are a band which seem to delight in showcasing individual talents. The other ‘moment’ for me was Lindsay Buckingham’s quite breathtaking version of Looking Out For Love which, despite being a song which would have worked with the entire band, was a tour de force of individual guitar playing prowess.

It was interesting to compare and contrast all of this with the altogether more humble surroundings of The Barn at ‘Solas’ where I had the joy of seeing Blue Rose Code and Honeyblood play on Saturday evening. Having only seen BRC within the confines of the BBC sessions he’s done for the show it was great to see him surrounded by a  sound band delivering an enchanting set.  Shortly afterwards we experienced Honeyblood live too. Again a great set with two people making a big, warm beautiful noise from two instruments. Safe to say, I really did enjoy the focussed drive of these sets more than the high-end pomposity of Fleetwood Mac a few evenings before. Check them in a town near you soon if you can.

I should also add that ‘Solas’ is the most perfect summer festival you might hope to encounter. From their point of view a few more people would help hugely to make sense of the economics of the thing. But at the moment it creates, in a beautiful setting, a lovely meeting place for all ages to think about society, faith, culture and celebrate it all with music, poetry and art. In my book that’s really as good as it gets. Well done people you are curators of a Scottish gem.

This Tuesday we’re going down to our special place in Studio 1 where we’ll welcome back old friends, Woodenbox for a live set to celebrate the release of their new LP  ‘Foreign Organ’ which came out this month. We think we’ll have the biggest number of musicians yet to play a session and by the time I join them in the room there will be ten of us there! It’s going to be a great big sound, some fine new songs and a great cover too. Join us on Tuesday evening from five past nine on BBC Radio Scotland if you can.

On Sunday..

I’ll be speaking to the UK’s most decorated paralympic medallist Tanni Grey-Thompson. We’ll be talking to talking to Christine Toomey, the author of a new book, The Saffron Road: A Journey with Buddah’s daughters. We will also cast a cold eye on Syria as a group of experts gathers in St Andrews to look beyond the headlines at what is happening int hat country.

We’ll have some great music ranging from Teenage Fanclub to Lauren Hill. It all starts this Sunday from five past ten on BBC Radio Scotland.

We have had a family reunion this week. Two daughters, both of whom have been abroad over the last year, returned to live at home again. You can imagine the scenes and some of the long conversations that have taken place, sometimes staggered over days. Threads of conversation that don’t really ever get fully resolved. Despite FaceTime and all the other modern communication possibilities there is only so much that can be said without the formal reunion.

It got me thinking about getting back together. It happens so often in art and, in our case, particularly with music. We fall in love with a record and somehow we project on to that recording all manner of attributes borne out of affection but often slightly misplaced. We’re playing the new single from Alabama Shakes this Tuesday and it’s a case in point. The band we thought we loved have become a slightly different (and more interesting and ambitious) beast.

Our journey with Neil Young illustrates the point perfectly. Even I, a hardy follower throughout the tumult of the late 60s and 70’s output began to lose my interest in the Geffen years. The Neil I wanted often didn’t turn up for the simple reason that he felt he’d done that and, thanks very much and all that, he rather fancied doing something different now. He’s almost repeated the feat but, having said that, no one who has followed his career will be at all surprised to know that he’s hooked up with another band (Willie Nelson’s sons) and delivered a record railing against the anti-ecological  stand of big corporations. We’ll play you what Neil Young did next on Tuesday.

They even look like a country band should….

Similarly when Kacey Musgraves has returned we sense small changes in direction without the abrupt hand-brake turns of our previous names. It celebrates all that she has done on that first album and consolidates and celebrates her music. Elsewhere on the AC tomorrow we’ll play music by First Aid Kit, The Browns, Danny and The Champions of The World and, in the week where Messrs Ross and Murdoch get to see Fleetwood Mac we’ll play you some dignificant Maclove by some of your favourite country artists. It all starts at five past nine this Tuesday on BBC Radio Scotland.

On Sunday…

I’m really looking forward to meeting one of my heroes of broadcasting. Robert Peston, BBC’s economics editor will be joining me for the first hour of my programme. We’ll tell you about Britain’s first Catholic literary festival coming this weekend, talk to that pillar of the Scottish Asian community Bashir Mann about his own memoir and our good friend Bob Dickson visits a very special school indeed. It all starts at five past ten and, yes, there will be music. TLC, Richard Thompson, Emelie Nicolas and, of course Fleewood Mac. Join me if you can this Sunday on BBC Radio Scotland.

If you go down to the BBC today the detritus of Music at The Quay will be getting packed away and trucked off to another festival somewhere. The stage, lights and PA. The little village of bars and cafes, the tables where we sat and yes…the deck chairs …all gone.

It was a quite magical down by the Clyde last week. As the sun came down last Thursday a few of us sat around, had a beer or two and chatted music. It had been a good night. Ostensibly three diverse acts (all good friends of the show) had come to entertain a gathered audience of loyal BBC listeners. And yet….there was something else in the air. Some of that was the realisation that we were all celebrating something we loved. Maybe it was Daniel Meade channeling his own influences of Gerry Lee Lewis or Red Sky July covering the Dixie Chicks and name-checking some of the finer names in country on their brand new break-up song. Perhaps too it was Andy Fairweather Low and his Low Riders who took us on the road from 60’s modness back to Duane Eddy, The Shadows and Freddie King. The result was that in two hours we gathered and we all celebrated the music that had brought us to this point. For me that makes all of that building and packing up worth the while. It means that the BBC is spending a good proportion of our money on music and doing its best to bring disparate musicians together to make something fresh and reach new audiences. I think that makes the license fee rather good value Mr Cameron.

If you didn’t make it down to any of this, fear not. Tonight from five past nine we have a special Another Country from the Quay bringing you the whole show. It looks like it’s going to be lovely weather. Sit outside and imagine you’re there! All from five past nine on BBC Radio Scotland this Tuesday evening.

On Sunday.

I’ll be spending a very good amount of time with Neil Ascherson, journalist and author of great books of national identity including Stone Voices and The Polish August. There are very few people who fit the bill, ‘National Treasure’ but I think Neil is definitely one of those.

We’ll talk to film maker Karen Guthrie about the documentary chronicling the story of her mother’s illness  – ‘The Closer We Get.’ Chris Dolan will join me to talk about his new book Alliyah and we’ll chat to Ronnie Convery about his recent trip to Turin where they may not have the Champions Trophy sitting pride of place but are still rather proud of their shroud.

There will be so much more as well as music from Big Sean, Maxine Brown, Ryan Adams, Fontella Bass and so much more…..

It all starts on Sunday from five past ten on BBC Radio Scotland.

A week past Sunday I went down the hill from a little restaurant where I’d enjoyed a very hearty brunch with one of Nashville’s many great song writers. I was intent on parking within easy reach of the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum. ‘You’re not far away,’ my dining companion assured me. ‘Just turn left on Demonbreun St.’ I didn’t flinch but remember thinking, ‘What was that name he just said?’

A couple of days later, and in the presence of one of the city’s many other great crafters who turned to me and said, ‘You know we have a street here in town that most people who don’t live in the city can’t pronounce. It’s called Demonbreun Street.’ I laughed. Yes I’d been able to find it but was still not sure I could tell anyone else how or where to do the same thing given my inability to say the name. ‘And why would anyone want top go?’ I feel you hiss beneath your breath.

Well on that unpronounceable artery lies one of the great, perhaps greatest musical, museums of the world. The Nashville Country Music Hall of fame and Museum does so many things right it’s hard to find the slightest thing to dislike. In fact, on reflection, I cannot find a single thing. It’s ages since I’d been and I got so excited on the top floor that I almost didn’t leave time to see the thing I’d paid my entrance money to see in the first place. If you ever go you should follow your nose and you will not be disappointed. What comes over more than anything is the belief within the curators that country is a) great b)worth celebrating and c) carries within its timeline great stories of ordinary people. Along the way I was stopped in my tracks. I couldn’t really get over how great Marty Robbins, Webb Pierce and Carl Smith  were in this great clip. I loved the introduction by June Carter too.

Eventually I got to Dylan, Cash and The Nashville Cats exhibition. I’d be listening to the accompanying record all week in my hire car and I’d fallen in love with the concept and, of course, so much of the music.  On Tuesday I’ll be playing you some of the tracks from this brilliant double album and I’ll tell you a little of the story behind the exhibition, the album and the book.

I want to share with you some great moments I enjoyed when I saw Darrell Scott’s tribute to Ben Bullington and, at The City Winery where, a week later, I also caught a beautiful intimate evening with Emmylou Harris and Rodney Crowell. In between times I saw a great double-bill of Sam Outlaw and Cale Tyson and with their respective bands at the Basement. So…lots of music from all of these people as well as some fine new things.

We will be down at the Quay this Thursday along with around 400 of you for our massively oversubscribed live show with Daniel Meade, Red Sky July and Andy Fairweather Low and The Low Riders. Next Tuesday we’ll play out the gig to everyone else who couldn’t make it.

On Sunday morning I’m back on the airwaves. Because BBC Scotland is celebrating music all next weekend we will be bringing a unique show to you. On the programme: The Soul Nation Gospel Choir singing live, Karine Polwart on protest, John Bell – Scotland’s most successful living song writer and our old friend Minister, Poet and all round good egg Steve Stockman. Much more too and it all starts this Sunday from 10 a.m. on BBC Radio Scotland. Do join us on all of this if you can.

It’s nearly the end of my trip to Nashville. There will be lots to tell you about on my return. Some great people, stories, a couple of excellent live shows and a pile of vinyl to share. But most of that can wait until next week. This week on the AC we have a very special night.

If  there’s any part of you that has lost faith in country music we have two hours and a couple of dozen songs to make you believe again. For the last couple of years we’ve finished each and every interview by asking our guest to pick a favourite country song and tell us why they love it so much. Sometimes you can tell it’s one they always wished they could have recorded themselves, often they simply can’t hide their admiration for the craft of the songwriters that are involved but most often it’s just because they simply love it and want to share it with us.

So first the guest DJs. Listen out for selections from: Raul Malo from The Mavericks, Beth Nielson Chapman, The Decembrists’ Colin Meloy, Ward Thomas sisters Catherine and Lizzie, Rodney Crowell and Willie Vlautin. Be prepared to be wowed by the songs selected by Anais Mitchell, Ryan Adams and Kacey Musgraves.

On the night you will hear great music from The Grateful Dead, Linda Ronstadt, Emmylou Harris, Hank Williams, Gillian Welch, Willie Nelson and George Jones – as you might well expect. I will also be allowed a few selections so look out for The Judds, Keith Urban and Marty Robbins. Listen out too for a very rare spin of Charlie Dore’s selection The DeZurik Sisters.

It all starts at five past nine on BBC Radio Scotland this coming Tuesday evening. Join us if you can.

The interview was going, largely, to plan. Matthew E White politely answered the questions and we  both talked enthusiastically about records, analogue recordings and the general ephemera of the studio until that question. ‘Why Matthew,’ I asked ‘…why is rock n roll cold?’

I’ll let that question sit there for a moment while I tell you a little more about the man. Matthew E White is from Richmond Virginia. It’s there he’s established his studio where he’s created a unique sound. Think of these great roots studios of yesteryear, Fame, Hitsville in Detroit, Stax, Sun and, perhaps more than any of these, Willie Mitchell‘s Royal Studio in Memphis and put you’ll get an idea of what Matthew was trying to create. Along with some fine musician colleagues he’s created house sound and managed to create a new label to celebrate the music. Space bomb is the name of the label and the studio and -have I mentioned Curtis Mayfield – it’s a great sound which leans heavily on the artists and production values of all the aforementioned studios and repertoire.

So now we come to that question. It’s a simple answer really but I will have to insist that you hear the session and interview on Tuesday evening to hear Matthew’s response. But, really, it’s worth it. Listen out too as Matthew and the Spacebomb fellas cover a great, great Randy Newman song

As well as all of this we will tell you details of the fabulous Southern Fried Festival this summer in Perth. We’ll be there and, once you know the details, you too will find it hard to stay away. We’ll remember the genius that was Mickey Newbury, play more from Angeleena Preseley and we’ll have Willie Nelson and Merle Haggard as they were and now are. If that’s not enough you can here Neil Young‘s take on Willie Nelson too. ‘All this in two hours Rick?‘ I hear you ask. Yes, and what’s more there will be so much other great music too. It all starts at five past nine this Tuesday evening on BBC Radio Scotland and it will only make sense if you can spare the time to join me..