Wow we had a great evening yesterday, watching the wonderful Charlie Parr in action at The Cube. What a fantastic guitarist and songwriter this man is. If he plays anywhere near you, you really should go and see him. He is a real gent as well; it’s high time that his work was more widely known. If you can’t get to see him in the flesh, he has two excellent albums available (and cheap), do yourself a favour a grab them.

Earlier a writing an email to blog friend Heather who lives in the states and found myself writing the following:
Meeting so many people who are involved in making music has been one of the joys of working in the record shop. As I am easily the wrong side of 40, it's really energizing to chat to these young people who are determined to make things happen for themselves. So many of them either make their own music or promote gigs and club nights, we even have a small cinema/ music venue (capacity around 110), which is run entirely by volunteers. They are so supportive and encouraging of each other, it really is great. No one makes any money, yet they keep on putting on interesting entertainments for the people of Bristol to enjoy. How lucky I am to live in a place where such things take place!

I think this really is a time of change in Bristol, as places like Imperial close and although it serves a different crowd, I was sad to hear of The Depot closing as that was a venue where people could enjoy hassle free dance music, without the big club attitude, which many places have. Although I never went to any of the nights there, I know from talking to friends that it will be much missed by a large section of the Bristol community. Still, it is really good to hear about the people that still want to find ways of doing interesting things for the right reasons, so in no particular order here are some of the people who continue to make this town of ours an interesting place to live; The Cube, Here (it’s a shop in Stokes Croft), Tom of my two Toms (and about 20 other bands), Mark from float and The Cube, Lady Lucy, RLF (sadly not in Bristol for much longer), Chiz, Ed, Dutty Girl, Simple Kid promotions, Aaron of run run promotions. Whilst we still have the likes of John Stapleton, Paul of Espionage fame and a few others of my generation working hard it’s fun to watch the new blood coming through.