SIDETRACKS & DETOURS to poetry, radio whispers, Springsteen, Beatles, jazz, classical & folk music

Whispering, Battle-rapping & poetry 4th August 2025

SIDETRACKS & DETOURS

Whispering, Battle-rapping & poetry, The Beatles and Springsteenand music

13th July 2025

CONTENTS

all news collated by Norman Warwick

POETRY

1     Exact Opposite Of What She Was. Joy France: battle rapper.

2     Rochdale: Town Of Culture . Sammy Weaver, is Poet Laureate

RADIO WHISPERS

3 Radio Remembers Light Programme Boon Radio to celebrate with David Hanmilton

4     Radio Whispers from Bob Harris. Making Playlists For Fun

5    Radio Whispers from Bob Harris. Eric Church Echoes Springsteen

BIO PICS AND BOX SETS: SPRINGSTEEN

6     New Bio-pic: Bruce Springsteen Deliver Me From Nowhere 

7 Box Set of Seven Albums, The Lost albums, Bruce Springsteen

ISLAND LIFE

8 Larry Yaskiel & The Beatles on The Canary Islands

JAZZ

9 Joni´s Jazz        Joni Mitchell shares her jazz influencers

10 Bewick´s Hot Biscuits Fishaguard Jazz Festival August 2025

CLASSICAL MUSIC

11 River of Music by The Kanneh Masons New album preview

ENGLISH FOLK MUSIC

12 Official Folk Charts with ten new entries

1 EXACT OPPOSITE OF WHAT SHE WAS

JOY FRANCE: creative, poet & battle-rapper!

by Norman Warwick

A few years ago now, on the recommendation of our audience, I booked poet and creative artist, Joy France, as our guest at The Ring O Bells Folk And Poetry club in Middleton. In its heyday the club had been hosted by an excellent folk duo called Pint And A Half, due to the respective heights of the duo´s members, and occasionally by Mike Harding (left), prior to his radio 2 years.

I had been in a room when Joy France (right) had delivered some of her observant, witty and socially aware poetry so I had no problems with booking her, and she was as inspiring in this gig as she had been on the previous occasion I had seen her. However, her spiel had changed. The lady who had been a dreamy poet had morphed into the image of a Blue Peter presenter, or at least she brought to the gig things she had prepared earlier, such as poetry, photographs, drawings and all sorts of paper trails of the here´s one I prepared earlier type. She asked quiz questions and engaged in conversation with audience members throughout her act. She was even more dynamic than I had remembered her, with lots of energy and good humour. Her silver hair and the sparkling eyes behind her glasses lent her the air of a tv presenter of an arts programme. The audience loved her, especially the poets in the audience like Katie Haigh who had worked with her, too, at Langley Writers.

Time flies, so fast forward from that 2002 evening to a significant birthday for Joy.

The year Joy France turned 60  she pledged to try 60 new things. It led to her trading insults with MCs on the international stage as Paul Cocozza wrote in The Guardian in August 2023.

As a child, Joy France was so shy that she walked to school with her hands over her eyes, believing no one would see she was there.

Now 66, she is an international battle rapper who raps in front of huge crowds. “I think I’m the oldest battle rapper in the world,” she says. She has battle rapped – a form in which rappers insult each other and make boasts in England and Ireland, in the Don’t Flop league (one of the UK’s biggest leagues). In the process, she has become “the exact opposite of what I was”.

France (shown left, ín battle) made her debut in 2018 at a club in Coventry – “stepping into a world that I was terrified of,” she says, so nervous that she came out in a rash. Before the battle – recorded by Northern Heart Films for a short documentary – France contacted her opponent and urged: “Do whatever you would do for any other contestant.” He obliged, rapping a joke about her genitals.

Usually, when she arrives at the door to perform, the security guard will say, ‘Sorry love, you’ve come to the wrong place. There’s going to be lots of swearing. I say: ‘Yes, it’s going to be me doing the swearing.’”

It might not be everyone’s definition of invigorating, but: “There’s nothing going to make me cringe or cower,” she says. She loves “the variety of people. It’s massively neuro-diverse. It’s a very welcoming scene, a beautiful world of mainly young men who are there for each other.” She already had friends – Sue who enjoys cruises and Eric who plays golf. Through rapping, she has made new friends: Maddo, Bacon, Rapthor and Skully The Mad Hat. “Lovely, unusual friendships.”

France spent her career teaching at a primary school, specialising in special needs, and later in pupil referral units. By her mid 50s, she was a single parent with an adult son and a reliable job. “There was nothing wrong with my life, but it was predictable.”

So she made a decision to “shake up life by following coincidences” to see where that led. Some of the “coincidences” she experienced produced bizarre outcomes. Cabbages were mentioned twice in one day, so France joined an event with a Chinese artist that entailed attaching a lead to a cabbage and taking it for a walk. Another time, coincidence led her to a poetry workshop in Wigan, where she lives. The workshop led to spoken word nights at a local pub. France stood at the back listening and watching for nearly a year, before she felt ready to perform herself. Then she became a regular, her confidence grew and she eventually won a poetry slam. “It’s usually younger people and not many women. I was breaking barriers. I found my voice.”

In 2014, France took early retirement to explore her creativity. She did a turn at the Isle of Wight festival and another at the Edinburgh fringe (where this week she performs a show entitled From Retirement to Battle Rap).

“I was just about to get sensible, start doing supply work,” she says, “when I got an offer to be creative-in-residence at Afflecks independent emporium in Manchester.”

At Afflecks, an indoor market of independent shops, France was given a room. She put a sign above the door that said: “Not a shop. The only rule was to be nice. Come in and create, but no money’s going to be spent. I let it grow organically. We had open mics, workshops. Bands would form.”

One day, a couple of teenagers dropped by. One read France a poem he had written, and she reciprocated with her own. “The boys laughed and said: ‘That’s rap. You should do battle rap!’”

They didn’t know that on France’s 60^th birthday, a few months earlier, she had pledged to try 60 new things before the year was out and to follow up every suggestion. She had already held an owl, gone fishing and learned a new Latin phrase. Now battle rap was added to the list.

She did a “mini rap battle” outside Afflecks. “But I knew I hadn’t done it for real. I’d not changed anyone’s views about a short fat woman with grey hair. I wanted to see if I could do it for real.”

For years, she says, “I kept myself away from doing things I wanted to do. I’m past that now.” She has discovered “how to embrace life” and whatever happens, “I will be able to think that I enjoyed the world – and hopefully made the world a better place by interacting with people.” Next year, she plans to battle rap in New York.

 Joy Uncensored by Northern Heart films is available at www.joyuncensored.co.uk

2     ROCHDALE, TOWN OF CULTURE

Gtr Manchester Town of Culture appoints SAMMY WEAVER: first poet laureate

Multi award-winning poet Sammy Weaver (left) has been appointed as Rochdale’s first ever poet laureate.

The multi-talented creative writer has been commissioned to capture the spirit of Rochdale in words, raising awareness and helping encourage people to engage with poetry during the town’s year as Greater Manchester Town of Culture.

Sammy, who lives on a narrow boat along Rochdale Canal, said she is excited about the opportunity:

“This seemed like a great chance to be a public poet in a place that has become my home, encouraging others, especially young people, to get involved and telling Rochdale’s fascinating stories through poetry. In the spirit of the co-operative movement that began in Rochdale I really like how the role has room for creative ideas to grow and for locals to have a say in the project. Anyone can be a creative writer if given the right support and I hope that through my work I am able to share the joy that poems can spark.”

Between May 2025 and March 2026 Sammy will be leading workshops in schools borough-wide, mentoring Rochdale’s 2 new young poet laureates as well as reflecting with her own words during the town’s big year in the Greater Manchester cultural spotlight..

After completing her creative writing masters at Manchester Metropolitan University, Sammy bought a boat and moved from the city to the anquillity of the Pennine waterways, using the moors and the post-industrial spaces as her inspiration:

“I really love it here, the wonderful communities we have, the canals, reservoirs and rivers, I love water and all the scenery we’re surrounded by, as well as the new developments in the town centre and of course the majestic town hall.”

Her debut poetry collection ‘Angola, America’ won the Mslexia Poetry Pamphlet Prize in 2021 and was shortlisted for the Michael Marks Award. Sammy has over 10 years’ experience leading creative writing sessions across the UK. Earlier this year she was made a Yaddo Fellow and was writer in residence at the organisation’s artists’ community in New York.

Deputy Mayor of Rochdale councillor Janet Emsley, (right) who is shortly due to be elected mayor for the next municipal, said, “I am so pleased to welcome our first poet laureate and am looking forward to seeing what she has got planned for our exciting year ahead.”

The appointment is part of a spectacular line up of festivals, live performances, exhibitions and art during Rochdale’s year as Greater Manchester Town of Culture. The title, awarded by the Greater Manchester Combined Authority (GMCA), celebrates the town’s rich history, creativity, talent and diverse arts scene. Rochdale is building on the town’s cultural capital and international reputation as the home of the co-operative movement with more than 35 arts organisations delivering an ambitious programme that runs until the end of March 2026.

 ‘People power’ will be centre stage throughout the year, with residents helping to plan, develop and deliver much of the line-up of creative activity alongside a number of big events.

Meanwhile, Norman Warwick, a poet and creative writing facilitator, and a former Rochdale resident, living in the town for fifty five years before retiring to Lanzarote, where he now works in the island´s burgeoning arts scene, applauds Rochdale´s success.

¨It is amazing how the size and demographics of  the town of Rochdale and the popular Canary Island are so similar. in terms of square mileage, sieze of indigenous population and their adult models.´ says Norman.

There is a healthy number of arts facilities and groups on the island, and I report on those in various outlets that are similar to the Heywood Advertiser, Middleton Guardian and The Rochdale Observer papers Effectively I´m writing very similar pages to those produced by Steve Cooke (and now, too, Matthew Haigh) in The Rochdale Observer. I know that the glossy Rochdale Style magazine carries arts news as well whilst over here a similarly excellent magazine, Lancelot, also delivers arts news. I contribute to, and extrapolate from, all those outlets and collate them in this occasional blog, Sidetracks And Detours which is an international on line site celebrating art forms and news from around the world.

During my time in Rochdale I was a great admirer and, I hope a useful advocate of some of our great arts groups such as the M6 Theatre, Skylight Circus, Can´t Dance Can, Cartwheel Arts, and Touchstones Art Gallery and Museum. In fact, the late Robin Parker and I  founded the monthly Poetry Readings At The Baum  which often drew, (and still do, I´m told)) more than twenty readers, such as John Leach and Catherine Coward to those evenings. Along with Val Chapman, I and a score of aspirant, and already excellent, writers formed Touchstones Writing Group and I served as its facilitator for several years until coming over here to Lanzarote.

Of course, funding was always difficult to secure or was at least subject to deep troughs and low peaks of monies available. And that is perhaps the significant difference between the arts scene in Rochdale and Lanzarote. Here on the island our population, and thousands of tourists, value our artists and our island government and our local councils fund those artist and even often prmote free concerts as a showcase of the acts and a benefit to the audiences. Rochdale probably has always had to fight for its share of finances even whilst in the shadow of Greater Manchester and neighbouring boroughs like Bury, Bolton and Oldham.

I enjoyed The Rochdale Literary And Ideas Festivals that ran for several years, funded by a very generous bequest from a local couple of library supporters.  I have noticed, too the number of new arts festivals that have taken place in the borough in the last decade or  so .

And now, Rochdale has Sammy Weaver, 2 young poet laureates and a series of festivals and events until May 2026., whilst Rochdale is a Greater Manchester Centre Of Culture, and this all gives the folk of Rochdale.a summer to look forward to.

Writers such Eileen Earnshaw, Katie Haigh and Seamus Kelly, advocates like Steve Cooke and Steve Bewick and Deputy Mayor Janet Emsley, herself an energetic supporter of the arts, have all helped to find Rochdale´s place in the sun.

Rochdale is a town with green parks and a historic town hall. A river runs through it, and this should be a great summer.

Enjoy the events as you support whatever you can´ !

3 Radio Remembers The Light Programme

Boon Radio celebrates with special Programme presented by DAVID HAMILTON

As the War ended in Europe, the BBC responded quickly in creating a new entertainment radio station – the BBC Light Programme.Having been born a baby-boomer I grew up on a radio diet of many much-loved programmes including Mrs. Dales Diary, Saturday  Club – and Housewives’ Choice (Ken Dodd pictured, reading his Family Favourites mail). It was also the spot on the dial for Family Favourites, a Sunday lunchtime favourite that connected BFO (Britsh Forces Overseas) with loved ones back home through messages read out, and requests to play a songs dedicated to sweethearts, spouses and children and grandparents.

I can still see vividly our living room at home, where mum was in the corner doing the ironing and I was on the floor playing subbuteo whilst listening to songs by Julie London or Frankie Laine or Max Bygraves or Nat Ki9ng Cole. Even then, in my pre-teens, the music sounded somewhat old fashioned as I dreamed of one day having a music collection of my own. I´m sure I didn´t envisage these óldies´being part of that collection, but now in my seventies they still feature and I see them now as the signposts that took me down sidetracks and detours to meet John Stewart, Townes Van Zandt, Toma Waits and Emmylou Harris et al.

Launching on 29th July 1945, when radio listening was at its height and fledgling TV had yet to re- commence, it was the station which would entertain the nation until its closure in 1967 – and the precursor to BBC Radio 2.

As the BBC Yearbook stated, it would “appeal not so much to a certain class of listener-but to all listeners when they are in certain moods’, but not everything was “frothy or frivolous”. The station would bring programmes that remain to this day including Woman’s Hour and Pick of the Pops – but the necessary reorganisation of wavelengths on radio dials “bewildered many listeners”.

David Hamilton is the only UK broadcaster who appeared on the BBC Light Programme regularly – and still broadcasting daily now.

On Boom Radio, to mark the anniversary, David will tell his personal account of the BBC Light Programme. Fond memories as a boyhood listener, glued to the football commentaries – and impersonating the characters in the channel’s famous comedy shows.

He tells of the programmes he hosted in his early BBC career – with the stars of the day performing live. And of how he was the person who closed-down the service in 1967, hosting the final edition of Housewives’ Choice – a programme seemingly ill-suited to the BBC’s new hipper Radio 1 and Radio 2 – and hosted Music Through Midnight, the programme which took the channel into its final day of life. “I felt like an undertaker”, says David.

4     RADIO WHISPERS WITH BOB HARRIS

       BOB HARRIS COUNTRY SHOWS BBC RADIO 2  at 9.00 Thursday Evenings

Bob Harris still shares his expansive knowledge of music and genres, and love of music and musicians in that familiar ´whispering´ voice we have known for decades since The Old Grey Whistle Test was on BBCtv. Whispering Bob also takes a collegiate approach to presenting, making friendships and alliances with not only those singers and songwriters who contribute so much but also to his fellow broadcasters, It was no surprise, therefore that he opined on a recent programme (July 19^th 2025) by referencing Jo Wiley, the presenter who had closed the programme before Bob´s show. 

She had closed her show with Blanket On The Ground by Bille Jo Spears,  and Bob followed her (after the news) and thanked her for playing a song that was a perfect lead in to his show, and complimenting her on how eclectic her show always is.

The first track played by Bob tonight was Zach Top´s She Said Yes, and he followed that by plying Kathleen Edwards´ Save Your Soul, after which he waxed lyrical about her new album Billionaire. I always listen with my ear close to the speakers in case I should miss any of Bob´s whispered recommendations, and he was sufficiently effusive (when he is ever rnot?) to ensure that I made a note to add her album to my playlists.

Molly Tuttle (right), is a name I first heard in a Skype talk with my son in South Korea when, in a shout rather than a whisper, he said ´you´ve got to listen to her,…. she´s gonna be massive.´ I listened and I agreed, and five years later she is commercially massive already and has gained the approval of veteran stars who have identified her as the real deal. Tonight, Whispering Bob chose to play, Prodigal Daughter,  Molly Tuttle´s duet with Hayley Whitters.

Harris then returned again to Zach Top with the rollicking Good Time And Tan Lines.

I was listening to this particular edition of the Bob Harris Country Show whilst compiling pages for our forthcoming Mary Chapin Carpenter Celebration and wasn´t really surprised that serendipity allowed Bob to play a track off her new album that had been released only five days before. He chose to play Girl And Her Dog off a Personal History track-list that seems to suggest new found, if somewhat resigned, contentment, but I, looking forward to Peter Pearson´s review of the album which I would like to include in that edition.

This was also the week in which we lost Brian Wilson, the genius inside The Beach Boys. Bob uttered words of condolence and appreciation for all Brian´s work. He then played Lori Morgan´s version of Don´t Worry Baby, a song of reassurance that sounds so simple on first hearing but reveals all sorts of lyrical depths and musical complexities on further hearing.

The recording was made for a double album featuring forty songs, called The Beach Boys´ Stars And Stripes on which The Beach Boys all played with each guest musician to record a Beach Boys song of their choice. To select from these guest performers could pick from Beach Boys genres such as Surfing, Rock and Roll a la Chuck Berry, Country, perhaps on tracks like I Can Hear Music and Americana.too, maybe on cuts like Wouldn´t It Be Nice?  Of course, one Beach Boys song carried all those genres and many more beside in a great big melting pot boiling in 4 minutes of a perfectly crafted, perfectly performed  and perfect production values on Good Vibrations. Sticking with album themes, Whispering Bob Harris recommend a series of box sets currently being released that feature the work of George Jones. Harris called the series, I think, Peak Possum, but the track he played was certainly Me Without You,

Bob Harris loves nothing more than to champion an artist that he thinks we might not know and who he think is worthy of our exploration. The song he played tonight by just such an artist was Neon Does by Byrce Leatherwood. Bob also handed out a Horizon Artist accolade to Alexandra Kaye, playing her latest single, The Last.

He also played High Road by Cody Wensall(?)

Bob became very excited when he played Lucas Nelson performing Disappearing Light, that Bob described as a fantastic song. It is, dreamy and thoughtful, another wonderful song that defies categorisation.

Naturally the radio 2 presenter followed up and closed the show with a song by Lucas´ old man, Willie Nelson. This was a track written by  Rodney Crowell, who at one time had an occasional group called The Cicades who recorded this track called Still Learning To Fly. Willie´s version is typical Willie, finger-picking good and vocally sublime.

Throughout the programme Bob Harris had read out answers from listeners to his question of who was the artist who first turned you on to country music?

Roger Miller, Hoyt Axton, Charlie Daniels, Willie Nelson and Kris Kristofferson were among the answers.

My answer would have been The Kingston Trio when John Stewart was in the line up, adding little bits of country to their folksie fare. Years later, The Monkees drew me closer to country when I also recognised the name of John Stewart as the writer of Daydream Believer. It was maybe ten years later when I heard Pete Benbow, a folk club performer and an occasional member of my then newly-formed Lendanear band with Colin Lever, perform a song called California Bloodlines that he said was written by John Stewart. I scoured the north west of England and found a copy of the album in Ryan´s Country Store, (his shed) in Pen Y Cae near Wreham in Wales. I took the vinyl eighty miles back home and put the stylus on it immediately  and realised I was in another country, as the music sounded very different to our UK pop music of the time. I would later hear all John Stewart as ´Americana,´ a subtly different genre to country. Nevertheless Stewart had started out as folk music, wrote pop, wrote country and all sorts of other genres. However, like all of us, I guess, he said to himself (and others) I Wanne Be Elvis.

5     RADIO WHISPERS FROM BOB HARRIS

ERIC CHURCH ECHOES SPRINGSTEEN

Eric Church (left) is an American country music singer and songwriter. He was born on May 3, 1977, in Granite Falls, North Carolina. Church has released several studio albums through Capitol Nashville since 2005. His debut album,  Sinners Like Me Sinners Like Me ,  was released in 2006 and produced three singles, including the top 20 hits How ‘Bout You, Two Pink Lines, and Guys Like Me.

Church is known for his distinctive sound, which often incorporates elements of rock and roll into his country music. He is also known for his energetic live performances and his willingness to experiment with his music. 

Some of Eric Church’s most popular songs include Drink In My Hand, Talladaga and  Record Year and I have been aware of these and many more of his songs since he first emerged on the scene. However, one particular song has remained on my radar ever since I first heard it and immediately became a permanent fixture on my Spotify playlists.

It was because of that song I decided to listen in to a recent Bob Harris Meets Eric Church episode of the Whispering Bob Country Show on BBC Radio 2. To my delight the programme opened with My favourite Eric Church song, Springsteen, an eponymous song about The Boss.  The recording isnot only a tribute to Springsteen´s  song-writing skills, (and Church nods at several Springsteen titles in his own lyrics)  but also pays homage to Springsteen´s energy and stage craft as a performer. However, Church delivers his skill set as a lyricist by not only reminding us how great, yet grounded, Springsteen is seen to be, but also reminds us of Springsteen´s working class empathy and Born To Run streak. Even more than that, though, he delivers this as a simple love ballad whilst building it into a rites of passage story that very cleverly employs Springsteen and his albums and gigs as the cinematic soundtrack to Church´s own formative years. The song has a great, if uncanny, air about it.

When the track ended and once he had been introduced to the listeners by Bob Harris, Church explained why he rates Springsteen so highly whilst admitting that the styles of he and Springsteen would cover only a thin shaded area of any Venn Diagram. Harris referred to Springsteen, the song, as a piece of music that addressed teenage issues. Church laughed and said there was certainly a part of his lyric that did that, and suggested to Whispering Bob that they should put a small playlist together, there and then on the show and then play it.

So we, the listeners then heard a glorious medley of Kreez´s Time, Paradise By The Dashboard Light, Amazing Grace (?), Sunday Morning Coming Down, Evangeline And The Machine (with faint echoes of The Cosmic RoughRiders), Johny (a song written about a school shouting in America) and The Devil Went Down To Georgia, in which of course Johny was also the name of the character who repelled the devil when they loosened up their bows. House Of The Rising Sun by The Animals closed this list with Church admitting The Animals were his favourite UK group in his early years. This ghastly, ghostly devilish playlist raised one more topic, that of fictional characters as super heroes. That´s a lot to contemplate from a short, compiled-on-the-hoof playlist !

In the eighties I I serialised extrapolations from my book, Their Names Fell Out In Conversation, in a UK country magazine that focussed on that genre. I should one day get round to updating the book so that it would include Springsteen by Eric Church and I´m sure there would also be plenty of other excellent tribute songs that I haven´t yet found.

Bob Harris quickly lifted the mood, though, when he asked about Eric´s life-style in North Carolina; Of course Eric spoke of the usual quietude of the region and the decency of its population but of course, some parts of the area had been recently ravaged by a hurricane. Eric said how saddened he was by the event but also of how sure he was that the local residents, given the right provisions and support will show the resilience to re-build. He also spoke of country artist Luke Comb and singer-writers like James Taylor and Sheryl Crow who have already pledged their artistic support. It was now an appropriate time to play Carolina, the title track of Eric´s second album released seven years ago.

The conversational pieces between Eric and Bob were warm in tone, and welcoming to the radio audience, when addressing topics like how recorded duets come about with Eric suggesting that musicians must have their way but that he feels the best way to achieve that is to build an empathetic relationship between the recording artist and the producer. This makes decisions easier to negotiate when discussing musical arrangements, session players and feature artists.

As an example of this, Bob and Eric agreed to play The Outsiders, a ballad that becomes a progressive rock track, and as the song finished Bob observed that it often takes a producer as inventive and attentive  as George Martin to find the full meaning and  realisation of the sound The Beatles wanted but couldn´t quite find the words to describe,

Eric Church explained how he spoke of Miss Misunderstood to fans at live gigs before playing them the song  that appears on his new album, which Bob referred to as a ´ride´ of an album and promptly played Miss Misunderstood song as an example.

The programme then faded out into whispers as Eric and Bob discuss artists such as Waylon Jennings and Willie Nelson, duet partners we might never have expected to gell so well, and as the voices lowered and retreated we learned how much of a hero was James Brown to Eric Church, (perhaps because he too shared Springsteen´s work ethic.

The words were fainter now, and harder to catch but just as the Ten O´clock News chimed in I could have sworn I heard Eric and Bob chattering quietly about a New Grass Revival !

pass it on logo

6    NEW BIOPIC: BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN Deliver Me From Nowhere

Only a few days after writing the above piece about Eric Church celebrating Bruce Springsteen in an Americana recording by Church of his song entitled, simply, Springsteen, I received news of a forthcoming Springsteen bio-pic.

Ana Carpenter in the Paste on line magazine has reported recently on the much anticipated Springsteen biography-in-film that is now in production.

Playing Springsteen will be Jeremy Allen White (right) who to some may seem like an odd choice to play a quintessential American rock star. However, according to Carpenter, the first trailer for Springsteen: Deliver Me from Nowheredoes plenty to draw connections between the upcoming biopic’s version of Bruce Springsteen and White’s previous role as the lead scrappy, jaded, and extremely talented chef on The Bear. 

Like Carmen Berzatto, the Springsteen in this trailer is a broken man: hyper-fixated on his own talent as a form of salvation. If the voiceover about the metaphorical hole in Springsteen’s childhood bedroom floor isn’t enough to convince you, the trailer also offers shots of White looking particularly world-weary against various desolate backdrops. 

“I want it to feel like I’m in the room by myself,” he says near the beginning of the trailer, one of the more restrained lines in a preview that also includes an explanation about how Bruce Springsteen is using his album to fix himself, and then fix the world. So it suggests that the film will not be aiming for subtlety.

The Paste journalist  opines that ´subtlety is probably not something one should expect from a Bruce Springsteen biopic, anyway. 

Of course, no self-respecting Bruce Springsteen biopic would be complete without an overflow of classic Americana iconography, and the trailer certainly delivers on to what Ana Carpenter calls that rose-coloured glasses nostalgia for decades past, complete with old-fashioned cars, old photographs, and sepia-lit country roads. ´

This is all fair enough, although the flashbacks to Springsteen’s childhood are described as being shot shot in some truly uninspired black-and-white sound  like they could be a bit much. 

Just in case the aimsof the film weren’t clear, the trailer concludes with a very sweaty Jeremy Allen White performing Born to Run on stage, a fitting note to end on for a movie that’s shaping up to be a by-the-book Bruce Springsteen drama drenched in angst and nostalgia.

Directed and written by Scott Cooper and based on a book by Warren Zanes, Springsteen: Deliver Me From Nowhere is set to release on Oct. 24, 2025.

7  BOX SET FROM BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN

SEVEN LOST ALBUMS

Bruce Springsteen has released a box set of seven never released albums that was teasingly alluded to by Whispering Bob Harris in his programme in June when interviewing Eric Church on BBC Radio 2 in June. These albums were recorded between 1983 and 2018. ¨The Boss´, once told us he had a Hungry Heart and this project, Tracks 2 The Lost Albums, surely proves that the hunger referred to was for music, although, of course we have known that because of his marathon concerts and sheer exuberance he has always shown with the E Street Band.

We knew about his Hungry Heart from his honest and deeply moving autobiography Born To Run but it is still surprising to learn that these eighty three tracks have been laying in studio vaults for all these years, with only nine of them ever having been released in any format.

With the biopic film Deliver Me From Here scheduled to be in cinemas later this year and these seven albums (vinyl or cd) in the shops now, Springsteen´s fans are going to need more room on their bookshelves and in their music collection. I have loved his music since the Nebraska album, and such lower key sound is still my preferred Springsteen.

Six of these seven albums are albums in their own right: each with its own sound and themes. According Adrian Thrills in The Daily Mail, Friday 27^th June, ´for those keen to investigate, this a real treasure trove´ The cost might deter some, the vinyl set asking 280 quid of our hard earned money, and the cds a slightly less frightening 230, but it should be pointed out that there are streaming options, too.

It is not the first time that Springsteen has raided his own vaults, but this heist took place as recently as the covid lockdowns, but the quality and quantity collected here make this the greatest heist yet.

In fact these albums fill in some crucial gaps in the timeline of Springsteen´s long career. The first album,  Garage Sessions 1983, fills that interlude between the afore-mentioned Nebraska and the return-to-rock classic  of Born In The USA. Garage Session is an eighteen-song package, recorded with only   a guitar and a drum machine.

In chronological order the second album in this collection is The Streets Of Philadelphia  Sessions, all drum loops and synthesisers, dominated in that atmospheric and emotional tone in which he delivered the eponymous title track to the 1983 Aids related film.

The third album in Springsteen´s ´gift´ is North Of Nashville, which critics have already called ´a highly enjoyable country album´ and who am I to disagree?

However it is album number four that most excites me,…Inyo, through myth and legend explores the Mexican diaspora in California and Texas. Delivered in a slightly affected but attractive drawl, these songs are complete with brush-drum and magnificent Mariacho horns that, as Mr. Thrill puts it, suggest a ´Hispanic Nebraska.´! It all puts me in mind of Tom Russell and Linda Rondstadt.

Album five, Perfect World eschews the standalone ethic. It is, instead, linked by a ´live sound´ we recognise from so many Springsteen concerts. All the usual suspects are here:  E Street stalwarts, Max Weinburg, Roy Bittan and Gary Tallent, deliver boisterous rockers that would fit any those three hour long rock gigs that The Boss and The E have delivered through the decades. In fact, Bruce´s wife Patti Scialfa and Steven Van Zandt play on the track,  

However, it is the final two albums (numbers 6 &7) that most deliver surprise element with Faithless, made in 2005, being a gospel-affected playlist that we are told was intended to accompany a never-got-made ´spiritual Western film !

Twilight Hours puts the lid on this seven album collection, casting Bruce as a Sinatra style crooner, delivering well-crafted songs of ill-fated romance. Made from 2010 to 2018 the album contains a refined track set on a morning commute. Its almost a Broadway / Bacharach ballad.

This intriguing and,  in many ways, invaluable, seven album box set was made available on Friday 27^th June but, for those who would prefer to first dip their toes in the water, there has also been released a twenty track sampler, entitled Lost And Found: selections from the Lost Albums

8 Island Life: LARRY YASKIEL & Beatles on Canary Islands

On one of the walls in his house, in Puerto del Carmen, Lanzarote, hang almost a hundred photographs taken of major rock and pop music stars of fifties and sixties One man appears in dozens of those photographs, very dark, bearded and always smiling. Many of these are photographs taken by the press and many of are of groups sitting in his office, where he is surrounded by musicians. All images are now several decades old, of course, but amongst the photographs it is amazing to realise  how many of the subjects are still alive and how much they have contributed  to the development of popular music.

In one photograph a bearded man is accompanying Joan Baez and her family. in another Jimmy Hendrix, and others include The Bee Gees, or Led Zeppelin, Fleetwood Mac, the composer Burt Bacharach , the Eurovision singer Sandie Shaw , Billy Preston and Tom Jones (now Sir Tom) with the late Queen Elizabeth 2 of England. The ´gallery´ also has pictures dedicated to  Dean Martin and Diana Ross.

The bearded man (now well-shaven) is Larry Yaskiel MBE (left), a well loved and much appreciated figure here on Lanzarote,  He and his wife Liz is equally well known and respected by so many of our citizens. British tourists also have much to thank them for, as Yaskiel has for many years been the honorary editor the glossy quarterly magazine, Lancelot, that provides details of all the news, the tourists spots and quieter areas. Lancelot celebrates the ethos of the island and applauds how it has become a thriving island despite the devastation caused by massive volcanic eruptions in the mid seventeen hundreds.

Larry and Liz came here  forty years ago after Larry had worked in the music industry since the mid 50’s to the late 70’s and although he is modest about his success, he really is part of the history of rock and roll.

A few summers ago, one of Larry´s nephews invited him to London to talk with children to help them   study the subject of ‘History Of British Rock’.

 “What I did is now a discipline in the school”, says Larry, “and did not know at that time was to be a historical thing.”I

So I guess we might even say that Larry Yaskiel paved the way for the film called School Of Rock.

Larry’s parents were importers of rock and roll albums by American musicians, like Chuck Berry or Little Richard . Larry´s first entrée into the rock and  roll industry, came when a company, Pye, decided to open to the German market, creating the label Deutsche Vogue, and sent a 20 year old Larry as a liaison to sell to British groups in post-war Germany. Those were the days when four lads from Liverpool played in the Starclub Hamburg, and with them, a fellow high school act, The Searchers, who were number two in sales and joined Larry.

The Germans liked to hear music in their language, so Larry translated some German songs, like She Loves You by The Beatles, (those four lads from Starclub Hamburg) when they “were not yet a phenomenon.” Then they introduced them in Germany and prepared a tour a couple of unknown guitar virtuosos, like Eric Clapton or Jimmy Hendrix.

In the late sixties Larry returned to London as the chief European American executive label with A & M, a label formed by Herb Alpert and Gerry Moss. wanting to enter the world of British rock. Mr Yasiel signed Hamble Pie with Peter Frampton, and Electric Light Orchestra. Larry also worked for Warner Bros. It was a time when rock and industry “made their own road.” There were no precedents, and Larry maintains that pirate radio installed in ships in England contributed much to the popularity of rock because until then the BBC aired only light music and boring.

Larry saw many concerts and listened to music all day. It was a profession of nerves because there was risk. Some groups were successful and others, most, were a commercial failure.

That was was not the case of Miguel Rios, who in 1970 had recorded his Ode to Joy. EMI rejected him but Larry bought the rights because he believed this was a music suitable for all audiences. The young Rios scored three appearances on Top of the Pops, with 17 million listeners and reached number three on a top twenty  list that also included  The Beatles, Pink Floyd anbd Elvis Presley .

Larry has a great respect for the musicians of those times. He says the industry created something from nothing, but I have to say all this excess was difficult for some artists, so the record labels had  to pamper them, and accompany them to all kinds of events including recording studios and, concerts … “They had to know that we were all day with them, had to be sure that I believed in them.”

When Larry decided to sign a group, he drew up a signed a contract for three LP’s because he believed and believes that for the first album the artist has “no thought”, other than merely to tell their life experiences, the second “is the first thing you think “and you can see if you have talent, and the third is a second chance.

One of the groups that used this method sold 800 copies of their first two albums. The third, Crime of the Century, went gold, and the group Supertramp sold 57 million albums.

He says he was “very happy” in the business of music and also listening to music, but the life was very expensive and hard work. In fact, in 1973, he was overwhelmed and this forced him to take leave for vacation and a place away from the music industry. He went to Jamaica and met a producer who invited him to party on his boat. However, Larry wanted peace, so he left his house and went to the other end of the island, to a separate house in a quiet place.

The first day Larry went for a walk and suddenly heard music coming from a nearby home. He looked, and could make out several Rastafarians playing with a white face. It was Keith Richards, who along with four other ‘stones’ had rented five houses in the same place and were preparing their album. Richards invited him the next day at his ranch in Dunn’s River Falls.

Larry recalls another occasion, when he went home with Chas Chandler, bassist of The Animals and Jimmy Hendrix’s manager and found the guitar genius himself indulging in his favourite hobby of doing cross stitch. ´even though people thought he was like the wild man of Borneo´.

But Larry wanted to find a place that had the sun and came to Lanzarote on holiday. A few weeks earlier he had been paid $27,000 for expected record sales of Leo Sayer in Argentina, and strolling along the Avenue de las Playas in Puerto Del Carmen found an apartment that cost exactly that money. He bought it and began to come in winter with his wife Liz and they soon decided  to stay and make their home here.. He spent two years “doing nothing” then a German friend told him that Lancelot was reaching for a magazine in German and needed a translator. That seemed interesting, but then he did not even speak “Castilian Chinese” that he claims to speak today.

Then he met two people who marked his career on the Island: Cesar Manrique, the island´s most famous artist, who fashioned Lanzarote in his own image and Agustín Pallares, who had written three Lanzarote history books that had been translated into English. Larry was fond of learning from history, (and in many ways creating history)  and when he started with the release of Lancelot in English,  he began to reflect on their pages for the British residents and tourists to know more of the beach and Lanzarote the sun

Today, of over 150 publications (if my maths are correct)  issues of the magazine, all back copies hve been donated to the Center for Teachers “for the paper is a school and children can learn English and other things,” such as Shakespeare in his works speaking of wine Malvasia.

Because of the Yaskiel thirst for knowledge Larry also ended up finding the descendants of Lanzarote who founded San Antonio in Texas.

When  the British ambassador to Spain invited Larry and his wife to the reception which took place in Madrid, for Prince Charles and his wife Camilla, Larry did his duties as ambassador to Lanzarote and told them about César Manrique and explained that the island is a Biosphere Reserve.

Larry Yaskiel MBE has now lived here on Lanzarote for more than forty years and he is very proud of the connections that exist between Britain and The Canary Islands. He still serves in his capacity as honorary editor of the quarterly magazine, Lancelot.

In his book about the connections  between The British Isles and the Canary Islands, he listed a visit by The Beatles to Tenerife in 1965, and only recently did the island celebrate the sixtieth anniversary of the event.

It is no surprise then that recently Larry has recently transmitted  news directly to His Majesty King Felipe VI, that I know Larry would have been delighted to report, in a letter that read,…

To the attention of His Majesty King Felipe VI

It is with all due respect that we share with Your Majesty a recent update on our cultural work.

I address Your Majesty to share a brief report recently broadcast by Televisión Canaria, which mentions my cultural and musical work in Lanzarote and my connection with the British-Spanish legacy over the years.

The attached video includes a fragment of this broadcast, which was part of a local celebration dedicated to The Beatles, in which I had the honour of participating. This occasion has been one of many that have strengthened the historical and emotional bond between our islands and the English-speaking world, something I have sought to promote with deep conviction and gratitude for decades.

I wish to take this opportunity to reiterate my admiration and affection for Spain, a land I consider my home and whose history and culture I have sought to honour through my work.

With my most sincere and respectful regards,

Larry Yaskiel

Lanzarote, Canary Islands

Larry also included a recording of a tv programme shown here on Lanzarote. To commemorate the Fab Four visit, press  journalists and tv news crews reported and showed footage  of Larry´s extensive archives of the Beatles.

If you search our free to read archives at sidetracks and detours, you will find many other stories we have written about Larry and Liz. My wife Dee and I  attended the launch of each of  his books  and over the years we have built  a lovely little friendship.

We meet up every three months or so at a lovely out door café in Peurto Callero. We sprinkle conversation into our cups of cappacino and spread tall tales over our carrot cake and talk of our love of music, and the reasons we all came to Lanzarote to live.  Larry and I compare notes on his deeds in rock and roll and my deeds in folk music. We were, for many years, working on the same ladder. Larry was standing on the top rung and looking out at international markets, cinema, television, recordings and the MTV revolution that was in many ways created by The Monkees tv programme and Mike Nesmith´s cinematic innovations.

I was hanging on the bottom rung with one foot still on the ground, trying to persuade passers by to step into The Gallows Folk Club in Rochdale because my band, Lendanear, was playing there in about an hour´s tim, whilstg at the same time working as a freelance journalist and music promoter..

We were playing in a pub one night, and whilst we were on stage my car was stolen and the thief had taken everthing except  all our cds. He had left all our cds, and we at least took solace in the fact that we knew they would all sell out. However, there were only four people in the audience and they were two married couples, and the wife in one couple ´preferred The Houghton Weavers´ and the male in the second couple said he had bought one a couple of weeks back, ….. for 50 pence in Poundland !

8   JONI´S JAZZ:

recordings by Joni Mitchells jazz influencers

We’re pleased to present JONI’S JAZZ, a passion project years in the making. This career-spanning collection features recordings chosen by Joni that reflect jazz’s profound influence on her music. Spanning 61 tracks, JONI’S JAZZ includes studio recordings, live performances, rare alternate takes, and material drawn from multiple decades and record labels. These also include two previously unreleased 1980 demos. The set features contributions from some of Joni’s most important collaborators in jazz, among them Wayne Shorter, Jaco Pastorius, Herbie Hancock, and Charles Mingus.  Joni Mitchell, who calls Shorter her favourite collaborator, dedicates the collection to him following his passing in 2023. Covering nearly every era of her recording career, the collection includes selections from SONGS TO A SEAGULL, THE HISSING OF SUMMER LAWNS, HEJIRA, MINGUS, TURBULENT INDIGO, BOTH SIDES NOW (a 2001 GRAMMY® Award winner), and more. It also features her guest appearances on projects like Hancock’s GRAMMY® Award-winning album, RIVER: THE JONI LETTERS. Across the collection, the music follows Mitchell’s artistic growth — from the rhythmic layering of Harry’s House / Centerpiece to the bold experimentation of The Jungle Line, the narrative scale of Paprika Plains, and the airy, improvised feel of A Chair In The Sky. It draws from more than five decades of Joni’s recordings, going back to 1968 for Marcie, from SONG TO A SEAGULL. The most recent piece in this collection is her performance of Summertime, recorded live at the 2023 Newport Folk Festival. It marked Joni’s first full-length concert in over two decades — a powerful return that resonated around the world. As a self-portrait in sound, JONI’S JAZZ captures an artist in conversation with jazz over a lifetime — never imitating, always inventing. Last year, in the liner notes for JONI MITCHELL ARCHIVES – VOL. 4, she joked, “People ask me my favorite of my albums, it’s going to be Joni’s Jazz.” Now it is. Order from Joni’s official on-line store and you’ll receive an 8X8 original JMA art print of Charlie The Bull Dying In Mexico, while supplies last.

9 BEWICK´S HOT BISCUITS

Fishguard Jazz & Blues Festival, August 2025

Readers might well remember the name of Bull Corby, a Rochdale artist and facilitator who accompanied me (Steve Bewick on my jazz exploration of Tel Aviv a few years ago, She has recently designed an ad for my HOT BISCUITS show on the Jazz channel on the Internet and she printed my design on a t-shirt. When I wear it at jazz festivals I will be a very prominent walking 2.10 meters vertical advertisement for his jazz channel. Bull will be happy to design for you your arts ideas, logos, business cards and more at low price. You can find her on facebook

Meanwhile, I bring news of a must have entry for your jazz diary listeners in August 2025, The Fishguard Jazz & Blues Festival will be offering five days of music, food and venues within a small village centre setting.

Following an interview with Festival organiser, Alice Stonehold , this weeks broadcast offers you an insight into the Aberjazz festival during the weekend of the 21st till the 25th August 2025.

Don´t miss Ma Bessie Productionss bringing a Speakeasy to perform the story of Bessie Smith

There will also be a tribute to the music of Miles Davis from the Tomos Williams Quartet, 7 Steps.

Also featured in the preview is, The Baires Connection led by Julieta Iglersias offering up a Tango Fusion.

It will be worth checking out the colourful guitartist James Chadwick with his Quartet, J4 band.delivering the sixties with a twist.

Other names playing include Alice Armstrong´´ s Chicago Blues Band. Listen out for New Orleans Jazz sounds from the Vic Partridge Jazz Quartet.

Others on the bill are vocalist Sharon Clancy´s Bossa Nova jazz and. Jambalaya with Dale Storr´s nimble fingers on piano, and Kevin Lawlor’s Cluster Funk.

Last, but not least is guitaris Jay Azzolina

Please go to www.Aberjazz.com for the full listing´.

What a month its been for me! A return to Durham for a University Jazz Festival 25. Alan Musson, Radio Presenter and Audio Producer joins us at Hot Biscuits. His first contribution will be latter this month with a review of the music of Johnny Hunter and out of our archives of live jazz sessions from Manchester we have a stunning recording of John & Kathy Dyson courtesy of Ian Brown.

Also taking space in the show this week is another track from Martin Kershaw’s Playtime featuring Denys Baptiste. Although not internationally known just yet, Playtime has become an institution in Edinburgh and, to a degree, in Scotland generally.

One that the Ken Colyer Society might like, featuring the Ken Colyer Jazzmen on, `Sing on.`

Ofri Nehemya offers up a new release, `Drive`. Courtesy of Rupert Burley, Dynamic records. If you missed them before be sure to catch them this time

Thang Long Jazz, say `You Don’t Know What Love Is.` Thang Long Jazz is a band from Hanoi, founded by pianist Nguyen Dinh Phuc. Special thanks to Hanoi Jazz Lovers.

Last, but not least, two pieces from the Durham University Jazz Festival 25 featuring, Northern Lights: DU A Cappella and Durham University Jazz Orchestra.

If this looks interesting please like, share, and of course listen in at mixcloud.com/stevebewick/ 24/07.

By the way This week in 1939, Billie Holiday and her Orchestra recorded four tracks in New York including Some Other Spring, Our Love Is Different,Them There Eyes and Swing, Brother Swing. It’s noted that Some Other Spring” was one of Holiday’s favorites.

Musicians Charlie Shavers (trumpet), Tab Smith (alto/soprano sax), Kenneth Hollon and Stanley Payne (tenor sax), Sonny White (piano), Bernard Addison (guitar), John Williams (bass), and Eddie Dougherty (drums) backed Holiday in this session. Revisit the classic tracks at found.ee/billieholiday-music

CLASSICAL MUSIC

10 THE KANNEH- MASON FAMILY :

A River Of Music runs through it

album preview by Norman Warwick

The Kanneh Masons are excited to be releasing a new project, River Of Music, by all of the seven siblings. It is an album that tells the story of their family and their love of music.

These remarkable classical musicians are each at a level of excellence in their own field with their own instruments, A feel-good tv documentary introduced them to the nation and the Kanneh Masons, in the few years since then have created an impressive discography as a collective and as individuals, published a family autobiography, made other documentary films and have played many classical performances at prestigious venues.

Sheku Kanneh Mason released a 2022 album, Song, showcases his innately lyrical playing in a wide and varied range of arrangements and collaborations. Sheku’s 2020 album Elgar reached No. 8 in the overall Official UK Album Chart, making him the first ever cellist to reach the UK Top 10. Sheet music collections of his performance repertoire along with his own arrangements and compositions are published by Faber.

Sheku Kanneh-Mason’s mission is to make music accessible to all, whether that’s performing for children in a school hall, at an underground club, or in the world’s leading concert venues. Highlights of the 24/25 season include the Konzerthaus Berlin as Artist in Residence, Lucerne Festival 2024 as Artiste Étoile, Czech Philharmonic in Prague and on tour with both Jakub Hrůša and Semyon Bychkov, Zurich Tonhalle Orchestra with Paavo Järvi, WDR Symphony Cologne with Cristian Măcelaru, Orchestre National de Lyon with Leonard Slatkin, Sinfonia of London with John Wilson on tour in the UK, SWR Symphony Stuttgart with Christoph Eschenbach, Camerata Salzburg on tour, Pittsburgh Symphony with Manfred Honeck, New World Symphony with Stéphane Denève, Philadelphia Orchestra with Yannick Nézet-Séguin, and City of Birmingham Symphony with Kazuki Yamada.

With his pianist sister, Isata, he makes his duo recital debut in recital debut at New York’s Carnegie Hall Stern Auditorium in a programme featuring a newly commissioned piece by Natalie Klouda. The pair also appear on tour in Bordeaux, Rome, Cincinnati, Toronto, Philadelphia, Dublin, Munich, Berlin, Antwerp, Haarlem, the Rheingau Festival, and at London’s Wigmore Hall. Sheku also appears with duo partners guitarist Plinio Fernandes, and jazz pianist Harry Baker.

Since his debut in 2017, Sheku has performed every summer at the BBC Proms, including as soloist at the 2023 Last Night of the Proms with the BBC Symphony Orchestra and Marin Alsop. In 2024, his family-friendly Proms appearances with the Fantasia Orchestra were designed to introduce orchestral classical music to a new generation of music lovers. Sheku also returns to Antigua, where he has family connections, as an ambassador for the Antigua and Barbuda Youth Symphony Orchestra.

A Decca Classics recording artist, Sheku appears on the May 2024 recording of Beethoven’s Triple Concerto alongside Nicola Benedetti, Benjamin Royal Academy of Music where he studied with Hannah Roberts and in May 2022 was appointed as the Academy’s first Menuhin Visiting Professor of Performance Mentoring. In 2024 he accepted the role as patron of UK Music Masters and remains an ambassador for both Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation and Future Talent. Sheku was appointed a Member of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire (MBE) in the 2020 New Year’s Honours List. After winning the BBC Young Musician competition in 2016, Sheku’s performance at the wedding of the Duke and Duchess of Sussex at Windsor Castle in 2018 was watched by two billion people worldwide. He plays a Matteo Goffriller cello from 1700 which is on indefinite loan to him.

From their Welsh grandmother following love across the sea to Sierra Leone, to their Antiguan grandad passing on his own dashed hopes of a musical career, River Of Music celebrates the musical threads of the Kanneh Mason family. Surrounding Schubert’s Trout Quintet, which they all grew up listening to, are new arrangements of classical favourites most loved by their grandparents, as well as Welsh folk songs and spirituals, performed and often arranged by these brothers and sister.

The ‘Trout’ Quintet by Schubert is a piece from childhood when as children they regularly heard it on car journeys with their parents

Their mum signed them up to a week-long swimming course one half term, and the journey was about half an hour, exactly the length of the ‘Trout’.

They listened to it twice a day for a week and  really got to know it.

Sheku Kanneh Mason, currently enjoying a high profile with the release of a solo album, says ´Schubert´s Trout is such a joyful piece. We wanted Jeneba, our fifth sibling, to learn the double bass purely so we could play this piece, but my mum said, ‘No, it’s too big.’ Jeneba now plays the piano!

“This is a story about our family and the sources of our music. Music runs like a river through the generations, and our passion for listening and playing music comes from our grandparents, and from their stories, flowing from the places and dreams they passed on…”

Konya Kanneh-Mason, Grandad’s Dream

FOLK MUSIC

ENGLISH FOLK MUSIC CHARTS JULY 2025

ten new entries

The Official UK Folk album Charts are produced by English Folk Expo, featuring the Top 40 best-selling and most-streamed folk albums released in the UK during the June reporting period by UK and Irish artists. Listen back to the June Chart as presented by Folk on Foot, via their YouTube channel for the full run down of new entries

10 new releases entered the June chart in 2025:

No. 1 – Reverie (Warner Records) by Amble 

Encapsulating the Irish trio’s raw energy and authentic spirit  lead vocalist Robbie Cunningham explains, “If you listen to Reverie, you’re truly hearing who we are.”

No. 3 – Jacob Alon‘s debut album In Limerence (Island Records), 

Having earned praise from Clash, Billboard and the Times, plus an appearance on Later…with Jools Holland, ‘In Limerence’ cements Alon as a singular new voice in British folk.  

No. 5 – Machines Will Never Learn To Make Mistakes Like Me (Folketown/MNRK),

This, the seventh album from Will Varley, features rich, luscious production to this album that compounds the album’s feeling of hope for the future.

No. 8 – The Wandering Hearts’ Déjà Vu (We Have All Been Here Before) (Chrysalis Records)

This album is full ofjoyous, escapist and courageous reinterpretation of Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young’s 1970 touchstone Déjà Vu.

No. 10 – Complete Fool (Demeter) by Chloe Foy T

This  sophomore album from alternative folk singer-songwriter and EFEx Artist Mentoring Pathway graduate Chloe Foy offers a vibrant, playful and refreshingly honest perspective on long-term relationships.

Other new Top 40 chart entries in June included are 

No. 11 – Sam Kelly’s Dreamers Dawn (Navigator Records)

No. 17 – Lavina Blackwall’s The Making (The Barne Society)

No. 22 – Skylarks (Wrong Speed) by Haress

No. 25 – Odette Michell’s The Queen of the Lowlands (Talking Elephant)

No. 31 – Forefowk Mind Me (Upset The Rhythm) by Quinie

On Sunday 2oth July 2025 we will publish a special introduction to JAKE BLOUNT & FRIENDS

drop a pebble in your misical pool and the ripples will run away to an incredible collection of generational reciprocity

Don´t Miss a fantastic special free bonus edition as

Norman Warwick and Peter Pearson

share their views of the Mary Chapin Carpenter discography that now includes her new album, Personal History.

FREE

to be published Sunday 3rd August