World Wide Woozle episode #656

Welcome back. In the event of an emergency, there's a case under your seat containing a Walkman(tm), AA batteries, headphones, and a Tom Waits cassette.

Tom Waits - Get Behind The Mule - https://youtu.be/brVbfzTHods

A while ago I wrote a post about gratitude. I'm not sure I expected many people to read it but the counter on the blog site tells me that over 100 people had a look. Today I'm grateful for that, thank you all.

I like albums. I like singles and EPs as well but the long playing album is where it's at. Albums can tell a story, they can build you up, they can bring you down. In the olden days, when I had hair, the car radio played singles and at home I listened to albums in their entirety. AC/DC's Shoot To Thrill sounds wrong to me if it doesn't follow on from Hells Bells. Last week, as the never ending jaunt through my CD collection continued, I hit the Midnight Oil section. Honestly, it's quite a long time since I listened to more than one or two Oils songs. What I discovered was that I didn't actually own a copy of Blue Sky Mining (1990) other than maybe a cassette I'd recorded from DJ Big Annie's CD back in the day. This was easily remedied with the disc being  purchased for about $8 shipped via eBay. And so I popped the disc in to play...

Midnight Oil - Stars of Warburton - https://youtu.be/F1b9oGV3apM

Blue Sky Mining is one of those albums for me that tells a few stories. There are five released singles from the ten tracks, so someone else obviously thought this was a strong record. I bought the sheet music book which would prove very useful years later when I had to learn five songs from this album for the Junk Sculpture gigs. It's easy to be blasé about the hits as they are overplayed by commercial radio, but, on reflection and with the benefit of not hearing them for ages (commercial radio is not for me), I was almost dumbstruck by how well the whole record hangs together. Give it a spin sometime. Or come and visit as I think it will be on regular rotation for a while at HQ World Wide Woozle because, "I can shake, I can move, but I can't live without your love..."

Midnight Oil - Shakers and Movers - https://youtu.be/QbNuwiL0sY8

I've been forced to accept that my physical recovery is going to take a while. The conservative estimate is six months. This is extremely frustrating. While I enjoy going for a walk, and I do that nine days out of ten, I miss my bike and the camaraderie of being out with my Northside Velo crew. I miss being able to go out early for breakfast and also to sleep without a million pillows. I have had a bit of a breakthrough though and some exercises before I get out of bed in the morning have meant that for the last six days I have been a lot more mobile first up. My next trick will be to be able to sit comfortably for more than ten minutes.

Juliana Hatfield - Physical - https://youtu.be/UfiMIK-x1uI

I've been a fan of Laura Kidd's music projects, She Makes War, Penfriend, and Obey Robots for a while now. She's someone you should check out and support via her website. The next five CDs in my listening journey are Laura's. She also provides a whole range of email and video updates. In the latest email, after reading all about upcoming gigs, music, and a lot more I saw that right at the bottom of the email it said, "I'm so glad you're here Rob..." You know what Laura? Today I am as well. The smallest thing can make people feel better.

Penfriend - Emotional Tourist - https://youtu.be/c94dy-Sl35M

That's all for this time, friends.

Keep smiling,

The Woozle

"No matter how far wrong you've gone
You can always turn around"

Gil Scott-Heron, I'm New Here, 2010.