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   President Trump is beside himself after Israel breaks the cease fire agreed to on Monday... so much so that he busted out the F word.  He's really hot... we have the latest.    While they won't say which pilots flew the B-2 bombers from Whiteman, we have a pretty educated guess as one Lt. Colonel holds the record for most hours in the cockpit.  Me and Jess have known a family member of his for years and we'll just call him KC's finest and  the B-2's Top Gun.    The Supreme Court backs Trump on deportation but a lower court judge is threatening to ignore the court.  This can't end well.    It's crunch time for the Royals and Chiefs regarding funding for where they play.  Patrick Mahomes has one very interesting salary cap statistic, the NBA Final game hits a 6 year record high an ESPN announcer that had nothing to apologize for, apologizes.  Unreal.

   President Trump is beside himself after Israel and Iran break the agreed to cease fire.  He was so mad, he busted on the F word to describe how stupid these countries are.  Then, the cease fire was back on.  We'll see.     While they won't say which pilots flew the B-2 bombers over Iran Saturday, we have a pretty educated guess that one of them was Kansas City's finest.   Me and Jess have known a family member of the record setting Lt. Colonel at Whiteman that holds the record for most hours in the cockpit of a B-2... over 2000 hours.  We'll give you the name of Kansas City and the World's Top Gun.    The Supreme Court backs Trump on deportation but a lower court judge says he's ignoring it.  This can't end well for the lower judge.   It's crunch time for the Royals and Chiefs regarding funding for where they play. Patrick Mahomes has one very interesting salary cap stat, the NBA gets it's highest rating in 6 years and an ESPN announcer apologizes for no reason at all other than she works at ESPN

For those who haven't heard the announcement I posted, songs from this point on will sometimes be split among multiple episodes, so this is the second part of a two-episode look at the song “Who Knows Where The Time Goes?” by Fairport Convention, and the intertwining careers of Joe Boyd, Sandy Denny, and Richard Thompson. Click the full post to read liner notes, links to more information, and a transcript of the episode. Patreon backers also have a forty-one-minute bonus episode available, on Judy Collins’ version of this song. Tilt Araiza has assisted invaluably by editing, and will hopefully be doing so from now on. Check out Tilt's irregular podcasts at http://www.podnose.com/jaffa-cakes-for-proust and http://sitcomclub.com/ Erratum For about an hour this was uploaded with the wrong Elton John clip in place of “Saturday Sun”. This has now been fixed. Resources Because of the increasing problems with Mixcloud’s restrictions, I have decided to start sharing streaming playlists of the songs used in episodes instead of Mixcloud ones. This Tunemymusic link will let you listen to the playlist I created on your streaming platform of choice — however please note that not all the songs excerpted are currently available on streaming. The songs missing from the Tidal version are “Shanten Bells” by the Ian Campbell Folk Group, “Tom’s Gone to Hilo” by A.L. Lloyd, two by Paul McNeill and Linda Peters, three by Elton John & Linda Peters, “What Will I Do With Tomorrow” by Sandy Denny and “You Never Know” by Charlie Drake, but the other fifty-nine are there. Other songs may be missing from other services. The main books I used on Fairport Convention as a whole were Patrick Humphries' Meet On The Ledge, Clinton Heylin's What We Did Instead of Holidays, and Kevan Furbank's Fairport Convention on Track. Rob Young's Electric Eden is the most important book on the British folk-rock movement. Information on Richard Thompson comes from Patrick Humphries' Richard Thompson: Strange Affair and Thompson's own autobiography Beeswing.  Information on Sandy Denny comes from Clinton Heylin's No More Sad Refrains and Mick Houghton's I've Always Kept a Unicorn. I also used Joe Boyd's autobiography White Bicycles and Chris Blackwell's The Islander.  And this three-CD set is the best introduction to Fairport's music currently in print. Transcript Before we begin, this episode contains reference to alcohol and cocaine abuse and medical neglect leading to death. It also starts with some discussion of the fatal car accident that ended last episode. There’s also some mention of child neglect and spousal violence. If that’s likely to upset you, you might want to skip this episode or read the transcript. One of the inspirations for this podcast when I started it back in 2018 was a project by Richard Thompson, which appears (like many things in Thompson’s life) to have started out of sheer bloody-mindedness. In 1999 Playboy magazine asked various people to list their “songs of the Millennium”, and most of them, understanding the brief, chose a handful of songs from the latter half of the twentieth century. But Thompson determined that he was going to list his favourite songs *of the millennium*. He didn’t quite manage that, but he did cover seven hundred and forty years, and when Playboy chose not to publish it, he decided to turn it into a touring show, in which he covered all his favourite songs from “Sumer Is Icumen In” from 1260: [Excerpt: Richard Thompson, “Sumer is Icumen In”] Through numerous traditional folk songs, union songs like “Blackleg Miner”, pieces by early-modern composers, Victorian and Edwardian music hall songs, and songs by the Beatles, the Ink Spots, the Kinks, and the Who, all the way to “Oops! I Did It Again”: [Excerpt: Richard Thompson, “Oops! I Did it Again”] And to finish the show, and to show how all this music actually ties together, he would play what he described as a “medieval tune from Brittany”, “Marry, Ageyn Hic Hev Donne Yt”: [Excerpt: Richard Thompson, “Marry, Ageyn Hic Hev Donne Yt”] We have said many times in this podcast that there is no first anything, but there’s a reason that Liege and Lief, Fairport Convention’s third album of 1969, and the album other than Unhalfbricking on which their reputation largely rests, was advertised with the slogan “The first (literally) British folk rock album ever”. Folk-rock, as the term had come to be known, and as it is still usually used today, had very little to do with traditional folk music. Rather, the records of bands like The Byrds or Simon and Garfunkel were essentially taking the sounds of British beat groups of the early sixties, particularly the Searchers, and applying those sounds to material by contemporary singer-songwriters. People like Paul Simon and Bob Dylan had come up through folk clubs, and their songs were called folk music because of that, but they weren’t what folk music had meant up to that point — songs that had been collected after being handed down through the folk process, changed by each individual singer, with no single identifiable author. They were authored songs by very idiosyncratic writers. But over their last few albums, Fairport Convention had done one or two tracks per album that weren’t like that, that were instead recordings of traditional folk songs, but arranged with rock instrumentation. They were not necessarily the first band to try traditional folk music with electric instruments — around the same time that Fairport started experimenting with the idea, so did an Irish band named Sweeney’s Men, who brought in a young electric guitarist named Henry McCullough briefly. But they do seem to have been the first to have fully embraced the idea. They had done so to an extent with “A Sailor’s Life” on Unhalfbricking, but now they were going to go much further: [Excerpt: Fairport Convention, “Matty Groves” (from about 4:30)] There had been some doubt as to whether Fairport Convention would even continue to exist — by the time Unhalfbricking, their second album of the year, was released, they had been through the terrible car accident that had killed Martin Lamble, the band’s drummer, and Jeannie Franklyn, Richard Thompson’s girlfriend. Most of the rest of the band had been seriously injured, and they had made a conscious decision not to discuss the future of the band until they were all out of hospital. Ashley Hutchings was hospitalised the longest, and Simon Nicol, Richard Thompson, and Sandy Denny, the other three surviving members of the band, flew over to LA with their producer and manager, Joe Boyd, to recuperate there and get to know the American music scene. When they came back, the group all met up in the flat belonging to Denny’s boyfriend Trevor Lucas, and decided that they were going to continue the band. They made a few decisions then — they needed a new drummer, and as well as a drummer they wanted to get in Dave Swarbrick. Swarbrick had played violin on several tracks on Unhalfbricking as a session player, and they had all been thrilled to work with him. Swarbrick was one of the most experienced musicians on the British folk circuit. He had started out in the fifties playing guitar with Beryl Marriott’s Ceilidh Band before switching to fiddle, and in 1963, long before Fairport had formed, he had already appeared on TV with the Ian Campbell Folk Group, led by Ian Campbell, the father of Ali and Robin Campbell, later of UB40: [Excerpt: The Ian Campbell Folk Group, “Shanten Bells (medley on Hullaballoo!)”] He’d sung with Ewan MacColl and A.L. Lloyd: [Excerpt: A.L. Lloyd, “Tom’s Gone to Hilo” ] And he’d formed his hugely successful duo with Martin Carthy, releasing records like “Byker Hill” which are often considered among the best British folk music of all time: [Excerpt: Martin Carthy and Dave Swarbrick, “Byker Hill”] By the time Fairport had invited him to play on Unhalfbricking, Swarbrick had already performed on twenty albums as a core band member, plus dozens more EPs, singles, and odd tracks on compilations. They had no reason to think they could actually get him to join their band. But they had three advantages. The first was that Swarbrick was sick of the traditional folk scene at the time, saying later “I didn’t like seven-eighths of the people involved in it, and it was extremely opportune to leave. I was suddenly presented with the possibilities of exploring the dramatic content of the songs to the full.” The second was that he was hugely excited to be playing with Richard Thompson, who was one of the most innovative guitarists of his generation, and Martin Carthy remembers him raving about Thompson after their initial sessions. (Carthy himself was and is no slouch on the guitar of course, and there was even talk of getting him to join the band at this point, though they decided against it — much to the relief of rhythm guitarist Simon Nicol, who is a perfectly fine player himself but didn’t want to be outclassed by *two* of the best guitarists in Britain at the same time). And the third was that Joe Boyd told him that Fairport were doing so well — they had a single just about to hit the charts with “Si Tu Dois Partir” — that he would only have to play a dozen gigs with Fairport in order to retire. As it turned out, Swarbrick would play with the group for a decade, and would never retire — I saw him on his last tour in 2015, only eight months before he died. The drummer the group picked was also a far more experienced musician than any of the rest, though in a very different genre. Dave Mattacks had no knowledge at all of the kind of music they played, having previously been a player in dance bands. When asked by Hutchings if he wanted to join the band, Mattacks’ response was “I don’t know anything about the music. I don’t understand it… I can’t tell one tune from another, they all sound the same… but if you want me to join the group, fine, because I really like it. I’m enjoying myself musically.” Mattacks brought a new level of professionalism to the band, thanks to his different background. Nicol said of him later “He was dilligent, clean, used to taking three white shirts to a gig… The application he could bring to his playing was amazing. With us, you only played well when you were feeling well.” This distinction applied to his playing as well. Nicol would later describe the difference between Mattacks’ drumming and Lamble’s by saying “Martin’s strength was as an imaginative drummer. DM came in with a strongly developed sense of rhythm, through keeping a big band of drunken saxophone players in order. A great time-keeper.” With this new line-up and a new sense of purpose, the group did as many of their contemporaries were doing and “got their heads together in the country”. Joe Boyd rented the group a mansion, Farley House, in Farley Chamberlayne, Hampshire, and they stayed there together for three months. At the start, the group seem to have thought that they were going to make another record like Unhalfbricking, with some originals, some songs by American songwriters, and a few traditional songs. Even after their stay in Farley Chamberlayne, in fact, they recorded a few of the American songs they’d rehearsed at the start of the process, Richard Farina’s “Quiet Joys of Brotherhood” and Bob Dylan and Roger McGuinn’s “Ballad of Easy Rider”: [Excerpt: Fairport Convention, “Ballad of Easy Rider”] Indeed, the whole idea of “getting our heads together in the country” (as the cliche quickly became in the late sixties as half of the bands in Britain went through much the same kind of process as Fairport were doing — but usually for reasons more to do with drug burnout or trend following than recovering from serious life-changing trauma) seems to have been inspired by Bob Dylan and the Band getting together in Big Pink. But very quickly they decided to follow the lead of Ashley Hutchings, who had had something of a Damascene conversion to the cause of traditional English folk music. They were listening mostly to Music From Big Pink by the Band, and to the first album by Sweeney’s Men: [Excerpt: Sweeney’s Men, “The Handsome Cabin Boy”] And they decided that they were going to make something that was as English as those records were North American and Irish (though in the event there were also a few Scottish songs included on the record). Hutchings in particular was becoming something of a scholar of traditional music, regularly visiting Cecil Sharp House and having long conversations with A.L. Lloyd, discovering versions of different traditional songs he’d never encountered before. This was both amusing and bemusing Sandy Denny, who had joined a rock group in part to get away from traditional music; but she was comfortable singing the material, and knew a lot of it and could make a lot of suggestions herself. Swarbrick obviously knew the repertoire intimately, and Nicol was amenable, while Mattacks was utterly clueless about the folk tradition at this point but knew this was the music he wanted to make. Thompson knew very little about traditional music, and of all the band members except Denny he was the one who has shown the least interest in the genre in his subsequent career — but as we heard at the beginning, showing the least interest in the genre is a relative thing, and while Thompson was not hugely familiar with the genre, he *was* able to work with it, and was also more than capable of writing songs that fit in with the genre. Of the eleven songs on the album, which was titled Liege and Lief (which means, roughly, Lord and Loyalty), there were no cover versions of singer-songwriters. Eight were traditional songs, and three were originals, all written in the style of traditional songs. The album opened with “Come All Ye”, an introduction written by Denny and Hutchings (the only time the two would ever write together): [Excerpt: Fairport Convention, “Come All Ye”] The other two originals were songs where Thompson had written new lyrics to traditional melodies. On “Crazy Man Michael”, Swarbrick had said to Thompson that the tune to which he had set his new words was weaker than the lyrics, to which Thompson had replied that if Swarbrick felt that way he should feel free to write a new melody. He did, and it became the first of the small number of Thompson/Swarbrick collaborations: [Excerpt: Fairport Convention, “Crazy Man Michael”] Thompson and Swarbrick would become a brief songwriting team, but as much as anything else it was down to proximity — the two respected each other as musicians, but never got on very well. In 1981 Swarbrick would say “Richard and I never got on in the early days of FC… we thought we did, but we never did. We composed some bloody good songs together, but it was purely on a basis of “you write that and I’ll write this, and we’ll put it together.” But we never sat down and had real good chats.” The third original on the album, and by far the most affecting, is another song where Thompson put lyrics to a traditional tune. In this case he thought he was putting the lyrics to the tune of “Willie O'Winsbury”, but he was basing it on a recording by Sweeney’s Men. The problem was that Sweeney’s Men had accidentally sung the lyrics of “Willie O'Winsbury'” to the tune of a totally different song, “Fause Foodrage”: [Excerpt: Sweeney’s Men, “Willie O’Winsbury”] Thompson took that melody, and set to it lyrics about loss and separation. Thompson has never been one to discuss the meanings of his lyrics in any great detail, and in the case of this one has said “I really don't know what it means. This song came out of a dream, and I pretty much wrote it as I dreamt it (it was the sixties), and didn't spend very long analyzing it. So interpret as you wish – or replace with your own lines.” But in the context of the traffic accident that had killed his tailor girlfriend and a bandmate, and injured most of his other bandmates, the lyrics about lonely travellers, the winding road, bruised and beaten sons, saying goodbye, and never cutting cloth, seem fairly self-explanatory: [Excerpt: Fairport Convention, “Farewell, Farewell”] The rest of the album, though, was taken up by traditional tunes. There was a long medley of four different fiddle reels; a version of “Reynardine” (a song about a seductive man — or is he a fox? Or perhaps both — which had been recorded by Swarbrick and Carthy on their most recent album); a 19th century song about a deserter saved from the firing squad by Prince Albert; and a long take on “Tam Lin”, one of the most famous pieces in the Scottish folk music canon, a song that has been adapted in different ways by everyone from the experimental noise band Current 93 to the dub poet Benjamin Zephaniah to the comics writer Grant Morrison: [Excerpt: Fairport Convention, “Tam Lin”] And “Matty Groves”, a song about a man killing his cheating wife and her lover, which actually has a surprisingly similar story to that of “1921” from another great concept album from that year, the Who’s Tommy. “Matty Groves” became an excuse for long solos and shows of instrumental virtuosity: [Excerpt: Fairport Convention, “Matty Groves”] The album was recorded in September 1969, after their return from their break in the country and a triumphal performance at the Royal Festival Hall, headlining over fellow Witchseason artists John and Beverly Martyn and Nick Drake. It became a classic of the traditional folk genre — arguably *the* classic of the traditional folk genre. In 2007 BBC Radio 2’s Folk Music Awards gave it an award for most influential folk album of all time, and while such things are hard to measure, I doubt there’s anyone with even the most cursory knowledge of British folk and folk-rock music who would not at least consider that a reasonable claim. But once again, by the time the album came out in November, the band had changed lineups yet again. There was a fundamental split in the band – on one side were Sandy Denny and Richard Thompson, whose stance was, roughly, that Liege and Lief was a great experiment and a fun thing to do once, but really the band had two first-rate songwriters in themselves, and that they should be concentrating on their own new material, not doing these old songs, good as they were. They wanted to take the form of the traditional songs and use that form for new material — they wanted to make British folk-rock, but with the emphasis on the rock side of things. Hutchings, on the other hand, was equally sure that he wanted to make traditional music and go further down the rabbit hole of antiquity. With the zeal of the convert he had gone in a couple of years from being the leader of a band who were labelled “the British Jefferson Airplane” to becoming a serious scholar of traditional folk music. Denny was tired of touring, as well — she wanted to spend more time at home with Trevor Lucas, who was sleeping with other women when she was away and making her insecure. When the time came for the group to go on a tour of Denmark, Denny decided she couldn’t make it, and Hutchings was jubilant — he decided he was going to get A.L. Lloyd into the band in her place and become a *real* folk group. Then Denny reconsidered, and Hutchings was crushed. He realised that while he had always been the leader, he wasn’t going to be able to lead the band any further in the traditionalist direction, and quit the group — but not before he was delegated by the other band members to fire Denny. Until the publication of Richard Thompson’s autobiography in 2022, every book on the group or its members said that Denny quit the band again, which was presumably a polite fiction that the band agreed, but according to Thompson “Before we flew home, we decided to fire Sandy. I don't remember who asked her to leave – it was probably Ashley, who usually did the dirty work. She was reportedly shocked that we would take that step. She may have been fragile beneath the confident facade, but she still knew her worth.” Thompson goes on to explain that the reasons for kicking her out were that “I suppose we felt that in her mind she had already left” and that “We were probably suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder, though there wasn't a name for it back then.” They had considered inviting Trevor Lucas to join the band to make Denny more comfortable, but came to the (probably correct) conclusion that while he was someone they got on well with personally, he would be another big ego in a band that already had several, and that being around Denny and Lucas’ volatile relationship would, in Thompson’s phrasing, “have not always given one a feeling of peace and stability.” Hutchings originally decided he was going to join Sweeney’s Men, but that group were falling apart, and their first rehearsal with Hutchings would also be their last as a group, with only Hutchings and guitarist and mandolin player Terry Woods left in the band. They added Woods’ wife Gay, and another couple, Tim Hart and Maddy Prior, and formed a group called Steeleye Span, a name given them by Martin Carthy. That group, like Fairport, went to “get their heads together in the country” for three months and recorded an album of electric versions of traditional songs, Hark the Village Wait, on which Mattacks and another drummer, Gerry Conway, guested as Steeleye Span didn’t at the time have their own drummer: [Excerpt: Steeleye Span, “Blackleg Miner”] Steeleye Span would go on to have a moderately successful chart career in the seventies, but by that time most of the original lineup, including Hutchings, had left — Hutchings stayed with them for a few albums, then went on to form the first of a series of bands, all called the Albion Band or variations on that name, which continue to this day. And this is something that needs to be pointed out at this point — it is impossible to follow every single individual in this narrative as they move between bands. There is enough material in the history of the British folk-rock scene that someone could do a 500 Songs-style podcast just on that, and every time someone left Fairport, or Steeleye Span, or the Albion Band, or Matthews’ Southern Comfort, or any of the other bands we have mentioned or will mention, they would go off and form another band which would then fission, and some of its members would often join one of those other bands. There was a point in the mid-1970s where the Albion Band had two original members of Fairport Convention while Fairport Convention had none. So just in order to keep the narrative anything like wieldy, I’m going to keep the narrative concentrated on the two figures from Fairport — Sandy Denny and Richard Thompson — whose work outside the group has had the most influence on the wider world of rock music more broadly, and only deal with the other members when, as they often did, their careers intersected with those two. That doesn’t mean the other members are not themselves hugely important musicians, just that their importance has been primarily to the folk side of the folk-rock genre, and so somewhat outside the scope of this podcast. While Hutchings decided to form a band that would allow him to go deeper and deeper into traditional folk music, Sandy Denny’s next venture was rather different. For a long time she had been writing far more songs than she had ever played for her bandmates, like “Nothing More”, a song that many have suggested is about Thompson: [Excerpt: Fotheringay, “Nothing More”] When Joe Boyd heard that Denny was leaving Fairport Convention, he was at first elated. Fairport’s records were being distributed by A&M in the US at that point, but Island Records was in the process of opening up a new US subsidiary which would then release all future Fairport product — *but*, as far as A&M were concerned, Sandy Denny *was* Fairport Convention. They were only interested in her. Boyd, on the other hand, loved Denny’s work intensely, but from his point of view *Richard Thompson* was Fairport Convention. If he could get Denny signed directly to A&M as a solo artist before Island started its US operations, Witchseason could get a huge advance on her first solo record, while Fairport could continue making records for Island — he’d have two lucrative acts, on different labels. Boyd went over and spoke to A&M and got an agreement in principle that they would give Denny a forty-thousand-dollar advance on her first solo album — twice what they were paying for Fairport albums. The problem was that Denny didn’t want to be a solo act. She wanted to be the lead singer of a band. She gave many reasons for this — the one she gave to many journalists was that she had seen a Judy Collins show and been impressed, but noticed that Collins’ band were definitely a “backing group”, and as she put it “But that's all they were – a backing group. I suddenly thought, If you're playing together on a stage you might as well be TOGETHER.” Most other people in her life, though, say that the main reason for her wanting to be in a band was her desire to be with her boyfriend, Trevor Lucas. Partly this was due to a genuine desire to spend more time with someone with whom she was very much in love, partly it was a fear that he would cheat on her if she was away from him for long periods of time, and part of it seems to have been Lucas’ dislike of being *too* overshadowed by his talented girlfriend — he didn’t mind acknowledging that she was a major talent, but he wanted to be thought of as at least a minor one. So instead of going solo, Denny formed Fotheringay, named after the song she had written for Fairport. This new band consisted at first of Denny on vocals and occasional piano, Lucas on vocals and rhythm guitar, and Lucas’ old Eclection bandmate Gerry Conway on drums. For a lead guitarist, they asked Richard Thompson who the best guitarist in Britain was, and he told them Albert Lee. Lee in turn brought in bass player Pat Donaldson, but this lineup of the band barely survived a fortnight. Lee *was* arguably the best guitarist in Britain, certainly a reasonable candidate if you could ever have a singular best (as indeed was Thompson himself), but he was the best *country* guitarist in Britain, and his style simply didn’t fit with Fotheringay’s folk-influenced songs. He was replaced by American guitarist Jerry Donahue, who was not anything like as proficient as Lee, but who was still very good, and fit the band’s style much better. The new group rehearsed together for a few weeks, did a quick tour, and then went into the recording studio to record their debut, self-titled, album. Joe Boyd produced the album, but admitted himself that he only paid attention to those songs he considered worthwhile — the album contained one song by Lucas, “The Ballad of Ned Kelly”, and two cover versions of American singer-songwriter material with Lucas singing lead. But everyone knew that the songs that actually *mattered* were Sandy Denny’s, and Boyd was far more interested in them, particularly the songs “The Sea” and “The Pond and the Stream”: [Excerpt: Fotheringay, “The Pond and the Stream”] Fotheringay almost immediately hit financial problems, though. While other Witchseason acts were used to touring on the cheap, all packed together in the back of a Transit van with inexpensive equipment, Trevor Lucas had ambitions of being a rock star and wanted to put together a touring production to match, with expensive transport and equipment, including a speaker system that got nicknamed “Stonehenge” — but at the same time, Denny was unhappy being on the road, and didn’t play many gigs. As well as the band itself, the Fotheringay album also featured backing vocals from a couple of other people, including Denny’s friend Linda Peters. Peters was another singer from the folk clubs, and a good one, though less well-known than Denny — at this point she had only released a couple of singles, and those singles seemed to have been as much as anything else released as a novelty. The first of those, a version of Dylan’s “You Ain’t Goin’ Nowhere” had been released as by “Paul McNeill and Linda Peters”: [Excerpt: Paul McNeill and Linda Peters, “You Ain’t Goin’ Nowhere”] But their second single, a version of John D. Loudermilk’s “You’re Taking My Bag”, was released on the tiny Page One label, owned by Larry Page, and was released under the name “Paul and Linda”, clearly with the intent of confusing particularly gullible members of the record-buying public into thinking this was the McCartneys: [Excerpt: Paul and Linda, “You’re Taking My Bag”] Peters was though more financially successful than almost anyone else in this story, as she was making a great deal of money as a session singer. She actually did another session involving most of Fotheringay around this time. Witchseason had a number of excellent songwriters on its roster, and had had some success getting covers by people like Judy Collins, but Joe Boyd thought that they might possibly do better at getting cover versions if they were performed in less idiosyncratic arrangements. Donahue, Donaldson, and Conway went into the studio to record backing tracks, and vocals were added by Peters and another session singer, who according to some sources also provided piano. They cut songs by Mike Heron of the Incredible String Band: [Excerpt: Linda Peters, “You Get Brighter”] Ed Carter, formerly of The New Nadir but by this time firmly ensconced in the Beach Boys’ touring band where he would remain for the next quarter-century: [Excerpt: Linda Peters, “I Don’t Mind”] John and Beverly Martyn, and Nick Drake: [Excerpt: Elton John, “Saturday Sun”] There are different lineups of musicians credited for those sessions in different sources, but I tend to believe that it’s mostly Fotheringay for the simple reason that Donahue says it was him, Donaldson and Conway who talked Lucas and Denny into the mistake that destroyed Fotheringay because of these sessions. Fotheringay were in financial trouble already, spending far more money than they were bringing in, but their album made the top twenty and they were getting respect both from critics and from the public — in September, Sandy Denny was voted best British female singer by the readers of Melody Maker in their annual poll, which led to shocked headlines in the tabloids about how this “unknown” could have beaten such big names as Dusty Springfield and Cilla Black. Only a couple of weeks after that, they were due to headline at the Albert Hall. It should have been a triumph. But Donahue, Donaldson, and Conway had asked that singing pianist to be their support act. As Donahue said later “That was a terrible miscast. It was our fault. He asked if [he] could do it. Actually Pat, Gerry and I had to talk Sandy and Trevor into [it]… We'd done these demos and the way he was playing – he was a wonderful piano player – he was sensitive enough. We knew very little about his stage-show. We thought he'd be a really good opener for us.” Unfortunately, Elton John was rather *too* good. As Donahue continued “we had no idea what he had in mind, that he was going to do the most incredible rock & roll show ever. He pretty much blew us off the stage before we even got on the stage.” To make matters worse, Fotheringay’s set, which was mostly comprised of new material, was underrehearsed and sloppy, and from that point on no matter what they did people were counting the hours until the band split up. They struggled along for a while though, and started working on a second record, with Boyd again producing, though as Boyd later said “I probably shouldn't have been producing the record. My lack of respect for the group was clear, and couldn't have helped the atmosphere. We'd put out a record that had sold disappointingly, A&M was unhappy. Sandy's tracks on the first record are among the best things she ever did – the rest of it, who cares? And the artwork, Trevor's sister, was terrible. It would have been one thing if I'd been unhappy with it and it sold, and the group was working all the time, making money, but that wasn't the case … I knew what Sandy was capable of, and it was very upsetting to me.” The record would not be released for thirty-eight years: [Excerpt: Fotheringay, “Wild Mountain Thyme”] Witchseason was going badly into debt. Given all the fissioning of bands that we’ve already been talking about, Boyd had been stretched thin — he produced sixteen albums in 1970, and almost all of them lost money for the company. And he was getting more and more disillusioned with the people he was producing. He loved Beverly Martyn’s work, but had little time for her abusive husband John, who was dominating her recording and life more and more and would soon become a solo artist while making her stay at home (and stealing her ideas without giving her songwriting credit). The Incredible String Band were great, but they had recently converted to Scientology, which Boyd found annoying, and while he was working with all sorts of exciting artists like Vashti Bunyan and Nico, he was finding himself less and less important to the artists he mentored. Fairport Convention were a good example of this. After Denny and Hutchings had left the group, they’d decided to carry on as an electric folk group, performing an equal mix of originals by the Swarbrick and Thompson songwriting team and arrangements of traditional songs. The group were now far enough away from the “British Jefferson Airplane” label that they decided they didn’t need a female vocalist — and more realistically, while they’d been able to replace Judy Dyble, nobody was going to replace Sandy Denny. Though it’s rather surprising when one considers Thompson’s subsequent career that nobody seems to have thought of bringing in Denny’s friend Linda Peters, who was dating Joe Boyd at the time (as Denny had been before she met Lucas) as Denny’s replacement. Instead, they decided that Swarbrick and Thompson were going to share the vocals between them. They did, though, need a bass player to replace Hutchings. Swarbrick wanted to bring in Dave Pegg, with whom he had played in the Ian Campbell Folk Group, but the other band members initially thought the idea was a bad one. At the time, while they respected Swarbrick as a musician, they didn’t think he fully understood rock and roll yet, and they thought the idea of getting in a folkie who had played double bass rather than an electric rock bassist ridiculous. But they auditioned him to mollify Swarbrick, and found that he was exactly what they needed. As Joe Boyd later said “All those bass lines were great, Ashley invented them all, but he never could play them that well. He thought of them, but he was technically not a terrific bass player. He was a very inventive, melodic, bass player, but not a very powerful one technically. But having had the part explained to him once, Pegg was playing it better than Ashley had ever played it… In some rock bands, I think, ultimately, the bands that sound great, you can generally trace it to the bass player… it was at that point they became a great band, when they had Pegg.” The new lineup of Fairport decided to move in together, and found a former pub called the Angel, into which all the band members moved, along with their partners and children (Thompson was the only one who was single at this point) and their roadies. The group lived together quite happily, and one gets the impression that this was the period when they were most comfortable with each other, even though by this point they were a disparate group with disparate tastes, in music as in everything else. Several people have said that the only music all the band members could agree they liked at this point was the first two albums by The Band. With the departure of Hutchings from the band, Swarbrick and Thompson, as the strongest personalities and soloists, became in effect the joint leaders of the group, and they became collaborators as songwriters, trying to write new songs that were inspired by traditional music. Thompson described the process as “let’s take one line of this reel and slow it down and move it up a minor third and see what that does to it; let’s take one line of this ballad and make a whole song out of it. Chopping up the tradition to find new things to do… like a collage.” Generally speaking, Swarbrick and Thompson would sit by the fire and Swarbrick would play a melody he’d been working on, the two would work on it for a while, and Thompson would then go away and write the lyrics. This is how the two came up with songs like the nine-minute “Sloth”, a highlight of the next album, Full House, and one that would remain in Fairport’s live set for much of their career: [Excerpt: Fairport Convention, “Sloth”] “Sloth” was titled that way because Thompson and Swarbrick were working on two tunes, a slow one and a fast one, and they jokingly named them “Sloth” and “Fasth”, but the latter got renamed to “Walk Awhile”, while “Sloth” kept its working title. But by this point, Boyd and Thompson were having a lot of conflict in the studio. Boyd was never the most technical of producers — he was one of those producers whose job is to gently guide the artists in the studio and create a space for the music to flourish, rather than the Joe Meek type with an intimate technical knowledge of the studio — and as the artists he was working with gained confidence in their own work they felt they had less and less need of him. During the making of the Full House album, Thompson and Boyd, according to Boyd, clashed on everything — every time Boyd thought Thompson had done a good solo, Thompson would say to erase it and let him have another go, while every time Boyd thought Thompson could do better, Thompson would say that was the take to keep. One of their biggest clashes was over Thompson’s song “Poor Will and the Jolly Hangman”, which was originally intended for release on the album, and is included in current reissues of it: [Excerpt: Fairport Convention, “Poor Will and the Jolly Hangman”] Thompson had written that song inspired by what he thought was the unjust treatment of Alex Bramham, the driver in Fairport’s fatal car crash, by the courts — Bramham had been given a prison sentence of a few months for dangerous driving, while the group members thought he had not been at fault. Boyd thought it was one of the best things recorded for the album, but Thompson wasn’t happy with his vocal — there was one note at the top of the melody that he couldn’t quite hit — and insisted it be kept off the record, even though that meant it would be a shorter album than normal. He did this at such a late stage that early copies of the album actually had the title printed on the sleeve, but then blacked out. He now says in his autobiography “I could have persevered, double-tracked the voice, warmed up for longer – anything. It was a good track, and the record was lacking without it. When the album was re-released, the track was restored with a more confident vocal, and it has stayed there ever since.” During the sessions for Full House the group also recorded one non-album single, Thompson and Swarbrick’s “Now Be Thankful”: [Excerpt, Fairport Convention, “Now Be Thankful”] The B-side to that was a medley of two traditional tunes plus a Swarbrick original, but was given the deliberately ridiculous title “Sir B. McKenzie’s Daughter’s Lament For The 77th Mounted Lancers Retreat From The Straits Of Loch Knombe, In The Year Of Our Lord 1727, On The Occasion Of The Announcement Of Her Marriage To The Laird Of Kinleakie”: [Excerpt: Fairport Convention, “Sir B. McKenzie’s Daughter’s Lament For The 77th Mounted Lancers Retreat From The Straits Of Loch Knombe, In The Year Of Our Lord 1727, On The Occasion Of The Announcement Of Her Marriage To The Laird Of Kinleakie”] The B. McKenzie in the title was a reference to the comic-strip character Barry McKenzie, a stereotype drunk Australian created for Private Eye magazine by the comedian Barry Humphries (later to become better known for his Dame Edna Everage character) but the title was chosen for one reason only — to get into the Guinness Book of Records for the song with the longest title. Which they did, though they were later displaced by the industrial band Test Dept, and their song “Long Live British Democracy Which Flourishes and Is Constantly Perfected Under the Immaculate Guidance of the Great, Honourable, Generous and Correct Margaret Hilda Thatcher. She Is the Blue Sky in the Hearts of All Nations. Our People Pay Homage and Bow in Deep Respect and Gratitude to Her. The Milk of Human Kindness”. Full House got excellent reviews in the music press, with Rolling Stone saying “The music shows that England has finally gotten her own equivalent to The Band… By calling Fairport an English equivalent of the Band, I meant that they have soaked up enough of the tradition of their countryfolk that it begins to show all over, while they maintain their roots in rock.” Off the back of this, the group went on their first US tour, culminating in a series of shows at the Troubadour in LA, on the same bill as Rick Nelson, which were recorded and later released as a live album: [Excerpt: Fairport Convention, “Sloth (live)”] The Troubadour was one of the hippest venues at the time, and over their residency there the group got seen by many celebrities, some of whom joined them on stage. The first was Linda Ronstadt, who initially demurred, saying she didn’t know any of their songs. On being told they knew all of hers, she joined in with a rendition of “Silver Threads and Golden Needles”. Thompson was later asked to join Ronstadt’s backing band, who would go on to become the Eagles, but he said later of this offer “I would have hated it. I’d have hated being on the road with four or five miserable Americans — they always seem miserable. And if you see them now, they still look miserable on stage — like they don’t want to be there and they don’t like each other.” The group were also joined on stage at the Troubadour on one memorable night by some former bandmates of Pegg’s. Before joining the Ian Campbell Folk Group, Pegg had played around the Birmingham beat scene, and had been in bands with John Bonham and Robert Plant, who turned up to the Troubadour with their Led Zeppelin bandmate Jimmy Page (reports differ on whether the fourth member of Zeppelin, John Paul Jones, also came along). They all got up on stage together and jammed on songs like “Hey Joe”, “Louie Louie”, and various old Elvis tunes. The show was recorded, and the tapes are apparently still in the possession of Joe Boyd, who has said he refuses to release them in case he is murdered by the ghost of Peter Grant. According to Thompson, that night ended in a three-way drinking contest between Pegg, Bonham, and Janis Joplin, and it’s testament to how strong the drinking culture is around Fairport and the British folk scene in general that Pegg outdrank both of them. According to Thompson, Bonham was found naked by a swimming pool two days later, having missed two gigs. For all their hard rock image, Led Zeppelin were admirers of a lot of the British folk and folk-rock scene, and a few months later Sandy Denny would become the only outside vocalist ever to appear on a Led Zeppelin record when she duetted with Plant on “The Battle of Evermore” on the group’s fourth album: [Excerpt: Led Zeppelin, “The Battle of Evermore”] Denny would never actually get paid for her appearance on one of the best-selling albums of all time. That was, incidentally, not the only session that Denny was involved in around this time — she also sang on the soundtrack to a soft porn film titled Swedish Fly Girls, whose soundtrack was produced by Manfred Mann: [Excerpt: Sandy Denny, “What Will I Do With Tomorrow?”] Shortly after Fairport’s trip to America, Joe Boyd decided he was giving up on Witchseason. The company was now losing money, and he was finding himself having to produce work for more and more acts as the various bands fissioned. The only ones he really cared about were Richard Thompson, who he was finding it more and more difficult to work with, Nick Drake, who wanted to do his next album with just an acoustic guitar anyway, Sandy Denny, who he felt was wasting her talents in Fotheringay, and Mike Heron of the Incredible String Band, who was more distant since his conversion to Scientology. Boyd did make some attempts to keep the company going. On a trip to Sweden, he negotiated an agreement with the manager and publisher of a Swedish band whose songs he’d found intriguing, the Hep Stars. Boyd was going to publish their songs in the UK, and in return that publisher, Stig Anderson, would get the rights to Witchseason’s catalogue in Scandinavia — a straight swap, with no money changing hands. But before Boyd could get round to signing the paperwork, he got a better offer from Mo Ostin of Warners — Ostin wanted Boyd to come over to LA and head up Warners’ new film music department. Boyd sold Witchseason to Island Records and moved to LA with his fiancee Linda Peters, spending the next few years working on music for films like Deliverance and A Clockwork Orange, as well as making his own documentary about Jimi Hendrix, and thus missed out on getting the UK publishing rights for ABBA, and all the income that would have brought him, for no money. And it was that decision that led to the breakup of Fotheringay. Just before Christmas 1970, Fotheringay were having a difficult session, recording the track “John the Gun”: [Excerpt: Fotheringay, “John the Gun”] Boyd got frustrated and kicked everyone out of the session, and went for a meal and several drinks with Denny. He kept insisting that she should dump the band and just go solo, and then something happened that the two of them would always describe differently. She asked him if he would continue to produce her records if she went solo, and he said he would. According to Boyd’s recollection of the events, he meant that he would fly back from California at some point to produce her records. According to Denny, he told her that if she went solo he would stay in Britain and not take the job in LA. This miscommunication was only discovered after Denny told the rest of Fotheringay after the Christmas break that she was splitting the band. Jerry Donahue has described that as the worst moment of his life, and Denny felt very guilty about breaking up a band with some of her closest friends in — and then when Boyd went over to the US anyway she felt a profound betrayal. Two days before Fotheringay’s final concert, in January 1971, Sandy Denny signed a solo deal with Island records, but her first solo album would not end up produced by Joe Boyd. Instead, The North Star Grassman and the Ravens was co-produced by Denny, John Wood — the engineer who had worked with Boyd on pretty much everything he’d produced, and Richard Thompson, who had just quit Fairport Convention, though he continued living with them at the Angel, at least until a truck crashed into the building in February 1971, destroying its entire front wall and forcing them to relocate. The songs chosen for The North Star Grassman and the Ravens reflected the kind of choices Denny would make on her future albums, and her eclectic taste in music. There was, of course, the obligatory Dylan cover, and the traditional folk ballad “Blackwaterside”, but there was also a cover version of Brenda Lee’s “Let’s Jump the Broomstick”: [Excerpt: Sandy Denny, “Let’s Jump the Broomstick”] Most of the album, though, was made up of originals about various people in Denny’s life, like “Next Time Around”, about her ex-boyfriend Jackson C Frank: [Excerpt: Sandy Denny, “Next Time Around”] The album made the top forty in the UK — Denny’s only solo album to do so — and led to her once again winning the “best female singer” award in Melody Maker’s readers’ poll that year — the male singer award was won by Rod Stewart. Both Stewart and Denny appeared the next year on the London Symphony Orchestra’s all-star version of The Who’s Tommy, which had originally been intended as a vehicle for Stewart before Roger Daltrey got involved. Stewart’s role was reduced to a single song, “Pinball Wizard”, while Denny sang on “It’s a Boy”: [Excerpt: Sandy Denny, “It’s a Boy”] While Fotheringay had split up, all the band members play on The North Star Grassman and the Ravens. Guitarists Donahue and Lucas only play on a couple of the tracks, with Richard Thompson playing most of the guitar on the record. But Fotheringay’s rhythm section of Pat Donaldson and Gerry Conway play on almost every track. Another musician on the album, Ian Whiteman, would possibly have a profound effect on the future direction of Richard Thompson’s career and life. Whiteman was the former keyboard player for the mod band The Action, having joined them just before they became the blues-rock band Mighty Baby. But Mighty Baby had split up when all of the band except the lead singer had converted to Islam. Richard Thompson was on his own spiritual journey at this point, and became a Sufi – the same branch of Islam as Whiteman – soon after the session, though Thompson has said that his conversion was independent of Whiteman’s. The two did become very close and work together a lot in the mid-seventies though. Thompson had supposedly left Fairport because he was writing material that wasn’t suited to the band, but he spent more than a year after quitting the group working on sessions rather than doing anything with his own material, and these sessions tended to involve the same core group of musicians. One of the more unusual was a folk-rock supergroup called The Bunch, put together by Trevor Lucas. Richard Branson had recently bought a recording studio, and wanted a band to test it out before opening it up for commercial customers, so with this free studio time Lucas decided to record a set of fifties rock and roll covers. He gathered together Thompson, Denny, Whiteman, Ashley Hutchings, Dave Mattacks, Pat Donaldson, Gerry Conway, pianist Tony Cox, the horn section that would later form the core of the Average White Band, and Linda Peters, who had now split up with Joe Boyd and returned to the UK, and who had started dating Thompson. They recorded an album of covers of songs by Jerry Lee Lewis, the Everly Brothers, Johnny Otis and others: [Excerpt: The Bunch, “Willie and the Hand Jive”] The early seventies was a hugely productive time for this group of musicians, as they all continued playing on each other’s projects. One notable album was No Roses by Shirley Collins, which featured Thompson, Mattacks, Whiteman, Simon Nicol, Lal and Mike Waterson, and Ashley Hutchings, who was at that point married to Collins, as well as some more unusual musicians like the free jazz saxophonist Lol Coxhill: [Excerpt: Shirley Collins and the Albion Country Band, “Claudy Banks”] Collins was at the time the most respected female singer in British traditional music, and already had a substantial career including a series of important records made with her sister Dolly, work with guitarists like Davey Graham, and time spent in the 1950s collecting folk songs in the Southern US with her then partner Alan Lomax – according to Collins she did much of the actual work, but Lomax only mentioned her in a single sentence in his book on this work. Some of the same group of musicians went on to work on an album of traditional Morris dancing tunes, titled Morris On, credited to “Ashley Hutchings, Richard Thompson, Dave Mattacks, John Kirkpatrick and Barry Dransfield”, with Collins singing lead on two tracks: [Excerpt: Ashley Hutchings, Richard Thompson, Dave Mattacks, John Kirkpatrick and Barry Dransfield with Shirley Collins, “The Willow Tree”] Thompson thought that that album was the best of the various side projects he was involved in at the time, comparing it favourably to Rock On, which he thought was rather slight, saying later “Conceptually, Fairport, Ashley and myself and Sandy were developing a more fragile style of music that nobody else was particularly interested in, a British Folk Rock idea that had a logical development to it, although we all presented it our own way. Morris On was rather more true to what we were doing. Rock On was rather a retro step. I'm not sure it was lasting enough as a record but Sandy did sing really well on the Buddy Holly songs.” Hutchings used the musicians on No Roses and Morris On as the basis for his band the Albion Band, which continues to this day. Simon Nicol and Dave Mattacks both quit Fairport to join the Albion Band, though Mattacks soon returned. Nicol would not return to Fairport for several years, though, and for a long period in the mid-seventies Fairport Convention had no original members. Unfortunately, while Collins was involved in the Albion Band early on, she and Hutchings ended up divorcing, and the stress from the divorce led to Collins developing spasmodic dysphonia, a stress-related illness which makes it impossible for the sufferer to sing. She did eventually regain her vocal ability, but between 1978 and 2016 she was unable to perform at all, and lost decades of her career. Richard Thompson occasionally performed with the Albion Band early on, but he was getting stretched a little thin with all these sessions. Linda Peters said later of him “When I came back from America, he was working in Sandy’s band, and doing sessions by the score. Always with Pat Donaldson and Dave Mattacks. Richard would turn up with his guitar, one day he went along to do a session with one of those folkie lady singers — and there were Pat and DM. They all cracked. Richard smashed his amp and said “Right! No more sessions!” In 1972 he got round to releasing his first solo album, Henry the Human Fly, which featured guest appearances by Linda Peters and Sandy Denny among others: [Excerpt: Richard Thompson, “The Angels Took My Racehorse Away”] Unfortunately, while that album has later become regarded as one of the classics of its genre, at the time it was absolutely slated by the music press. The review in Melody Maker, for example, read in part “Some of Richard Thompson’s ideas sound great – which is really the saving grace of this album, because most of the music doesn’t. The tragedy is that Thompson’s “British rock music” is such an unconvincing concoction… Even the songs that do integrate rock and traditional styles of electric guitar rhythms and accordion and fiddle decoration – and also include explicit, meaningful lyrics are marred by bottle-up vocals, uninspiring guitar phrases and a general lack of conviction in performance.” Henry the Human Fly was released in the US by Warners, who had a reciprocal licensing deal with Island (and for whom Joe Boyd was working at the time, which may have had something to do with that) but according to Thompson it became the lowest-selling record that Warners ever put out (though I’ve also seen that claim made about Van Dyke Parks’ Song Cycle, another album that has later been rediscovered). Thompson was hugely depressed by this reaction, and blamed his own singing. Happily, though, by this point he and Linda had become a couple — they would marry in 1972 — and they started playing folk clubs as a duo, or sometimes in a trio with Simon Nicol. Thompson was also playing with Sandy Denny’s backing band at this point, and played on every track on her second solo album, Sandy. This album was meant to be her big commercial breakthrough, with a glamorous cover photo by David Bailey, and with a more American sound, including steel guitar by Sneaky Pete Kleinow of the Flying Burrito Brothers (whose overdubs were supervised in LA by Joe Boyd): [Excerpt: Sandy Denny, “Tomorrow is a Long Time”] The album was given a big marketing push by Island, and “Listen, Listen” was made single of the week on the Radio 1 Breakfast show: [Excerpt: Sandy Denny, “Listen, Listen”] But it did even worse than the previous album, sending her into something of a depression. Linda Thompson (as the former Linda Peters now was) said of this period “After the Sandy album, it got her down that her popularity didn't suddenly increase in leaps and bounds, and that was the start of her really fretting about the way her career was going. Things only escalated after that. People like me or Martin Carthy or Norma Waterson would think, ‘What are you on about? This is folk music.'” After Sandy’s release, Denny realised she could no longer afford to tour with a band, and so went back to performing just acoustically or on piano. The only new music to be released by either of these ex-members of Fairport Convention in 1973 was, oddly, on an album by the band they were no longer members of. After Thompson had left Fairport, the group had managed to release two whole albums with the same lineup — Swarbrick, Nicol, Pegg, and Mattacks. But then Nicol and Mattacks had both quit the band to join the Albion Band with their former bandmate Ashley Hutchings, leading to a situation where the Albion Band had two original members of Fairport plus their longtime drummer while Fairport Convention itself had no original members and was down to just Swarbrick and Pegg. Needing to fulfil their contracts, they then recruited three former members of Fotheringay — Lucas on vocals and rhythm guitar, Donahue on lead guitar, and Conway on drums. Conway was only a session player at the time, and Mattacks soon returned to the band, but Lucas and Donahue became full-time members. This new lineup of Fairport Convention released two albums in 1973, widely regarded as the group’s most inconsistent records, and on the title track of the first, “Rosie”, Richard Thompson guested on guitar, with Sandy Denny and Linda Thompson on backing vocals: [Excerpt: Fairport Convention, “Rosie”] Neither Sandy Denny nor Richard Thompson released a record themselves in 1973, but in neither case was this through the artists’ choice. The record industry was changing in the early 1970s, as we’ll see in later episodes, and was less inclined to throw good money after bad in the pursuit of art. Island Records prided itself on being a home for great artists, but it was still a business, and needed to make money. We’ll talk about the OPEC oil crisis and its effect on the music industry much more when the podcast gets to 1973, but in brief, the production of oil by the US peaked in 1970 and started to decrease, leading to them importing more and more oil from the Middle East. As a result of this, oil prices rose slowly between 1971 and 1973, then very quickly towards the end of 1973 as a result of the Arab-Israeli conflict that year. As vinyl is made of oil, suddenly producing records became much more expensive, and in this period a lot of labels decided not to release already-completed albums, until what they hoped would be a brief period of shortages passed. Both Denny and Thompson recorded albums at this point that got put to one side by Island. In the case of Thompson, it was the first album by Richard and Linda as a duo, I Want to See the Bright Lights Tonight: [Excerpt: Richard and Linda Thompson, “I Want to See the Bright Lights Tonight”] Today, I Want to See the Bright Lights Tonight is widely regarded as one of the greatest albums of all time, and as one of the two masterpieces that bookended Richard and Linda’s career as a duo and their marriage. But when they recorded the album, full of Richard’s dark songs, it was the opposite of commercial. Even a song that’s more or less a boy-girl song, like “Has He Got a Friend for Me?” has lyrics like “He wouldn’t notice me passing by/I could be in the gutter, or dangling down from a tree” [Excerpt: Richard and Linda Thompson, “Has He got a Friend For Me?”] While something like “The Calvary Cross” is oblique and haunted, and seems to cast a pall over the entire album: [Excerpt: Richard and Linda Thompson, “The Calvary Cross”] The album itself had been cheap to make — it had been recorded in only a week, with Thompson bringing in musicians he knew well and had worked with a lot previously to cut the tracks as-live in only a handful of takes — but Island didn’t think it was worth releasing. The record stayed on the shelf for nearly a year after recording, until Island got a new head of A&R, Richard Williams. Williams said of the album’s release “Muff Winwood had been doing A&R, but he was more interested in production… I had a conversation with Muff as soon as I got there, and he said there are a few hangovers, some outstanding problems. And one of them was Richard Thompson. He said there’s this album we gave him the money to make — which was I Want to See the Bright Lights Tonight — and nobody’s very interested in it. Henry the Human Fly had been a bit of a commercial disappointment, and although Island was altruistic and independent and known for only recording good stuff, success was important… Either a record had to do well or somebody had to believe in it a lot. And it seemed as if neither of those things were true at that point of Richard.” Williams, though, was hugely impressed when he listened to the album. He compared Richard Thompson’s guitar playing to John Coltrane’s sax, and called Thompson “the folk poet of the rainy streets”, but also said “Linda brightened it, made it more commercial. and I thought that “Bright Lights” itself seemed a really commercial song.” The rest of the management at Island got caught up in Williams’ enthusiasm, and even decided to release the title track as a single: [Excerpt: Richard and Linda Thompson, “I Want to See the Bright Lights Tonight”] Neither single nor album charted — indeed it would not be until 1991 that Richard Thompson would make a record that made the top forty in the UK — but the album got enough critical respect that Richard and Linda released two albums the year after. The first of these, Hokey Pokey, is a much more upbeat record than their previous one — Richard Thompson has called it “quite a music-hall influenced record” and cited the influence of George Formby and Harry Lauder. For once, the claim of music hall influence is audible in the music. Usually when a British musician is claimed to have a music ha

   Midnight Hammer was carried out with precision and force over the weekend as three nuclear sites in Iran are obliterated.  It was overwhelming strong and safe for our pilots and the remarkable sailors on a submarine 400 miles away undetected.   Our men and women at Whiteman Air Force Base were flawless carrying out this mission and we couldn't be prouder the Show Me state produced a Show Stopper for the ages.  This is America First.    The young person that set a pair of Teslas on fire in KC is looking at real prison time and that has the KC Star's panties in a wad.   These are the same people that praised locking up old ladies that walked into the capitol building to take a picture and walking out on January 6.  Imagine that.    The Royals were winning a classic low scoring game on Sunday, their specialty, before they let it slip away.  It's exactly the kind of game this team has to win almost every time they get the chance.    The NBA Finals were set up for a dramatic game 7 when a devastating injury to Indiana's star player in the first quarter put a damper on things.  LSU wins the College World Series, Simone Biles has had it with social media and golfer Keegan Bradley wins and creates a Ryder Cup dilemma for himself as he's the team captain.

Mark Alford joins Pete Mundo live from Whiteman Air Force Base where the B2 Bombers just landed yesterday after their weekend strike on Iran. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Listen to how a local mechanic with the same name as another well respected local mechanic and business owner became our first DEI winner of the FAFO championship.

Send us a textJason welcomes writer & rock star Andrew Whiteman (of Broken Social Scene, Apostle of Hustle, & Bourbon Tabernacle Choir fame) for a wide-ranging interface about giant Greek eyes, secretly grooving to Sade, the glory of Prince, being possessed by the guilty spirit of Dostoevsky's Raskolninov, the split self, spontaneous eruptions, & Frank O'Hara. Join the early sh*t chat at https://www.facebook.com/WRTESpodcast & on Instagram @writersreadtheirearlyshit. Thanks to Wayne Emde for the artwork, Joe Emde for help with the intro, DJ Max in Tokyo for the wizard music, and you, wherever & whoever & however you are, for listening. Support the show

Gus T. Renegade gives counter-racist analysis on the third day of the Sade C. Robinson murder trial in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. More than a year after the murder and dismemberment of the 19-year-old black teen, Suspected Racist Maxwell Anderson is accused of arson, dismemberment, hiding a corpse and homicide. 12 jurors and 3 alternate jurors were selected on the first day of proceedings. Unless Gus is mistaken, only 2 of the 15 are classified as black. Since Gus T. is not a Milwaukee native, he was not initially aware that Milwaukee does not have a majority White population. The US census indicates the "Cream City" has a population of less than 35% White. This 15-person jury has 12 people classified as White - a whopping 80% of the jury. A number of local journalists and scholars have researched and written about this local element of White Supremacy for years. Yet, the problem remains. Also, during late morning testimony, Detective Kayla Bjerke disclosed that she found 47 methamphetamine tablets at Sade's apartment. The defense will surely argue that the accused Anderson did not commit this heinous crime, but rather, this dastardly act was the work of her drug supplier. During afternoon testimony, ATF agent Ricky Henkins provided scientific detail about the deliberate nature of the fire set to Sade's blue Honda Civic. He explained how evidence and witnessed testimony shaped his conclusion about the intentional blaze. Later, Detective Casey Donohue testified to the neighborhood surveillance footage he gathered about the car arson. Numerous cameras captured a figure who strongly resembles Anderson as he calmly walks from the fire. The figure appears to be a large, pale, White Man. #ForSade INVEST in The C.O.W.S. - https://cash.app/$TheCOWS #TheCOWS16Years CALL IN NUMBER: 605.313.5164 CODE: 564943#

If you found this conversation interesting, Seen & Unseen, the creators of Re-Enchanting, offers thousands of articles exploring how the Christian faith helps us understand the modern world. Discover more here: www.seenandunseen.com. Chine McDonald is the Director of Theos, the religion and society think tank. She is also a regular contributor to TV and radio programmes and author of ‘God Is Not a White Man: and Other Revelations' and the brand new ‘Unmaking Mary: Shattering the Myth of Perfect Motherhood'. She is also our first ever returning guest on Re-Enchanting! In this episode, Chine talks to Justin and Belle about the myths she has endeavoured to shatter around motherhood, whether or not the task of mothering can be subcontracted out to machines and how God is as much a mother as he is a father. For more from Chine: https://www.chinemcdonald.com/For Theos Think Tank: https://www.theosthinktank.co.uk/For Re-Enchanting: https://www.seenandunseen.com/podcast Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Gibbs-White has been linked to Man City but could he end up at Arsenal this Summer? To Buy Wolfie a Coffee Click Here: https://buymeacoffee.com/forestfantv Forest Fan TV brings you a blockbuster transfer update as Arsenal have joined the race to sign Nottingham Forest's star midfielder Morgan Gibbs-White this summer, adding to interest from Manchester City! The 25-year-old England international, who notched seven goals and ten assists in the 2024/25 Premier League season, has caught the Gunners'. Wolfie dives into whether Gibbs-White wants to leave the City Ground after Forest's qualification for the 2025/26 Europa Conference League and if financial pressures, like past PSR breaches, might force Forest to sell. Subscribe and hit the notification bell to stay on top of this transfer saga! Adding to the drama, The Sun reports that Manchester City's Matheus Nunes could be a “bargaining chip” in negotiations for Gibbs-White, with Forest eyeing the £35m versatile midfielder as a potential incoming transfer. Wolfie dissects the likelihood of this swap deal, exploring Nunes' fit under Nuno Espirito Santo, who admires the 26-year-old's ability to play as a full-back or midfielder, despite Pep Guardiola's critique of his midfield “composure.” With Forest's £10.1m profit in 2023/24 and no immediate need to sell, can they hold firm on Gibbs-White or leverage his transfer to secure Nunes and strengthen their squad for Europe? What do YOU think about these transfer rumours? Are you worried about Arsenal and City circling Gibbs-White, or do you believe he'll stay loyal to Forest? And would Matheus Nunes be a smart addition for the Reds' Conference League campaign? Drop your opinions in the comments and join the Forest Fan TV community as Wolfie breaks down these stories and what they mean for Forest's future. Let's talk transfers! Come on, you Reds! #nffc #arsenal #premierleague ⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯

FEAT: NISA DA GOAT & LIL NICKY 1ST HALF - Let him think I'm cheating 2nd Half - PLAYING IN THE SNOW 

Send us a textFEAT: NISA DA GOAT & LIL NICKY 1ST HALF - CONVERSATION AMONGST FRIENDS#drumarjohnson #drumar #drumarsdaughter #princeofpanafricanism #panafricanism #panafrican #blackqueensforever #interracialrelationships #mixedcouple #growingupmixed #racialtensions #mostracistcitySupport the show

In this episode of the Archive Room, we revisit a compelling conversation with Marvin Whiteman, a blind preacher and musician. Originally aired in July 2020, this episode delves into Marvin's remarkable journey of overcoming obstacles, nurturing a love for music, and embracing a life of service in ministry despite his blindness. Join us as Marvin shares anecdotes from his early life and his philosophies on faith, music, and the universal message of God's love.

#realtalk #podcast #rbcfYoutube link: https://youtu.be/O0TZ7zo-hW0Podcast link:https://spotifycreators-web.app.link/e/0ib4AJrytTbJoin us as we briefly touch on police brutality, black on black killings, STD's in the village, and Imperialism. Hashtags: #africa #america #whiteman #devil #originalpeople #oringalman #blackpeople #blackamerican #blackamerica

Lesbian with big muscles save meeeJoin our ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠discord⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ to chat with us! ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://discord.com/invite/q2rwfEJ22eCheck out our Patreon for bonus content!  ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.patreon.com/OneandaHalfLesbians⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Music by @Hirahxo with edits by Adriana ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://soundcloud.com/amberthvt/i-like-my-shit-from-the-baby-x-hirahxo-open-zip⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Social Media:One and a Half Lesbians | Twitter/IG/Bsky: @1point5lesbiansAdriana, the lesbian (they/she) | Twitter/Bsky: @ultralesbeam IG: somewhere_unknownBee, the half (they/them) | IG: @namastaywoke

What does the arrival of South African refugees in the US mean for Christians? In this Family Meeting, Monique and Kevin dive into the Trump administration's decision to grant refugee status to 59 white Afrikaners while suspending other refugee programs. We explore the pros and cons of this policy, the land appropriation issues in South Africa, and the biblical question of partiality in justice. We also tackle "black fatigue"—the growing exhaustion with ratchet culture, violence, and racial grievance narratives in the black community. Have "ratchet" black Americans squandered the goodwill of their neighbors? How should Christians respond? Join us for this exciting discussion on race, culture, and justice.

This week, an interview with Clifton Ariwakhete Nicholas and Franklin Lopez about about the film currently in production via Amplifier Films, A Red Road To The West Bank: An Indigenous journey of resistance and solidarity. The conversation covers some about relationships between the people of occupied Palestine and Kanehsatà:ke in so-called Canada, histories of settler colonialism and resistance of it. Clifton and Franklin are attempting to raise $10000 CAD for the film. Franklin also talks about his recently published kids book “The mega-adventures of Koko Sisi & Kiki Pupu” that he co-created with his son. Links: Karistatsi Onienre: The Iron Snake (film by Clifton) Elsipogtog: No Fracking Way! (film by Clifton) Trouble #1: Killing The Black Snake (narrated by Clifton) Anarcho-Indigenism: Conversations on Land and Freedom (Clifton contributed an essay) A 2011 interview with Franklin we conducted Franklin's interview with Clifton on the Mi'kmaq Warrior Society and Oka Mahmoud Darwish's poem, The Penultimate Speech of the Red Indian to the White Man . ... . .. Featured Track: L'enfant Sauvage by Gojira from L'enfant Sauvage

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Bob, Cory, and Todd rant and rave about dollar-store botulism, Shadeur Sanders, and D&D for Dummies.   00:00:00 - Housekeeping 00:21:46 - 90-second Sports 00:42:40 - TT's TikToks 00:59:38 - Gentleman's Agreement 01:29:37 - Existential Question of the Week   Send your comments and existential questions to Schnozzcast@gmail.com! Follow us on YouTube, Instagram, Threads, and Facebook @Schnozzcast! And don't forget to rate, review, and subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, PodBean, Audible, Amazon Music, or wherever you get your favorite podcasts!   Special thanks to Jack Moran for the intro and outro music. Follow him on Instagram @ thejackmoran.

Multiple May Day marches and rallies in Milwaukee, Madison, and around the state continue in Madison on May 2, the South Central Federation of Labor holds its annual Workers Memorial Day remembrance, Marquette University faculty and staff and staff are demanding recognition of their union, proposed changes to Wisconsin's unemployment insurance system pose serious risks to workers' rights, we play an excerpt from Walt Whitman's 'We Hear America Singing,' a community services position has opened in Dane County, postal workers prepare for their annual food drive, and Rick Smith speaks on the origins of May Day.

Tim Walz was and remains a complete weirdo and speculation about why the entire country of Portugal went dark.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

April 28, 2025 - We consider changes to the uncontested divorce process in New York with April Dalbec, co-chair of the matrimonial and family law practice group for Whiteman, Osterman & Hanna LLP. We also consider potential changes to the legal separation laws and access to pro bono divorce attorneys.

The Context of White Supremacy welcomes Calvin Schermerhorn. Classified as a White Man and a graduate of Harvard Divinity School and the University of Virginia, Schermerhorn is a historian of slavery, capitalism, and African American inequality. Weeks ago, he penned a piece deconstructing the local System of White Supremacy that's responsible for hundreds of black homeowners having their housing jeopardized or destroyed by the 2025 California Wildfires. One of the locations with a high population of non-white residents is the “unincorporated” region of Altadena, an area prone to fires yet reserved for non-white people. All of this fits neatly into the massive economic patterns Schermerhorn inspects in his 2025 publication: The Plunder of Black America How the Racial Wealth Gap Was Made. This text examines how generations of Whites have codified the looting of black people. A major component of this Racist codification is keeping black people ignorant and illiterate. Professor Schermerhorn documents how White people across the continent create laws, burn black school houses, and/or loot educational funds designated for black children all with the desired aim of maintaining a mindless, vulnerable population of black people who will be dominated in perpetuity. #MoneyDontMatterTonight #TheCOWS16Years CALL IN NUMBER: 605.313.5164 CODE: 564943#

Episode 526 - Brenda May Whiteman - UNMET NEEDS NEVER GO AWAY - A New Paradigm for Raising Our Children in the 21st CenturyWe are all individuals with personal life experiences that shape and mold us in both constructive and challenging ways. It is necessary to integrate and metabolize the emotional, psychological, spiritual and physical components of our total life experience in order to expand and deepen our consciousness.  In this way, we move  towards a mature, comprehensive and stable personality, capable of experiencing the full human emotional continuum of  joy, elation, love and relationship as well as the challenges of pain and sadness inherent in every person's life.As an experienced Psychotherapist, I approach all life issues from a perspective that seeks to illuminate these fundamental aspects of our human structure that comprise the spirit of every individual.Optimism, faith in oneself and universal creativity, positive psychology and transformative emotional experience are vital to a rewarding and uplifting life journey.   This is the one true path to healing.https://www.brendawhitemanpsychotherapy.ca/Support the show___https://livingthenextchapter.com/podcast produced by: https://truemediasolutions.ca/Coffee Refills are always appreciated, refill Dave's cup here, and thanks!https://buymeacoffee.com/truemediaca

HOW TO HAVE ETERNAL LIFE : https://youtu.be/t_6L7E_mfIw00:00 - Intro02:15 - Talking to Catholic Family13:07 - Is there a Formula to Prayer?17:28 - Do I pray to the Father or to Jesus?18:54 - Easter or Christianized Passover?22:45 - 1 Cor. 7:14 "sanctified?"25:49 - Near Death Experiences?35:50 - Philippians 1:15-18 "preaching Christ?"40:48 - Struggling with a lifestyle of sin.53:14 - I have a hard time focusing on prayer.57:12 - 2 Cor. 13:5 - "Examine Yourselves?"01:01:07 - Is compatibilism Biblical?01:05:14 - Should I have quit my job and sold everything?01:10:15 - Struggling witnessing to my Grandma with Dementia.01:14:07 - Jehovah, Yahweh, Yah, or Yeshua?01:16:45 - How to agree with/reach other beliefs?01:19:15 - White Man's Religion?01:26:19 - Thoughts on the Online Free Grace Community?01:31:43 - How to go to heaven?01:32:10 - OutroSUBSCRIBE https://www.youtube.com/c/biblelineLIKE https://www.facebook.com/biblelineminCOMMENT ask us a question!SHARE with all your friends and familyDo you have a Bible question? Send your question to questions@biblelineministries.org!Support Bibleline - https://www.calvaryoftampa.org/donate/Bibleline is a ministry of Calvary Community Church in Tampa, Florida and is hosted by Pastor Jesse Martinez.LIKE THIS? CHECK THESE GUYS OUT:https://www.youtube.com/c/Northlandchurchstc(Tom Cucuzza)https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCdddWVKMcM9c-SjUR1LZTBw(Jim Scudder)https://www.youtube.com/@focusevangelisticministriesinc(Josiah Coile)https://www.youtube.com/user/biblelinebroadcast(Yankee Arnold)https://www.youtube.com/c/TheKeesBoerMinistryChannel(Kees Boer)#bibleline #liveqna #salvation #truth #callinshow #live

My guest this week is the lead for MAN v FAT Rugby - Karl White. We talked about: .The history of MAN v FAT How MAN v FAT Rugby was born The specific benefits of group sport in the weight-loss journey Some incredible early success stories This is a fantastic episode - I hope you enjoy. LINKS MAN v FAT Rugby - https://manvfatrugby.com/ Just Ask A Question - https://jaaq.org/home Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/manvfatrugby Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/manvfatrugby/ TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@manvfat YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/@manvfat GET STASH England Rugby Store - https://ers.pxf.io/KjV30v British & Irish Lions Store - https://bil.sjv.io/9gNaL4 BUY ME A COFFEE Coffee helps me make more and better episodes. https://www.buymeacoffee.com/amateurrugbypodcast PATREON Join The Amateur Rugby Podcast Patreon community for some extra amateur rugby goodness! (https://patreon.com/amateurrugbypodcast) SUPPORT If you would like to support the podcast in some way there are plenty of options for you on my Support the Podcast (https://www.amateurrugbypodcast.com/support/) page.

Jameela Jamil is a fierce critic of power, tackling the erosion of women’s rights to the rise of far-right ideologies. The British actor, writer and activist, best known for her break out role in The Good Place, is unapologetically honest and uses her platform to publicly say what many won’t. In this chat with Antoinette Lattouf, Jameela explains why she approaches every opportunity with the confidence of a ‘white man’ and how wellness culture can lead us astray. Find tickets to Jameela's live tour here or at fane.com.au Weekend list with Helen Smith TO WATCH: Love on the Spectrum Season 3 on Netflix TO WATCH: Annie the Musical Australia touring nationally TO DO: Peaches Pilates online app or in person TO TRY: Ant’s food waste hack or try the Saveful app If you need help or support for an eating disorder or body image issue, please call the Butterfly National Helpline on 1800 ED HOPE (1800 334 673) or visit www.butterfly.org.au to chat online or email. Follow The Briefing: TikTok: @listnrnewsroom Instagram: @listnrnewsroom @thebriefingpodcast YouTube: @LiSTNRnewsroom Facebook: @LiSTNR NewsroomSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

A (reposted) blog by Jason Cherry. Jason Cherry is an elder at Trinity Reformed Church, as well as a teacher and lecturer of literature, American history, and economics at Providence Classical School in Huntsville, Alabama. He graduated from Reformed Theological Seminary with an MA in Religion and is the author of the book The Culture of Conversionism and the History of the Altar Call, now available on Amazon. He is husband to Traci, who is proficient at blessing others, and father to Anily and Gaby, who are gifted in the art of laughter. Trinity Reformed Church is a CREC church in Huntsville, AL. seeking to extend and unite the Kingdom in the Huntsville area. Check out our website, Facebook or YouTube!

Hosts Ramses Ja and Q Ward discuss the recent news story the use of racist language at a Florida Popeyes restaurant. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The Context of White Supremacy welcomes Racist Suspect Joel Whitney. Classified as a White Man, Whitney is a Brooklyn, NY writer whose work has been featured in The New York Times, The Daily Beast, The Baffler, The Wall Street Journal, Newsweek, and Boston Review to name a few. He's "a former features editor at Al Jazeera America and a founder and former editor-in-chief at Guernica." Gus originally hoped to speak with Whitney about his 2016 publication, Finks: How the CIA Tricked the World's Best Writers. I'm not quite sure what my original motivation was for exploring this text - could have been Rev. Jim Jones and the Peoples Temple or Soundtrack to a Coup d'État. Anyway, by the time we got our calendars synchronized, Mr. Whitney had written another book, Flights: Radicals on the Run. Most of the featured subjects who had to flee oppression are Victims of White Supremacy like: Minister Malcolm X, Paul Robeson, Dr. Angela Davis, and Leonard Peltier - who recently benefited from a commuted sentence from departing President Biden. During the broadcast, Mr. Whitney repeated the tacky refrain that White people are also "held back" by Racism. He could only list two trifling ways that the System of White Supremacy holds him down. Whitney also engaged in another suspicious and common practice amongst Racist Suspects: Citing the work of Ibram X. Kendi, a Victim of White Supremacy, to confuse non-white people about what it means to be classified as White. #LorraineHansberry #FarceOnWashington #TheCOWS16Years INVEST in The COWS – http://paypal.me/TheCOWS Cash App: https://cash.app/$TheCOWS CALL IN NUMBER: 605.313.5164 CODE: 564943#

We're watching Star Trek: Enterprise Season 2, Episode 1 “Shockwave Part II,” but only Jamie has actually watched the episode. The Suliban have taken over the Enterprise, Captain Archer is stuck in the future, and Star Fleet is considering canceling the entire deep space program. The only way to save it is for Archer to […] The post EnterpriseSplaining 29: Mediocre White Man Energy! appeared first on The ESO Network.

I'm looking for 3 therapists who are ready to break free from the low fee trap. Find me on Instagram @leaninmakebank and DM me the word “POWER."   When therapists talk to me about needing to give back and be accessible, I often think about my own experience as a sliding scale client. I know what it feels like to pay a sliding scale fee. I know what it means to need help and not be able to afford it. But being a sliding scale client has its dark sides.   Resources Mentioned:  Fun with Fees Calculator DM Tiffany on Instagram Send Tiffany an Email  

The Context of White Supremacy welcomes Aran Shetterly. Classified as a White Man, Mr. Shetterly studied at Harvard, is a “journalist and narrative historian,” and a non-fiction writer. He's lived in Costa Rica, Cuba and Mexico, and his black wife Margot Lee may own the title as best writer in the family. She authored the bestseller, Hidden Colors: The American Dream and the Untold Story of the Black Women Mathematicians Who Helped Win the Space Race. The local history of Alabama White Supremacy in book and film format. Mr. Shetterly does his best as the 2nd best writer in his house with his 2024 offering, Morningside: The 1979 Greensboro Massacre & The Struggle for an American City's Soul. Gus found this book in response to the passing of Rev. Nelson Johnson, who transitioned earlier this year. Mr. Johnson was nearly killed - and, ultimately, blamed, for the November 3rd, 1979 Greensboro massacre. White Terrorists coordinated with local police, the FBI, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, & Firearms, journalists, and probably other Whites to kill 5 people. No Whites were ever criminally charged for the slaughter. Johnson - who was severely injured during the melee, was blamed for the fracas for decades. #ReplaceWhiteSupremacyWithLove #GreensboroMassacre #TheCOWS16Years INVEST in The COWS – http://paypal.me/TheCOWS Cash App: https://cash.app/$TheCOWS CALL IN NUMBER: 605.313.5164 CODE: 564943#

On this episode of Submarine and A Roach, Nigeria's funniest podcast and Nigeria's #1 comedy podcast, hosts Tmt and Koj are joined by the multifaceted Oyinkan Dada for a lively conversation that traverses fitness, content creation, art, and cultural perceptions. The trio delves into the evolution of influencer culture on Instagram in 2025, highlighting the shift from consumerism to authentic storytelling. Oyinkan shares how her passion for art was ignited by her interest in African and Black history, leading to a discussion on the importance of genuine narratives in connecting with audiences.​Tmt poses a thought-provoking question about the imagery of God, sparking a conversation on cultural conditioning and personal beliefs. In celebration of Women's Month and International Women's Day, the hosts spotlight funny Nigerian women, acknowledging their contributions to the HaHa's on Obasanjo's internet. The episode concludes with an exploration of the enigmatic Ghanaian artist Okuntakinte, debating whether his controversial actions are a scam or a social experiment.​Tune in for an episode filled with insightful discussions, humor, and cultural reflections, available on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and other streaming platforms.

talking about sports, our ever dwindling lifespans......and fighting games :)

Chelsea is joined by Traci Thomas (The Stacks podcast) to break down one of the wildest letters to hit The New York Times Magazine: a white man wondering if prioritizing women of color in dating will advance his antiracism. They unpack the letter's cringiest moments, the ethicist's response (was it satire?), and why no woman wants to be compared to kale. Plus, Chelsea introduces her new viral article rating system—because some articles demand a group chat rant. Follow Chelsea: Instagram @chelseadevantez Where to order Chelsea's book: Bookshop.org  Find other places to order Show Notes: As a White Man, Can I Date Women of Color to Advance My Antiracism? (NY Times) Jada Pinkett Smith Ep (with Traci Thomas) Non-fiction recs from Chelsea and Traci Where to find our guest: Traci Thomas The Stacks podcast Substack Instagram *** Glamorous Trash is all about going high and low at the same time— Glam and Trash. We recap and book club celebrity memoirs, deconstruct pop culture, and sometimes, we cry! If you've ever referenced Mariah Carey in therapy... then this is the podcast for you. Thank you to our sponsors: Visit Brooklinen.com and use code TRASH to get $20 off your order of $100 or more. Libro.fm - Click here to get 2 audiobooks for the price of 1 with your first month of membership using code TRASH. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Flakko and his guests talk about faith and beliefs. ----- Promote Your Music with No Jumper - https://nojumper.com/pages/promo CHECK OUT OUR ONLINE STORE!!! https://nojumper.com NO JUMPER PATREON   / nojumper   CHECK OUT OUR NEW SPOTIFY PLAYLIST https://open.spotify.com/playlist/5te... Follow us on SNAPCHAT   / 4874336901   Follow us on SPOTIFY: https://open.spotify.com/show/4z4yCTj... iTunes: https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/n... Follow us on Social Media:   / 4874336901     / nojumper     / nojumper     / nojumper     / nojumper   JOIN THE DISCORD:   / discord   Follow Adam22:   / adam22     / adam22     / adam22   adam22bro on Snapchat Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We're kicking off with the biggest story in American news media: the Murdoch family. We're also discussing Hamas, Ukraine, and Mayor Karen Bass's masterclass in spin. Wretch on! Timestamps:  4:28 - Front Page 46:35 - Obsessions 55:55 - Reader Mail 57:21 - Favorite Items Show Notes:  The Atlantic: Growing Up Murdoch The New York Times: ‘You've Blown a Hole in the Family': Inside the Murdochs' Succession Drama  The New York Times: Hamas Releases What It Said Were the Bodies of 4 Israeli Hostages Free Beacon: WATCH: As Gazans Celebrate the Murder of Jewish Women and Children, NPR Calls the Scenes 'More Somber and Much Less Celebratory'  Commentary Magazine: What Did Trump Just Say About Ukraine? WHAT???  The Wall Street Journal: How the Trumps Turned an Election Victory Into a Cash Bonanza  The New York Times: How Trump's Directives Echo Project 2025 The Hill: Washington Post backs out of ‘Fire Elon Musk' ad order Jeremy Barr on X: NBCUniversal is settling a lawsuit filed by obstetrician gynecologist Mahendra Amin Collin Rug on X: NEW: LA Mayor Karen Bass says she's investigating why she was allowed to go on a trip to Ghana days before the LA fires. The New York Times: As a White Man, Can I Date Women of Color to Advance My Antiracism? NPR: Performers protest Trump leadership at Kennedy Center with dance  CBS News: Online searches for gambling addiction surge as sports betting expands, study finds The New York Times: What Should I Wear to Protest an Unspoken Dress Code?  The Telegraph: Margaret Brennan's CBS humiliation exposed everything that's wrong with the Left-wing media  The New York Post: CBS News exec Adrienne Roark, who reprimanded anchor over Israel interview, plans to exit network  The Wall Street Journal: Inside Amazon's Messy Push to Bring Everyone Back to the Office  I Might Be Wrong on Substack: I'm Such a Hopeless Libtard That It Bothers Me When We Side With the Authoritarian Predator State  The New York Times: Art Adviser. Friend. Thief.

On this episode of The Professional Homegirl Podcast, Eboné's guest opens up about her journey of self-discovery and the emotional challenges of growing up in a sundown town. Raised in an environment where her Blackness was erased and given away to her adopted father, she battled feelings of abandonment and a deep longing to connect with the mother she never knew. After years of searching, she finally reunited with her biological mother and uncovered the truth behind why she was given away. As they worked to rebuild their relationship, her mother was diagnosed with cancer, bringing them even closer and underscoring the power of healing generational wounds. Inspired by her own experiences, she founded a business dedicated to helping women navigate and heal complicated relationships with their mothers. This heartfelt conversation is a testament to the strength it takes to reclaim your story and rewrite your ending. Connect with Eboné: Buy Eboné A Gift: Shop Now Eboné PHG Storefront: Shop Now Read Eboné's Love Letters: www.theyalltheone.com Website: www.thephgpodcast.com Instagram: @theprofessionalhomegirl & @thephgpodcast TikTok & Twitter: @theprofessionalhomegirl Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@theprofessionalhomegirl Email: hello@thephgpodcast.com Shop PHG: https://www.thephgpodcast.com/shopSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Should the U.S. stop giving foreign aid? This is a question many have been asking long before Elon Musk and Donald Trump launched DOGE (Department of Government Efficiency) and began dismantling USAID and its work around the globe. Critics of foreign aid, like Bill Easterly, author of The White Man's Burden, and Dambisa Moyo, author of Dead Aid, argue that foreign aid often does more harm than good. They contend that the U.S. and other nations should radically rethink their approach. But this winter, Donald Trump did something no one expected: he halted nearly all foreign aid and operations worldwide.  Today, we're joined by long-time international correspondent and host of NPR's Rough Translation, Gregory Warner, for a deep dive into why USAID was founded in the first place, how it expanded into the massive program it is today, the consequences of freezing its operations, and an examination of the claims that USAID is part of a U.S. deep-state operation. For the listener who'd like to hear more from Warner, he publishes a Substack newsletter called Rough Transition. And if you reach out to him mentioning you're coming from Reflector, he's happy to offer a complimentary six-month subscription. Thank you to our sponsor Ground News. You can visit them here to learn more: GROUND.NEWS

For two thousand years, the Virgin Mary has been depicted throughout art, literature and culture as symbolising the perfect mother: chaste, beautiful, meek, mild and white. These supposed virtues and symbols have penetrated not just Christianity but wider popular culture, and contributed to harmful views about motherhood and what it is to be a woman. Chine McDonald deconstructs the myth of perfect motherhood and reflect on its theological, social and personal impact, proposing a more authentic, grace-filled way forward. Chine McDonald is the Director of Theos, the religion and society think tank. Previously she headed community fundraising and public engagement at Christian Aid. The author of the best-selling 'God is Not a White Man (and other revelations)', her latest book is 'Unmaking Mary: Shattering the Myth of Perfect Motherhood'.

Will Falk is a biophilic author, attorney, and activist. He works with the Community Environmental Legal Defense Fund and his law practice is focused on helping Native American communities protect their sacred sites. He is the author of two books. "How Dams Fall" describes his relationship with the Colorado River within the context of the first-ever American federal lawsuit seeking rights for a major ecosystem that he helped to file against the Colorado Attorney General. "When I Set the Sweetgrass Down" is a full-length collection of poetry. You can follow Will's work at willfalk.org. Tiokasin and Will dissect a recent essay by Will, titled, "Tribal Sovereignty, White Man's Reservations, and the Need for Tribal-Municipal Solidarity to Protect Our Collective Future." Find it here: https://bit.ly/40O2XJEProduction Credits:Tiokasin Ghosthorse (Lakota), Host and Executive ProducerLiz Hill (Red Lake Ojibwe), ProducerOrlando Bishop, Studio Engineer, Radio Kingston, WKNY 1490 AM and 107.9 FM, Kingston, NYTiokasin Ghosthorse, Audio EditorMusic Selections:1. Song Title: Tahi Roots Mix (First Voices Radio Theme Song)Artist: Moana and the Moa HuntersAlbum: Tahi (1993)Label: Southside Records (Australia and New Zealand)2. Song Title: Break the GlassArtist: Don AmeroSingle: Break the Glass (January 2025)Label: Don AmeroAbout First Voices Radio:"First Voices Radio," now in its 32nd year on the air, is an internationally syndicated one-hour radio program originating from and heard weekly on Radio Kingston WKNY 1490 AM and 107.9 FM in Kingston, New York. Hosted by Tiokasin Ghosthorse (Lakota), who is the show's Founder and Executive Producer, "First Voices Radio" explores global topics and issues of critical importance to the preservation and protection of Mother Earth presented in the voices and from the perspective of the original peoples of the world.Akantu Intelligence:Visit Akantu Intelligence, an institute that Tiokasin founded with a mission of contextualizing original wisdom for troubled times. Go to https://akantuintelligence.org to find out more and consider joining his Patreon page at https://www.patreon.com/Ghosthorse

Far too ignorant of the histories of the rest of the world, being aware of only the accomplishments of Greece, Rome and Europe, Westerners have been made to believe that their societies represent the most superior examples of civilization. However, the Western value system stems from a misconception that, as in nature, human society too is evolving. The idea derives from the hidden influence of secret societies, who followed the belief in spiritual evolution of the Kabbalah, which taught that history would attain its fulfillment when man would become God, and make his own laws.Therefore, the infamous Illuminati gave its name to the Enlightenment of the eighteenth century,which claimed that human progress must abandon "superstition," meaning Christianity, in favor of "reason." Thus the Illuminati succeeded in bringing about the French and American revolutions, which instituted the separation of Church and State, and from that point forward, the Western values of Humanism, seen to include secularism, human rights, democracy and capitalism, have been celebrated as the culmination of centuries of human intellectual evolution.This is the basis of the propaganda which has been used to foster a Clash of Civilizations, where the Islamic world is presented as stubbornly adhering to the anachronistic idea of "theocracy." Where once the spread of Christianity and civilizing the world were used as pretexts for colonization, today a new White Man's Burden makes use of human rights and democracy to justify imperial aggression.However, because, after centuries of decline, the Islamic world is incapable of mobilizing a defense, the Western powers, as part of their age-old strategy of Divide and Conquer, have fostered the rise of Islamic fundamentalism, to both serve as agent-provocateurs and to malign the image of Islam. These sects, known to scholars as Revivalists, opposed the traditions of classical Islamic scholarship in order to create the opportunity to rewrite the laws of the religion to better serve their sponsors. Thus were created the Wahhabi and Salafi sects of Islam, from which were derived the Muslim Brotherhood, which has been in the service of the West ever since.But, the story of the development of these Islamic sects involves the bizarre doctrines and hidden networks of occult secret societies, being based on a Rosicrucian myth of Egyptian Freemasonry, which see the Muslim radicals as inheritors of an ancient mystery tradition of the Middle East which was passed on to the Knights Templar during the Crusades, thus forming the foundation of the legends of the Holy Grail. These beliefs would not only form the cause for the association of Western intelligence agencies with Islamic fundamentalists, but would fundamentally shape much of twentieth century history.Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-opperman-report--1198501/support.

Dan and Tom bring back Tom Whiteman from Legacy-Collectibles.com to talk about some of the OSS weapons that were created to help the first U.S. spy agency in WW II. We talked with Mr. Whiteman in an earlier episode where we discussed James Bond's assigned pistol, the Walther PPK. OSS morphed into the CIA!   Tom gives us the background of these weapons, if the weapon was ever used, the pros and cons of the weapon, and a very interesting background on a knife in an OSS Agent's possession.  What spy movies and TV shows can you watch to see some of these weapons?  Take a listen!  Some of the weapons we discuss include:  The Beano grenade  The Liberator pistol  The Colt model 1903 snub nose revolver  A spring-loaded baton  The FitzGerald revolver  The OSS Stiletto (Pancake Flipper)  And more ….   Covert operations weapons offer a lot to decode, so take a listen!   Tell us what you think about our discussion with Tom Whiteman of these OSS weapons  So, take a listen and let us know what you think. Have you heard of any of these?  If so, have you used one? Which one of these weapons do you think would have been the most effective.   Have you seen any of these weapons in a spy movie, TV show, or streaming series?  Let us know your thoughts, ideas for future episodes, and what you thought of this episode. Just drop us a note at info@spymovienavigator.com.  The more we hear from you, the better the show will surely be!  We'll give you a shout-out in a future episode!    You can check out all of our CRACKING THE CODE OF SPY MOVIES podcast episodes on your favorite podcast app or our website. In addition, you can check out our YouTube channel as well.    Episode Webpage: https://bit.ly/3CjZvgE   

This week, I am joined by Kendrick from the I Ken Not Podcast! He joins me to discuss RHOBH, RHOSLC and a little Wags to Riches. We had a time!! Follow Kendrick: IG: @withkendricktucker Buy A Beer: @realitycomics2 Threads: @withkendricktucker Follow Mocha: IG: @mochaminutes Buy A Coffee: @mochaminutes Blue Sky: @mochaminutes.bsky.social X: @mochaminutes  

The Context of White Supremacy welcomes Matthew D. Taylor. A White Man and California native, Taylor “is a religious studies scholar and expert in independent charismatic Christianity and Christian nationalism. He is the creator, writer, and narrator of the Charismatic Revival Fury audio-documentary series on the Straight White American Jesus.” Gus T. heard about Taylor's 2024 publication, The Violent Take It By Force: The Christian Movement That Is Threatening Our Democracy,” during the 2024 US presidential election campaign. Reports once again predicted that White evangelicals would be a solid, White rock of support for Trump's third try at the White House. Taylor's work explores how the White evangelical bloc became such staunch, violent allies for our current, less than pious president. He highlights how many of the now-pardoned White Terrorists who stormed the Capitol on January 6, 2021 believed they were soldiers in the army of White God who were battling against “dark,” satanic forces opposed to Trump's second term. Gus is amazed The Peoples Temple's Jim Jones was not mentioned in this book, as he's is sterling illustration of the dangers of White evangelicals who deceptively use religious rituals to support the violence of the System of White Supremacy. The details about White female evangelical powerhouse and Suspected Racist Paula White again illustrate that most people classified as black do not understand what it means to be classified as White nor do we suspect White people of being Racist. #WhiteGeneticAnnihilation #ManifestDestiny #TheCOWS16Years INVEST in The COWS – http://paypal.me/TheCOWS Cash App: https://cash.app/$TheCOWS CALL IN NUMBER: 605.313.5164 CODE: 564943#

The Katherine Massey Book Club @ The C.O.W.S. hosts the 4th study session on the late Dr. Maya Angelou's The Heart of A Woman. This is a rare "double dip" for the book club, as we read I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings in the summer of 2014 just after the transition of the famed author and Wake Forest scholar. Ironically, when The C.O.W.S. last read Dr. Angelou, she was frolicking as a young lady in San Francisco. Gus T. was inundated with the life and literary work of Dr. Angelou during his recent Golden State sojourn. And it took Gus seeing the documentary film Soundtrack to a Coup d'État three times to accurately write down the title Heart of a Woman. The extraordinary film on the assassination of Patrice Lumumba is "receipt-heavy," and Andrée Blouin and Dr. Angelou's respective memoirs are just two of the many books in the project. Last week, Dr. Angelou described meeting Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in New York. Before departing Dr. King told Dr. Angelou that there are some "good White people." Dr. Angelou wondered if he said this because a White Man was listening. She later echoes Dr. King's conclusion, citing the Russians and Fidel Castro, who allegedly never self-identified as a White Man. While Dr. Angelou is globetrotting and drinking with White Men, her son is threatened by a gang of "worthless" black males. Her son Guy seems to insist with every other sentence that he: "Is a man." Dr. Angelou writes over and over about the impotence, unnecessariness, and failure of black manhood. Like her brother, who was in greater confinement during the early 1960s. #AppleEvent #SoundtrackToACoupdÉtat #TheCOWS16Years INVEST in The COWS – http://paypal.me/TheCOWS Cash App: https://cash.app/$TheCOWS CALL IN NUMBER: 605.313.5164 CODE: 564943#

A White Man allegedly dumps raw cotton on Georgia church steps. Lawsuit alleges Ex-ESPN Host, Skip Bayless harassed a hairstylist and offered her $1.5m for sex. A tourist woman allegedly sets fire to businesses in Puerto Rico. Host: Sharon Reed (@SharonReedLive) Co-Host: Jackson White *** SUBSCRIBE on YOUTUBE  ☞  https://www.youtube.com/IndisputableTYT FOLLOW US ON: FACEBOOK  ☞   https://www.facebook.com/IndisputableTYT TWITTER  ☞       https://www.twitter.com/IndisputableTYT INSTAGRAM ☞  https://www.instagram.com/IndisputableTYT Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The fallout from and reaction to Donald Trump's resounding re-election continues to follow the liberal playbook: blame race, blame sex. How did we get here? Jason, Steve Kim, Butter, and Shemeka Michelle work to answer that question and how Disney's impact may have played a big role in how generations look at gender roles in America.  We want to hear from the Fearless Army!! Join the conversation in the show chat, leave a comment or email Jason at FearlessBlazeShow@gmail.com Visit https://TheBlaze.com. Explore the all-new ad-free experience and see for yourself how we're standing up against suppression and prioritizing independent journalism. Show Outline: 06:56 He's back!!! pt.2 13:36 Donald Trump's victory sparks gender debate 30:26 America suffers from Disney Princess Syndrome 37:01 Lebron James vows to protect his daughter from Donald Trump 48:52 Steve Kim: Donald Trump's victory sparks gender debate 58:50 Steve Kim: Lebron James vows to protect his daughter from Donald Trump 1:04:24 Dan Le Batard declares U.S. presidency as the "White Man's Dynasty." 1:39:52 Shemeka Michelle: Donald Trump's victory sparks gender debate 1:49:50 Comments of the Day ​​Today's Sponsors: FIRST CUP COFFEE Today's episode is brought to you by First Cup Coffee. A Christian-owned patriot coffee company that stands for Core Values, Family, and Building Community across the Nation. First Cup's freshly Roasted Beans delivered in Ground or Whole Bean Texture, Pods, and Bulk. Go to https://FirstCup.com and use code FEARLESS and save an additional 10% on your order and if you subscribe save an additional 10% for the life of your subscription. PATRIOT MOBILE Join me, switch to America's only Christian Conservative mobile provider, Patriot Mobile Go to https://PATRIOTMOBILE.COM/JASON or call 972-PATRIOT for your FREE MONTH of service today. Get 10% off Blaze swag by using code Fearless10 at https://shop.blazemedia.com/fearless Make yourself an official member of the “Fearless Army!” Support Conservative Voices! Subscribe to BlazeTV at https://get.blazetv.com/FEARLESS and get $20 off your yearly subscription. CLICK HERE to Subscribe to Jason Whitlock's YouTube: https://bit.ly/3jFL36G CLICK HERE to Listen to Jason Whitlock's podcast: https://apple.co/3zHaeLT CLICK HERE to Follow Jason Whitlock on Twitter: https://bit.ly/3hvSjiJ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices