Roxanne Tellier – Mother’s Day, CMW and This is America

My mother has been gone since April of 1992 … 26 years ago. There are days when it feels like we were playing a spirited game of Rummoli only yesterday, and other days when I can’t remember what it was like to have my own little family.  After my mum and grandmother died just days apart in that horrible year, the tenuous link we had with Montreal was broken. While I’ve been ‘home’ a few times since then, Quebec hasn’t really drawn me back for decades.

Cameron Carpenter – 10 CC – Vinyl Season One

Well I had to wait for the DVD to be released but I have finally seen Season One of Vinyl. I first heard about the HBO series a couple of years ago as Nigel Grainge and I grabbed lunch at the Imperial Pub after his keynote address at Indie Week. We were catching up on each other’s careers as we had not seen each other or worked together for years. At MCA I was the Marketing Manager for Nigel’s label Ensign and looked after everyone from The Waterboys and World Party to Sinead O’Connor, The Blue Aeroplanes and Stump. I immediately liked Nigel on first meeting and he taught me a lot about marketing and the music industry (as well as Arsenal). Before he started Ensign Records he worked at Phonogram in London and signed Thin Lizzy, 10 CC and The Boomtown Rats. He is a true music man.

Segarini – I Want….

 

One thing I have learned from the Internet (aside from realizing that we have access to every bit of information, both true and false, that exists in the known universe) is that not many of us seem to be very happy. We don’t like the way our lives are going, the way things are run, or the seemingly endless parade of ridiculous events and idiotic statements attributed to people, that may or may not be true. Common sense is dead or dying, and the voice of reason is tiny and can barely be heard through the cacophony of those who shout it down

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Cameron Carpenter: The ABC’s Of Rock ’n’ Roll – H2

Hip-Hop

Most people would make the very safe assumption that I am not a fan of hip-hop but there was a time in my career that it played a very big part in my life. When I worked at Quality Records back in the late seventies we were the distributors for Joe and Sylvia Robinson’s rap label Sugar Hill Records. Their first release in 1979 was the ground breaking “Rapper’s Delight” from The Sugarhill Gang. It was revolutionary.  Master Gee, Big Bank Hank and Wonder Mike took the bed track from Chic’s “Good Times” and in one take rapped back and forth for close to 15 minutes.