She Had a Dark and a Roving Eye

Mrs S & I are out of town for the next few days, so the halls and corridors of Swede Towers have fallen silent. In fact, all being well, as you read these words we'll be in Oxford checking out the dreaming spires, plus the odd pub, gallery and coffee shop, before heading down into London's East End later in the week to visit my elderly Aunts. I'm a fairly regular visitor to Cambridge, that other great seat of learning, but have only ever been to Oxford once before and that was 45 years ago, so I don't recall an awful lot about the place. I'll report back with our impressions next week.

Here's the great Shirley Collins with 'The Oxford Girl', an ancient murder ballad that has appeared in many guises over the centuries. Shirley apparently heard this particular arrangement as 'The Wexport Girl', performed by Suffolk singer Phoebe Smith on a Topic Records LP. Shirley's reading of the song is taken from the 1970 record 'Love, Death and the Lady', made with her sister Dolly, a phenomenal album that remained on constant rotation in my car for well over a month late last year.

Shirley Collins - The Oxford Girl

Out Of Town

By the time you read this, Mrs S and I should, all being well, be in the middle of a short stay on the North Norfolk coast. Our destination is only an hour and a bit away from Swede Towers, but rather than coming and going, we thought we'd snag a B&B for a couple of nights and make a break of it. The plan, as always, is for a bit of walking, a bit of eating and, who knows, maybe even a bit of drinking, though these days anything more than a couple of glasses of wine at one sitting sends us quickly on our way to snoozeville - lightweights!

My CD collection is still (still!) stored away in the spare room following our move in 2011, but whenever we travel I always have a fish about in the boxes and grab a few albums for the road. For this trip I've also lovingly hand-crafted a couple of brand new CDr compilations, the first in absolutely years. Here's a great live version of a tune that made the tracklist of one of those compilations, 'Hinterland' by Lonelady, a firm favourite round these parts since its release in March.