Cheerio 2024!
My year in review featuring radio shows, music gigs and more!
Yes, Yes I know. A flurry of posts and then zilch for almost two months. I’m sure I wasn’t missed… and if I was, what’s wrong with you?! I jest. I took some time out to get on with writing my manuscript. I’d hoped to get it finished and I almost have. Thankfully, I’ve got a couple of weeks off the day job to do so, and I thought this would be a great time to post my year in review to my lovely subscribers.
February
In December 2023, I was very lucky to have a post featured on the Toppermost website, which is a site where people can recommend ten of the best tracks of a music artist or act. The post I contributed back in December recommended ten tracks from the solo career of Glenn Tilbrook. February saw my second contribution, ten recommendations from Chris Difford’s solo career. Meric, who runs Toppermost, is always looking for new contributors so why not click this link and find out more.
March
I’ve enjoyed the works of comic Steve Delaney aka Count Arthur Strong for a while and saw him in Newcastle a few years back. So when he announced his farewell tour, And It’s Goodbye From Him, I decided to get some tickets. As much as I enjoyed the Newcastle gig, I think this one, in Edinburgh, was even better!
When I was younger I used to record on cassette myself pretending to be a radio DJ and blether away between songs. I didn’t expect years later to be hosting an actual radio show. But thanks to Ben Baker and the good folk at Noisebox Radio, that’s exactly what I did for ten weeks. The Rufty Club was a weekly, pre-recorded, hour-long mix of my favourite songs (not necessarily well-known ones), comedy snippets, and games. It was a fun experience and something I’d be interested to continue at some point, but perhaps plan ahead better! All ten episodes are still available on MixCloud.
June
In June, my kids and I went across to Belfast for a few days. This was in part because they’d never experienced airplanes or airports before. Belfast was lovely and the people were so nice and friendly, and thankfully the weather was generally glorious during our stay. Might pop back sometime in 2025 for a long weekend and take in more of the sights (including the Game of Thrones exhibition!).
August
I like the comedian Dara O’Briain. I saw him live in 2023 when he was finishing off his So Where Were We tour which had been interrupted by the pandemic. When I saw that he was doing a work-in-progress gig at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival very close to my birthday, I thought I’d go. I’d never been to a WIP gig before so wasn’t sure what to expect. Turns out a regular gig except he had notes on a table that he would refer back to occasionally, sometimes mentioning that he would “keep that bit” or that a particular bit didn’t quite work. It was slightly shorter than a normal gig - I think we were there just under an hour. But it was an entertaining evening… and we’ve got tickets to see him again in Edinburgh when his upcoming tour comes to Scotland in 2026!
September
Autumn saw two things what I did. First up, for my mum’s birthday I took her to the Rebus stage-play - “A Game of Malice”, written by Ian Rankin. It was enjoyable play though struggled to hear some of the dialogue, but there’s scope to write more of these if Rankin gives up the novels. Secondly, that month I went to see the Paul McCartney and Wings feature, One-Hand Clapping, - I wrote about it here on Substack…
October
I’ve been having guitar lessons for over a year to improve my basic skills (the lessons are sporadic, not regular), but I’ve been trying to get singing lessons for quite a while. The singing tutors at the music school I have my guitar lessons were always fully booked. However, October saw me have my first ever singing lesson. I was nervous but hugely excited. That first half hour lesson was spent talking about what I wanted from these lessons, what music I was into, and what exercises the tutor, Tyla, was planning. At the time of writing, I’ve only had a handful of singing lessons but already I can see (or hear) a bit of an improvement. These lessons are not only to improve my singing but also to help gain confidence to… gulp… perform live in front of people some day!
October was also the month I’d been looking forward to for over a year since I got tickets to see this band. Yes, I saw Squeeze live in Edinburgh on their 50th anniversary tour, and got a very good view! Yeah, you betcha I wrote about it!
And… that’s about it for this year’s interesting things. Finances permitting, I’m actively attending more things in 2025 because I realised I really, really like live music, comedy and theatre and I should be immersing myself in them a lot more. Already, I’ve got a few things lined up to go and see, so my 2025 review post should be quite a healthy size!