Category Archives: Music to pot plants to

A camberwell beauty

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Prince Buster  – Taxation – Fab records white label
Here’s another second-hand classic (with very apt lyrics!) which was found in the Scope shop in Camberwell (42 Denmark Hill, London SE5 1JL) in the late 1990’s. This charity shop still delivers today as the other week I got a Mongo Santamaria greatest hits LP (cuban latin jazz) and Johnny Clarke’s version of  “no woman no cry” on 7″ for £2. How good is that?

Anyway the buster tune was found when I was off-loading some unwanted Christmas presents from the relatives in the midlands (white socks, denim after-shave and a big tin of tea-time assorted biscuits etc). I walked into the shop just as the guy behind the counter was flicking through a bunch of singles which I noticed contained a couple of reggae sevens. He was chuffed I had recognised one of the tunes and also that I had donated some stuff so he let me have the pile of about fifteen singles for a fiver. This was probably one of my best finds of all-time as it included a Wailers 7″ from the late 60’s and some punk singles including Subway Sect’s “Ambition”. Super! The moral of this tale is don’t bin those white socks and that woolly cardigan from your nan, stick them in your local charity shop!

http://soundcloud.com/weedsuptomeknees/prince-buster-and-the-all

Friday night chilling

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Matthias Reiling – Apology Girl (Tornado Wallace Remix)
I heard this the other day on phonica record’s podcast from a couple of months back (listening to records I’d love to buy but can’t afford. Arghhh!) and it’s been running through my brain since. A lovely tune, a bit moody at the start then building into a jazzanova/love dancing vibe. Lovely stuff!

A scratched sunday night reggae classic

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Last night fueled by supermarket bottled lager, I decided to go through a few forgotten about second-hand singles found searching through boot sales and charity shops over the years. In amongst the pile I found some singles that would be worth a mint if they were in a half decent condition (which they ain’t!) but discovered this classic rock-steady guitar instrumental from 1969. Not exactly hi-fidelity but a tune all the same!


Well cork it Kojak cork it

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Here’s how the wormery is doing that was started back in March. I check up on it a couple of times a week and pop in some chopped kitchen waste. When I lift the top off there’s usually flies a go-go and the stuff inside is not looking too healthy with mouldy old bread and the odd yellow potato shoot but when I stuck my hand in today (urgh!) I noticed there were a good few worms wriggling about. Don’t have nightmares, and do sleep well (and don’t look too closely into the bucket)!

Music to watch the garden grow by…

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Yesterday I spent most of day sitting in a dentist’s chair having work done on me teeth as I’m a case presentation (aka “case prez”) for a dental student, so still feeling a bit shell-shocked from that combined with the heatwave we’re having here at the present so feeling a bit odd to say the least. I’m not really up for doing much in the garden tonight apart from watering the plants and having a butchers at what nature does best while sipping a cold bevvy from the comfort of a chair!

Anyway, here’s a couple of tunes to blast out in the garden this weekend while ‘tipping about’ with a hoe. Enjoy the old heatwave!

One for Ron!

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Yesterday I visited the friends of Horniman’s plant sale in Forest Hill. I got down there a quarter of an hour after it opened and I reckon I might have missed a few bargains as people were walking out with bagfuls of plants and there were a few bags stuck behind some stalls to pick up for “Ron” (later on).

Saying that, it wasn’t a bad sale, I got 4 Tomato plants (Gardener’s Delight) for £2 and 10 assorted Dahlias for £3, all very healthy looking with a little bit of root growth peeping out of the bottom of the pots. Good value or what? I also got a couple of houseplants, an Aloe vera for a pound and a medium sized Chinese Money plant (Pilea peperomioides) for a fiver.

The only down side was part of the sale was in their big glass conservatory. Not good considering the sun was beating down yesterday. I left after five minutes in there before the tempers got frayed, “What, you want three pounds for THAT?” “Plant sale rage” I can do without!

Also while buying the Tomato plants, someone told us a bonkers tip for deterring slugs. Put coffee grounds and crushed egg shells around your plants but also mix in some oat bran. The slugs go for it with gusto, go back to their lair to expand and explode. Not a very nice ending!

Oi! Get orfa me barra!

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Old Bob Flowerdew was right, as soon as you produce some decent compost you can’t get enough of the blooming stuff! I’ve been helping myself to my second attempt of a compost heap for a good while now but today I filled up two barrow’s worth to mix in with some soil which I put in the second raised bed made with the scaffolding boards obtained free from our “Portuguese man with a van”. Owt for nowt for definite! If you can be bothered to collect up all your kitchen waste, turn it every now and again and wait a few months, it’s well worth doing for some top quality compost!

Great weather today so did a couple of hours, weeded around the salad bed and as it was root day, sowed some Carrots, Beetroot and Parsnip. If the weather keeps up I’ll do more tidying up and “tipping around with a hoe” tomorrow.

I’ve moved the portable cold frame (aka the old window frame I found in the street which stands on some old bricks from a skip) over a couple of Courgette and Squash seedlings to give them some protection and a bit of a head start.

I’m taking a risk with the Potatoes I moved the cold frame from as there’s still a good risk of frost, but I’ve covered them tonight with some horticultural fleece I’ve had kicking around since last year. Fingers crossed it won’t get too cold.

And I tell you what, I’m missing that “gloves in a bottle” stuff too!

This week’s post was written while listening to Friday’s Echo Beach on WLUW-FM Chicago with a great Pressure Sounds mix. http://archive.org/details/EchoBeachBroadcast05-11-12

Thursday on my mind…

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A couple of things to pass on tonight, one is Scarlett’s “i-Grow” piece this month, about annuals and perennials. http://i-donline.com/2012/04/i-grow-annuals-and-perennials/

And the other is this week’s Ross Allen’s show on Strongroom Alive in interview with the great Tom Moulton. There’s some great tunes played on the show including Harold Melvin & The Bluenotes “The love I lost”, M.F.S.B’s “T.S.O.P” and Lou Rawls “You’ll never find another love like mine” amongst many others.
http://www.strongroomalive.com/2012/04/ross-allen-chats-to-tom-moulton/

Two good things for a Thursday night!

Radio Dada and it goes something like this…

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A big cheers to Will for telling us about the programme last night on BBC 6 Music with Terry Farley talking and selecting records with Andrew Weatherall as well as giving a potted history of London’s clubland. Some great tunes and some great stories and it’s up on the web for six more days if you fancy it.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b01g9cdg

All the talk about youth cults and fanzines on the show brought me back to the time I produced my first fanzine many many moons ago. Here’s an excerpt from it; a letter I wrote to the local paper complaining about the latest youth cult at that time. I was appalled!