Dusty Springfield began her career in a folk-pop trio The Springfields with her brother Tom. When The Springfields broke up, she went on to solo success in the early 1960s with ‘I Only Wanna Be With You’ and ‘I Don’t…
Congratulations to Rich, Geoff, and Tony for scoring perfect marks in last week’s quiz on Russian Dolls. I found this week’s quiz very educational. It’s about the use of unusual instruments in pop songs, and I’ve never thought about what…
English folk-rock duo Richard and Linda Thompson’s career resembled a soap opera. Active as recording artists between 1974 and 1982, they married, released three albums in quick succession, then spent three years in a Sufi Muslim commune where Richard’s religious…
The small city of Dunedin, in the south of New Zealand, produced a lot of great music in the 1980s – The Flying Nun record label distributed acclaimed albums by acts like The Chills, The Clean, The Bats, and Chris…
Congratulations to Tony () and Geoff () who both scored 20/20 in last week’s food and drink quiz. This week’s challenge is to name the musical acts represented by Russian Dolls: I scored 22/22, but my score might not…
I’ve been very impressed by Jason Isbell’s last two albums; 2013’s Southeastern and 2015’s Something More Than Free. After sobering up, he’s fulfilling his potential as a great songwriter. After two albums of heartfelt, acoustic country, Isbell plugged his electric…
Congratulations to Geoff () and Jim () who both scored 18/20 last week. This week’s challenge is to insert the missing food or drink: I don’t think it’s super tricky, but it’s pretty and covers lots of musical ground.
Germany’s Can were too ahead of their time, and too weird, to enjoy a hit record, but they were hugely influential; for instance, when Radiohead ditched guitar rock in favour of more experimental work, Can were one of the bands…
Congratulations to J () who scored 20/20 in 1:42 on naming rock albums from the 1990s. Rich and Geoff also scored perfect marks, but not quite so quickly. This week’s challenge is to name the classic rock song in other…
For some reason I never found Aretha Franklin’s original studio albums in second-hand bins, and for years the only album I owned from her was a double disc retrospective. The second disc dabbles in her 1980s work, with star power…
Congratulations to Stephen1001 () for scoring 19/20 in last week’s music quiz, and nailing the very cryptic clue for ‘Dear Prudence’. This week’s game is simple – name the album from the back cover. The artist name is also acceptable.…
Vigilantes of Love took their name from the New Order song ‘Love Vigilantes’. The band hailed from Athens, Georgia, a city with rich pop music heritage; in all honesty they’d probably struggle to break onto a list of greatest musical…
