John Martyn

I was shocked and saddened to hear of the loss of John Martyn yesterday. His style of playing and songwriting has had a great influence on my own style and I have included a number of versions of his songs in my own set. I admired his ability to transmit raw emotion in song and I feel there is a definite Glaswegian soul to be felt in his songs. His affinity with Glasgow was clear and he continued to perform regularly here and I am gutted that I missed his November show.

His talent will be sorely missed.

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=TkcmB8a1cn8

The Long Blacks

Well that's me back from the land of the long white cloud to the land of the permanent low cloud. It is a bit of a shock to the system, stepping back into winter, although I have noticed its not quite as dark now and there is also the benefit of no more hayfever.Im almost over the jet lag which has been aided by strong coffees and generally staying up as late as possible. I am still sifting through the photos and will put some up in the next day or to for the daily pictures.

I hadn't forgotten how beautiful a country New Zealand is, but it did me no harm reminding myself just how good it really is. I had a very relaxing New Year and enjoyed several late night jam sessions with friends. I'll blog more about what ive been up to soon. In the meantime its good to get a decent sized coffee now that I am back.

The importance of a good coffee cannot be underestimated. Whilst sipping on a brew, I enjoy people watching, reading, collecting ideas for songs, and general thinking time. Coffee has the same textures for me as found in quality chocolate, whisky, and cigars, so its important to get it right.

The perfect coffee for me has to last the right amount of time. In order to achieve this it has to be

a)hot enough so that it doesn't go cold within say 15mins

b)It should also be long enough i.e. of a decent size. - An espresso is of no use to me, that would be gone in under a minute

c)it should also be strong enough so that the size of it does not weaken the flavour too much.

Here in lies my NZ gripe. In order to get a black coffee (Americano being my favourite request) that is not an esspresso the sytle to ask for is a Long Black- a Short Black being an esspresso. The Long Black has hot water added to it. However it never ends up very.. long. It always just fills a small tea cup , see above. Coffee belongs in mugs. This then spoils my whole coffee experience. I end up drinking it too fast, ordering another, then another becoming so wired that i then have to zoom of and find something active to do to ease the buzz.

I will say that the quality of coffee is always first class, just more of it please. I've also been thinking that it may be called a Tall Black due to the kiwi fixation of naming things by their colour, e.g. The All Blacks (Rugby Team), The Tall Blacks (basketball team) -  maybe they are not quite so tall?, The Black Caps (Cricket), The All Whites ( Football Team) etc...

Happy New Year

Happy New Year, hope everyone is having as good a time as I am. Ive uploaded a few pics to kick start the photo a day for 2009 - the image above was taken at Corsairs Bay near Christchurch NZ, on new years day. Its great to experience a summer at this time of year again although not so good for the hayfever.

J