Music
Posts about the Live music we have been to as part of the A-Z Music Tour
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Mackenzies with Land Surveyor
28 February 2026, The Glad Cafe Walking into the Glad Café on Saturday night to see the Mackenzies and Land Surveyor play felt a bit like going back in time to the 1980s. Four decades or so later, the anticipation was the same. The chatter about the bands and musicians who played around that earlier…
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Psychedelic Porn Crumpets with Waldo’s Gift
25 February 2026, SWG3 In truth, I had to re-familiarise myself with the music of the Psychedelic Porn Crumpets ahead of the gig at SWG3. What was evident from doors opening though, was that the band didn’t have such worries with the rest of the audience as they drifted in. Young (compared to us!), excited,…
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Jonny with BMX Bandits
20 February 2026, Strathaven Hotel FRETS concerts describe themselves quite succinctly as follows – ‘FRETS concerts are intimate acoustic affairs, we’re all about songs and live performances’. The Strathaven Hotel has been the venue of choice since their inaugural event back in 2019. while the Glad Café has also played host in recent times too. What…
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Big Special with Gans
19 February 2026, SWG3 Big Special I’ve been lucky to see Big Special three times now. As a support act, higher up the musical food chain as part of a one-day Glasgow festival and at SWG3 as the headliners. I’ve yet to be let down by their performances. The intensity, the humour, the political messaging,…
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Besnard Lakes with The Thorn
17 February 2026, The Rumshack Arriving early at The Rumshack in Glasgow’s Southside, we were able to pick a suitable vantage point to see both bands play to an enthusiastic crowd who packed out the venue. A good vantage point is recommended as the stage sits only a few inches above floor level and when…
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Mogwai with Forest Swords
12 February 2026, Paisley Town Hall Walking into Paisley Town Hall is like taking a walk back in time when grand buildings like it littered towns and cities across the country. Unlike many though, a considerable refurbishment has given it a modern contemporary feel within a stately framework. It’s an impressive sight. An impressive setting…
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Echoes of Scotland – Show No.4
I’ll be playing some contemporary music each Sunday between 7pm and 8pm GMT. Some will be old. Some will be new. Some will be borrowed but they will all be tinged with some Scottish blue.
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Kula Shaker with Helicon
11 February 2026, The Old Fruitmarket Helicon On the day that the band’s latest album Arise is released, it seems very appropriate to provide a review to their support act at The Old Fruitmarket. I’ve been fortunate to see Helicon on several occasions over the past couple of years and each time they look and…
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Xiu Xiu
4 February, Cottiers, Glasgow Eraserhead Xiu Xiu was described as a new a live concert with accompanying film that uses field recordings, concert specific homemade instruments, organ, modular synths, vocals, flashlights, electrical interference and elements of musique concrete to express the bizarre emotionality, conflicted sexuality, relentless darkness and singularly unsettled moonscape of this most incredible…
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Friends Again with Lloyd Cole
31 January 2026, the Old Fruitmarket Over 40 years ago, a group of young men threw a bottle into the sea and watched it drift away into the Clyde Estuary. It floated through currents across the world, untouched by the ever-changing musical vibes that drifted just above the seas. Four decades on and the bottle…
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Echoes of Scotland – Show No.2
I’ll be playing some contemporary music each Sunday between 7pm and 8pm GMT. Some will be old. Some will be new. Some will be borrowed but they will all be tinged with some Scottish blue.
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Tom McGuire And The Brassholes with Sean Choon & The Prawn Monsoon and The Great Pleasure
30 January 2026, Barrowland Ballroom I’ve been to my fair share of gigs across the years at Glasgow’s premier music venue, The Barrowland Ballroom. However, across the whole evening, I can’t remember so many people on stage to entertain the packed floor in front of them. There appeared to be a competition between all three…
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Echoes of Scotland – Show No.1
I’ll be playing some contemporary music each Sunday between 7pm and 8pm GMT. Some will be old. Some will be new. Some will be borrowed but they will all be tinged with some Scottish blue.
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Rudebeard with The Three’n’Eights
23 January 2026, McChuills I’ll start this post by putting the gig in some kind of context. McChuills invites everyone who plays and attends gigs there to enjoy an intimate evening. You can, as I did, get up close and personal to the performers if you’re so inclined. Alternatively, you could stand at the back…
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Biffy Clyro with The Armed and Soft Play
OVO Hydro, 21 January 2026 When Biffy Clyro formed in 1995 or thereabouts, did they ever imagine they would be ending the UK leg of their tour in front of 14,000 adoring fans at an indoor arena in Glasgow? Such was the case when they arrived on stage to an adoring fanbase on a damp…
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Top 10 Gigs and Albums of 2025
So many to choose from in both categories The Gigs Of The Year 2025 was another busy year for gigs, though I didn’t manage to close off #Chapter2 of our #AtoZMusicalTour with the letters U and X still awaiting to be ticked off. The #RaceAcrossEurope tour which was our #Interrail holiday was even better than 2024 with some great locations and bands, topped off with Nick Cave in the Pompeii…
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Miki Berenyi with F.O. Machete
Nice’n’Sleazy’s, 20 December It’s now almost a week since attending, what looks like, my last gig of the year with headliner the Miki Berenyi Trio and local support F.O. Machete. I’ve used the lapsed time to listen to both their 2025 albums, assess how they both interpreted and re-mixed them into the live setting, and…
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Tom McRae with Radhika and special guest Boo Hewerdine
King Tuts Wah Wah Hut, 17 December Arriving just after the doors opened at King Tut’s Wah Wah Hut on a midweek night in Glasgow, I half expected Tom McRae’s show to be intimate yet with plenty of room to manoeuvre across the venue floor to get a couple of different views of him in…
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The Creeping Bent Organisation with
Radhika & Future Pilot AKA, The Secret Goldfish, The Leopards, QUAD90, The Bluebells and Port Sulphur Mono, 12 December The Creeping Bent Organisation Let’s put the record straight at the outset. Unlike many of those who arrived at Mono to remember all the good times that were created over the past thirty years or so…
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Stereophonics with Finn Forster
The OVO Hydro, 10 December For a few years either side of the millennium, Stereophonics were establishing themselves as a band who produced anthemic songs for their growing fanbase to share at festivals at home and abroad. A quarter of a century on, the band dug deep into their recorded work, providing the music, and…
