Mon 15 Mar – Classic FM Live
A great night out. ClassicFM celebrating their birthday in style. Great fireworks and flames an a number of occasions during the concert added to the spectacle.

Rhydian was excellent and being Welsh I was proud to hear him sing his songs in Welsh, and with the support of the choir. An excellent performance.

Another great ClassicFM Live.

Two points of struggle:

1) Finding time to add my new purchases to this journal - bought quite a few new albums since my last update. Must make a note of them soon.

2) Finding new music. I've hit a 'discovery wall' and I haven't found anything new and interesting for a while. Help!

Okay, so March was the last time I updated this record of my purchases - and that's what I see this Journal as. It's quite interesting (sad?!) to look back at what you bought and when!

So, the following have been bought since March 30th.

Respect - The Very Best of Aretha Franklin was nabbed from my iTunes basket, where it had been sitting for quite a while. Think had been one of my favourite tracks since I'd heard an old friend playing it around 1993. Since buying this album, and more so over this weekend, Spanish Harlem has been…

A trip into London yesterday led me to the Zavvi store (formerly Virgin) in Picadilly. First time I've been in that store and it was a fantastic place.

Although many of the prices were high, the choice was great and it proved to be a good place to browse and find music. (e.g. was £17 - Amazon £13, iTunes £5) Note Bleu: The Best Of. . ..

On the top floor they have their jazz/blues/world section and playing was The Harder They Come soundtrack. I'm not a fan of regae but was stopped in my tracks by Jimmy Cliff…

I was buying something from Amazon so thought I'd throw in a couple of low-cost CDs to make use of the postage costs.

Bass on Top by Paul Chambers is the first one, which is a relatively short album but nevertheless pretty good.

The second album was The Very Best of Jackie Wilson by… Jackie Wilson - primarily bought for the track (Your Love Keeps Lifting Me) Higher and Higher.

Payday and Easter weekend combined to bring me, via iTunes:

1) Ma Fleur by the The Cinematic Orchestra. Some iTunes and Amazon searching led me to this album - I think I was looking into Acid Jazz at the time.

2) The Sermon by Jimmy Smith is the second album and was in my iTunes basket for a month or so before I bought it. More jazz.

David

Saturday lunchtime and I was trying to find something to listen to in my iTunes library and I thought, 'What the hell, I'll put some Jean-Michel Jarre on.

So, on went Rendez-vous and it's just ended. It's a good album. Really like Last Rendez-Vous (Ron's Piece) - it's sort of dreamy and a little BladeRunner-esque.

Traveling back from Pembrokeshire last month I heard Amy Macdonald on BBC Radio 2 being interviewed and also playing a few acoustic pieces.

She seemed really nice, down-to-earth and pleasant. Her track Run was fantastic - it was just her, her guitar and the microphone. Great voice.

Just bought her album This is the Life and it's well worth the cash. Downloaded it via iTunes and the 'live' version Run (Acoustic W14 Session) is currently my favourite.

Right, haven't logged recent purchases for quite a while so here's a rundown as to what's new since the last entry.

> Led Zepplin is back on the scene and I jumped on the band wagon and listened to their music for the first time when I bought mothership.

> All The Right Reasons by Nickelback is a pretty good album and the Rock Star is a classic (see below).

> Peter Phillips: Tallis Scholars and Peter Phillips: Tallis Scholars is fantastic and joined my collection in February.

> Savane by Ali Farka Touré.

>Taj Mahal and…

In search of more relaxation/background music, I bought Ravi Shankar's album Raga Charukauns or as iTunes calls it 'Incredible Ravi Shankar'.

Pretty good.