Happy New Year! The A-Z podcasts are back after a fortnight’s hiatus with “T”. Easy as pie at www.joeboyd.co.uk – click on a letter and the ten-minute podcast plays.   * * *   As a teenager, I was horrified by the idea of white blues singers, but modified that view when I heard my […]

If any of you are near Bristol, England this Monday (November 2) evening – come along to the Institute of Art and Ideas where I’m giving a talk and answering questions. It starts early, at 6pm, which is appropriate for the now-geriatric era which is the subject of the event, “The Sixties”! The location is […]

Due to a glitch on our end, all those email raves about the “Joe Boyd’s A-Z” podcast seem to have bounced back! The problem has been sorted now, so feel free to lob bouquets or brickbats by hitting “reply” to the newsletter. Letter J has just gone up, filled with the “great, thick blubbery rugs” […]

It took a few weeks but JOE BOYD’S A-Z is now available as a podcast on iTunes. I have seven letters up, so you can listen for over an hour! (10 minutes each) Tell your friends, tweet them, facebook them, start a virus…. (If you like it, that is.) Just go to your iTunes store […]

Last month saw the launch of my podcast, “Joe Boyd’s A-Z”. Each weekly 10-minute episode starts with a track from my collection, which serves as a doorway to talk about memorable recording sessions I’ve been involved in, or to my favourite albums, or to curious histories and remarkable personalities. I’ve spent the last year and […]

  I have been hiding my head in shame for the past month after committing an apostrophe-crime in the editor’s letter I shared with you, right after the other rant about bad grammar!  Thank you to all the sticklers who pointed this out. A somewhat shorter version of the following account of my Albanian adventures […]

My career as village crank, banging out letters to the editor, is on the upswing! Two letters published in the past three weeks! One in the Guardian, one in the International New York Times. They trimmed them a bit, so I’ll let you read them as nature, well me anyway, intended: To the Guardian: Sirs, […]

My somewhat cranky appearance on Radio 4’s “A Good Read” is available now in BBC iPlayer: (The article I mention about the great Lesley Blanch can be read here.) Despite the scowls directed towards anyone who asks when my book on ‘world music’ will be finished, some evidence is emerging of what I’ve been up […]

John “Hoppy” Hopkins died at the end of January. Some of you may have read the obituary I wrote for the Guardian or heard my contribution to “Last Word” on BBC Radio 4. The Guardian stayed reasonably true to my original text, but added more facts and removed some of the quirkier passages. Originally, (and within their word-count restraints) it read like […]

Dear Mailing List, “I was going to send out a newsletter about “Inside Llewen Davis” and Dave Van Ronk but I’m pleased to say that “The Believer”, that most excellent magazine run by Dave Eggers and Vendela Vida and the great McSweeney’s team have put it up on their “Logger” website/blog. So you can read […]