Cooker #23

I really have little idea why Theresa May chose to steal my thunder by making her snap election announcement just before this release of Cooker #23. I suppose it must be put down to deliberate spite or her insane jealousy of my extra five years on this planet, which gives me an unassailable lead over her in the fashion stakes.

I leave you to join me in making other malicious inferences until we are corrected by an apology from Downing Street.

While you and I wait for that let's skip back to something more reliable... this here April Cooker.

A father and son Dury duo was bound to appear eventually. Here it is among some not very oft-listened to musicians. Don't put Courteeners in that category. They are here at the request of a former pupil. Thank you for your good taste in music, Kerri... I'm sure I would have discovered them in time.

A demanding track winds up proceedings. How do we enjoy the loveliest of love songs when we know the pain of the person who wrote it?

I'll drag myself back to less complicated things by sending a reminder to our PM to hasten that apology.

Thank you once again for your ears. And do please remember... look both ways before you listen.

Cooker #22

It's Friday. It's five o'clock. And it's CRACKERJA...

Squrrrp... Rrrrrp... Sgrrrllldlp. Erp - I might have gone a little off track there. No matter. I have completely regained the compos of my mentis by listening to the entirety of this, my second palindromic #Cooker (Ah, Cooker 11, how we loved you).

And the restoration of the equilibrium of my mind is so complete that I have little (no) hesitation in shoving this 64 minute distraction right before your very ears... merry listening!

Cooker #21

Happy New Year!...

Slight pause for a considered breath of reflection and remorse. Where the hell have I been! 

Let's just say that I was unavoidably and almost indescribably detained by one of my regular triangular attacks of lassitude, lethargy and lasso practice.

All over and behind me now. I've discovered that the squeak of the hippopotamus is equal to the sum of the squeals on the other two sidewalks. 

In short ("Yes, do keep it short" I hear you saying) I am ready and willing to proffer my coming-of-age #Cooker for your untrammelled delight.

'Ere 'tis. It concludes with one of those anthemic track type thingys. 

Continued thanks for the attention from your tympanic cavities and eustachian tubes.

Cooker #20

Much consternation as I realise that this is my first post since relying on the magnificent Matthew's guest playlist at the beginning of last month. So let's push out number 20 of my official offerings before the weekend is over. Turn up the volume and you might even escape listening to the dull thud of Monday arriving.

Anyone given The as a middle name deserves sympathetic consideration so the opener here comes from someone who I met a few years back. Mr Don chatted to me for much longer than most people do on first contact but, instead of being grateful for his indulgence, I went back to family and friends and we all made insulting comments about his choice of hairstyle. Terrible, I know... maybe this promotion of his work will see me spend a little less time in Purgatory.

Eleven support tracks to go with your headliner. All courtesy of my ambling and rambling through Spotify.

Delighted to see the latest Rolling Stones album being available so soon and being so darn good. I'll let you find that one... after you've finished listening here, of course. And, of course, thank you for your listening.

Cooker - Guest Playlist

Wow... this happened and I am swimming in a sea of sonic smashingness.

Link through this cartouche for immediate transport to a steady stream of Matthew's good taste in music 

The very giving and truly wonderful Mr Moore has come alongside with his own flotilla of fabulously defibrillating tracks.
He came uninvited but softly and with grace. His unexpected offering gives me the glorious chance to share his generosity and spare you, for a while, from another of my own paltry playlists.
I have already spliced my main brace… come and join me on the poop deck and let’s enjoy this together!

Thank ee most kindly, Cap'n Matthew.
 

Matthew's ability to produce sweet, sweet music from his vocal chords and twanging instrument are being further developed and refined at this very moment. Be assured that a link to his YouTube channel will be forthcoming as soon as it has come forth.

Cooker #19

So much music out there. Well, I say good show for that... and present to you twelve more tracks. All you have to do now is listen, deliberate and decide which of these are keepers and which are sleepers. Ah, yes, and you should also decide which are offensive enough for you to set to with drafting a letter of complaint to me. I can take it.
Thank you for listening. May all your responses save you putting pen to paper.

Cooker #18

It's two Fridays after the last Friday a #Cooker was posted. Time for a refresher course, eh?

I have just given this selection a final ear-test and it was so fine I felt like keeping the whole damn thing to myself. In the end I convinced myself that generosity was the better part of valour and enrolled in the nearest order of chivalry. It appears that my local branch are competing in the ping-pong league at the 'Swan With Two Necks' on Sunday and I'm in the second pair for doubles. Off to check the pimpling on my bat... enjoy the music and wish me luck!

Cooker #17

September is upon us! Octember and Novober are waiting in the wings. I don't need to tell you it's the "season of mitts and yellow truthfulness"... John Keats already did that years ago, didn't he.

In a rare attempt to spare you more ramblings of the above variety, allow me to present another #Cooker. Getting up to number seventeen means that I really need some sort of checking system. Until I'm more organised, please let me know if I'm repeating tracks or dwelling on artists too heavily. Who knows... I might have my very own playlist filing system and tracking device installed before next autumn.

Thanks for glistening!

Cooker #16a... Moore for your money

This is so hot on the heels of Cooker #16 that I'm sure you'll be demanding some very fine reason. Very well.

Mr Moore is a good friend and sometime work colleague of my two sons. I have spoken to him for scarcely more than a half hour on our only meeting. After being so impressed by Matthew's assured manner, perfect politics and jauntily angled cocktail parasol, I vowed to maintain links at a respectable distance on social media... social media which has alerted me to his imminent celebration of the day on which he arrived on this earth. 

I have already tempted, tinted and tainted this young man with my own musical tastes. Here is evidence that he is in deep trouble as he listens to a gentle offering from my beloved Captain 

You are just one click away from spiralling right into Matthew's Spotify splendour

What birthday treat for the person who desires nothing but to give his earnest goodness to a waiting world? Aha - more music is the answer. Of course, present giving is best guided by the premise that you should offer something which you would be glad to receive. So, without further explanation or apology, please allow me to send out assembled sounds which I don't mind listening to. I don't mind you listening to them either. But don't you dare do so before the birthday boy has taken his fill... that would spoil the gift, wouldn't it.

Thank you.

Cooker #16

Much busy, very busy and oh so busy lately. But not so busy as to forget all of you, my faithful listeners. I know you are out there... if I could be a little cheeky and ask you to share this new #Cooker we might just recruit enough devotees to form a water polo team. Yay!

I have given careful thought to the running order of my sweet sixteenth. Of course, you are most welcome to shuffle the deck and even finesse a few of your own tracks into the mix.

As always, thank you for listening.

Cooker #15

A visit to my family home cannot stop the flow of #Cookers. I've dragged my lovely, nearly ninety year old Mum screaming from her laptop keyboard just long enough to publish this. She will return soon and continue sending recipes and filthy jokes to her octagenarian friends. No lamentation for the demise of two deliveries a day from the Royal Mail... Mum can send out a dozen emails before plunging her morning coffee cafetiere.

Definite jazz action entering the fray here. The reliably hippy, trippy, drippy Donovan is on hand to help us focus on our navel area. And there is a spot of electronica.

Lending your ears is appreciated. Thank you for listening.

Cooker #14

Sorry... SORRY!

Those increasingly large apologies are most sincere, I assure you. Three days between my last two offerings and here we are seven weeks later with not a sniff of a #KitchenCooker. Except... here it is. So all that sorry can be completely ignored as I withdraw it (even though it was most sincerely offered)

I reckon there is a spot of rise and fall with this selection. Not meaning a variation in quality as far as I'm concerned... I leave you to be the judge of that. Rather, there is a spread of approaches and musical styles which, perhaps more than usually, reflect recent events. The need to suppress resentment and anger in the face of politics, religion and just plain-old nutty world news is a good excuse to rally music to the rescue. You should be aware that there is much of happiness here as well. Very dearly loved people continue to do wonderful things which enrich my life back to default joy. One in particular accounts for the Thompson Twins track as she PhDees her way into a shiny future.

Please share my mixed emotions but be assured that the sunny side is always there to grab if you have a mind to grab it.

Let's not be sorry at all, eh.

Now click away on the screen capture below, escape my ramblings here and fire up the thruster rockets of Cooker #14.