I’d sort of forgotten. However I was reminded by social media that thirty eight years ago our first album came out. I’d made a small independent album a few years before and Jim, our keyboard player had played on other people’s albums, but to make our own record had been our ambition. An album was such a permanent thing. A gig happened then quickly disappeared into the ether, but an album, well….no one could take that away.

And so it seems, people still listen, all these years on. For that we’re grateful. But the album as a piece of art is enduring in tough times. The novel, the film, poem and painting have survived and there is no doubt about the endurability of the song, but the record album – twelve songs or more around a loose idea or time – is struggling to keep its head above water.

It’s not that people don’t love music or consume music. They consume it an even faster rate than before, it’s actually because of the volume of music available to all of us that makes the business of listening from beginning to end a slightly onerous task. Then comes the second problem; where to buy them. Leafing through the racks of records in the local store was a lunchtime activity for us as schoolboys growing up in Dundee. Swapping, taping and lending was the way we expanded our record collection. (Apologies now Sheena Matthews – you never got Hunky Dory back).

Streaming, as far as we can estimate, is here to stay. Even for me, an album lover, owning the CD or the vinyl doesn’t preclude opening my laptop or hooking up my phone to the kitchen ghetto blaster and letting Spotify take its algorithmic course. However, occasionally something comes along which demands the full listen from beginning to end and last Friday with a new Eric Church album arriving that moment presented itself. On Saturday morning, as I prepared some lunch for old friends arriving I played Evangeline v The Machine from beginning to end and it did not disappoint. In fact on EC’s record it actually encourages you to keep listening by quietly segueing the tracks. It’s a great listen and gently moves the dial of country music one more time to create a new thing which, I’m delighted to say, is always fresh when Eric Church is at the helm. On this week’s show I’ll play a couple of key tracks from the record which might make you do what I will be doing as soon as I get into town next week: picking up a physical copy.

On last week’s show we played Eric Church followed by Avery Annna as they both referenced Monsters beneath their beds. On this week’s show we’ll be playing out a conversation with Avery I recorded during her visit to C2C in March. Her new album comes out a week on Friday and it’s based around fan letters she has received over the last couple of years. Titled Let Go Letters it promises to be another piece of work you’ll want to listen to from beginning to end. Listen in as we talk through letters and more this Tuesday from eight. Join me on BBC Radio Scotland or BBC Sounds if you can.

I was working with an old friend the other evening. Davie Scott, of Pearlfishers fame, is steeped in music and has spent many hours ruminating on the business of wrting songs. His mantra has never changed: ‘If you want a song you should ask a songwriter.’

I always understood the importance of that axiom as, for many years in the old business of music, it was assumed that all artists should also be song writers. Chuck Berry, Buddy Holly and The Beatles started it the fashion because they all happened to be great, but it doesn’t always mean you have to write your own songs. To be honest, I was less than chartitable about this on the first few years of presenting Another Country. I’d look down at the credits and I’d sniffily pass on some great records because they didn’t come from the pen of the singer. More fool me.

The great tradition of A&R in the old days was to match an artist to the right song. In fact it was often the job of the producer to be the person who would select the material. My old music publisher Richard Rowe told me of Sunday evenings sitting around the record player in his Dad’s house sifting through American 45’s that had still not come out in the UK in order for him to find songs for appropriate artists on his Decca label.

Increasingly the song has become assembled by a large cast of writers. It’s often very difficult to imagine what four or five people might have done on a 3 chord country song about trucks and beers lasting three minutes. But..if they were in the room they are on the credits. It has been pleasantly surprising to find newer artist who we’ve played in recent weeks like Tanner Adell, Sierra Hull and Crys Matthews taking feeling confident enough to put out songs written entirely on their own.

Allen Toussaint

On this weeks show we’ll highlight a couple of great solo writers who have written massive songs in country music. Rodney Crowell has written some brilliant songs which have been covered by everyone from Emmylou Harris to Van Morrison. Last Friday Willie Nelson released his latest album, Oh What A Beautiful World, which is made up entirely of songs written by Rodney. We shall also play two great songs by Kenny O’Dell whose most famous song topped the country chart fifty two years ago this week. And finally we will play a classic song which became a country hit more because of the artist than the song itself. Glen Campbell’s version of Allen Toussaint’s Southern Nights came about because Jimmy Webb was playing the original release to Glen one day. Glen loved it so much he whipped the 45 off the turntable and shouted to Jimmy that he had to borrow it as he had a great idea. The next time Jimmy heard the song Glen’s voice was coming out of a car radio and the song had been re imagined and released.

So…on this week’s AC we shall celebrate some great songs, old and new. We’re on Radio Scotland from five past eight and available on BBC Sounds any time after that. Do join me of you can.

Last Tuesday I enjoyed an unusual privilege: attending a gig on an AC night. For technical reasons we need to pre record some shows and I took the chance of being free to catch my old friend Sam Outlaw on his visit to Cottiers Theatre in Glasgow’s West End.

The gig was promoted by Kevin Morris via his Fallen Angels Club which has been supporting live music for many years before the AC has been on air. It was a real joy to see how packed out the theatre was for Sam’s show. Not only that but the Fallen Angels audience love a support act and were all there early for Hannah Aldridge too. (something my youngest and I didn’t manage). He and I however had the best night. Sam, perfectly accompanied by Hannah and others was on great form as he played through his great back catalogue. Highlights? Too many to mention but it was great to hear Angeleno, Love Her For A While and that kind dedication on Tender Heart (one of my favourites).We’ll play another stand out live highlight on this week’s show.

As well as enjoying Sam’s set it was great to meet so many folk who listen to the show. This is a real bonus for me as in radio, you are never really sure who is listening. Someone – please remind me – mentioned they were in Nashville and encountered the multi talented Chris Scruggs. Chris, as many of you will recognise, is the son of country royalty. Earl Scruggs along with his partner Lester Flatt was responsible for bringing bluegrass music into the mainstream and if you’ve never heard Foggy Mountain Breakdown then I suggest it might well be the very thing to lift your post holiday blues.

On the AC we love nothing more than a country connection and on this week’s show we shall start the two hour collection with a Chris Scruggs collaboration before we move on to his regular band leader, Marty Stuart. You’ll have to tune in to hear how we do that but let me draw your attention to a significant anniversary. It’s 90 years since the birth of  WS Fluke Holland the original drummer of Johnny Cash’s Tennessee Three. In the 80’s Johnny’s band was joined by Marty Stuart and Johnny’s extended family continue to make great music as you will hear from his former son in law Rodney Crowell who’s newest offering is a duet with Johnny’s old Highwayman partner, Willie Nelson.

It’s country music folks and we love it. There are plenty of new acts to celebrate too and you will hear it all from 8 this Tuesday evening on BBC Sounds or BBC Radio Scotland. Join me if you can.

Since it was record store day last weekend, and it being Saturday and football was taking precedence, I decided to make my own private record store sojourn the day before. I don’t buy vinyl, though occasionally some gets sent and I gather up a few over the course of a year. I like vinyl, in fact can find almost no good argument against it – hell we released about 50 versions of our recent album on twelve inchers. It’s just that I really don’t need any more stuff in my life. I’m consciously decluttering, except I really don’t commit hard enough so I compromise by culling some of my record collection every year or so then immediately filling up the shelves with, well, my own personal record store day.

I remember reading an interview with Elton John in the seventies when he was asked about his wealth and he explained that he could go into a record shop and buy whatever he liked. Reading that then seemed liked the apotheosis of luxury living. Never mind sports cars and swimming pools – this was as good as it gets. I’ve never come close to that kind of oppulence but I do reflect that with the family grown up and my serious commitments being less exacting on the bank balance than they once were it allows a little lassitude in the record shop.

Last Friday I bought the new Bon Iver, last year’s Zach Bryan, Jason Isbell’s Foxes In The Snow (don’t you already own this one? – Ed) and a missing Tyler Childers. (Can I Take My Hounds To Heaven – thanks for asking). Thing is…I used to get sent most of these but it’s all gone digital. The other thing is that albums are so long…how much time do we have to listen? I’m still on Zach and it’s Monday. But I do like hearing the running order the artists intended and, even when there are few, I like the credits. You will hear the fruits of this record store day in the months to come.

Siobhan Maher Kennedy

In other news we have another great show for you this Tuesday. In the second hour we will be joined by an old friend from Nashville, Siobhan Kennedy. Siobhan is from Liverpool but went to Music City over thirty years ago to record an album with the man who would become her husband, Ray Kennedy. Since that time Siobhan has become part of the city’s fabric and a close confidante of the late John Prine. She’s also got a few stories to tell about her experience of running Ray’s Room and Board Studio over these years.  Liverpool to Nashville! It’s the ultimate music journey. Join me this Tuesday to hear from Siobhan as well as fabulous new records from Muscadine Bloodline, Charley Crockett, Crys Matthews, Vincent Mason and Tanner Adell. It all starts at five past eight on BBC Sounds and BBC Radio Scotland.

On Friday last week I found myself in an interesting place which should perhaps have a blue plaque. Shepherd’s Bush Empire in west London was the venue for our final show in our short run of theatre concerts last week. Although I knew it to be a great music gig I was surprised at how wonderful it was as a great rock n roll ball room. Yes, there are floral boxes and plaster carvings on the decorative ceiling but there is in its heart a warm space where rock ’n’ roll can thrum and thrive.

It has history of course. In the seventies the Empire was home to BBC live events like In Concert specials from The Old Grey Whistle Test. In the eighties it became the permanent home to the Wogan TV show which aired three times weekly. Before all of that variety acts of all stripes and colours performed on a stage which even boasted Charlie Chaplin as a visiting artiste.

In 2003 a run of the mill London date by American Country act The Dixie Chicks gave the Empire a new notoriety. Ashamed and embarrassed by George W Bush’s intervention in Iraq, Natalie Maines declared:

Just so you know, we’re on the good side with y’all. We do not want this war, this violence, and we’re ashamed that the President of the United States is from Texas.

That short sentence triggered a longer backlash than anyone could imagine. It also foreshadowed the ominous fissures in American politics which have been a hallmark of US society since that time. For the Chicks (their name change came along 17 years or so later) their country music career almost ended. Pariahs on country radio and victims of death threats at live performances, nothing would be the same again. It is good to remember however that, despite being banished from one genre’s airwaves, they remain a successful recording and performing group. 

All of this has been going through my head as I get back to celebrating the great roots music we love to highlight each Tuesday on the AC. People (quite correctly) are feeling anger and disappointment towards America and what the current president is inflicting on countries who have been good friends over many years. Even at this Sunday’s Olivier awards it was remarkable to hear legendary American actors apologising for where they have come from. There is , of course, no need.

America is not Trump, Vance or Musk and they in turn, are not America. Similarly America is not The Chicks and neither is it their great adversary, Toby Keith. America may be divided and extreme but these are positions that have always been apparent in US society. Country music, at its best, will keep telling the stories of ordinary Americans, and for that I am still grateful. We play all of these voices on Another Country and we continue to celebrate that diversity.

We will play tracks by Charlie Worsham, Maddie and Tae, Hailey Whitters and an extended chat with 49 Winchester’s Isaac Gibson recorded during their recent visit to Glasgow.

Join me for another packed episode from Tuesday at 8 p.m. on BBC Radio Scotland and BBC Sounds.

As my good brother-in-law likes to declare, minutes after the chimes that herald each new year, ‘Well that’s it all over for another year.’ In the same spirit the AC team of Richard, Emma and myself breathed a sigh of relief that we’d recorded fifteen (fifteen!!) interviews and with the good help of my friend Edith Bowman, managed to introduce all of the acts who played on the C2C stage at Glasgow’s 2025 Country festival.

If that’s not enough the weekend was rounded up emotionally by Lainey Wilson presenting our programme’s producer (he invented the show with myself back in 2008) Richard Murdoch, with his first ever award. It was a Country Music Association award for his contribution to widening the popularity of the genre. Proudly, we boast five awards for the show over the years we’ve been on air but on this occasion it is such a joy to see Richard in the limelight.

The award could not have come from a more fitting artist. We are all huge Lainey fans at the AC as you must know by now. We have championed her music since we first heard What a Man Ought To Know, her first major release back in 2021. So it was truly joyous to end the interview we recorded about her huge success over the last few years with her surprising Richard by presenting him with an award which recognises the work he puts in to making the AC such a special show. I am often asked if I know any of the stuff I say on air and I usually reflect that I would know none of it were it not for the notes my producer gives me. Between us we have always vowed to learn as we go along as there is always so much more to know. Sharing what we have found out brings us both such pleasure. All of this would not be possible without the newest member of our team, Emma Gallagher. Emma has been such a great colleague for us and it was Emma who booked every artist to be interviewed in my tiny dressing room backstage at The Hydro and whose subterfuge managed to keep the award a surprise until the very last moment.

The event itself was, perhaps the most successful festival yet. Each night was special and, in the lucky way that the venues rotated, we kept the best show until the final night with Lainey Wilson’s masterclass 90 minute Whirlwind. It hit all the right notes and played songs we loved to perfection with some added live edge on tracks like Heart Like A Truck and the beautiful acoustic picking on What A Man Ought To Know. But…there were so many highlights over the weekend. I only missed two shows (because of interview duties) but I heard 49 Winchester  and The Castellows made many friends. For me the stand out moments came from Dierks Bentley – perhaps some of the finest players to grace the stage (and thank you for the shout out Dierks), Avery Anna, the amazingly emotional set by Shaboozey,  Cody Johnson (what a voice!),Wyatt Flores and Lainey Wilson. I’m sure you may have a few things I missed so please feel free to add in to the blog here.

However we will celebrate all of the acts withe extended conversations and tracks from this Tuesday and the following week with all of this available on BBC Sounds. Do join me from 8 p.m. this coming Tuesday on BBC Radio Scotland.

Well, who’d have thought it? For two weeks running on the AC we play There Stands The Glass and in neither week did we feature the Webb Pierce version. If you missed either show you can listen back on BBC Sounds to both shows which feature Chuck Prophet and Willy Vlautin. Chuck favoured Ted Hawkins singing his version of the country classic and Willy opted to give us his own version of the song. Both were brilliant as was the conversation that came with the songs.

Chuck’s take on modern America is as unique in its own way to Willy Vlautin’s. Willy even talks about his fandom of Chuck and the joy he got riding in the Econoline with his old Green On Red guitar hero. What they both have in common is their empathy for the outsider. The characters that inhabit the songs of Chuck and Willy are all outsiders who, by the standards we’ve come to associate the newest American government, have very little going for them. In a  brutal world where the populus is divided into winners and losers it’s a pretty sure bet the big man with the orange face wouldn’t be counting these characters or their authors in the winning column.

That’s the thing about America; we no sooner get a handle on some of what is going on than we find a conflicting story to disabuse us of all we thought we understood. Take this coming weekend: The twenty odd acts that make up the 2025 C2C line up will probably be telling stories about a different America than the ones favoured by Chuck Prophet, Willy Vlautin, John Prine, Nanci Griffith and Johnny Cash...insert your own act here. However that’s the great thing about country music or musical theatre or…pop music…just when you’re convinced that you don’t love it, along comes a song that turns you round and leaves you pointing in a different direction.

On this week’s AC we’ll give you a glimpse of that other side of country music celebrated by the many acts of C2C who’ll be performing at Glasgow’s OVO Hydro this coming weekend.  We will also remind you of some of the great moments of C2C from the last ten years or so of festivals which started off in the smaller Clyde Auditorium but now attracts crowds of at least 4 or 5 times the size of that original audience. You’ll hear songs from headliners Dierks Bentley, Cody Johnson and Lainey Wilson. We’ll include some great cuts from Shaboozey, Tanner Adell, Wyatt Flores and The Castellows. If these names are new I can assure your they will become familiar over the coming months and years.

We will play songs from years gone by with contributions from Kacey Musgraves, Eric Church, Darius Rucker and Ashley McBryde. It’s a packed celebration which will set you up for the biggest event in the UK’s country calendar. Listen in live if you can from five past eight this Tuesday evening on BBC Radio Scotland or BBC Sounds.

Now Jesus was a social drinker
He never drank alone
He never partied at a strip club
Keeping his woman up at home
Or overstayed his welcome
Or threw up in your sink
Nah, Jesus was never late to work, man
And he always pulled his weight

Not my words, but the lyrics of Chuck Prophet who brought his new band, His Cumbia Shoes to the city of Glasgow on Sunday and left everyone feeling a lot better than when they arrived. He turned St Luke’s into a Cumbia dance floor and gently poked fun at Elon Musk, the audience and mainly himself over the course of a couple of hours of wonderful live music. Jesus Was a Social Drinker is typical of the Chuck oeuvre where something almost whimsical turn around into a human truth that often as not will break your heart. It’s a Chuck thing and I love it. Here’s how that song ends:

He was an all-around decent dude
But he had his share of rough nights
And the more I learn about him
Well, the more respect I have for the guy

Chuck’s found a new groove and the music he’s discovered has given him an energetic boost and perhaps the inspiration he needed to keep going. His live show, as I may have mentioned here before , is that rarest of events these days, something that leaves you with a warm smile in your heart and never outstays its welcome.

Chuck was admirably supported by three members of California’s Cumbian Kings, Quiensave as well as two of his regular Mission Express buddies, and although Stephanie Finch wasn’t part of this particular expedition she was serenaded beautifully in a tender moment by her husband. Late as Sunday was, Chuck came into AC HQ early on Monday morning and recorded an hour with me which will become the second half of this week’s show. He picked some favourite country/ Americana tracks and hidden gems and put them all into wonderful context with matching anecdotes. It’s a magical hour you won’t want to miss.

Before all of that the first half of this week’s show will include new records from Patterson Hood, Dean Owens, Hannah Cohen and Sunny War & Tre´Burt. There’s more, but I’ll leave that for you to discover when you listen in. Let me just ask this however: why has it taken me so long to discover the voice of Randy Hauser…yes he’ll be in the show too.

It all happens from five past eight this Tuesday evening on BBC Radio Scotland or BBC Sounds. Do join me if you can.

As I write this I’m thinking of a very special place I visited with my wife, Lorraine, five years ago. Bukavu in South Kivu, Democratic Republic of Congo is a very special place. The suffering and crimes that have been visited on the women there have been chronicled elsewhere in my writing but it’s safe to say that events over the last few days have made people’s lives there far more precarious, if that is even possible.

I usually think deeply about Bukavu every Sunday morning as I recall the most exciting Mass I have ever attended. The singing, the dancing and the sense of celebration and welcome allowed our small party of Scots visitors to experience a unique religious experience which, speaking for myself, I have never encountered before or since. I doubt today, I will ever participate in anything like it again. The coming of the M23 rebels into the city has changed everything and we await news from our friends there who, when we last heard, were too frightened to step outside their homes.

Some of the amazing Bukavu singers

In the church on that Sunday 6 a.m. Mass we heard music that soared through the building and felt as if it might lift the roof. What a thing music is. Sometimes it comes in when you least expect it and it changes the scenery and offers hope and release when there seems little else to lift the spirits. My old friend, The Herald’s foreign correspondent, David Pratt told me a story about reporting from a war zone in the middle east and, avoiding gunfire, found himself sheltering a giant video screen which was showing a video of Deacon Blue being broadcast by MTV or another music video channel.

In 2017 I was visiting Sarajevo  when I heard from a Bosnian woman who told me how our music had offered her respite (as a young school student) during the worst days of the Balkan war. It was humbling and reassuring to know music travels, inspires and sometimes, at the worst of times interrupts the darkest of times. Songs are necessary and I’m grateful.

On this week’s Another Country we’ll play you some songs you may find will (happily) interrupt and inspire. I trust none of you reading this are facing the hardships and dangers endured by some of the stories I’ve chronicled here. However we will all face times we haven’t reckoned on and I’m sure music and particular voices and songs will find a way in. Let me point you to some special moments you want to revisit from this week’s show. Listen out for Madison Hughs and Brent Cobb, Will Johnson, Vincent Mason and Katie Pruitt. You’ll also hear some classic songs from Shania Twain, Charlie Worsham, Tift Merrit and Brandi Carlile.

It all starts at five past eight this Tuesday evening on BBC Radio Scotland (FM folks) or BBC Sounds. Do join me if you can.

I’m  in a learning mode. Let me explain: In the period between making a record and the record coming out is a strange liminal period where no one really knows what’s coming except the band and close associayes who played on the record. It’s probably fair to say we don’t really know it that well either. In truth I have to go about leaning my own songs. I have a poor memory and often when I sit down to recall a song i find myself thinking, ‘I’m not even sure what key this is in.’ So if you pass me running on the road  or driving along somewhere and I look lie I’m singing to myself …I am doing just that.

It’s a thing that I never thought would happen, but there are songs I’ve written or been involved with in some way that I have forgotten, and sometimes I can’t even remember them coming about in the first place. However that is the magical thing of creativity; sometimes these gifts just land and the only thing you really are asked to do is to accept or refuse the offer.

I thought about all of this as I was in conversation with a journalist about how one of my earliest songs came about and I found myself confessing that I really don’t know where it all came from but was simply glad it had arrived. An old songwriter friend once recalled how a record company had nudged him to write them another of his classic songs which he’d penned for some significant artists. He explained that he’d try, but that kind of song usually only arrives once a year or so, despite the fact he went into his studio every day to upset that ratio.

As someone who sifts through new songs by new artists every other day it’s interesting to stumble on a track that makes you want to play over and over again only to find the next release somehow doesn’t do it for you. I guess if we knew how to hit the mark every time we’d all be doing it!

All this brings me to this week’s celebration of one of the greatest pop/country song writing partnerships of all time. Boudleaux and Felice Bryant were the magical husband and wife team behind some of the biggest songs by The Everly Brothers, Roy Orbison, Buddy Holly, Ray Charles and even Bob Dylan. It’s 105 years since Boudleaux was born and you’ll hear some classic country cuts of his songs on this week’s show.

Listen out too for fabulous records by Stephen Wilson Jr, Sierra Hull, Dylan Gossett and Waxahatchee.

All of this begins at eight o’clock on BBC Sounds or BBC Radio Scotland. I’d love you to join me if you can.