If you’re going to work your way home from Edinburgh the chances are you’ll end up on Cockburn Street as you wind your way to Waverley. It was on this street one day in round 1980 I had a significant vinyl moment. In a window of what became Ripping Records was a Bruce Cockburn record I didn’t own. It wasn’t too surprising I didn’t own it, after all I was the only person in my world who had any Bruce Cockburn albums….I’d bought Sunwheel Dance from Groucho’s a couple of years before but there the catalogue had ended. We knew very little more about the man. My friend Doug had decided to drop him a post card and – what do you know – he replied. So that day on Cockburn Street I went into the record shop to buy this missing record only to find there were four or five others waiting there in the racks. I went home to Dundee with two bulging carrier bags and a hole in my finances. In these days a cheque book was a handy thing. Years later I would meet Bruce a couple of times and enjoy his company as well as see his shows. Next week he plays a keynote show at Glasgow Americana and as a prelude to that I’ll be spending an hour talking music, faith, Central America, ecology and much more this Sunday morning.
By the way, I discovered reading his autobiography that he too has walked down Cockburn Street as a young traveller. As well as chatting I hope to play a lot of significant Bruce Cockburn songs from his 45 years or so of making some brilliant music. It all starts at five past ten this Sunday.
This Tuesday on Another Country I’ll catch up with an artist who is every bit as exciting as the young Mr Cockburn was on that line album I owned all these years ago, Andrew Combs excellent, ‘All these Dreams’ has been a significant album for us this year on Another Country. We’ve played a good few tracks and have been very impressed by the authority and maturity of his songwriting and singing. Andrew has passed this way before. A few years ago he was supporting Caitlin Rose in Glasgow but we managed to persuade him into the AC to record some songs and stay around for a chat. There are echoes of Jackson Browne, Gordon Lightfoot and Harry Nilsson in Andrew’s music and he has a few good tales to tell.
We’ll have some new music from Lewis and Leigh, Anderson East and 10 String Symphony as well as some lovely returns to great records by Kris Kristofferson and Faith Hill. Our new favourite band A New International have a new single out too and we’ll hopefully have a few surprises along the way too.
Sound good? We think it will. Join us from five past nine on BBC Radio Scotland this Tuesday evening.
