The new album from Beth Orton is something to cherish. The Ground Above carries on from Weather Alive with a voice that feels like it might break down at any moment. She somehow manages to hold it all together. You’re through some of her shared pain along the way.

I really regret missing out on Beth over the past three decades or so. This is her ninth album. All those cliches of being the Comedown Wueen somehow passed me by. Truth be told and I never really came down during those tired and emotional days of living the party lifestyle.

The vocals on The Ground Above are so weathered. There’s some fine jazz musicianship on this album, but it’s the voice that breaks through and remains front of centre.

Somehow Beth Orton has managed to emerge as one of those unique and celebrated British female voices. Sure she’s never going to trouble the charts. This is non-commercial music that is still being allowed to be released and managed by the mainstream.

We should cherish her.

Oh dear. Bailed after less than a minute. Horrid, horrid rock rap. Whingy white boys. Wanky guitar solos. Nope. SEE YA!

⭐

Another year, another album from Cleaners from Venus. Yer man Mr Mule seems to drop these almost monthly now - that’s an exaggeration, but you get the point; productivity somehow naturally balanced with a laid-back slackness governs his own micro world.

And so here we have Beryl and Ruff Go Shopping. But OF COURSE they do. I’ve not dug deep enough yet to find out the meaning behind the title. I’m sure I’ll read about it on Facebook in another 5,000-word essay.

All the usual themes appear to be present and correct. We’re talking seasonal change. It’s four seasons in one album. There’s no one else who quite paints a picture of the changing small-town England landscape than Mr Mule.

The sense of Englishness lingers heavy throughout the album. That’s Englishness being celebrated for all its quirkiness, rather than any flag-waving nonsense. It’s like life stopped in 1983 for Mr Mule, yet somehow he still manages to make these DIY records at a remarkable pace.

For all his self-confessed Luddite tendencies, I don’t think he recognises that he is actually something of a digital disruptor and maverick. Self-recording, self-producing and self-distributing music at such a pace is very much for the modern world.

He’d hate to hear this comparison but he’s something of an Estuary Wilde’s Prince. ARF. That made me chuckle.

The music is pretty timeless. He knows how to pen a bloody good tune and then add his usual jingle jangle and reverb all around it.

I tend to lose track of the amount of music he’s creating these days, but that’s not the point. It’s some legacy that is being built up.

This feels like one of those absolute masterpiece albums that I should be familiar with. I’ve got a lot of catching up to do when it comes to my jazz noodlings. The early start with So What is, of course, exemplary. I have to confess that my introduction to this song was via good old Smiley Culture on the Absolute Beginners double soundtrack. Oh dear.

What I love about Miles is that you can never really tell if it’s a live album or not. This is a complement. The playing and arrangement are simply magnificent. This feels like it could equally have been a drawn-out recording process, such is the perfection captured in the live environment.

One play in and this already feels like a classic to me. I do very much enjoy exploring and discovering new jazz as I continue with my quest for knowledge.

⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐

The bass playing on this album is phenomenal, as you might expect. At first I thought it was a trombone, but nope, it’s Bruce plugging away and getting some extraordinary lush heavy sounds out of his bass. It’s also a very soulful album. All that guitar heaviness puts me right off Cream. Songs for a Tailor is a sound with some soul and emotion that I can get behind.

⭐ ⭐ ⭐ ⭐

I’m not a fan of these confessional life story type albums. It’s the narrative as told by those wanting to write their own history. Sure, hip hop needs that bravado but there are two sides to every story. The beats and delivery are as tight as you’d expect. I wanted a bit more joy, a bit more happiness. I think that was lacking in the 2Pac story.

⭐ ⭐

Tom Waits, Small Change. You couldn’t get away with an album cover like that these days.

I never know when to start with Tom Waits. The trick is just to dive in, strap yourself down and be taken along for the ride. You can’t get all muso-obsessive in understanding what he’s done and where he’s going.

Small Change is no different. It starts with what I call the Waltzing Matilda song, which isn’t even Waltzing Matilda. He then starts to ramble as his bottle becomes increasingly empty.

I won’t call it a masterpiece but then I don’t want musical perfection from Tom Waits. It’s more about the mood. Small Change provides this.

Fella can sing, blue eyed soul and all that. But he ain’t no rapper. It just doesn’t speak to me. It’s not part of my world. I felt like I was only one step away from wearing a dumbass stupid MAGA cap.

⭐ ⭐

I bloody loved the BBC’s Prog Proms. That’s something I would never thought I would find myself saying.

It is unashamedly uplifting, spiritual music that remains completely pompous, especially with all the power of the mighty BBC Symphony Orchestra behind it.

There was still an emotional element there in the song choice and the complexity in which the orchestra organised each song selection.

I’m undergoing something of my own summer of prog right now. I had to bite the bullet and just dive in at a random junction. Prog is so utterly bonkers that there is no easy path in which to safely navigate your entry point. Just pick some prog and bloody play it.

There was only one place however for the BBC Prog Proms to start: ELP’s Fanfare for the Common Man was the bombastic opener that the concert needed. It was only at the end of the track that I realised that Carl Palmer was the rather youthful dude who was holding it all together behind the drum kit.

The Genesis Wardrobe song is another track that has been daintily enlivening my summer of prog in recent weeks. It was a joy to hear this, even with Guy Garvey taking the vocals, a voice that I’ve never really warmed to.

Northern Lights then followed. This was a little too folky for my liking but it was delicately done with Jane Weaver hitting all the right high notes.

I’m not sure that Nights in White Satin is strictly a prog song. I loved Soft Machine’s slight jazz detour; Tubular Bells of course which was a cliché that had to be included.

The highlight for me was Van der Graaf Generator and Refugees. This is completely new to me. I knew nothing of the band apart from the name. Up stepped the old boy Peter Hammill to deliver what was a highly emotional and very timely performance.

Oh yeah - I wasn’t expecting Gruff from the Super Furries to out himself as a prog-believer.

So that was the BBC Proms. There’s always been a prog element to my music, etc. I reckon I was born a decade too late.

SHOUT OUT to the Cool as Fuck prog dude who was conducting the orchestra.

The haul from my recent trip to my favourite secondhand CD shop only returned a couple of CDs, but they’re both good ‘uns.

I found myself in Frinton on Sea with half an hour to spare. What’s a boy about town to do? Hey! Let’s go and spunk some money in the wonderful charity shop record store.

The Frinton shop is very well organised. It’s not just A to Z, but the way the CD’s are put with a spine laid out so they’re poking you in the face. It’s a shame I forgot my specs and so I couldn’t whizz through at greater speed.

It’s a slight step above the usual charity shop crap. Think less Cliff Richard, more Leonard Cohen, which was exactly the direction I went in.

I managed to pick up Leonard’s The Future CD. I think this was the follow-up to I’m Your Man, his absolute late 1980s classic. Not bad for just £2.

Following on from the C’s I moved over and then stumbled again on the O’s and picked up Mike Oldfield’s Five Miles Out. I’ve got this on vinyl but I rarely play it. I do love the title track, as well as the original of Family Man.

I did ponder over a Julie London triple CD. Mmmm, I thought, have I already got this? A quick shifty back at base confirms that I have.

They also had some incredibly reasonably priced CD players. These are getting hard as a source. If my Demon ever packs up on me then another trip to the seaside could be on the cards.