It's been another very full on year here in AUK Towers, a year in which we got bombarded with albums but more than that, by the four minute pieces of music which make them up - we must have been sent when you include the album tracks easily in excess of 10 thousand songs to listen to, and as I have noted in recent years, it's the timeless art of the song which resonates with me more than ever.

Swedish singer-songwriter Jesper Lindell has released his cover of Willie Nelson’s 'Pretend I Never Happened' from his forthcoming album "3614 Jackson Highway", which comes out on CD, LP, and digital platforms on March 6 via Yep Roc Records. The album is available for pre-order here. In 2024, 30-year-old Jesper Lindell took his band The Brunnsvik Sounds on a pilgrimage across the Atlantic to better understand where his favorite music comes from.

I describe myself as a live music junkie – I can never get enough – and the particular joys for me include favourite artists, much loved venues, and of course new artists and new venues. The start of the week found me in the gods at the O2, Greenwich, for Radiohead, and then the following night a few stops up and east on the Jubilee line to a new venue for myself, the Cart and Horses, at Stratford.

After a sold-out edition in 2025, Fairport's Cropredy Convention returns for 2026 with a trademark line-up of folk and rock heavyweights, alongside some of the UK's most established and upcoming talent. Taking place across the 13th, 14th and 15th of August 2026, the 3-day festival of folk, roots and rock will once again transform the bucolic village of Cropredy (as well as its hostelries, waterways and pastures) into a mecca for the discerning music lover.

Ronald Clyde Crosby was born in 1942 in Oneonta, a small city in Otsego County, New York, but to you and me, and the rest of the musical world, he was better known as Jerry Jeff Walker. After high school, he joined the National Guard, but his thirst for adventure led him to go AWOL, and he was eventually discharged, from where he continued to roam, busking his way around the country.

So, a couple of weeks ago, I was banging on about how at this time of year there was a proliferation of lists - best of the year, etc. Well, in the spirit of the prevailing sentiment, Sounds from beyond the Shed, the radio show has leapt wholeheartedly into the fray with the next three shows all being list-based. First up is the show that features below.

Sometimes these introductions write themselves - we know you know who Lucinda Williams, we know you know who Mavis Staples is, and we'd expect a good proportion of you to recognise 'So Much Trouble In The World' as a Bob Marley song.  So all we really need to do is remind you that Lucinda Williams will release her new album "" on January 26th on Highway 20 Records / Thirty Tigers.

Here's the latest single from Minneapolis-based singer-songwriter Samuel Wilbur. 'Everything is Falling Apart' is an apocalyptic anthem for holding onto love, hope and everything that matters when the world is unravelling around us. The song builds towards a triumphant climax, with soaring harmonies and instrumentation. Throughout, the real highlight is Wilbur's distinctive voice, which is really compelling, particularly when delivered in textured vocal layers.

Well that’s it from us for another week dear reader, and what a track to leave you with this week. Yesterday morning I was listening to 6 Music (I'm learning to tolerate Nick Grimshaw by being slowly ground down) and out of the blue he played a track I hadn't heard in so many years, 'Comedy' by the band Shack fronted by Michael Head which ushered in a wave of emotions at 8.20am and brought me to tears while I was eating my toast.

And now we're less than two weeks away from the big celebration and all the signs confirm this - the weather is taking an upturn and if that means no White Christmas then it also means lower spend on fuel and a concurrent positive effect for carbon release.  Alongside this there's the nagging doubts that it is too late to get that one extra present - well, maybe turn that gift that will probably be a "

Rising star Jaimee Harris, with a voice that sounds like an edgier Emmylou Harris (who unsurprisingly just happens to be her hero) met the venerable singer-songwriter Mary Gauthier in 2017 at a songwriting workshop in Taos, New Mexico, at which Mary was teaching. Their instant chemistry resulted in them becoming writing partners, then touring partners and then life partners.  Harris discovered Gauthier via a Ray Wylie Hubbard song, ’

What a year 2025 has been, musically speaking.  There's been a lot outside of music that has been...hmm, disappointing - one way or another.  No one was really expecting the dawn of a new socialist utopia, but we had been promised change.  And actually if enough digging is done then some change is happening, but the overturning of almost 15 years of misrule is a slow process. 

Hard times, no, unusually hard times served to bring the Airborne Toxic Event frontman Mikel Jollett a sense of purpose in life as a singer, songwriter, band leader, author and speaker about childhood trauma. As he acknowledged about hiding trauma, “So you perform, maybe become funny. I better make people like me because they won’t like me for myself.” Headphones on and allowing myself to be fully ensconced within the world Jollett has built on Airborne Toxic Event’s 2025 record, 

Join Keith for a fabulous conversation with John Stirratt and Pat Sansone of The Autumn Defense that touches on birthdays, writing styles, and collaboration, as well as gigs to come. There's also brand new stuff of the cover variety from Joe Pernice, Jeffrey Martin, Betty Lavette, and Jesper Lindell (Ok, the Lavette isn't brand new, but the album it's coming from is!). There's also Courtney Marie Andrews and a tribute to Steve Cropper and possibly the English cricket team. What's not to like?

There's a funny fact that we can impart before you go and break your heart listening to then latest single from Anna Tivel.  'Swan Song' is taken from a new collection called "B Sides" which acts as a companion piece to the current full album "Animal Poem".  Yes, this song of fragile beauty is a B-side. 

Amy Speace has it all. She is an outstanding vocalist, balancing raw emotion, storytelling tones and great control. She is an accomplished songwriter who displays fine musicianship and finds glorious melodies, arranged with care and sensitivity. And, importantly, she is a superb narrator of life's tales, bringing her stories to life with poetic lyricism and the detail of her characters' development.

If one thing has become apparent from the lists that have appeared on these pages and the, not unsurprisingly, incredibly wide range of songs that have featured to date, it must be that it seems highly unlikely that there will be a runaway winner here. There appears little broad consensus, something that reflects, almost inevitably, on the equally broad range of ages asked to offer up their opinions for this feature.

The Brinsley's "Silver Pistol" was the album that perfected their Band obsession and, at the same time, showed that there was a lot more to them than being simple wannabes. Coincidentally, it was the first time that Ian Gomm was featured on record as singer, guitarist and songwriter, roles he continued to fulfil until Brinsley Schwarz ran out of steam in 1975.

Ten emotive tracks of timeless quality. The Sweet Hereafter have been around for close on a quarter century. On this new album from the band, the tracks within centre around Jesse Sykes' transcendent voice, tracks filled with themes of magical thinking, emotional dislocation, death and transformation, but with Phil Wandscher's playing bringing additional musical alchemy. Sykes said that this album is "

Grammy-nominated American songwriter Amythyst Kiah makes a long overdue return to the UK and Ireland for her first shows here since the release of her acclaimed “Still + Bright” album.  AUK’s Fred Arnold, awarding the album a deserved 9/10 in 2024, wrote: “Amythyst Kiah digs very deep, expanding her musical space, opening up her songwriting process, displaying a greater vocal range and delivering a very personal message – it’s a remarkable and powerful album”.

Music Venue Properties was started by The Music Venue Trust and “focuses on removing venues from vulnerable leases by purchasing the freehold of the buildings and placing them into community ownership.” They recently acquired The Croft in Bristol, which while not especially associated with “our” sort of music does have a consistent programme of live music supporting artists at real grassroots level.

Having just returned from a successful two-month tour in the USA, Cornwall-based singer-songwriter Sarah McQuaid is gearing up for a short “warm-up” UK tour starting on 16th January, and she’s already at work on her new album. “My new studio is nearly finished,” she says. “When I first got home from the US tour we had to get the builders to sort out a few places where water was still coming through the tanking — but they’ve done that now, so it’s just a question of getting the walls and floor sealed and decorated in order for us to be able to start tracking the new album over the Christmas break!”

A good debut of melodic, laid-back americana, with words that reflect well the realities of life. “Daylight Heart Moonlight Soul” is the first album from Belfast-based Slow Autumn, although they have previously released a couple of singles, ‘Wash Me In The Fading Light’ and ‘Lean into the Night’. They say their music is for fans of Wilco, Jason Isbell, and John Moreland, and this is a good starting point, though it is a little gentler in reality.

Farewell to the greatest voice in modern popular music Raul Malo has died, at the ridiculously young age of 60.  The son of Cuban emigrants who could sing virtually anything with ease and conviction will no longer grace us with his heavenly tones, having succumbed to severe complications from colon cancer that he publicly disclosed in June 2024.  So it is perhaps fortunate that he leaves an extensive and important body of work, both with The Mavericks and solo.

Laura Hugo's new single 'Radio' is her first single since 2017 and comes in advance of her five song EP "Where We Go To Grieve" which will be released early next year.  'Radio' is a poignant reflection on her upbringing on and around the Navajo Nation, a landscape that shaped her resilience, humanity and creativity.