If you were a black kid growing up in postwar Detroit, there’s a good chance you would sing in the school choir and the church, and end up in a doo wop group before graduating to RnB and soul.

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Fusing punk, funk and elements of avant-garde jazz, Ludus were one of the first, and most distinctive, postpunk artists.

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La Luz sound as if they should come from somewhere by the sea in sunny SoCal but actually come from rainy Seattle… though they did once record an album in a California surfboard shop, and now live there.

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Bow Wow Wow were formed by Malcolm McLaren from the ashes of Adam & the Ants, with 13-year-old singer Arabella Lu-Win.

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Around the turn of the century I made a musical pilgrimage to the tiny Texas town of Luckenbach, once immortalised in song by Waylon Jennings.

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She might not be a household name but Jean Shepard was a pioneer for women in country music, with a staggering 73 singles in the country chart between 1953 and 1981.

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For some musicians, a tragic death elevates a mediocre career to legendary status. But it didn’t work out that way for Cowboy Copas.

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I have to confess that growing up I only knew the name Brenda Lee from the Golden Earring song Radar Love. I’m not sure I even knew she was a real person. But she was.

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I would not have called myself a big fan but I once went to interview Lionel Richie, in Paris, almost entirely for my own amusement. I shall explain.

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During the short but sweet 2-Tone era, The Beat clocked up half a dozen hit singles of which Mirror In The Bathroom, which reached No.4 in 1980, was arguably the best. 

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