Back to the Boot!

I've really missed these mornings at the Rousden car boot sale, for the past 3 weeks we've been busy with the auditions for Lyme's Got Talent at Woodmead Halls, and though it's been fun and really enjoyable, hauling PA Systems about at 8.30am on a Sunday morning is not half as enjoyable as rooting in other peoples rubbish!
Wasn't a 'big boot' this week, I presume the weather must have put people off, but there were bargains to be had, and besides the usual crop of CD's, I also found some mic and guitar leads, brand new and packaged, for a fiver. Also found some lovely Tibetan Buddhist wall plaques, painted metal, one of them being a 'wrathful entity', the Mahakala, which I'm going to fix to my front door to chase away evil spirits! (Mormons. Jehovahs Witnesses, anyone I don't know wearing a tie....)
Anyway, on to the real business of the day, increasing my CD collection!:
Sarva-Antah: Mantras from Tibet. A brilliant addition to my daily yoga music. A half hour stretch, followed by a sitting meditation, best thing there is for clearing the mind and creating crop circles in the head. Only two chants on this wonderful CD, one of them plays for 55 minutes!
Sarah McLachlan: Touch. Canadian singer/songwriter, famed for emotional ballads and the range of her voice. I think I first heard her on a Bob Harris show a few years ago.
Bob Dylan: Bob Dylan. The stunning first album by Bob Dylan, and he looks so young on the cover! Some classy songs on this one, showing Dylan at the beginning of his career, and signs of the laconic delivery that later became his trade mark. At this time, he was the darling of the radical folk movements, something which he would overturn with a devastating electric performance at the Newport Folk Fest, only a couple of years later.
Mark Knopfler: Sailing to Philadelphia. I'm a big fan of Dire Straits, going all the way back to the days I lived in Deptford, SE8, but I bought this mainly for the title track, a duet between Mark and James Taylor (Sweet Baby James, You Got a Friend etc). I was a schoolteacher at the time I lived in Deptford, living on the Crossfield Estate, off Deptford Church Street, I had a primitive recording studio in our flat. I remember this really tall guy at my door (circa 1976), who I later recognised as John Ilsley, with this bulky metal tape box under his arm, asking if I could do some copies for him, I couldn't, but I intro'd him to John Dodds who worked at Jeff Beck's Underhill Studio in the Old Kent Road, who eventually sorted it all out. I'm pretty sure in retrospect that it was the 'demo' that made them famous within a year. I remember too, playing gigs at the Oxford Arms, where Mark Knopfler was rumoured to be playing dominoes in the back bar, the landlord knew me as George, and we played with a (literally!) down and out barrelhouse piano player we only knew as 'Harry', believe it if you want,........
White Noise: An Electric Storm. The stuff of legends, and what a find! The genius behind this rare and totally groundbreaking album was a character called David Vorhaus, a musician who had interests in electronic music. It was a secret at the time, revealed since, but the album was made at the BBC Radiophonic Workshop, where worked the truly legendary Delia Derbyshire, who very few people have heard of, but everyone knows her work. Among other projects, she created the original Doctor Who theme tune. My head is still reeling after hearing 'Black Mass An Electric Storm in Hell' for the first time in about 30 years! Best Track? The first one, 'Love Without Sound'.
David Gilmour: On An Island. The astoundingly successful guitarist of Pink Floyd, with an impressive number of solo albums to his credit. This one isn't just an album, it's beautifully presented, not in a plastic box, but a blue CD size booklet with the disc on the back page. An excellent range of harmonic music, vocals and instrumentals.
That's it for this week, six great albums, in new and pristine condition, difficult to say which is the 'Choice of the Week', but this lot only cost £1 each.......