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Continuing my trip back through the 1981 album charts. 02/08/81 : Hotter Than July - Stevie Wonder Our sixth visit with Stevie and, like the rest of them, I've never heard this one - but looking at some of the tracks that I already know on here, I think I'm gonna like it. Oh yeah - this has got some fine tracks on it. "Happy Birthday" is the one everyone knows, but I also really like "I Ain't Gonna Stand For It", "Master Blaster (Jammin')" and "Lately". I didn't know any of the rest but they all sound decent enough on first listen, so this definitely seems worth multiple listens - which is obviously true for most of the Stevie albums I've met (all except for Journey Through The Secret Life Of Plants ) and I've yet to relisten to any of them. There's no doubting he's an exceptionally talented lad though, and this is a joyful, celebratory, skilful bunch of tracks with some great hooks. We're at #8 in the char...

Some fine parkrun tourism. 06/09/25 : Cassiobury  This was my first proper parkrun tourism - heading away from St Albans to see what their event offers. My eldest was, of course, responsible - we were off to see Tia, one of her friends from uni and we'd carefully arranged to meet her at the café beforehand, so time was allowed for chatting. The event is 19km away in Watford and I know the traffic can be terrible on a Saturday morning, so I allowed some time for that. It's also in a very big park and I had no idea how close the parking was to the start, so I allowed some more time for that... ...and so, to no-one's surprise in the family, we were there very early. We were also very much on our own - not only were there was no sign of a friend, there was no sign of any runners at all. Hmmm. Ah, hold on, there are TWO cafés - time for a speedy warm-up walk! By the time we got to the start line, there was no time to experience the other café (there was always afterwards) but th...

Continuing my trip forward in time through the album charts 30/10/26 : Visitor - Sienna Spiro Well, this is a bit of a surprise. We met this album in passing as a new entry back in mid July and I liked it with her pushing Madonna close for the coveted album of the week award. However, I never imagined that we'd get to meet it properly seventeen weeks later with it not having left the top ten at all in that time - the lass has got to be pleased with that, hasn't she? Interestingly, the Olivias ( Rodrigo  and  Dean ) and the Michael Jackson best-of have also been ever present in the top ten during that period and the Fleetwood Mac best-of runs them close, but spent a couple of weeks at #11. But this week is all about Sienna... Last time I said that it gave strong Amy Winehouse or Raye vibes and she's only 20 but it's got a much more mature sound than that would suggest - but you're obviously looking for a much more in-depth analysis than that, so here goes. Well, err...

Continuing my trip back through the 1981 album charts. 09/08/81 : KooKoo - Debbie Harry I remember this album cover but I didn't remember it was Debbie - I find Blondie's output to be somewhat variable, so I'm not sure what to expect from this. Hmmm - it's an odd one. The backing tracks are generally fine, if somewhat generic, funk-pop and Debbie does her Blondiesque thing, which is generally fine, if not always quite in tune. However, the vocal and the backing track don't always seem to quite match up - it just feels like they were done separately and paired randomly,  which makes some of the songs rather puzzling . I did quite like "Chrome" though - they got it right on that one. I didn't love it overall but I wouldn't say it's a dreadful album - it just feels a bit odd for most of the time. We're at #6 in the charts this week on her second week of a seven week run, with this being as high as it got. The top five this week were the Royal ...

A milestone! 31/10/26 : Jersey Farm  This is my closest event but wasn't the first one I did - for various reasons I went to the main St Albans one first, but couldn't be bothered going quite so far when I went back for my second week. So, on 18th May '24, I took the ten minute walk from my house to the Jersey Farm Country Park - and I remember absolutely nothing about that run except that I hated the hills (and they involved a lot of stopping and walking). But I've been back a few times since and so, this weekend, I celebrated my 100th event there (out of 119 parkruns in total) - but I also celebrated a second consecutive family-based first. Last week was the first time that our youngest did it and so we had three Reeds doing the same event (Elaine was volunteering for the Poppy Appeal otherwise I'm sure she'd have been there) but this week the eldest was off in Burton doing a spot of parkrun tourism on her own, so it was the first time it was just me and the ...

Continuing my trip back through the 1981 album charts. 16/08/81 : Hi Infidelity - REO Speedwagon My initial thought on seeing this week's offering was "I didn't expect to see them in the 80s" - but then it occurred to me I had no idea when we might be seeing them. Wikipedia tells me that they were active from '67-'24 but this is likely to be the only time we meet them - it's also only their second ever mention, after noting they chose not to record "Danger Zone" for the Top Gun soundtrack. Well, it's not dreadful in terms of musical skill but whilst it may be 1981, for me this belongs squarely in the mid 70s - they do know how to put a decent melody together but it's all super cheesy with an awful lot amount of repetition (they're really not scared to reuse any ideas they have). However, I do have give them credit for  "Keep On Loving You" which just has such a rousing chorus that I can forgive it any sins (and it actually ...