Well, I thought I would never get around to writing another blog. A mixture of a broken laptop and ‘life in general’ has resulted in me not writing a post for a couple of months. I intend to change that over the next few weeks! Over the two month period of blog absence I have been working on the edited Zappa collection for Ashgate entitled ‘Zappa and the And’. Progress  is good, some chapters finished, a few ‘on route’, and a few just starting the journey: one this is for sure – I am confident it will be an excellent contribution to Zappa’s legacy. As the book has been taking up so much of my time, I have had little time to write much else, although I did have a Zappa chapter come out a few weeks ago in ‘Contemporary Theatre Review‘ It is part of a special issue on Music and Performance and has a number of really interesting chapters by other academics. A snapshot of my chapter on The Zappa Family Trust can be found at here. (So many people helped me with this research, and they are all listed in the  first footnote). Alongside my colleague Ben Challis, I have also started to complete (if that makes sense) a book chapter on popular music and loops. I blogged about this a while back, but we are now working on finishing up for a book chapter that will be published in a French publication – more details when they become available.

Much of my time over the last few months has also been taken up with starting up the Foundation Degree in music industry entrepreneurship I blogged about a while ago. The first cohort of students were inducted last week, and the course officially starts this Friday. As the programme develops I will blog about the challenges etc, and one of the things I am hoping to do over the next few months is spend some time putting together an advisory panel, and also recording some interviews with key music industry personnel, who can offer pertinent advice to the students. Again – more info soon.

Finally, my research into the live sector of the Welsh Music Industry was finished, and it has resulted in some good media coverage. I am not very good at keeping links etc, but a recent radio interview can be found below (my bit starts at around 39 mins), and an interview for the Miniature Music Press here.

http://official.fm/tracks/284178?size=large

Ok, to finish off, what have I been listening to. Well, as I type I am listening to Ergo Phizmiz, an artist from the UK, who really is continuing the experimental subversive art that I so love in Frank Zappa’s music. He has an amazing collection of  free music that he makes available via his web site here, it really is worth a listen.

That’s it for now

More next time