With regard to other matters, Mel Wright informs me that he managed to get Bernie Pallo’s obituary in the online Guardian and to read it, the link is as follows:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/theguardian/2012/jan/15/bernie-pallo-obituary

It’s a good tribute to Bernie’s life.

I’ve just received the contract for our gig in September for the Banbury blues festival “Blues Attic Revisited” on Saturday September 8^th  at 8p.m. until 9.20p.m. in the theatre at The Mill Arts Centre, Spiceball Park, Banbury, Oxon. OX16 5QE I am looking forward to it as I have fond memories of the Blues Attic days. As I’ll be 75 a month later perhaps I’d better start thinking of another Birthday Bash while I’m still in full charge of a my faculties. Or at least I think I am. Now how did I lose those emails?

Talking about medical matters, a week ago I went to Wimbledon to meet Chris Youlden for a pre-Christmas drink. It turned out that a bad foot infection and swollen leg had obliged him to go on a heavy antibiotic regime which meant definitely no drinking. This meant that I had to drink for both of us, which, naturally, I endeavoured to do. I’m sure my doctor would have approved of my good intentions. Chris and I reminisced, without too much maudlin, about the early days when we did a few gigs with the late Dave Peverett and his brother. This was before Dave’s days with Savoy Brown and Foghat. Yes, the mention of Savoy Brown brought up a few interesting memories too. It’s good to see that Kim Simmonds is still going strong with the band. I then went up to Sloane Square to meet Gigi and some of her friends who had just been left a million pounds each And so to bed.

The perambulations continued for the next few nights with assorted parties and celebrations, My final outing was a couple of days ago when I met up with drummer Dino Coccia and his protégé Dean. We were joined by a friend of Dean’s who’d been living on the streets but was now on the up and was in fact helping others who were living rough. This was illustrated when we were about to part at Holborn tube station and he saw a homeless woman. He immediately decided to stay and help her. I gave him my loose change to do as he thought best for her. Ah, the spirit of Christmas and me an atheist. Despite that, I wish you all the Best for the Fest.

Afterwards we went to the nearest pub for breakfast. This happened to be the William IV on Harrow Road where proceedings were interrupted from time to time by a very determined food-seeking Jack Russell terrier. My daughter Elinore decided that as it was pretty dirty and obviously hungry it was probably lost so she took it along to the nearest Mayhew animal centre where they told her that they would try to find the owner but that in the meantime, they would name the dog as they always did when animals were brought in. No surprise then to find that the dog had been named William the fourth.

The next day Jean and his wife and a few of Bernie’s friends, including Gordon Smith and I, gathered to scatter his ashes. The following evening, we  put on a musical wake for Bernie. The basic line-up was myself, Jim Mercer and Dino Coccia. We were joined by Jon T-bone Taylor, Todd Sharpville and Big Joe Louis, with other guests including bass players Pete Duke and Brian Diprose, who had all worked with Bernie over the years. It was very much a last minute  operation because for some reason I was reluctant to organise it, but I’m glad I got it together.

To turn to other matters, last Sunday I went along to The first fund-raising session for the newly formed National Blues Archive which aims to gather material on the early days of British blues among other things. It intends to do for British Blues what the National Jazz Archive does for Jazz. They will probably be doing more fundraising sessions in future at the Coach & Horses in High Road Leyton. What surprised me about it was the quality of music played there and also the fact that there were some great young guys. Considering that I was bemoaning the state of blues in London not too long ago, I was really pleased to get such a shot in the arm.

I have arranged a wake gig at the Elephant and Castle, Elgin Avenue W9 on Wednesday evening starting at 8.30. The pub is at the Harrow Road end of Elgin. The line-up is Gordon Smith on guitar and vocals, Jim Mercer bass and vocals, Dino Coccia on drums and myself on harp and vocals.

Bernie’s last recording was on the “Greek Street” Cd along with Chris Youlden, Mel Wright and myself. He also played in my band for the last five years at the Inn on the Green monthly residency. Indeed his last gig was on our final night there, as the place closed down a little while later. He has been fighting cancer for the last two and a half years and I and his other friends will miss him badly.

He hated the cigarette smoking ban and the gastrofication of pubs but loved food, cigarettes, wine, women, Guiness, books and film and we often went together to his favourite cinema in Soho for matinee performances immediately followed by a trip to the Coach and Horses in Greek Street. This was the pub where we met with Mel and Chris for so-called business talks, but the only real business there was drinking and discussing music, books and anything else, but not too much nostalgia.

For me, it was as a bluesman that I found him most on my wavelength. He loved Vinyl and had not much time for anything other than analogue reproduction. In fact the only time I ever got to listen to some serious blues on disc was when we’d spend the evening over a bottle of wine and bathed in the blues sounds of the greats of American blues. His style of playing was routed in the early Wolf guitarists and he was unique in that determination to play that way.

He had a part-time day job for over thirty years delivering Meals-on-wheels in the Westminster area and he made many friends during that time. I and Gordon Smith also worked there from time to time and I remember that Bernie would sometimes come in like a bear with a sore head, but on the whole he was helpful and considerate to his colleagues and customers. He will be missed there as well as on the music front.

On another note, Bass player Bob Brunning also died a week ago and his funeral is on Wednesday in a couple of days. It will be at 12.30 at Lambeth Crematorium in Blackshore Road. I did a couple of gigs with Bob and played also at his club. He ran a decent little blues festival too. He also published a few books including “Blues: The British Connection” as he was also there in the early days, with Fleetwood Mac and Savoy brown among other bands that he played in. He had a decent obituary in the national press and again will be sadly missed.

My next foray was to Paradise by way of Kensal Rise to catch Big Joe Louis and his band. Another good evening not too far from home. Jon T-bone Taylor joined us there and it’s good to see him out and about. Not quite such good news about my guitarist Bernie Pallo as he had to go back into hospital. He’s out again now but is taking a long time to recover.

Last week Gigi had a break from work so we took a couple of trips, one to Brighton and, last Friday, to Paris for the day She had some business to transact and I decided to go with her. We mooched about the capital and ended up in a restaurant, watching passers-by in the rain, before heading for home. She probably would have preferred that I had stayed at home as, on going through the departure check out, we found that I’d lost her passport  On reflection I realised that the only place  I could have lost it was on the train, so thanks to some very helpful liaison between the French and British Border controllers it was found at the lost property office at the Gare du Nord. I think I’m back in her good books now…I was very impressed with the Eurostar service, by the way.