One More Tune DJs

04/12/2024

DJing at the Buttoned Down Disco in Camden's Koko. Link and more photos in the comments below 🔗👍😁

26/11/2024

Let The Music Play: how R&B fell in love with 80s synths by on . I've seen some dafties mark this down because it didn't mention Erasure, New Order, Depeche Mode etc but if they had bothered to read the title they would understand it's actually clearly about the legendary New York TONTO synthesiser, and how Stevie Wonder, Prince, Marvin Gaye, Michael Jackson, Janet Jackson, Madonna, Arthur Baker, Giorgio Moroder, George Clinton, Ray Parker Jr et al assimilated synths into their songs. Each chapter tackles a set of songs related by personnel or chronology. There were whole chapters of stuff I had never heard of. This is an incredible work, scholarly yet easy to read, and a delight to read accompanied by a good smart speaker linked to the big evil streaming service of your choice. 5/5

31/10/2024

The grisly climax of several Pin Up Frights was spending a record fee to secure the DJ services of Carl Barat. A complicated character, but he was certainly box office. New blog and loads more pictures on the One More Tune DJs website. Sincere thanks to & for most of the photography. Tag anyone you recognise 😁🧟‍♂️👍

23/10/2024

It's not all music here at OMTDJs HQ as I visited Amsterdam at the weekend to run . I don't think there have ever been any champion distance runners from Donegal (where 100% of my genes are from), but I like getting fit and this is the first time I have competed internationally. Like some crazed homing pigeon the day before the race I walked right past old haunts , punk rock dive bar Cafe The Minds (yes, its named after ) and the Leidseplein, where I busked back in 1999 🎸. I also hobbled around the Rijksmuseum on the Monday morning and finally saw the famous Cuypers Library. At the race itself I succumbed to mad cramp and finished 3:30, 3 mins behind my PB. Fine margins at this tough level 😆 Swipe to see some pics including a Mobot on the finish line 🤖

14/10/2024

I never ever met this guy, but respect is due. I saw him in the Soundhaus and I saw him in Spain (OK, Catalonia) and it was great fun every time. When running parties in the noughties I tried to make pals with and failed, and it was maybe Jackmaster deleting my emails!

As a DJ he had a world famous ability to play whatever the hell he wanted, Idioteque at the end of his fabriclive mix being a perfect example (if anyone else tries to play Radiohead, it's a disaster - I speak from experience).

When I think of Jackmaster I think of the fantastic Ultra Thizz (I assume he produced it, I don't know what genre it is), Simulated by Marco V (trance?) and Georgy Porgy by Toto (yacht rock definitely).

I will let others such as wrestle with his legacy, noting that RA has seem hell-bent on taking down some of their Gods of the 10s. Maybe they will step more lightly from here on in.

14/08/2024

Thank you Fiona! How lovely to get a review from a wedding back in the mists of time of September 2021.

I have checked correspondence and I did indeed describe the 7 hour example playlist Fiona sent me as (caps lock deliberately on) "AMAZING". Multiple Primal Scream and Pulp was played and also, later on, Utah Saints and Future Sound of London. Wonderful records.

is a very cool venue but unfortunately it's an absolutely epic journey from my humble Glasgow lodgings, so I am pretty much priced out of ever DJing there again.

Delays were also no problem as I got time to chat with the legendary .

08/08/2024

Thank you Richard & ! I felt onstage that WEDFEST was a very Good One but I never truly know if I'm just getting high on my own supply of fun times. I've already Done A Reel (go look please) from the wedding. Upon reflection, I included several photos of Rosa's dad BJ from his afternoon DJ set, and it looks a bit like he is One More Tune DJs. And y'know what? That's fine. I spoke to him at the end and he was great 😁😎🪩

06/08/2024

Tales From the Dancefloor by with Luke Bainbridge. Sacha was the creator of The Warehouse Project and Parklife. I have huge admiration for someone who can scale club nights to the heights of thousands of folk per night. A few years back I had tickets for New Order's biggest ever show, also promoted by Sacha, but couldn't go (I did the right thing and attended a great pal's stag do in Aviemore :-))

Some thoughts -

I don't think it needed the autobiographical stuff about Sacha's childhood at the start. It doesn't seem that relevant, apart to flag he is a big Prince and Bowie guy and maybe isn't that into the music his parties and events have become famous for.

There's some surprising typos and repetitions - was this finished in a rush? Was Luke brought in fairly late on? At the start the chapter titles all reference The Smiths, then that's just ditched for more factual headings ("Grace Jones").

It's not really clear why he took on re-opening (nightclub) Sankeys in (incredibly rough area) Ancoats. In my experience promoters don't really know much about running clubs - and vice versa. There's definitely a chunk of story missing there.

Otherwise he seems honest to an almost fault. It's absolutely fascinating and great fun. He admits staging fights to avoid sound restrictions, drills holes in walls belonging to Network Rail, names and shames plenty of promoters and artists, even grasses up Man U players and staff for attending parties before big matches.

Personally, I had a lot of criticisms of the Victoria Warehouse venue during my visits, and Sacha confirms that he also knew it was crap and the worst 2 years of his life. (I actually got taken into a room there once, and was accused of stealing phones. So it's good to hear there actually was a massive problem with phones being stolen, by a Romanian gang.)

Overall a 5/5 for me!

11/07/2024

New blog - Rosa & Richard's WEDFEST feat Tequila Mockingbird, BJ the DJ, and One More Tune DJs! Link in bio to photos by and videos by me 🙂

05/07/2024

I will write a proper blog about this wedding, but it will take a wee while for the professional photos to be ready (and for me to beg permissions to use a few of them). In the meantime a wonderful review from Jayne and and a nice photo of me and my guest co-DJ .

I wouldn't say I was nervous about this one, but I definitely thought relatively hard about the potential playlist. "This guy has come all the way over from Scotland, and he's pure rubbish" is feedback I wanted to avoid.

Jayne very graciously omits to mention that I played Nessun Dorma and it bombed. I did however break the habit of 20 years of DJing and played Robbie Williams, and it was a big hit (Rock DJ if you must know). Thank you Jayne and Josh, and thank you Wendy for the styling 😁

27/06/2024

The Islander: my life in music and beyond by Chris Blackwell with Paul Morley. Chris grows up in Jamaica, is educated at Harrow in England but is asked to leave, then builds a career out of reggae, ska and rocksteady jukeboxes and soundsystems back home. Island Records really takes off with Millie Small's "My Boy Lollipop", a song I absolutely adored as a child.

There follows loads of anecdotes about an amazing array of musicians. Steve Winwood, Nick Drake and John Martyn. Cat Stevens, Robert Palmer, Tom Waits and Grace Jones. The heart of the book is Chris' discovery of, and ongoing collaboration with, Bob Marley. If you've ever wondered why Redemption Song was uncharacteristically just Bob and a guitar, the full story is told here. Loads of other things are explained too. Why Steve Winwood was in a group named after another band member. How the Tom Tom Club came about. How some of the biggest records of all time (eg Back in Black) were recorded at Compass Point studios. The MTV-smashing video to "Addicted to Love". How Chris ended up owning Ian Fleming's GoldenEye resort.

You get a sense of Paul Morley playing a very nice hand and it's almost like an expertly crafted setlist, with the story of U2 saved until the end. I feel there's probably not as much U2 chat as some would like or expect. There's also only a page on Roxy Music - which suggests there's a story there we are not getting.

Overall it's all about the music and about Chris' love of Jamaica and its people.

5/5

29/04/2024

Some Monday morning fun, it's "Muscly Murdoch", my sole foray into comic strip artistry around 2007 for Glasgow comic Khaki Shorts. You can clearly see the bold lines and dynamic energy of my favourite world-class Marvel pencillers & .geoff, and the influence of many Boxing Days spent reading Oor Wullie annuals.

Around this time my big brother counselled me against referring to Stuart Murdoch by this nickname in all Pin Up Nights media. He was concerned it was disrespectful. It was of course meant with great affection, and I'm sure Stuart (if he ever noticed it) knew this. I met him at a party once, and he was surprisingly down to Earth, and VERY funny.

19/04/2024

Mare's Guitars by Johnny Marr with Martin Kelly. Guitars have been the obsession of Johnny Marr's life. The photography by Pat Graham is beautiful, the captions and short interviews fascinating. He credits his Irish parents with his love of music 😁.
He owns the guitar worn (and I mean "worn") by Bryan Ferry in the famous inlay photo of For Your Pleasure. Famous friends such as Noel Gallagher, Bernard Butler and Ed O'Brien describe guitars he has gifted them. I'm not sure Morrissey is mentioned even once. Make of that what you will. 5/5

10/04/2024

Just a reminder that I can also help with writing speeches, and have set out my top ten tips for wiring a wedding speech on my website, under the tab "speech writing". That's it. "Brevity is the soul of wit."

21/03/2024

I keep getting asked about birthday parties, playlists, and mixes - so I've written FAQs.

I find myself regularly answering questions about DJing at birthday parties, helping with playlists, and creating mixes. Here’s some handy FAQs. Is a DJ really necessary at a birthday party? It depends. If you want a big proper party with a jumping dancefloor, then almost certainly yes. The party ...

24/01/2024

5 or so years ago I was at a Citizen’s Theatre fundraiser at .  The chap who invited me was actually from Manchester, and unfortunately wanted to chat all the way through a Ricky Ross solo piano performance.  He didn’t seem to “get” who Ricky Ross was.  This is probably as good an indication as any of Ricky and Deacon Blue’s unclear status.  They can play arenas throughout the UK, but outside Scotland are probably seen as an 80s pop rock act on a par with something like Johnny Hates Jazz.  Within Scotland they are regarded as having several absolutely massive songs and quite a few more very good ones.  I don’t think anybody in Scotland really thinks or bothers about what genre the band is, or whether they have ever been “cool”. They're as much a staple on 's Get It On as what folk are having for their dinners.

By the mid 90s Ricky seemed to think Deacon Blue was a creative straitjacket, but he never achieved solo success (bar co-writing James Blunt’s first single) and at the time of his writing this in 2021, he seemed to have embraced the Deacon Blue songbook as containing the highlights of his career. I would have liked more about how he wrote particular songs.  There is a bit of “God Stuff”(as one grumpy reviewer on Good Reads has put it) but I would actually have liked more of the God Stuff as God, and Dundee United and Bruce Springsteen, is clearly what makes him tick. As well as Glasgow – there’s lots of positivity about Glasgow. "Dignity" was written by the window of his flat in Kenmure St, Pollokshields.

So - I’d give this a very solid 4/5 - bearing in mind I’m a fan who gets hacked off at folk talking over Ricky performing.

ps during the post-dinner auction at the Citizens’ fundraiser, I actually won an item that I had made an initial offer for, just in order to kick the bidding off.  Whoops!  It was lunch, hair, make up and professional photos on the Citzens stage (via their wardrobe dept) for and 7 pals.  A veritable bargain.