Spending a day in the 1930's with the Al Bowlly enthusiasts...

Richard, myself, Neil and James before we set off

Those people keeping note of my facebook recently will have noticed that I went to London on Saturday for Memory Lane's Al Bowlly tour.

I was quite nervous actually, I had never been to any event before concerning the 1930's, or any singers related to that period. In fact, before I went to this I had never met (excepting online) anyone sharing my music tastes so I didn't quite know what to expect.

My favourite photo of Al Bowlly

And I was pleasantly surprised! Alright, the average age of the crowd was probably well over 50 - in fact I think I was the only person my age who came alone, the next youngest people were in their mid 30's I think.

I felt more at home in that crowd than I have ever been, the crowd of people in vintage clothing, the crowd of gramophone collectors and dance band enthusiasts. I didn't feel odd or out of place talking about 78rpm discs like they were fragile relics, gramophones - and people didn't say "what?" when talking about Ray Noble, or Lew Stone

One lovely couple I met, Andrew and Karen

In short, I loved meeting so many like minded people all at once because they were all so nice - and united by their passion for the real good music from the past. I remember at one point when Ray stopped the tour, saying "Sorry for the background noise, I think there's some builders doing building work - or is it rock music playing". A ripple of hearty laughter spread amongst the crowd. In few other places would that joke go down so well.

I think the more I get in to my passion, the more I'm convinced I am a man out of his time