In this episode we were joined by self-professed “failed musician” and pasta-sauce mogul Loyd Grossman, OBE, to wax nostalgic about the most important years of his illustrious career: those he spent as a contributor to Fusion, Rolling Stone and other American music papers. Loyd reminisced very amusingly about seminal late ’60s shows at the Boston Tea Party, before explaining how he moved to London and reinvented himself as a British national treasure on TV and in every kitchen in the country. He also recounted how he came to play guitar, three times a year, with Jethro Tull.

After a digression on the sad passing of Fairport Convention’s original singer Judy Dyble, Loyd joined us in hearing clips from a 1982 audio interview with Queen’s Brian May in which that poodle-headed plank-spanker describes, among other things , working with David Bowie on the classic ‘Under Pressure’. I dragged Loyd into a discussion of the wrath heaped upon his compatriots the (Dixie) Chicks, whose new album Gaslighter afforded the opportunity to examine the close links between country music and hyper-patriotism. Loyd turned out to be a country fan and gives a special thumbs-up to the Chicks’ defiant 2006 song ‘Not Ready To Make Nice’.

Mark Pringle brought the episode to the boil with remarks on new library pieces such as Lillian Roxon’s 1966 review of James Brown at Madison Square Garden, Roy Carr’s day out in Hyde Park in summer 1970 watching Pink Floyd and Kevin Ayers, and David Keeps meeting Madonna at the Hard Rock Café. Jasper Murison-Bowie’s chosen pieces included Ian Penman on hip hop and John Calvert on OK Go…