It has been a while since posting a YouTube find but this particular video was worth it. Squeeze, bringer of Jools Holland, appeared on the Jimmy Fallon show a few weeks ago to promote their upcoming tour. Besides giving a rollicking performance of this classic from 1980, the performance featured an iPad piano solo – the first on television! Organ is featured throughout but their keyboardist throws in this gem at 2:27 into the performance. It is outstanding to see the precision in his fingers as well as the excellent sounds coming from his tablet.

Speaking from experience, few keyboardists would give up a human-surrounding rig of keyboards for an single device, but gigging musicians can continue to dream…

And welcoming in this lovely new site is the first YouTube find.

What happens when you fuse together a late-1980s Fleetwood Mac classic with a late-2000s Indie Rock band with African influences? The result is this cover of Everywhere by Vampire Weekend. I’m a big fan of Vampire Weekend – their sound is clean, modern and interesting. Their songs are not huge anthems to be sung in arenas – they are short, quiet and energetic stories of romance, class warfare and architecture.

So, Everywhere? The bass line is a strong part of the song and the groove fits in with their set. However, they’ve stripped away most of the organ and synthesised parts, which leaves the song bare at times. The crowd know the song and sign along rapturously. When you compare to it a live performance by the Mac, it may fall a little flat but Vampire Weekend haven’t desecrated the musical history of Everywhere, they’ve just done a decent cover.

So enjoy this Upper West Side Soweto version of Christine McVie’s request for love and attention.

This has been my first post in a long time, over a month in fact. This is due to having a ridiculously life at the moment – with a final year degree, my role as Vice President of Van Mildert College, my band and enjoying each and every day! Tonight I am working on a number of menial tasks that aren’t particularly fun for anyone and I was sifting through my music collection to find something I had not listen to in a while.

What came out was this beauty. Fire, the lead single of Kasbian’s last album West Ryder Pauper Lunatic Asylum. The album has been described as “Sounds like a Frog in a Top Hat, wearing a monocle. Smoking a cigar”.

Can’t disagree really, can you? Fire begins off as a slowing ballad, that rollocks into fifth gear for a funk-inspired rock chorus, with some excellent vocal-guitar interplay. Very much a return to form of their best work.

Today’s video find isn’t going to be about Fleetwood Mac (or even Public Image Ltd for that matter). We will be exploring a piece of music that rates among some of the greatest achievements in British music. Echoes by Pink Floyd is a 23 minute movement that you either love or hate. For some, it drags on too long for a song. For others, it is a grand statement of everything the Floyd are about. Indugling yourself into the piece takes you on a journey of moods that is unlike anything else ever written.

The introduction is an exquisite example of the musical chemistry between David Gilmour and Richard Wright. There are some parts that are cringeworthy – namely the feedback wah-wah section, but it all helps the tension building and breaking process. Here we have some of the last live performances of Richard Wright. If you do some browsing, or buy the DVD, you can see the rest. The jam section that comes later in the song is just brilliant too.

Your Own Sweet Way (The Notting Hillbillies) – From Mark Knopfler’s side project during Dire Straits late-80s hiatus. Slower and more contemplative, this country-blues influenced project is rather reminiscent of his recent solo work. This live version strikes a good balance of staying true to the original and improvisation. The slow and laid back pace works well with Knopfler’s vocal stylings. Harmonies and tasty organ work are always a plus.

Magic (Ladyhawke) – After being introduced to Ladyhawke, I was delighted to discover you can trace each of her songs from her debut album to something that was created in the 80s. In the case of the wonderful opening track to her album, looking no further than the extended mix of The Safety Dance. Following the mantra of ‘great artists steal’, this is a wonderfully catchy track that would not be out of place in any 2980s dance floor, or 2000s for that matter.

Fool’s Gold (The Stone Roses) - Taking a more funk-orientated direction than their seminal album, this is possibly their most known song (among fans, apparently), with its bright and bouncy rhythms. Waterfall, She Bangs The Drums and Made of Stone are also contenders in my ranking of their top material. It is astonishing they managed to produce some truly great songs in only the span of one album and a few years of time.

They don’t get any more rare than this. I was amazed to find this on YouTube and how on earth it made it to the internets, I have no idea. The Second Arrangement, from Steely Dan was infamously erased during recording sessions due to a mistake of their engineer. The song was meant to be one of the highlights of the upcoming Gaucho album but it was not meant to be. After this disaster, a re-recording was attempted and this is what we have today. It’s not great quality but it gives you the idea of what the song would have sounded like.

The track is more upbeat than anything else on Gaucho, apart from possibly the title track. It has a slightly disco vibe to it and appears here in an almost-complete version with backing singers, guitars, electric piano and drums. To me, the song sounds great and a true lost gem. However, Fagen and Becker weren’t satisfied as it obviously never met their original vision for the song. Their visions and ideas were of very high standards so something had to be truly great to make the final cut.

Conclusion? If it was even released as it is here, it probably would have been a highlight of the album. Listen and enjoy to one of the few unreleased Dan tracks.

Wings, The band the Beatles could have been.

The immortal words of Alan Partridge, in reference to Paul McCartney's post-Beatles backing group. I for one, have not explored much of the post-Beatles work of Lennon, Harrison and Starr, usually following with the consensus that it is inferior to anything the Fab Four achieve within their years together and not worth touching. However, while browsing the internet one evening, I discovered that the best selling album by any ex-Beatle is All Things Must Pass by George Harrison. Not Band On The Run. Not Imagine.

One of the songs from the album is today's featured video. My Sweet Lords was a #1 hit single on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean and, as the young folk say today, is a tune. Harrison, known for his spiritual awareness, honours the Hindu God Krishna throughout, injecting some gospel vibes too this. The version featured is from The Concert For George, a tribute to Harrison after he passed away in 2002. The number of musicians on this is staggering – Billy Preston injects some soulful singing and tasteful organ playing, Clapton leading the band, Harrison's son, Jeff Lynne, the list goes on. Despite the poor quality of this video, this is a fantastic rendition of a great song. With the recent interest in all-things Beatles, this is one of the best things I've managed to gain from the media explosion.

And let's not mention Ringo's drumming on this performance.

We all have our own favourite albums (I would say records but that's an antiquated term now) and mine have changed many times. From the top of my head, my answers over the past few years include Wish You Were Here, Let It Bleed and One Of These Nights. Yes, these are all old records that haven't been popular for twenty years. However, my personal progress of musical discovery started with all the big major artists and has moved forward with the lesser known ones. I'm becoming better at accepting new artists and finding where the new pioneers are. However, if I did a survey of my Last.fm, I could probably guess 80% – 90% of my library is from pre-1990.

My current top record, without question, though is The Nightfly by Donald Fagen. It was his first solo recording after the partnership of Fagen and Walter Becker broke up in 1980 and the album has something magical about it. The topic is Fagen's childhood – the futuristic view forward from a young man. In fact, the title track gives this away. The International Geophysical Year (or IGY) was 1957-1958 so, put yourself into the mindset for this album. It moves from the notions of teenage romance to the future, the cold war and late night Jazz radio. Some records are made to be listened to at night, and The Nightfly is one of them. It's also something to be listened to as one piece.

There are few live recordings of Fagen around but the nearest thing is this performance on Night Music of the album opener, IGY. You can see Fagen, the fellow in the grey shirt on keyboards who appears. This performance certainly takes the tempo of the song up with a different approach to singing and saxophone work by David Sanborn. The song looks to the future – what a wonderful world it is going to be, how technology will have evolved and how happy we will all be. Just like those futuristic images from the 50s showed how we would be living in twenty years time. Although the topic is old, the musical is crisp, clean and very early 80s. It never feels nostalgic. Synthesiers can be found but they don't overrule the record. The first twenty five seconds the record set the perfect tone for the whole record – laid back, easy, futuristic and late night.

Check out the original full recording here too, it's a thing of beauty.

With Mark Knopfler recently released his sixth solo album Get Lucky, he's now done as much work solo as he did with Dire Straits. In my oh-so-personal opinion, the last great thing mark did was 2004's Shangri-La. It has some of his most rocking tunes since the early 80s, even with his laid-back approach. However, today's video is the opposite of this – Dire Straits really kick into this performance of Once Upon A Time In The West. Knopfler isn't seen here as the confident show man that was to mature in later years.

When looking at the first two albums, some say there is little to differentiate their first eponymous release from Communique. However, the album opener shows progression from straight rock to something different. It can be argued that Dire Straits ended with David Knopfler left the band during the recording of their third album. I say it’s just the end of the original band. They moved onto more complicated music, leaving behind this brand of laid back, jazz-influenced pub rock. So, enjoy this gem from the original Dire Straits.

If only Mark would give this (and some other early tunes) a shot with his current band. Now that would be something to see.

Before the allegations and problems you read about in the tabloid press, Amy Winehouse was an amazing singer. A true diva of the twenty first century and someone who made songs. Someone who also knew her heritage in the classic singers of old – Ella Fitzgearld, Etta James and Aretha Franklin.

Tonight's clip from the end of 2007 shows us an excellent cover of I Heard It Through The Grapevine, featuring not just Winehouse and Jools' house band but also Paul Weller. Yes, that Paul Weller of The Jam. He does a good job but the song comes into its own when Winehouse is let loose to do her job. They could have chosen any Motown song but none would have worked as well as this does.

Hopefully the days of Ms. Winehouse entertaining us all with her vocal pipes return once again.