Work, plus the all-pervading sense of existential despair engendered by politics in 2016. Or maybe I’m just coming down with a cold.

Some good things that came by via Twitter and MixCloud through the day:

Fantastic photos of London c.1970-71 by David Wisdom: “I was more entranced by the continued existence, both architectural and human, of a London that stretched back in time before The Beatles, before The Wars, back to the slophouses of Dickens, back to the slatterns and toffs of William Hogarth and back to the Romans.”

News of a new SoulJazz Records compilation: Venezuela 70. A nagging thought in my brain says I can’t just buy everything that comes out on SoulJazz, but there would be worse ways to build a record collection. Anyway, the teaser track sounds great:

 

Ghostpoet’s Soho Radio show threw up a few great tracks, in particular Herbie Hancock’s Wiggle Waggle, which I’d never heard before – an excellent bit of soul-funk apparently recorded for a kids’ tv show; also Rangda, whose album I’d  made a mental note to buy when I heard the single on Soundcloud then immediately forgot about.

Photobook collection addition

Got home to find East End by John Claridge had arrived in the post, published by Spitalfields Life blog, which I’d quite forgotten ordering. It’s good: nicely produced with a lot of images in,and smartly edited. I’m not a huge fan of that blog’s prose style but its commitment to photography, never mind its overall scope of recording the history of Spitalfields – and in particular the history of ordinary people – in detail, is hugely impressively.