The Oscars took place last weekend, an awards ceremony which always has a special place for me. My grandad, Lionel Couch, was an art director and – as you can see from the accompanying photo – was twice nominated for Oscars, for Sons and Lovers (1960) and Anne of the Thousand Days (1969)...

I was saddened to hear of the recent death of Karl Wallinger, a musician whose work plays a huge part in the story of Dead Man Singing.

I first encountered Karl Wallinger as a member of the Waterboys in their ‘big music’ phase, which remains my favourite incarnation of their varied caree...

Like Canned Heat, on Saturday I found myself on the road again. The Dave Masters live experience – aka myself and singer/guitarist/all round good bloke Olly Hopper-Pay – were hitting Arundel to appear at a literary festival, my first one as a speaker.

We met some lovely people, from orga...

Q is for Queen, who don’t get many mentions in Dead Man Singing, but who do crop up a couple of times. They would have been contemporaries of Dave’s on his way up, albeit ones whose career avoided the dip that derailed their fictional peer. I included their first album in the list of rec...