well all i can say Dick is - have a go at singing songs you don't like. you often discover virtues you didn't realise existed! that's my experience. the whole Irish thing opened up for me when the thene pub made it possible for me to swap the rickenbacker for an acoustic guitar. i always loved acoustic guitar - but there was no possibility of making a living with one up til then - not for my generation. the same with country music really. i was afolkie - always disdainful of Nashville, til i won a competition singing a country song and that gave me my professional music career - or at least gave me the impetus.

I was very interested in Lemon. but he seems to have led a shadowy existence. the biographical material is really there in his songs - nobody much seems to have written much about him.

fellow mudcatter Elmore and i had a go finding out about Lemon but we hit a brick wall. the stuff that's written about him is very insubstantial. one of the few places i've found a solid recollection of the man is Elijah Wood's biography of Josh. his childhood memories of Lemon are very vivid and convincing. that's why i said i thought he knew more about him and his music than most. Also Josh has this intensity with blues. Lemon is intense - so intense that he doesn't seem to notice what's around him - whereas with Josh its all about the audience. nevertheless - he SO knows what the blues is about.