By the way, no-one we spoke to thinks that paying out £200 to go to a festival "for the craic" is a good idea.

More depression, I'm afraid, feel free to skip this.

As mentioned elsewhere, we attended a family wedding on Saturday. Chatting to fellow guests, we mentioned our festival plans for the summer.

A few people of various ages from mid-20s to mid-50s asked who was headlining at each of the four festivals we're going to.

First telling point was that I had to look them up online. Honestly, no-one stuck in my head.

Second telling point was that most people we spoke with had never heard of almost any of the artists. Rick Wakeman caused a raised eyebrow from one older guy, but only because he was convinced Rick died years ago.

One woman looked over my shoulder at the screen showing Cropredy artists and commented that if they're having a special guest and they're not selling enough tickets, you'd think the Special Guest's identity wouldn't be shrouded in secrecy. Unless they're not that special.

Incidentally, it was recently suggested that the Special Guest may well be Joe Brown (again). Nice chap, but not a draw.

I enthused about the New Forest Folk Festival too. Again, no-one had heard of the artists featured except for Oysterband, by one person who thought they'd broken up years ago. When I mentioned this was their farewell tour, he wasn't at all surprised.

Of the Shrewsbury Folk Festival artists this year, The Longest Johns and Josh Burnell were the only artists even vaguely recognised - by two people. Spiers and Boden may be famous in some parts of the world, but not Herefordshire, it seems.

Kate Rusby was recognised by a couple of people as the Beardy Folk Festival headliner, but no-one else seemed to strike a chord.

Now, admittedly, this was not a gathering of folkies. Far from it, some were metalheads, most just the standard British public. Frank Turner was mentioned a few times, for instance.

What this brought home to me was that the folk audience is not enlarging right now - it's shrinking as people stop going to festivals and gigs (for whatever reason, cost, age, illness, death).

Right now, if mostly-folk-based festivals want to survive, I reckon they have to diversify, get some artists that will appeal beyond the folkies and embark on publicity campaigns, perhaps jointly and severally to sell themselves outside of their traditional audience.

"Spider" John Koerner, aged 85.

Martin Graebe has written a very interesting book about SBG and his folk song collecting (which also functions as a general biography), called As I Walked Out.  Worth tracking down if you want to learn more about him.

I loved the story about how he met his wife, when he was a curate in Yorkshire. She was a mill-girl, quite a bit younger than him, and far below him in social status (this was the 1860s, so these things mattered).  He was determined to marry her, and arranged for her to spend a year or so living with a middle-class family to learn how to function in those circles, whilst he paid her family the equivalent of her wages.  They were happily married for about 50 years, and had 15 children, and are buried side by side in the churchyard, and his epitaph for her calls her 'the better half of him'.

Agreed. He's always worth catching in concert. Hope you get a chance to see the Baring-Gould show.

Old school British soul tonight with The Real Thing in my old hometown Of Clitheroe.

Soul singer Jimmy James (of Vagabonds fame).

Jah Wobble and The Invaders of the Heart playing "Metal Box Rebuilt In Dub" at The Exchange in Bristol on Thursday night, augmented by Jon Klein (ex-Banshees) filling the Keith Leven guitar role.  All five players are fine musicians and they didn't disappoint. As well as the Metal Box album, we also heard two songs from PiL's first album: "Public Image" and "Fodderstompf".  

A compact and bijou venue, ideal for Wobble's bass to be felt as well as heard - the only other bands I've experienced live with such a full bass sound were Aswad (open-air gig on St George's Plateau in Liverpool) and Can (at the old boxing stadium in Liverpool).  

So glad I now wear "Hearos" earplugs to most gigs - they cut out the high-frequency distortion that used to leave my ears "ringing" until the following day.

I really enjoy Jim's singing, a really wonderful voice and an engaging performer live. I didn't know this tour was happening and pleased to see so many dates, especially SW which is understandable. Thanks for sharing, looking forward to catching a live gig.

Just got back. Terrific evening. Jim Causley & Miranda Sykes were as excellent as ever, and John Palmer, who shared anecdotes and read some of SBG's stories, did so with a real passion for his subject. I went for the music but left feeling the need to properly explore SBG's work. Job done by the performers!

If you get the chance to catch a performance, I hope you enjoy it!