The Wedding Album

With shelves heaving under the weight of dozens of Beatles-related books, many of them compendia of photos once deemed rare, I thought I'd seen it all. Now well into the internet age, and with the abundance of free blog space available to anyone with a collection and a scanner, I'm constantly amazed at the 'new' discoveries that turn up with impressive regularity.



These photos of Magic Alex's July '68 wedding (some of which apparently emanate from an October '68 edition of Motion Picture magazine) would, only 20 years or so ago, have been the stuff of once-glimpsed-in-a-scrapbook myth. Now these, and countless other similarly dazzling finds, are common currency at the click of a mouse.

Take Five

The Stones in the Park

As we seem to be on a brief 'summer of '69' theme here, it's fitting to mention that the Rolling Stones are once again playing Hyde Park, 44 years on from their legendary free concert.

Given the glorious weather we've been having of late, a friend and I decided on a last-minute outing to the park this time last week, sans ticket (hmm, £95?), to soak up the amtosphere and, maybe hear and see something of the occasion. My pal decided it would be nice to watch Stones in the Park for old times' sake, before setting off; I left her to it, as I've seen the film so many times its every utterance and sun-dappled image is imprinted on my brain. (Unlikely, but if that woman with the 'harp' in speakers corner walked past me today I swear I'd recognise her.) Funny, I remember when it was something of a rarity for the film to be shown on British TV (certainly once or twice during the 1980s). Now it's a Sky Arts staple.