I'm at that stage

 where my mental health is taking a bit of a downturn.

So, I'm doing what I have to do to get back to me again. Obviously, that includes a lot of riding my bike - but increasingly, it seems to manifest itself in listening to albums I loved when I was 14. I'm not sure why, but I'm guessing it's a comfort blanket.

Today's slice of my youth, then - is taken from the first Riuchard Hell & The Voidoids album. Bought on a school trip to Windsor, in 1979. Sneaked away from my classmates, and somehow, found a record shop. Back then, it was almost a sixth sense: I could look at grids of roads, and predict where I should look. I guess it helped, that in those days, Record Shops were considerably more plentiful than they are now.

But, the album quickly became a part of my life, despite being the least stereotypically "punk" record in my collection. A lot of that is down to the sheer genius of Robert Quine, on guitar. Here was a guy who looked like an accountant. Balding, small glasses. Kind of dorky. The least rock and roll person imaginable. Yet every time he picked up a guitar, punk attitude dripped from every pore, and fantastically emotive screeds of brutal noise burst out, filling my head with their surges of pain, of anger, of beauty. 

Quine is unlike any other guitarist I can think of: his is a tone full of pure creativity, and it's never held back by tradition

or any other expectation. It's mind-expandingly brilliant. The sort of thing which makes my life better. And that's why my ears are full of this right now.