A pretty cool album nonetheless, with the following track listing:

Side 1

1. Wanted Man (Bob Dylan)
2. Wreck of the Old 97 (arranged by Cash, Bob Johnston, Norman Blake)
3. I Walk the Line
4. Darling Companion (John Sebastian)
5. Starkville City Jail

Side 2

1. San Quentin
2. San Quentin
3. A Boy Named Sue (Shel Silverstein)
4. (There’ll Be) Peace in the Valley (Thomas A. Dorsey)
5. Folsom Prison Blues

Ten tracks, and two of them ‘San Quentin’, repeated by popular demand. Some years later I came to relive my original analogue experience in a digital world and found eighteen tracks in a different order. How could this be?

1. Big River
2. I Still Miss Someone
3. Wreck Of The Ol’ 97
4. I Walk The Line
5. Darlin’ Companion
6. I Don’t Know Where I’m Bound
7. Starkville City Jail
8. San Quentin
9. San Quentin
10. Wanted Man
11. Boy Named Sue
12. There’ll Be Peace In The Valley
13. Folsom Prison Blues14. Ring Of Fire
15. He Turned The Water Into Wine
16. Daddy Sang Bass
17. Old Account Was Settled Long Ago
18. Folsom Prison Blues/I Walk The Line/Ring Of Fire/Rebel Johnny Yuma

Ladies & gentlemen, we are officially rewriting history. Or more importantly, my history. No matter that the reissue is a more accurate representation of the concert, or that I get more tracks for my money, I wanted the album I used to listen to in a more convenient format. I did not want someone’s idea of a ‘better’ version.

I realise that this makes me seem unreasonable, grumpy and old. I don’t care. I also realise that it’s potentially unfair to those of the digital generation who do not have the ten tracks in the non-historically correct order hardwired into their brains and who, for whatever reason, enjoy the later version. I still don’t care.

My biggest realisation though is that all I need to do is build a playlist with the ‘correct’ order and i have lost nothing, gained a few previously undiscovered tracks and also the possibility of preferring the fuller version. This makes this album therefore a lousy candidate to start the great ‘anti-remaster’ rant, which I will now put off till another day.

I feel strangely better for that.

Oh joy. This necessitated a trip to the local Our Price to see what they had in the ‘P’s. Nothing as it transpired but lurking in the 12″ Rock & Pop section was a copy of Roman P. Its location and the price tag of £3.49 did not lead me to expect the 7″ single that was proffered but I was far too cool to let it show. When I got it home I carefully unwrapped this:

Catalogue no. SS33009 it was released on the outrageously cool French label Sordide Sentimentale in a fold-over cardboard cover with the above artwork and also included a booklet of the usual (it turned out) PTV nonsense which explained the large size.

Side A’s Roman P was fantastic but the B side was an education. While the main track was ‘Neurology’, more cod religion from Mr Sebastian (PTV’s tattoist, apparently), it was years before I discovered that it was double-grooved and about one play in four revealed sermons by Charles Manson and Jim Jones, in one speaker each at the same time. Pretty nifty, eh? And it really pissed Fran off too, which was the point of the whole thing.

So we (finally) come to the T-shirt. The above led to a long-term infatuatio with PTV and when ebay came along to make the whole collecting thing far too easy I chanced across a shirt bearing the three-bar-cross logo on the front and a reference to TOPY Chicago X and the number 23 on the back. Supposedly brand new from a newly discovered batch kept in a box from the eighties (which I didn’t believe for a moment) I shelled out some hard-earned and wear it as we speak.

Black of course, size XL in heavyweight cotton by Jerzees it’s a mainstay of my wardrobe & on special occasions appears under a Paul Smith suit, which pleases me greatly. Its biggest drawback is its latter day likeness to the Take That logo which leads to some perplexed looks and awkward conversations. The main chest print is a basic silver psychic cross in a circle, the back print is the logo of the (possibly fictional) Chicago offshoot of TOPY.

This one really does tick nearly all  the boxes; black, comfortable, no workmates know what the symbol means and are free to show their ignorance (“no, I’m not a Take That fan”) but if anyone does get it there’s a shared ‘Gosh, aren’t we cool’ moment. Back prints are always a bonus too.

This post begins an ongoing series of my favourites and their history, in no particular order. Most are obviously very tired, some feature customizations for comfort and some sport bleach stains around the waist, of which more later. Expect a few tears along the way.

Good job they’ve invented adultescence, eh?