I don't mind playing gigs for no money, to no people, with crap sound, in draughty rooms upstairs from pubs where people would stab you for a laugh. (Not that last night's gig at the Cambridge Boathouse was anything like that). I just get incensed by how completely oblivious some singer-songwriters are to the cliches inherent in the format. I've said it before, but I'll say it again, to anyone who is thinking of picking up an acoustic guitar and a dictophone-

1) What makes you think that your emotional torment is any more worthy of public broadcast than anyone else's ? If you're going to take your lyrics direct from your diary then do us a favour and at least change the first person to third. Or here's a real challenge- write a song about the person/people who you believe to be the source of your misery and then change the 3rd to 1st ! Dare to try something other than begging your audience for sympathy !

2) Mumbling does not make you sound like John Martyn.

3) Screaming does not make you sound like Jeff Buckley.

4) Hitting the odd deliberate bum note does not make you sound like Ravi Shankar/John Renbourn/Jimmy Page/Davey Graham/whoever.

I read an interview with John Prine recently where he said the great thing about Bob Dylan was that he made OK to still perform music even if you didn''t sing like Pagliacci. That may well be, but listen to "Bob Dylan's 115th Dream" or "Tombstone Blues" and you'll hear a torrent of ideas and imagery which prove exactly why he could get away with that. It was also 40 years ago, as was the angst of Leonard Cohen/Joni Mitchell etc ad nauseum. It's the idea of being unable to escape the shadow of all that, especially in the utterly diluted form of bedsit whiners, that really makes me want to sell my guitar.