David Baddiel’s a busy guy. Already this year he’s made a powerful documentary, Confronting Holocaust Denial (available on BBC iPlayer until March 19th), as well as debuting tonight’s show, about social media. The gig sold out so quickly that a matinee was added. That sold out too. He’s preceded by three minutes’ worth of onscreen tweets, one describing his look at an awards show as ‘Aldi Jeff Goldblum,’ a gag that he, naturally, embraces. How much you like this show will depend partly on how much you like Twitter, which Baddiel happily confesses that he is addicted to (I can relate). If I were trolling him, I’d be tempted to point out that tonight’s generous two hours must have been one of the easier shows…

Judy Collins is a folk-rock legend, both as a songwriter in her own right (‘My Father’) and as an interpreter of others (she discovered Leonard Cohen and was first to record early songs by both him and Joni Mitchell). At 80, her long silver hair as big as ever, she shows no sign of slowing down. She says she recently played over 115 shows with Stephen Stills, who wrote ‘Suite: Judy Blue Eyes’ about her. Tonight, she is accompanied by Russell Walden on piano and begins with Jimmy Webb’s ‘The Moon’s a Harsh Mistress’. You can never get enough Jimmy Webb and she is one of his finest interpreters. The first hour is a mix of songs and storytelling. All the greats turn out to…

Every year since 1989, my partner Sue and I have sent a compilation of our favourite music released in the previous year to friends near and far. Since 2001 they’ve been on CD (before that: cassette, 8 track and eh… wire recording). And every year since 2005, in the run up to new year, I’ve written near daily sleeve notes to accompany the CD, with MP3s of the songs for those who don’t receive it. I know that some friends save up the CD and won’t read this until they’ve heard it. Fine. I start posting them this afternoon. Hey ho, let’s go. Listen to each song in the little players below each entry. Hot Chip – Melody of Love You have to start with…

Every year since 1989 we’ve sent our more musical friends a best of year CD or cassette featuring our favourite music released that year. Some of them have done the same. Some even put together two or three CDs (but they’ve all fallen by the wayside). Since 2001 I’ve kept it to one, 80 minute, single disc (though it was previously a 90, 100 or, once even a 110 minute cassette). The first eighteen of them are above. That means leaving loads of favourite out. I listen to a lot of new music and average around forty gigs a year, not counting the acts I see at the Green Man festival. This year I would have liked to include songs by Lambchop, Big Thief and…

Chicago’s Whitney make short, sweet albums of indie soul. The second, Forever Turned Around, came out recently, and is full of memorable songs. The band they emerged from, The Smith-Westerns, were fun but frivolous. Nothing throwaway about Whitney, whose drummer and singer Julien Ehrlich (above left) takes centre stage. His diffident manner and Ed Norton meets Chris Martin looks appeal to the large female contingent in the packed, mostly twenty-something audience. The seven piece band includes two keyboards and occasional horns. Ehrlich’s blue-eyed soul voice is a distinctive wonder. It takes me half the set to realise what the soul inflected songs (co-written with guitarist Max Kakacek) most remind me of: pre-disco era Bee Gees. There’s also a clear influence from the late Southern soul…