John Sebastian has been very much on my mind. And the way things work the more I have found myself thinking about and listening to John Sebastian the more I have come across his presence. So, for example, I recently stumbled upon footage from the Summer of 1984 of John onstage in New Jersey with REM performing ‘Do You Believe In Magic?’, complete with autoharp. The smiles on Michael Stipe and Mike Mills’ faces you just would not be able to wipe off, no matter how hard you tried. This was so astonishingly wonderful that I got into quite a frenzy, which was a bit daft as I was meant to be sitting quietly before heading round to the local GP surgery to have a blood pressure check-up. Needless to say, the reading was not good, and the nurse suggested I was feeling anxious. Ha! I was tempted to explain, but how the hell do you tell a stranger about …?
