As the publisher's website says:
High Flying Around Volume II continues the remarkable story of Leicester’s 1960s arts and music scene via the people who were there. Their memories and reminiscences bring back to life the buildings long since demolished, the groups who packed out the venues and the people who filled the halls and clubs.
Find out how some of the biggest names in music performed in some of Leicester’s smallest and long-lost venues, revisit the 1969 free festival, and discover the incredible stories of Leicester band Gypsy and the 1960s creatives. Discover the importance of the college and university circuit, the arts lab, the city’s underground music, folk and poetry scenes and the music that influenced Leicester playwright Joe Orton.
Leicester women tell their stories about life in the city during the 1960s, while singer/songwriter Ryan Dunn explains how the decade influences his songwriting and fashion.
Dipping into it, I find plenty of new bands to research and the odd anecdote I might share here.
And, yes, my home town gets at least one mention:
The first time we played in Market Harborough was at a place called the Embi Club, on St Mary's Road. The building had a great doorway, which was the entrance, then you went to the back building through a small yard. That was where the club was. The club itself was long and it looked like a few rooms had been knocked into one. It was a very busy venue. Jethro Tull had played there as did Edwin Starr. I later learned the site had been an old cinema. the Oriental, which opened in 1921. The interior decor consisted of Egyptian mummies Chinese dragons, palm trees and pyramids.
The main building had, I think, gone by the time I moved here – the length of it ran behind what is now the House of Art tattoo studio and probably a couple of other vanished buildings – but the exotic domed entrance on St Mary's Road lasted through the Seventies.
In 1996 we printed a book on the Portsmouth music scene called 'Twenty Missed Beats' which has long been out of print and now sells for ridiculous amounts of money. While the Liverpool and Manchester music scenes have been written about extensively the smaller cities like Portsmouth, Leicester, Southampton etc. only seem to be commemorated by local enthusiasts - thank goodness that the UK has people like that!
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