July 15th 2025

I’m sorry about this but … it’s all over, I’m finally giving up RMHQ as from the end of July 2025; because, as the bookies say ‘When the fun stops, stop.’ and it has.

Pretty much it’s my mental state at the moment getting me down and even making the editing seem like a chore, when it shouldn’t be … as I love the music and more importantly, what my writers all do for me and you; and can’t thank them enough for carrying me and the website this far…as they’ve all brought a fresh spark to not just RMHQ, but to some degree, this end of the industry IMHO

Weirdly the stats for the site are outstanding this year, and are carrying on in the same vein as 2025 rolls along, so I’m going out on something of a high.

We will be publishing reviews until the end of July and after that, the site will remain open forever … just not with anything new being added, and my RM Social Media accounts will all close at the same time.

Thanks again for reading our reviews over the last 10 years solo and 20 years for various publications, God knows I appreciate it, and I hope you’ve gone on to buy cd’s/LP’s/downloads on the back of our words … but everything has a sell by date.

Lots of love #BuyDontSpotify

Alan xx

Welcome to the Rocking Magpie HQ – a box-room on the Internet for one man and a bunch of his Roots Music loving friend’s thoughts and musings on a wide variety of music, usually; but not exclusively based around all things ROOTS:- Americana, Folk, Blues, R&B, all variants of Country, a bit of Ska, Reggae and Soul too.

After many years writing reviews for a variety of magazines, newspapers and websites I decided to break up the band and go solo in 2014; putting everything under one roof on ……THE ROCKING MAGPIE.

Me? I live in the North East of England; but the team live across the UK and two are in America, and we received music from all around the world….with a readership that reflected that, as we had followers in over 130 countries across all 4 continents.

Our priority was bringing you reviews and previews of music that had actually been listened to and appreciated…not just the regurgitation of a Press Release  (unlike many ‘household name’ websites!).
We did this because we love music and wanted you to get an Independent view from someone just like yourself; and in theory this would make you want to actually buy a copy not just scam a free listen on the likes of Spotify and Apple Streaming!
#BuyDontSpotify
Dig deep into the site; as the bonus is a myriad of my old reviews (400+), some dating back to 2010 which really are a snapshot in time – some I got bang on, others I raved about yet the album and artist still drifted into musical obscurity.
Alan aka The Rocking Magpie

If there’s one song that summed up our attitude to what we did and why we did it, it’s this song……. Rex Bob Lowenstein by Mark Germino