Back in late 2000s, I was DJing at a wedding and Gladys Knight was my warm up act! Yep, it’s true. The father of the bride was a record label owner who had worked with Gladys in the late 70s and had her flown in to perform the first dance for his daughter and new son-in-law and was flown out just as quickly. So, I spent her entire performance staring at her backside as I was set up behind her and had the interesting task of having to follow her performance, but I managed it and the great knight was had by all.

Anyway, Gladys is 79 years old this week and still sounds as good as she did 30/40+ years ago. She joined the Motown stable in 1966 and left seven years later to join the Buddah label and then, four years later joined CBS.

Her only hit that didn’t credit her backing group, The Pips, was the 1989 James Bond film theme Licence to Kill, but I thought you should enjoy her live performance of the song she performed on the one and only (k) night I worked with her.

With nothing but bad news and corruption in politics and the police force, let’s take your mind off it for about 15 mins.

The wonderful Victoria Wood would have been 70 this week.

This weel, the lead singer with The Eels, E celebrates his birthday.

He was born Mark Oliver Everett in Virginia and once claimed he was called E because there were several people in his life at the time who had the same first name. He relocated to California in 1987 and formed The Eels in 1995 in Los Angeles.

He has suffered with his share tragedy when in 1996, his sister took her own life, two years later his mother was diagnosed with terminal lung cancer and three years after that his cousin was aboard the plane that crashed into the Pentago during the 9/11 terror attacks.

The band charted nine UK hit singles and a whopping 16 studio albums, let’s remember their number 11 hit from 2000.

How impressive is this lady who celebrates her 24th birthday last Thursday?

Enjoy.

This country legend is 90 this weekend.

He was born in Texas and began recording in 1956. Four years later he moved to Nashville, Tennessee. From 1970, he was often in financial trouble first due to bad investments in various tours that did make good returns. In 1990, many of his assets were seized because of unpaid taxes to the tune of $32m. The sum was soon cleared following the sale of the aforementioned assets at auction.

He is still recording and usual involves his family who record with him. He has been releasing albums since 1962 and his latest, I Don’t Know a Thing About Love is released this year.

Let’s enjoy the title track from his 61st studio album in 2013.