iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Mark Braund @markbraund.substack.com · 24/09/2026

Last day at Lord's for me this season. So glad my dad, now 87, was able to come, 51 years since he first took me. I remember that day like it was yesterday, not least because John Edrich scored a sublime century off Lillee and Thompson in their pomp. #cricket #lords

John Edrich batting for England vs Australiaat Lord's, 2nd August 1975. Photo: Patrick Eagar.

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Mark Braund @markbraund.substack.com · 24/09/2026

The sky at London Bridge right now. The photo doesn't do it justice, alas.

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Mark Braund @markbraund.substack.com · 28/05/2026

Pixies sounding better than ever @royalalberthall.bsky.social tonight. If you have tickets for tomorrow you're in for a treat.

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Mark Braund @markbraund.substack.com · 11/03/2026

Cardiacs in Brixton tonight. Remarkable gig from an exceptional group of musicians. And all a bit emotional too. Tim would have loved it, I think.

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Mark Braund @markbraund.substack.com · 09/03/2026

Anyone else bereft at the end of Call the Midwife? Sunday evenings in January and February will never be the same. But what a way to end: brilliant writing, great stories, gentle but serious politics and some fine acting. RIP Sister Monica Joan, a character of truly Dickensian proportions.

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Mark Braund @markbraund.substack.com · 07/12/2025

Ed West wouldn't have coped had he been at Brixton Academy for The Last Dinner Party tonight. It was a fabulous celebration of London, and Britain, in all its thrilling, anarchic diversity. Still the best city in the world. And the band were bloody brilliant, too.

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Mark Braund @markbraund.substack.com · 25/11/2025

Lily Fontaine. Wow! The rest of English Teacher were pretty damn good at The Roundhouse tonight too.

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Mark Braund @markbraund.substack.com · 30/10/2025

As of this evening I've seen Black Country, New Road play live more times than any band other than Peter Hammill/Van der Graff Generator. Which I guess makes them my second favourite band of all time. Their set tonight at Brighton Dome was sensational. Brixton Academy tomorrow night! #bcnr #vdgg

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Mark Braund @markbraund.substack.com · 01/10/2025

Peter Hammill is now 76. Tonight at @rncmlive.bsky.social he sang and played like he was 26. And he finished with Afterwards, a song, as he said, that he first sang in Manchester back in '68. Remarkable.

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Mark Braund @markbraund.substack.com · 08/09/2025

Not sure if I’ll get here again this season, September weather being what it is, but today Lord’s looked gorgeous in the autumn sunshine.

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Mark Braund @markbraund.substack.com · 30/05/2025

Kind of thrilling to be staying in the beautiful Royal York Hotel in Toronto. When it opened in 1929 it was the tallest building in the British Empire.

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Mark Braund @markbraund.substack.com · 25/05/2025

And here he is again, this time taken from the top of Mont Royal.

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Mark Braund @markbraund.substack.com · 24/05/2025

One of the great Canadians, photographed from the top floor of the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts this afternoon.

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Mark Braund @markbraund.substack.com · 23/05/2025

MAD! The new album by #Sparks is out today. My verdict after one listen: it's a classic. Ron Mael's songwriting genius is undiminished, even at 79.

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Mark Braund @markbraund.substack.com · 31/03/2025

Great view of London this morning. Spring is definitely here. Taken from The Point, Blackheath.

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Mark Braund @markbraund.substack.com · 11/02/2025

35 years ago today. Such a hopeful time. Rather squandered the opportunity though, didn't we? #mandela

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Mark Braund @markbraund.substack.com · 04/02/2025

Great to see Joe Hill-Gibbins' Figaro revived at ENO. It only lasted one performance in 2020 before Covid shut it down. Fabulous production. Hanna Hipp, back as Cherubino, the stand out for me. But great singing and acting all round. Minimalist, modern-dress Mozart at its most enjoyable. #opera

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Mark Braund @markbraund.substack.com · 31/01/2025

Very saddened by the death of Marianne Faithfull. I'll never forget seeing her the night she fulfilled her lifetime ambition of singing at Ronnie Scott's back in 2016. It was quite a night. This fabulous photo of her taken in 1978 courtesy of Sandra Lousada at Mary Evans Picture Library.

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Mark Braund @markbraund.substack.com · 24/01/2025

Went to see Tom Stoppard's The Invention of Love last night. It's one of my favourite plays: so clever, funny and poignant. Excellent production, and I'm pleased to report that Simon Russell Beale and Matthew Tennyson are the equal of John Wood and Paul Rhys in the original NT production of 1997.

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Mark Braund @markbraund.substack.com · 18/01/2025

Just caught the first episode of the new series of #Severance. Quite brilliant. And after this week's news, so apparent how it couldn't have been conceived unless David Lynch had paved its way.

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Mark Braund @markbraund.substack.com · 17/01/2025

And I don't care what the critics say, Wild at Heart was a brilliant film.

Laura Dern as Lula and Nicolas Cage as Sailor in Wild at Heart, 1990.
Photograph: Polygram Filmed Entertainment/Allstar

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Mark Braund @markbraund.substack.com · 24/12/2024

"you will be visited by three spirits" .... and their pets.

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Mark Braund @markbraund.substack.com · 18/12/2024

I presume the caption here has something to do with @theguardian.com's commitment to identity politics? Always good to be clear about such things.

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Mark Braund @markbraund.substack.com · 17/12/2024

Sorry for the ghastly photo, but here are four individuals determined to turn back the clock of civilization by several centuries. Of if you prefer, scumbags.

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Mark Braund @markbraund.substack.com · 16/12/2024

Lottie and I will be there tomorrow lunchtime, hoping it remains clear. Today, however, she decided she was a goat.

Lottie the working cocker spaniel puppy, at work, not working very hard.

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Mark Braund @markbraund.substack.com · 16/12/2024

I re-watched series 1 of Wolf Hall to warm up for series 2. I'm going to miss it terribly. Mark Rylance was outstanding, but he couldn't have done it without Damian Lewis and a host of others, all superb. It was a drama of one-on-one relationships, all featuring Cromwell. Remarkable television.

Mark Rylance as Thomas Cromwell and Ellie de Lange as his daughter, Jeneke, in a scene from Wolf Hall.

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Mark Braund @markbraund.substack.com · 07/12/2024

Good Lord. 250 hours listening to Spotify this year. A pretty accurate record I guess, certainly of my digital listening. I have to admit to being badly seduced by The Last Dinner Party early on. And On Your Side is definitely my song of the year. Abigail's voice on that track is sublime.

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Mark Braund @markbraund.substack.com · 29/11/2024

I had a fabulous time visiting The Uffizi last week. And I think this was my favourite painting. There's just so much in it. Calumny of Apelles by Botticelli, 1494-95. Mind you, Florence seems a world away now I'm home.

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Mark Braund @markbraund.substack.com · 25/11/2024

The Spire of Notre Dame by Robert Delaunay, 1909. I saw this beautiful painting at the wonderful Palazzo Zabarella in Padova last week. Delaunay and his wife Sonia were co-founders of the Orphism movement, an offshoot of cubism, and brilliant painters both. #art #cubism #orphism

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Mark Braund @markbraund.substack.com · 22/11/2024

Britain, it seems, has much to learn from a country we routinely disparage as the economic basket case of Europe. What say you @seatsixtyone.bsky.social?

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Mark Braund @markbraund.substack.com · 22/11/2024

So that's it. Three fabulous concerts culminating last night in the gorgeous Salle dei Giganti in Padova. 36 different songs, 42 if you include Rome and Naples, which I didn't attend. So many highlights, but to finish the tour with Refugees made for a lot of very happy Italians, and this Brit.

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Mark Braund @markbraund.substack.com · 21/11/2024

Or a larger monumental square than the Prato della Valle. Remarkable.

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Mark Braund @markbraund.substack.com · 21/11/2024

If there's another city in the world with as many - beautifully formed - arches as Padova, I want to go there.

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Mark Braund @markbraund.substack.com · 20/11/2024

Another great set from Peter Hammill ( @sofasound.bsky.social ) in Florence tonight. Reminded me what an interesting and original songwriter he is. I can't believe it's 41 years since I first saw him play live, on that occasion with the inimitable John Ellis. And you have to love the Italians:

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Mark Braund @markbraund.substack.com · 20/11/2024

It turns out that my favourite architect is Filippo Brunelleschi (1377-1446). His work is all over Florence, but for me the Pazzi Chapel, also part of the Santa Croce complex, is his most sublime offering. I can’t imagine a more beautiful building.

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Mark Braund @markbraund.substack.com · 20/11/2024

Vasari's Last Supper, in the refectory of the Basilica di Santa Croce in Florence. The flags to the left show the height of the flood waters over the centuries. In 1966 it was damaged so badly it was absent for 50 years. Thankfully, it now has a lifting mechanism to keep it out of harms way.

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Mark Braund @markbraund.substack.com · 20/11/2024

The tomb of Galileo Galileo in the wonderful Basilica di Santa Croce here in Florence. Now there's someone who was unafraid to speak truth to power, whatever the personal consequences.

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Mark Braund @markbraund.substack.com · 20/11/2024

If this gorgeous ceiling panel from the Uffizi in Florence gets a few likes, I might stay all day and photograph the lot.

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Mark Braund @markbraund.substack.com · 19/11/2024

Glad to see a couple of fellow DipWSETs have followed me today. In case you come across it, this is a fabulous Rosso di Montalcino I'm drinking this evening. And it'll be even better in five years time.

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Mark Braund @markbraund.substack.com · 18/11/2024

At Heathrow, on my way to Milan to see the peerless @sofasound.bsky.social Well, we're neither of us getting any younger.

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Mark Braund @markbraund.substack.com · 21/03/2024

Latest from me at Progress and Survival. On tennis, suicide and the remarkable human spirit. open.substack.com/pub/markbrau...

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