Listen with Tim

When I was 15 I had a poster on my bedroom wall. Actually, I had a lot of posters on my wall, from Smash Hits, from NME and Melody Maker, from gigs. But around Christmas 2005 my particular favourite was a five foot high bootleg poster of Tim Burgess I'd bought from a dodgy geezer on the street after seeing The Charlatans at the Manchester Apollo (yes, I know, naughty - always buy official merch kids).

I spent a lot of time listening to that band (their eponymous titled fourth album was in my Top Five of '95), in fact I still spend a lot of time listening to The Charlatans. The whirling Hammond making it stand out from the rest of the Britpop crowd that year as previous albums had also forced their way to my attention and lifted themselves above their peers. This wonderful sound fronted by a, frankly, beautiful man with a lot of soul.

It was intriguing then when this part of my musical make-up appeared in the orbit of my online world and I started to follow Tim Burgess on Twitter especially when he opened his 'metaphysical, metaphorical' cafe, the Tim Peaks Diner. There he goes again, you see, doing things in his own way and making me pay attention.

A virtual coffee and a level playing field - he tweets back if he's got something to say and takes time to acknowledge those tweeting him. And just when you think 'that's nice, appreciate that, what a nice bloke' he does something quite interesting and lovely with the channel - he curates collective listening parties for each of The Charlatans' albums.

Musicians should start taking notes here: it's a simple concept and I'm surprised more artists aren't doing this yet (I think NME did a collective listening to mark the anniversary of Nirvana's Nevermind recently). At a given time we gather around the hashtag #timteractive and press play / drop the needle / boot up YouTube at the same time and then Tim talks us through facts about each song. It might be something technical about the recording or an anecdote about that place and time but either way it's a novel way to add an extra level to revisiting these albums in full.

Tonight it was that 1995 eponymous album and I've felt my heart soar as I was transported back to that summer (anecdotally, I'd just done my GCSEs and was skulking around record stores or making VHS tapes of the indie chart off of ITV's Chart Show). I've listened to that album and those songs so many times and each hold their own memories for me but listening, albeit virtually, with one of the people who created them was something else. Just, well, wonderful.

It's a whole collision of things I love - music and the connectivity of online. This should be the norm for more musicians, hell, more people whatever, whoever, they are or do (and I usually blog more about that sort of thing over in my other place).

Anyway, check out the hashtag or Tim's time line from about 6pm GMT to see the stream accompanying tonight's shared listening of The Charlatans and stay tuned for date / time for Tellin' Stories listening party. Follow him generally for adventures in the Tim's Peak Diner (now with a lovely cartoon strip by @proofspirit).

And if you like the whole collective listening and LP vibe and you're around Derby come along to Long Player at Quad. Next night is 19 October where there will be a double-bill of Rubber Soul and PJ Harvey's Mercury-winning Let England Shake. There's also a mixtape swap and this month the theme is 'materials' (to complement Rubber Soul of course) - and you all know how much I love a mixtape right?