I TOLD you last week about the CDs I often receive from recording companies, looking for column inches on up-and-coming musicians who have been in studio, committing their talents to what in my heyday was vinyl.

Well, there was even better to come when I took a call from a young chap called Simon who is associated with a place with a terrific name: Jazzy Kex, in Regent Street, Blackburn.

Simon told me that Jazzy Kex was doing its best to stimulate and maintain interest in jazz-funk and occasionally featured live bands with the intention of giving them a leg-up on the ladder to wider recognition.

A date he has urged me to pass on to readers of this column is Saturday, November 9, when a seven-piece Funk/Latino band called MISMO will be appearing at Jazzy Kex. Apparently they have been attracting some pretty flattering reviews and Simon guarantees that anyone interested in this particular type of jazz, a wonderfully heady mixture of black American and Latin American, should catch MISMO in concert.

Information about this show, and the other attractions on offer at Jazzy Kex, is available on 01254 693023.

East Lancashire favourites Sounds 18 bring the magic of Duke Ellington and Count Basie to Blakeys Bar in King George's Hall, Blackburn, on Monday and The Rhythm Station at Rawtenstall the following night, back-to-back gigs which give big band enthusiasts a double chance to see them.

This band is unique in that it has been in operation for a staggering 31 years.

Musical director and tenor soloist Geoff Kelly, an original member, is its driving force, and it has some outstandingly talented soloists in its ranks.

I take a particular interest in Sounds 18 because my band Jeriatric Jazz has shared the billing with them in the past and a number of the personnel are mates.

Dave Minshull, for example, is one of the best big band drummers in the business and the brass section is a clean, hard unit which perfectly reproduces the authentic big band blast, which is so invigorating and exciting. Any band which has been in existence as long as Sounds 18 must have considerably more going for it than just being a meeting place for musicians with an interest in big band music.

Many of these men, while sporting thickening waists and grey heads, are ex-pro musicians who can blow a tune with the best.

Those of you who travelled to Bolton for the Ben Castle concert at Derby Ward Labour Club last Friday cannot fail to have been impressed by this young man's awesome talent.

If there is a better tenor sax jazz soloist in the UK at the moment, I haven't heard him and Ben, an absolute mirror image of his dad, the late and greatly lamented Roy Castle, has a stage personna and presence which immediately wins over the most sceptical and demanding jazz audience.