'Blue Eyed Plaice & Shiny Windows'

 

These recordings have their beginnings back in the early 1990's when I teamed up with Tim Hill in Reading. Tim is a multi-talented musician; alto and baritone saxophone, clarinet, arranger and composer. He was leading a band which had a floating personnel that he called The Pandaemonium Marching Band. One of the things Tim and I had in common was our shared love of the music of Kurt Weill and Nino Rota. Rota is a long time favourite of mine, the soundtracks he composed for the films of Federico Fellini especially so. The songs ranged from 'Song of the Streets' and 'Irish Rockabilly Blues' from my 'The Shelly River' album to versions of Elvis Presley's 'King Creole' which Tim arranged as 'John Zorn meets Dixieland jazz' through to the Flying Burrito Brothers 'Sin City' treated as a Southern Baptist hymn.

I gave Tim what was pretty much a free hand in arranging my songs and he never came up with anything that I didn't approve of, in fact I loved everything he did. His settings drew upon Weill and Rota as well as Southern hymnal music,jazz and Brazilian styles. The band varied between five and ten musicians according to their availability. We did a lot of gigs at the Rising Sun Art Centre in Reading, the highpoints being the Bracknell Festival and WOMAD in Reading. To this day that band and the things we did are some of the things I'm most proud of and some of the happiest times I've had playing music.

Although the plan was always to record we didn't begin until the late 90's. By then it wasn't possible to have all of the original band for the sessions although some of them are involved, chiefly Tim Hill himself.

So far ten songs are in various stages of completion, all of them being observations on lives, life and areas of Reading, which is where I was born, grew up and still call my home in many ways. The record is being co-produced and financed by Chris Britton at his Wired Studios at the Rising Sun Art Centre (which is where my album 'Mother Indigo' was recorded by Chris in 94). The tracks range form almost solo acoustic performances through to experimental soundscapes using found sounds. Steve Rolfe who did the artwork with me for 'Mother Indigo' and 'The Sound of the Moon' is doing the art with me for this using a lot of my photographs of the town and surrounding areas.

There are also several hours of archive 'live' recordings from the Rising Sun , Bracknell and Womad shows to choose from. These include songs of mine such as 'Union Street, Reading: Smelly Alley March' , '500 Miles from Memphis' and 'La Strada' which were always band and audience favourites but aren't on the studio sessions.

The musicians include drummer Simon Price and electric bassist Garry Jones who played with me in 'Domino Effect' in Reading in the 80's. Simon was also the drummer/percussionist on my albums; 'Rhythm Oil' and 'The Heart Sings'. Hugh Turner on electric guitar who was also part of 'The Heart Sings band ', Luke Daniels on accordion. Tim Hill brought in some of his friends from the London free jazz scene; John Edwards on double bass and drummer/percussionist Steve Noble.

There is also a guest appearance by Mike Cooper on vocals and lap steel guitar. Mike is one of my oldest friends and also one of my favourite musicians and writers. He was an inspiration to me when I was growing up in Reading in the 60's and learning to play and write. He's been based in Rome for many years now so it was great that he was back in town during one of the sessions and could play on some tracks.

There's a lot of work still to be done on this project because there are so many people involved but it will be completed.

Please check back for updates on it's progress.