My pal Sarah McQuaid, whose usually strings two or more months of UK dates together at this time of year, has just about managed 10 bookings this time. These are hard times for the likes of Sarah – whose sole living is in music – and her manager/sound-person/driver Martin (ditto). If any of these dates are near you, think about giving her a go. I can’t – I live in NI. If/when she books dates in Ireland, I’ll be there. Her blurb from social media plus the dates are below…

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So it looks like my short Jan-Feb UK tour will actually be happening. These are tough times for all of us and I would be enormously grateful for any support you can give. Even if you can’t make it to a gig, please help to spread the word if you can.

I’ll be testing daily, wearing a mask when not on stage and generally doing everything I can to keep things as safe as they can be for everybody.

Mawgan Lewis Purple Knif’s beautiful videos of all 15 tracks on my new album The St Buryan Sessions (filmed as it was being recorded » Continue Reading.

I’ve had the great pleasure of curating this fabulous 13CD set, due in November. Amazon UK and Germany, and JPC, are advertising it already. UK price is £70 – an amazing price, in my view. The audio is mostly superb throughout – I’ve been OKing test pressings yesterday and today and the sheer heft and brilliance of the body of work, along with the sound, comes through loud and clear. Repertoire’s regular mastering maestro Eroc has done his usual astounding job. The complete tracklist can be found by clicking on the CD numbers at Repertoire’s site (link below).

Sales blurb:

Formed by trumpeter and future Miles Davis biographer Ian Carr, Nucleus were a distinctly British jazz-rock group forged in the musical village-like cauldron of London at the end of the 60s. Within its first year alone (1970), Nucleus had caused a sensation at both the Montreux and Newport jazz festivals, and had recorded two albums (the first of nine for progressive-rock label Vertigo) and a torrent of sessions and concerts for the BBC, from John Peel’s Top Gear and Sounds of the 70s on Radio 1 to Jazz in Britain on Radio 3. Curated by John McLaughlin biographer Colin » Continue Reading.

Jethro Tull’s 1970 classic Benefit will be celebrated in a brand-new 4CD/2DVD set, featuring remixes by Steven Wilson, an abundance of previously unreleased material, packaged within a deluxe hardback book, containing 100 pages of commentary from numerous contributors alongside hordes of images of the band creating and performing their first million-selling album. After pandemic-enforced delays, Benefit (The 50th Anniversary Enhanced Edition) will finally be out on 5th November.

Highlights include: – Original album and associated recordings remixed by Steven Wilson – Additional associated recordings including mono and stereo mixes of various A and B sides – The 1970 Fillmore at Tanglewood concert, with new stereo remix by Steven Wilson – Live At The Aragon Ballroom, Chicago 1970 concert in mono – Steven Wilson’s 2013 remix of the album, 5 extra tracks in DTS and Dolby 5.1 surround and stereo 96/24 LPCM – Flat transfers of the original UK+US LP master in LPCM – Additional tracks Sweet Dream, 17 & The Witch’s Promise – The 1970 Fillmore at Tanglewood concert on video with Steven Wilson’s 2020 audio remix in stereo and 5.1 surround.

Following the successes of This Was (1968) and Stand Up (1969), Jethro Tull returned in 1970 with » Continue Reading.

31/10/2021

Picking up what should have been 29th March 2020.

Abbey Road, Let It Bleed and something else from 1969 (suggestions please) played from remastered vinyl on a top-flight hi-fi in the Courtyard Café, Papworth Everard.

Home-roasted coffee, loose-leaf tea, locally-sourced cakes, full bar including microbrewery ales.

2:30-4:30pm, free entry. Well-behaved kids and dogs welcome.

Hello AW massive.

Hope you are all keeping well.

I finally got off my arse and released some music on Bandcamp.

Take a listen. Buy a copy if you like.

Let me know your thoughts.

https://steeveclarke.bandcamp.com/releases

Hi all, bit of shameless self promotion here. I’ve been messing about with a collection of folky/country tinged numbers for a while and here they are to brighten up what’s left of a fairly rubbish summer. Treat yourself!

Country Folk by Jonathan Roberts

https://jonathanroberts.bandcamp.com/album/country-folk

18th August 2021: Prog legends Caravan announce the release of their new album It’s None Of Your Business to be released on CD format on 8th October 2021 and as a vinyl LP, on 8th November, on Madfish Music.

It’s None Of Your Business is Caravan’s first album since Paradise Filter (2013) and features nine new songs plus one instrumental track influenced, to a degree, by the events and restrictions placed on society over the past 18 months.

Caravan are Pye Hastings (guitar, vocals). Geoffrey Richardson (viola, mandolin, guitar), Jan Schelhaas (keyboards) and Mark Walker (drums). Lee Pomeroy (ELO, Rick Wakeman and Take That) has guested as bass player, following the departure of Jim Leverton, while Jimmy Hastings has also guested on flute.

The album was recorded, as restrictions allowed, ‘in the old-fashioned way’ between 24th June and 4th July 2021 at Rimshot Studio, Bredgar near Sittingbourne. “Sitting round in a circle having eye to eye contact, a large sound room was required,” Pye Hastings explained. “I much prefer this method because you can bounce ideas off each other as they occur, and voice encouragement when the whole thing begins to click.

“And it is much more rewarding to » Continue Reading.

While most of my living over the past few years has been based on proofreading, writing and record label consultancy (on archive projects), music creation has also been a part of the picture. I’ve been making recordings, often with myriad guests from the fully professional music game and from the local music community in NI, for 30 years. I’ve been fortunate enough that it’s been a hobby or side-line that has more or less paid for itself, with between £1,000 and £2,000 a year from airplay and sales (CD & DL) in recent years… up to a cliff-edge in 2019. I suppose the rise of streaming is a big part of that (and yes, you can find two CH albums, an EP and a couple of singles from 2015-2020 on Spotify et al. – the music might as well be heard, but the rewards are in pennies).

I had a handful of compositions I wanted to record this year, with fabulous mid-Ulster singer Breige Devlin, and thought I might as well try crowdfunding – selling in advance – to cover the studio costs. We’ll have a few guests on the eventual mini-album. In the photo with the Fundrazr » Continue Reading.

16/07/2021

I’ve posted hereabouts before on the psychedelic pop splendour of ethereal Belfast/Bristol personality Francis Kane O’Kane, with his current collective OTHERISH. Between 1988-95, he was the main man in Bristol psych-popsters ME – who are, in July, anthologised with ‘Crows Nightingales SHOCK (Best of Me 1991-95) by Bristol Archive Records.

Here is the Bandcamp blurb:

On 16th July 2021 Bristol Archive Records are releasing “Crows Nightingales SHOCK (Best of Me 1991-1995)”. This will be the first UK-released collection drawn from the many records put out in the early ‘90s by Bristol-based Anglo-Irish troubadours Me. With Me cited by NME at the time as “effortlessly the best band in Bristol”, this new selection of the band’s best work showcases the very distinctive sounds of the widely praised but often misunderstood Anglo-Irish pop-visionaries.

With four gifted songwriters onboard, Me’s songs were always bound to be insightful, wilful, hook-laden, bathed in soaring pop-sensibility and propelled upwards by tightly ecstatic vocal harmonies. Championed in their day (1988-1996) by the likes of John Peel, Mark Radcliffe and even Bob Harris, Me toured widely – USA, France, Czechia & UK – while putting out two richly varied double-albums and a handful of diverse and distinctive » Continue Reading.

20/03/2021

There will be a virtual festival on the evening of March the 20th. It is a grab-bag mystery line up of international artists of the acoustic alt-country and singer-songerwriterly bent (probably). If you’re not going out, you might want to stay in. As angry from Manchester points out, it’s just likely to be repeats on TV. For the background, read on. Link in blog. https://skirky.blogspot.com/2021/02/what-helstock.html

27/08/2021

Reading and Leeds are going ahead, apparently. Everyone will be vaccinated by then, of course. Hmmm…

Two main stages mean no clashes.

I have to say, the lineup looks very poor. I’m not sure if Offspring The Elder will be interested. I’m not keen.

22/04/2021

Three dates in Sweden and Norway, then a quick dash round the UK.

Much as I dislike the Cambridge Junction, I’ll have to go. I’ve not seen them since 1990.

I imagine these will be postponed.

03/11/2021

ACR head out on the road for 13 dates in November.

Hare & Hounds for me, vaccine permitting.

07/10/2021

Field Music have announced a 9-date October tour. We’ll hopefully be safe by then.

Typically, on the one date I can make, I am double-booked.

I wasn’t originally going to post this on the Afterword, because it isn’t related to music, books, TV, Richard Thompson, progressive-rock, etc. Plus, in these times, we *all* have friends in difficulties of one sort or another – and there’s only so much any of can do.

But on reflection, it’s a friend in need, a long way from home and it’s potentially life-changing… so I’ll just leave the link here and if you want to share it somewhere or contribute a small sum, then great.

In brief: Veronika is from Slovakia, and is a massage wizard. She has lived/worked in Belfast for a few years, but has only one relative in the UK. She very recently married a fellow mainland European in Belfast, who was also in Belfast more or less alone, but who has relatives in Scotland. Veronika was diagnosed with a brain tumour late last year – and moved to Scotland a few weeks ago, permanently, with her husband (both giving up their jobs), for two reasons: (1) to get surgery with one of the best UK surgeons for this condition in February; (2) to stay with her husband’s relatives while recuperating, which may take months.

» Continue Reading.