Photo taken outside my home by Lawrence Hyne aka Greenbeanz Photography.
This years end of year blog really is going to be like no other. 2020 was shaping up to be good. I had a small tour with All Living Fear booked, a Sell out gig at Ronnie Scotts with Mike Westbrook as well as loads of other Westbrook shows in the diary. What was there not to like? Well I will come to all of that later.
A photo from Arthurs Soundcheck
2020 Kicked off with the usual January trip to Butlins Minehead for 'Giants of Rock' this year was going to be great as I had not see my dear friend Arthur Brown for a little while and he was playing on the opening night. It was also the debut of a new band so a lot resting high. It was a great show well received and also had a fine evening meal too. Saw and photographed a few other great acts too. I really love these butlins weekends, great music, always loads of friends there. I started the idea of doing some new electronic music, I came up with one track and went with it and decided to release it. This is it.
Barnfield Theatre Exeter 4th feb 2020
I had a last minute solo show in Exeter, this was not really planned I wasn't intending to do much solo stuff in 2020 until I had some new material. but I never like to turn down a gig. February also saw the annual return of one of my Favourite bands Fairport Convention. I think I have seen fairport more times than any other band in the last 10 years. They are also on a bit of a roll with a superb new album and live show as great as ever. Around this time we started preparation for the Mike Westbrook show at Ronnie Scotts this was going to be amazing as the performance was
Fairport Exeter
going to be Mikes 1985 album 'On Dukes Birthday' one of my favourite Westbrook albums of all time. Sadly we never got past the first run through with the rhythm section. February was also the month that All Living Fear had a mini tour and as such the first 'Tour' for over a decade. We had several rehearsals for these shows and as Michael couldn't come down for the run though we did record one 'As Live' and sent him the tape to work with. This turned out to be very useful indeed. The last big gig of 2020 was seeing my friend Simon and his band The Mission in Frome. Now there was I remember a little unease in the air, this was around the time that Covid was really being talked about. And It was a little bit of a worry being around so many people. It was also the last time I ever shook hands with anybody!
The Mission in Frome
I had one last trip out with a guitar in March, I was offered the chance to sit in with my buddies Russell Sinclair and the Smokin Locos a very fine Blues band based here in Plymouth. I have played with them a few times now, this time felt like I didn't need my blues band L plates. It was a cracking gig, and was hopefully one of a few that may have taken place this year.
Then the big Lockdown was around the corner, we had already decided to cancel the All Living Fear shows and for that matter I had a solo show, to be my 50th gig at the Exeter Cavern. Then it was Lockdown. So what is a person to do during these times?
Well the day job was un affected, I was classed as a key worker so I worked as per normal. The hardest part of those early months was not being allowed to visit my Mum. Everything else I just took as it came. So I became pro active and decided to clear the decks of everything that has been on the to do list for years. I digitised the whole of the all Living Fear archive, something like 300 cassettes of gigs that we had played between 1992 and 2008 before we had digital recorders. I built a model aeroplane, I started learning more about electronics and old computers. As all Living Fear couldn't play live we thought it might be an idea to do a virtual gig, this proved too tricky so the next best thing would be maybe as 'As Live' EP. Because we had that rehearsal in the can all we needed was Michael's elements. so he played as live the show on his home setup, and I then mixed it all and between us we came out with what I consider to be a very strong and solid EP. The 'Lockdown' EP was very well received and we even released it on Cassette. This was our first release on that format since 1998. As it was fun to do we re issued some of our other releases back on Cassette. I also get the bands entire back catalogue out on all streaming and digital platforms going back to our first demo cassette. Two additional songs made it on to 2 Compilation Albums
I also started to do a few lockdown videos, starting with the odd song and this soon gave way to 3 live streams this was a lot of fun, and was actually quite tricky to do in the sense of getting the whole thing together. Its like a piece of television as I wanted the best sound and picture quality that I could do. Did a lot of research and by the time I did the third one I think I cracked it.
On the third livestream I even played the BBC Micro Live!!!
Then came something quite bonkers, The weather presented Owain Wyn Evans did a video playing drums to the BBC News music, so I thought I would have a bit of fun with it. Turned out to be the most popular video that I have ever put on the internet.
The new Kate Westbrook album was released, this was recorded last year at Joss Stones Studio in Devon. This was a great fun recording session, and I got my first proper solo on a Westbrook album too.
I then decided to pass the time along with re learning how old computers work such as Windows 3.1 on a 486 (yes I did get my 1996 version of Cakewalk Home Studio to work fine Just like I did for the second All Living Fear Album). I also have the idea that I am still working on about recording some new music using these very old Technology.
I somehow also made a cameo into the video for a Charity single by the Norfolk Singer / Songwriter Serena Grant.
By the time that we got close to the Eurovision song Contest I decided to finish off my recording of 'Save Your Kisses for me' by The Brotherhood of Man. This was set as a challenge by a BBC radio Presenter. Once complete I decided to send it to the band to see what they thought. The reply I got from The Brotherhood of Man was ' Wow! That's so different to any other cover we have ever had..... The band loved it' needless to say this made me very happy.
I also made a very lowfi video for the song.
Another show that was cancelled was my solo appearance at the Tavistock Edge festival, They wanted to do a compilation CD and commissioned me to send in a song. I had nothing new due to the ongoing writers block that I have however, I did decided to re work an old band song. It turned out OK and they were pleased with it.
We then entered into the post lockdown breather. The first creative thing I did was master an album for my friend David Jaggs. he has a classical label called Timespan Recordings. and I mastered a lovely album by the virtuoso classical guitarist Cristina Galietto. Order the CD from http://www.timespanrecordings.co.uk/cristina-galietto---classical-guitar.html
Jazz south whom promoted The Westbrook gig at Colston Hall in Bristol last year commissioned a new piece that Mike and Kate wrote titled 'Says The Duke' this is in essence a continuation of the On Dukes Birthday album. I was the recording Engineer / Producer of the project and was a challenge to make a 20 minute recording while under strict social distancing rules. However we did it. How we did it may be the subject for a blog another time.
I was also asked to take part in a photographic project from greenbeanzphotography.com photography where he interviewed many musicians from the local area about life under lockdown and photographed us at distance.
As October came along it was the 25th anniversary of the first All Living Fear album. I had the tapes for this baked and transferred about 5 years ago for the possibility of a 20th anniversary edition. At the time I was very busy with Mike Westbrook and working on my Solo album and the debut Secrets for September album. As since then the band had reformed now felt the right time to do it. When we made the album we have little to no equipment, we didn't even own a compressor for recording the vocals. There was also a few bits that needed a tidy up, a bit of guitar that dropped out, Missing Bass Guitar on Tres Desole. All of these things I was able to do in the mix. along with making the vocals and general sound more punchy. The finished recording to me, feels way better, and had it been like this first time round may well have been even more successful than it was. For an unknown band to sell out of its entire pressing in a couple years with no distribution was pretty impressive even then. The finished album was favorably received from those that bought it.
We were also able to add in the 5 songs that we recorded with Drummer John Macklin and producer Steve Paine and Engineer Steve Sheard that had never been heard before.
Earlier in the year after we heard of the passing of the veteran game show presenter Nicholas Parsons, we remixed the old song 'Game Show Host' this being the re recorded version for the Fifteen Years After album. And as we finally got our back catalog on Digital platforms we released Game Show Host as a stand alone release.
I have also edited many Mike Westbrook videos for the Westbrook website and Vimeo Channel here is an example of one of the things that I filmed in Italy.
That's pretty much it for 2020. Lets hope once the vaccine is rolled out that life can get back to normal. I have no firm plans for anything in 2021 apart from wanting to make NEW music and go forward in creativity. Lets see what happens.
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