If variety, as they say, (whoever 'they' may be) 'is the spice of life', then my musical diet for this past week or so, can only be described as being flavoured with one heck-of-a red hot chilli pepper (not the band…. rather, the stuff they ground-up and put in to Chilli Con Carne) - in terms of sheer, one-end-of-the-spectrum-to-the-other, all over the map, kinda, total diversity!
First off, on Thursday January 25 in the An Lanntair was the Burnsong Tour - an evening of new and for the most part, unheard music that sprang forth from a creative experiment of sorts.
Burnsong, if you're unfamiliar with its workings, 'is a natio
nal project dedicated to promoting, encouraging and nurturing songwriting in Scotland. Burnsong events include songwriting workshops for schools, professional development courses for writers, as well as live music events and a national songwriting competition. It was created with one aim in mind: to inspire a new era of songwriting in Scotland'.
In late 2005, Burnsong invited eight songwriters, from a variety of musical styles - jazz, pop, rock, folk and traditional music to live together 'Big Brother' style in a Georgian Mansion in the heart of the Dumfries and Galloway Countryside to see what they would come up with. After just five days, the eight housemates: Boo Hewerdine formerly of the band The Bible, he's now a solo artist who's written songs for Eddi Reader amongst others; David Scott founding member of The Pearlfishers and a member of BMX bandits; Niki King winner of the 2001 Perrier Jazz Vocalist Award with four critically acclaimed albums; Emily Smith who won the 2002 BBC Radio Scotland's Young Scottish Traditional Musician Award and has toured all over the world; Geoff Martyn is a singer, songwriter, producer, engineer and has written with Chris Difford along with many others; Marc Pilley is the driving force and songwriter with Mercury Award nominated band Hobotalk; Riley Briggs is the singer/songwriter for Edinburgh band Aberfeldy who's acclaimed album 'Do Whatever Turns You On' was released in July 2006 and Sophie Bancroft is a renowned Jazz Singer and Songwriter and experienced educator, emerged with 24 songs.
And with the support of the Scottish Arts Tune-Up the Burnsong House writers took to the road to play their songs live and tell the story of their experience - with a little something for everyone: West Coast Folk Pop, Burt Bacharach-esque ballads, Leon Redbone Rags, Scorchy Soulful Diva driven Power Ballads, somber acoustic jazz, moody 60's Film Noir and all manner of jangly Folk acoustica and a whole lot more! Ending the night with a choir like encore of Hewerdines' ode to loneliness and despair 'Patience of Angels' which Eddi Reader recorded for her 1994 self titled album. As one punter said: "One of the best night's entertainment he'd been to in a long time". And what does Burnsong have to say about it all: "It seemed that our experiment had worked, these eight writers had come together and in such a short time created something truly special and unique, a true reflection of the real talent, imagination and passion for great music that exists in our country today."
Yes, it 'twas something quite different and unique in terms of performance and presentation; compared to your run of the mill gig, and maybe all the songs weren't to everyone's liking but taken at face value - a most enjoyable evening!
Friday January 26 - first stop was the Clachan to check out the new Fuh-kings line up after the sudden departure of vocalist Maurice Beaton, who was not only instrumental in the band's sudden burst onto the local pub circuit, but had also developed into a darn fine frontman, with an excellent sense of timing, phrasing and melody - moved on, but definitely not forgotten - thanks for the memories Bud!
Enter, Steven Murray formerly of Spindrift to fill the position, who brings a whole different approach to the role of vocalist and frontman - a bit edgier, a bit looser, he plays a mean harp and he loves that tambourine! Plus, he's got a backlog of original material; so it will be most interesting to see how this one develops.
That was the first half of the night. The second half was spent in The HEB, in as totally a surreal situation as I have ever been in! Only heard about it on the day, it was billed as an Elton John tribute night, so I didn't know what to expect and when I got there I could hear the strains of Elton's music faintly from outside, so I wasn't sure if it was recordings or what I was hearing until I walked in and saw, tucked away in the corner behind a keyboard, a pretty close to perfect likeness of Elton, singing his little heart out on all the hits.
I couldn't take my eyes off the guy, the likeness was uncanny! The facial expressions, the poses, the playing and singing style and this wasn't one of those prime time mimers either - this guy, whoever he was, could r-e-a-l-l-y sing and tickle those ivories like Chopin or Beethoven or Debussey. Like I said totally surreal or unreal or too real!
Now, for the forthcoming events! Don't forget that Ivor Novello Award winning singer/songwriter and former Snow Patrol member Iain Archer with special guest William Campbell from Our Small Capital will be performing acoustically in the Woodlands Centre on Friday February 9.
Xtreme are in the An Lanntair on February 10. And fresh from their German and Belgium dates supporting +44 and a mini-Scottish headlining tour of their own, Our Lunar Activities return for two Island shows - the Anchorage, Leverburgh on Friday February 16 and the An Lanntair on the 17th with special guests Endor from Glasgow on both nights and Harris Hard Rockers Her Voice Resides opening the An Lanntair show.
That's all for now, goodbye and good night.
Jori
