Mixin in the Kitchen.

29/06/2018

Last night our producer for current recording project with The Blue Yellows,  Mr Tim Lee, was back with us to do some sterling work getting some tracks fixed up and mixed down.

When The Piper plays...

A free gig like this can go either way, or indeed along any point between those ways, so I

Photo: Will Riding

was thankful that the sunny weather brought a fair crowd out. I was also thankful that the more extreme heat that we have had at times over the Spring, and is perhaps back on the way again, kept at bay for today at least, making lumping two guitars around on public transport and on fair walking distances much more pleasant than it could have been.

Chester Live Festival, of which this was a part, is a well organised affair if this, the Acoustic Summer Party at The Piper is anything to go by, with lots of calm and professional staff (or volunteers) doing their work calmly and expertly, making sure the sound is good and the public are well informed and so many other things that have gone on for months before the event.

I was also really knocked out by the wonderfully poignant and beautifully considered songwriting skills of one Will Riding, I especially loved a song inspired by his autistic son, 'Favourite Shoes'. Do check his stuff out.
Thanks as ever to those who listened, commented and bought CDs.Until next time!

A content summer crowd enjoy Will Riding.

I also played 'Flamingos', not on the setlist...

F-A-B ... 'Thunderbirds are GO!'

"FAB Fest" is an obvious reference to the heritage of this great event (as the Middlewich Folk and Boat Festival) as well as being a decisive break from it, such that it will never please everyone, as change never does.

In some ways, the kind of weirdness factor of all the different types of bizarre and wonderful morris dancers around this town at festival time, along with many dyed-in-the-wool folkies who would appear en masse from all over the country, with feathers in hats and other quirks that set them out as 'trad-folkies' is to be missed, although there were still a few to be seen, just not in the great numbers that there used to be when this was more of an out and out folk festival with just a few other types of acts that were perhaps more on the contemporary side of things.

On the other hand, a huge fan of folk music who used to run a record shop in Chester used to say to me "What is 'folk music' anyway?.. It's music for folks, it encompasses all kinds of music".

Nevertheless, plenty of the same vibrancy and excitement in the crowds remain as does plenty of quality music from all kinds of acts, from folk to rock and even pure pop, such that this is one of the key music festivals of the whole region, ranked in the Top 10 of the smaller festivals by The Guardian a few years ago.

This year's event was headlined by Peter Hook and The Light, and our fringe event by the enthusiastic hardworking and talented (not to mention award-winning) bunch that are Middlewich Music. Our set went a bit off piste in places a few times in the first half, we are still pretty under-rehearsed for lots of new songs and sounds we are putting in the set at the moment, though things improved through the set and by the second half we seem to have found our form (which is definitely the right way round to do things if you're going to have a couple of dodgy moments!), but our finding ourselves back in the flow again was not least in thanks to an enthusiastic crowd, good friends and new ones who turned up and gave us a good time.
Thank you all! XX

Set list FabFest 18

Venue Poster

Our Poster

Pic by Adam Roberts

This was during a #Rehearsal break with #TheBlueYellows for tomorrow's @fabfestival. We're on at @narrowboatinn #Middlewich at 4pm! Be there! #BeFab #FABFest @middlewichmusic #Newmusic #livemusic #bandsofinstagram #band #altrock #folkrock #folkrockmusic #musicians #rehearsals #festival #Festivals #musicfestival #northwest #Cheshire #socheshire

A post shared by Jonathan Tarplee (@jonniegitahhr) on Jun 16, 2018 at 1:46pm PDT

Transmission Belper!

Always lovely to get comments like this, thank you to one Lizzy Sherlock at #BelperGoesGreenFest :) pic.twitter.com/F23o1awxQq

— Jonathan Tarplee (@JonnieGitAhhr) June 2, 2018

After a shattering couple of days with not much sleep (for reasons I won't delve into here), as well as being a natural night-owl, perhaps at my perceptive and physical peak between around 10pm and 3am (I hate going to bed at night as much as I hate leaving it in the morning), I find traveling to daytime gigs particularly exhausting.

However, as soon as I got to the sight at Belper Goes Green Festival, my spirit and energy levels were lifted (as well as the coffee kicking in!).
What a fantastically chilled-out, relaxed, friendly feeling festival this is. My first time here, I also got a nice 45  minute solo set, enough time to really get into it. The PA system I was going through was really unusual (and really loud!), run by a guy who makes wind-turbines, I really should have asked him more about it.
I also had time to enjoy some of the other great music at the event including the outstanding songwriter Lucy Milford... do check her stuff out, beautiful). I'd love to come back here with The Blue Yellows one year, great stuff.

Incidentally, this being a green festival is a good opportunity to mention that, as someone who travels to so many gigs and rehearsals by train, feeling as if I practically live on trains in fact, it's heartening to see so many other musicians, and even entire bands plus all their gear, traveling this way these days.

1st stop in Belper; double espresso.