I'm Pretty Excited

 Load-in is arranged, songs, a long set is rehearsed, tech-spec sent and... I'm pretty excited about this one in particular!

Come to the Show!

 

The Attachment Theories Launch Party!

Album launch cupcakes were made a special one-off appearance on the Merch table!
Photo (and more importantly CAKES, by Mel Brennan.

I was genuinely chuffed by all the people who made the effort to come along to the Attachment Theories Launch party!

I was also honoured by my special guests who not only performed on the night but had all played a part in the album as follows;

Dan Logan - Album producer plus drums on tracks 1, 3 & 6, percussion on tracks 2, 4 & 5, additional guitar on tracks 1 & 3, bass on track 4 and banjo on track 2. As I said on the night, it's as much his album!

Dayve Dean - Backing vocals on track 7.

Hayley Strangelove & Paul Senior (Baxter) - Backing vocals on tracks 1, 4 & 6.

Tim Lee - Rhythm guitar on tracks 1 & 6 and Bass on tracks 1, 3 & 6.

Emma & Simon from The Blue Yellows - Track 7. 

Plenty of friends turned up to The Railway Inn, Alsager.

Great to see Dan perform with Dayve Dean again!

Hayley & Paul; Baxter were great.

Tim Lee perfomed his own version of
"Forget Her" as well as his own great songs.
Thanks Tim!

Photo of me  by great songster -Tim Lee.

The album is now also out on iTunes as well as bandcamp.

Jonathan Tarplee solo album, Attachment Theories - OUT NOW!

"..this observational journey, sometimes reflective, sometimes questioning and sometimes well, sometimes capable of taking you another place for a second or two..an appealing and engaging record."  - FATEA RECORDS MAGAZINE.

"Full of melody & honesty"  NIGEL STONIER.

Click on the image of the album above to download the album for as little as £4 or get the CD posted to you (plus the download) for £5.

The album also features the musical brilliance of Daniel J. Logan, Tim Lee, Hayley Strangleove, Paul Senior, Dayve Dean & The Blue Yellows.

Attachment Theories releases on Monday, October 20th... then on Friday 24th, THIS!

The Alsager Music Festival, now a biggie!

July 12th-2014

I've been fortunate enough to play the Alsager Music Festival for the past few years and it's grown every year, this year seeing it really step up to a whole new level in every respect, great to see! 

One of the best aspects about all this is that for original acts like myself and many others playing the event, the audience here were a really enthusiastic and attentive, friendly bunch. A lovely experience. I can't help feeling that so many venues which stick to the old ways of putting on cover-only acts (many of which play the same hits as each-other) are missing out on this increasing mood for original sounds and new music. There seems to be an appetite for it everywhere. I was joined once again by the talented purcussion maestro Daniel J. Logan.

The talent in terms of the other acts I got to see was outstanding, please check out my recommendations below the photos! 

The big crowd enjoyed great weather and great music!

Dan (left) played with 2 other acts as well as me on the acoustic stage. He even dodged a football at one stage, without missing a beat! Thanks to Dave Myatt for the photo.

The inimitable Hayley Strangelove joined us for the final song with her daughter Cherry, surely the youngest performer at the festival! Thanks to Dave Myatt for the photo.

Recommended artists I managed to see, check these out;

Hayley Stangelove; She and Paul Senior's (together they are Baxter) crowd-pleasing brilliance seemed to almost start a new religion.

Sam Hollyman - of The Voice fame, but here doing some really quite rootsie, country-ish stuff with Dan and Narn. Brilliant!

Dirty Money No 5 - Kind of Funky, scratchy, groovy ska with ace musicianship and vocals. You can't not like it!

Sea based Turtles - We're deep in the funk here, you like funk? You'll love these!

Dayve Dean - Dayve has made a welcome return, bringing his heartfelt, melodic and tuneful brilliance back to the live circuit!

Support slot at the Hayley Strangelove Album Launch night.

The Freebird is where it all happened, here's a bit of the ceiling!

Hayley Strangelove has been a staunch entertainer around the clubs, pubs & festivals around the North West, Midlands and beyond for more than 10 years now, for a long time keeping her adoring friends and fans waiting for her to unleash her outstanding vocal and songwriting talents in CD format. Well finally it is here, Tutti Pelliccia her brilliant debut.

I felt genuinely honoured to support Hayley with a short set of songs (the last one of which the gal herself also joined me on). The night also featured Edd K and Lenny 'Hurricane' Lane  who produced the album and plays on several tracks (Lenny also plays with Bearfoot who I shared a stage with at Middlewich, it's a small world). They were both great.

Highlights; So many on this special night, especially during Hayley's set, including being joined on vocals by her dad (who also appears on the album) and Paul Senior (also of Son of Shinobi & Baxter).

Lowlights; exiting the stage by falling off and hurting a knee, doh!

The long-awaited CD. Buy it!

Photo by Mike Willacy. Mike's daughter
kindly made me a good-luck loom band!

I mentioned to Lenny my struggles with my transducer on
my mini-acoustic, asked him about his and he gave me one!
Top muso, top chap!

A Tour De Force!

The audience seemed to love the show, here are some of them in the interval enjoying a hot drink or cold beer.

Like most or more likely all independent musician's, I've had my fair share of promoters, organisers and venues who treat the musician or band as a cheap (or even free) way to make money, perhaps through beer sales, without giving much time or effort over to trying to make make a success of the night, leaving that side of things entirely to the musician's involved. I'm delighted to say that this event was event was the polar opposite of any of that. Mike Willacy who runs The Cycle Junction bike shop near Sandbach is clearly as nuts about music as he is about bikes. An enthusiasm which clearly had an impact on the success of this sell-out event.

The 2012 live music act means that small venues, or would-be venues, are now able to host live music events without too much bother. (The M.U. have some fab advice and downloadable kit HERE for those who run cafes, pubs, village halls or any other potential venue that could host a live-music show). Now, I have read some criticism of the act, including the view that this will encourage more pubs to have bands on in any particular area meaning that the potential available audience for live music in that area would be more dispersed, making things worse for musicians, venues and punters (in terms of atmosphere in the latter case). I would hope though that the act will mean more potential venues will consider it. It was certainly a huge success in this case, and honestly the best gig I have ever done in a bike shop ;)

In this case it was the stunning vocal talent of Hayley Strangelove who was in a more supportive role on this occasion, and I will return the favour on the evening of July 31st when I support both Hayley and Paul Senior in the guise of Baxter. 

For the full run-down of ace talents appearing at these shop-sessions,have a look over HERE. 

Thanks to Mike & his team for the videos below. Now, I must dust off my Pinarello!

Other blogs about this event;

Read The Cycle Junction's own blog HERE.
Read Grateful Fred's blog HERE.

Hayley and Paul, 'back-stage' and back soon as "Baxter".

Press coverage for the Cycle Junction concert(s).

The Saxon newspaper - thesaxon.org

The Chronicle series Newspaper.

April 4th - Easter Mini Tour 4. The Riser Sessions.

As you can see this has already happened. I will post more when the links to corresponding Backstage Pass Podcast and photos become available.

Boxjam Phoar! (the show must go on and all that...)

The old show-biz adage "the show must go on" was very much to the fore of my mind as we prepared for this years' Boxjam IV, or perhaps "Boxjam Phoarr!" given the immensely talented bands and soloists playing, literally too many to mention without forgetting to leave out some of the best artists I've seen (ok heard) so, sorry in advance.... I'd pretty much been in bed since the Levenshulme festival (see previous post) with a fever and was still very much within it's grip.

Human Condition were on stage as we loaded in and sounding even better than before, I think Abbie's vocal confidence had grown allowing her to take flight over Mat's mega-keyboard sounds. Then we had the chance to really enjoy Benjamin Bloom, a real musical showman and talented pianist (throwing in plenty of classical references into this pop-oriented set) before our set, and Chimps On Death Row in full-on rockster mode after us. Hayley Strangelove introduced us on stage, herself a "must see" musical phenomenon. Our set was so short by our usual standards that it flu by (get it?) and I managed to enjoy a misery-free half hour just running on adrenaline!

Post-Chimps, I ambled  over to the Acoustic stage to see the wonderful George Borowski (allegedly "Guitar George" of "Sultans Of Swing" fame, which was a piss-take of the band seen by writer Mark Knopfler was it not???... but that's another story). Anyroadup... I'd "seen" George on youtube. It doesn't do him any justice at all. The man is a troubadour, a story-teller and something of a home-spun shaman. Go See!

Mahoosive thanks to Simon and Tina newbury of Simon J. Newbury Photography for organising, raising all the dosh for Oxfam and taking the black and white shots here. Hats off to you! x 




Thanks to Abbie from Human Condition (& "A band, A Badger & a Blog") for this pic.

Em giving it some keys. Photo Tina Newbury.

Hayley giving it some stick. Photo Tina Newbury

Me nearly giving it some puke. Photo Tina Newbury.



Simon Zenning the bass. Photo Tina Newbury.