Blackberry Season

 Oct 3rd 2026

We gathered, along with many others on a multi-artist evening at the best city center rock venue that just happens to be in a small market town, somehow, instead - Percy's!

Barn54 we're the headliners once again and at the time of the booking more than a year ago, we weren't aware that it also coincides with Whitchurch's biggest event of the year - The Blackberry Fair.

It was our 1st of 3 gigs with super-pro musician Dayve Dean. He has had just one rehearsal with us and is absolutely nailing our songs. Top work, Dayve.

I had some technical issues surrounding my pedalboard or power to it for a time, Sina (from Barn54) having similar issues too with her sustain pedal, Emma swapping it out for hers didn't seem to help so it may have been a socket issue perhaps. 

The gig was a reminder though that technical issues or not (they will also be a part of the rough & tumble of live shows, though of course you try to minimise them) it is the over all vibe and communication of feelings that really counts - I think we got away with it & Barn54 were mesmerisingly good, as always.

Photo: TMR Photography 

Photo: TMR photography 

Photo: TMR photography 

What a night! Photo: TMR photography 

Dave, Jonathan, Bass-Depp Dayve Dean & Em of The Blue Yellows. Pic by Dave Coomer. 

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!

EP Day 2: Rock Out with your Sock Out.

Updated 05/02/2020

Although recording full drums would be the ideal way to start tracking-proper, time restraints and a keenness from all concerned meant we wanted to get on with it and record what we can in the hours available.

Drummer Dave, myself and producer José gathered at a José’s brand new home studio to record percussion and acoustic guitar tracks.
Recording sessions always seem to throw up some quirky moments... Dave found that zip-tying a pair of José’s socks to his mallets perfected the tone on the wash effect he was aiming for on the ride cymbal.

José and Dave discuss the approach.

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The best thing since sliced bread?

Watch the brand new video for Toast The Night!

Premiers June 7th, 2019 at noon.

#YC19 Festival

We were festival virgins for Your City Festival, set among the still fairly numerous (for today) music venues in the centre of Stoke On Tent.
For those who don't know, the city centre is Hanley, though most from other parts of the country have never heard of it, confusion added by the fact that the town of 'Stoke', though in Stoke On Trent, is today a bit of an offshoot from the main centre of things in Hanley. On top of this 'the D-Road' is an A-road duel carriageway... Oh I'll shut up now..

Anyway it was a pleasure to play #YCF19 in the tasty environs of Mart's Brewhouse and Tap and we felt like we were on form and playing well, albeit just to other musicians who had just been on, or were about to go on.
Good fun nonetheless!

Video Killed a Barbeque Star.

Last night we descended on the location for the first video-shoot for The Blue Yellows   since  'No Tobacco'. The setting was a real-life BBQ at our very own drummer Dave's place with Rob and Ang behind the cameras.

I travelled there with Rob and Ang who, like me both suffer from Social Anxiety,  so normally the thought of going to something like a BBQ could be quite a daunting ordeal. In addition Ang and Rob were both exhausted after full days and I was still feeling ill(!).

Nevertheless our lovely hosts and jovial atmosphere made it a joy, now the real work begins, the endless hours of editing for Rob! Thanks mate!

Mixing it up for Neve.

25th March 2019

Music for Team Neve Fundraising Night
Bar B at The Market Tavern, Sandbach

To many in music, Neve is the name of a classic mixing desk/console, and The Blue Yellows were certainly mixing it up with some very diverse acts for a special fundraising night for Neve, a young child with a number of very serious neurological conditions (please see the link at the bottom of the text) for which money is needed for support from specialist American medical institutions on top of the quality health care she is receiving through the NHS.

Typically, a musical evening might be of cover acts to provide easily accessible entertainment or original acts for a more discerning music-loving crowd with an ear for new sounds. However the mix seemed to work really well, with the audience lapping up the new music along with the classics. As well as my gang, acts included host for the evening as well as sound-engineer, stage manager and singer-songwriter Dayve Dean, Tim Lee, Luke Stephenson, Bitter and Twisted, and Footsteps who also kindly lent their cajon, thanks guys!

Although Monday-night gigging provides an incredibly tiring prospect, having not yet recovered from the weekend, and having to get back into my routine of working hours through the day and night through the week as well, I'm expecting to look back on this with fondness when (if) I recover.
Please see the Team Neve crowdfunding page at: https://www.justgiving.com/crowdfunding/teamneve

Fabulous turn-out of charitable music-goers for a Monday Night!

Thanks to Tim Lee for this pic of The BYs

Pre-soundcheck

A flood of nice words!

We've just had this ace review from one of the most highly respected music blogs around, Here Comes the Flood;

"Eccentric, funny, tongue-in-cheek vaudevillian garage rock. with enough musical references to keep the music geeks at bay, like the Take Me To The River bit in Spiral Dive. Singer Jonathan Tarplee is an old fashioned balladeer turned indie rock musician, but the band's secret weapon is Emma Alcock with her uncanny knack for syncopation on both accordion and keyboards give the music an off-kilter quality that make the songs jump up and down in a good way."

Read the full review at https://werksman.blogspot.com/2019/03/the-blue-yellows-kitchen-sessions.html

Release.

View this post on Instagram

Left the house again tonight to see the Blue Yellows launch their latest album

A post shared by Bob (@wayofthebob) on Mar 1, 2019 at 4:12pm PST

March 1st 2019 - The Blue Yellows 'Kitchen Sessions' release Show.

If you're an unhealthy combination of worrier and control freak, then the many months of build up to meeting all the deadlines on the way to the successfully release of an album on time are a prolonged struggle comprising of garnering various people, software programmes, organisations, materials, third parties and so on... all against the relentless progress of time, any one thing threatening to cause a postponement of release-day and therefore scuppering months of promotional drip-feeds, press packs sent to music press, photography, conventional press releases and so on. Such a delay would then either end up being one of many months so that it can promoted properly again, or resulting in a bit of a non-event.
So it's a real sense of contented release I find myself in now, knowing The Blue Yellows can go back to being a gigging band again. Easy! 😉

What a lovely night you lot gave us at Tom's Tap and Brewhouse though, much of the talk afterwards while signing albums and so on, was how the young duo The Bugs owned that stage and played so well, these comments coming from a very knowledgable 'music-crowd' that really know their stuff. Pretty amazing for youngsters Owain and Dylan still at primary school!

Tim Lee, the brilliant singer-songwriter, friend and producer of the new tracks on this album, provided a similarly pitch-perfect tone for the night with his honest, emotionally and texturally rich songs.

The audience was full of familiar faces from near and far, many coming from Manchester as it worked out, and from further afield, some really good friends too, the only problem at an event like this is really having hardly any free moments to speak much.

To those of you there, thanks for giving us such a great night and sharing the happiness, contentment, new tunes and sense of... release.

This is a set-list pic from Tim's own blog-post on this event which you can read, in full HERE.

Tim Lee on superb form, photo by Rob Collins. 

Joined for the finale by Tim and The Buggs, photo by Rob Collins. 

You can now get to the new album on iTunes, Apple Music, Spotify, Deezer or whichever is your favourite streaming or download site, or order the limited edition CD, before they go, below!

Huge thanks to every one of you who came along to give us a great #KitchenSessions party! Plus brilliant guests @timleesongs & #TheBuggs! https://t.co/NU0uG8rLhK

— The BlueYellows (@TheBlueYellows) March 2, 2019

Get the Blue Yellows single 'Toast the Night' and pre-order the album 'Kitchen Sessions' now!

The Kitchen roll out..

So, as the forthcoming album made with my gang The Blue Yellows and with another talented friend Tim Lee on Production duties, the roll out of promotional activities has started;

Firstly, the single Toast the Night became available on Feb 1st along with the option to pre-order the limited edition CD (see link above).

On Thursday night this got it's first ever airplay on Redshift Radio thanks again to Tim and his superb Doorstep Mixtape show.

Then last night, Friday, we eschewed our usual rehearsal for a live Q and A about the album (watch at the bottom of this post).

Tim also blogged about this here (thanks Tim!): https://timleesongs.wordpress.com/2019/02/09/live-vinyl-a-weekend-of-musical-opportunities/?fbclid=IwAR3i9GPwyOyNLQ1NY7oprJplxdI5KcN1Z06BDUi5KSxzxSbheq5lKMQ8umk

More over the next few days and weeks too...

View this post on Instagram

We (#TheBlueYellows) did a Facebook-live Q&A on our forthcoming album #kitchenSessions with special guest, our producer @timleesongs from Em's kitchen where much of the album was made. It was good fun but the last few mins were chopped off somehow, so we missed thanking everybody involved boo hoo 😢 watch it at facebook.com/blueyellows #livestream #qanda #band #bands #livemusic #newmusic #production #musicproduction #CD #newslbum #behindthescenes #howtomakearecord #livetracks #sessiontracks #Kitchen #interview #bandinterview #broadcast #protools #cubase #livebroadcast #facebookisdeadtome

A post shared by Jonathan Tarplee (@jonniegitahhr) on Feb 8, 2019 at 2:52pm PST

Just prepping for our live Q&A live session on Facebook, to promote our forthcoming album "Kitchen Sessions"... 7.30 tonight if you fancy joining us! pic.twitter.com/xTP0ILgCfX

— Dave the drummist (@DDrummist) February 8, 2019

Watch the livestream QandA (until we got cut off) here;

GlastonLee Festival - Made of Love.

I know it takes a dedicated team of people to work on a festival as a full-on commitment for the best part of (if not a full) year to make it this sort of success. Well this, Glastonlee Festival one was put lovingly put together by family members of Lee Belsham (of Dr Phibes fame), in his memory and honour, and to raise money for St Luke's Hospice which did so much to care for Lee, as with so many others. A festival indeed, made of love.

The ongoing heatwave, which has been making life so uncomfortable in many ways, was of course a further blessing for an event like this, and although tickets sold well online, plenty more paid on the gate as the day went on. A great day, and night!
A pleasure, an honour,  to be a part of this.

Evert act I head sounded great! This was Brave New World, kicking the whole day off.

Mark Barnett with relaxed audience.

Not needed thankfully.

Our salubrious back-stage area.

Playing the Tracks.

Today I was out with the gang, The Blue Yellows playing amid the historic railway paraphernalia of Crewe Heritage Centre for Rock and Rails Festival. It was a struggle to get into the set for a while as we had a few sound issues that are sometimes inevitable at such events, but it was a good chance to practice some new songs on those who made it along.

Today we were in traditional 'national dress' The 'knotted hankey' being in jokey support of the UK for tonight's Eurovision Song contest, myself and Dave from the band having appeared in a crazy Eurovision-themed version of The Doorstep Mixtape on the radio, two nights beforehand, with Dave sporting the infamous head-gear.

The BYs Rhythm Section not messing about. Thanks to Tim Lee for the photo.

Don't laugh, you'll all be wearing them by next summer. 

Thanks to Martin Butterworth for this photo!

Thanks to Tim Lee for the photo.

Em somehow managed to look good in hers... not fair!
Thanks to Tim Lee for the photo.

A post shared by Bob (@wayofthebob) on May 12, 2018 at 1:41pm PDT

Brewing up some new tunes.

Friday, April 6th 2018 (*updated 08/04/18 to include link to live review)

Last night I was out with The Blue Yellows playing long set with new songs. As we have, of late, been focusing on recording, we were under-rehearsed in terms of live performances of new songs and in some cases, any rehearsal at all of some of the longer-standing tunes in the set. Nevertheless, although our set may not have been technically perfect, we were definitely 'in the zone' as far as artistic expression, emotion and spirit are concerned, playing an absolute blinder from what I could tell. The lovely crowd packed into the bijou but gorgeous (with equally gorgeous beers and gins) Offbeat Brewery.
I dedicated a couple of songs to my good friend Alex an amazing tour de force of a character. She and her lovely doggie died in a horrible boat fire earlier in the year.
Thanks to everyone who made it along, you gave us a great night, and lovely to see so many old faces, and enthusiastic new ones!

*Marina is Red also wrote a review of this gig at https://www.marinaisred.com/2018/04/08/gig-review-the-blue-yellows/

Awesome gig of @TheBlueYellows last night at the Offbeat Brewery #Firstyfriday pic.twitter.com/gOUPyLXvPf

— Manu Arteaga (@arteagamusic) April 7, 2018 

Official Video ad'

Setlist - spot the new tunes?

On the Offbeat, Off the Rails.

Many thanks to Tim Lee for this photo.

The creative Crewe people at, well creativecrewe.co.uk put on a fab festival, The Big Event Festival, in the huge hanger-like former railway 'shed' that is now Crewe Heritage Center.
It was lovely that so many old friends turned up, not that I had much time to spend with them in my pre-gig tension or post-gig emotional exhaustion.
I did get to enjoy some fabulous artists before our set however including the jangly rockers with Beatlesque vocal harmonies The Continental Phase.
Good friends and brilliant songwriters Tim Lee and Dayve Dean both performed lots of as-yet unreleased material and it was great to hear their fine vocals in a place with such a huge, natural reverb.
You can also read Tim's experience of the occasion HERE (a blog-post within a blog-post I tell you, it's all here).
Raven's Way had a kind of post-folky retro thing going on and did an incredibly moving version of 'Who Knows Where the Time Goes', a wonderful Sandy Denny song. They were minus a (poorly) fiddle player but all sounded great, especially my fellow finger-picker guitarist Pete but then, I am biased.

A typical thing happened with me during our Blue Yellows set, and I should know better by now. A couple of songs in and I had lost so much of my vocal ability that I felt as if I was singing through a narrow straw, so wasn't able to go for the songs in the way that I wanted to, yet a few songs later and I had recovered... proof of lack of vocal warm-ups (again!). MUST DO. The gang did me proud, as always though, I'm very lucky to have you, thanks guys (and girl).

The Continental Phase opened the day.

Dayve Dean arrived in time to play a great set.

Me with drummist Dave, who'd had the
Purple Yellows treatment.

A very appreciative crowd, thanks all, and to all the friends I hardly got to speak to at all.
The Blitz team did a superlative job on the sound as we have come to expect and the Offbeat Beers were very nice indeed, I look forward to more of them when I have a few more pennies.

Tim Lee with great new songs.
(Sorry about my rubbish photo, Tim).

Lymelight Festival 2017

Fierce crowds were kept back by the security fencing!

Most of the band seemed more than a little bleary-eyed on arrival in Newcastle Under Lyme, our tiredness probably matched by the dull, drizzley skies which greeted us. We enjoyed the brilliant Kez Liddle's dreamy music before we went on. Finding we had a slightly longer slot at this, the fabulous town-center music and arts extravaganza that is The Lymelight Festival than we had originally been told,  so after a quick chat we added 'Love is the Answer' to the set list.

And... the Sun came out!

We added 'Love is the Answer' to the setlist
after the Radiohead cover.

We were super impressed with dreamy singer songwriter
Kez Liddle.

WOW Macclesfield! You won't find a better venue than The Swan with Two Necks in Macc.

 March 3rd, 2017

Just wow! On my stays in Macclesfield in the past I have always tried to make it into The Swan with Two Necks as the atmosphere is so good, and I'm really glad to report that it's still as great as ever.
A clean, well presented place that also has a bohemian character (not to mention characters inside). Clean stylishness and bohemia are sadly not common bedfellows in the music-venue world, but they are here.

So a lovely place to be in, super-friendly and helpful staff and the people who came along were also dead friendly and up for a good time.

Thank You All!

In short, THE perfect place to play or see a band!
They are pretty active on facebook so please do check them out at https://www.facebook.com/TheSW2N oh and treat yourself to a night out there!

First time using my two-in-one guitar bag from Gear4Music

We pretty much stuck to the planned setlist
this time, other than modulate 'There She Moves' into
'Jolene' (by Dolly Parton) when some enthusiastic
folk started singing it!

Looking back. Looking Forward, and Thank you, yes YOU! xxx

Pre-order at https://jonathantarplee.bandcamp.com/album/rafflesia-dreams

Thank you, yes YOU! xxx

Getting in Key. Recording with The Blue Yellows; Session 2.

Em had been absent from the 1st recording session with the band for the current record we (The Blue Yellows) are working on, as she was really quite busy with her newborn baby, Heidi! Now, she was ready though, and her keyboard sounds were the main thing yet to be recorded on the tracks we're laying down with our production maestro, Tim Lee.
It all took place in very domestic, relaxed surroundings and went really smoothly. 

Em at the Keys, Tim at mission control.

Em worked quickly, not needing to go over anything too much on keys, pretty impressive really, given how much time she has been out of the band lately. I was there to do some backing vocals with her; she used to work really well together with Hayley when Hayley was in the band and I thought it might help if we were both there to help sort backing vocal harmonies out, in the end, for technical reasons we recorded one at a time on vocals and it wasn't a problem. A really quick, productive session, and two tracks are now sounding really promising. Exciting stuff, we can't than Mr Lee enough for all his hard work!

There wasn't as much waiting around as usual in recording, but I just had time to see some niceness outside.

Recording  doobries.