Weirdlore cancelled!

Oh no! Bad news I'm afraid. It seems my earlier post about Weirdlore tickets selling fast was, erm, optimistic and the organisers have reluctantly pulled the plug on the event. Seems that in these straightened times people just aren't buying tickets in advance. Shame - I was looking forward to it.

Here's what they said:


Unfortunately this has had to be CANCELLED due to the proverbial "circumstances beyond our control" - a common euphemism for the recession, the cuts, the Jubilee, the Olympics and all the other factors currently seriously blighting live music in the UK - which meant that advance ticket sales nowhere near matched the apparent enthusiasm being shown for the event.

All ticket buyers have been notified and their payments have been refunded.

But: coming soon! Weirdlore, the album!

Buskers

The sudden arrival of summer has multiplied the numbers of buskers and street entertainers working the streets of Oxford. Two caught my eye on Wednesday.

The first was playing acoustic guitar in the new percussive style that's proving popular: the guitar is laid over the lap in open-tuning, and is generally thwolloped and thwacked with palms and fingers, making for a dramatic and flashy effect. The crowd he'd pulled certainly agreed. I watched as his case filled up with coins, and not just shrapnel, gold too. I felt I ought to like it but, whatever the skill involved, it seemed too easy and after five minutes I was bored and longing for something more...musical. I found it twenty yards down the road.

A young Irish guy was propped up in front of HSBC playing hammered dulcimer. Now the dulcimer can be a sickly sweet instrument, all roses and castles and doilies and faldarol, but in the hands of a master it's a proper medieval groove box. As he played, his dancing hands unlocked shimmering layers of sound, trickling arpeggios and thundering rhythms. The only other person I've heard who played like that was Krismael from the Space Goats (with whom I played in Jabberwocky, back in the day). I was mesmerised.

Needless to say, but for the unwelcome intrusion of a wino, the poor chap was being largely ignored and had all of twenty pence in his case. I gave him some money, thanked him, and told him that he'd brightened my day.

There's a troubling but persistent myth about music and art in general, one that the present government likes to foster: that its worth can only be measured in terms of how much money it makes. If your art is any good, so the story goes, it'll pay for itself (and you won't be needing any government handouts neither). What rot.

Leave such things to the market and all we'll get is flash and blather, surface not substance. Can I put a price on what that dulcimer player did for my spirits that day? All art matters but the best eludes fashion and taste and the vagaries of the market because it comes from a place where such things are of little moment. It shows them for what they are.

Over 50? Take drugs?

Channel 4 are looking to make a documentary about people over 50 who take illegal drugs but lead normal lives, and they need volunteers! I've spoken to Jennifer Gilroy, the producer, and I'm happy that they want to make a genuine film, one that will challenge our current cultural schizophrenia whereby in public no one takes drugs, but in private everyone does. In other words this won't be freakshow TV.

Details follow below - if you're at all interested give Jennifer a ring on 0141 353 8417.


My name is Jennifer Gilroy and I’m a producer with IWC Media, specialists in intelligent and thoughtful documentaries.  Previous programmes which have received critical acclaim include: Terry Pratchett: Living with Alzheimer’s and The Secret Life of a Manic Depressive with Stephen Fry, as well as recent blue chip science programmes such as Brave New World and Stephen Hawking: Master of the Universe. 

I am currently developing a potential documentary for Channel 4 which looks at recreational drug taking amongst older people (50 plus).  People in this age group are often characterised as Britain’s ‘hidden drug users’ – which is interesting in itself, but what we want to do is see and hear positive personal stories, meet the people who want to talk about recreational drugs and the experiences they’ve had with them, all throughout their lives.   Drug taking is considered to be something that only the ‘younger generations’ do – but in fact, there are many happy, functional older adults who have been using drugs all their lives, and have had no problems as a result.

Channel 4 are really keen to make this and so I am trying to find the right contributors to take part.  I’m hoping to find individuals and groups of friends who are happy to talk candidly and allow us to film their normal everyday lives whilst discussing their relationships with drugs over the years.

If you might have 5 minutes to discuss it in a bit more detail,  I’d be delighted and can be contacted on direct line 0141 353 8417.

Weirdlore

Telling the Bees were recently asked to contribute a track to a new compilation of strange and peculiar folk music going by the appropriate name of Weirdlore. It's being released by Folk Police Recordings on June 11th 2012.

The brief was to produce something new, a collaboration or a remix or just something from the vaults that had been lying around collecting dust. As we're currently a five piece (at least until the autumn) we decided to re-record 'The Worship of Trees'. We got kind of demented in the studio, as I hope you'll hear (though this new 2012 mix will only be available on this compilation).

I'm pleased to say the album has had it's first review, and most favourable it is too. Here's what The Active Listener blog has to say about us:

"Worship of Trees" by Telling the Bees sounds like a pagan Hawkwind left to their own devices in the woods, and features some exceptional violin work.

It's always refreshing to get a good review but on reading that I felt my work was done. Well, nearly.

There is, of course, a Weirdlore gig to go with the CD (in fact, the gig spawned the CD). It's going to be a good old-fashioned all-dayer, a festival in a box. I'm very excited about it. Tickets are selling out fast, so if you're thinking of going best to book early to avoid disappointment. Up the May!

Devon again

And so to Devon again, to visit my Dad

and my Mum,

and to walk by the sea. We were even blessed with a short sighting of the sun.

Before heading back up the M5 we took a detour to Dartmoor for a long overdue visit to Rima,

 and Tom,

and not forgetting Macha, the otherworldly lurcher who sees things the rest of us don't.

We drank tea, ate cake, went for a walk in the steep Teign Valley by Fingle Bridge, drank more tea, ate curry, talked about art and magic and acupuncture and Dartmoor and Devon and the stuff that stories are made of.

Rima and Tom have a proper Victorian Gypsy Caravan in their garden (you mean you don't?), all ready for a performance next weekend. The perfect place for tea and conversation with extraordinary friends.

And so to Eynsham

On the May Bank Holiday we made our customary pilgrimage across Port Meadow, up and over Wytham Woods, across Swinford Bridge, to Eynsham, to see the local Morris dancers bring in the May. After so much rain, Wytham Woods was an almost fluorescent green, the last of the bluebells looking bedraggled and sorry for themselves in the mud.

Though we were quite dry and found a rare pool of sunshine to sit in, our picnic in the woods (and the music of one solitary cuckoo) was interrupted by ominous claps of thunder. When we emerged through Swinford Gate the sky had gone quite black. Forked lightning skewered the horizon and a strange vortex of cloud whirled about our heads as if it were the end of days. Counting the gap between lightning flashes and thunder we worked out that the storm was still a few miles away and but for a few drips it passed us by. Nevertheless, its ferocity earned it a mention in the press.

A storm is probably not the best time to investigate a hollow tree, but Taranis had other things on his mind and we were safe.

Eynsham Morris seemed genuinely pleased to see us. It's a strange thing, but their annual home gig goes almost unnoticed. Only fifteen or so locals assembled to see them. Barely anyone from the Oxford Folk scene was there. And yet, buoyed up by the recent influx of young blood, or perhaps driven by the crackling electricity of the storm, they danced as if their lives depended on it, thumping the ground with their boots and thwacking their sticks together so hard that sparks flew.

Eynsham are the real deal. It's a special thing that they do. Next year, why not come and see for yourselves? Up the May!

Nomitron

I helped Nomi out today by taking some publicity photos for her. I was using an iPhone with the Hipstamatic app, and while I appreciate it's hard not to get stunning shots with this nifty bit of software, we were both pretty pleased with the results.

I particularly like this sequence.

Circulus

I supported Circulus at a recent gig in Oxford, down at the Port Mahon pub, ably organised by Dave Todd. I played for about thirty minutes, half solo and half with Mr Jim Penny whipping up a storm on his Anglo-Concertina. Here's a few videos of the night for your delight and delectation - you can hear another version of Astrolabe here.

Dartmoor

Over the bank holiday weekend we made a stealth-trip to Dartmoor, stealth because we really ought to have been visiting friends and family, but, well, we were rather in need of some time away from everything and everyone. The hard drives wanted de-fragging. Next time, I promise.

We managed to fit in three long walks, all around Lustleigh.

I don't think I am happier than with a map, a thermos of tea, my walking boots on, and several easy miles under the legs.

Everywhere you go, great boulders of granite jut up out of the ground. Some are covered in ivy or moss. All are coated in lichen. Granite is my favourite kind of rock. According to the hymn by Reginald Heber, 'the heathen in his blindness bows down to wood and stone', but why wouldn't you? It makes perfect sense to me. I feel the urge to touch them, to show respect, to make offerings. Some feel quite numinous, almost alive.

In Lustleigh it was May Day. There was Morris Dancing, a Maypole and a May Queen, who processed around the village accompanied by the local town band.

It's tempting to read the day as some latent and half-remembered piece of sinister Wicker Man voodoo but it's nothing of the sort. A bit daggy at the edges, it's so wonderfully English.

On our way home we were hailed by a friendly stranger, Suzi, who recognised me from Telling the Bees. You know when you're on the right path when you pass unnoticed and ignored in the city but get flagged down in the middle of Dartmoor, and by a maker of shamanic drums at that. A fine meeting indeed.

One last walk took us to Bowerman's Nose and Hound Tor, where Nomi, more keen-eyed than me, spotted an adder sunning itself by the path. Neither of us had seen one before. Shortly afterwards we heard our first cuckoo of the spring tootling in a copse.

Three days on Dartmoor had finally worn off, and the cares of the city were quite gone. The hard drives were working again.