4th July 2012: The Big Eyes Family Players & Friends / Playlist

Featured: The Big Eyes Family Players & Friends - Folk Songs II (Static Caravan)

Big Eyes was started in 2000 in Leeds by James Green as a private project, a naïve way of trying to create classical music, and somehow fuse his interests in the melancholia of Mike Leigh, Egon Schiele, Edward Elgar and The Birthday Party. It soon outgrew the bedroom and a band was formed. Big Eyes recorded 4 albums over the next four years (for Pickled Egg Records) and split up in 2004.

After this, The Big Eyes Family Players were formed, as a more collaborative arrangement. So far, they have worked with people like Jeremy Barnes (A Hawk And A Hacksaw), Terry Edwards (Gallon Drunk/Tindersticks), Rachel Grimes (Rachel’s), James Yorkston, James William Hindle and many more.

TBEFP are currently based in Sheffield, UK and they dwell somewhere within chamber music, folk music and perhaps pop music; guitars, strings, harmoniflute, organ, bass, drums, flute, sometimes vocals and other bits and bobs.

The interest in recording folk material first started with the recording of the ‘Warm Room’ album in 2008. It was conceived as an ‘ode’ to folk music, so not a ‘folk album’ per-se, but a distilling of the elements that make up the form. It did however contain one traditional number, being ‘False True Love’, based on the Shirley Collins version.

Shortly after this, and totally unconnected to it, James Yorkston put the idea to them to collaborate on an album of traditional material. They agreed, and the album was completed in January 2009, with the help of Nancy Elizabeth, Pip Dylan, David Wrench and Luke Daniels. They also went on a tour of the UK/Germany with Mr Yorkston in late 2009 in support of the album.

At the end of the ‘Folk Songs’ tours, James (Green) was considering what Big Eyes should do next. Mr Yorkston suggested another folk songs album, this time with a selection of singers/collaborators. James didn’t take that suggestion particularly seriously, but the idea was sown. Shortly after returning home, James contacted a few of his favourite singers and asked if they’d like to contribute to an album of traditional songs (and choose songs). They all agreed, somewhat surprisingly.

‘Folk Songs II’ by The Big Eyes Family Players & Friends is a continuation of the previous collection, but on this record the boat has been pushed out a little more. The songs and stories are more sprawling, and arrangements show further disregard for any folk tradition. James admits openly to not knowing much about folk music, or particularly having much time for folk authenticity. The aim was simply to illustrate the songs and the voices in the most appropriate way, and the only way that the Big Eyes Family can.

The Big Eyes Family Players

Radio Playlist 4th July 2012 (HERE)

Jerry Hionis - The Red Dead Mule [Graveyard Stomps & Funeral Rags]
Dave Gerard & The Watchmen - Under Veiled Light [Under Veiled Light]
The Big Eyes Family Players & Friends - Looly, Looly (feat. James Yorkston) [Folk Songs II]
**
The River Has Many Voices - Yeah, I Got Away, But I Never Got Clear [Barton Creek EP]
Broken Fences - For A Long Time Coming [S/T]
Tarkio - This Rollercoaster Ride [Omnibus]
**
The Big Eyes Family Players & Friends - Greenland Bound (feat. Adrian Crowley) [Folk Songs II]
I Am Oak - Everything In Waves [Nowhere Or Tammensaari]
Oberon Carter - Natural Life [Natural Life]
**
The Big Eyes Family Players & Friends - Farewell Lovely Nancy (feat. Nancy Elizabeth) [Folk Songs II]
Anne Briggs - Thorneymoor Woods [A Collection]
James Yorkston & The Big Eyes Family Players - Thorneymoor Woods [Folk Songs]
**
The Big Eyes Family Players & Friends - Bonny Boy (feat. Heather Ditch) [Folk Songs II]
James William Hindle - Bleak House [Joshong]
Shakey Graves - Roll The Bones [Roll The Bones]
**
Nancy Elizabeth - Off With Your Axe [Battle & Victory]
Foreign Fields - Where The Willow Tree Died [Anywhere But Where I Am]

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Sideways Through Sound Archive

27th July 2011: Sea Of Bees
20th July 2011: Major Chord
13th July 2011: Cave Country & Interview
6th July 2011: Kaya Ogawa
**
28th July 2010: The Driftwood Manor
21st July 2010: v/a Beyond Berleley Guitar
14th July 2010: ASS
7th July 2010: Rangda
**
29th July 2009: The Steals
22nd July 2009: v/a Leaves Of Life
15th July 2009: Rusted Rail Records
8th July 2009: Tranko/Yoshino/Japanese Special
1st July 2009: The Boy Who Spoke Clouds
**
28th July 2008: Tom Carter & Christian Kiefer
21st July 2008: Arborea
14th July 2008: Jeff Eden
7th July 2008: I Am Your Autopilot
**
27th July 2007: Fence Records
20th July 2007: v/a Leaves From Off The Tree
13th July 2007: v/a Dead Man's Shoes OST
5th July 2007: White Magic

27th June 2012: Mark Fosson & Interview / Playlist

Featured: Mark Fosson - Digging In The Dust (Tompkins Square)

Mark Fosson's new album is an exquisite collection of newly-discovered 12-string demo versions of the lost '70's Takoma album.

Kentucky native Mark Fosson recorded one album for John Fahey's Takoma Records in 1976 which went unreleased until 2006. Mark recently found the home demos for that session. Here's what he has to say about them:

"These 11 tracks are the songs I began writing after acquiring my first 12-String guitar. I recorded them in my living room on a Pioneer RT1050 2-track reel-to-reel with a rented microphone (I believe It was an AKG414 but I won't swear to it). All are originals except for "Back In The Saddle Again" which resulted from my other obsession at the time of watching old black & white Gene Autry movies any chance I could... usually at 5:00AM! I met Mr. Autry many years later and tried to tell him this but the crowd was too loud & his ears were too old & he couldn't hear a word I was saying. Anyway...thanks Gene. Most of these songs would appear later in slightly altered form on 'The Lost Takoma Sessions', but these original versions are my personal favorites. I can't believe the tapes have survived so long and still sound as clean as the day I recorded them." - Mark Fosson

Mark Fosson

Radio Playlist 27th June 2012 (HERE)


Yousei - Early Morning Mist [Broken Woods & Some Prayers]
Jason Lowe - Snow On The Cimmarrons [S/T]
Mark Fosson - Sky Piece [Digging In The Dust: Home Recordings 1976]
**
Jack Bradley - Hearts [Demo]
Moonwood - So The Darkness Shall Be The Light & The Stillness Be The Dancing [The Strength Of The Pack Is The Wolf & The Strength Of The Wolf Is The Pack]
GNOD - 5th Sun [Trensmat 7']
**
Mark Fosson - Still Ain't Got No Home [Demo]
Mark Fosson - Quarter Moon [Digging In The Dust: Home Recordings 1976]
Vetiver - Any & All [v/a In A Cloud II]
Hawkwind - Hurry On Sundown [Live at Hawkfest 2007]
**
The Maple Trail - Sailor's Voice [Live on Sideways Through Sound, 02-05-2012]
Carter Moulton - Lamplight [Cloud]
Mark Fosson - Cosmic Hiccup [Digging In The Dust: Home Recordings 1976]
**
Strand Of Oaks - Maureen's [Album Advance (Dark Shores)]
James M Carson - Black Buzzin' Fly [Demo]
Father John Misty - Hollywood Forever Cemetery Sings [Morning Becomes Eclectic - KCRW Santa Monica LA, 30-05-2012]
**
Mark Fosson - Gorilla Mountain [Digging In The Dust: Home Recordings 1976]

20th June 2012: Tales Of Murder & Dust / Playlist

Featured: Tales Of Murder & Dust - Hallucination Of Beauty (SR)

Tales Of Murder & Dust, formed with the desire to play music referencing surf music and film scores from classic Spaghetti Westerns... a great template to start with!!

With the release of the 'Peyote EP' in 2009, they achieved this and something much more, something quite special... Tales Of Murder & Dust had found a uniquely dreamy soundscape, littered with psych and folk-like detail.

Following the release of the debut EP, Tales Of Murder & Dust continued to hone their musical expression even further...

With their long awaited debut album 'Hallucination Of Beauty' now available, you are once again invited to absorb yourself in the wonderful psychedelic world of Tales Of Murder & Dust... now with extra added sitar... could it be more perfect for Sideways Through Sound?!?

Tales Of Murder & Dust 

Radio Playlist 20th June 2012 (HERE)

The Chemistry Set - Time To Breathe (rough mix) [Fruits De Mer 7"]
Bad Liquor Pond - Great Planes [Blue Smoke Orange Sky]
Tales Of Murder & Dust - Hypnotized Narcissist [Hallucination Of Beauty]
**
The Laurels - Changing The Timeline [Album Advance (Plains)]
The Method - The gatekeeper & I [7"]
Ancient Sky - Wooden Ear [T.R.I.P.S.]
**
Tales Of Murder & Dust - Darlin' 61 [Hallucination Of Beauty]
The Dandy Warhols - Don't Shoot She Cried [This Machine]
The Altered Hours - Daydream Parade [Downstream]
**
The Saint James Society - Ballad Of The White Horse [demo]
Moonbell - Nether Days [Parallel EP]
Tales Of Murder & Dust - Dead Eyes [Hallucination Of Beauty]
**
Kingdom Of The Holy Sun - Into The Clouds [S/T]
The Brian Jonestown Massacre - Face Down On The Moon [Aufheben]
White Manna - Heavy Metal Acid Head [S/T]
**
Tales Of Murder & Dust - Silence [Hallucination Of Beauty]

13th June 2012: Sideways Through Sound Hawkwind Special

Featured: Hawkwind - Onward (Eastworld)

Now into their sixth decade, space rock luminaries Hawkwind are still releasing albums with pleasing frequency. Many bands of this vintage get to a point where they simply tour a greatest hits set and do little to challenge themselves, rarely issuing new material. With Hawkwind's numerous line-up changes (founder member Dave Brock is still present) one doesn’t necessarily expect greatness from them in 2012. Happily though, there is plenty of life left in these old space dogs.

Alongside Dave, we have Tim Blake who has been a member on and off since 1979, layering his trademark psychedelic keyboard and theremin flourishes all over the pounding noise and one time guitarist Huw Lloyd Langton makes a very welcome guest appearance on 'The Hills Have Ears'. 'Onward' delivers a couple of tunes destined to become future classics, one listen and you'll know that this could have easily fit into a set at the Roundhouse in 1972...

Sideways Through Sound will be dedicating the whole show to Hawkwind this week, undoubtedly one of the major musical cornerstones of the show, so stay tuned for an hour and a half trip Sideways Through Sound with extra added space rock, stone circles, spaceships and sonic attack...!!

Hawkwind

Radio Playlist 13th June 2012 (HERE)

Hawkwind - Countdown (live) [BBC, The Paris Theatre, 1972]
Hawkwind - Seasons [Onward]
Hawkwind - Levitation (live) [This Is Hawkwind, Do Not Panic: Live At Stonehenge]
Hawkwind - Angels Of Death (live) [Live Chronicles]
Hawkwind - Silver Machine [7" original version]
Hawkwind - Ejection [7" unreleased version]
Hawkwind - System Check/Death Trap [Onward]
Hawkwind - Warriors/Magnu [Warriors On The Edge Of Time]
Hawkwind - Paradox [7" remix edit]
Hawkwind - Lord Of Light/Down Through The Night [Doremi Fasol Latido]
Hawkwind - 10 Seconds Of Forever (live) [Space Ritual Sundown]
Hawkwind - Mindcut [Onward]
Hawkwind - Web Weavers [Hall Of The Mountain Grill]
Hawkwind - Hassan I Sahba [Quark, Strangeness & Charm]
Hawkwind - Needle Gun (live) [Live Chronicles]
Hawkwind - The War I Survived (live) [The Chronicle Of The Black Sword]
Hawkwind - Aerospace Age [Onward]
Hawkwind - Welcome To The Future (live) [Space Ritual Sundown]

6th June 2012: v/a Weirdlore: Notes From The Folk Underground

Featured: v/a Notes From The Folk Underground (Folk Police)

“There’s something happening here, but you don’t know what it is…”

… said Bob Dylan, which could be a pretty good starting point for weirdlore, the genesis of which was in an all-dayer taking place in Bristol on Sunday 10th June (details HERE). Both the event and now the album celebrate the point where all sorts of English folk music (plus an emigrant American living in North Wales and a far-from-token Scot) meets what Lord Buckley referred to as The Far-Goneasphere. Not for nothing did fRoots magazine once have a cover depicting the Padstow 'Oss and the Bacup Nutters with the strapline "England, the last undiscovered exotic outpost of world music."

The clichés about our folk music suggest that if it’s not 97-verse traditional ballads about our murderous aristocracy, then it’s all jolly milkmaids, foaming nutbrown ale and illegal shagging. Others would have it as some sort of Wicker Man kingdom of haunted pastoral pagan fakelore shading through whimsical singer-songwritery into eccentric steampunk with banjos. Well, it’s some of all that and none of that, but there are increasing numbers of musicians and songwriters beyond the mainstream currently taking inspiration from the themes, tunes and musical strangenesses of our roots and making something timelessly new but still distinctly local out of them. And sometimes quite odd: hence, weirdlore.

Folk Police Recordings have taken up the baton laid down by the weirdlore organisers and bring you an album of 18 exclusive tracks by some of the best artists operating in the twilight zone between folk and all manner of odd-goings-on. The album features names you may know (including Alasdair Roberts, Emily Portman, Sproatly Smith, Rapunzel & Sedayne, Nancy Wallace and Telling the Bees) and some who will be less familiar. In keeping with the theme of the weirdlore all-dayer, the album features sounds that range from twisted trad to bucolic psychedelia, from fully fledged brass-and-wood-flavoured steamfolk to the sort of songwriting that used to happen before singer-songwriters gave the genre a bad name.

Folk Police Recordings

Radio Playlist 6th June 2012 (HERE)

Mevrouw Tamara - Yvette I [Ik Ben Spiritus]
Wyrdstone - Pucelancyrcan [v/a Weirdlore: Notes From The Folk Underground]
Jep & Dep - The Fall Of The Leaves Never Cease (3 songs demo]
The Straw Bear Band - Black Hive [v/a Weirdlore: Notes From The Folk Underground]
**
Mevrouw Tamara - Yvette [Ik Ben Spiritus]
Fern Knight - Pentacles [Castings]
Smoke Fairies - Feel In Coming Near [Blood Speaks]
**
Starless & Bible Black - If You Fall I'll Fall With You [v/a Weirdlore: Notes From The Folk Underground]
Cheval Sombre - As Tears Go By [Trensmat 7"]
Richard Hawley - Don't Stare At The Sun [Standing At Sky's Edge]
**
Horse Feathers - Cascades [HearYa Live Session April 23, 2010]
The Deep Dark Woods - Peggy O [HearYa Live Session September 29, 2010]
Other Lives - It Was The Night [HearYa Live Session April 30, 2009]
**
The False Beards - Marie Celeste On Down [v/a Weirdlore: Notes From The Folk Underground]
Sam Moss - Miniature Dwellings II [v/a Imaginational Anthem Vol.4 New Possibilities]
Nancy Wallace - Walking Into Walls [v/a Weirdlore: Notes From The Folk Underground]
**
John Flanagan & The Begin Agains - Autumn Song [Young Minds EP]
Michael Wohl - Poor Boy Long Way From Home [demo 2012]
Emily Portman - Spine Of A Wave [v/a Weirdlore: Notes From The Folk Underground]

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Sideways Through Sound Archive

29th June 2011: The Black Angels & Interview
22nd June 2011: Owls Of The Swamp
15th June 2011: Grey Reverend / Melodie Nelson in Session
8th June 2011: Vetiver / Sister Jane in Session
1st June 2011: Arbouretum
**
30th June 2010: Strange Attractors Audio House
23rd June 2010: Resurrection Fern
16th June 2010: M.Mucci
9th June 2010: Static Caravan
2nd June 2010: Sleepy Sun 
**
24th June 2009: The Orbweavers
17th June 2009: Humble Soul Records
10th June 2009: Alela Diane
3rd June 2009: Jeff Zentner
**
30th June 2008: Silver Summit (2ser 107.3 debut show)
26th June 2008: Thomas Denver Jonsson (2nsb 99.3 final show)
19th June 2008: C. Joynes
12th June 2008: Andrew Douglas Rothbard
5th June 2008: Dan Mangan
**
28th June 2007: Kaki King
21st June 2007: Winter Solstice Special
15th June 2007: Telescopes
8th June 2007: Fonal Records
1st June 2007: Micah P. Hinson