Now that the Jaywalkers wagon is in the garage and the jack leads are all packed away as 2018 draws to a close, I thought it about time we have a little end of year report and a look ahead to what 2019 brings....
Time to Save the World
Dominating our 'To Do' List since the first few moments of the year in early January, this year was all about writing, recording and releasing a new album. At the start of the year, I (Mike) had 2 or 3 songs written, and a fairly empty diary for January, so the main bulk of the CD was written before February came along. We spent the next few months working the new songs into a record-able state and had the looming deadline of mid June before the great Josh Clark was rolling in to town with his studio in tow.
As the peak of the summer heat wave hit, we spent 10 days with Josh recording the CD, playing as much as possible 'live' together, with spare instruments and vocals overdubbed in Josh's Bath-based recording lair.
On the drive to Kimpton Folk Festival the day after recording had finished, the CD title was decided - 'Time to Save the World'. A nod to the environmental themes woven in the songs throughout the album.
Once that had been decided, we found a talented illustrator based in Brazil - Miopia to design the front cover for us. What he did exceeded way beyond what we had hoped for.
Many thousands of decisions and one funding campaign later, the album officially came into the world on the 5th November. We are so incredibly proud of it and if you haven't heard it yet, it's available in all of the usual streaming/download places .... or buy it direct from us via our shop!
New Videos
To support the new CD, we have released two videos. First, Georgia Williams designed and created this wonderful animation to the effective title track of the album 'This Time'
Secondly, we spent a day in Chester with our good friend John Breese filming two 'live' videos. The first to be released is filmed (perfectly legitimately) on the Eastgate Clock tower as the sun set one September evening.
We'll be releasing the other video from this session next year.
Reviews
With a new album, you end up with a lot of reviews... here's a little snippet of what has been said about the CD:
"A really fine album by a talented trio .. that simply gets better with repeated plays” AmericanaUK
“Warmth, energy, thoughtful writing, beautiful vocals and fine ensemble playing.”
Northern Sky Magazine
“A beautifully performed take on Americana"
RnR Magazine
“A band convincingly hitting their stride”
Songlines
“Stunning three-part harmonies, soaring fiddles and fearless mandolins"
Country Music Magazine
"mesmerising and attention-grabbing yet without shouting its prowess.”
Folk Radio UK
Touring
When you make a new album, you get the pleasure of taking it out on the road! Starting on November 1st and taking us right up to last Thursday (13th December) we've been up and down the M6 more times than we ever thought possible. But it's been great fun, this has been our most successful tour to date and we can't thank all of the promoters & audiences enough for making them all happen! Here's where that tour took us to:
2019
So it's been a busy old year for us. The ins and outs of writing, recording and (self) releasing an album sometimes feels like an impossible mountain of admin ... but we made it, and we could not be prouder of the result! As far as looking ahead to 2019, we have another bunch 'o' tour dates coming up in February (Album Launch Tour Part 2). Starting with a quick hop over to Southport in the new year and then a full run of dates starting 1st Feb. For any of our Chester based fans, we have a big 'Album Launch' show at Storyhouse on the 2nd Feb which we are very excited about and will sell out so make sure you book in advance here.
Thanks to everyone who has helped make 2018 our best yet as a band, roll on 2019!