Tuesday 5 January 2010

More snow this morning, and it's not due to get above freezing for another week yet: this is really unusual. I'm going to ease myself back into work today, after spending the whole morning taking down Christmas decorations.

Yesterday I was back at La Chunky, joining in on a session for Sushil's next album. I took the sensible combination of guitar, stylophone, melodica and laptop, and managed to get all of them in there somewhere, along with the studio's trusty Welmar upright piano. Iain MacInnes pointed out that wah-wah stylophone sounds like a very irritated duck. With the piano, I only really heard what I was playing when we listened back in the control room, as the excellent Stu Brown had been directed to channel Keith Moon, so the piano was covered in blankets in an attempt to get a bit of separation and I couldn't hear a thing ... it sounded a bit like Roxy Music actually.

We reprised last January's reggae version of The Slave's Lament with Mairi Campbell, and a horn section of Raymond MacDonald on sax, me on melodica, and Iain MacInnes on whistle: not a combination you come across often. When I was in full ring-modulated and delayed guitar flight, I couldn't always tell which weird noises were coming from me, and which were Dave McGowan getting an incredible variety of sound from his pedal steel. The studio had never managed to fit in eight people playing at once before: these photos don't really give an impression of the amiable crush. Scottish smallpipes sound fantastic with steel guitar, incidentally.  

Sushil in retro analogue mode with cassette

me and baby guitar - note stylophone and melodica neatly laid out before starting 

later
I started work eventually, pinning down dates and travel for projects in the second half of the year ... while watching the BDO darts championship of course. It's that time of year again.