MUSIC PREVIEW
V LISTEN!
I Congratulations to Owcn Cunningham, Ken Torrance, Catherine Schublin. Nick Gilbert. Rob Munn, Max Dupuy, Anne Roberts, Becky Watson, Kari Gray and N W Ettles, who will shortly be receiving their limited edition Burns a la Warhol T-shirt, printed up by Hand Pict Productions for their Burns’ Night programme, Thar. This issue, we‘re going to get you working for your prize for a change. We have three (limited edition. of course) American radio promo CDs of this issue‘s featured rock stars The Exploited. These contain the band‘s last LP, The Massacre, and a selection of their previous favourites all on one disc. To win one. what you have to do is tell us what word this Chambers Concise Dictionary definition refers to: ‘A thick yellowish fluid formed by an inflamed wound or sore, consisting of serum, white blood cells, bacteria and debris oftissue.‘ Easy, right? Your body‘s probably manufactured its own. many times. Just pop the answer on a postcard or the back of an envelope and send it to Listen! at the Edinburgh address. One of these sought-after items could be yours.
I Fleadh, the world‘s biggest Irish music festival, which was a massive success at Finsbury Park in London last year. is coming to Glasgow. The organisers. The Workers Beer Company and Vince Power from The Mean Fiddler. have very astutely decided that it would be a bright idea to site it on Glasgow Green on 24 May. We don't have confirmation ofany names yet, but in the past such musical titans as Van Morrison . The Pogucs and Christy Moore have appeared. ln Glasgow, the Irish contingent will be joined by well-known Scottish acts, who will no doubt be clamouring to get on the bill. considering the festival‘s prestige.
V FOLK
A certain song,the soundtrack for a TV ,-
advert wherein our hero wakes up to his submersion in an inhuman monochrome metropolis, then leaves his lady and heads to the sunny north, male companionship and fizzy beer in a Glasburgh concept bar, has tugged at Scots sentiment. Frankie Miller is recording a new single version of it for imminent release, and its writer, Dougie MacLean is delighted at its success-while admitting that the song has been around for a long time.
‘I must have written it about thirteen or fourteen years ago. When i sing it now, as I did at the Runrig concerts, I’m amazed at the fervour of the audience reaction. They’re all singing along. I remembertalking to Donnie Munro at the Edinburgh Castle gig, and we were imagining that everyone, all the thousands in the audience, could just turn round and take the Castle. A strong feeling of nationalism like that is sort of scary, and I’m not into that sort of thing. lwrote “Caledonia” as a love song, a love song for the country. But it seems to have caught on with the public, it symbolises that need, that identity of feeling Scottish.’
Only hear for the beer
Dougie’s audience has been steadily building up in Scotland since he settled back in Dunkeld after innumerable European and continental tours. lle played in groups like The Tannahill Weavers before embarking on a solo career as a singer, abetted by his fine fiddle and guitar talents, and he has, overthe last decade, built a respected record label from his Perthshire base.
‘lt’s been a busy year. I’ve been dashing over to Nashville a few times. Kathy Mattea, who is a big star over there - new country music, sort of like Nancy Griffith- has recorded “Ready For The Storm”, another of my songs, on her new album, which has already sold over 500,000 copies. She does other songs of mine as well, and we’ve become good pals. I went on tour with her overthere last year, playing big stadiums. Her band accompanied me and I joined her in the show for some duets. She was even over here at the studio. We had Gary West’s pipes recorded on her version of From a Distance, then mixed it in Nashville.
‘I love playing with my own band but I don’t want it to become permanent or full-time. Then it becomes like a Boy’s Club. Anyway, lots of my stufl is better with just acoustic guitar. So the guys in the band can relax, they don’t have to play all the time. They do it because they enjoy it, and I take all the financial risk!’ (Norman Chalmers)
Dougie Maclean supports Runrig atThe Barrowland, Glasgow on Fri 7 and Sat 8, and The Dougie Maclean Band play in their own right atThe Dueen’s Hall, Edinburgh on Thurs 13.
Perfectly Frank
Niall Linehan has an accent slippier than a salmon’s cod-piece and an enthusiasm chirpierlhan a rotting cock-robin. He has good reason to be. The troupe from whence Niall comes are The Frank And Walters, the brightest new sparks in town with the fizziest of pop song jewels to their credit.
Last year, the Cork trio released their first two EPs forthe London independent-with-vision Setanta. Thereafter, the floodgates opened. Singles Of The Week in the press, a glorious few come-aIl-ye first gigs, a deal with Go! Discs and end of the year plaudits in all the right readers’ and writers’ polls. Then there are the imminent tours with Inspiral Carpets, Thousand Yard Stare and Carter USM, then somewhere in between, the debut Go! Discs 12in and a headline tour of
The Frank And Walters
their own.
Phew, dizzying stuff. In that the F&W’s world seems a twilight zone of ofl-beatness, a parallel universe where everything seems that bit. . . spacier, this sudden whirllgig must be not a little disconcerting. Niall?
’Well, we still kinda lead our lives like we did; we still can’t get out of our beds! We do try and keep it paced-down a bit, but you could let it fly away with yourself.’
Thankfully, though, after seven months in a YMCA in The Big Choke, swamped by the ministrations and voracious appetite of the media biz, the F&W’s levity and spunk— a heartening respite when all around is dour and flaccid — remains intact. But, as Niall says, this Day-Glo, hey-ho punch has always been around, and by necessity.
‘We couldn’t get gigs in Cork, so we used to play down in the country. And we were playing to old men, but we’d he promised twenty pints or something. And the 60-year-old fellas’d be looking at you and you’d be trying to keep them entertained, so you couldn't be sitting down looking at your shoes and playing your guitar. We had to jump around. . .’ (Craig McLean) The Frank And Walters support Inspiral Carpets at The Barrowland, Glasgow on Wed 12.
Tori Tori Tori
North Carolina’s ‘failed prodigy’ Tori Amos, the
unexpected hit of the year, talks to Alastair Mabbott.
As a piano-playing singer-songwriter of the nakedly confessional school, the flame-haired Tori Amos is an unlikely candidate for media saturation in the 905. Still, she‘s doing all right, in Britain, at least. Her powerful track ‘Silent All These Years’ was picked up by radio
26 The List 31 January - 13 February 1992