The Flood

As a predominantly (had to look that up!) Sixties band we often hear folk tell us that there are no good modern songs.

However, whilst having a rather cynical view of types of music that require no talent at all and that can be described by adding a "C" to the beginning, I do think there is some good stuff out there at any time you go looking.

There is a bit of a fad for sucking the excitement out of music at the moment though but I can't help it when I arrange a new song for the band - I have to add a bit of drama!

So here's a fairly recent Take That hit for you...

Can You Hear the Drums?

So we were just having a rare rehearsal to remind ourselves of a few new songs we had stuffed into the repertoire...

Not the most polished sound - no microphones, no sound system, the keyboard is coming from its own speakers which of course point straight up and the guitar was plugged through the computer into the hi-fi. Recorded on a Flip camera - no expense spared...

Can you hear the drums?

Garstang Music & Arts Festival 2011

Yesterday we played the Garstang Music and Arts Festival for the first of three appearances this year.

We will be back in the same place - our usual spot by the Information Centre next Saturday and Bank Holiday Monday.

From yesterday's spot, here's a taster!

Garstang Arts & Music Festival 2010

Yesterday afternoon we were in our usual spot at the Garstang Arts & Music Festival.

The weather had been very mixed and indeed after an hour or so we had a really heavy shower that had us dismantling and hurrying everything into the building behind us.

After an hour I'd managed to dry everything out apart from my shirt and with the sun making sporadic apprearances we set up again and played a couple of hours, attracting a decent sized audience.

Here's a video of our version of Concrete and Clay.

The Night Has 1000 Eyes

Always a good one to belt out towards the end of a night on stage, I've been putting guitars and bass on Bobby Vee's hit The Night Has 1000 Eyes this afternoon.

That makes it 15 songs finished, one still needing guitars and 2 or 3 more to start for the new album. One of those will be the song that we sang at the funeral the other week to fulfil a promise, although it is a wonderful song anyway, very emotional and a little unusual for us in that it's not a well-known song.

We've not yet decided whether to put a solo one from me on the album. The three albums we've done so far have all featured a solo track - Great Balls of Fire on the first, Fleetwood Mac's Need Your Love So Bad on the Kites album and the relatively unknown I Try To Think About Elvis on the last one.

So the album is moving closer bit by bit... I bet you're fed up of me saying that, aren't you...?

Introducing the Duo

Well it's now official that Bob will be leaving the band to concentrate on his work with The Old School Band.

David and I wish him every success in the ceilidh band which has become extremely successful and in demand for parties, making it difficult for him to perform with us on Saturday nights!

However David and I are well used to performing as a duo and that is how we are going to continue for the forseeable future. We have a few club bookings coming in and bookings for 2010 are looking as though it will be a good year again for us.

We'll be travelling about a bit too - February sees us up in the Lake District performing for a wedding reception and March sees us back in Northampton at the big Billy Fury gig of the year - Sunnyside. But we hope to see our regulars at the usual regular bookings at Myerscough, Witton Park, Garstang, Heskin Hall, Larbreck etc.

A return to Highfield Road is on the cards too, as apparently club members have been asking when we were to be booked again. Given that David had flu that night (and gave it me too, grrr...) we can't have been too bad! Also clubs in Eccleston and Ormskirk are in the calendar.

The new album will be completed as a duo - it's been a long time coming, but I've released a few tracks from it now - in the left hand column you can download The Gambler, Have You Ever Seen The Rain, Be My Baby, King For Tonight, Forever Autumn and 24 Hours From Tulsa.

The album will be a full hour of music and, of course, I'll let you know when it is available.

Christmas Music

Happy Christmas everybody from David, John and Bob.

Three Christmas songs from the band for you to enjoy.

Good King Wencelas
A Winters Tale
I Believe In Father Christmas

Large version of the photo: Christmas store

Sound Files Working Again

I've now transferred the sound files to http://fileave.com and they should be working again.

Click the song name under the "Listen - Music Tracks" heading in the left hand column.

Media Files Unavailable

Sorry to anyone who has been trying to listen to the media files. Mediamax, the website that was hosting them has decided to "upgrade" to something called "The Link Up" and has spectacularly downgraded instead.

I only had a free account and they have decided that anyone with a free account doesn't have their files moved to the new site at all. A disadvantage over paid accounts, but only the very slightest of disadvantages as all the (ignored) screams on the blog of the site seem to suggest that the paid customers' files haven't been moved either...

They are not going to allow seamless linking either so I'm on the lookout for somewhere else to store the files. If anyone has any experience or knowledge (I'm against spending money for this because of the relative unreliability of such services) then I'd be pleased to hear from you!

John

Christmas Song Downloads

Merry Christmas to all our friends and followers.

We hope to see you soon and wish you all a happy and prosperous 2008!

We recorded these two songs for the Christmas edition of Sounds Special on the Billy Fury website.

We hope you enjoy them!

A Winter's Tale
I Believe In Father Christmas

A Song for Remembrance Sunday

As it's Remembrance Sunday, I've uploaded a track from our new CD for free download.

It's The Green Fields of France a beautiful song that sums up the day. Click on the song title to download it.

The CD is just waiting for a cover to be designed - that could be my job for today...!

A Billy Fury Tribute

We have a new song on the Billy Fury web site for the month of September.

Last Night Was Made For Love was one of Billy's best remembered hits and my personal favourite and it also happens to be the opening track from our soon-to-be released third album.

In the late 1950s and early 1960s Billy Fury was billed as England's answer to Elvis. Born Ronald Wycherley on 17 April 1940 in Liverpool, he became one of the Larry Parnes stable of artists, appearing on TV shows such as "Oh Boy". During the 1960s he had 24 chart entries, clocking up an impressive 258 weeks on the Top 50.

The website keeps Billy's name and music alive through an excellent collection of sound and video resources, interactive forums and the monthly "Sounds Special" feature which contains an free album's worth of music recorded by artists from all around the world. A must for Billy Fury fans and we hope that our fans will have a listen to all the songs not just our own. There is a facility to comment on the "Sounds Special".

Gold Award at Billy Fury Site

It's only a bit of fun but also nice for us! Dave Jay, one of the brilliant artists who contribute to the Sounds Special feature on BillyFury.com gives his verdict on the other artists in the form of a gold award every month.

We seem to have picked it up for the last two months. Last month I had an instrumental up there - which probably won for its novelty value as most tracks are from vocalists. This month's track was our version of Del Shannon's "Runaway" from our 2003 album "Kites". You have a few days left to hear it on the site!

Dave, no mean artist himself, said, "I don't really like to give my award to the same artist the following month, but if it's deserved then I can only be true to myself, so again the gold medal goes to John Burke's Creeping Bentgrass. This is just a wonderful version of Runaway, so different to the original and I actually think, better!!!"

Ah, Mr Jay, flattery will get you anywhere!

The artists who contribute a song every month are definitely worth listening to. Some are professionals but many are guys like the three of us, who do it for the love of it or who do the odd gig here and there. You can download the Sounds Special music tracks for free off the Billy Fury site and also hear many tracks from the great man himself.

Regular contributors include (in no particular order) Dave Jay, Mike Chambers (can you tell him from Elvis?), Johnny Storme, Rob Dee, Roger Sea, Andrew Tween, Russ Dee, Geoff Howlett, Bruce Seaton and Des O'Reilly.

You can also buy the brand new DVD of Billy's life story - which I must get round to ordering myself!

June's Music Track at billyfury.com

The online Sounds Special feature at http://www.billyfury.com has changed a couple of days early this month as the site administrator is taking a well-earned break!

Our track for June is from our 2003 "Kites" album and is an updated version of Del Shannon's "Runaway". Expect a touch of fuzz from my guitar! No more fuzz than usual from David's voice though...!

The web site commemorates 1960s British pop idol, Billy Fury. Every month the site features the work of artists from both the UK and further afield in its "Sounds Special" feature. Fans of Billy Fury will also find lots of original sound and video files available to download as well as a thriving community of fans and enthusiasts of all ages.

Many thanks to the good people at http://www.billyfury.com for continuing to allow us to contribute!

Billy Fury Song is First for Album No.3

Our forthcoming (a blooming long time coming actually...) album sets off with a Billy Fury track - "Last Night Was Made For Love".

John has now finished mixing the track, appropriately enough, the first track to be completed for the album which is currently going by the rather strange working title "Already Plastered".

You can hear 40 seconds of the track by clicking the words "hear the current sound clip" in the column to the left - or indeed the same words here!

As always, bear in mind that our sample track changes every now and then and may not be the same as the one I'm writing about at the end of April 2007!

The photograph is of the fantastic new Billy Fury statue in Liverpool.

New Sample Track Uploaded

I've uploaded a new 40 second sample of the band to the website.

Seeing as the finished version of "Somebody Else's Girl" is now available on the Billy Fury site, it didn't make much sense to leave the half-finished version up our our own site!

The latest sample is of the final track from the 2004 album "Kites" and is our cover of Robbie Williams' "Angels".

Download available at Billy Fury Website

During the month of April, one of our songs can be downloaded in its entirety from the Billy Fury Website: http://www.billyfury.com

In the late 1950s and early 1960s Billy Fury was billed as England's answer to Elvis. Born Ronald Wycherley on 17 April 1940 in Liverpool, he became one of the Larry Parnes stable of artists, appearing on TV shows such as "Oh Boy". During the 1960s he had 24 chart entries, clocking up an impressive 258 weeks on the Top 50.

He is most remembered for his hit singles "Halfway to Paradise" and "Last Night Was Made For Love", but his 1960 hit "A Wondrous Place" gained much new interest recently, being used as the soundtrack to a TV Advert for the Toyota Yaris.

The website keeps Billy's name and music alive through an excellent collection of sound and video resources, interactive forums and the monthly "Sounds Special" feature which contains an free album's worth of music recorded by artists from all around the world. A must for Billy Fury fans and we hope that our fans will have a listen to all the songs not just our own. There is a facility to comment on the "Sounds Special" without having to register and login. We have contributed our version of Billy's hit "Somebody Else's Girl".