Maya Burman-Roy (cello); Alison Eales (keyboards, accordion); Fraser Ford (guitar, keyboards); John Blain Hunt (vocals, guitar); Findlay MacKinnon (drums, percussion); Aoife Magee (viola); Basil Pieroni (guitar); Robert Spark (bass guitar).
For information and bookings please e-mail ken@butcher-boy.co.uk.
Sounds Like
"The secret ingredient here is the monastic commitment that the most beautiful pop songs divine from those given the job of playing them. By filling up an album with them, Butcher Boy have set a standard against which every other release this year must surely be judged." - Pete Paphides, The Times, April 2009
Our records are available from the HDIF shop and iTunes via the links below:
Our house was miles from the coast but the gulls still wheeled around it. That was the first thing I noticed when we moved. We were by the seaside. There was a cherry blossom tree in our garden but the branches were still young and so the birds would nest in our gutter instead. The birds would wake me up in the morning. I could still climb the tree.
Even though our house was new, the town itself was old. It had been a port for years - years before any Glaswegians were decanted there. Next to the angles of our house and the prim lettering of the new shopping centre there was something a little unsettling about the fish and chip shops with bubble gum machines, the amusement arcades, the flaking white stucco of the pub and the bookies. In town, we were in the midst of the prescribed gaiety of a holiday weekend. You weren’t meant to live there. Even then it felt like the past.
The barber on Bank Street wore a built-up shoe and had a Tubeway Army LP cover in the window. Craig once went down with a pound and got a number two all over. He couldn’t leave the house for a week. When I went I’d shut my eyes, grip the arms of the chair and then go to the Saturday matinee at The George across the road itching, itching.
It wasn’t until I got older that I appreciated the darkness of a winter afternoon at the barbers, the drowsy warmth of the radio and the Calor Gas heater. It’s only now I understand the delicacy and tenderness of the transaction.
This thought takes me home.
Our house was painted with the same blues and yellows they’d used for the hospital and the school. When it was sunny, you could smell the creosote on the fence. And around us, houses were packed so tightly you’d be surrounded by the clacking echo of your feet wherever you went. The crisp geometry left crisp shadows, but if you walked in any one direction from our house for even ten minutes you’d be in woods black as dried blood.
You’d stumble across the embers of fires in these woods, matted fleece snagged on fence posts, the bones and skulls of animals picked clean and then bleached over the summer. This wasn’t the New Town and you’d feel lost - but back through the nettles and over the motorway you could see numbers two to sixteen Lomond Place and you could imagine the calm and gentle rituals of eight tables being laid for dinner.
Last Saturday I stood there, looking across at those houses - still, small, dimpled glass, blistered wood - and I felt that gentleness again.
The moment you leave, I realised, is the moment you’re more in love than you’ve ever been.
THE FIVE ACES ROCKIN’ DANCE PARTY. A night of rockin’ soul, rock n’ roll and rhythm & blues featuring live music from The Five Aces, The Bottleneckers and The Privates Hammond Orchestra. Mikey Collins will be DJing which makes this an unofficial pre club to the last night of the glasgow mod weekender. Tickets £5. The Venue @ Oran Mor, Byres Rd. Doors at 7pm, 1st band onstage at 7.45pm sharp Last band offstage by 10pm latest.
Hey, just to let you know we have uploaded tracks from Ali's new solo album Flying High to his myspace, come by and let us know what you think or if you want to pre order you can get it on his myspace page.
Ali will be on tour in the UK from June 19th – July 4th come and see him and his new band live – they are tearing it up, round the country with a great party vibe!
Big Love Ali's Team x
BLACK KEYS Do The Rump POCKETBOOKS Cross The Line PROCEDURE CLUB Leave Me Out NOVEMBER FIVE Closure EMILY SCOTT Pageant Queen BUTCHER BOY Sunday Bells BUTCHER BOY A Better Ghost LOOP Vapour MUGS Slow Curve LOVETONES Journeyman PROJEKT A-KO Nothing Works Twice EMBRACE My Weakness Is None Of Your Business CRYSTAL STILTS Love Is A Wave PJ HARVEY The Chair BILLY HOLIDAY What Is This Thing Called Love MANIC STREET PREACHERS Jackie Collins Existential Question Time --------------------------------------------------------------------- WEBSITE : www.popscenewithjalal.com MYSPACE SITE : www.myspace.com/popscenewithjalal --------------------------------------------------------------------- POPSCENE with J*A*L*A*L Radio Weser [Bremen/Germany] 92.5 FM [antenne] / 101.85 FM [cable] Fridays at 18 hrs [since 1994]
We've a new single out NOW through Thee Sheffield Phonographic Corporation. It's a split 7" single featuring our song "Dancing". The single also features fellow SPC band Slow Down Tallahassee.
We've have some great reviews for it & radio play on XFM and 6Music.
You can order the 7" single (or buy the digital download now) from Thee SPC website at www.theespc.com or from our profile.
If you buy the 7" vinyl, you get a special code to access the digital download for free.
Couldn't have timed that much better. Just asked for a midlands gig and then indietracks comes along just up the road from me. You guys and Camera Obscura, I'm there. Do you know which stage you'll be playing yet?
So glad I came across your music. The album you've posted is stunning. Something about your sound reminds me of Love and Arthur Lee and a wee bit of Badly Drawn Boy, neither of which is ever a bad thing. Really hope to be able to catch you live sometime if you are playing when I can make it back up, or if you venture down to the midlands. Cheers for the tunes.
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