Dave 'The Hat' McGowan - Lead vocals, Swearing;
'Longhaired' Johnny Graffham - Pedal Steel, Guitars, vocals;
Brendan O'Connell - Guitars, 4 & 5 String Banjo, Mandolin, Cuatro, vocals;
Dmitri van Zwanenberg - Violin, vocals;
JoJo - Bass guitar, Viola, vocals;
Andy Ireland - Drums, Guitar;
Jason Meherin - Accordion, Piano.
Also featuring:
Arthur Bassingham- Bass guitar
Will Sneyd- Violin, vocals
Mr Reality- Drums
Lisa Billson- Lead vocals
Will- Vocals
James- Harmonica, shakers.
Influences
Hank Williams; Big Johnny Cash; Marvin Gaye; The Sex Pistols; Mahalia Jackson;
London Town; Ladies; Pot; Speed;
The Rolling Stones; Sam Cooke; The Harmonizing Four; Spike Milligan; Peters Cook and Sellers; Raymond Chandler; Robert Mitchum; Little Feat; Klezma; Sleep deprivation; A well turned ankle; Cheese (the foodstuff)..........
Tom Waits; Captain Beefheart and his flippin' Magic Band; Jim Thompson; Erich von Stroheim; Screamin' Jay Hawkins; Kate Bush; Peter Tosh; Harpo, Groucho, Chico; Burt Bacharach; Bert Kaempfert; Robert Johnson; Nicholas Hawksmoor; Sister Rosetta Tharpe; Mavis Staples; The Who; Dead Pat; The Kinks; Jermyn Street; Noam Chomsky; The Wizard of Oz; The Half Way Line; The Ramones; Theda Bara; Marlene Dietrich; The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists; David Shrigley; Modern Toss; Simon Wiesenthal; Yasser Arafat; MDMA; Makin' Babies; Psilosibe Semilanceata; Hell's Bells; eating game in and out of season; acting silly; getting on trains; looking; pointing; saying hello to people.
Sounds Like
Leonard Cohen meets Ian Dury in a London pub whilst a handsome country band steal your heart, then beat you up, dust you down, buy you a beer and drag you off into the night. One of us stays, though. just to make sure the ladies are alright. After all, yer gonna be gone for a while.
Starting out as a duo singing about killing a barmaid whilst insulting her, The Messengers have matured into a seven piece outfit that sing about hanging yourself in a shed.
After only four gigs we found ourselves playing to 600 Alabama 3 fans, next gig we broadcast live to the whole of London Town on Resonance 104.4 as part of Johnny Brown's Mining For Gold. Soon after we covered Army of Me by Bjork in a competition and was chosen by her from over 6,000,000 entries as the best version. This ended up on an album that couldn't help but leave the critics and the punters as baffled as a bat in a frying pan. We never dreamed one could get so much feed back (two emails in two years). Available in record stores for £16.
In the very near future we will have in our hands an album of songs, probably eleven of them, featuring artists what have played with us over the last four years and some that are still living.
Some home-spun homilies and
a brief oral history of The Messengers of God:
Johnny Graffham: " Showboating in other peoples bands is fun, especially when you're better looking than the boss(!) but I'd gone about as far as I could go with a holdy guitar so I formed my own band, sat me down and learned the pedal steel. I didn't have much money back then to afford no fancy instrument, so mama had to scrimp and save and fool around to give me the cash to customise my Springfield. Boy, did we freeze our asses off that winter. Still, it was worth it. With the extra levers and pedals I can make this old contraption sigh just like a lady cry like a baby and sigh just like a lady.
In recent months I toured the UK with Robert Love and the Nihilistics, Sandy Dillon and Jeff Klein. I had to hold it down a bit though, in case I mugged 'em all up.
Ambition: To do something positive to the kids back in The Switch.
Andy Ireland: Working with Flowered Up and Shane MacGowan and the Popes couldn't help but instill an almost mental obsession with punctuality in Andrew. The best drummer in the world known to man. He can tap out a rhythm on a raspberry jelly.
Lucky number: 1 & 5 reverse forecast.
Brendan O'Connell: "When I'm not renting out flats to chinese cockle pickers there's nothing I find more relaxing than dreaming up infectious melodies on one of the many stringed instruments I own. Blimey, you'd think I were that feller from The Penguin Cafe Orchestra the way I carry on.
There's a photo of me on the way up the stairs to the gents in the 12 Bar. How many of you can say that , eh?
And I co-wrote that recent Robert Love album but there weren't no wedge in it."
Heroes: Nicky von Hooegstraaten (he's yummy!!).
Dave McGowan: : These bastards won't let me 'ave a go at no mug no more! If it ain't one thing it's another, they've clipped me bleedin' wings, that's what they've done. I can't even have a pop at the ******* now, I dunno.....
Dream job: Drawing on peoples faces.
JoJo: "String quartets ain't all they're cracked up to be, pet. All them notes, they do yer bloody 'ead in, they do. Give me an electric bass and I'm happy as Larry. Vi-bloody-ola! What was I thinking of."
Favourite saying: "Mind out for dog mess in the hallway."
Dmitri van Zwanenberg: "Boy, am I good, the devil went down to Georgia coz I fuckin' told him to." This man can fiddle his way out of, or into, anything. Famous for getting sausages put on the menu at The Hilton in Tel Aviv for the weekend of our stay there. This guy can pull strings as well as bow 'em!
Favourite colour: Money.
Jason Meherin: Code name Captain Cock. Crack shot with an assault rifle, deadlier with an accordion. He's got a playing style that's wheezier than a coal miner with advanced emphysema. Jaded by his stint with the gay folk mummer groups that tour the American Mid-West, but bouyed up by pockets full of U.S. dollars, The Messengers were Jason's natural spiritual home.
Favourite Monkee: Mike (Woolhat) Nesmith
Favourite word: Zany
The MOG are now dead but we live on, right here on myspace, buster.
Three new Christmas songs up. With a little Texas swing. "White Christmas", "Winter Wonderland" & "Missing You At Christmas". Come by and let me know what you think. Judy DeRamus with The Jordanaires
The Kittiwakes - CD Launch - Clerkenwell 22nd June
Leigh-on-Sea 3-piece, The Kittiwakes, celebrate the release of their Midwich Records debut, ‘Lofoten Calling’, a collection of original folk songs written about the people, landscape, folklore and history of the Lofoten Islands above the Arctic Circle and influenced by the traditional music of Norway and the British Isles.
'The Kittiwakes craft timeless and magical acoustically dappled folk treats - gentle and alluring ostensibly Gaelic in sound texture and gorgeously flighty braided as they are by corteges of mandolins, accordions and violins.' [LOSING TODAY]
'The Kittiwakes (rissa tridactyla): delicious, intriguing and evocative music, beautifully played and sung by this talented trio. Recommended to twitchers and lovers of folk music alike' [LEIGH FOLK FESTIVAL]
Online Now!
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