The Bearded Lady Also Sells The Candy Floss

I never really bothered putting my poetry into pop music before, it showed up now and again but I never made a point of it. However, in lockdown it just came to my mind as something to follow through on. As is quite normal for me, I booked the studio time then under that pressure wrote two or three songs the night before, (on a few occasions, at eight in the morning before I left home. As usual there where no rehearsals, but under the lockdown conditions over half of the tracks are just me and Jim Riley (engineer) doing everything - drums, guitar, bass, organ - because no one else would brave the plague and come into the studio. Those tracks sit hidden within the actual group recordings and sound the same as if recorded by the group. When mixing we see it all visually - the room in the mind's eye - where all the players sit; the drummer to the right; the vocalist is stood up front; the wood paneling on the walls of a top end US studio in the '60s / '70s. Jim was in the local R'n'B group in '77, and I was in the local punk group. We came to be friends then and are both obsessed with the 'sound' in music. This is how music is to me: a picture in sound. It has to have an origin, an emptiness and a vulnerability. I don't look for guitars to be impressive, I'm sick of impressive ego driven music - I want authentic heart music. No one asked for one LP of this stuff, now there are five (including the Hangman Records release The New and Improved Bob Dylan.) As in all my endeavours, games and life, I only do what I do irrespective of what's wanted or required and then force it on the world regardless. I'm so happy to have made these records that are for no audience - but hopefully will find one. These are as true to my heart as anything I've done. William Loveday - December 1st 2020