Viking Galaxy at King Tuts

Viking Galaxy headlined Glasgow's King Tuts, which could have proved a daunting experience for a band so early in it's career. They met the challenge bravado as the packed crowd where enthralled by their rock 'n' roll theatre! The band have strong stage presence with their leather trousers, capes, catsuits, pan pipes, horned space helmets and an array of plastic weaponry. 

Their songs Call of the Valkyrie, Space Chariot, Raid and Pillage, and Galactic Plunder all went down well. Their catchy melodies give their music broad appeal while their thunderous soaring riffs and vocals won't leave metal fans disappointed!  

The King Tuts gig was the perfect showcase for their brand of theatrical rock!  The band’s shows combine costume, props and comedy with well-written, catchy power metal which all made for a fun night.

The band includes - William Hill (lead vocals), Ross Keightley (bass) and Mike Parkin (guitar), Mathew Brown (keys) and Alasdair Dunn (drums). Three of the band members met at school where they won the school talent show. Watch out for them at a venue near you! More gigs around the UK are to follow, updates are on their facebook and twitter. 'Viking Galaxy' is a space viking metal band based in Glasgow who released their debut album, 'First Contact', at Love Music Glasgow on Record Store day this May. Viking Galaxy's 'First Contact' is available on Amazon.

I go to many fun gigs - yet it is hard to explain quite what its like when it is your son's gig at such an iconic venue as King Tuts Glasgow. On the stairs are painted the lists of top bands who have performed here over the years. Simply ultra cool!
Fun crowd and great tunes. The band have just released their 'First Contact' album. I love King Tuts one of my favourite Glasgow venues!  http://soundcloud.com/viking-galaxy

Woman and Art

I read recently about Beverly Martyn (or Bev Kutner) who had worked with Paul Simon, Nick Drake and Jimmy Page before she met John. I was surprised to hear of their song writing collaborations, her being a partnership with John Martyn and then her being left at home with the children, a home on top of a hill. A home she didn't even choose. Apparently John Martyn wrote his best songs with Beverly Kutner, his wife, which she gets little credit for.  Beverly and Martyn recorded three albums together  - Stormbringer, Road to Ruin and Bless the Weather - before John was persuaded by the record label to go solo. She played piano while they wrote songs together for the album Solid Air.  John said that he would credit her 'on the next song.' Beverly was then left on the house on the hill to raise their children while John toured. When John turned to drink he became abusive towards her and after one threatening scene Bev decided to leave him after ten years of marriage.

....and yet John wrote the deeply caring song 'May You Never', all very poignant really.  

Beverly and John Martyn

I also used to wonder about the artist Margaret Macintosh, the wife of the better known Glasgow artist Rennie Macintosh. She was first a collaborator with her sister, and later with her husband, the architect and designer Charles Rennie Mackintosh. Macdonald was celebrated in her time by many of her peers, including her husband who wrote, "Remember, you are half if not four-quarters of all my architectural...Margaret has genius, I have only talent." It is not known exactly which of Charles Rennie Mackintosh's works Margaret was involved with but she is credited with being an important part of her husband's figurative, symbolic interior designs.  These include the Rose Boudoir at the International Exhibition at Turin, the designs for House for an Art Lover and the Willow Tea Rooms. Her best known works include the panel The May Queen, which was made to partner Mackintosh's panel The Wassail for Miss Cranston's Ingram Street Tearooms, and Oh ye, all ye that walk in Willowood, which formed part of the decorative scheme for the Room de Luxe in the Willow Tearooms. Together with her husband, her sister, and Herbert MacNair, she was one of the most influential members of the collective known as the Glasgow Four. She exhibited with Mackintosh at the 1900 Vienna Secession, where she was arguably an influence on the Secessionists Gustav Klimt and Josef Hoffmann.

Panel by Margaret Macintosh

There have been some outstanding women photographers.  

Great Women Photographers include Eve Arnold and Dorothea Lange (Migrant Mother).

Migrant worker by Dorothea Lange

Dorothea Lange 1895 – 1965 was an American photo journalist, best known for her Depression Era work for the Farm Security Administration ( FSA).  Her photographs drew attention to the plight of migrant farm workers, rural poverty and exploitation of share croppers. Her husband, economist Paul Taylor, interviewed and took economic data over the plight of migrant workers while she photographed and they documented rural poverty and the exploitation of share croppers and migrant labourers.  Her photos led aid being sent to the camps. Eve Arnold, 1912 - 2012 was an American photojournalist. She joined Magnum Photos agency in 1951 and became a full member in 1957. Her interest in photography began in 1946 while working in a photo-finishing plant and she learned photographic skills from at the New School for Social Research; She went on to photograph many iconic figures – including Marilyn Monroe. She left the United States and moved permanently to England in the early 1960s. While working for the London Sunday Times, she began to make serious use of colour photography. She received the Lifetime Achievement Award from the American Society of Magazine Photographers. She did a series of portraits of American First Ladies. She received an OBE in 2003.

Photographer Eve Arnold

There are many great women writers -  Virginia Woolf, Jane Austen, Sylvia Plath, Emily Bronte, George Eliot, more. I attend the Edinburgh International Book festival (EIBF) each year and in the book world there is a true equality - its' all about the craft and substance. 

In music in recent years there has been a rise in woman musicians gaining attention, as opposed to decorative woman singers. In the UK in particular there has been new strong solo women who play, write and perform – Adele and Emeli Sande.   

Emeli Sande

I have read of many out standing woman artists down the years – the question is how many of them have been able to break thorough and most have been left in the shadows of their better known partners. The women have been left with the day to day chores of raising children and keeping the home going. Of course being a mother is and should be the most rewarding  job of all - and it is. I have raised three children and it is also very demanding (!) on a woman's time and energies. In the UK in particular, the role of homemaker as it is known in the States, is undervalued and not treated with the respect the role deserves. In America mothers are given more respect as they are after all the bedrock of society. I don't know why.

Even in today's world of equality were many women are the main wage earners it falls to their lot to also be the main homemakers too. So this is a few words here to the forgotten woman artists and writers.. and a special few to those woman who are breaking free.

Perhaps women need to feel they can be equals in the creative arts - particularly in art and music. 

To name but a few of the great women behind the men. I am certain there are many many more. 

Marilyn Munroe by Eve Arnold

Emeli Sande Oran Mor 2007

I first took images of Emeli (then Adele) at her EP launch gig at Glasgow's Oran Mor venue. Emily was in the same medical course as my daughter then and she usually won the talent show at her uni course each year. 

She had an accomplished energetic rock soul band with her and performed a few upbeat songs. Then she took to the piano on the left of the stage and sang some Nina Simone songs. She had big hair back then!  She showed even then her unique passion in her voice. She had three backing singers too which surely showed how seriously she was being taken in 2007 by the industry.

I started this blog in 2007 while I wasn’t taking the blog as seriously then. Little did I know!. and if I might have imagined big things lay ahead. We all thought her voice was strong but it is impossible to be sure about anything in this fickle music business. What I hadn’t figured on was her drive and commitment which are certainly key ingredients.

I posted the photos from the gig and her PR contacted me about photos for her Aberdeen gig flyers and posters. I met her PR guy at a few events he had me along to shoot at.

Her manager phoned me about photos from London, which was really very exciting.  I started to pursue my music photography seriously in 2007 after I got some fun shots at a few gigs in 2006 with a small digital, and I purchased a SLR camera.  

Over this time she was very busy working on her uni course during the week and travelling to London on weekends to write songs and work on her music. She had a few hit songs – one with Chipmunk and another with Wiley.

Then in 2011 she played King Tuts…everything was being carefully planned. I met Emeli at her sound check there and she kindly signed some prints for me. 

At King Tuts she said she wanted to do "soul with a rocky edge." She is genuine and sincere and she appeared incredibly motivated. She sings of the wonder and beauty within all of us. I love the positive and true vibes of her music. She is excellent live and her voice has a moving resonance.

I believe that the successful artist have a purpose in their art – a message they need to convey and that they believe is important.

In July 2012 Sande performed at the London opening and closing ceremonies.This May 2013 Emeli won two prizes at this year's Ivor Novello songwriting awards for her hit song Next To Me as best song music and lyrics, and also most performed work. Her album Our Version of Events beat a record set by The Beatles for the most consecutive weeks spent in the UK's Top 10 by a debut album. I’m so happy for all her successes. 

We all left the Oran Mor (and the Albert Hall all those years later!) full of that feel good energy she exudes on stage.  

I look forward to the next chapter!

Jake Wallace Simons

Jake Wallace Simons journalist and writer of crime fiction, discussed his book The Pure at The Edinburgh International Book Festival.  Copyrighted
I loved the old-fashioned black and white feel of these images - I guess that's my style really!

Novelist Neil Gaiman

Neil Gaiman was such a fun character to shoot in Edinburgh!

Neil Gaiman is an English author of short fiction, novels, comic books, graphic novels, and films. Including the comic book series The Sandman. Gaiman's writing has many awards, including Hugo, Nebula, Bram Stoker, Newberry meal and 2010 Carnegie Medal in Literature. He gave a talk at the Einburgh Book Festival 2011. Copyrighted.

Neil Gaiman's work has been honoured with many awards internationally, including the Newbery and Carnegie Medals. His books and stories have also been honoured with 4 Hugos, 2 Nebulas, 1 World Fantasy Award, 4 Bram Stoker Awards, 6 Locus Awards, 2 British SF Awards, 1 British Fantasy Award, 3 Geffens, 1 International Horror Guild Award and 2 Mythopoeic Awards. http://www.neilgaiman.com/

Irvine Welsh and Nile Rodgers

Irvine Welsh, Scottish novelist and playwright, best known for his novel Trainspotting, at the Edinburgh International Book Festival. Copyrighted.

Irvine Welsh is a Scottish novelist, playwright and short story writer. He is recognised for his novel Trainspotting, which was later made into a critically acclaimed movie. His work is characterised by a raw Scots and brutal depiction of Edinburgh life. He has also written plays, screenplays, and directed several short films.

Irvine Welsh had a fun and very interesting chat with Nile Rodgers at Edinburgh Book Festival 2012.  They were such a contrast to watch and listen to! The very white, very Scottish Irvine and the so soulful and very black Rodgers! Amazing chat!  I also really enjoyed Nile's storied interjected with his guitar playing.
 Rodgers – sometime actor for Sesame Street, songwriter, musician, producer, arranger and guitarist. Le Freak, Everybody Dance, We are Family, Let’s Dance, Like a Virgin, The Reflex. Nile has written his autobiography “Le Freak – An Upside Down Story of Family”.  

Haim, worth checking out!

I heard this girl band from LA on Jools Holland the other week - HAIM - and I thought they were excellent with fun rhythms and vocals. I took photos of another cool American girl rock band called Warpaint a few years back. No cool Scottish girl bands around though... oddly?    


The band's releases include the EP "Forever" and the single "Save Me" 2012.  They were announced as winners of the BBC Sound of 2013.

Haim is a group formed in 2006 in Los Angeles who first released in 2012. The band consists of sisters Este Haim (born 1986), Danielle Haim (born 1989) and Alana Haim (born 1991), along with drummer Dash Hutton. Most frequently compared to Fleetwood Mac, their sound has been described as "nu-folk–meets–nineties–R&B" and "music that sounds like it was written on a lakeside retreat attended by Stevie Nicks, John Waite and En Vogue"

Tom Waits waits in the shadows

Brian Appleyard on American singer songwriter Tom Waits, good piece! : )) One of my favourite writers too, some truly great photos and some of my favourite music images too by Anton Corbijn - http://bryanappleyard.com/tom-waits-growling-through-the-grain/ 

Wait's journey is the car and movement and the open American highways, mine is the Scottish and Irish shorelines and the docks at Newhaven and Leith. 

Tom Waits has some great lines - on his  marriage, “if two people know the same things, one of you is unnecessary.”  “She opened my eyes, she’s a real trapeze artist. She’s my headlamp and my road map and my hood ornament, my sunglasses and my spotlight, she’s all that.”  The dividing line for Tom is not an album, a song or a change of label, it is a wife. He met Kathleen Brennan on the set of Francis Ford Coppola’s film One from the Heart. She is a musician but, for Coppola, she was working on scripts. It was love at first sight.

He was a beat, a child of the Fifties ... formed by reading Jack Kerouac’s On the Road. Some of his most moving songs — notably Ol’ 55 and (Looking for) The Heart of Saturday Night — are all about cars, about movement.  “Kerouac? God, yeah, sure. I wanted to be on the road. I wanted to be famous like Robert Frank’s photograph of Highway 85 going through New Mexico: a dramatic black-and-white photo with the highway going to a vanishing point. It was like a sign for me. If I’d seen that when I was 16 I would have decided to drive a truck for a living. Yeah, away is the place to go for me…He divides his songs into bawlers and brawlers: the first sweet and lyrical, the second defiant, wounded, and often sung in an epic, throaty growl...
“My favourite highway recently is the Interstate 5. It runs through Oakland and all the way to Los Angeles. It’s just flat and really dramatic, it’s so empty, it’s like being in the middle of the ocean. I’ve been driving a lot lately. I don’t like to take planes because I have too many things in my pockets and it’s too confusing in the airports. I have a lot of things in my pockets they disagree with in security.”

Quotes from -  Tom Waits: Growling Through the Grain Sunday Times, 15 April 2013

The dividing line for Tom is not an album, a song or a change of label, it is a wife. He met Kathleen Brennan on the set of Francis Ford Coppola’s film One from the Heart. She is a musician but, for Coppola, she was working on scripts. It was — I hate to say this, but in this case it’s true — love at first sight. They married at a 24-hour wedding chapel and, ever since, at any opportunity Tom finds new strings of metaphors to describe her glory. I got my own special instant poem. After he met his wife Kathleen - things changed.  She introduced him to the work of Captain Beefheart, rock’s most avant-garde star, and Kurt Weill and, together, they produced the wildly odd album Swordfishtrombones. They have worked together ever since.
Their collaborations can be startling, both intimate and improvised. There’s a song called Pontiac in which, to the sound of traffic noise, Tom acts the old guy, recalling every car he’s ever owned. It’s about Kathleen’s dad and she recorded it as they were driving along and Tom had slipped into one of his idle, improvised riffs. This guy, as I find when we speak, sings when he talks.
He divides his songs into bawler and brawlers; the first sweet and lyrical, the second defiant, wounded and often sung in an epic, throaty growl, not unlike that of Captain Beefheart. Simon Schama, the historian, says Waits’s voice is “one of the great sound instruments of American art”, and describes the growl mode as “the raspy ruins of a voice that is itself like a building shattered by shellfire and coated with befouled sand”. “I guess I only have two categories,” Tom says in less elevated terms, “I need you and leave me alone.”
Hmmm. I try a Bob Dylan quote he’s fond of, “Fear and Hope: always sounds like a comedy team to me…”
Though he was exactly the right age — born in 1949 — he was never, you see, a hippie. He was a beat, a child of the Fifties rather than the Sixties, who had first been formed by reading Jack Kerouac’s On the Road, the beat bible. Some of his most moving songs — notably Ol’ 55 and (Looking for) The Heart of Saturday Night — are all about cars, about movement.
Some of his most moving songs — notably Ol’ 55 and (Looking for) The Heart of Saturday Night — are all about cars, about movement.  “Kerouac? God, yeah, sure. I wanted to be on the road. I wanted to be famous like Robert Frank’s photograph of Highway 85 going through New Mexico: a dramatic black-and-white photo with the highway going to a vanishing point. It was like a sign for me. If I’d seen that when I was 16 I would have decided to drive a truck for a living. Yeah, away is the place to go for me…
“My favourite highway recently is the Interstate 5. It runs through Oakland and all the way to Los Angeles. It’s just flat and really dramatic, it’s so empty, it’s like being in the middle of the ocean. I’ve been driving a lot lately. I don’t like to take planes because I have too many things in my pockets and it’s too confusing in the airports. I have a lot of things in my pockets they disagree with in security.”

‘Love Music’ Glasgow Record Store day 20 April 2013 –

 We had great fun with rock Viking metal band Viking Galaxy who launched their album First Contact at a packed out Independent Record store day at Love Music Record shop Glasgow.  Indie bands performing were -Young Aviators, Viking galaxy, French Wives, Fake Major, Wooden Box, Three Blind Wolves, Washington Irvine, Glasvagas, 

‘Record Store Day’ was started in the States in 2007 by record store employee Chris Brown as a backlash to the cheap and low quality sound sent out over the internet. The compression of MP3s only carry percent of the music. Online is a good means of discovery these days but – as with those hardback books - the hard copy vinyl or CD has that something collectable and to treasure.  They also offer the artist’s artwork, lyrics and more. Some of us can remember the booths with the headsets in the record shops in town where we could check out new albums. The joy of discovering new music.
This yearly event celebrated physical records, counter-culture, grassroots labels and local community. The record shops offered special limited editions and exclusives. This year's Scottish Record Store Day highlights included vinyl, tapes and treats from Orange Juice, Biffy Clyro, King Creosote, Admiral Fallow, Adam Stafford, Randolph's Leap, Frightened Rabbit, Mogwai/Aidan Moffat and Bill Wells, The Twilight Sad and more.  

Scottish Independent Record Store Day
Up North - Groucho's in Dundee (Nethergate) had performances from Silent Nothing, Colour Coded and General Judgement. Inverness's fab Imperial (Academy Street) from Sara Bills and the Hasbeens and Willie and Tabs Macaskill.  Stirling, Europa Music (Friars Street) houses Scotland's largest vinyl collection and they hosted live in-store appearances including local indie tearaways FRANK and Miniature Dinosaurs along with James Grant of Love and Money.  

GLASGOW. Love Music (Dundas Street, Glasgow) had live sets from Glasvegas, Woodenbox, French Wives, Three Blind Wolves, Washington Irving, Fake Major, Viking Galaxy and Young Aviators, and also a tea stall, classic rock cake and a pinball AC/DC pinball machine.  Monorail (King's Court, Glasgow) hosted Subway Sect's punk renegade Vic Godard with Davey Henderson's art-pop firebrands The Sexual Objects. Other live highlights include Ela Orleans and alt-rock radicals World Peace.
Oxfam Music (Byres Road, Glasgow) held a Record Store Day party helmed by pop collective TYCI. Rubadub (Howard Street, Glasgow) stocked danceable exclusives and deals on vinyl, while guest DJs and live acts included electronic diviner Dam Mantle, Trevino and Silk Cut. 

EDINBURGH. Underground Solu'shn (Cockburn Street, Edinburgh), had dance and electronic action with a day-long vinyl DJ sets from Fryer, House of Traps, Colvin Cruikshank, Fudge Fingas, G-Mac and EH1. Folk wonderland Coda (The Mound) held live in-stores from songstress Karine Polwart and Jenna Reid, Elvis Shakespeare (Leith Walk) welcomed Saint Max and the Fanatics and Oi Polloi, and Avalanche (Grassmarket) had in-stores from Glasvegas and Admiral Fallow. The Bow Bar (West Bow, Edinburgh) had special cask ale, Sid 'n' Nancy IPA. 
VoxBox Music and Last Word Saloon (St Stephen Street, Edinburgh) celebrated Auld Reekie's thriving grassroots community and teamed up with local labels Gerry Loves Records and Song, By Toad that featured Magic Eye, Mike Heron Band, Rob St John, Adam Stafford and Honeyblood, and Fence Records alt-pop Kid Canaveral (aka Kid Canaverowl).

There was also Song By Toad's inspired Beer vs Records  – ‘Why do we resent paying £12 for a record, when we'll happily fork that out for a round of drinks?’
Support your local artists and record shops/ We all pay far too much to the giant Apple Empire, who give nothing back to the artists!  

RECORD STORE DAY SEES ALBUM SALES RISE BY 60%
Record Store Day album sales soared by 60 percent compared with last year, official figures have shown. Read more: http://www.m-magazine.co.uk/news/record-store-day-sees-album-sales-rise-by-60/

Edwyn Collins and his band at the O2 ABC

Still rockin in his soul, even if his body has failed him at times.

Edwyn Collins, Scottish musician, best known for his song A Girl Like You and also for the song Rip It Up with his band Orange Juice, rocked a gig ABC Glasgow 18th April 2013. 

  

Understated, the title of his new album suits him well. Here's man who rocks deep inside with a generosity of spirit and soul. He's unassuming and sincere and there was a lot of love in the room for him at this gig and some nostalgia for a few no doubt. He performed songs from his 2013 album Understated as well as some of his back catalogue songs. Collins had a band of quality musicians who seemed to enjoy playing with him.

Songs: Ghost of a Chance; Understated; I Never Met a Girl Like you Before.  

For an encore he sang Home Again, searching for my soul again, and Simple Life – simple choice makes the world a better place. Seven years after his two strokes the indie veteran has produced another excellent album.