I missed the impromptu set by The Three Craws at Homegame earlier this year, so I was delighted when my friends Iain and Aileen, who live in Aberdour, got Mel and I tickets to go see them at the Aberdour Festival.

As it turned out, we were already heading to Fife that weekend to visit my mum and her partner, who were renting a little holiday house in Lower Largo, so we were able to head to Aberdour on the way back and catch the set.

In case you’re not aware, the Three Craws are James Yorkston (James Yorkston), King Creosote (Kenny Anderson) and the Pictish Trail (Johnny Lynch). Now individually these are three of my favourite songwriters/performers, so to see them all together at the same time was a joy.

They played a wide variety of stuff – at the beginning they took turns to play one of their own songs but they soon went off into what was obviously an improvised set of great folk songs and tracks by their friends including by Kenny’s brother Gordon, who has recorded so many great songs under the name of The Lone Pigeon and with the Aliens and the Beta Band. The highlight for me though was an absolutely storming version of Adrian Crowley‘s Walk-On Part.

I have to admit I didn’t know this song previously but on my return I immediately bought his album Long Distance Swimmer so I could listen to it on repeat whilst furiously knitting my brow and wringing my hands at the pointless absurdity of life, drinking whisky and smoking crack (er ok, whilst having a nice cup of tea).

What’s so great about the Three Craws, in addition to the silly banter and improvised nonsense, is their harmonies. Their voices complement each other so perfectly it was stunning to hear.

So, yes – I couldn’t resist making another wee video. I hope the Craws don’t mind me including some personal footage of my visit to Fife with clips from their performance – and I suppose this is a bit of a companion piece to my Homegame video seeing as I missed them at that. I have to admit, and this is coming from an avowed city lubber, I think I’m starting to fall in love with Fife a little bit. Hope you enjoy it.

Vimeo:

YouTube:

 At the beginning of the video James Yorkston is referring to a gift he was given of a crocheted tortoise, hare and fox – go the fence forums to get a closer look..

If you’re lucky enough to be heading to the Green Man festival this year in Wales, you’ll see the Three Craws there, along with various other Fence Collective peeps.

Also worth checking out are these live acoustic performances by King Creosote in Hyde Park for the website www.bandstandbusking.com especially if you want to find out what the actual words to ‘Rims’ are… hint: it’s not “let me remind you that you had a menu”

The second part of a two-part special on Scotland’s Fence Collective.

1. King Creosote – Don’t Ask Me How My Weekend Went 
2. King Creosote – Houston Tharoule 
3. Rozi Plain – Stolen Shark 
4. The Pictish Trail – Into the Smoke 
5. Rozi Plain – Roof Rook Crook Crow 
6. King Creosote – On Esther’s Planet

www.fencerecords.com

illustration by Leigh Pearson http://thunderheart.co.uk

Read the accompanying column in the October issue of The Skinny

Photo by Alison H (more at flickr)

“I wouldn’t want to belong to any club that would have me as a member” Groucho Marx

Even though hipster’s fave Bon Iver is appearing up the road at
the Queen’s Hall, there are lengthy queues outside The Caves for
tonight’s Fence Club and a few unlucky souls are turned away due to a
last-minute sell-out. The subterranean den is absolutely rammed both
with the Fence faithful and a large contingent of curious newbies. It’s
a spacious venue, but unfortunately the layout makes it difficult for
everyone present to get a clear view of the stage.

The
performances and friendly atmosphere though, more than make up for the
squeeze. Things kick off with alarming speed with  a tantalisingly
brief joint set by The Pictish Trail and Rozi Plain and a well-received
guest spot from fence affiliate Malcolm Middleton. The main event
though is undoubtedly James Yorkston and the Athletes. Something about
the quiet confidence of Yorkston’s voice is enough to send a hush
throughout the venue for at least a few moments, before the drunken
rabble who can’t get close to the stage drift back into conversation. 
But those of us who continue to pay attention are rewarded with
luscious live versions of tracks from his new album such as Tortoise
Regrets Hare and the title track When the Haar Rolls In plus some well
chosen gems from his back catalogue including the gorgeous I Awoke. The
set highlight was probably his epic cover of Lal Waterson’s Midnight
Feast, with trusty henchmen King Creosote and The Pictish Trail giving
it laldy on backing vocals.

Creosote then tied things up
with an eclectic DJ set that made a pleasant backdrop to some last
minute boozing and bonding, before he and Yorkston drove off into the
night in a car held together with some sticky tape. And with an exclusive piece of vinyl on the way out, this is one club that
even Groucho Marx would have wanted to be a member of.

Published by The Skinny

illustration by Leigh Pearson

From small beginnings, Anstruther-based label Fence
Records has deservedly grown in stature over the last decade or so, and
now boasts a dedicated fanbase and an impressive roster of artists
whilst very much retaining its down-to-earth DIY ethos. I caught up
with label lynchpins Johnny Lynch and Kenny Anderson, otherwise known
as The Pictish Trail and King Creosote for a chinwag just before they
played a blinding gig as part of the Retreat! mini-festival in
Edinburgh.

Not everything has run
smoothly however. Anderson’s last two albums as King Creosote, KC Rules
OK and Bombshell were released through Warners offshoot 679, allowing
him to reach a much wider audience than ever before. But the record
industry being what it is, he’s back to releasing his latest album
through Fence and perhaps not coincidentally it has a more experimental
side, not least the title – ‘They Flock Like Vulcans to See Old Jupiter
Eyes on His Home Craters’. Being back in control must be something of a
relief though, given the hoops that major labels expect their artists
to jump through to justify their investment? Kenny: “Well it is a
relief because we’re at the helm so we’re as busy as we make ourselves.
The difference is when you’re with another label and they make you busy
with all sorts of things that you never expected to have to do, but
you’ve signed up to do it – and they make it quite awkward for you if
you don’t do it. All these things are there to help promote your album,
but it’s just amazing all the weird and wonderful things you end up
doing.”

As well as interminable
interviews that take up entire days (The Skinny not included,
obviously), this involved some major support tours, for the likes of KT
Tunstall and Squeeze. And despite Tunstall’s early links with the Fence
clan, it was playing with Squeeze which paid off. Kenny: “Actually
Squeeze made more sense, in an appreciation kind of thing because it
was an older audience and it was a music buying audience, and we did
better from sales of albums. Whereas a lot of Kate’s audience were
younger and had only heard two or three songs on the radio; it was like
a different gig. As soon as she played ‘Suddenly I See’, the place just
went bananas – even though it’s not a stand-out in the set at all, but
it’s just one that everybody knows. So for us as a support band, can
you imagine? We don’t have anything even approaching her least known
songs.” Johnny however is keen to stress the glass-half-full side of
the arrangement.  “It doesn’t mean it was worthless because the end
product of that was that for other Fence shows that we’ve done since
then, it’s brought in a different audience and it’s made the audience
that was there think of us as a real band instead of just ‘some guys
from Fife’” Kenny agrees that there are benefits to such compromises.
“That’s true, and also playing with Kate did get us that Jools Holland
thing  – without a doubt that was what swung it for the producers.”

But despite the raised profile both are
determined to avoid the label morphing Decepticon style into a
monstrous corporate machine. Johnny: It’s reflective of the audience
that’s there, if the audience that gets properly excited about it gets
bigger then we want to accomodate that, because there’s nothing worse
than putting on something and people who really want to be at it can’t
get to it.” Kenny: “But we’re not in it just to make a quick buck and
escape. the Homegame, for example, is different, oddly enough because
it is different. We’ve made our own rules. Everybody expects you to
want to be bigger and better, but we kind of don’t. We want it to be
manageable, and just to keep people happy.” Johnny:  Because at the end
of the day the Fence thing only has to supply a wage for two people.”
Kenny: “And a lot of kids..”

Fence Club #6 takes place on Wed, 17 Sep at The Caves, Edinburgh and
will feature James Yorkston, Malcolm Middleton and The Pictish Trail. They Flock LIke Vulcans… is available now at King Creosote’s live gigs and will be more widely available in November. King Creosote, The Pictish Trail and The Fence Collective play The Corn Exchange, Cupar on 25 Oct.

As published in the Sept issue of The Skinny and online.

Hear part 1 of the I Hear a New World podcast here.

Perfectly
representing the organic mix of traditional and electronic
instrumentation with quality songwriting and unself-conscious
experimentation that characterises the output of the Fence Collective
is Secret Soundz Vol.1, the first long-player from The Pictish Trail
aka Johnny Lynch.

Born and raised in Auld Reekie before
moving to the US as a teenager (where he became a big fan of the likes
of Beck and Pavement), Johnny Lynch was drawn back to study at St.
Andrews University by a love of the Beta Band and Belle &
Sebastian, and it wasn’t long before he made a fateful encounter with
Fence founder Kenny Anderson aka King Creosote. “Kenny used to play pub
shows in St. Andrews and they’d be three hours long with different
songs every time. I got the Beta Band connection when I saw him and his
brothers singing She’s The One, which Gordon (aka The Lone Pigeon and
lead songwriter of The Aliens) had written. It was just amazing seeing
that and being a fan of that band.” And the rest is history.

Despite having released material for years, Secret Soundz
is the first “proper” album Johnny’s released, but he’s philosophical
about his chances of breaking through into the mainstream. “Maybe
people will buy the record and become new fans of Fence or maybe
they’ll just be sworn off buying anything by anyone Scottish ever
again!” chuckles Johnny. “I know people were burnt really badly with
Deacon Blue – they ruined it for us!” And although there are three
excellent tracks that were recorded with The Earlies – who also played
on Kenny’s first major label album KC Rules OK – the album is
extremely varied, and far removed from any predictable attempt to
replicate his pal’s winning formula. “I wanted it to be a kind of
hodge-podge thing because a lot of the songs have been done at
different recording sessions – I mean I respect bands who go and do a
ten day stint somewhere and record a thing all at the same time – like
Bruce Springsteen’s Nebraska - but I wanted things a bit fucked up and a bit weird.”

Far from the cabin fevered sparsities of The Boss, Secret Soundz
is influenced by bands like Hot Chip – who Johnny admits to being a
massive fan of – though he says that by comparison “the equipment I’m
using is absolute shit!” There are also similarities to fellow Fence
artists Barbarossa and Found, not surprisingly as Johnny, who runs
Fence on a daily basis, was the man who signed both acts and still
speaks excitedly about the pair.

“The Barbarossa record I got through Adem – we put out an acoustic
EP, and then James had also recorded stuff with Simon Lord from [now
defunct electro rock band] Simian, which was the sort of music I get
really excited about – it’s the same thing with Found because they’ve
nailed proper songs with something that’s a wee bit experimental but
not for its own sake – it’s not too arty, it’s pop music. Man, you
should hear the new Barbarossa stuff, he sounds like Justin Timberlake!
He’s done a few tracks with Diplo who did the MIA record.”

So given his taste for genre-hopping artists, can we expect Secret Soundz Vol. 2 to be Pictish Trail’s answer to Beck’s infamous Midnite Vultures?
“I’m not sure,” Johnny ponders. “I might not even call the next record
Vol.2. But I do love that album – powerhouse funk is an overlooked
genre!”

Published in The Skinny Magazine, September 2008

1. James Yorkston – Queen of Spain www.jamesyorkston.co.uk
2. The Pictish Trail – I Don’t Know Where To Begin www.myspace.com/pictishtrail
3. Rozi Plain – The Lang Toun (James Yorkston cover)
4. David Thomas Broughton (James Yorkston cover)

See www.myspace.com/jamesyorkstoncoversalbum for more info.

See the September 2008 issue of The Skinny for my interviews with The Pictish Trail, King Creosote and James Yorkston of the Fence Collective. 

www.fencerecords.com

Published today by The Skinny