Nick Garrie - 49 Arlington Gardens

MYSTERIOUS, CULT SINGER/SONGWRITER EMERGES WITH CREAM OF SCOTTISH INDIE MUSIC SCENE TO RECORD STUNNING NEW MATERIAL.

Just a couple of years ago lost legend Nick Garrie entered a songwriting competition at a bar in London and, unsurprisingly, won. His prize  a website which allowed those very few select people who had been transfixed by his lost classic album from 1969 to realise that he was very much alive. A clutch of record labels immediately got in touch and as a result The Nightmare of JB Stanislas, an album that had only ever reached the promotional copy stage at the end of the 1960s, was finally released in 2005 to widespread critical acclaim on the Rev-Ola label.

Cut to 2008 and Garrie is introduced to fast-rising Scottish singer/songwriter Ally Kerr through Rev-Ola records head honcho Joe Foster, formerly of Creation Records. After a series of phone conversations with Garrie singing new songs down the line, Kerr invites Garrie to come up to Glasgow to play at the club night he resident at - Viva Melodia. Friendships are struck with other musicians including emerging alt-folk duo Doghouse Roses, culminating in the recording of five songs (with plenty of live takes) over just one weekend at Riverside Studios in Glasgow just a few months later. Fans and friends also involved in the recording process included Norman Blake (Teenage Fanclub) and Duglas T. Stewart (BMX Bandits) on production duties with Duncan Cameron (Delgados, ravis, Trashcan Sinatras) engineering. Other players included brothers Brian and Jim McEwan and Stuart Kidd (all BMX Bandits / contributors to many Scottish indie bands and acts).

The recording was emotional, the results were incredible with songs written from the heart, full of poignancy, purity and reflecting the life of this wandering minstrel. At their core is a brutal honesty, of someone writing in a way that is unaffected by trends. Being half Scottish (his mother was from Broughty Ferry) this was only his second visit to Scotland, the first had been when he'd come up to play just a few months earlier. In a way hed come full circle and Garrie described this intense recording weekend in January 2008 as the best musical experience of his life. Listening to the songs one can hear just why.

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