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I have decided to keep you informed as to my progress or lack of it as we move into record mode. I will try to explain how decisions are made and how I arrive at the treatment a song gets.

• 10 March 2010
Quite a lot has happened since my last update. Most of it has been preparation for the recording studio, but as I mentioned the city of Belfast I will say that the show went very well. It is true to say that this place has always been a great place to play and I have enjoyed some very memorable moments here since my first visit in 1969.

I must have played in almost every venue since then some of which are no longer in existence!

This concert was in the May Street church behind the imposing city hall and people came from Dublin and Derry as well as the city itself. The “craic” was good, and Donard and I enjoyed some afters with long time supporters Joan and David Baxter who flew over from Scotland and Ken Woolas from Birmingham. I did not get to see Nanci Griffiths but spoke on the phone and she was gracious and chatty. Her tour manager Phil was the guy who took Gram Parsons body to the desert and cremated him as per his wishes. I knew Phil vaguely from his Harley days and occasional forays to the Half Moon Putney.

I have been working especially on “The Break of the Union” song and continue to tamper with the melody and piano part. The lyric has moved away from the metaphor of two people in a one to one relationship and is now two people representing each country. It is an English voice which addresses the points as I realised I am hardly qualified to put a Scottish view point across. I think it is a better song as a result and focusses more on the philosophical nature of the vow or contract. Based on the assumption that a deal between two parties can only work if both wish it.

Not exactly hit parade material but challenging to write if unwieldy given the discipline of the rhyme scheme.

I am also working on making more of “Somewhere Down The Road” which is now the working title for the album. I played this tune quite a lot on one of the “up close” tours. It was meant as a tribute to the great Jesse Fuller and his one man band. I employed a stomp box (bass drum effect) and a Hi-Hat cymbal unit along with my Gibson twelve string.

As with all things in repetition I started to find more in the song and thanks to Tom Mates wonderful set up on the guitar I have made the guitar part more interesting (to me at any rate). I think I will see if I can get Adrian who played tuba on my gates of Eden recording to do this song with me. I also have him in mind for another tune. As usual availability is a problem and I am already encountering date problems for some of the musicians.

As I begin next week I will record several pieces on my own and possibly overdub the chaps as they become available. Mostly whenever I record with other players I will try to do it live but some arrangements will be best served by slow build up of other artists. I am delighted that Chris Parkinson is coming down on the second week of April with his wife Nadine. We will have a day's rehearsal and then heads down in the studio for three days. I am also hoping to use some of my chums from the “Bucket Boys” Steve Turner (Red Sky) Willie Wilson and Dave Quinn as part of an loose ensemble for three other tracks.

• I Didn't Want To go To The Dance
• Rosa-Linda
• The Ghost of Robert Johnson.

This last track is taking time. All the verses are written and as a piece I am quite happy with it.

The music is taking longer.

RJ is quite simply the greatest of all the country blues poets/singers/guitarists and I want this song to do him justice. I do not wish to tell his tragic story but rather to say what the soulful effect of his music means to me.His most famous song Crossroads Blues is the setting for the opening verse and from there I try to put metaphorical flesh on the bones of his intent.

I have written eight line verses but can engineer them into almost a blues twelve bar format but I wonder if this is selling the idea cheap. I would prefer to have a song structure within the cowboy chords (that is to say the chords found in the first position) but I keep hearing the “ghost” of his music whenever I try setting the words to a tune. This is because I want to hint at his slide playing which needs to be at a certain tempo and a suitable key for the open tuning that style requires.

It is a tough gig with so many tunes on the go. I feel like that plate spinner type act from variety days and although none of the tunes are in danger of falling off the poles, I am jumping from one to the other in mild apprehension that there is more to do.

As usual just before the recording starts I realise how much more attention is needed as the creative process keeps throwing up new ideas. It is easy to see why some guys actually almost live in the studio. This is not for me however.

There is out doors as spring surely creeps up on us. Today the goldfish reappeared from their murky depths and a very large drunken bumble bee drove into me.

“Aujourd'hui Le Ciel est Bleu” alors!

• 13 March 2010
All day yesterday on the piano for “The break of the Union”. The tune is still changing although almost set. I want a Scottish flavour without the cliches. Unfortunately the piano has gone out of tune, especially the lower octave fon the left hand B- C- (low) F and Fsharp. My piano tuner is too busy to come and I have reluctantly resorted to mole grips on the infuriating wedge shaped tuning pegs, which was not entirely successful. It is hard to convey the great sweep of Scottish scenery when the piano sounds as though it should be heard coming out of a saloon in a cowboy film.

The rest of the afternoon was spent working on the lyric for “The Ghost of Robert Johnson” (hereafter referred to as RJ). The song has once more slightly evolved and begins and ends with the man but moves into descriptions of the power his work has to convey mood and emotion. I am still moving it about and have just stopped to write this as I have to have a break and go back to it. I suppose its a bit like a painter moving back from his canvas every little while.

Yesterday I strung up an old Tom Mates guitar as a high strung and it sounds beautiful. In fact the stringing is the same as the octave strings on a twelve string which I first tried over the intro and outro of Barges. I have come up with two melody lines for the RJ song. One is in a minor key which may not be suitable for the slide guitar. The other sounds a bit folky so I am in favour of the minor key at the moment.

Went to see my friends “The Bucket Boys” play a gig in Truro last night. As usual they were great. During the interval I booked three of them for the recording. Dave Quinn bass, Tim Renwick guitar and Willie Wilson drums. Steve Turner will add his guitar later and help arrange and MD in the studio.

• 25 March 2010
Work has begun at the studio.

As usual I got my nervous anticipation before commencement but John the engineer is affable and easy going. He is extremely accomplished and after a shaky start. I began with an attempt of “Walk Into The Morning.”

I have played this song a lot in live performance and each time I perform it I am transported back to those precious early days where making music and feeling part of something was so special. In live performance I love to extend the harmonica part and just play for however long I want between the verses. The song is about freedom and self discovery and I don't have to worry about arrangements that other musicians might have to retain. Each night is different when I play it and there lies the problem. Will I really know when I have the best version.

I was pleased with the first attempt and even added a light high strung guitar over certain passages. We did a rough mix which I brought home and I do like it but the first verse sounds a bit dull (nerves I guess). In keeping with the theme of youth and adventure it needs to be lighter at the start and less intense.

I tell John I will re-record it at the start of every session but so far I haven't.

I recorded another version of Rev Thunder and this one might be a keeper. I already have some good live versions of this song so I am asking myself what I am looking for with a studio version. At first I thought about adding some ambient street noise to indicate Rev Davis's place of work also rain and thunder. Now I am not so sure. The piece really swings well and I wonder if a voice trio of singers on the choruses would be better. I have found my old Harmonium that some of you will remember from the song “Lay Your Money Down” and it is still wheezing and clattering away. I am tempted to introduce the church feel to the song which will bring it back to studio reality. I intend to record some other versions of this song as well.

“Somewhere Down the Road” sounded good on the B-45 Twelve string and I really enjoyed hearing it back for the first time. I now have three twelve string guitars but this is the sweetest sounding. Tom Mates has set it up beautifully but it must be played lightly to get the best from it. There are so many intricate treble patterns coming off the instrument that I am reluctant to let any other string players on to the recording. However I am in contact with a remarkable banjo player and I think some rippling gentle picking in harmony will be a good thing to try. I have also decided that I will try a version with some rhythm snare drum and hi-hat cymbal when Chris Parkinson arrives in a couple of weeks.

I have spent weeks and months preparing for these sessions and hours on the lyrics every day but this does not prepare you for the studio.

These days there are several ways of working and some bands I am told lock themselves in the recoding studio armed with nothing but a couple of riffs and a title or two. Others work with scripted written parts like Nashville and if they cannot get three songs done in three hours there has to be something wrong.

I take in finished lyrics and carefully worked out guitar parts but once in front of the microphone it becomes apparent how much more there is to do.

With few exceptions lyrics will not be properly memorised and prompt sheets are necessary. This means that that you have to take your eye off the guitar momentarily and fingering mistakes sometimes occur. Also I think you can hear when someone is reading the lyric of a song. I should be very grateful to Roger Whittaker for singing “Streets of London” but it sounds to me as if he is reading the words and I do think if a song is worth singing it must be worth committing to memory. Johnny cash read the words of “A Boy Named Sue” and it didn't stop it being a huge hit so what do I know?

On day 2 in the Studio I tried “A Sunny Day” and realised all my points above had come to bug me. I had not practised the phrasing properly or calculated where the instrumental verse should occur. Also I have two verses in French which I had left on my email and the song was not whole without them. I decided then to just demo several songs and get used to my surroundings and get my monitoring right in the headphones (hence forth to be known by their pro name as cans).

I managed this Ok and recorded in total 10 demos. These included the three band songs for the next session after Easter.

The Ghost of R J
Rosa Linda
I Didn't Want to Go To The Dance.

The song R.J. Has taken a long time and is still evolving. I have shifted my position on a Dylan style jam in one take, to a measured chord sequence in e minor. I hope this will give a slightly eerie quality to the sound.

I see this song as a landscape set in the early to mid evening. The ground is flat and the air humid. Colour has drained from the land and a thin thread of blue cigarette smoke is the only colour discernible.

It's a good start anyway.

I brought these recordings home and was encouraged by them and now have a better idea about approach.

• 28 March 2010

I returned to London for meetings and a small gig in Twickenham and more business stuff. I caught up with Donard and Joanna our secretary and we discussed various aspects of the recording work.

Whilst there I tried to format one of my other songs and now have an arrangement to take into the studio. I won't say too much about this one but it is called The Jersey Ferry.

Every now and then a “happy accident” occurs on the guitar when I am playing and a tune emerges that would not otherwise happen. I was playing this tune to Steve Turner some months ago and said to him that I thought the melody was leading to another chord to take it somewhere else. He identified the chord and even gave it a name which I can't remember but which I will reveal when I next write. Now I have a slightly unusual sequence which sets up the lyric very nicely. I will be trying this song out on my next sessions after those with the band.

I was listening to Bessie Smith singing the other day and remembered a Jack Eliot version of the same song. As part of my “live” demo sessions I recorded a version of “Bed Bug Blues” on the twelve string. I doubt if it will make it to the album as it will not really fit but I will keep it and maybe put Adie Davis on with his tuba when he comes to record with me in a couple of weeks.

I have now tentatively booked a fiddle player and banjo player for up coming sessions. Steve T has held a sax payer and I am trying to decide about a recorder trio for two other titles.

I have decided to change the title of “I Didn't Want To Go To The Dance” to “Moon June and a Cajun Tune” Actually it's nearly as long to say but it acknowledges the cliché and makes it positive I think.

Still on the Twelve string I have come up with a tune for “Kettle Wobblin's”

Again doubtful for the album but a new song to record nevertheless.

I am still experiencing some anxiety over my Scottish tune on the piano. While I wait for my piano tuner I have straightened out the lower F -F sharp- C and B flat. I used a combination of mole grips and socket set and the sound has moved slightly from western cowboy saloon to silent movie piano accompaniment!

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