Category: The Story of Moorscape

42 years ago this Christmas my Mum & Dad bought me my first ‘real’ guitar – the one they bought me several years earlier was made from thin metal and had nylon strings, and it was a toy guitar for a small boy. It was blue and white, but I had always wanted to be John Lennon so any guitar was more than acceptable. So this is my first real one. It cost £17, which seemed to me like a small fortune at the time.

A year later I got a temporary job at the Cooperative Furniture Department in Blackpool and the (rather strange) man I worked with had a salary of £17 a week and he thought he was made for life. I can still remember taking it out of its cardboard wedge box, picking it up and wondering what the hell to do next. Mum & Dad had also bought me a chord book, and I very probably made an unspeakable row for the several years that followed.

My brothers and sisters will remember that while this was my very first permanent musical instrument, it was not the first I had played at home. I had opted for string instruments at school music lessons. Starting with the violin, I quickly learned how to play ‘Twinkle Twinkle Little Star’ in a manner that sounded like a cat fight. I soon moved on to the viola, which sounded more like a pair of mature cats fighting a bit more slowly and howling in baritone, and then I graduated to the cello because not many others seemed to want to.

Taking home a violin or viola to practice ‘Twinkle Twinkle Little Star’ was relatively straightforward, even with a heavy bag full of homework. But getting a cello home when I always liked to sit at the front of the top deck of the 7A bus, was more of a challenge. I did though, more frequently than my traumatised family would probably care to remember. The best I can say about my efforts to play a bow-string instrument is that I learned how to put the fingers of my left hand on a fret board, so when I first played my Spanish guitar the only thing I had to get used to was how hard I had to press the strings to get a half decent sound, a process that took about three years.

Mum and Dad bought the guitar from a shop in town, that was either owned by or run by a bloke who lived with his parents about ten doors away from us Reeds on the other side of Norcliffe Road, down the hill towards Red Bank Road. He was called Eric Dixon, known to all as ‘Ez’ and I was later partly impressed by him because he used to call his Mum and Dad ‘Muz and Daz’. I used to deliver their papers, so occasionally bumped into Ez, who was a stout bloke in his twenties with thinning, long, curly hair and he always looked a bit fierce. I don’t think I spoke to him until much later, and only in his shop. But he apparently gave Mum and Dad some good advice on which was the best of the cheaper guitars, and a good deal so that they could actually afford to buy it for me.

His advice must have been pretty good because in the 1980’s I worked with a guy called Martin Tate. Martin was a really nice bloke and an amazing classical guitarist. He came round to my place once shortly after he had spent a huge amount of money on a new Spanish guitar, but he preferred mine. So if I have a favourite guitar it is this one, not just because it still plays really nicely but because it carries with it a huge number of memories. Everyone who knows me as a guitarist will at some stage have seen me with that guitar, picked it up, bumped into it, moved it out of the way so they could sit down, or played it, so it is very much a part of me.

Its soundbox label says ‘Torre – Guitarrez de Calidad’ Interestingly, ‘Torre’ translates from Spanish to English as ‘Tower’, of which there is one in Blackpool. So maybe Ez and his shop had them made specially? I guess we will never know.

I have been playing guitar for 42 years, picking one up, strumming it, sometimes productively, sometimes irritatingly, putting it down. I have never liked to do covers, and that’s possibly more to do with confidence than ability, a need to feel I have done justice to someone else’s work, but it is also something I have never really been interested in doing. So to find myself after all these years on the cusp of releasing Moorscape™ is a massive but pleasant surprise.

A CHANCE ENCOUNTER

What changed? Well I went to Johnny Roadhouse in Manchester to buy a set of bouzouki strings for my son as a Christmas stocking filler. There on the wall, I saw what I  thought, in my ignorance, was a ten string bouzouki so I asked to have a play and soon I felt it was playing me! It was a cittern, and I felt an immediate connection that led to me buying an Ashbury cittern in July 2014. It was only later that I found out there are ten string bouzoukis, twelve string citterns, and that the mandolin family of instruments is far more varied and versatile than I had ever considered.

A SPECIAL INSPIRATION

I have written hundreds of songs over the years but most are not repeatable and most are not very good. Yet within a month or so of buying the cittern I had created a number of tunes and remembered them by videoing the results, and had written and recorded a passable song, borne out of a special inspiration. Although Garageband  has huge limitations as a recording medium for a technical ignoramus like me, it showed me that song writing was something I could do. So encouraged, I set about writing more.

AN ACCIDENT OF TUNING

I created songs in the tuning that the cittern came with, only later to find out that GCGDG is one of its less common tunings. The whole of  Moorscape™ is based on that tuning and therefore the same key, and although I thought that might be limiting the resonance of the cittern seems to carry it through.  There is still a lot of recording to do, but I feel confident of a decent result.

TWO PASSIONS COMBINE

I have always had a passion for the English countryside, and especially for its moorland scenery. There is something pure about its bleakness and there is no hiding place for anyone brave enough to work or travel through it. I love open spaces and that feeling that you are on your own with the elements. My (not terribly good) degree is in History & Landscape Archeology, so I am also aware of much of the social history of rural Britain, and that there are parallels in today’s selfish society with historical divides between the ‘haves and have-nots’, the rich and the poor. Moorscape™ is therefore partly a stab against the current clueless Conservative government whose policies are creating misery and privation among the poorest in society while the rich continue to thrive. The album evokes the sights, sounds, spirit and atmospheres of the British moorlands and is loosely based on the life of a drover taking his stock to market or herding them from summer to winter feeding grounds.

SOMETIMES YOU MAKE YOUR OWN LUCK

In my day job I am a self-employed international trade consultant, and as part of my work I hold regular export surgeries in a number of locations around the North and Midlands. The locations have been selected either because they are close to areas of manufacturing and industry or because many of the venues are run by cooperatives or non-profit organisations. I was drawn to The Fuse in Partington near Manchester for the latter reason, and because a friend and his brothers started to rent the offices there to help with sustaining this vital and valuable community resource. Little did I know that The Fuse also housed a fully equipped recording studio. It suddenly felt like Moorscape™ was meant to be!

AN EXTRAORDINARY PIECE OF GOOD FORTUNE

As if to confirm that feeling, when I first met with Jabzz (Jabulani Mhlanga) at The Fuse, he decided he needed to bring in another engineer –  good friend of his – who had more experience with acoustic instruments.  And so I met 25 year old Ali (Hey Gamal) whose experience of sound recording and live performing stretches back to when he was 14 years old, and whose pedigree has come from him learning his trade with some of the country’s top record producers. It shows!

WITH (MORE THAN) A LITTLE HELP FROM MY FRIENDS

As well as being hugely privileged to work with these two guys in a fabulous recording set up, it has also been a massive encouragement to me to have the support of two close friends in giving Moorscape™ a further special dimension. I have been great friends with Kieran Heaney since my schooldays. We skived off school to watch Woodstock at Blackpool’s ABC cinema, went to (remember hitching?) multiple gigs and festivals together back in the late 1970’s, and attended the same University in Norwich, where we met Jad (Rajendra Jadeja). Kieran is a more accomplished musician than he would ever admit. He has been a guitarist in a number of bands on the Blackpool/Lancashire club and pub circuit, and can play pretty much any string instrument (currently lead guitarist with The Cobras). Jad is a classical tabla player and general all-round good bloke who lived with his family in New Zealand for seven years, before returning to the UK about five years ago. When we met together again after 33 years it felt like 33 minutes and as I write, Kieran still has that wonderful experience to come – in three days time. All I have to do now is to do justice to Moorscape™ and to make it a really special piece of work. With the help of all these guys we will. I already believe this is meant to be. ALBUM RELEASE DATE (…ISH) Moorscape™ will be released in the Spring of 2016, although we all feel it will be released when it is ready so it could be sooner and it may be later. JOHN ‘WALDO’ REED There are Waldeaux everywhere      

I will remember 18th November 2015 very fondly in years to come. Moorscape™ has evolved as an album over the last year or so, from being a figment of imagination through to a collection of songs and now a concept album about the British moorlands. Part of that evolution has been the agreement of two close friends to help in creating the mood of the album, and yesterday they met together in the same room for the first time in more than 35 years. After a couple of hours of reacquaintance and the occasional, directional jam we set off for The Fuse in Partington to complete a song I had started recording the previous week.

Ali (now officially called ‘The Boss’) got to work straight away on mic’ing up Jad’s tablas while the reacquainting carried on around him and soon Jad was stuck in the corner of the Live Room only to emerge when Ali wanted him to listen to the reasons why he had to do another couple of takes. The inclusion of tablas on this album has possibly been the master stroke I was looking for. Not any tabla sound would do. Although it was many years since I had heard Jad practising (when we were at University together) I knew he would add significant depth to some of my songs – I just didn’t realise how much depth!

Kieran seems to know intuitively what I am trying to create, and added simple bass and guitar that provided a perfect complement to everything we had previously recorded. Then Ali remembered his Ebow and added a few bits of technical magic to create a short, punchy song about how the public no longer have access to some of our most pristine moorland (maybe that’s also a good thing?). So we now have our first unmixed track, and we are pretty pleased with it. It will probably be the most ‘energetic’ track on Moorscape™(but who knows?), and you probably won’t hear it until Spring 2016 – although I am looking at how and where we provide music samples sometime between now and then.

There is no turning back now because the feeling and fun behind yesterday’s session is sure to continue every Wednesday until we have the finished product. So here we all are, having completed this first song, and ready to keep creating and keep smiling after every song until then.

Left to right: John ‘Waldo’ Reed, Kieran Heaney, Hey Gamal (Ali – The Boss), and Jad (Rajendra Jadeja). Why Waldo? Why indeed, but it will be explained one day. We are all Waldeaux really.  Moorscape™ is due to be released in the Spring. Follow us on Twitter @DWaldeaux (no ‘r’) and keep looking in for more stories, images, and eventually songs.

Moorscape™ attempts to evoke the atmosphere, imagery, sounds, social and political history of Britain’s moorlands. Our moors were once largely forest, and have seen massive change over the last few hundred years. Their current shape comes from the enclosure of land by the monasteries in the Middle Ages, and from the 18th Century onwards, when landless labourers were forced to live on the margins of private estates where land was poor and food was short. 4,000 enclosure acts were passed that converted land out of common ownership into the exclusive private property of the landed gentry.

The parallels with society in today’s Britain are evident: the poor being marginalised and made to pay for the lifestyles of a small minority of extremely wealthy people. If there is hope in Moorscape™, it comes from the fact that life runs in a series of cycles, and that people of all races, creeds, abilities and income brackets experience nature, love, and the joy of living, as well as the hardships and sadnesses that seem to come with the territory. And that a better cycle will one day return.

Well, the fun has started. It has taken just over a year to put the basic songs together for Moorscape. Even now, after the lyrics and tunes have been tweaked a few times, it is not certain whether further substantial changes may need to be made to some. There was a sense of a gathering realisation in the first dry run session with Ali that there is much more to this recording mullarkey than I had imagined. I knew I would have to do several takes of the same song, but not how many. I knew there would be an element of sitting around, but not how much. And I knew that it was important to involve Kieran and Jad, but I did not know how important their skills, support, and friendship would be. Knowing all those things as I do now, and expecting further periods of delay and disruption, I feel calmer about the whole process. That is probably also a result of gaining both personal confidence and confidence in the work itself, that it may actually turn out to be at least as special as I intended it to be. After a weekend of messing about with ideas for the title track, I visited a number of music shops yesterday to find suitable percussive instruments by way of contributing to the atmosphere of the album. Ozzy is really not sure about percussive instruments. Even if we end up not using any of them it was enormous fun banging and shaking and rattling and clicking until I found one or two things that I felt fitted the bill. And tomorrow’s session is the fourth in the process, with just me and Ali this time around, and it promises to be very interesting indeed. Don’t forget to follow @DWaldeaux on Twitter – for some reason, they didn’t like the ‘r’ but such is the life of Les Waldeaux.

Recording Day 4 (25th November) was set aside for doing as much as possible to the title track for MOORSCAPE™, with just tabla to add next week when Jad travels north. Armed with the now obligatory flask of ginger and lemon tea with a dash of honey (amazing for waking up my voice), I drove to The Fuse feeling pretty positive and listening en route to bits of Genesis’ “Lamb Lies Down on Broadway” album. And so into the darkened studio I strode, with Ali and Jabzz already in the mood listening to a really vibrant pop creation of theirs. Smiles are always a good way to start a session. Ali and I were left to it, and after playing a few ideas on my cittern we decided to record a full run through of MOORSCAPE and add vocals, other instruments (my new mini maracas feature!) and effects. Asonishingly it took only one take, with everything being in near perfect time, and when Ali smiled (again!) and gave me the thumbs up it felt like we were onto something really special. It was during a short break that I realised it was my Dad’s birthday and without wishing to sound cheesy, that thought made me even more determined to produce a title track that would be worthy of the name. My Dad was a wonderful, kind man who passed away nearly twenty years ago. So I am hoping that today will have done justice to his memory. In the end Ali and I were on a roll, and ended up also recording THE DIM BLUE LIGHT, which immediately follows MOORSCAPE. Over the previous weekend I had worked out how to link the two tracks anyway, but with the second of the two being very wordy (an interpretation of a sad folk story from the Staffordshire Moorlands) I didn’t see any way that my voice would hold up – ginger tea! Ali seems to understand exactly what I want to achieve with the album, and with both tracks added subtlety to the mood that has been in my head for some time now. There is still some work to do on both tracks as Kieran and Jad add their contributions, but essentially the hard work has been done. I think my Dad was probably looking down on me, as I often feel he is. Happy birthday Dad!

The last arena gig I went to see was Peter Gabriel at the Arena in Manchester in 2013. The gig itself was a celebration of hugely  innovative music and highly accomplished performers, and introduced Jennie Abrahamsson who opened the gig with her haunting ‘Snow Storm’ – you really need to check that track out! I am definitely not a fan of the arena gig experience, but this was one of the good ones. I much prefer the more intimate setting of smaller theatres, arts centres, and folk festivals because they frequently highlight new talent and provide some really pleasant surprises.

When a few of us went to see Show Of Hands at the Bury Met last year, their support was the now highly acclaimed Philip Henry & Hannah Martin. That led to us seeing them more recently at the 100th gig staged at The Live Rooms in Saltaire, and buying all their albums! Even the most successful artists start somewhere, but some actually still prefer smaller venues where there seems to be a better connection with their audiences. I was delighted when Manchester’s Band on the Wall re-opened after many years of closure, and I am a regular at their gigs. Since then, and in spite of media reports, there seems to have been a resurgence of small venues opening up to accommodate both new talent, performers with a growing reputation, and to play host to numerous older bands who still love to play the UK circuit.

We are privileged to be recording Moorscape™ at The Fuse in Partington, which is about ten minutes drive from the M60 Manchester ring road. Partington was for years one of the more challenging satellites in the near Manchester area, so when The Fuse was built nearly ten years ago it was part of a sustained effort to regenerate the area and its community and to attract business, sport, and the arts. It is partly because the venue is a little bit out on a limb that its 300 capacity performance space has so far escaped a place on the music circuit, but watch this space!

 

The Fuse was actually closed for a full year during its short existence, until a mix of funding and commercial synergy saw this fabulous community facility re-open again earlier this year. It has the potential to become a showcase for all kinds of local and regional talent as well as expanding its relationship with the local business communities. The Fuse is home to Redeeming Our Communities, a Christian religious organisation who do a huge amount of good work in the local communities, with kids whose evenings might otherwise be spent in less positive activities! It also houses my good friends Luxson whose innovative professional marketing services populate some of the upstairs office space. Loads of brothers with the most positive and vibrant business approach and really good ethics. It also has a bar football table!

There is much more to come from The Fuse, so keep your eyes and ears open during 2016. Meanwhile, it’s Recording Day 5 on Wednesday. We love working there!

There are loads of Waldeaux there too.

I love walking on the moorlands of Britain, whether the Peak District, North Yorkshire, Northumbria, or wherever. There is a honesty about their bleakness, and the feeling of being alone with the elements is something special. But they haven’t always been like that. A few hundred years ago I would have been walking though forest. Centuries of felling trees for construction, shipbuilding and charcoal burning have removed the forest cover to leave us with the open heather moorland and heathland that we see today. Much of its area is now out of bounds, either because it is in private ownership or because it has been acquired by the military for training or as firing ranges. The irony is that these ‘out of bounds’ British moorlands have become a refuge for numerous endangered birds, animals, insects and plant life. If ‘the public’ had been allowed access over the years, it is likely that these pristine habitats would be less well preserved. Moorscape™ is a comment on all of these issues, and delves further into the social and political history of this fascinating landscape, from the enclosure acts through to the industrial revolution, and the impact of each on the fabric of this changing landscape. A landscape that looks like it does because of years of abuse. The album loosely follows the life of a drover until his death on the very tracks that he has walked for many years. It is a mix of folk songs, atmospheric tunes, stories, political commentary, and the life and love of the drover himself. The songs have been completed in their basic form and some have been recorded, but there is much to add in order that we can replicate some of the sights, sounds and atmospheres that you can experience walking the moors. If you haven’t done so, please do so at least once. These are beautiful wildernesses. There is fascination in the moors for everyone.

When Jabzz hobbled into the studio yesterday having damaged his toe playing football, I’m afraid I laughed! I actually had a century old walking stick in my car to help me get in and out in case my disc slipped – again. This was Recording Day 5 – reprise. Last week I had to stop Jad at relatively short notice from driving up from Hemel Hempstead, and let Ali know as early as possible that he wouldn’t after all need to come back to Manchester between gigs in London and Birmingham.

I had been walking my two spaniels as usual on the previous Saturday morning and jarred my continuously incompetent lower back by treading in a tyre rut in my own drive. That led to six days mainly flat on my back trying to keep the day job going between watching some truly appalling Westerns and a few too many episodes of Judge Judy – one day I may sue a neighbour or close family member for the emotional distress and harassment caused to me by them causing a minor scrape on the passenger side front wing of my car.

The car in which yesterday I had a strategically located century old walking stick. There is a lovely story to that first stick. It was given to me by my Uncle John. Although John has spent most of his life in Canada after emigrating in the 1950’s, his sister lives in Derbyshire and until only a few years ago cared for their 102 year old Mum. She was amazing. I have an abiding memory of this lovely lady waving at me from her bedroom window as I left after one of my few short visits to see her. She was largely bedridden, but still managed to struggle to the window that day. It was her stick that John gave to me and probably pre-dates 1900. The second stick was my Dad’s. It is longer and more flexible than the century old stick and has a more conventional curved, wooden handle – the century old stick has a handle that may be antler or another kind of bone, and it has a very useful hook which I found to have multiple applications. Don’t worry – I’m not even going there!

It took nine days in total with the aid of that and a second stick to get me back on my feet and I finally walked the dogs to the park stick-free on Monday afternoon. It was so good to get back into the studio and regain the momentum we lost by having a week away. Jad added some spectacular tabla work to the title track and one other, and then left to collect his daughter from Nottingham en route back home while Ali performed  his usual magic. I wanted to lay down the foundation of another track for Kieran next week, and what followed was truly amazing. The story of NIGHT will follow in a couple of days. Meanwhile, back to the day job. And Jabzz. You now know where to come if that toe doesn’t heal quickly and you need a stick!

 

“Glorious 12th on a shooting stick” from Moorscape track 7 ‘ GUNS’

Once in a while you say something so unbelievably stupid that it deserves to be written down for posterity and go down in history, attributed to you and only you. Before I disclose how stupid, I would like to say a word or two about Jad, our tabla player. I met Jad back in 1976 when we both arrived as young students at the University of East Anglia. I think it was a few months before we were introduced by the fabulous Stavros (Steve Stavrinou), but Jad was instantly likeable. He was the cool dude in the group, tall, dark, with a white kaftan, reflector shades, yet still the nicest, nicest man you could ever wish to meet (you can pay me later Jad!).

A group of us moved into holiday cottages in North Elmham the following year, and it was then that I learned Jad played tabla. I heard him once or twice through the wall of our adjoining cottage, so I knew he was pretty good even back then. A couple of days ago, he drove up to complete his part on the title track of MOORSCAPE™, followed by a short instrumental piece that links it with THE DIM BLUE LIGHT (a folk story from the Staffordshire Moors). His first take was awesome. His second take was awesome. Then, as if to prove that everyone is fallible he screwed up at the start of the third take, then followed up with two or three more takes that stretched the boundaries of awesomeness. Tabla sound has so much diversity, and like the cittern they are like an enhanced form of another instrument: the cittern being like an enhanced guitar and  tabla being like enhanced drums.

I was groping away for superlatives to describe to Ali one of the softer, more mellow sounds that Jad achieved on MOORSCAPE™ but all I could come out with was ‘It sounds like a handclap in a gardening glove!’ Thus I created my contribution to the History of Stupid! The ‘live room’ at The Fuse that adjoins the recording studio has a timer on the light switch. During one of the middle takes, the light went out and Jad played on as if nothing had happened and if anything, did an even better take. We soon learned that if he pressed the timer switch as he went in to do another take, he could get through the two songs without again being plunged into darkness. He would come back into the studio after a couple of takes to see how the whole thing was shaping up, and I think both Ali and I had already agreed that Take 2 gave us probably all we needed.

But when you work with a perfectionist who has been trained by perfectionists, I suppose you have to give them a bit of lee way if they feel their contribution was not up to their own high standards. Jad was particularly unhappy with a faster section between the two tracks and so did a few more takes just for that short section, and remained so. He is now working on possibly 30 seconds of tabla that he is unhappy with so he can replace the section he is not happy with on his next journey North. There is an honour among tabla players that is there to be admired. None of them want to produce anything that is anything less than the highest of their own standards. Wouldn’t it be a nicer world if more people thought like that?  I was listening yet again this morning to the ‘unhappy’ section, and it would honestly grace any album, any song. However, MOORSCAPE™ has become very important to all of us, for our own reasons as well as collectively, so if it takes multiple more takes for Jad to achieve the standard he expects of himself then so be it.

Jad may be a legendary Waldeaux!