A Ripple

This weekend I will be going to help Calaid sort and pack donations that will be going to refugee camps in Europe. Its only a small thing but as my wife and I have been thinking about what we could do we heard about Calaid and so thats why we are going. In such an overwhelming and seemingly hopeless situation we want to do something and be part of bringing hope and transformation. It may only be a ripple, but many ripples could be a wave of transformation.

Photo by crazydiva/iStock / Getty Images

Photo by crazydiva/iStock / Getty Images

A Collection Of Folk: Wish You All The Best

Here is a video from my November performance at A Collection Of Folk, watch the other artists which includes clients from the workshops run by Lupus Albus or jump straight into to my song "Wish You All The Best"

I was so glad to hear A Collection Of Folk will continue to host their monthly gigs at St Giles in the fields on Denmark Street. I wish them all the very best!

 

Song by Song: Laisser Passer and Heritage

Laisser Passer started out with a simple guitar loop and keyboard loop which then we built around. It was not much at the start but Davis gave some flavour to it with horns, bass, beats and more. We tracked a guitar riff to guide the session guitarist.

Heritage started with some beats and bass lines. We built a series of loops for verses and choruses. This was later worked on by Cissa. I also recorded the backing vocals. It was really nice working on this song.

Photo by eclipseart/iStock / Getty Images

Photo by eclipseart/iStock / Getty Images

Song by song: Trone de grace and Alleluia

Trone de grace: was an old song of Bernards that he wanted to rework, slow down and chill out. We tracked him live singing and playing on keys to give us a guide. Davis tracked some drums and bass, I added some swells and guitar. The rest fell nicely in to place after. It was great tracking all the harmonies. We tracked the sax as well in Bernards house.

Alleluia was another remake of an old song. Bernard wanted something quite simple, we tracked some guitar and electric piano. I was able to add some electric guitars on top of the structure we had. Bernard took this to a studio to add vocals, more keys and layers.

Photo by suprunvitaly/iStock / Getty Images

Photo by suprunvitaly/iStock / Getty Images

Song by song: Voyage and Samm Katt

Voyage came about from a melody Bernard and in mind for guitar. He tracked a synth guitar and I added a real acoustic underneath it. I also added electric guitars. Davis tracked the drums with Addictive. The drum break was recorded by me as well with Honore, who played Djembe, Talking Drum and some other percussion for the break. It was a really funky tune, Davis and bernard made the horns sections as well. 

Same Katt was my first ever reggae tune. Bernard has a real creative mind, he had lots of ideas for sounds, melodies for all of the songs, but this one in particular he had an idea for the strings. So we looked around my samples for ages before getting the right sound. I played electric guitars on the track and some acoustic too. Davis made the beats, another session player added the cracking bass line. Later Cissa worked with Trinity a dutch band on the song to add the flute and the english vocals. We added synths, organs and lots of sounds to this. We tracked some real djembe as well which was cool

Photo by iacona/iStock / Getty Images

Photo by iacona/iStock / Getty Images