Irish Release 16th February 2007 on Cooking Vinyl

Kindred spirit Johnny Dowd, as well as narrating ‘The Skaters’, contributes counterpoint vocals on two other songs – ‘One Man One Guitar’ and ‘I’ve Been Everywhere’. The two men played a show together in March 2006 in the Austrian alpine town of Kufstein, and after a long evening partaking of Johnny’s bottle of home-made Czechoslovakian absinthe (“the real stuff”- Johnny) agreed to collaborate on disc.

Leon Hunt is one of the UK’s finest banjo players whose solo albums and work with the band Daily Planet have long been admired by Jackie. Says Jackie, “I asked Leon if he could provide texture and understatement, rather than just be flashy, and I love what he played – for instance, the pathos he provides on ‘Here Come The Urban Ravens’ is simply perfect.”

D.J. Unfit For Work provides a guest track at the end of the album, ‘Mellow My Madness’, on which Jackie plays no part. Real name Phil Murphy, singer songwriter D.J was previously known for his superb mid ‘80’s band The Regular Guys, and this track was written, sung, performed and recorded in his London flat. Both Jackie and D.J. have strong links with the London-based pressure group Mad Pride who, as well as releasing excellent records on their own label, exist primarily to promote civil liberties as they pertain to mental health service users. Says Jackie, “The album has a very dark end and D.J.’s beautiful song has a nobility and grace under pressure to which most songwriters can only aspire.”

The album was co-produced by Jackie and engineer David Wrench mainly at Bryn Derwen Studio in Snowdonia, Wales, UK, with additional recording at Leon Hunt’s studio in Bath, England, UK. However, the vocals on the slower songs are first takes which were sung by Jackie in The Ukrainian Cathedral Of The Holy Family In Exile in central London, UK.

The song ‘The Silver In Her Crucifix’ is a homage to Jackie’s all time favourite singer the late Judee Sill, and ‘Here Come The Urban Ravens’ is a homage to the late and much loved Kevin Coyne.

Last word from Jackie: “The bluesy elements (of the songs) are actually more acid than psychedelic, more content than style: although I haven’t taken acid for years I am occasionally overwhelmed by flashbacks – for instance, every time I look at a patterned carpet I see Mickey Mouse on horseback in the style of a medieval knight. On ‘The Long Hard Field’ I asked (engineer) David Wrench to construct a Tex Mex percussion track. When I came back and he played it to me I said ‘it’s not very Tex Mex is it?’”

“It’s post-modern Tex Mex” he replied.

Accompanying Notes for
“OH WHAT A BLOW THAT PHANTOM DEALT ME”

ONE MAN ONE GUITAR

‘There’s a woman on the snowline selling sex - she got a little tartan skirt and a bottle of Beck’s’

Driving on tour in early 2006, from Dresden to Vienna via Czechoslovakia, we came down a long mountain pass towards one of the most godforsaken towns I have ever seen – and I’ve been to Barry … As we descended via hairpin bends, I glanced to the right and saw a glamorous coloured woman standing in a clearing of pine trees, just where the snow ended, wearing a tartan skirt (MacDonald dress tartan) and holding a bottle of Beck’s beer.

‘Did you see that?’ I said to fellow traveller Michael Cosgrave – ‘why would that woman be standing there?’

‘Yes I saw her’ said Michael – ‘but look at this’…

Looking ahead I saw that the entire town seemed to be lining the street in billowing snow, clearly selling sex, and also that most of the buildings were brothels with names like ‘Hotel California – Best Massage’. Old men and women, people in wheelchairs, and very young teenagers, all peered into our tour bus, beckoning us to stop and go with them. It was one of the saddest and most disturbing places imaginable.

‘Do you want to stop?’ asked Thomas our tour manager. We didn’t.

I’VE BEEN EVERYWHERE

In 2006 me and Johnny Dowd played a show together in Kufstein, a beautiful town in the Austrian Alps. In the hotel bar afterwards we were carrying on drinking, having finished Johnny’s bottle of home made over-strength Czechoslovakian absinthe. A German businessman got talking to us, and hearing that I played in Germany a lot, asked me where I’d played. I named a few places, and the man started asking me about other places – ‘Have you been to Wuppertal?’ I’d say yes, and Johnny would drawl ‘he’s been EVERYWHERE!’

‘Have you been to Baden Baden?’ – ‘He’s been EVERYWHERE!’

This went on for a long time, until suddenly I heard myself breaking into song with the old American favourite ‘I’ve been everywhere man, breathed that mountain air man’ etc. A great recording idea was born…

THE SILVER IN HER CRUCIFIX

My homage to the late Judee Sill, written in cold harbour bars in the city of Portsmouth – just me and a few hung-over marines standing round a fruit machine.

HERE COME THE URBAN RAVENS

My homage to Kevin Coyne – I was asked to sing a Kevin Coyne song for a tribute album, but asked if I could write a song about Kevin instead. I then got stuck as to how to start until I read in the paper about how ravens, having become nearly extinct in the UK, were making a big comeback, and how these previously shy Moorland birds were now to be seen looking through people’s rubbish bins in many cities. My idea is that the spirit of Kevin Coyne has entered raven genetic stock and made this possible for them. You may think this a little unlikely, but the more you consider it…

THE SKATERS

This is a prose poem from the book ‘Still Another Pelican in the Breadbasket’ by the late Kenneth Patchen, a great American writer, and a huge influence upon me. (His masterpiece – ‘The Journal of Albion Moonlight’.) I hear it as a twisted confession to murder by a man who is slipping away from sanity even as he speaks. As far as I’m aware, Patchen never qualified this piece of writing, so this is only my dark take on it. When I sent it to Johnny, he wrote back – ‘it’s gonna be hard’. For me it’s just a stunning performance and one of the best things to ever come on to my records.

MELLOW MY MADNESS

I’ve developed a happy association with Mad Pride, a London based organisation which campaigns on behalf of people with mental health issues (Kevin Coyne is their kind of patron saint). Lots of the music coming out of this movement is brilliant, though off-kilter. My favourite artist in their stable is D.J. Unfit for Work, and this track, recorded by D.J. at home acts a suitable coda to the album, following, as it does The Skaters. The song says you can live successfully on the borderline in the face of deep loss as long as people still care about you unconditionally - so different from the stark fate of the man (and the woman, if she ever existed) in The Skaters.