Back in the 1980s, a handful of us – Bob Theil, Don MacLeod, Pat Orchard, Bob Cairns and myself – got together to record an album. Not a band album as such, but one that would represent the work of each of us as songwriters. Unfortunately, the album was never released because of contractual issues: it’s a pity, because there was some excellent stuff on it, in my unbiased opinion.
Fast forward to 2021: having reluctantly come to the conclusion that at my age and in my state of health, it’s unlikely that I’d do any more serious gigging even if life returns to something nearer to normal, so I’ve started to work on releasing some music digitally.
The first steps involved a couple of releases on Bandcamp:
- The album Tears Of Morning, featuring songs and a few instrumentals, most of which have some connection with Shropshire, including my settings of verse by A.E. Housman and ‘W.H.B.’ – Bill Golembeski’s very kind review for folking.com is here.
- The single ‘Moonflow VI‘ started life as a lengthy instrumental partnered with Bert Jansch’s ‘Needle of Death’ but took on a life of its own as the acoustic and resonator guitar duet ‘Moonflow III‘ (included on Tears of Morning), then acquired a couple of extra electric guitars, by which time it was in its 6th iteration.
- My intention is that ‘One Step Away (From The Blues)’, though it will be released only a few weeks after ‘Moonflow VI’, will receive a wider digital distribution, though it will also be available on Bandcamp. It’s one of my tracks from the 1980s album mentioned above, remastered to the best of my ability, and it has a more contemporary edge than the ‘Tears of Morning’ album. It will be released on Friday 12th February 2021. (Wheal Alice Music WAM03-21)
- Words & music by David Harley
- Vocals, acoustic guitar and electric slide guitar by David Harley
- Acoustic lead guitar by Don MacLeod
- 12-string acoustic by Bob Theil
- Produced, engineered and mixed at Hallmark Studio, London.
Here’s a live-ish video of ‘One Step Away’ coupled with another song that I haven’t commercially recorded yet.
