Hello Everybody
I'm writing to you from the blue sofa in my music room on an unusually sunny spring day in early May. After reflecting somewhat I can see it needs just a little time spent tidying up in here, untangling the wires and getting the decor in some kind of order. I can hardly keep my eyes open as so much has been going on lately. Last week started recording songs that will be the beginning of a new album. I have the great fortune of being friends with some of the most truly amazing musicians in Bristol and we went into a studio owned by Jim Barr who is the bass player in Portishead. Damon Reece who plays for Massive attack and Spiritualised was playing drums, Stew Jackson and Dan Moore from Phantom Limb on guitar and piano and Dan Brown on bass. Let me tell you in the words of Stew who produced my last album The Mad Straight Road... "What a band !"
It was so cool to be listening to the songs developing and being able to record live with the warm sound of all the instruments coming through in my headphones. "It already sounds like a record" was what Jim Barr said and that was true. It was exciting to hear how things were really working out and when we listened back everyone relaxed and I sensed us grow closer and more inspired ....it was then I noticed we were all smiling. That was a great moment for me. So I'm really looking forward to seeing this through with the first two songs we've put down. Continuing to overdub towards the end of May. It's a slower process than I'd wish for as this is happening with people's good grace in between their hectic schedules. It means that yet again I'm entertaining my old friend the God of Patience. I'll keep you posted.
There's been a real renaissance in songwriting going on for me lately and in the last few weeks I've written about fifteen songs. It means I've now got about four albums worth of material written for the next record . About fifty songs. It's going to be a case of feeling out what sort of album I want to make.. as now there are so many directions I could go in. I'm playing almost every day now and thoroughly enjoying quite a solitary life just getting to know the new songs. Although on saying that I've been jamming once a week with a bassist called Guy Fowler..and my old friend Emily Breeze has come round and listened through to some of the new songs for me too... some much appreciated musical interaction..
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| Rainer Maria Rilke at his desk |
Recently I've also returned to studying the poet Rainer Maria Rilke who is a great favourite of mine. Instead of just reading the poems myself I'm looking through some essays on his work written by people from Universities and that is requiring some thought, effort and concentration. I've never really bothered with this kind of thing before. It can be quite annoying trying to decipher what they are actually saying at times but in that process it has forced me to contemplate what it is I like about the work myself without just occasionally dreamily escaping into it and letting some parts just drift off because I don't really understand... and actually in some ways I've found that quite inspiring. At night before going to sleep I've been reading a book called The Way of The Pilgrim translated by Helen Bacovcin. The pages were written by an unknown nineteenth century Russian peasant and it is a very simple and beautiful narrative. Our man has lost both his material possessions and his family and he has no home of his own. A handicapped arm prevents him earning a living, so he wanders from one end of his vast country to another wrestling with the problem of how to pray ceaselessly. Writing both of his adventures and the strange, often tormented characters he meets as well as describing in simple terms his blossoming inner life. He is a man very different from us today in so many ways that it feels refreshing to read his words once I've shaken off each day and I'm climbing into my bed.
The last thing I wish to draw to your attention today is the Concert I will give in Camden London on June 4th 2012. I've already started rehearsing for this as there are so many songs I want to do. I'm trying through the experience of playing to intuit my way into which ones will comprise the set . The performance will take place at a venue called The Purple Turtle and the evening is being promoted by Zachery Stephenson with the opening act being his sister Amy Fox. I would like to encourage as many people as possible to come out and support me on this night. It is a Bank Holiday Monday due to the Queens jubilee and also it's a Full Moon on that night... Zak has had an inquiry from the palace and there is a chance Her Majesty may actually be there. Apparently Zac was told by one of the servants that "the Queen quite likes a bit of Patrick Duff" . So there you go. However I've told Zak that "she has to buy a ticket the same as everyone else man. I'm not putting her, or any of that lot she's bringing, on the list...Diamond jubilee or whatever."
I wish you the very best and look forward to meeting you all somewhere down The Mad Straight Road !
Love Patrick x
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