Murphy's Law

An old friend of ours and long time fan recently commended us for our improvements in the last year, noting that we'd become a well-oiled machine playing really good music, as opposed to the "passionately ramshackle" quintet that get things horribly wrong but have fun along the way. It seems that ever since our debut film, How NOT to be in a Band, was released we've turned a corner and almost distanced ourselves from a reputation that was starting to stick. It's true that ever since we changed the venue hours before the Cornish film premiere - the latest in a year of madcap decisions - we've run a far smoother course. Since then, gigs have been plentiful and we've played pretty well. We've been punctual and adaptable and almost professional. We toured in Europe, filling every venue and came home with a profit! We then ran a successful fundraising campaign to make our second album, again crucially coming in above budget. We then went and secured the services of one of the folk world's top producers and all this without a wrong turn, puncture, venue change or forgotten instrument! Long gone are the days of leaving chainsaws on the train and fashioning branches into mic stands. "You should be called The Good Folk" suggested our friend as he sipped a cup of of Labrador tea. Though a second name change in three years would definitely be a return to the old days and the old ways, losing fans and falling off the ladder and sliding back down the snakes.

There is still room for misadventure, we're not adversed to it, we won't temp fate by saying we've turned a corner indefinitely. Things can still go terribly wrong; Murphy's Law could yet strike! Belan Hall, where we are recording the album could be under 5 feet of snow, it being high in the mountains of mid-Wales after all. We could well lose a day getting snow chains on our tyres and finally pull into the old shooting lodge to discover the pipes have frozen and there's no water. Back down the mountain and we'll stock up on a hundred bottles of Volvic and finally we're ready for creative lockdown but progress is slow; the drummer has a sinking cold, the piano player's forgotten his piano and we're still unsure of the structures of these brand new songs we've written! After Day 3 we're starting to smell because washing with freezing cold mineral water isn't appealing and we're behind schedule because it takes us till midday to summon up the courage to get out of bed because temperatures have dropped to below zero and this old building doesn't have heating! By 2pm we've lit both fires and the place is finally warm enough to begin work but we're struggling with all these new songs, it's becoming apparent that by writing a brand new album we've lost our style and our stamp is yet to find it's way onto these shiny new tunes. We start arguing whether we should have stuck to the songs we knew, there being 10 that we play that aren't on The Sweet Release, surely it would have been easier doing them? But then they are very dated and we need new material! But the material is perhaps too new! We should have met in the middle! Jazz Louis, an old song of ours, and often our best performer and match winner at many gigs, and who was very unlucky not to make The Sweet Release, is now furious at being overlooked for this album too! He's getting violent and throwing his trumpet around the room, and threatening to walk out on the band!

Day 4 and the drummer's feeling better but I've lost my voice and the bass players not managed to get out of bed and it's almost dinner time! Not that it matters because the producer and the piano player have gone off in search of a piano anyway! Day 5; and after fresh snowfall we take some time out from recording and go tobogganing, but the guitar players gets stuck in a tree after being thrown from his sleigh and it's nightfall by the time we get him down! Day 6 and we've somehow managed to get most of the album down, all except the solos, and then Cat breezes in with her cello ready to record her parts but the smell of 6 unwashed men is enough to make her faint! Day 7, the last day, and we're running out of time for solos and there's pandaemonium as egos clash left, right and centre. As night draws in we're ready to have a listen back over the weeks work. We all pretend to like it, smile, pat ourselves on the back and slide back down the mountainside. "It sounds rubbish!" says Jazz Louis as we leave.

A few weeks later the producer calls us and explains that he wants to take his name off the recordings in order to protect his reputation!

We release the album to a half empty school hall, failing to sell a single copy.

We split up. Each of us vowing to go solo!

After a year's absence, with not one solo show announced (apart from the guitar player strumming some flamenco at a friend's art exhibition in Clapton-in-Gordano) we do a comeback tour, this time remembering the piano but forgetting the player! We release a new film, How NOT to make an Album!, documenting our experiences up at Belan Hall and once again we're hailed as a quirky, slapdash quintet 'whose reputation for disorganisation precedes them!'

"Do you miss those days?" says my friend, still nursing his Labrador tea.
"In a way I do" I reply. "But we needed to change, we needed a few right turns, we'd never have achieved what we did last year if we'd have carried on the route we were taking..." 

He smiled. "The Good Folk, think about it!"

www.theoddfolk.com