PLAINSONG: FAT LADY SINGING - FAREWELL TOUR AND ALBUM 2012

In 1972, nearly 40 years ago, Liam Gallagher, Gwynneth Paltrow and Zinedine Zidane were born.   The Munich Olympics took place.   Richard Nixon was in the White House, showing the North Vietnamese where they had gone wrong.    Edward Heath was doing the same to the Irish.   And 2 young friends, Iain Matthews and Andy Roberts, already music business veterans, formed Plainsong, a groundbreaking vocal harmony quartet, which lasted for exactly eleven months before musical differences brought it to a premature end.  During that year they recorded the much-loved album In Search Of Amelia Earhart, and a second record, Now We Are 3, which was consigned to the vaults until its delayed release in 2005.

Iain and Andy went their separate ways.   Iain moved to America for 30 years, to build a career that has now encompassed over 50 albums ranging from solo releases to collaborations with some of the most illustrious musicians of the last 50 years.   Andy played in groups for a while, Pink Floyd being the most notable, and then wrote extensively for theatre, TV and film, ending up scoring for Disney in Hollywood.

In 1990, they met again by chance and started a new phase of their collaboration.   For 2 years they worked as a duo, and then in 1992 they decided to rebuild Plainsong to recapture the vocal and instrumental ideal of the original band.   They recruited Mark Griffiths, a multi-instrumentalist who had been lead guitarist in Iain’s celebrated band of the 1960s, Matthews Southern Comfort, and Julian Dawson, a talented singer and writer, who brought his harmonica, guitar and banjo playing to the mix.

Over the next 11 years they recorded, toured extensively in the UK and on the continent to great acclaim, and built a strong following amongst discerning lovers of acoustic music.   With four experienced songwriters in the band, a stream of high quality material was at hand, augmented by well-chosen covers of songs they respected.  

In 2003 they released the album Pangolins, toured widely to promote it, and then – NOTHING!   They were at the peak of their form for this tour, and their fans have been perplexed at the seeming silence from the four.

They certainly didn’t disappear!   Iain has reclaimed his life with a new marriage and a move to Holland.   He has released a string of excellent CDs, progressing with his superb writing and fine tenor vocal in a jazz direction.   Andy moved into record production and revived his work as a touring sideman with Roy Harper, Hank Wangford and members of the Bonzo Dog Band.   Griff has toured the world as bass player for both Cliff Richard and The Shadows; and Julian has continued to release regular albums, and most recently became the author of a well-received biography of the highly successful session pianist Nicky Hopkins.   Amongst all this activity Plainsong had no chance to tour.

However, when they last worked together an unexpected bonus had occurred.   They recorded a set of 19 songs in Holland in 2003, playing live in the studio before an invited audience.   This thoroughly honest performance is unembellished with the usual tricks of overdubbing and “sweetening” that are commonplace in the artful music business - just four great voices, a whole range of superb songs in wide-ranging styles, and a fitting reminder of Plainsong at its height.   Now, as a tribute to the 40 years since the original line-up, Iain, Andy, Julian and Griff are to make a farewell tour in 2012, and to release that live album, now called Fat Lady Singing.

There are 19 songs on the CD, drawn from all eras of Plainsong’s history (though not, understandably, from the exceptional New Place Now, which was recorded with Clive Gregson during Julian’s temporary absence in the late 1990s).   The satisfyingly eclectic mix spans classics such as YoYo Man and Raider from the Amelia album, through to many of the fine songs from Pangolins.   There are widely varied items, from Andy’s spirited rendition of Charlie, a perennial live favourite, to Iain’s nod to his former colleagues in a rendition of Fairport Convention’s epic Sloth.   Weaving throughout all the songs are those unmistakable Plainsong vocal harmonies, Julian’s evocative harmonica, Griff’s searing fretless bass, Andy’s Appalachian dulcimer and bouzouki, all in support of Iain’s soaring voice.

The release of FAT LADY SINGING on Blue Rose Records will be supported by selected live appearances in the UK, Holland and Germany, a last chance to see this legendary band onstage together for one final climactic tour.