New Single Out Today

I hold it in my hands. It exists in the material world. Today is the release day for Pea Green Coat which is out on 7 inch on Moshi Moshi. Go and buy it and convince the record label it's still worthwhile printing up singles. It's also available digitally for those of you living in the future. Either way, it comes with exclusive b-side Gene Tierney which is an even more Childish-like tune than the A-side. Here's the cover:

There's no note on the sleeve as to who did the cover but the eagle-eyed garage-rockers amongst you will notice the similarity to recent Wild Billy Releases:

It's not just the songs, instruments and production he's lending a hand with. It will be fascinating to hear from the man himself on this collaboration. A week today the new Wild Billy Childish and The CTMF LP comes out - Acorn Man - so I shall be scouring any interviews he does for this in hope of a WP's mention.

GBFBM Pre-Order

There's a pre-order up on the Moshi Moshi site for the new LP - http://shop.moshimoshimusic.com/Shop/DownloadDetails?rid=MMR_RE_117

And it includes a tracklisting! I'm intrigued to know how the song-writing collaboration worked. In debuting Pea Green Coat on his show, Marc Riley disclosed it was him who put Billy Childish and The Wave Pictures in touch last December. Considering City Forgiveness was supposedly written in a burst after the 2012 US tour with Allo Darlin, and was then recorded in September 2012 and January 2013, that seems like at least a year of songwriting in between the two records. For someone as prolific as Tattersall I can't believe there weren't other songs in that period. Are they sitting on another big batch of songs? Did they scrap them in the wake of the Childish sessions? Am I getting greedy? Time will tell.....

1.     Great Big Flamingo Burning Moon

2.     I Could Hear The Telephone (3 Floors Above Me)

3.     Katie

4.     At Dusk You Took Down The Blinds

5.     All The Birds Lined Up Dot Dot Dot

6.     Frogs Sing Loudly In The Ditches

7.     Sinister Purpose

8.     Green River

9.     Fake Fox Fur Pillowcase

10. The Fire Alarm

11. The Goldfish

12. We Fell Asleep In The Blue Tent

13. Pea Green Coat

I Could Hear The Telephone (3 Floors Above Me)

Great Big Flamingo Burning Moon is the new album from English national treasures The Wave Pictures, due for release on Moshi Moshi in February 2015. The album was co-written and produced by one of their all time heroes Billy Childish and every note tingles with excitement at the collaboration. Bursting with energy and ignited with a garage-rock spark, the album rings loud and bold, showcasing Dave Tattersall’s searing guitar solos and sharp lyrical wit. Tattersall describes the experience of working with Billy Childish like this:
“We first met Billy in his painting studio in Chatham. It’s daunting to meet your heroes, but he was great – just chatting away in his overalls and beret. Everything from that point on seemed so easy and so exciting. Billy is inspired. He knows exactly what he’s doing.”
The Wave Pictures trio – Jonny Helm, Dave Tattersall and Franic Rozycki – love a good collaboration and over the years have worked as backing band to musicians such as Daniel Johnston, Stanley Brinks and Darren Hayman. Having formed when Dave and Franic were teenagers in 1998, they have always been incredibly prolific, with Dave writing so many songs that the band have made at least one album every year since they moved to London in 2006. Their varied discography captures a range of styles and influences, from garage rock to afro-pop to country punk, all recorded live with few overdubs. They never use keyboards or guitar effects pedals yet they have all they need to create the perfect rock and roll record.
Great Big Flamingo Burning Moon really lays its influences bare. Those who might not usually look past Tattersall’s distinctive vocal stylings might miss hearing touches of The Who in the title track or The Troggs in “All The Birds Lined Up Dot Dot Dot”. Tattersall swears that the song “I Could Hear The Telephone (3 Floors Above Me)” is; “The Wave Pictures in a nutshell: The Modern Lovers with Rory Gallagher on lead guitar.” It was while recording the song “Frogs Sing Loudly In The Ditches”that Billy commented that the band sounded like “a weird Cream” and proceeded to put the heaviest, bassiest feedback under it. He also suggested doing two Creedence Clearwater Revival songs back-to-back, as Dave reminisces, “He said ‘that way people will know you’ve really got an issue!’ and burst out laughing.”
Billy Childish helped to bring out a different side to The Wave Pictures and inject a renewed enthusiasm to the recording process. Tattersall said that he; “was a joy to work with and we love the record. It was the most fun we’ve ever had making a record and to us it’s the most exciting sounding thing we’ve ever done.”

Great Big Flamingo Burning Moon

Here's the first shared track from the upcoming WP's LP, Great Big Flamingo Burning Moon, which will be out in February 2015. It looks like Billy Childish not only produced/recorded the record but co-wrote it too. Should be interesting, and as you can hear below the WP's are taking on his raw sound too.

<br />  More detail here: http://diymag.com/2014/10/10/the-wave-pictures-announce-new-great-big-flamingo-burning-moon-album 

More imminently are the Artistic Vice shows. D Tattersall gives a brief interview to promote them here: http://www.theargus.co.uk/news/11527694.The_Wave_Pictures_cover_Daniel_Johnson_in_new_show/

The Wave Pictures

First published Friday 10 October 2014 in News
Last updated 11:16 Friday 10 October 2014 by Duncan Hall

THERE’S a difference between songs and records. Some great records don’t have particularly good songs, but Daniel Johnston’s songs are almost better than his records.”
When The Wave Pictures were approached to play a favourite classic album in its entirety for a Spanish festival, frontman David Tattersall admits finding the right subject was surprisingly tough.
“I thought there would be so many to choose from, as there are so many albums I love,” he says. “But it’s hard to find one where you would want to do all the songs.”
Initially the band hit on the idea of doing the first Rolling Stones album – a cover of a covers album.
“There’s Chuck Berry and Buddy Holly’s Not Fade Away on there,” says Tattersall. “It seemed like a fun idea – but when we had a go at it we didn’t sound as good as The Rolling Stones, so we gave up on that idea.”
Having backed the singer-songwriter on a UK tour in 2009 the band already regularly covered troubled musician Daniel Johnston’s songs My Life Is Starting Over and Happy Soul. It seemed natural to choose their parent album.
1990’s Artistic Vice was Johnston’s first album recorded in a studio, following a series of self-produced live tapes recorded in basements and garages.
It was released not long after Johnston’s infamous manic episode following an appearance at South By South West festival in Austin, Texas – leading to his father having to crash land the two-seater private plane taking them back home to West Virginia.
The incident led to Johnston being committed to a mental institution with schizophrenia and a bipolar disorder, starting a long period of treatment.
Having already been championed by Nirvana’s Kurt Cobain in the early 1990s, while Johnston was still in hospital, the singer-songwriter’s story was captured in the brilliant 2006 documentary The Devil And Daniel Johnston. His songs have been covered by the likes of Tom Waits, Sparklehorse, Eels, Beck, Bright Eyes and The Flaming Lips.
Johnston, who released his last album Space Ducks in 2012, is now managed by his brother Dick. He has played shows in Brighton backed by British Sea Power in 2012 and The Wave Pictures and Laura Marling in 2009.
“He seems pretty happy,” says Tattersall recalling their time together. “I would have thought it was the best possible life he could be living, because he’s really not very well.
“He was childlike most of the time – he wanted to talk about Queen and The Beatles and comic books. He’s not a dark person to be around.”
Having turned the festival show of Artistic Vice into a tour-only album and touring beast, Tattersall admits to enjoying playing the songs live.
“They are very uplifting songs,” says Tattersall. “We knew we could change the songs quite a lot and do what we wanted with them, but still retain their character.”
With the follow-up to Wave Pictures’ 2013 double album City Forgiveness due for release in February, Tattersall admits covering Johnston’s work hasn’t filtered into his own songwriting.
“There is something so honest about his songs,” he says. “They are very true, simple and direct expressions of how he’s feeling.
“I find myself drawn to more mysterious lyrics where you’re not entirely sure what the story is or what the motivations are.
“Honest lyrics and simple chords are something I should do more – but I think the simplest things are often the hardest to do. Doing the shows hasn’t changed the way I write songs – but I have considered the possibility.”

Artistic Vice

You lucky Spaniards! The upcoming WP's tour to Spain has the interesting premise of them doing a set of Daniel Johnston covers - in fact, the whole of Johnston's 1991 LP Artistic Vice.

 They've covered him before, and indeed played as his backing band, but the real scoop is the band will be selling a studio version of their covers as a tour only cd. File next to their Springsteen and Molina covers records. Will they sell copies when they return? Will they put it on bandcamp? Will the rest of the world forever be envious of the 100 people who buy it over the course of the gigs? Time, as ever, will tell. I imagine this is the sort of thing they can bang out in the time it takes to listen to, so hopefully some of the recent recording sessions which have been mentioned were to capture original material. Don't let 2014 be the first year without a WP's album!

In other news, a recent interview here - http://www.histericasgrabaciones.com/index.php?option=com_k2&view=item&id=121%3Athe-wave-pictures-city-forgiveness-2014-entrevista-a-david-tattersall&Itemid=114 - was happily translated on the site:

Why the name The Wave Pictures?
We took our name from a book that my parents gave me for Christmas one year. It was called ''Art Now''. It was a little paperback book about modern artists. In it, there was a chapter on an artist called Zoe Leonard. She created a series of photographs called ''Wave Pictures'' which gave us our band name. It's not that we were fans of her or even that I liked that book especially. It just sort of sounded right. It's not a very exciting story, but that's the truth. That's where the name comes from. We've been called that for so long that the name has absolutely no meaning to me, it's just what we are called!
 

The songs of The Wave Pictures sounds to Rock, to Folk, and obviously to Pop, a curious mix of styles that results in the exquisite sound of your music, what really are your musical influences?

We listen to loads of things and take whatever we can from wherever we can. I suppose the biggest influences on the band are the 60s groups like The Rolling Stones and The Kinks, and also 70s things like the Ramones, Television and Jonathan Richman. We all listen to loads of blues and rock and roll, music from the 50s – T-Bone Walker, John Lee Hooker, which is all about feeling and musicianship. We can't really play as well as those people, but it certainly inspires us a lot. As for songwriting, ''The Natural Bridge'' by the Silver Jews was a really big influence on me. It affected the way I thought about what lyrics could do. Again, I can't write as interesting stuff as David Berman, but it's something to aspire to.

 

Why you titled "City Forgiveness" to your new disc?

The title came to me in a dream. It's the only time that anything useful has ever come to me in a dream. I woke up, and wrote it down, and then went back to sleep again.

 

Something has changed from previous albums, who is different in “City Forgiveness”?

We have some great special guests on City Forgiveness: our mate Dom playing a whole second drum kit on some tracks. That was a great day! Two drummers playing at the same time! Chaos! We also did a bunch of tracks with Paul Rains from Allo Darlin – he's a great guitar player. And we did some with Stanley Brinks, who is always so creative and talented and just brilliant to be around. It was a lot of fun!

 

12 albums and 16 years on the road. Many things have happened at this time to The Wave Pictures. Any anecdote you can tell us?

I'm afraid not – musicians have a saying: ''what happens on tour stays on tour''.

 

You will start a new tour around Europe. What are you going to offer in your live concert, and what do you hope from the public in your shows?

Franic Rozycki has been playing some really amazing bass lately. Every show he does something new that impresses me. He is very creative and a really original bass player. I can't believe that he does it every show – every show he surprises me! You should watch out for that at the shows. 

 

Do you have any surprise or any plans alternative to this tour for 2014? Can you anticipate anything to us?

We're recording an album at the moment and it's going to be great when it's finished! It's really really fun at the moment. We're having a lot of fun in the recording studio. That'll be out soon. I hope it will anyway!

 

Do you think the digital world will end with music as we know it today? What do you think is the future of music?

The thing that makes me most sad is that record shops struggle to survive. They sell so few records these days that they can't afford the rent anymore. Ever since I was young I really liked record shops. I even like the smell of them! When The Wave Pictures go on tour we really look forward to checking out the record shops in each new town we go to. Unfortunately, a lot of times the record shops are closed down, or maybe there will be just one left in a town. Loughborough, which was the nearest town to where I grew up, used to have four record shops. Now it doesn't have any. I guess I'm just nostalgic, but I don't think the internet is a good substitute for everything. The internet is wonderful in all sorts of ways, but I think it has taken over in too many areas of life. The internet is no substitute for record shops. But it is putting record shops out of business. 

 

What is your best memory about music?

We did a tour a few years ago where we played as Daniel Johnston's backing band. I just found his music so uplifting to play. It was so much fun playing his songs every night. That's a great memory. It was a really happy time.

 

What do you think about current economic situation in Europe and World in general?

I am worried about Britain. A very right wing party called UKIP has become popular here. They are quite a racist party. I am afraid that this is a trend all over Europe. I wonder if the economic situation makes people scared and the fear makes them vote for more conservative parties. It is a worrying time.

 

Could you tell us about...

 

... A book?:

Savage Night by Jim Thompson

 I really like Jim Thompson. He writes these very dark, strange thrillers. A couple of them were made into films. There's two really great films of Jim Thompson: The Grifters (directed by Stephen Frears) and The Getaway (directed by Sam Peckinpah). You would get a sense of how dark and strange Jim Thompson is by those two wonderful films, but when you read him you see how much more experimental he was than most pulp fiction writers. Sometimes you're reading pure prose poetry, other times it's a hard-boiled thriller. I particularly liked ''Savage Night''. That would be a good one to read first. He's great.

 

... A movie?:

Starship Troopers, directed by Paul Verhoeven.

This is a really strange, long, very dark film, with these incredible moments of beauty in it, too. It's also completely kitsch, very camp and completely fake. It's kind of just it's own reality – it's very postmodern but it also works just as a straight film. It's not really like anything else. I think it's great. So entertaining and funny. I love Paul Verhoeven: Total Recall, Robocop, Basic Instinct... he made so many fun movies!

 

... A song?:

Be My Baby de The Ronettes

The other day i was in a bar and ''be my baby'' by the ronettes came on the jukebox. There's just nothing better than that song! The intro is so great and it's all so melodramatic and moving. It's a little bit kitsch but just incredibly emotional at the same time. It's just one of those songs that gets me every single, it doesn't matter how often i hear it, i always respond to it.

 

... An album?:

Leave Home by The Ramones

The last album I listened to was ''Leave Home'' by The Ramones. That's a great album! So many fun songs, including their excellent cover version of ''California Sun''. It's got a lot of their best stuff on it:   Oh Oh I Love Her So, I Remember You, Gimme Gimme Shock Treatment. I always liked Joey Ramone's voice, he is a sort of a ridiculous singer but he's still kind of moving. He does a fake British accent, which is very unusual because usually British singers put on American accents! 

 

.. A group or soloist?:

Barbecue Bob.

Lately, something that I really like is a cd called ''Chocolate to the Bone'' by Barbecue Bob. Barbecue Bob was very popular in the 30s. He was a blues singer, but with kind of a humourous, gentle style. In his day he was much more popular than Blind Willie McTell or Leadbelly, but history hasn't been especially kind to him. He's not exactly a very famous name! He doesn't get mentioned when they talk about the great blues singers. There's something kind of humble about what he does. It's very simple, almost innocent music. But the more I listened to it the more I realised what a strong and brilliantly intelligent musician Barbecue Bob was. The first track on the album is called ''Motherless Chile Blues''. You've got to hear it: it's one of the most beautiful pieces of music that I've ever heard. Somehow the sound and his voice and the really simple guitar part just make this perfect, mysterious little whole. It's like a dream, that song! The whole ''Chocolate To The Bone'' cd is worth getting, though, in my opinion. It's such a brilliant collection. I have to say, I'm a Barbecue Bob fan!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Lisbon Rarity

Big thanks to Chris H for submitting the following evidence of the Lisbon one-sided 12 inch!

And to think I bemoaned there were only 300 copies of the Helen EP!

Helen Info

Did you manage to get a copy? Personally, it was tricky and frustrating but in the end I paid the bucks and got a copy from ebay for twice the shop price. I could moan about the nature of Record Store Day but then maybe it serves me right for being vinyl collector scum! After disappearing for a week or so the mp3's do now seem available on Amazon and iTunes so the songs are out there. Sadly there's no download with the vinyl so more expense but.... what about the songs?

As we're now becoming accustomed to they are mostly excellent. The title track is terrific and a favourite of this batch, The Easter Parade has a lovely circling Spaghetti-like guitar line and Coconut Tree also bounces along. Red Cloud Road (Part 1) turns out to be pretty much the same song as Part 2 on the album, but with different lyrics. One By One is different to the version on the b-side to Lisbon but oddly seems to be more electric than that version (which was tagged "electric").

So another fine addition to the WP's catalogue. Maybe in a bizarre way, someone who's never heard of them will have picked up the record due to its limited status and has now become a fan.

Wild Billy Childish, the Toe Rag, in My Living Room

Here's a nicely shot video from what was presumably a detour on the last Spanish tour.

http://milivingroom.com/the-wave-pictures-proximamente/

In other news - or at least gossip, Jeffrey Lewis let slip on his message board that the WP's are recording/doing something with Billy Childish. If you don't know him then it's time to use Google for it's original intention. Fascinating chap and all round good egg.

Finally, here's a Toe Rag version of the already familiar The Worm inside The Brain.

http://www.rockfeedback.com/magazine/detail/exclusive-the-wave-pictures-share-a-new-song

Helen EP

The advance word was true - The Wave Pictures are releasing a new 6 track EP for Record Store Day:

'Helen' EP tracklist:

1. Helen
2. Red Cloud Road (Part 1)
3. One by One (Electric)
4. The Easter Parade
5. Coconut Tree
6. Lea Bridge Roundabout

You may recall One by One (Electric) was the b side to the 7 inch of Lisbon and Red Cloud Road (Part 1) appears to be the prequel to (Part 2) from City Forgiveness.

The internet suggests this is limited to 250 copies on 10 inch so the chance of actual people who like the band getting a copy are slim. The MP3's are up for preorder on Amazon though so at the very least the songs will be available. Time for Moshi Moshi to allow someone like Fika or WIAIWYA to round up the various b-sides, extra tracks and  CD only songs (I'm thinking of the Just Like A Drummer EP) on to a compilation? That would be nice. The rumour starts here.

New EP and news round up

It appears the WP's are going to be part of the madness that is Record Store Day this April with a new EP called "Helen". No further news at the moment but these people seem to be involved in making the artwork and have posted some nice and intriguing photos to whet the appetite:

http://shedpress.org/2014/02/23/helen-ep-by-the-wave-pictures/

Let's just hope we can get a copy without paying over the odds to an ebay scammer.

In other news the Stanley Brinks and The Wave Pictures tour continues apace. For the next four days you can still hear their Marc Riley session here:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p01tg9gy

The interview also confirms they're going to record the next WP's/Brinks LP at the end of the tour, though judging by the 10 month turnaround time for Gin, it's debatable whether we'll hear this until 2015.

Finally, there's a great piece by some-time instrumentalist David Beauchamp here:

http://davidbeauchampdrums.com/2014/01/07/oh-the-wave-pictures/

In a very well written piece we get some insight into the recent European tour and it contains the requisite amount of bemusement at the band's continued lack of a commercial breakthrough. If you're reading this you probably share that bemusement.

Onward!

Video Time!

Got 30 minutes spare? Here's some new videos to watch then:

Los conciertos de Radio 3 - The Wave Pictures

• Los conciertos de Radio 3 - The Wave Pictures

Spain Showing Love

InSide #1 - The Wave Pictures from 3 HEADED MONKEY on Vimeo.

Videos, news, happenings

Welcome to 2014!

It's been announced that Missoula will be the next single from City Forgiveness. Judging by the press I've read it sounds like a download only affair  i.e. no b-side. Presumably to tie in with the upcoming UK Tour.

Tiny interview here: http://blog.billetto.co.uk/2014/01/16/the-wave-pictures-interview/

Billetto had the chance to talk to David from The Wave Pictures before their show at the Deaf Institute in Manchester, and found this would be the right time to let them open up a bit more about their US experience right before the recordings of their double album City Forgiveness.

This 20-track double LP is the result of a six-week tour in the US, during which David Tattersall wrote frenziedly. It all started with a tiny van, and a full agenda: “It was the only option we had. We toured as Allo Darlin’s support band. We had a lot of gigs booked, and there was no money. You don’t get paid to tour America – you have to pay. It costs a small fortune, so we drove together in a tiny van.”

Despite being a necessary measure, driving all around the country enabled the band to make the most of their time abroad, getting inspired by the surrounding as Dave points out that he wrote the lyrics while they drove around in America, but they made the album in London: “I remember the Golden Gate Bridge – we couldn’t see it because there was so much fog. It was completely submerged in fog. Gradually, the fog lifted and the bridge became visible. It was beautiful. A huge red bridge. I wanted to put a lot of these images into the lyrics. I always like it when the lyrics paint a picture.”
City Forgiveness cannot be labelled as an Americana record as such, however, the theme of exploration of the unknown, and travelling wanderlust are reiterated in the record: “I like to get out and about myself, and play for people who don’t know us so well.” When it comes to the fondest memory of the trip, the choice cannot be anything but New York: “I have a lot of friends there. I love it. I think New York was the highlight of the trip for me. I love the pizza!”

It seems the upcoming tour/LP with Stanley Brinks is getting just as much media action as the double album, with a couple videos turning up, both as unlikely to win MTV awards (if the "M" still stood for music) as each other. Fun though, and proof you need to buy the excellent Orange Juice single which is out this week on Fika and NOT on the upcoming LP. Okay, it's only January 21st but come on - tune of the year already!