Pendragon-New UK dates and new album planned

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It's all new, new new......

Go to  http://www.pendragon.mu/forum/viewforum.php?f=24

to find out more!

P-C x

From the ramblings............

"Uggghhh....so that was Christmas. Actually it was pretty good, we had a goose this year, I thought why not give a poor turkey the year off! 
So, the goose , I cut two slices and that was about it , it was a good job we didn't have more people around for dinner otherwise we'd have had to bolster the lunch up with a couple of tins of Spam. 

Christmas Eve all went fairly well, the kids had managed to whip thermselves into an utter frenzy, they are all over 11 years old now, I thought this kind of excitement waned after 11 years old , but not here......they were all suitably whipped up for the following days proceedings. 
What is it about post Christmas that makes you feel like you've got a family of rats living inside your body.......oh to get to the gym. Mind you I did do a pre Christmas ride out wiv me mate Win, a bit o' greenlaning on the old motorbikes, fantastic! Stupidly steep hills, deep river crossings, and more mud than you can shake a stick at and beautiful countryside up there in Thetford Forest. 

So time to start thinking about the Christmas Riffs gig....and then it came, the phone call from Noly, he was ill, very ill probably too much brandy butter on that Xmas pud methinks..no, it was flu. Which meant rehearsals would be minimal as he was in bed till the day before the gig. Which was a shame as we had hoped to reshake the set up a bit and bring in Circus and Dark Summer's Day with Julian guesting on sax, but we did manage to squeeze in Schizo, King Of The Castle, 2 am plus Higher Circles and Leviathan. 
I think the lack of rehearsal showed a bit as I forgot some of the lyrics in Kinger and there were a few trecherous musical moments as we lumberred through a less than polished performance with some hideous technical problems, my guitar kept cutting out for the first 2 songs and without our usual sound engineer Rob Aubrey it was all looking a bit tough going. But , the crowd loved it, the vibe was high as a kite, and the sold out venue rocked into the night with silly spray string and some very funny moments with the fantastic audience especially the Welsh guys. They really crack me up! 

We've got a couple more shows lined up for June, Fri 13th, The Marlborough, Ilfracombe, Devon and Sat 14th The Peel Kingston, Surrey. 

June Fri 13th, The Marlborough, Ilfracombe, Devon 
07854 190177 or box office tickets 01271 863001, 

http://www.myspace.com/themarlboroclub 

June Sat 14th The Peel Kingston, Surrey. 
HOUSE of PROGRESSION, 
Ttickets for pre-sale. Phone the venue on 020 8546 3516 to order. Priced ?10.00 credit card orders welcome, 

http://www.peelmuzik.com/ http://www.myspace.com/houseofprogression 

The set list will be getting a total overhaul so expect some stuff that hasn't been played before or for a long time plus hopefully it will be your first chance to hear some material from the new album. 
[by the way, just out of interest it would be nice to hear from you about the songs you would like to hear Pendragon play] 

The next day it was the Pendragon Christmas meal, fantastic stuff, all 30 of us , band members including Julian Baker and Barney , the road crew and some old Pendragonees. What better way to spend the day chewing the fat, we started off at 12 noon and to be honest could have been there till the wee hours of the morning , it was just too short as there was so much to talk about with everyone. Hopefully we can do this again next year. 

the Pend Xmas lunch 

News Years Eve is always an odd one for me, I feel there is this strange expectation to 'have a good time', so this year we just invited 14 friends around for a nosh up of sausage and mash and lots of getting drunk, excellent fun especially when Julian got the karaoke and saxophone set up, he was so sh*tfaced he could barely stand let alone play the sax, in fact it was a bit of a job for anyone to sing anything , apart from JJ [Arena forum Dutch guy] who seems to have an encyclopedic knowledge of every lyric ever written and put in a fair old vocal performance as well to be honest. 
And Julian honked his sax....and Clive sat with two cushions over his head 
At 3 am I was statrting to feel a bit groggy, so off to bed..............................the following morning I felt like hell, I had caught Noly-itis in all its vomiting glory! And in bed I stayed for 4 days, when finally I just about managed to drag myself downstairs and switch on the gear to start on some new music. 

New Years Eve 

Eraserhead 
And so 2008 and some new music. I have been working on a new song called Eraserhead which is loosely based on the surreal horror film that came out in 1979 . The song is about a child brought up in the 60's/70's by fussy liberal parents who believe everything in their world is shiny and happy [as in the film , the child is a mutant but the parents refuse to recognise this] and the result is that the kid turns out as a really nasty social misfit [in my song that is] with selfish and bizzare set of morals, I believe this is a trait that has actually happened and is almost a reflection of Stalinist Russia where people ended up with perculiar ideas that had no real humanitarian basis ['enemies of the people' etc], a kind of brainwashing by loony liberal parents. 

Musically the song starts with an aggressive kick ass 7/8 keyboard riff which sounds like Tony Banks with a chainsaw and a gimp mask, get the picture? 
The vocal melody is one of those that just popped out, I love it when that happens as getting vocal melodies I am happy with can be a real chore. 
It then goes into a powerful atmosphere with a string chord and some electrostatic human voices, very fitting of the Eraserhead title, then a chugging guitar comes in over the top with a helluva powerful riff. The only touble was, it sounded a bit too Floydy so I dropped one of the guitar notes and rewrote all the keyboard strings down a semi tone, which now makes the whole thing feel very uncomfortable....bliss 
And now it sounds quite original and I have a very strong verse and chorus that has a vocal style not unlike a Radiohead [but without all the whining] with long single notes, and a backdrop of a very modern rock song....guttwrenching stuff! 
At the moment I am upto what I was thinking of being instrumental, with some keyboard and guitar solos, well melodies really, but I keep getting this nagging feeling about avoiding all the usual cliches with prog solos, and have decided that I will do the solos but the sounds MUST paint something new about them, and not just sound like cheap run of the mill triplet moog arrangements, they must not sound contrived!!! So, I have found some amazing new Korg Triton sounds [Chromy BPF Sweep....oooohhhhhh baby!] which give the song a trance like feel, so it sounds reasonably original,........I know your gonna love this song! 

Comatose 
I have also done quite a bit of work on Comatose, which has ended up with millions of sections , it might need a bit a of a rewrite but I have for the most part managed to get something a little more original than standard prog fare, with some awesome heavy guitar moments and huge slabs of melodic harmonised vocal sections. I'm please with it but I need a break from hearing it. 

Indigo 
Got all this mapped out but don't have a satisfactory vocal melody through out yet, got a monster keyboard riff at the end and utterly gorgeous Methenyesqe guitar section at the end too. 

We are planning a huge tour in Autumn this year to promote the album....just thought I'd let ya know. 

We're also thinking of having a fans area on the webiste with work in progress extracts of the new album and bits of old videos and new stuff about playing , new songs anything really! 

Keep ya posted! 

Lots of love 

Nick 

ps . by the way , does anyone want to buy a Kurzweil K2000 keyboard, the plastic casing is smashed in a couple of places but it still plays gud! Email me on [email protected] if yuz in the market ?300 inc case, bargain! 

I flippin love that sweatshirt me.

Luv Nick "

Edited by prog-chick - January 12 2008 at 13:41