Tag: Rod McVey

Andy White is still in lockdown in Melbourne and preparing to release his latest album Time Is A Buffalo An The Art Of War on vinyl.

We ordered it at the start of the year since Andy was scheduled to play London on Record Store Day. He was going to bring it on tour at the end of this year.

It’s a double album with six new tracks from the recording sessions and a beautiful gatefold sleeve. This is a limited edition ALT Recordings pressing and you won’t find it on release anywhere else. I’ll let Andy tell the story,

“I remember writing the latest album to zoom out from the specific songs of The Guilty & The Innocent. To see more of the big picture. The title track of that album had knocked me out, it brought me back to ‘The Big Rain’ and ‘Speechless’ and I knew if I followed it would take me to the next album.

Long songs about where we all are. Time to jam with Sebastian knowing that the songs didn’t have to end up where they started out. ‘Friday Night’ begins in a Belfast venue I used to play and ends up in Melbourne with the girls behind the bar singing ‘Staying Alive’. ‘One In A Million’ starts in Great Victoria Street bus station in Belfast and ends up in a jazz club. ‘Armageddon #4’ is the march to freedom. ‘The Last Train’ was leaving soon. I wanted on it, with all of you on it too.

I knew something was up. Things were heading in a strange direction and the only thing seemed to be to write about it and make the music as beautiful as I could. Jonathan Dreyfus took my string ideas and made them into compositions which told the story of the songs without words. It was amazing to have Rod McVey back playing. We have known each other since school, and I couldn’t have done any of the early albums without him.

The album was going to be called ‘It’s Our World And This Is How I See It’ until I dreamed that it was called Time Is A Buffalo In The Art Of War. And the next morning, it was. It made perfect sense. This whole thing is moving slowly and all we can do is try to play our part, whatever that is.

The album tour in Europe last year was great. So many venues and crazy nights, it’s hard to even imagine now. Thanks to those of you I met on the road. I’ve been amazingly lucky living the Kerouac dream I read about while growing up. At the start of this year I was going to play Record Store Day and we decided to make a special edition of the album for that, and to bring on tour at the end of the year.

I went through the studio recordings and found extra tracks from the sessions. A version of ‘Everyone’s Gone To France’ in French. The original solo recording of ‘Fire Engines Blue Trains And Trucks’ which I wrote at the piano in our front room surrounded by my little nephew’s toys. The orchestral versions of the songs. I added a take of ‘The Guilty And The Innocent’ with Rod on organ, because that’s where the whole thing started.

After we pressed go and ordered the vinyl, the shit really did hit the fan. Sebastian and I have been locked down for months and I hope you’re all safe and getting through alright. Boxes of the album arrived last week, and I know Rose has some in Europe.

It’s taken a long time to release my first double album (the original track list wouldn’t fit on a single LP) and we’ve made it as groovy as possible for you. Turning round the colours and including the lyrics in a size I can read. The arrows point the way. As they always do.

So, I hope you dig it. It’s been wild listening to the songs again. Fly If You Want To? Yes we do and no we can’t!!! There’s more where these came from. Been writing, been recording. Music takes you there.

See you when I see you.

Lots of love,

AW”

Andy White will launching the album with Sebastian on drums live on Facebook on Sunday October 18 at 10 a.m. London time. That’s very early in North America, 11 a.m. in Europe and 8 p.m. in Australia. The event link is here
<https://www.facebook.com/events/1208292882889915/>
and we’ll post the show on Andy‘s Facebook page for anyone who can’t make it.

Artist’s website: http://www.andywhite.com/shop/

Read Dai Jeffries’ review of the CD album here.