AUGUST
The group August was my main musical focus in the early 2000s…
I had set out to make a break from my previous incarnation as guitarist and singer-songwriter. I’d fronted a number of different bands, in London and Leeds, mostly playing various shades of what I guess you’d call indie rock, influenced by The Beatles and The Velvet Underground and Bob Dylan, as well as contemporary bands like the Pixies and My Bloody Valentine…
I had been feeling increasingly constrained by what I saw as an outdated format, and when the last of these groups staggered to a halt I set out to do something different…
My solution was to move myself onto bass guitar (an instrument I’d been increasingly enjoying playing, as a sideman for other groups), and set my sights on assembling a large group along the lines of Sly & The Family Stone of the JBs, with a horn section and various vocalists, and also incorporating rappers and turntablists, influenced as I was by what was happening in hip hop at the time; imagining a high energy party band, but with a seriously avant-garde, forward-thinking vision; determined to arrive at something new and original…
The idea never quite got off the ground; initial rehearsals were chaotic, and the first large-scale incarnation was soon reduced down to a trio of myself on bass, drummer Clean Cut Mark, and baritone saxophonist Areles Molleman (a.k.a. Yankee Bob), and we cut our teeth like that playing parties where we improvised freely for dancers in a sort of avant-garde hard funk style…
Those gigs felt exciting, but we struggled to capture what we were doing on record, and eventually began to build the line-up back up from those foundations…
Areles left, and vocalist Vedina Mosé joined, along with guitarist Nick Richards (a.k.a. Earl Grey), and with that line-up (sometimes augmented by other members, including Maree Choie and Art Terry) seemed to finally hit on something that we were all excited by. We kept our funk roots, but we somehow morphed into more of an experimental pop group, and began to record ideas for what became our only album…
Almost as soon as it had come together, though, the delicate balance of personalities in the group began to cause serious friction, not helped by some personal life tragedy; and before we’d had the opportunity to do much in the way of proper studio recording we went our separate ways – Vedina joining Manu Chao on tour and then moving to Miami and then Toulouse; myself setting off on tour with Mr Hudson & The Library, and Mark eventually emigrating to South Africa…
It’s Not The Wand, It’s The Magic, the album that I assembled out of what we had managed to record – a couple of tracks at Gizzard Recording plus some rehearsal recordings and home demos – doesn’t sound much like the band as it was in live performance or in rehearsals when the energy was really flowing. It’s also somewhat hampered by my inability at the time as a recording engineer and producer. It was my first album production, and I’ll readily admit I had very little clue what I was doing. Nevertheless, it’s a fascinating document of the time that it was made, and features some excellent writing and performances from my band-mates. I’m grateful to them for having the opportunity to cut my teeth as a producer in such esteemed company…
