qrz236 - todd dillingham

den folgenden text habe ich completely gecopied und gepasted aus
einer mail, die todd dillinghams bruder im juni 2007 an totally
fuzzy geschickt hat. marginale ergänzungen stammen von mir später.
also: jay strange said: "My brother Todd Dillingham recorded many
albums back in the nineties in a psychedelic/progressive/folk vein
and with backing from the likes of Richard Sinclair (Caravan) Andy
Ward (Camel) Mike Wedgewood (Curved Air) Yukio Yung (Crysanthemums)
and Bevis Frond...all of his albums are now OOP and can only be
found occassionally on ebay if you're lucky. A while back we
noticed that the excellent blog lost in tyme had posted up the
first two albums and Todd was really pleased to see them up and
available for people to hear..it was always about the music with
us...so rather than have a silly hissy fit we decided that we loved
the idea of Todds music being out there once more, thought it might
kick start Todd into creating new music once more...so we not only
thanked Lost in Tyme for posting the albums we also sent them
another three albums and a load of exclusive unreleased goodies
including the thirty two minute long Mock Opera that features both
Victor Krummenacher and Jonathan Segel of Camper Van Beethoven to
post...so far they have put up Astral Whelks with more to come...
all the best Mick Dillingham The link between the classic
Canterbury Scene of the '70s and the D.I.Y. psychedelic pop scene
of the '90s, Todd Dillingham is a one-of-a-kind artist. Equally
capable of writing concise, catchy little pop songs, twisted
psychedelic explorations, and sprawling prog rock improvisations,
the North London resident is like a one-man combination of XTC,
Robyn Hitchcock and the Egyptians, and the Bevis Frond. Remarkably,
for a one-man band who plays almost all of the instruments on his
records, Dillingham came late to music, not recording his first
songs until he was already into his thirties. His first album was a
limited-edition self-released cassette, 1989's Stalking the Wily
Chub, with a homemade cover designed by his brother, music
journalist and psychedelic poster artist Mick Dillingham.
(Dillingham has something of an obsession with fish, which
regularly appear in his album titles and cover art.) Brother Mick
took an even more active role in Dillingham's next project, the
Bizarrdavarks, a trio featuring the brothers and Bevis Frond
mastermind Nick Saloman that placed two tracks on 1990's Woronzoid,
a double-album compilation on Saloman's Woronzow label. Saloman and
Mick Dillingham also appeared on Dillingham's next recording
project, the Saloman-produced Art Into Dust, which was supposed to
appear on Woronzow in 1990 but was shelved, eventually appearing on
the Voiceprint label in late 1992 with the addition of one later
track, a nearly half-hour jam on Pink Floyd's classic "Interstellar
Overdrive." Dillingham's association with Voiceprint, a label
associated with the '70s Canterbury Scene spearheaded by the Soft
Machine and Hatfield and the North, began in 1991, when Caravan
LEGEND Richard Sinclair invited Dillingham to record an album with
himself, drummer Andy Ward (Camel), and reedman Jimmy Hastings
(Caravan, Soft Machine, National Health). The resulting Wilde
Canterbury Dream received rapturous reviews among prog rock
diehards, but Dillingham's next two releases were a pair of more
immediately accessible psychedelic pop EPs in the style of XTC's
Dukes of Stratosphear side project: the Norwegian release A Dash of
Haddock (1993), and the German release Arthur Woodcote (Is His
Name) (1994). Dillingham's next two albums, both released in 1994,
re-emphasized the prog side of his musical personality, although
the live Radio Session included a few '60s-style freakbeat rave-ups
as well. Vast Empty Spaces marked a reunion with Ward, with Curved
Air's Mike Wedgewood and Anthony Alridge of the jazzy and eccentric
Skaboosh! contributing bass and violin, respectively. With the
exception of occasional extended improvisatory workouts, Dillingham
then retreated from progressive epics into a marginally simpler and
considerably poppier form of psychedelic pop. The self-released
Astral Whelks, which included contributions not only from Ward but
Ward's Chrysanthemums bandmate, Yukio Yung, was the first evidence
of this new focus, but it was 1995's Sgt. Kipper, with its
priceless cover portraits of Dillingham, Yung, and Ward in
Sgt.Pepper-style satin outfits, that delivered Dillingham's most
consistently poppy and groovy set of tunes." und wir hören einen
ausschnitt aus der cd wilde canterbury dream... |>> todd
dillingham - 2excerpts