In Aid of Vulnerability

’In Aid of Vulnerability’ is now out in the world. This collection of songs has been 3 years in the making and I’m proud to have persevered to get the most honest and vulnerable music I’ve made finished. Success to me for this record, is just so that my son can see and hear that his Dad expressed how he felt and that he feels it’s normal to express himself and talk about anything that he needs to, when he wants to.

I couldn’t of got this out without attending Talk Club over the last four years. An amazing charity which is doing phenomenal work to literally - aid men to be empowered by their own vulnerability. Thanks to all those I’ve met there. If you are a man reading this, who is struggling, I can’t recommend enough having a look at the website to either find a group near you or attend their online sessions. It will help.

Thank you to Nick Powell for mixing this record and providing much needed creative direction. To Izzy McPhee for mastering it in a short space of time. Thank you to James Lock for snapping the cover image in a freezing lake and playing additional guitar on Globus. Thank you to James Burt for providing the artwork. Thank you to Cags Diep for playing violins on Globus. Legends, all of you.

Whoever YOU are, I hope it does something for you and to be honest in what you need to be. Thank you for listening to me.

Click HERE to stream on your prefered platform

Peace x

JL833191A Revisited

Hi

Thanks for coming to read this.

This really isn’t a new single at all…i’ll explain why I decided to put out another version.

This version has been developed from a live session that I performed throughout 2017-18, with a person called Guy Fleisher, from Tel Aviv in Israel, who I met through Goldsmiths University. We started working together to do live gigs and played at a few venues in London and Kent. What you hear is a mixture of our production efforts.

When I first made JL833191A, I wasn’t equipped with the production skills to make it into what I heard in my head. I was dissatisfied with the result. Meeting Guy and collaborating with him on this track and other subsequent material opened up a new way of working, in which we essentially jammed over the top of loops and audio stems that I had on a hard drive. He then added other elements and production techniques, that I hadn’t considered. I like to think that the result is a little more polished, but not that shiny. It felt wrong to not at least put the track in the public domain when someone else had put their effort into it’s reimagining.

Aside from the creative sound process, lyrically this song no longer feels like it’s about my situation, and my life has changed very much from when I first wrote those lyrics. However, I still feel that the words are reflective of some of the complex socio-economic situations that I tend to see, read and hear about. If you want to read about the original motivations for the song, please head to the bottom of the blog where you can read the original posting.

Follow here to listen and I hope it does something for you,

Duncan.

CWTCH V1 & V2

It's almost a year since I released my debut tracks 'JL833191A' and 'Quantifiers'. I'm really pleased to be able to share something new, even if it has been close to ten months in the making, so thanks for coming to read this. Whether I know you or not at all, I really appreciate it...

This track has been knocking around for a little while and I think it just needed a context in which to fit it in to. I moved back to Kent in July 2016 after moving out of London and exiting a long term relationship. To say the least I wasn't in the best state of mental health at the time, I think it was probably the lowest i've ever felt in my life, it was quite dark and now looking back in hindsight, was almost unbelievable. However, I had some counselling and started teaching music in August, this allowed me to slowly build myself back up over the following months. I loved that I was contributing towards peoples education and the daily offering of knowledge really helped me feel good about myself again.

At the end of November, I thought i'd take a look into Tinder...it's not something i'd ever used and I almost felt silly even being on it. I'd never been in the headspace of wanting to date. I think really I was just intrigued as I wanted to meet new people and being outside of a city, that can be difficult, especially in a small commuter town on the outskirts of London. So on my way home from work one evening I got a "match" and started chatting away. I then got an invite to go over to this person's house after twenty minutes.  I thought it was strange to be given this sort of invite as a first date, firstly as she has no idea who I am coming into her home and I don't know what i'll be going in to. Surprising myself, I went to meet this person. Within the first ten minutes, she told me that she had been signed off work with anxiety and was currently really struggling, it looked like she hadn't slept for days. I remember being really taken a back with how upfront she was about this. I thought this was quite courageous. We chatted for a while, talking about music, work, friends etc. I realised that she was just lonely and needed someone to talk to who was completely outside of her friendship circles, pretty much like myself at the time. She was experiencing some prejudices at work, she was far away from her family on the other side of the country and suffering from mental health issues. I slept over next to her that night without anything physical happening, she actually broke down into tears a couple of times which was quite awkward and upsetting, but I did what I could to comfort her. I remember looking at four carved wooden letters on the mantel piece which spelt 'CWTCH', which is the welsh word for hug or embrace. I thought it would be appropriate to use this as the title for this song, from which I started to write the lyrics, themed around this experience.

I said goodbye the next morning and haven't seen this person again. I wasn't in the best frame of mind myself for anything to develop and some things are best left.

I have also released a V2 of the song, which doesn't feature any vocals, other than a speech by David Foster Wallace. I listened to this speech not long after that night and I felt that it summed up how I felt about the experience. These compositions are a reflection and interpretation of something i've experienced, I hope they do something for you.

This track wouldn't of sounded or appeared as it does without the input of some good friends. Thanks to Fiona McAuley for playing the violin, her input really brought the track to life. David Trevillion whose first band I grew up listening to, for recording the drum parts, a real pleasure to work with. Check his other work here. Finally to Ed Bidgood for the incredible artwork, go and check out his design work and music here.

Thanks for reading and if you would like to own a copy of the song, please head to my BandCamp where the song can be downloaded for £1. The money will be donated to the charity CRISIS who are working to end homelessness. Alternatively you can stream them on Soundcloud or YouTube

Duncan.

JL833191A

I thought it was necessary to give some context around this track, but at the same time I would like people to take from it whatever they would like to.

In the summer of 2015, I found myself in a job centre in Finsbury Park, north London. As I was waiting for my appointment, I thought I would get a "field" sample, so started to record a voice memo on my phone. Within about a minute, one of the advisers came over to me and asked if I was a particular person, and saw my phone lying next to me. Immediately, she said "Don't leave your phone there, put it in your pocket...everyone's broke around here". Fortunately, I managed to capture this conversation and it's what you hear at the end of the track. I'm not quite sure what it was, but this statement had an overwhelming affect on me, making me feel angry that she had said that in front of all those people there and the joy she evidently took in saying it. I went back to my flat and this track started to come together literally in a matter of days. I thought it would be appropriate to keep the title close to my national insurance number (it's not actually it, don't worry). I suppose it was just the attitude that she had and the care free way in which it was delivered that shocked and saddened me. People had become a series of numbers and stereotyped.

So...this track is partially to do with that experience and it made me think wider about the way we treat people and coupled with the personal hardship I was going through at this time in my life, I just felt I had to say something about it, even if it was in this small way. I really want this song and the next one I put out titled "Quantifiers", to be received in a positive light and ultimately I hope to just make people appreciate others around them whether they're friends or strangers. Everyone deserves to be treated nicely and given time of day.

Thanks again for reading this, watching the video and listening to the track and if you feel like owning a copy, it can be downloaded for one pound from Bandcamp. Your money will go to CRISIS, who help homeless people across the UK. Alternatively, it's also available to stream via Soundcloud and will be out on all other streaming services in the next week. Please spread the word.

Lots of love x