16 August 2018

UK-based singer/songwriter Sarah McQuaid is heading out on the road again with a battery of new instruments and a new album that’s been hailed as a “consummate artistic triumph” (Folk Radio UK) and tipped as an early candidate for folk album of the year by magazines and blogs in the USA, UK, Netherlands and Spain. Produced by guitar legend Michael Chapman, who’s also given Sarah his own electric guitar on long-term loan, Sarah’s fifth solo album If We Dig Any Deeper It Could Get Dangerous is distributed worldwide by Proper on LP as well as CD. With the help of financial support from Arts Council England and Cultivator Cornwall, Sarah was able to commission videos of her songs “Slow Decay” and “The Tug Of The Moon” from Cornwall-based filmmakers Brett Harvey and Mawgan Lewis, respectively, as  well as a documentary by Lewis on the making of the new album – all of which can be viewed on Sarah’s YouTube channel: http://www.youtube.com/sarahmcquaid She’s also upped the number of instruments in her arsenal to include drum and (where possible) piano in addition to electric and acoustic guitars. “People look at my stage setup and say, ‘Oh, I didn’t realise you were bringing a band with you,’” she laughs, “and I have to explain that no, it’s still just me! But it’s great to be able to have so much variety in my live set, and I’m getting really excited about all these new possibilities instrumentally. I think I might be writing a lot more on piano in the future, and I’d like to do more with the drum as well.” The Spain-born, American-raised and UK-based artist is now gearing up for three solid months of touring, with 37 shows in the USA and 25 in the UK (62 concerts in total), starting on September 7th and winding up back in her adopted home county of Cornwall on December 2nd. To find out where Sarah McQuaid is playing, and to buy tickets, click here. Photo by Phil Nicholls (www.philnicholls.co.uk)

For the first time ever, some 51 years after Bobbie Gentry’s debut single was released, all seven of the popular singer-songwriter’s albums are set to be re-mastered from the original tapes, to form an eight-disc collection. Titled ‘The Girl From Chicksaw County’, the eight-disc special will be released on 21 September via Capitol/UMe, and along with Gentry’s plethora of hits, the collection features 75 previously unreleased recordings, which – among demos, outtakes and other hidden gems – includes her ‘lost’ jazz album. One thing that Gentry is famously known for it her debut album ‘Ode to Billie Joe’, which – mere weeks after entering the Billboard 200 album charts – dislodged the Beatles’ ‘Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band’ from top spot. The eighth disc in the collection is a ‘Live at the BBC’ special, as Gentry became the first female singer-songwriter to have her own series on the BBC, and the CD contains excerpts from that series. There is also an 84-page book with the collection, eight different postcards, a copy of Gentry’s handwritten lyrics for the song Ode to Billie Joe, and specially commissioned cover art from David Downton. Throughout her career, Gentry won three Grammy awards – including Best New Artist – and weaved through genres such as country, folk, soul, jazz and blues with remarkable ease. It still remains a mystery to this day as to why Gentry called time on her musical career so early – her last studio album was released in 1971, just four years after her debut – but her music has long stood the test of time, and Gentry’s work is still lauded as inspiration for a number of female artists in the music industry. Disc 1: ‘Ode to Billie Joe’ Disc 2: ‘The Delta Sweete’ Disc 3: ‘Local Gentry’ Disc 4: ‘Bobbie Gentry & Glen Campbell’ Disc 5: ‘Touch ‘Em With Love’ Disc 6: ‘Fancy Disc’ Disc 7: ‘Patchwork Disc’ Disc 8: ‘Live at the BBC’ ‘The Girl From Chickasaw County’ is available from 21 September, and can be pre-ordered here.