Bluehorses sabatical

Greetings Horseheadz

Thought it was about time we brought you all up to speed on current happenings at BH Towers...

Having been 'at it' for nearly fifteen years (! - where did that go then???) the band have decided to take a break from live shows this year and spend a bit of time working on their own things.

Nic and Jay have been having fun in the studio over the past few weeks working on ideas for a new project, and Liz is concentrating on the more traditional side of things for a while.

Nic's also finding time - and headspace! - to design and make Celtic and Anglo-Saxon inspired ceramic sculpture and tiles for the first time since he and Liz started the band waaay back in 1994.

Huge thanks as ever for your continuing support, we really will miss seeing all of you at the festies and shows and to keep you going til we next meet... do make sure you pick up a copy of the new album 'Thirteen Fires' - it really is a stormer :o)

You can listen to some tracks on MySpace http://myspace.com/bluehorsesrock and Last.fm http://last.fm, but preferably buy the album, and all the other CDs and DVD from the website http://www.bluehorses.co.uk (paypal or credit cards accepted) and from http://www.amazon.co.uk

Those of you suffering from withdrawal symptoms there is a new(ish) video on YouTube of Raggle Taggle Gypsio

There is also an excellent review in the latest copy of Rock n Reel
Our very, very best wishes to you from everyone at BH Towers

Bluehorses December Dooooooos

Happy New Year stablemates,

Normally at this time we reflect on the last year and look ahead to the new one - however there were a couple of events that provided a poignant marker for the whole of the year. The Fifth Bluehorses album - Thirteen Fires was available for purchase, and also the band proved again that the music transfers Live on stage equally as well as on CD.

The Album is available from

• the main band web site - http://bluehorses.co.uk/goodies
• from Amazon - http://www.amazon.co.uk/Thirteen-Fires-Bluehorses/dp/B0010YO876/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=music&qid=1199712537&sr=8-1
• and also all good CD stores - (if they insist they can't get it, then they are not trying hard enough, it is certainly available for them to source.)

Thirteen Fires - Bluehorses

1. Dance With Me
2. Ray of Light
3. Calling My loves
4. The Ride
5. Chant
6. Raggle Taggle Gypsio
7. The Unknown
8. The Fool
9. Aberdulais
10. Waes Hael

Previews (or rather full copy review versions) of six of the tracks are available on the Bluehorses MySpace site (www.myspace.com/bluehorsesrock). Mike has also placed some video up on YouTube (www.YouTube.com/bluehorses) to compliment the MySpace tunes, and there will be more over the course of early 2008.

Waes Hael


Dance With Me

The Xmas Mini tour shows were at

• 14th December - The Flowerpot - Derby
• 15th December - The Railway - Winchester
• 16th December - Robin2 - Bilston

there are overviews of the shows and the set list etc on the Horsetailz blog (www.horsetailz.blogspot.com).



Hopefully we will see you at a show in 2008, either way buy a copy of the new album; (if you already have one then buy another for a friend and spread the good news)

Neddy

Remember November - new Bluehorses album goes to print

Greetings horsey folk,

It is a momentous time...
The smoke out of the chimney has finally turned white, and Nic was seen emerging from the depths of the forge here at Bluehorse towers, clutching a shiny new disc. There was a reverent hush in the reception party, followed by contentment and much back slapping - I even got a celebratory carrot! The seventh Album - Thirteen Fires was now a reality.

In the end, after months and months of nail bitting agony and waiting, everything happened so quickly - the art work was produced and approved, the final editing tweaks were applied, the disc mastered and "red booked" (not sure what this is but Nic says it is important), and I dictate this - I chewed my nails off so cant write - the hallowed disc is with the CD production company to be glass mastered, stamped and put into pretty digipacs for your delectation.


Thirteen Fires - Bluehorses

1. Dance With Me
2. Ray of Light
3. Calling My loves
4. The Ride
5. Chant
6. Raggle Taggle Gypsio
7. The Unknown
8. The Fool
9. Aberdulais
10. Waes Hael

This is a quote from Nic to give some of the background to Thirteen Fires..
"Over the last 15 years we've played numerous festivals in every country in Europe and Scandinavia, but compared to the stuff we've jammed in the privacy of Bluehorse Towers, we've always toned things down quite a bit.

Now thanks to the delights of YouTube, we've discovered there's a massive Folk Metal scene going on with fantastic bands like Korpiklaani and In Extremo and it's made us realise there's an awful lot of people around who want to hear the kind of music we've always really enjoyed playing.

We spent the summer at our studio up here in the Welsh mountains with Jay MacDonald our guitarist - who also played bass on Thirteen Fires - writing and recording the new album which has just gone to press, and we seriously think it's a bit of a stunning beast!"


Copies will be delivered (courier dependent) in time for the Xmas shows - with the web site and other channels having them available shortly afterwards - so an excellent opportunity to get ahead of the game and come to the shows. Liz and the boys are hard at work rehearsing the new tunes so expect to have many of them included with all your old favorites ;)

The Xmas shows are
14th December - The Flowerpot - Derby
15th December - The Railway - Winchester
16th December - Robin2 - Bilston

full details from the web site.

Previews (or rather full copy review versions) of six of the tracks are available on the Bluehorses MySpace site (www.myspace.com/bluehorsesrock). Mike also plans to get some video up on YouTube (www.YouTube.com/bluehorses) to compliment the MySpace tunes.

Hopefully we will see you at the Xmas shows, if not have a happy Yule and a fantastic new year (don't forget the new album they make fantastic stocking fillers)

Neddy

Bluehorses in October

Greetings horse-mates

There was not a newsletter last month as it was all quiet on the Welsh front - there's still no white smoke, however the mutterings are that there has been good progress.

Nic has been locked in the studio editing then mixing down the tracks - This is the pedantic phase where every note has to be perfect. There are 9-10-11 tracks, and a full listing will be available shortly along with some sound bites (those that came to the summer shows will have already heard three of the tracks - Dance with Me, Raggle Taggle Gypsio, and Waes Hael).

The next step is to get the resultant tracks "mastered" then we can send it all off for pressing. The main aim of all this is to hopefully have a physical CD thingy available for purchase around the Xmas shows (got to make best use of the marketing potentials ;) ). So here is a plug for the Xmas mini tour ...

Friday 14th December Flowerpot - Derby, Saturday 15th Railway - Winchester, Sunday 16th Robin2 - Bilsden.

Whilst we are talking about shows - much apologies about the cancellation of the show at the Thomas Tripp - I think they discovered that we were not a "covers" band, so pulled out, not that we are cynical or anything.

We also have a new arrival at the stables .. Connor McDonnald - He was born on the 17th October at 16:45 BST, weighing in at 8lb 3.5 oz and 57 cm long. Pictures available soon on the gallery - once Jay has sound checked the baby guitar.

any way the nights are drawing in earlier these days and i need my beauty sleep..

hopefully we will see you at the xmas shows

Neddy

Bluehorses August Procedings

Greetings stable mates,

Just back from me 'olidays, Liz and the boys took me to various fields around the country, so despite not being able to canter around Chepstow (the castle not the racecourse) with the rain last month, things got brighter throughout the month, and finished with an almost summerish end to the month. All of the pictures - http://bluehorses.paganhost.co.uk , gossip - http://horsetailz.blogspot.com , and general vibes - http://myspace.com/bluehorsesrock are available at a good website near you!Bluehorses started off in Shropshire at Farmer Phil's - organised chaos - this is what festivals are all about - we like this place. Playing on the revolving stage was again a tremendous thrill for the band, and despite the lightly rain falling, the band proved to be a crowd pleaser. The following week they had a mid-afternoon slot at Cambridge rock festival, only this time Radio Caroline broadcast the show live .... yep that was straight off the stage and into the ether ... so on top of all the people in the hall, loads were listening in. Hopefully we can make selected highlights available in the near future for people to re-live the experience - especially Mr Rich's birthday surprise. Next up was Peterborough - if you like Ale this was one for you, once the number of different beers got past 5, I lost count v- comes of not having fingers and toes!! - but I am told there was several hundred varieties. To finish up there was Solfest (north to Carlisle turn left, and stop when the grass turns blue/ grey/ white). Apart from the strange stage time (1am is a long wait) everyone had a blast... With all the fancy dress around I didn't even look out of place!.

Hopefully we will get some video clips from all these and make them available on Youtube next to the ones already there - http://youtube.com/bluehorses

So what is coming up for Bluehorses in September .... the smoke coming from the chimney is still not white, but does appear to be grey rather than black. (pope analogy there) Now the summer holidays are over everyone is back in the studio ... 4 of the tracks are being mastered, with a further 8 being finalised. Nic has started to design the artwork, and there have been discussions of a video to accompany a track or two - most probably Dance with Me - which was played at the festivals last month. The other tracks played at the festivals were Waes Hael and Raggle.

Next show for Buehorses is the Thomas Tripp in November - http://www.thomastripplive.com/

see you all down there

Neddy

Bluehorses July she will fly... and so she did!

Bluehorses August Newsletter

Greetings stablemates,
July continued in the same vein as June - rain and more rain. Luckily none of the band were caught up in the flooding, but Andy from the crew spent a long time stuck on the M5 because of it. He made up for the experience by terrorising the locals with a Unimog (if you've not met one of these beasts before it is a 4*4 truck crossed with a seriously large Quad bike) helping to get feed to the animals.
We were all very sorry to see the Chepstow show postponed - I was looking forward to a trot around the course! - but just looking at the news coverage will give a suitable reason for this action, so there can't be any complaints. We will let you know when it get re-scheduled.
In a similar vein the Salisbury festival show has been canceled, again for reasons beyond our control, but this one is unlikely to get re-scheduled this year.
There were two excellent shows one at Cardiff and one at Spratton. Reviews can be found on the Tailz blog, with pictures in the gallery - a great thanks to Mike H and Dave J for allowing us to add their photos. There is also some dodgey video floating around of Rhayn and a Bull ride , but he is keeping me in sugar lumps at present!

August sees 4 shows, with the first one just coming up on the Saturday 11th at Farmer Phil's Festival on the main revolving stage.

Later on we are at the Cambridge Rock festival and then at Peterborough Beer Festival (this is a Thursday night) and at Solfest to round it off. - Keep up with the "up-to-the-minute" news by going to the news blog
****Breaking News**** Radio Caroline are planning to broadcast a live set from each day at the Cambridge Rock festival, and guess what!! - Bluehorses will be providing the set for the Saturday show... I had better make sure there are several rehearsals on the calendar, I would not want them embarrassing themselves!
Other than that; the steam continues to pour out of the studio here at Bluehorse towers, and there is still no one to gossip with :( although I am hopeful that the Iolo and Bran will pop round to have a chat now the sun has deigned to appear.
A couple of the new tracks have made it into the live set so far and were well received at the Point and Spratton. Raggle is a reworking of Raggle Taggle Gipsyo from the dim and dark past - for those who were around then it used to be in the live set when Dave and Jonathan were with the band, and also on the Dark Circus EP (only available on Cassette tape at the time, and now deleted - C30C60C90 anyone!).
The other new track, (under the working title of Hen but now looking like being called Waes Hael. A track of tremendous pace, which has a slight Balearic feel and is bound to get every one bouncing. The name imparts an idea of drinking and merriment, plenty of the latter, but I suspect that much of the former will be spilled as it is far too energetic!
Anyway more shows this month, and things are looking brighter ... so see you there!

Neddy
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Forthcoming Shows [More details here]

August
11th - Farmer Phils Festival - Shropshire - http://www.farmerphilsfestival.co.uk/
18th - Cambridge Rock Festival (formerly RBF) - http://www.rockinbeerfest.co.uk/
23rd - Peterborough Beer Festival (Thursday night) - http://www.beer-fest.org.uk/
25th - Solfest - Cumbria - http://www.solwayfestival.co.uk/

November10th - The Thomas Tripp - Christchurch

December - The Xmas Bashes
14th - The Flowerpot - Derby
15th - The Railway - Winchester
16th - The Robin - Bilston - Wolverhampton

**** News Flash **** Bluehorses Chepstow gig POSTPONED

Just a very quick note Horsey Dudes

We are sorry to relay that the Chepstow show ..... Sounds of Rock in the Swamp ... has been postponed

Sorry, but the Castle/ dell site is a bit of a swamp just now. Further news will be relayed as soon as we find out details.

Many thanks for your understanding

Neddy

Bluehorses Central