"Black and White"
Brian Willoughby
Featuring
Cathryn Craig
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All text written by Brian Willoughby *
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I made the album in memory of a dear friend, Peter Reid, who died of oral cancer. Just before he died, he was encouraging me to do a solo project and he could sense my reticence. How could I ignore his request to “do it for me"? |
Click on any song title below.
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| In
mid-August 1994, Dave Cousins and I finished an acoustic tour of
America. Dave went home and I stayed on, to fly from New York to
Nashville, to visit my English pal Steve Dobson for a week. I’d never
been to Nashville, so I called Ginny & Paul Kirkby in London, to
give me telephone numbers of friends they’d met while recording in
Tennessee. Their immediate recommendation was Michael Snow, a
Liverpudlian who’s been in Nashville for nearly thirty years. Michael
wrote “Rosetta” for Georgie Fame & Alan Price and has been a
successful writer ever since. He invited me over to “write a song”
and we came up with “Totally In Your Hands”. On my next visit, 6
months later, Michael and I penned several songs and we remain prolific
writing partners and great friends. One of the songs produced during
that period, was “Hard Luck Cafe”. Michael knew exactly who could
sing a great demo for us and that’s how I met Cathryn Craig. Michael also introduced me to Bill Lloyd and ..................... |
| IN THIS ROOM was conceived
by Bill and myself during a very
enjoyable afternoon talking about guitars. We wrote the song in record time and recorded the tracks in his studio. When it came to making my album, I couldn’t see any way of improving on our original guitar parts, so I removed his voice and added Cathryn! Her “AhAhs” at the beginning are actually there to cover up a click-track spillage that I couldn’t get rid of! |
| ALICE’S SONG Cathryn was busy cleaning my front-room rug(!) while I was playing this melody and suddenly she burst into tears. I thought it was maybe the cleaning fluid she was using, but actually the tune had inspired her and off she went to the kitchen and came back shortly thereafter, complete with the lyrics to my tune, dedicated to my niece, Alice. |
| BLACK & WHITE The idea for this story of young mixed-race love was already sketched and Cathryn found it easy to fit to my instrumental background. I had always thought of calling the album “Black & White” anyway, because of the cover photograph taken by my brother, (featuring my favourite guitar, my 40-year-old Gibson J45 and an advert for my beloved Guinness) and because of the uncomplicated way I intended to record. |
| TOTALLY IN YOUR HANDS As mentioned before, the first song written by the Snow-Willoughby machine. I originally offered the chord sequence to Dave Cousins, but it was not to be. I did not play on the Nashville demo,--Dave McKenzie played Harrison-type electric slide, to Michael’s bass and Pat McInernie’s drums. A little different from our version!! For guitar fans, each harmonic chord is in a different tuning, by the way. |
| THE FIRE
The first song Cathryn and I wrote together and it remains my favourite
on the album. I just wish I’d changed my strings before recording the tracks,--they sound a little dull to my ears. |
| HARD LUCK CAFE
On the inaugural Craig / Willoughby gig, at Bromley Acoustic Music Club,
we played this song and when “Mary and Bennie” came up in the lyrics, we looked at each other in horror / amusement, because in the audience were our good friends Mary Hopkin and Bennie Gallagher! Their namesakes were totally coincidental, but we hadn’t thought of it before. |
| LOVE BELONGS RIGHT HERE
September 20th., 2001, is my 52nd.
birthday and it also marks my 30th. year as a professional guitarist. On
my 22nd. birthday, I did an audition with Mary Hopkin and immediately turned my back on my future as a language teacher,--Mary offered to take me off to Australia and all points N, S & W. The rest is history. This song is our first attempt at writing together after all this time and I’m very proud to have Mary as a dear friend and now a writing partner. The recording was edited to a great extent,--Kenny the engineer watched in horror as I bravely elbowed harmony vocals, Mary on keyboards and my electric guitar!! Vocal by Mary Hopkin |
| HE LIES
Originally “She Lies”, this was spawned by a bizarre tuning on the
guitar. I had put on a set of strings and accidentally tuned the D & G strings up a semi-tone, so I fiddled around and came across some interesting chord shapes, producing the melody. On the demo, I was ecstatic to have Al Perkins from The Burrito Brothers etc. playing pedal steel. It was sung by Jeff Ross, Terri Clarke’s bandleader. |
| MORE THAN YOU LOVED ME A couple of non-Americans writing a country song! Whatever next? This one gave me a great opportunity to get my Dad in the studio, playing his accordion and Cathryn gave it all the Country you could wish for. C’mon, Dolly, please record it! |
| WILLOW A very
personal lyric for Michael, this is one of my favourites, again demo’d
by Jeff Ross and interpreted beautifully by Cathryn. This and “Black & White” were the only ones where I kept an electric guitar track. |
| THEN SOMEONE SAYS YOUR NAME This was written with my pal Duncan Gillies, a Glaswegian I met in the early 70’s. Neither of us can remember the last 30 years! |
| THE FEEL OF LETTING GO
Written as a possible pitch to Alison Krauss,
Michael and I recorded the demo with Alison’s friend Andrea Zonn
singing and playing violin. It was a beautiful version, but I think Cathryn does the song great justice. |
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Crown Rd., Twickenham, TW1 3EJ
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