So, it is about time I properly updated the Huckiad and informed you of The Fee's, and my solo, plans for the next coming months. We had our first 'band meeting' last week after a 4 hour rehearsal. We managed to pound out "Christine" for the duration. We discussed our tour/trip to America. A big thanks to the wine and Wooky hole cheese that facilitated this meeting, without which I'm sure we wouldn't have made it this far. America is shaping up to be quite the trip of the year, with the boys planning to get a nice little van and drive from Seattle, down the West Coast via San Francisco, LA, Las Vegas, through Death Valley onto Phoenix, Arizona and Denver. I'll be joining them in Texas if they've managed to survive that long without me, where the second leg of our journey begins. I shall keep you updated from here on in.
In other news, The Fee will be making a music video with Big Face Art, based in London, and I'll be mixing my solo stuff next month. I still haven't decided on a cover design, but I have a few artists in mind. Perhaps I'll create a shortlist and ask you to vote for your favorite.
See more at BigFaceArt and BigFaceJam.
Check out this video of Henry Stead performing Attis. This was taken from the LPS night we performed at in the Jam Factory, Oxford.
HENRY STEAD - Attis from Big Face Art on Vimeo.
Tuesday, 25 May 2010
Tuesday, 18 May 2010
Love and Affection
I saw Joan Armatrading live at the beginning of the month and she performed this song. Truly one of the most outstanding female guitarists I've seen. Enjoy.
To read more click here
To read more click here
Sunday, 9 May 2010
The Fly review Red Stripe Music Award @ The Cellar, Oxford
'With his studded jacket removed to expose what looks like a filthy string vest, the drummer from Sextodecimo, a face that screws through slightly terrifying expressions even during the calm opening to his set, and two more old-school glamorous members, Huck is nothing if not visually arresting. And the music soon catches up with the image; ‘Passion Man’ rolling along like Os Mutantes swapped their Rolling Stones records for the Pixies. But his set never really recovers from the hitch of breaking all the strings on his guitar. It feels like there's unfinished business here.' (Chris Bennett)
For more go here.
For more go here.
Tuesday, 4 May 2010
The Oxonian Review of Huck and the Fee
Check out this review by the Oxonian Review of the London Poetry Systems gig on the 10th April 2010:
'The evening finished with a performance from local Oxford band Huck and the Handsome Fee, which continued the theme of incorporating poetry and performance. Many of the numbers in Fee’s repertoire began as written works. Reworking these pieces into songs allows richer and more immediate access to their emotional depth and enlivens the interpersonal drama of their narratives. This is particularly true in virtue of the Fee’s co-vocalists, Humphrey Astley and Tamara Parsons-Baker. Between Astley’s tortured, thespianic vocalisations and Parsons-Baker’s impassioned and gracefully sombre style, these two expertly share the often weighty burden of their material’s characters and themes.'
By John Maloney
To read the full review more click here
To see a glimpse of the event...
'The evening finished with a performance from local Oxford band Huck and the Handsome Fee, which continued the theme of incorporating poetry and performance. Many of the numbers in Fee’s repertoire began as written works. Reworking these pieces into songs allows richer and more immediate access to their emotional depth and enlivens the interpersonal drama of their narratives. This is particularly true in virtue of the Fee’s co-vocalists, Humphrey Astley and Tamara Parsons-Baker. Between Astley’s tortured, thespianic vocalisations and Parsons-Baker’s impassioned and gracefully sombre style, these two expertly share the often weighty burden of their material’s characters and themes.'
By John Maloney
To read the full review more click here
To see a glimpse of the event...
Monday, 3 May 2010
Me and The Fee
Tamara Parsons-Baker
I suppose it’s unhealthy prejudice, but forgive us for thinking that Tamara Parsons-Baker was going to be chortling jodhpurred lass singing nasal, plummy songs about palomino geldings. Imagine our surprise in being confronted with a beautifully clear voice that trickles through the air like a limpid stream above some subtle guitar.
I suppose it’s unhealthy prejudice, but forgive us for thinking that Tamara Parsons-Baker was going to be chortling jodhpurred lass singing nasal, plummy songs about palomino geldings. Imagine our surprise in being confronted with a beautifully clear voice that trickles through the air like a limpid stream above some subtle guitar.By David Murphy
Oxford Bands
Humphrey 'Huck' Astley is a veteran of the Oxford music scene, having played bass with notorious extreme metallers Sextodecimo since their inception a decade ago. Although a lover of rock as well as the avant-garde, his heart was often in the traditional genres of blues, country and folk, and it was only a matter of time before he gave them their dues. In the summer of '09 he transplanted Sextodecimo's powerhouse drummer Tommy Longfellow from one stool to the other and recruited bassist Matt Halliday (who makes time between full-on duty in Borderville and occasional moonlighting with Stornoway and Richard Walters) to fill out the Fee sound. 
Tamara Parsons-Baker, a singer-songwriter in her own right and perhaps Oxford's finest female vocalist, cut her teeth at the city's myriad open mics, where she and Astley would often duet; her joining the band was the natural course of action. The result is a combo that plays hard and soft and fun and fierce, in a style they like to call 'the New Butch'. With the Tom Waits songbook in one pocket and some lipstick in the other, Huck and the Handsome Fee are poised for 2010.
Oxford Bands
Humphrey 'Huck' Astley is a veteran of the Oxford music scene, having played bass with notorious extreme metallers Sextodecimo since their inception a decade ago. Although a lover of rock as well as the avant-garde, his heart was often in the traditional genres of blues, country and folk, and it was only a matter of time before he gave them their dues. In the summer of '09 he transplanted Sextodecimo's powerhouse drummer Tommy Longfellow from one stool to the other and recruited bassist Matt Halliday (who makes time between full-on duty in Borderville and occasional moonlighting with Stornoway and Richard Walters) to fill out the Fee sound. 
Tamara Parsons-Baker, a singer-songwriter in her own right and perhaps Oxford's finest female vocalist, cut her teeth at the city's myriad open mics, where she and Astley would often duet; her joining the band was the natural course of action. The result is a combo that plays hard and soft and fun and fierce, in a style they like to call 'the New Butch'. With the Tom Waits songbook in one pocket and some lipstick in the other, Huck and the Handsome Fee are poised for 2010.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
