- There’s music on this page now (20th June 2010), still waiting for photos.
- The Dave Village music player is not very graceful at the moment, but give it time.
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- Music plays on modern smart phones too (tested on an iPhone and Palm Pre).
- It should play the songs sequentially, so you only need to click once to listen to the whole album.
Recorded: 1996 – 1997
Method: 2/4 track home recording
Release date: 20 June 2010
The Magic and the Moment LP, recorded 1996 – 1997
— We will write some background spiel for each album; place them in some kind of context, whether that improves the aural experience...
Dave remembers everyone in his world listening to Oasis’ What’s the Story, or Smashing Pumpkins’ Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness album, or maybe that was just the people he was living with at the time. Anyway, Dave Village wrote his first song in April 1996; he was feeling a little low, it was around his birthday. It’s something to do with the recognition of the passing of time, the usual unfulfilled ambitions thought–treadmill. Let‘s go travelling, he thought. Run away to Australia, it was far, far away. ‘Hobo’ was written about that feeling. There was no stopping him now, at least in a song writing sense. Dave Village never visited Australia, only a few pages of the Lonely Planet.
His next song ‘Astrid Sky’, started with one of the best opening lines: "it‘s absolutely alright to feel the curve on the chair tonight". I mean, 1967’s Summer of Love rolls over in its presence – it’s sexual expression to the max. Another line: "the moon rises with a scarlet sunburnt face," let’s all talk about physics, the partial lunar elipse, which was very pretty.
‘Spring Daffodil’ orientates itself around simple observations, having just returned from a summer in the U.S.: "I drink white sweet coffee", shocking I know. How could anyone drink white sweet coffee? But it appeared someone did in 1996; "Inhale the powder, designed to protect the flower" was not a rock’n‘roll reference to the influential talkative powder, but a reference to his CFC free asthma inhaler. Yes, they even had environmental awareness back in the 1990s, but obviously not an economic aerosol propellant substitute; "My mind is for Old Man Moses", refers to one of Dave’s early repeat jazz plays by Grant Green – syncopated beats, coolin’.
Riveting stuff. I should stop writing a blow-by-blow account on each song. It takes away the magic and the moment. How were these songs recorded? Yes, that’s a much more interesting thread than picking apart song lyrics. Well, they were recorded simply – initially with a two track tape deck. Followed by a borrowed four track tape recorder; capturing a lovely warm acoustic sound, at least that is what some people may claim in this current digital age, but probably not about the songs involved with this album.
Okay, let’s change tack once more, how about we talk about where this album was written? It was mainly written in and around Cardiff city (someone needed tertiary education), with a brief influence from a summer working in America: stars, strips, steaks, seaside and a little car journey from the east to west coast.
Looking through the musical vaults we found a few previously unreleased songs, including: ‘Nice Day for a Walk’, a typical dozy summer song and ‘Brewery Daily’, a comment on a Burton-Upon-Trent newspaper clipping mentioning the birth of a certain Dave Village, on a Wednesday back in the 1970s. Just think: bonus.
Finally, why write these songs? We’re not sure, why does anyone sketch city architecture on their holidays, or walk through the park on their way to work instead of taking the usual route.
