JOURNALS

I went into the studio at the end of 2018 after releasing and touring my live album SOLO:DUO:TRIO and realised it was coming up 3 years since I’d recorded my last official studio album ‘Tall Tales & Rumours’.

It was like putting on an old coat being back in the studio with Dan Lucas at Anchor Baby Recording Co.
The same chairs, the same live room, the same 88 channel desk! The only difference was this time round, myself and Andy Sharps had something/ someone new, Elliott Norris.

Elliott joined the trio lineup late last year and it has been a joy having him as our drummer, electric guitarist and backing vocalist. The boy plays everything, so having him involved on this project and lending his wonderful ability has been amazing and in opening up our sound for the album we decided to invite in pianist, Jarrod Piner to lay down some beautiful parts and Lizzie White to sing stunning female harmonies on a handful of songs.

I had also been touring some new songs that were going down very well and had a bit of a songwriting burst, so luckily we had no shortage of material. For the first time ever I have also included a cover as it works so well in my live sets where I play it following one of my original songs, so it seemed natural to have it on the album.

I had been toying with lots of different album titles when this project was coming together, but I kept coming back to ‘Journals’ mainly because at the time this list of songs truly felt like an audio version of a diary.

Each track tells it’s own story, whether it be of romance, heartbreak, happiness or woe, every one is its own tale and journey. Some are of course more personal and close to home than others but with each song telling a story in its own little chapters, when I laid down the track list in front of me it was like having a diary of songs, an album wrapped up as a journal.