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  • Michael Chapman 'True North'

    Paradise Of Bachelors

    Michael Chapman 'True North'

    £11.99

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    Paradise Of Bachelors

    Michael Chapman 'True North'

    £20.49

    The masterful follow-up to his universally celebrated 2017 album 50, Michael Chapman's True North finds the elder statesman of British song writing and guitar plumbing an even deeper deep and honing an ever keener edge to his iconic writing.

    This authoritative set of predominantly new, and utterly devastating, songs hews to a more intimate sonic signature'more atmospheric, textural, and minimalist than 50, stately and melancholy in equal measure. Recorded in rural West Wales, True North unflinchingly surveys home and horizon, traveling from the Bahamas to Texas to the Leeds of Chapman's childhood, haunted by the mirages of memory and intimations of mortality.

    Joining him on this introspective journey is a cast of old friends and new disciples: once again Steve Gunn produces and plays guitar, and fellow UK song writing hero Bridget St John sings, collaborating with cellist Sarah Smout and legendary pedal steel player BJ Cole, who has accompanied everyone from John Cale to Scott Walker, Elton John to Terry Allen, Felt to Björk.

    The album begins with the gnawing regret of 'It's Too Late,' and every song Chapman sings thereafter directly references the passing of time'its blind ruthlessness, its sweet hazy delights in noirish language almost mystical in its terseness and precision. (The two transportive, gorgeous instrumentals, one per side, both have appropriately evocative'though decidedly not Northern'pastoral place names for titles: Eleuthera is an island in the Bahamas where Chapman habitually holidays every winter, and Caddo Lake straddles the border between Texas and Louisiana.)

    This is Chapman at his darkest and most nocturnal, yes, but also his most elegant and subtle, squinting into the black hours with an unseen smile. By the time True North is out in the world, Chapman will be seventy-eight years old and will have released nearly as many records, a staggering achievement. True North represents the most nakedly personal album of his career, his most authoritative, unguarded, and emotionally devastating statement.

    His universally celebrated full-band 2017 album 50 flirted with much-deserved triumphalism, offering a retrospective of his illustrious career, revisited in the company of the fellow UK song writing hero Bridget St John and a rowdy gang of younger acolytes including Steve Gunn, James Elkington, and Nathan Bowles.

    The production hearkens back to Chapman's classic Millstone Grit (1973), as well as recalling Bob Dylan's Time Out of Mind (1997); True North shares something of that album's spectral gloaming, midnight heartache, and sly, self-knowing winks.

    Compared to 50, these recordings feel narrower in range, less overtly narrative and dynamic and more impressionistic and restrained, but they are correspondingly more piercing and arrow-like in their rending impact, more concerned with an archer's deadeye aim than pyrotechnics.

    Whereas 50 featured two new songs among radical reinterpretations of material from Chapman's deep catalogue, True North includes twice as many new numbers among its quiver of eleven arrows''It's Too Late,' 'Eleuthera,' the fiery 'Bluesman,' and slow-rolling album centre piece 'Truck Song''confirming the exultant return of Chapman the songwriter. The other songs were selected from various obscure corners of Chapman's vast catalogue ('Youth Is Wasted on the Young' was previously recorded with Thurston Moore and Jim O'Rourke for a compilation, for example.) In these renderings they receive their definitive treatments, utterly transformed.

    'A rich, haunting, collection of forlorn love songs, apocalyptic picaresques, and bewitching instrumentals that marks the latest stage in a remarkable career renaissance - ¦ by the godfather of new cosmic Americana' The Guardian

    'Beatific. Haunted by memories & auguries, & communicating something of their uncanny twilight power' MOJO

    'A finely tuned piece that surveys the looming thunderclouds of mortality and the biblical gloom of the times, and quietly, unshowily transcends both' Uncut

    'A late-career triumph [of] mystery and weight' The Times
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  • Michael Chapman 'LIVE VPRO 1971' - Cargo Records UK

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    Michael Chapman 'LIVE VPRO 1971'

    £11.99

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    Blast First Petite

    Michael Chapman 'LIVE VPRO 1971'

    £11.99

    LP comes with a Download Code for the whole 90+ min concert.

    For a self confessed journeyman'musician who has spent most of his 50 year career on the road live Michael Chapman albums are curiously rare items and even more rare from his earlier years.

    This one, recorded by dutch 'hippie' radio station VPRO'on 6th May 1971 is the earliest known live recording so far discovered of Michael Chapman after he started releasing records on the legendary UK based Harvest / EMI record label in 1969.

    This period is for Chapman fans the classic period, that more recently has drawn belated media coverage and recognition in response to the more recent kudos bestowed upon Michael from the likes of Thurston Moore, Kurt Vile, Jim O'rouke and the late, great, Jack Rose.

    A beautiful clear, warm and intimate recording of Chapman duetting with long time collaborator Rick Kemp on electric bass and which documents material from all three albums in a free flowing improv inflected style very much in favour at the time.

    It is with this free flowing vibe in mind that we include with both CD & vinyl editions the complete 90 minute concert via a download code card so listeners can experience the whole set. Chapman sounds in a confident, gentle and relaxed mood. The Audience Is Initially Tentative, Possibly Unfamilar With chapman's work but gradually warming to his complex dexterous not folk'playing.

    The recordings make for a fascinating snapshot of the time, with a loose and open approach that offers a rare chance for guitar buffs to evesdrop between songs on some those bespoke Chapman guitar tunings!.

    The set begins with another very rare Chapman item - a cover version - in this case of Tim Hardin's 1965 'A Reason To Believe'. A song which had just reappeared that year as the A side of a Rod Stewart solo single (The B side being Maggie May'!).

    Tracklisting:
    Side A:
    1. Reason To Live
    2. The Aviator
    3. An Old Man Remembers

    Side B:
    4. Not So Much A Garden, More Like A Maze
    5. In The Valley

    Release Date: 23/03/2018
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  • Michael Chapman '50' - Cargo Records UK

    Paradise Of Bachelors

    Michael Chapman '50'

    £11.99

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    Paradise Of Bachelors

    Michael Chapman '50'

    £11.99

    A master guitarist and songwriter - ¦ The godfather of experimental rock guitar' MOJO

    'A world-class songwriter. Terrifically unpredictable - ¦ beyond any genre tag' Pitchfork.

    After five decades of recording and touring, veteran British songwriter and guitar sage Michael Chapman has finally made what he calls his "American record," and the aptly titled 50 now stands as his late career masterwork, a moving legacy statement by a legend.

    Backed by a collaborative group of friends and acolytes - Steve Gunn (who also produced), Nathan Bowles (Pelt, Black Twig Pickers), James Elkington (Jeff Tweedy, Richard Thompson), Jason Meagher (No-Neck Blues Band), Jimy SeiTang (Rhyton), and fellow UK songwriting luminary Bridget St John - Chapman tears into both bold renderings of new songs and radical reinterpretations of material from his revered catalog, the crack band adeptly scaling the same rarefied sonic heights of classic Harvest albums like Fully Qualified Survivor, guided by a true survivor's instinct, wit, and wisdom.

    The result is a sublime chiaroscuro self-portrait, more shadow than light, as an invigorated Chapman wrestles with weighty themes of t ravel, memory, mortality, and redemption, his world-weary whispers assuming the incandescent power of prophecy.

    The deluxe LP package includes tip-on jacket, printed inner sleeve, lyrics, and download card with two bonus tracks; the CD features a gatefold jacket, lyrics, and two non-LP bonus tracks.

    The album includes both radical reinterpretations of obscure material from Michael's catalog as well as three new compositions: 'Sometimes You Just Drive,' 'Money Trouble,' and 'Rosh Pina.' A longstanding but freshly urgent preoccupation with (as Michael sings in a beloved early tune) 'time past and time passing' is evident straightaway, from the album title and the first line of the first song through the final lyric of the record. Never before in his storied career has Chapman gazed so steadily into the abyss of time lost and regained; never before has he engaged so intimately with his legacy and the changing meanings of his own music over time.

    That he manages to do so without succumbing to nostalgia or sentimentality bears testament to the steely fortitude of his ruminative, tough-minded songs, which survey both inscape and landscape with the same stoical detachment. With 50, Chapman faces mortality with both guitar and chainsaw in hand, and endures.

    It's the unguarded sound of Orpheus descending, the snake riding the guitar down the river Styx and returning upstream to tell his story.

    Tracklisting:
    Side A:
    1. "A Spanish Incident (RamÃ"n & Durango)
    2. "Sometimes You Just Drive
    3. "The Mallard
    4. "Memphis in Winter

    Side B:
    1. "The Prospector
    2. "Falling from Grace
    3. "Money Trouble
    4. "That Time of Night
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  • Michael Chapman 'The Polar Bear' - Cargo Records UK

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    Michael Chapman 'The Polar Bear'

    £18.99

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    Michael Chapman 'The Polar Bear'

    £18.99

    Polar Bear is the third album in Chapman's series of his recent improvised musical series.

    The first being 2011's The Resurrection and Revenge of The Clayton Peacock'which Wire magazine nominated as No. 5 Album of The Year, was widely received favourably by press and fans alike as another highpoint in Chapman's late blooming career which has been boosted by the public recognition of his talents by the likes of Thurston Moore, Jack Rose & Will Oldham.

    The second album, 2012's 'Pachyderm'was a minimalist masterpiece, a single chord ambient work quite unlike anything Chapman had ever done before and gained him further widespread supportive reviews and a sell out UK tour with a solo Thurston Moore. It is from that tour that comes the duo performing the noise epic 'Six Two Thirteen' on this new album 'Polar Bear'.

    The new record also sees Chapman experimenting with cello accompaniment, and some pieces featuring his own atmospheric slide guitar work. Further proof as it were needed of Chapman's still restless search for new musical adventures.

    At 73 years old, he is playing better than ever, having started out on EMI's legendary 60's Harvest record label, he only goes to show that stick with it and eventually your time will come.

    Tracklisting:
    1. Flowers In The Oven
    2. The Polar Bear
    3. Black Dirt On A Hot Day
    4. Razorback Hat
    5. The Old Inertia Reel
    6. To See The Sea In C
    7. Six, Two, Thirteen
    8. Slidey Bit
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  • Michael Chapman 'Pachyderm' - Cargo Records UK

    Blast First Petite

    Michael Chapman 'Pachyderm'

    £10.99

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    Blast First Petite

    Michael Chapman 'Pachyderm'

    £10.99

    This album is the second in Chapman's series of his more improvised musical releases.

    The first ,The Resurrection and Revenge of The Clayton Peacock', released in 2011 was Wire magazine's No. 5 Album of The Year, was widely received favourably by press and fans alike as another highpoint in Chapman's late blooming career which has been boosted by the public recognition of his talents by the likes of Thurston Moore, Jack Rose & Will Oldham.

    'Pachyderm'is an LP length minimalist masterpiece, a single chord ambient work quite unlike anything Chapman has done before and equally as surprising and different as Peacock managed to be. The second track is remix of the first side by one Rob Antony, a young Cumbrian neighbour of Michael's.

    Together they form a mellow and gentling shifting work that easily beckons auto repeated plays.

    Chapman is now 71 years old, and playing better than ever, he started out on EMI's legendary 60's Harvest record label, turned down playing in both Elton John then David Bowie's 'Spiders' band, he only goes to show as per the recent rediscovery of the talents of his other contemporaries Roy Harper or John Martyn eventually your time will come.
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