The Parsonage is the first ever choir to record a Onder Invloed session. You could say it’s a mile stone. Ro’s done a brilliant job on the recordings. The location was an art gallery called Project Ability, one of Scotland’s leading specialist arts organisations. They’ve been supporting people with different kinds of disabilaties to take part in art projects since 1984.

I was looking forward to this session ever since Davie Lawson had me listen to their MySpace when he came to Utrecht in February. A bold collection of individuals who basically just love to sing, performing old songs they love, wether it’s Gram Parsons, Woody Guthrie, Hank Williams or even Joy Division. Their joy in singing has gotten them far. For example: they sang on an album by Echo and the Bunnymen and performed live on stage with Rod Stewart.

Their rehearsal nights are on Mondays, but because Ro and I landed on Monday night late, The Parsonage, or at least 30 of them, changed their schedules to Tuesday for this session. We’re happy they did, and so will you after watching their versions of some straight up classics.

The first ever - and maybe the only ever - choir to record an Onder Invloed session. Enjoy. Photos can be found here.

The Parsonage - If I Can Dream - Walter Earl Brown / Elvis Presley

The Parsonage - Lost Highway - Leon Payne

The Parsonage - She - Gram Parsons

The Parsonage - You Don’t Miss Your Water - William Bell

Audio by Ro Halfhide.

Ross played songs by The Band and Elliott Smith and one of his own songs. All one-takes, despite having a bit of a cold. A perfect beginning of the Glasgow week, which you can read all about on the special website http://glasgow.onderinvloed.com.

Some photos of Ross Clark and Oran Mor can be found here.

Ross Clark - The Weight - The Band

Ross Clark - St. Ides Heaven - Elliott Smith

Ross Clark - Dark Corners

Filmed & edited by Matthijs van der Ven
Audio by Ro Halfhide
Preparations by Davie Lawson, Paul Tasker & Iona MacDonald
Thanks to Oran Mor

After finishing the two sessions withing one hour, Les Johnson took us for a ride through the city. Having lived there all his life, he had a lot of stories to tell. We drove past the Rangers stadium, had a look inside the workshop where Davie works, took some photos of him pretending to jump from a bridge (he does that a lot, you’ll find when seeing the documentary about him, which is due later this year), and drove past places like the big music venue Barrowlands.

Interesting guy, Les Johnson, a million different sunglasses and as many good stories to share. Like a friend who got threatened by the maffia and told them just to shoot him, while facing a gun from up close, and so they did. Stuff like that.

Did I already mention the sunglasses? Yes I did. The sun has been shining like crazy all week. Still not sure if we flew to Glasgow or Rio de Janeiro. After the previous days full of running around and filming a lot, it was nice to have an early start today, so we could finish around three o’clock in the afternoon. We had a nice quiet night; Ro, Davie, Iona and I went out to dinner and headed to the State Bar afterwards, which closes at midnight.

See some of the photos we made today here. Some of them are made by Ro, some by Davie and some by me.

Matthijs

We did a really interesting interview at their garden house which they turned into an office. After that, Tony drove us around a little bit and showed us the practise room where the band he manages, Mr Kil, is doing some recordings. Paul thinks they’re ‘shit hot’ and I can’t disagree. Drummer Paul Crawford told us how the recordings are going and showed his skills on the drum kit.

After lunch, Paul went down to the borders for a weekend of guitar teaching to some kids and Iona and I went to interview Malcolm Lindsay, who produced the Doghouse Roses debut album ‘How’ve you been (all this time)?’ and who’s worked with e.g. the Willard Grant Conspiracy. Lindsay’s collaborated with a lot of Glasgow musicians over the years and is a very busy man, composing music for movies and television shows.

Fighting traffic jams and racing like a Formula 1 driver, Iona got us to the Trans Europe Cafe, where the interiors are made of old bus seats and other parts. We recorded some songs with The Dirt, a remarkable duo who were good at doing one-takes, as are many of the bands we recorded this week, by the way. His voice as deep as can be, nicely accompanied by hers. You’ll probably either love it or hate it, Ro and I are believers.

The second session on Friday is the one with John Alexander, who’s just released his debut album. John’s a friend of Paul and Iona, so we decided to record him in their appartment. Following the good example of fellow videomaker from Utrecht, Gerben Schmidt and his ‘Badkamersessies’, we put John in the bathroom, which is probably the most bizarre location we filmed in this week. Iona did the works with all the candles in the bathtub, which almost set both our cloths on fire, trying to film and sing from the edge of the bathtub.

Iona joined John on one of the songs, and before we knew it, the session was done. While Davie and Ro decided to be wise and go home, as it was already after midnight; John, Iona and I went to the State Bar for some pints, which resulted in more beer in some other pub and ended with Iona forcing me into drinking tequila. Lesson learned the next morning: don’t drink tequila in the middle of the night if you’ve got two more sessions at 10 o’clock the next morning…

Matthijs

This preview is a part of their version of Neil Diamond’s ‘Solitary Man’, previously covered by Chris Isaak, HIM and Johnny Cash.

They gave us a tour around the building, we filmed a student playing the bagpipe, we got a stack of albums brought out by the college and we saw Wooden Box record the vocals for their upcoming album. A couple of really talented bearded guys, keep an eye on them. After the tour and the interview, we went back home to sit in the sun for a while.

While Ro was sleeping in the grass, I edited some photos and tried to get Final Cut Pro to work. I didn’t succeed…

We had a good night after the rest we had in the afternoon. First Ro, Paul and I went to the album launch of The State Broadcasters. They’re a group of really good musicians, and had a big crowd turn up for the release of their debut album. We had to leave early to be at the Laurieston bar, were we were going to be locked in with the magnificent band The Starlets.

We already met some of the bandmembers the night before at the open mic in the Halt Bar. Singer Biff is great, he seems shy, talks quit softly and only looks up when he’s making a joke. Something he’s really good at by the way. Just as singin; the session will - without any doubt - end up as one of the public’s favourites. A band I would try to book live in The Netherlands any day.

In the movie ‘Young Adam’, featuring Ewan McGregor, there’s a scene that’s filmed in the same bar, on exactly the same spot as we filmed The Starlets. Brilliant covers. By the time the session - which was filmed in the presence of three cheery elderly people - ended at 01.30h. After having Guinness and some other beers we went home around 3 o’clock and Paul and I went out again to get some kebab.

There’re some great photos too, made by Davie and me.

Matthijs