"While You've Still Got It Out, Barry...."

Big thanks to everybody who made the Rattlebag Yule song session such a great evening. Pretty much all our regulars braved freezing weather to be there and we had some new faces (and voices) too. Drinks were drunk, mince pies were scoffed and the atmosphere was really rather special.
Special thanks must go to Barry Dransfield who played and sang so beautifully that we didn't really let him stop. Absolutely brilliant.

Christmas Song Session!

Our next "Rattlin' Good Sing" at the Stag in Hastings' All Saints Street will be on Thursday the 16th of December. We'll begin at the earlier time of 8.30. The theme is, of course, Seasonal Songs.

Please come to sing and listen, everybody's welcome.

A Reminder

Just to let you know once again that the link to the online CD shop is now...

http://www.chipperfieldjones.co.uk/shop.asp

..so please ignore any other older links that you might be tempted to use.

Thanks!

PS You do realise what a perfect Christmas gift a Rattlebag CD would make, don't you?

We Bring You A King With A Head Of Gold

....is the title of Cold Spring's follow up to the award winning Folk compilation "John Barleycorn Reborn" . Subtitled "Dark Britannica II" this new double CD represents 34 tracks and 146 minutes of music from what they describe as "the best of current British Folk artists". Do they mean us? I think they do!

Go here to take a first look....

http://www.coldspring.co.uk/discography/csr100cd.php

Three of the songs on the album (including ours, folks) are linked to mp3 samples so you can have a quick listen before you buy!

"We Bring You A King With A Head of Gold" is available from November 29th. Just in time for Yule!

Another Rattling Good Singaround!

The Rattlebag singaround always takes place on the third Thursday of the month at our second home: The back bar at the Stag in All Saints Street, Hastings.
This means that the next one will be on Thursday October the 21st. We hope to see you all there: Bring a song or two or just bring yourself and have drink and a listen. It's always a good laugh. We'll start around nine.

Shop Update (new link)

As you know, the new Rattlebag CD is now being sold at the Angles/Climax Ceilidh Band/Meridian shop.

The shop has a new link and here it is...

www.chipperfieldjones.co.uk/shop/


Get in there and buy some stuff. Hurry. Christmas will be here almost as soon as you've read this link.

Rattlebag featured on new Cold Spring Collection.

Three years ago Cold Spring Records released the compilation, "John Barleycorn Reborn". Described as a collection of "Dark Britannica", this was a fascinating double CD set that included a wide range of music from acoustic to folk rock to the electronica and avant garde pieces more often associated with the label.

This combination of traditional and newly written material was a fantastic listen and critically well received. Now the same label has completed work on the follow up double CD collection, "We Bring You A King With A Head Of Gold". Rattlebag's song "The Tyburn Sisters" - a retelling of the old murder ballad "Two Sisters" given a psychogeographical twist and hot-wired into a traditional Swedish folk tune - is featured on this new collection. As far as we know, the CDs go into production this week. Watch this space.

Meanwhile, check out Cold Spring....

http://www.coldspring.co.uk/

It's a terrific label with a wide range of good music on offer, from the traditional to the dark and rather more hair raising. We've also added the label to the list of interesting links to stuff we like on the right of this page. Have a look!

Buy Rattlebag CDs Online!

As many of our friends know, the latest Rattlebag CD, "Shifting Shapes" has been available since the Spring. We're pretty pleased with it and with the balance of material it showcases from the traditional songs and gospel classics to the pieces where we've sourced unusual traditional melodies and given them our own lyrics. Getting it out there to people who might like a copy has been a problem, though. Not any more. We're delighted to say that from now on, you can buy Rattlebag's "Shifting Shapes" from right here:

www.chipperfieldjones.co.uk/shop/

This is the Angles/Climax Ceilidh Band/Meridian shop and we'd like to thank Richard Jones - who also produced and engineered the CD - for sharing his online retail space with us.

Four Star review in Rock n' Reel!

Get yourself down to your local WH Smith's and grab a copy of the latest Rock & Reel magazine where the new Rattlebag CD "Shifting Shapes" has been given a very favorable review. Or, if you'd rather save your money and not risk being informed that the shop "isn't a library", you could always read it here. This is an accurate transcript. All odd bits of prose and scandalous charges of being "middle aged" are theirs:

"Displaying eclecticism and unpredictability equally, this is the second collection by a formidable a capella quintet formed by middle-aged denizens of a Hastings pub and its folk club. They trade mostly in overhauls and, in some cases, virtual rewrites of traditional songs, but have the unmitigated audacity to throw in arrangements of, say, Cerys Matthew's 'Chardonnay' - on their 2008 maiden 'Girls Who are Drinkers - and 'The Scarlet Tide' from Elvis Costello's Delivery Man.
While the latter is sandwiched between the late Peter Bellamy's 'I Once Lived in Service' and 'The Tyburn Sisters' - Rattlebag lyrics to a Swedish melody - the run-on effect is seamless. It's the same when gospel ditty 'I'll Fly Away' follows the late mediaeval 'Auchindoun', owing to the ensemble impregnating any given musical genre with an ingrained originality.
Paradoxically the only issue I have is with the programming. Though led by Lynne Heffernan's assured soprano, downbeat 'Bright Morning Star' (from the Oysterband portfolio) might not have been the soundest choice of opening salvo, other than its evocation of the pageant of sunrise. Yet this is a minor criticism of an offering that can only enhance growing regional and, potentially, national renown."

So there you go.

Fancy a copy of "Shifting Shapes"? Getting one has just become a bit easier. More on this later!

What We Did On Our Holidays....

Autumn is with us but Rattlebag are still on a bit of a high following a successful and very enjoyable Summer. We rolled up at this years' excellent Towersey Village Festival where we had a great time performing at the open stage before being asked to sing at the Church Hall. Following this, we were selected to open the final concert on the festival Main Stage. We sang 'Tyburn Sisters', our murder ballad, after which Jackie Oates took to the stage followed by Martin Carthy's group Brass Monkey. It was all rather fab.

Ch-Ch-Ch-Changes.....

.... as David Bowie once said. Probably.

Hello again. It's been a while, hasn't it? After a few technical glitches and a very busy and eventful summer for the 'rats, we're back in the Blogosphere.

This is just the first of several updates although it's a bit of a sad one. In May Rattlebag said goodbye to Meg, who left the group. We do still miss her, but we always knew it was going to happen one day. Most of our friends are probably already aware of this change but it's worth blogging about, we think.

The good news is, we're all still in touch and Meg joined us recently at our spiritual home, The Stag in All Saints Street. The occasion was Rattlebag's fifth birthday celebration where much red wine, chocolate and birthday cake was consumed, many laughs were had and one or two songs were even sung.

A date for your diary.....

Rattlebag are delighted with the success of the regular singaround at The Stag in Hastings' All Saints Street. Each evening has been different and every one of them has been great fun with singers of different styles and abilities bringing a wide range of songs to the table.

The next one is on Thursday March the 18th. We start at nine.

All Quiet on The Rattlebag Front

Followers of this Blog (we know you're out there) may have noticed a lack of updates recently. As well as having a great time hosting the regular back bar singaround at The Stag in Hastings' All Saints Street (more on that later), Rattlebag have been busy rehearsing and recording material for a new CD. Early mixes, produced and engineered by Richard Jones of the Climax Ceilidh Band, are sounding very promising.