Calgary Bay

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Hi All
I'm writing this sitting at a wooden bench that overlooks Calgary Bay, on the west coast of the Isle Of Mull.
I'm looking out at the Atlantic ocean roaring away. I've taken a walk through a path created by sheep shit
down to the ocean to record the waves. On one take i even got a bird squawking. I'm after the cries of the authentic seagods.
(Apparently i did just write that…!)
I love all the different shades of green here. It's so peaceful and now i've gone and ruined that by playing
The Water album on my Mac to the curious sheep. I'm not sure if they think the production on this one is tighter and it's my best album to date, but I'd hope so. Who can tell what goes on between their ears? I'm at that odd stage when the album
is finished and the finished copies with the artwork etc are waiting for me in London, but nobody has really heard it. Tony Benn's voice is crackling out of the speakers, bringing the album to a close.
I should really put something else on, but then listening to it here, at this place, feels special. It's as though i can really hear it. The white sands down at the water (the physical kind) were softer than usual under foot, more like a form of Hebridean quick sand. There was a small dog running about barking in circles
as though he knew something none of the rest of us do.
Now I've got 'Band Of Horses' playing. Their first album. I think there's another one out around now. There are real horses in the distance. I wonder what they'd make of a band of people from Seattle and South Carolina taking their name. If they have any quarrels with it then they should have done it first. They're already an album behind.
The recording up here really has been fantastic. 10 full-on days, but every part of it has been great fun. I probably wont appreciate what i've done until i leave the island. There feels like a few gems. I wont say too much more about it till after The Water album comes out, I should focus on those gems for the next while, but some time next year you'll hear what i've been doing back home.
Last night i also got involved in a music workshop with some of the local kids. I taught them The Final Arrears and they'll keep playing it each week. Who knows where they'll take it. But i could identify with the sight of the boys leaving to walk home with their electric guitars over their backs, the rain coming in sideways, with no cases to take the brunt. I was flying by the seat of my pants a bit as i'd just come back all sweaty from playing a game of football with some of the local guys i grew up with (11-10). The new all-weather park in Tobermory was opened last summer and it is named after my Dad. It lights up the centre of the town at night as though a UFO has come to visit. Who knows, maybe Balamory reaches further than we know…
I'll upload a shot of the view I'm looking at here at Calgary Bay.
My next post will carry more of what you need to know about The Water release.
Colin

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