CREDITS
Unless otherwise noted:
Singing and playing by CG
Songs written by CG, published by Gregsongs, administered by Bug Music Ltd (UK), except 16: written by CG &
Boo Hewerdine, published by Gregsongs, administered by Bug Music Ltd (UK) & Chrysalis Music
Recorded & Mixed by CG
Produced by CLIVE GREGSON
Mastered by JIM DeMAIN at Yes Master, Nashville, TN
Design by: STEVE KNEE at Blade Design, London, England
Photographs by: Phil Barnes, Andrew Cleal, Jim Harrington, Marcus McCallen, Griifin Norman, Mark Tucker
Unless otherwise noted:
Singing and playing by CG
Songs written by CG, published by Gregsongs, administered by Bug Music Ltd (UK), except 16: written by CG &
Boo Hewerdine, published by Gregsongs, administered by Bug Music Ltd (UK) & Chrysalis Music
Recorded & Mixed by CG
Produced by CLIVE GREGSON
Mastered by JIM DeMAIN at Yes Master, Nashville, TN
Design by: STEVE KNEE at Blade Design, London, England
Photographs by: Phil Barnes, Andrew Cleal, Jim Harrington, Marcus McCallen, Griifin Norman, Mark Tucker
| THE BEST OF CLIVE GREGSON |
SONG NOTES
01: "I LOVE THIS TOWN"
Title song of my fifth solo album. I don't own the rights to that album so I've used the demo recordings of the
relevant songs here. This is actually the version of the song that was the template for the Nanci Griffith recording,
which is perhaps one of my better known cover recordings. I recorded this at home on a Tascam 488 multitrack
cassette machine and mixed it down to a Revox B77. Talk about old technology! It's not about anywhere in
particular... any town that you've had enough of will work just fine.
02: "ANTIDOTE"
A rare thing for me... a genuinely cheerful song. All the way through. I cut a version of this with Boo Hewerdine and
Eddi Reader in Nashville when we had one of our "roughly once every seven years" get togethers. That version
never saw the light of day so I recorded the song again solo for "Comfort & Joy". And there's yet another version
of this on the Acoustic Affair CD, an acoustic duet with Jackie Sharp. Check it out.... Can't think of any covers of
this one. Maybe that's why I keep cutting it myself! Recorded at home on a Roland VS1680 digital workstation.
03: "HOME IS WHERE THE HEART IS"
The 7" vinyl single version.... remember them? I can't recall ever owning a copy of the single..... I tracked one
down at an online retailer a while ago and tried to buy it. Unfortunately, the record never arrived.... so if anyone
has one they'd like to get rid of, let me know! Written on the old upright piano at my parent's house. I can probably
count the number of live shows where I haven't played this song on the fingers of one hand. Check out
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gDs9xinQdIM for the "Old Grey Whistle" TV performance and
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DE8HrP20esU for a more recent solo performance. The original track was
recorded and mixed at Pennine Studios in Oldham by Paul Adshead and features Phil Barnes and Christine
Collister on backing vocals and Sarah Tuakli on French Horn. The unedited version is on my first solo CD,
"Strange Persuasions". The song seemed to become something of a folk club standard for a while and there are
quite a few cover recordings, perhaps the best known of which is by Fairport Convention.
04: "TROUBLE WITH LOVE"
My solo demo of the song that became the fourth Any Trouble single for Stiff. Between tours, I got into the habit of
going up to Pennine to record simple versions of new songs, just me and a drum machine. And Paul Adshead at
the controls, of course. It seems to me in retrospect that a lot of those demos are more relaxed and vibey than the
subsequent group recordings.... and this song certainly changed enormously by the time it appeared on the
band's "Wheels In Motion" album. Different words, different chords, different feel, different melody.... This version
was included on my second solo outing, "Welcome To The Workhouse' which was essentially a collection of
demos such as this.
05: "FRED ASTAIRE"
I wrote this as a result of two rather strange Nashville experiences... the first being that I was recruited by a
telephone sales marketer to take a course of ballroom dancing classes... and the second being that a couple of
days after my first dancing class, I was introduced to Peter Skellern, that most English of singer-songwriters, at
The Station Inn, Nashville's premier bluegrass venue. I have no idea what he was doing there.... but Peter's
presence reminded me of his "Astaire" album, where he sings songs initially made famous by Fred. A great
record.... Anyway, I jumbled up all these events and came up with this song, another enduring live favourite. Initially
recorded at home on the Tascam 488, then bounced to a Roland VS 880 and finally bounced to a Tascam DA 88
so that John Wood could mix it back in England, along with the rest of the "Happy Hour" album. Norma Waterson
recorded a lovely version of this on her album "The Very Thought Of You".
06: "CORNERSTONE"
Lead off track to my last solo outing, "Long Story Short".... if memory serves it started life as a mandolin noodling
session, which is perhaps why it features the three chords I can actually play on the mandolin! A song about
enduring love.... if only real life was like this! Recorded at home on a Roland VS 880 machine.
07: "TOUCH & GO"
Another Pennine demo. I don't think it's overstating the case to say that it was this track (and my demo for "I'll Be
Your Man") that secured the EMI America deal for Any Trouble. We chased this demo valiantly on the subsequent
album... and technically, there's no question that the latter recording was better. But for sheer vibe and that
indefinable something, this version is pretty hard to beat. Two things inspired the writing of the song.... I was very
taken with the OMD song "Enola Gay", which was entirely built around the 1/6m/4/5 chord progression and
thought I'd have a go at trying the same thing.... and I was also influenced by a spate of drum machine and
keyboard based records that I thought were really soulful despite the lack of much in the way of "real"
instruments.... Marvin Gaye's "Sexual Healing" being a great example. Some of the sounds that I played in by
hand would mostly likely have been sequenced in perfect time in more "professional" recordings... and what I
later referred to as the "percolator" is pretty shambolic here! Still.... it did the job and still raises a smile. Kim
Carnes recorded a lovely version of this song on the album after her multi million mega selling album featuring the
mighty "Bette Davis Eyes"....
08: "CAMDEN TOWN"
From "People & Places", the first album I made after moving to the USA in 1992. My comfort zones being what
they were back then, I of course made the album back in the UK. I gathered together some familiar faces....
Martin Hughes on drums and percussion, Ruari McFarlane on bass and Andy Whelan on electric guitar plus Paul
Adshead behind the desk and we spent a week in rural Wales at Loco Studios, a place I'd worked in once
before, on Boo Hewerdine's "Ignorance" album. We had a smashing time....and then Paul and I took the tapes
back to his place and finished off the vocals etc.... In a truly twilight zone moment, Paul found a studio in
Manchester that he wanted to mix the project in. We showed up to take a look and I realised that the studio was
actually built into what had been the music department of the last school I'd taught at before I spared many
children the awful experience of my attempts to teach them and jumped ship to work in a dole office for a couple
of years before "turning pro" in 1980... Another live favourite, I really can't remember what inspired this song. I
suspect it was one that leaped from the air fully formed.... my favourite kind!
09: "FINGERLESS GLOVES"
I actually heard this on BBC Radio Two last year.... almost crashed the car! Based on a true story... I heard a
busker singing "Home Is Where The Heart Is" in Stockport shopping mall one day and off to the races I went. I
think every single fact was actually changed in this final version... but I can still see the Stockport serenader
whenever I play this song. Recorded at home on the Roland VS 1680... banjo and accordion to the fore. Another
folk club favourite, apparently.
10: "JERICHO JUNCTION"
Another "ILTT" demo... recorded at home on the trusty Tascam 488 cassette machine. We ran this in live on the
1992 Boo, Clive and Eddi tour.... a much more acoustic version. Pretty complicated tune.... I was really into key
changes back then: I'd read somewhere that many Motown hits featured modulations. I spent ages "flying in" the
backwards stuff from a Sony Walkman. We're not talking hi-fi here.... I think The Feeling should have a crack at
this.... anybody know how to get it to them?
11: "JEWEL IN YOUR CROWN"
This song was a longstanding favourite in the Gregson & Collister live show. "Strange Persuasions" was an
album that came at something of a transitional period for me.... at the time I recorded it, I didn't really know that
Any Trouble was pretty much over. By the time the album was released, I was a solo artist and about six months
later I was in a duo with Christine! Things tend to not move quite so quickly these days... A song of frustrated
ambitions.... Phil Barnes and Christine Collister on backing vocals, recorded at Pennine with Paul Adshead
engineering. Jim DeMain later remixed the track in Nashville for the US release of the album.
12: "COOL COOL RAIN"
A very late addition to the "Long Story Short" album.... I cut the song at home on the Roland VS 880 and tacked it
on to the end of the sequence for no good reason that I can remember.... At the mastering session, Jim DeMain
added it to the first reference disc he made for me. And there it stayed.... I play this a lot live... it's simple, direct
and seems to work. That's about the size of it!
13: "FEATHERS"
I decided to use the demo version of this rather than the studio version found on "People & Places"... it just has
something about it that I like. I spent a fair bit of 1999 on the road with Plainsong and we played this song a lot. It's
a grizzly little story with a tune that certainly puts my notoriously dodgy upper vocal register to the test! The tune
that is featured in the solo sections is probably lifted from some trad song or other but I'm damned if I can identify
it. No doubt Mr P. Edant of Slough will drop me a note and give me chapter and verse! Recorded at home on the
Tascam 488.
14: "SUMMER RAIN"
In the period between Any Trouble folding and the release of "Strange Persuasions", I toured America as part of
Richard Thompson's band. Happy days, great memories... Richard would very graciously feature the band
members during the show and this song was pretty much a permanent feature of the set. Check out
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nlvjv_D3V5k for a clip. The song came about as the result of a conversation I
had with a friend about his child custody case. Andy Ebsworth on drums... which we recorded at The Greenhouse
Studios in North London... Paul Gadd engineering. I then took the tapes up to Pennine where I added everything
else, with Paul Adshead engineering. Phil Barnes played the sax.
15: "TATTOO"
My dad's favourite song.... well, his favourite of my songs, anyway. Last of the "ILTT" demos and in some ways,
the one that's least like the album version. I got the idea for this one from a roadside sign that Nancy, my ex-wife, spotted in Kentucky.... "Charlie's Tattoos - Done While You Wait"..... couldn't make it up, could you? Another mandolin workout.... I actually learned a fourth chord in order to play this one. Recorded at home on the Tascam 488. I pulled that machine out the other day.... it still works perfectly. Pretty amazing...
16: "BLACK TRAIN COMING"
Co-written with Boo Hewerdine. We played this at quite a few of our duo gigs back in the day and Boo always
sang it. I felt that "People & Places" needed an up-tempo number, so I had a crack at the vocals. The band is
really great on this one.... Martin Hughes on drums, Roar McFarlane on bass and Andy Whelan on lead guitar.
Great solo from Andy and at the end of Martin's "man falling over drum kit" break, I always want to shout "Oooh
Yah, Oooh Yah!".... A cheerful little toetapper about impending death. Engineered by Paul Adshead, recorded at
Loco and Stable Music, mixed in my old classroom.
17: "COMFORT & JOY"
One of my personal favourites.... one of those songs that sprang into being pretty much fully formed. I tend to only
play this live around Christmas time.... which is pretty daft, really. Also one of the few recordings I've made where
I really wouldn't change anything much in retrospect.... it came together very quickly and easily. Recorded at home
on the Roland VS 1680. I went mad on this and played two organ parts.... I love playing organ, it's totally primal
for me. Read into that what you will!
18: "THERE COMES A TIME"
I often close shows with this song. Short and somewhat bittersweet. When I made the leap from the analogue
world of the Tascam 488 to the all digital Roland VS 880 machine, this was the first song I recorded, more as a
means of getting to know the new technology than anything else. Recorded at home and then mixed by John
Wood, it almost inevitably ended up on the "Happy Hour" album. I originally intended to close the album with "Until
We Meet Again", another "farewell" song, but once I had the final mix of this tune, there was no way I could leave it
off the album. It seemed perfectly logical to close this compilation with it too. Hope you agree....
Clive Gregson, Houston, TX, July 2008
01: "I LOVE THIS TOWN"
Title song of my fifth solo album. I don't own the rights to that album so I've used the demo recordings of the
relevant songs here. This is actually the version of the song that was the template for the Nanci Griffith recording,
which is perhaps one of my better known cover recordings. I recorded this at home on a Tascam 488 multitrack
cassette machine and mixed it down to a Revox B77. Talk about old technology! It's not about anywhere in
particular... any town that you've had enough of will work just fine.
02: "ANTIDOTE"
A rare thing for me... a genuinely cheerful song. All the way through. I cut a version of this with Boo Hewerdine and
Eddi Reader in Nashville when we had one of our "roughly once every seven years" get togethers. That version
never saw the light of day so I recorded the song again solo for "Comfort & Joy". And there's yet another version
of this on the Acoustic Affair CD, an acoustic duet with Jackie Sharp. Check it out.... Can't think of any covers of
this one. Maybe that's why I keep cutting it myself! Recorded at home on a Roland VS1680 digital workstation.
03: "HOME IS WHERE THE HEART IS"
The 7" vinyl single version.... remember them? I can't recall ever owning a copy of the single..... I tracked one
down at an online retailer a while ago and tried to buy it. Unfortunately, the record never arrived.... so if anyone
has one they'd like to get rid of, let me know! Written on the old upright piano at my parent's house. I can probably
count the number of live shows where I haven't played this song on the fingers of one hand. Check out
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gDs9xinQdIM for the "Old Grey Whistle" TV performance and
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DE8HrP20esU for a more recent solo performance. The original track was
recorded and mixed at Pennine Studios in Oldham by Paul Adshead and features Phil Barnes and Christine
Collister on backing vocals and Sarah Tuakli on French Horn. The unedited version is on my first solo CD,
"Strange Persuasions". The song seemed to become something of a folk club standard for a while and there are
quite a few cover recordings, perhaps the best known of which is by Fairport Convention.
04: "TROUBLE WITH LOVE"
My solo demo of the song that became the fourth Any Trouble single for Stiff. Between tours, I got into the habit of
going up to Pennine to record simple versions of new songs, just me and a drum machine. And Paul Adshead at
the controls, of course. It seems to me in retrospect that a lot of those demos are more relaxed and vibey than the
subsequent group recordings.... and this song certainly changed enormously by the time it appeared on the
band's "Wheels In Motion" album. Different words, different chords, different feel, different melody.... This version
was included on my second solo outing, "Welcome To The Workhouse' which was essentially a collection of
demos such as this.
05: "FRED ASTAIRE"
I wrote this as a result of two rather strange Nashville experiences... the first being that I was recruited by a
telephone sales marketer to take a course of ballroom dancing classes... and the second being that a couple of
days after my first dancing class, I was introduced to Peter Skellern, that most English of singer-songwriters, at
The Station Inn, Nashville's premier bluegrass venue. I have no idea what he was doing there.... but Peter's
presence reminded me of his "Astaire" album, where he sings songs initially made famous by Fred. A great
record.... Anyway, I jumbled up all these events and came up with this song, another enduring live favourite. Initially
recorded at home on the Tascam 488, then bounced to a Roland VS 880 and finally bounced to a Tascam DA 88
so that John Wood could mix it back in England, along with the rest of the "Happy Hour" album. Norma Waterson
recorded a lovely version of this on her album "The Very Thought Of You".
06: "CORNERSTONE"
Lead off track to my last solo outing, "Long Story Short".... if memory serves it started life as a mandolin noodling
session, which is perhaps why it features the three chords I can actually play on the mandolin! A song about
enduring love.... if only real life was like this! Recorded at home on a Roland VS 880 machine.
07: "TOUCH & GO"
Another Pennine demo. I don't think it's overstating the case to say that it was this track (and my demo for "I'll Be
Your Man") that secured the EMI America deal for Any Trouble. We chased this demo valiantly on the subsequent
album... and technically, there's no question that the latter recording was better. But for sheer vibe and that
indefinable something, this version is pretty hard to beat. Two things inspired the writing of the song.... I was very
taken with the OMD song "Enola Gay", which was entirely built around the 1/6m/4/5 chord progression and
thought I'd have a go at trying the same thing.... and I was also influenced by a spate of drum machine and
keyboard based records that I thought were really soulful despite the lack of much in the way of "real"
instruments.... Marvin Gaye's "Sexual Healing" being a great example. Some of the sounds that I played in by
hand would mostly likely have been sequenced in perfect time in more "professional" recordings... and what I
later referred to as the "percolator" is pretty shambolic here! Still.... it did the job and still raises a smile. Kim
Carnes recorded a lovely version of this song on the album after her multi million mega selling album featuring the
mighty "Bette Davis Eyes"....
08: "CAMDEN TOWN"
From "People & Places", the first album I made after moving to the USA in 1992. My comfort zones being what
they were back then, I of course made the album back in the UK. I gathered together some familiar faces....
Martin Hughes on drums and percussion, Ruari McFarlane on bass and Andy Whelan on electric guitar plus Paul
Adshead behind the desk and we spent a week in rural Wales at Loco Studios, a place I'd worked in once
before, on Boo Hewerdine's "Ignorance" album. We had a smashing time....and then Paul and I took the tapes
back to his place and finished off the vocals etc.... In a truly twilight zone moment, Paul found a studio in
Manchester that he wanted to mix the project in. We showed up to take a look and I realised that the studio was
actually built into what had been the music department of the last school I'd taught at before I spared many
children the awful experience of my attempts to teach them and jumped ship to work in a dole office for a couple
of years before "turning pro" in 1980... Another live favourite, I really can't remember what inspired this song. I
suspect it was one that leaped from the air fully formed.... my favourite kind!
09: "FINGERLESS GLOVES"
I actually heard this on BBC Radio Two last year.... almost crashed the car! Based on a true story... I heard a
busker singing "Home Is Where The Heart Is" in Stockport shopping mall one day and off to the races I went. I
think every single fact was actually changed in this final version... but I can still see the Stockport serenader
whenever I play this song. Recorded at home on the Roland VS 1680... banjo and accordion to the fore. Another
folk club favourite, apparently.
10: "JERICHO JUNCTION"
Another "ILTT" demo... recorded at home on the trusty Tascam 488 cassette machine. We ran this in live on the
1992 Boo, Clive and Eddi tour.... a much more acoustic version. Pretty complicated tune.... I was really into key
changes back then: I'd read somewhere that many Motown hits featured modulations. I spent ages "flying in" the
backwards stuff from a Sony Walkman. We're not talking hi-fi here.... I think The Feeling should have a crack at
this.... anybody know how to get it to them?
11: "JEWEL IN YOUR CROWN"
This song was a longstanding favourite in the Gregson & Collister live show. "Strange Persuasions" was an
album that came at something of a transitional period for me.... at the time I recorded it, I didn't really know that
Any Trouble was pretty much over. By the time the album was released, I was a solo artist and about six months
later I was in a duo with Christine! Things tend to not move quite so quickly these days... A song of frustrated
ambitions.... Phil Barnes and Christine Collister on backing vocals, recorded at Pennine with Paul Adshead
engineering. Jim DeMain later remixed the track in Nashville for the US release of the album.
12: "COOL COOL RAIN"
A very late addition to the "Long Story Short" album.... I cut the song at home on the Roland VS 880 and tacked it
on to the end of the sequence for no good reason that I can remember.... At the mastering session, Jim DeMain
added it to the first reference disc he made for me. And there it stayed.... I play this a lot live... it's simple, direct
and seems to work. That's about the size of it!
13: "FEATHERS"
I decided to use the demo version of this rather than the studio version found on "People & Places"... it just has
something about it that I like. I spent a fair bit of 1999 on the road with Plainsong and we played this song a lot. It's
a grizzly little story with a tune that certainly puts my notoriously dodgy upper vocal register to the test! The tune
that is featured in the solo sections is probably lifted from some trad song or other but I'm damned if I can identify
it. No doubt Mr P. Edant of Slough will drop me a note and give me chapter and verse! Recorded at home on the
Tascam 488.
14: "SUMMER RAIN"
In the period between Any Trouble folding and the release of "Strange Persuasions", I toured America as part of
Richard Thompson's band. Happy days, great memories... Richard would very graciously feature the band
members during the show and this song was pretty much a permanent feature of the set. Check out
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nlvjv_D3V5k for a clip. The song came about as the result of a conversation I
had with a friend about his child custody case. Andy Ebsworth on drums... which we recorded at The Greenhouse
Studios in North London... Paul Gadd engineering. I then took the tapes up to Pennine where I added everything
else, with Paul Adshead engineering. Phil Barnes played the sax.
15: "TATTOO"
My dad's favourite song.... well, his favourite of my songs, anyway. Last of the "ILTT" demos and in some ways,
the one that's least like the album version. I got the idea for this one from a roadside sign that Nancy, my ex-wife, spotted in Kentucky.... "Charlie's Tattoos - Done While You Wait"..... couldn't make it up, could you? Another mandolin workout.... I actually learned a fourth chord in order to play this one. Recorded at home on the Tascam 488. I pulled that machine out the other day.... it still works perfectly. Pretty amazing...
16: "BLACK TRAIN COMING"
Co-written with Boo Hewerdine. We played this at quite a few of our duo gigs back in the day and Boo always
sang it. I felt that "People & Places" needed an up-tempo number, so I had a crack at the vocals. The band is
really great on this one.... Martin Hughes on drums, Roar McFarlane on bass and Andy Whelan on lead guitar.
Great solo from Andy and at the end of Martin's "man falling over drum kit" break, I always want to shout "Oooh
Yah, Oooh Yah!".... A cheerful little toetapper about impending death. Engineered by Paul Adshead, recorded at
Loco and Stable Music, mixed in my old classroom.
17: "COMFORT & JOY"
One of my personal favourites.... one of those songs that sprang into being pretty much fully formed. I tend to only
play this live around Christmas time.... which is pretty daft, really. Also one of the few recordings I've made where
I really wouldn't change anything much in retrospect.... it came together very quickly and easily. Recorded at home
on the Roland VS 1680. I went mad on this and played two organ parts.... I love playing organ, it's totally primal
for me. Read into that what you will!
18: "THERE COMES A TIME"
I often close shows with this song. Short and somewhat bittersweet. When I made the leap from the analogue
world of the Tascam 488 to the all digital Roland VS 880 machine, this was the first song I recorded, more as a
means of getting to know the new technology than anything else. Recorded at home and then mixed by John
Wood, it almost inevitably ended up on the "Happy Hour" album. I originally intended to close the album with "Until
We Meet Again", another "farewell" song, but once I had the final mix of this tune, there was no way I could leave it
off the album. It seemed perfectly logical to close this compilation with it too. Hope you agree....
Clive Gregson, Houston, TX, July 2008
