Weird City Electric Company

It's been a very long time coming, but finally we're able to release Garry Jones' Gloryland on CD. 

After much interest and performances at Glastonbury Festival, a BBC introducing session at Londons historic Madia Vale Studio, and a soon to be aired performance on the Hollyoaks Music estival. Vienna Ditto release their debut single 'Long Way Down' in a collaborative release, with Weird City Electric Company. 

The album 'Gloryland' is about finished. Or as finished as it will ever be. I've had to overcome challenges along the way, including inner demons about not having the man around himself to approve or to blame, technnological issues about the recordings being in multiple locations in multiple formats and not having had access to my studio for the last six months.

 Most of it was mixed a year ago at Wired with Steve Rolfe after he and Tim Milbourne had added some backing vocals on 'Man who sings'. We spent a couple of days in the studio mixing the tracks that we had transferred from tape and we felt that we were there - done. But upon listening in the days following a couple of nagging issues grew on me...In the second song 'Anything She Wants' the vocal inexplicably drops in level for the second verse and in the final track '(This is) Gloryland' - Garry's bass is strangely distorted, (as opposed to normally distorted) The trouble is both of these sessions were recorded on a high end ProTools session which I had no access too.

In the year since finishing One Dollar Peep Show's 'Showreel' and after Adam had moved on to exciting projects, I'd pretty much been content to work solely and occasionally on my Macbook Pro but somewhere between 1DPS touring with my interface and Apple upgrades to Leopard my ProTools Interface stopped working.

So I set about rebuilding my aging MacBookPro and running ProTools. It turns out 3 interfaces later that my MacBookPro was frying interfaces as soon as i connected then to it...but in very subtle and different ways...I sent 3 ProjectMix interfaces back to M-Audio in 3 weeks....they thought I was unlucky ( I had multiple support calls with Digidesign and had tried all interfaces on other Macs and PC's) but I've always known that I am lucky so I started to think differently...I took my MBP back to the Apple store finally to get a check on my FireWire interface which seemed to work with hard drives but mysteriously never with interfaces. And they did some tests and said something vague was wrong with the FW and that they would need to replace the logic board (expensive). Luckily and to my shock I had had the forethought to buy 3 years warranty...the only time I ever had!

So that gone done for free, I returned my final broken Interface, got a new one back a week later I upgraded all my software to version 8 and now everything worked perfectly!!  Just professional crastination to beat, oh and relearning upgraded software and a brandnew Control Surface. Music Technology is gloriously and hideously complicated and when you're as used to it as I have been....not being able to jump quickly and effortlessly between tasks is incredibly frustrating.  

And so yesterday I hunckered down and mixed 'Anything She Wants' in my kitchen! I loved it and remember that there's nothing better. Well except mixing/recording/creating  with really good friends, and then celebrating with them after.

Garry N. Jones was an extraordinary musician. A bass player, singer and songwriter, his work would stretch genres and bend expectations.

Garry died of thoat cancer on 20th august 2007.

This website is to celebrate his life and his work, for those who knew him and for those who have just found him.

There will be a concert celebrating the life and songs of Garry Jones, featuring many of the musicians that Garry has collaboarated with.

February 23rd - 21 South Street - 7.30 PM £5.00 All profit to cancer charity TBA.

information about Garry Jones can be found here

One Dollar Peep Show have finally emerged, blinking, from their 18-month self incarceration at Wired studios. In their hands they have a long-awaited album entitled Showreel. Bringing together a wildly disparate collection of influences, the record combines organic- sounding electro pop with wayward guitars and a 'healthy' dose of ungodly experimental noise that, on occasion, verges on the filthy. Produced by Weird City's Chris Britton, the album is reminiscent of a guitarier Metric, or possibly an electronic incarnation of The Cardigans, while singer Minna Harris' dark musings make this is the ideal soundtrack for doing away with that unfaithful spouse.

"When you hear the opening cut 'under your skin' you'll understand fully why we've been much smitten."

Losing Today

"THIS is how it's done. 1DPS ...are smart enough to realise that electronica has to be handled with care when vocals are concerned. Consequently, while the backing here occasionally strays into fat synthland, it doesn't overpower singer Minna's voice by being too hard or clinical, and Minna herself doesn't embellish what God gave her with mock American flourishes or drama student airs. She's the kind of girl who sounds like she'd be just as at home singing with some inaccessable grrl group, a fey indie band or Stereolab. 1DPS are somewhere between all three and aren't afraid to explore both ends of the electronic indie spectrum- at one they sound like Ladytron, at the other Curve... the atmosphere is good: dirty and a bit melancholic. Nice."

Holly Hernandez, PlayMusic

You can hear the whole album on Last.FM

Not content with defiling the public's ears via their own music, One Dollar Peep Show's Scott Lawrence and Nigel Firth created the Naughty Boys production team with Weird City honcho Chris Britton in order to spoil other peoples songs as well. Having already remixed the likes of Bo Diddley and Barry White, the trio currently have their beady conniving eyes on 'Duvet' By Bidgie Reef and the Gas and 'I Wish I Could Live the Life You Live' by Oxford's Witches. They are also currently reworking a number their own songs from the 'Showreel' album to fit the Dancefloor/Boudoire/Crackhouse.

Nigel at the Zodiac,march 14th. with the rest of the band of course....

Are you looking for a regular rehearsal space? We are launching a new rehearsal space in Reading.

http://www.silverstreetstudios.co.uk

Silver Street Studios is aimed at people looking for a space, who would maybe like to invest time on developing songs/pre-production as well as just rehearsing their set. Whole evening slots - offer the flexibility to get in and get out at leisure with time to catch up and try ideas.

Director Chris Britton explained " We're really looking for a few bands to use the space on a regular basis who can treat it a little bit like their own. There are quite a few options at the moment for people looking for rehearsal space, which is great for the customer, but what we can offer is a great space at a fantastic fixed rate with a relaxed get in and out because noone is coming in after you"

"It's about having the space to play really, an environment in which to create as opposed to somewhere you go to just bash-out a set. Although it's perfectly suited for that when you want to"

Silver Street Studios has evolved because Wired Studios is being used primarily by label Weird City Electric Company with the band One Dollar Peep Show, and work is more and more control room based, leaving the live space predominantly empty.

The room is soundproofed and 7.5m by 3.5m, currently equipped with a Vocal P.a., drum kit and amps.

"We can add gear, but we'd rather find out exactly what people want first."

We're based at the Rising Sun Arts Centre - this is very central Reading, so parking is available but not completely without it's challenges.