Tom Wiggins, Letter Carver & Writer

One gig to rule them all, one gig to find them,  One gig to bring them all and in the darkness bind them. Chock-full of indie youth it was, but there will come a day far, far in the future when last night's Foals gig will be a half-forgotten memory to all who attended.  Facts about the event will blend with folklore.  Some half-truths will creep in, others will creep out; events will be spun more than Alistair Campbell at a clay pot-making class.   I once heard that in the eighties, a late friend of my dad's busted Bono in the chops right up on stage.  Admittedly, the details were hazy and lacked the necessary corroboration for me to take his claim to fame seriously.  He was a drunk with a Napoleon complex so he may have just clobbered an Irishman with long hair, sunglasses and the ego the size of Kent.  The point I'm trying to make is this: spin and subjectivity is everywhere. However, spin and subjectivity can take a walk on this occa...

You would be hard-pressed to find a genuine slice of Californian bluegrass and old time music on any given Wednesday in Gloucester .   On this particular Wednesday, however, The Tree Tops Bar and BWM Promotions was very proud to host that very ticket as we were joined by The Old Tire Swingers during their fifth leg of their 13-date UK tour.   The four-piece band from Fresno , California is made up of Paul Chesterton (banjo, vocals), Nick Kennedy (guitar, vocals), Frick Dau (upright bass) and Nathanael Felon (mandolin, vocals).   Placed between two extensive US tours, the band have travelled the five thousand miles from central California to promote their self-titled debut album.   At around 6 feet 4 inches and sporting a bushy Amish-style beard, Paul Chesterton cuts an imposing figure as the band’s lead singer and physical peak.   Adjusting the ribbon microphone to meet his height, his friendly and engaging manner quickly disperses any preconceptions of anyt...

Few would disagree that 2011 has been an exceptional year for Laura Marling.   Only three weeks in and a Brit Award nomination for Best Female lands on her doormat, followed in its wake by a similar acknowledgement posted from the offices of NME (two prizes she would later go on to win).   Now at album number three, not only has high praise run in parallel with each of the singer’s record releases, but her previous albums have doubled as prize magnets. Her debut, 2007’s Alas I Cannot Swim and last year’s I Speak Because I Can both garnered nominations from the Mercury Prize panel, arguably the UK ’s highest music accolade.   And if PJ Harvey’s Mercury success is anything to go by, more nominations will invariably follow.         Not one to rest on her laurels, last month heralded the release of A Creature I Don’t Know, the singer-songwriter’s third studio album.   Like its predecessors, it was lavished with wide critical acclaim, cementing h...

When it was announced that The New County Hotel and BWM Promotions would be playing host to Way Out West, I did what any researcher of the internet age would do: I googled them.  The top three search results failed to hit upon my subject, reading as follows: Way Out West (a Swedish Music Festival, which, coincidentally, was taking place that very weekend), Way Out West (a UK progressive house and trance band who rose to fame in the nineties) and Way Out West (a 1937 film starring Laurel & Hardy).  Intriguing as they all were, I continued in search of my Way Out West with an adapted Google search: Way Out West (omit results that include: Trance, House, Göteborg, Sweden, Another, Fine, Mess).  I felt lucky.      For purpose of disambiguation, the Way Out West in question are a Gloucester-based ensemble who between them employ the sounds of two accordions, a fiddle, a guitar, a ukulele and a banjo to rework and reinvent popular songs.  To say ...