Dr Alan Farmer from Bearos Records recently recorded an interview with Brum Radio which you can catch up with on Mixcloud. Back in 1999 Saloon were incredibly excited by the noises coming out of Birmingham from bands such as Pram, Avrocar, Plone and, of course, Broadcast which is why we made a concerted effort to try and get in on the action. We played numerous gigs in Birmingham at The Jug of Ale for Alan and Arthur from The Catapult Club. We also made some good friends. 'Electron' our single for Bearos Records was probably the most effortless record we ever put out, and I still list is among my very favourite Saloon releases. Bearos also saw the debut of my ongoing project Rodney Cromwell with the track 'Radaghast the Brown' featuring on their Lord of the Rings tribute album. In the interview, as well as spinning 'Electron' Alan talks about how Bearos championed Birmingham bands between 1998-2007 as well as talking about Kushikatsu Records and his current fascination with Japanese pop. Rodney Cromwell will be coming to Birmingham as part of the Ohm from Ohm tour, and on the opening night on 15th March, Alan will be DJing for us playing entirely Japanese indie and electo pop. Details on the Ohm from Ohm website. Adam Saloon
After a flurry of activity when I re-launched the Saloon website as this blog, it has been fairly quiet on here for a while. The reason has really been because of too much musical activity in our lives rather than too little. Matt and Alison’s projects go from strength to strength. Matt’s band The Leaf Library have released three albums in two years and Alison and her husband mark, as well as a flood of activity with The Left Outsides, have also a new band The Trimdon Grange Explosion. Make sure to look them up on social media. I am going to talk about myself now though (Matt, Alison – as ever, do send me stuff and I will post it up). It has been just over two years since I released the Rodney Cromwell album ‘Age of Anxiety’ on Happy Robots Records. When I last posted about it in April 2015, I was pretty downhearted. Although at that stage it had received some radio play I was struggling to get anyone to write about it. But, following its very slow start, with barely a tweet from anyone on the day it came out, the album ended up being surprisingly well received.
In the end I took on a press agent Shameless Promotion (PR) from Canada and between us we were able to get great coverage in NME, Huffington Post, the Electricity Club, Electronic Sounds Magazine, Record Collector, Louder Thank War, Impose Magazine, SoundsXP, Overblown and loads more. It also had a lot of ‘grassroots’ coverage and I ended up doing more interviews than I had ever done in my career. It was particularly great to get positive feedback from a few synth ‘legends’ with Mal Holmes from OMD saying nice words and Rusty Egan from Visage / Rich Kids saying great things and playing the record loads on his shows. I also got a load of terrific radio play from the likes of Gideon Coe and Steve Lamacq on BBC 6 Music and on several shows on RNE3 in Spain. And it hasn’t stopped; the album and its singles are still getting constant play on specialist indie and synthpop shows and stations. I did a few radio sessions too – the highlight perhaps being a session with Julio Ruiz on RNE3 in Madrid. Julio previously interviewed Saloon back in 2002 when we played in Contempopranea Festival, so it was lovely to meet him again and play some songs on the show. If I posted links to all the radio sessions, interviews and reviews is would take me all day, but – if you care – all the links are available on the Happy Robots Records website. I also never thought I would play live again – in fact I sold much of my gear in 2014 at a boot fair. But by Summer 2015 I was playing my first shows for five years. Almost every gig we played was great. There were almost too many highlights to mention but clearly playing with the bands Marsheaux, Death and Vanilla, and Snookerstar DJ Steve Davis, plus the festivals Indietracks and Madrid Popfest, have to be near top of the list. It was great organising another Happy Robots gig in November 2016 and really great that some of the old faces who used to come and watch Saloon came out to show their support. The call of the Travelodge, terrible service stations and tiny back room venues will always be there for me. I can’t ever see that going away. It is impossible to thank everyone who has helped me out, but many thanks must go out to those who played in the heavily rotating Rodney Cromwell band over the last year and half – Adrian Taylor (from Controllers) and Matt Saloon / Leaf Library all deserve a massive thank you! A slightly bigger thank you should also go out to Alice (Martha of Arthur & Martha fame plus Cosines, Mass Datura and more) and Richard Salt (also Controllers) who played the lion's-share of gigs. We spent many enjoyable hours in our rehearsal rooms talking about guitar pedals, synths and how shit Brexit is, as well as practicing occasionally. And to the point of this lengthy post, well after a most enjoyable trip to Spain, where Matt from Saloon joined us on guitar, I feel things have come full circle and I’ve achieved all I wanted to accomplish in terms of promoting ‘Age of Anxiety’. It's time to put the synths back in the metaphorical loft and let my ears recover. It feels like a good time to think about future projects but also to spend a bit more time with my incredibly supportive wife Alison and our two kids, who have had to endure me being away for many weekends. This is not to say there won’t be any gigs or releases in the future. Rod Cromwell will be appearing on a couple of great compilations soon, and in terms of gigs I am always up for offers. I just won’t be actively looking for opportunities. I do hope to play at least one more London gig in 2017 (and you know where I am if you need me.)
But I want to spend a bit more time with the family while concentrating on the label, probably arguing with strangers about politics on twitter and, maybe even, writing some new songs. I also have a couple of great new releases out this year on Happy Robots Records, so do stick with us, follow us on Facebook and sign up to the Happy Robots Mailng List if you haven’t done so already. Right – off to write that new album I keep promising you. Adam
Up at the moment on Stereo Embers website, Rodney Cromwell (aka Adam Saloon) lists his top 48 songs of the year as his 'Post-Truth Pop Party.
For your audio delight, here is a link to the Spotify playlist and what Adam has to say about the mix...
Despite it having being a miserable year for many in terms of the global political arena with the ascendancy of post-truth politics, there have still been some decent records released in 2016 to cheer us up. This mix is my attempt to soundtrack the spirit of 2016 through those new releases – it is no coincidence that it includes songs with titles such as ‘Play with Lies’ and ‘The Dictator Decides’ and that the mix is 48 tracks long.
There have been some decent synthpop and electronica songs from the likes of Computer Magic, Train to Spain, Hannah Peel, Porches, Hologram Teen to name a few, with also the release of my favourite Pet Shop Boys album in years. Many of my most-loved tracks of 2016 have though come from the psychedelic and krautrock tradition: my three favourite gigs being by Vanishing Twin, Camera and Cavern of Anti-Matter, all of whom feature here in one way or another. There have been a load of great re-issues this year too, my favourite being ‘Venezuela 70: Cosmic Visions of a Latin American Earth’ an album of Venezuelan experimental rock from the 1970s. Admittedly, it is probably not everyone’s cup of tea.
In this age of anxiety and political hypertension, the dark electronica of Pye Corner Audio, Vile Electrodes, Essaie Pas, the Stranger Things soundtrack and the epic ‘Sphynx’ by La Femme seem the perfect soundtrack. However, to stop the party getting too dark, I try to pull it back with some lighter and more uplifting pop by the likes of Rémi Parson, Belbury Poly and a certain Mr Rodney Cromwell.
It wouldn’t be 2016 without a bit of narcissism thrown into the post-factual bubbling pot now, would it!
It has been many months since I last posted on here, not
because of how quiet things have been, but because we have all been so busy.
2015 has been a great year for ex-members of Saloon, with Alison, Matt and
myself all having released well received records this year.
But any success is always tempered by a degree of sadness,
as we think about the friends and family we have loved and lost on our travels;
none more so than at this time in November, when we remember Mike and his wife
Sara who are no longer with us.
A few weeks ago Paul from Track and Field sent me a copy of
a letter from his archives. It was the letter that Mike sent to Track and Field
as an introduction to Saloon; at the time we badly wanted to play their club
because it was so damned cool and we were sick of playing terrible gigs every
time we came to London. Little did we know that Track and Field had already
seen us when we supported Stereolab and couldn’t really see the point in
Saloon. Still, the letter must have made a difference, as within the next few
years we went on to play countless Track and Field shows and release three
albums with them. Anyway here is the letter for you to enjoy.
Missing you Smoughts!
Friday, 17 April 2015
Recording Artist Rod Cromwell
Other Projects
It has been a busy few weeks. My new album has been out for over a month now and I have still not officially announced the release on here. I tried writing a lengthy blog post about it, but just can't find the time to finish it, so here is the quick version.
So you know, the album is out in the shops, called RODNEY CROMWELL 'Age of Anxiety' released on the Happy Robots label on CD and digitally:
It has been favourably compared to early-OMD, Giorgio Moroder and Krafwerk (I think in terms of its sound rather than its cultural impact). The record has had really good airplay, with plays on the Gideon Coe show on BBC 6 Music, multiple plays on several Radio 3 in Spain and on loads of synthpop shows and other radio shows (all of whom I will thank again properly at a later date). Oh and somehow two songs are on heavy rotation on Croydon FM. So muchos respect there.
Thanks to everyone who has played, bought and said nice things about it. It has been very much appreciated! I will write some more about it I'm sure. Oh and feel free to follow Happy Robots on the Facebook. You can hear it on Spotify too, although obviously we would prefer you to buy it.
What else to report:
Alison's band 'The Left Outsides' have a new album 'The Shape of Things to Come' out on 8th May which itself is getting some great airplay. Follow all their news too on Facebook. I've not heard it yet but I'm sure it will be really good.
Indietracks 2015
Matt I know is in the studio at the moment with The Leaf Library working on their new album. And both The Leaf Library and Rodney Cromwell will be appearing at the Indietracks festival this 24-26th
July. It's the first announced gig for Rodney Cromwell so many thanks in advance to Indietracks for taking a punt and booking me.
On the Saloon front, I've renewed the Soundcloud subscription so all the old stuff is available again. Gideon Coe played two songs from the first Peel Session last night (that is the 16th April 2015). Gideon has played that session several times so many thanks for that Gid.
Lastly I've been emailing a chap James who was in the band Postalowa who we played with once in Norwich. As well as having a great Mixcloud show Tall Ships Radio Club, he has a band Broads who Saloon fans may be interested in. Our chat also enabled me to find the details on the 2003 gig in Norfolk which I've added to the Saloon timeline. As keeper of the archives and master of the data this stuff matters OK.
It has been a while since our last update. The reason being,
well we have been rather busy.
2015 has been dubbed the year of the Saloon comeback!
Ex-members of Saloon have, we hope, three new records out this year, so Loonatics start
saving your pennies…(please)….here is the news so far....
RODNEY CROMWELL
(Adam)
Age of Anxiety
The album that I have been tinkering with for about for several
years is finally finished. It is very much an extension of sonic area explored with
Arthur & Martha (it features Alice / Martha on a couple of tracks too). It
is an album of ten songs propelled by hissy analog synths, cheap vocoders, toy
instruments, crackly samples, bass riffery and – errr - more analog synths.
Although the title is a nod to 80's electro (Age of Chance
and/or Age of Consent by Bronski Beat) its themes are those of love, loss, grief,
paranoia, euphoria in our modern post millennial world of over connection and tribulation
That sounds quite ominous - it’s really just a silly indie disco record.
I’m releasing it under the Rodney Cromwell name – which is a
moniker I used once before, during the Saloon days, when I recoded a song
Radaghast the Brown for a Lord of the Rings tribute album on Bearos. It is to
be released on CD / digital download on 9th March 2015 and distributed by the good people at
Cargo Records. The lovely cover was designed by ‘our Matt’. And it will be the
first release in five years on the Happy Robots label; hopefully – if we break even – we will be able to put out some more releases (by other bands) in the near future! …oh and
you will be able to buy it on our website
as well as in the shops and on iTunes.
Adam
THE LEAF LIBRARY
(Matt and Co)
Daylight Versions
Second album time! We’re halfway through recording another
album at Studio Klank in north London – it’s a lovely place, and they’ve even
let us build a little shrine on the wall above the mixing desk (the full Happy
Robots back catalogue to the first person to name them all...).
It’s all shaping up nicely thanks with tons of guitars, a
bit of synth and some piano, lots of drones, some pedal steel and a ride cymbal
orchestra all recorded so far. It’ll hopefully feature contributions from some
of our mates too including members of The Clientele / Amor de Dias, The Drink,
The Left Outsides and Singing Adams. And horns! There are definitely going to
be some horns on there too.
The album is called ‘Daylight Versions’ and is inspired by
(variously) the sea, commuting, the Suffolk coast, Walthamstow marshes and
death. It’ll be out on vinyl via Where It’s At Is Where You Are some point this
year. Happy listening.
Matt
That’s all for now. Hopefully more soon. Do get in touch if you need to
know any more.
As it is the 10 year anniversary of John Peel's death, this means it is also the anniversary of a far less momentous occurrence, the split of out band Saloon, a band was much championed by the jovial DJ. We officially announced Saloon's split two or three days after the Peel news, but in truth the band had fallen apart at least a year before.
As a way of marking the date, I am posting here a set of real rarities; a collection of ideas recorded, mostly in 2003, and were a work-in-progress towards our third album. An album we referred to as our folk LP, also known as 'Speak Softly a dream sleeps here.'
I issue thee songs with a 'health warning'; although written for Saloon I am somewhat loath to really give them the Saloon name. Our band was a very much a collaboration - nay collective - of five people, and it is telling that as soon as one of the five left, then the band fell apart. These recording are mainly just Matt and me; Amanda sings and plays on four of them, but there is not much of Mike and Alison on these recordings. Nevertheless, if you are or were a Saloon fan, I hope you enjoy these tracks despite the rather dour tone of some of them.
If you want to know a bit more of the backstory behind these recordings, I have written a much more comprehensive post on another page.
On a cheerier note, I'm happy to say (to those who don't already know) that earlier this month I became a father for a second time (which explains why I am up typing this at 4am. Alison has a new record coming soon from The Left Outsides (lots of activity on their website), Matt is recording a new record with Leaf Library and I'm happy to say my synth-heavy solo record - under my moniker Rodney Cromwell - has been mixed and mastered and is being polished off right now for, I hope, a release after Xmas. Lastly talk of a vinyl re-release of Saloon's our first collection of recordings - The Blue Demo - is gathering pace, so keep looking out here for an inevitable crowd funding request soon.
So it feels
like the last few weeks have been a (relative) hive of activity for the ex-members of Saloon
and their extended families, with our Rock-Family Tree seeming to spread its
branches further.
One of the
things I had been putting off for ages was getting the two Saloon synth
serviced. The guy I have been using for almost 15 years now is the best in the
business; the moog rogue is playing better than ever and the Moog Opus 3
finally has a working string section. The strings have never worked so this is
a big deal to me (but probably not of much interest to anyone else reading
this.)
Three tracks
from the July 2001 Saloon Peel session were aired again by the brilliant Gideon
Coe on his 6 Music Show. Someone emailed Gideon to say that he had fond
memories of us at Truck Fest (hopefully from the great 2003 show as opposed to
the ropey 2000 one where we were compared to The Corrs).
The Saloon
ex-members have spoken a fair bit about setting up a Saloon Bandcamp, giving
fans the chance to buy enhanced versions of the albums with extra bits and bobs.
Hopefully we can make that happen soon. In the meantime I have set up a
bandcamp for Arthur and Martha
which is looking quite nice. No rarities on there yet (as there aren’t really any)
although you can get the singles at a bargain price, as well as downloads of
the three A&M videos.
Alison and
Mark have started recording their new album for The Left Outsides. News and
links found on their Facebook.
They are also playing in a band The Trimdon Grange Explosion which has a new Facebook page also.I don’t know how the pair of them find the
time to be in so many bands!
Matt has been
doing some work with his other band The
Form Group, in demo-ing some new songs towards a proper album. He is also writing
songs for a new The Leaf Library
album and they have a new 7" single
coming out in June. A picture disc no less.
Mike’s
brother Rob with his Hot Chip hat on, posted a link the other day to a great
cover of William Onyeabor’s ‘Atomic
Bomb’ that he plays guitar on and will be released for a forthcoming remix
album which I think will be out for Record Store Day. Nice moog on the cover
too.
The news for
me is that although I hinted
previously that there might be another Arthur and Martha album in the pipeline,
Alice and I have agreed that the record I have been slowly working-on, probably
shouldn’t be an Arthur and Martha record. This is in part due to Alice’s
commitments to her band Cosines, but perhaps more due to the fact that it
really is an Adam solo album, and it’s very hard to pretend that its anything
else. So instead I will probably release it under my solo-Rodney Cromwell
moniker. Rodney Cromwell was the name I used back in 2002 when I recorded a
song– Radaghast the Brown – for the Bearos Records Tribute
to The Lord of the Rings (my song was inspired by the Spectum Lord of the
Rings game).
I mentioned
Alice’s band Cosines who played last night (which I missed due to family
commitments / general flakiness) well their new single Commuter Love is out
now via Fika Recordings and it’s a glam rock, glittertastic stonker. She
originally wrote it for A&M, which might explain the name-checking of the
old Moog Rogue, but obviously due to my aforementioned flakiness I never got
around to doing anything with it.Anyway
I hope you enjoy it along with everything Alison and Matt are doing – hopefully
one day I will have something new to contribute.
