Hello folks,

With all the excitement surrounding the completion and subsequent release of my solo album Mandala I have let the road diary slip somewhat! So i thought I’d briefly redress the balance a little by filling you all in on some of the various goings on of late.

Even as I sit here writing to you now, I should really be packing. Tomorrow lunchtime I set off with the Duke Special band to play at Electric Picnic over in Ireland before heading straight across to China to play three shows in Shanghai. Oh yes indeed folks, we’re jet-setting this week!

August has been a pretty hectic month, let me tell you! Since the Duckworth Lewis gig at the Dublin Olympia at the end of July I’ve been back and forward to Heathrow airport like a maniac! Pretty much the moment I got back from Dublin I flew back out to Ireland to play at the fantastic Indiependence festival in Mitchelstown near Cork. This was a real in and out affair so I didn’t get a chance to catch any of the other acts but we had  great show. I’ve been playing my new Danelectro Dano ’63 bass with the Duke of late to save us lugging the upright around, which has been a real treat. Thinking I might have to post a little review here at the some point.. watch this space!

On the 8th we played the Tall Ships Festival in Hartlepool which was a lot of fun. The stage was enormous (as was the crowd!) and I got to watch Ocean Colour Scene straight after our show. I used to love them back in the day and it was brilliant seeing them live (even without the fab Damon Minchella on bass). We then burned straight up the motorway to play at the Famous Spiegeltent at the Edinburgh Festival. We were met with some traditionally grotty Scottish weather but playing in the Spiegeltent is always good fun. We went back to some of the Mother Courage and hector Mann set for this one-off show which went down a storm.

The Duke band also ventured forth into Devon to play Beautiful Days a couple of weeks ago. I’d never played this festival before. It’s quite small but had a great lineup including The Wailers, Fairport Convention, James and New Model Army. My parents decided to come along to this one for their first festival experience and loved it (even in the rain!). Again I didn’t manage to catch any of the other acts as is often the way in these situations, but we had lots of fun during the gig…

In between all the Duke dates, the Teal tour continued on with three shows in Germany. We started off at the lovely Rheingau festival, which is set in the grounds of a beautiful old castle. We were playing on a small stage which was floating on the moat (!). In fact,  the speaker stack was suspended in the most peculiar fashion, which Clare christened the “Speaker of Damocles”. I tried to get a photo of it in all it’s glory, but all I could come up with was this, taken from our dressing room…

Playing on a floating stage with that hanging over your head was a bit exciting, let me tell you.

We then moved on to the lovely town of Jena where we played the first of two shows opposite the fantastic Canadian boogie pianist/singer Michael Kaeshammer. He had a great trio featuring Marc Rogers on bass, who was also a joy to watch. If you haven’t heard their music, you should definitely check them out…

The last show was in Kassel. Both those shows were right in the town center. I really enjoy playing these kinds of festivals. They’re quite common in Germany and Scandinavia; state funded arts festivals which often run for more than a month throughout the summer. They often feature a rich and diverse mix of music, theatre and cinema right in the heart of a town; bringing proper culture right into the local community.

We were so well looked after by our German promoters. Really looking forward to playing some more German dates soon..

As soon as I landed back in the UK from the German shows with Clare I was back on the plane on my way back to Germany to play a one-off festival with Maggie Reilly. It was a big beer festival where we shared the stage with a very loud and raucous schlager band and, wait for it…. Right Said Fred! Oh yes indeed folks! They are still alive and touring in Germany. Absolutely hilarious.. The gig involved a very early start for me at Heathrow, a four-hour drive to the festival site from Berlin and getting picked up at 2.15am after the show to do the four-hour drive back to Berlin to fly home alone. Why?! You may ask. It was the day before the Tall Ships festival in Hartlepool! The gigs really are the easy bit…

So, enough of this waffle. I’m off to China in a couple of days and shall undoubtably be blogging away on my return. Today I dropped the master off at Key Production to start the process of getting the Mandala CDs pressed. I had a photo shoot with my friend Ary Vidot last week and Symeon Cosburn has done a sterling job on the cover design. They should be ready in a couple of weeks for those of you who don’t like downloads. For those of you who do, or can’t wait that long for the CD, you can buy the album in whatever electronic format you prefer at my website. You can also stream the whole thing there too. Oh you lucky people!

Until next time x

I thought I’d share with you an article on my new album from the wonderful notreble.com. I was contacted by Kevin Johnson who asked a few questions and posted this lovely little write-up. I’ve had lots of great feedback on the album via Twitter. Many of you are asking about the physical CD, which I’m working on right now. Had a photo shoot on Monday with my friend Ary Vidot and have decided on which company to use for replication. I’ll be having the CD produced in ‘Ecopaks’ made from 100% recycled card and no plastic parts so the packaging will be as green as possible. Hoping to get the run in production whilst I’m in China next week with Duke Special. Anyway, here’s the article…

Simon Little Releases New Solo Project

By Kevin Johnson

Bassist/composer Simon Little has released a new solo bass album, Mandala. The ten tracks on the album are all live improvisations, utilizing the Looperlative LP1 looper.

“When I was 17 I was listening to the Weather Report live album 8:30 and heard Jaco perform his solo live-looping piece ‘Slang’, it changed the way I thought about playing the bass and so began my obsession with making music using the bass as a solo instrument,” Little explains.

Simon used his Warwick Thumb VI throughout the album, as well as a slew of effects pedals, including a Lexicon MPX G2, Boss Super Octave, DD-6, and EMMA DiscumBOBulator. He also tracked the project by himself, but has advice for all the do-it-yourselfers out there.

“Having the album professionally mastered made such a difference to the sound and was an incredibly important stage in the process. I would recommend anyone starting out with DIY recording to look into professional mastering if they can. And I cannot recommend Bandcamp.com enough. It has allowed me to get my album out independently on my own schedule and the site is so user-friendly and above all, honest.”

Preview Mandala

Visit Simon Little at his website to download the album.

Mandala Track Listing:
1. One man’s ceiling is another man’s floor
2. West of Eden
3. Sometimes it rains in august
4. Calling out
5. Gil’s glass harmonica
6. The happy wanderer
7. Light & shade
8. Ohm is where the art is
9. The redemptive powers of temporary insanity
10. …And then suddenly nothing happened

This was my thought process this morning regarding this blog post…

• “Shall I write the Album Progress Report #3 post this afternoon and launch the album on Monday?”
• “If I can just sort out the website to point to the Bandcamp page, I could actually start selling downloads right now..”
• “Must sort out those ISRC codes first for Bandcamp.. “
• “Hang on a minute, everything is coming together suddenly…”

My new album Mandala is hereby unleashed!!

I spent Saturday with my good friend Joe Leach at the Cowshed mastering the album. I chose the best ten tracks from the twelve originally shortlisted (the album was running far too long…) and Joe worked his magic with some great gear at the studio. The sound has expanded so much from the original, I am so pleased with the finished product.

Thanks to those delightful folks at Bandcamp, you can now stream the entire album for free on my Music page. This is also where you’ll need to visit in order to download the album in whatever format you prefer; from 320k mp3 to FLAC. For those of you who’d prefer a physical copy of the album, you will have to bear with me for a little while. But fear not, I am on the case and when they are ready they will also be available on the Music page.

So where do we go from here, you may ask? Well, I’m now handing the album over to you all with the hope that you will listen and download away and spread the word via whatever means you see fit. Be it Twitter, Facebook, Posterous, or some of the fab little embeddable widgets available on the Bandcamp page (see below), let’s see if we can spread the word amongst ourselves.

There is no record company, I have no manager or booking agent. It’s just me and you guys right now. I’ve been working on this solo project and using looping technology for a few years now and I’m really pleased with the end result.

Not that this is by any means the end folks. Oh no! I am going to continue producing solo music here at Little Towers and will soon be starting work on my next project Little Alex, a duo project with drummer Steve Alexander. Watch this space.

Hope you enjoy the album; here’s a little taster x