Emily Barker
Emily Barker - Nostalgia (Wallander version)
updated
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CREDITS
Filmed by Charlie Miller | The Mono Grande
Edited by Shea McChrystal
Emily Barker - vocals, piano
Richard Causon - dulcimer
Luke Potashnick - Moog bass, electric bass, drums, percussion
Rebekah Allan - violin
Laura Anstee - cello (performed by Emma Sheppard in the video)
Rachel Robson - viola (performed my Miriam Wakeling in the video)
String Arrangement - Tim Harries
Engineered by Josh Best-Shaw
Produced by Luke Potashnick
Mixed by Luke Potashnick
Mastered by Dick Beetham @ 360 Mastering
Recorded at The Wool Hall
The making of this video was assisted by the Australian Government through Creative Australia, its principal arts investment and advisory body
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LYRICS
See the horses from my window
Bodies huddled and shape one shadow
Flowers open, slow then violent
Time is passing, I stay quiet
Loneliness, your letter came
you know my house, you know my name
Loneliness, I hear you call
from the kitchen, through the wall
Loneliness, alive and well
is there someone I can tell?
Loneliness, you fill the day
I wish that you would go away, would go away
Everyone else seems surrounded
With people and purpose and things that ground them
Take me outside, shake the dust off
In the sunshine all is not –
Loneliness, your letter came
you know my house, you know my name
Loneliness, I hear you call
from the kitchen, through the wall
Loneliness, alive and well
is there someone I can tell?
Loneliness, you fill the day
I wish that you would go away
Loneliness, I feel you breathe
down my back, upon my cheek
Loneliness, I’ve had enough
of moving slow, I want a rush, I want a rush
I want a rush, I want a rush
See the horses, from my window
Bodies huddled and shape one shadow
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Twenty-five fourteen- to sixteen-year-old girls volunteered their time to be in the music video for Wild to be Sharing This Moment. Some of them knew each other through school, but most were strangers who had responded to a social media callout.
On a video shoot, there’s always a whole load of waiting around. I wondered if they’d all be on their phones, if they’d get bored.
What unfolded was something I had not expected, and it was beautiful.
It started with the girls chatting, taking pictures of each other in their costumes, giggling, reading books (one of the girls was reading ‘Perfume’ by Patrick Süskind, which I read around her age too), and there was one particularly gorgeous moment when a few of them started playing a hand-clapping game. Within two minutes, all twenty-five of them were sat in a circle playing this game and laughing, a lot.
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Do you remember your last school photo? Is it buried in a box in the attic, framed on a shelf, lost in the last house move?
Do you remember what was happening in your life at the time? What was going through your head as the photographer clicked away? Perhaps you faked a smile, or perhaps a smile came easily on that day... It’s such a pivotal moment – saying goodbye to some peers and friends, teachers, familiar corridors and classrooms, readying to take a leap towards the unknown.
“Growing up is losing some illusions, in order to acquire others.” – Virginia Woolf
emilybarker.com/wild
#innocence #empathy #compassion
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Wild to be Sharing This Moment
(Emily Barker)
I see a thousand worlds in the window
of a train as it passes me by
Each one plugged into an orbit,
their own pain, their own lullaby
Isn’t it wild to be sharing this moment
the same very thimble of time
Isn’t it wild that we each hold an ocean
yet fail to fathom other tides
Down at the edge of the water
A mother weeps on the shore
How can we study the wounds of our history
and still send our children to war
Isn’t it wild to be sharing this moment
the same very thimble of time
Isn’t it wild to be living when love is
endangered, denied
Isn’t it wild to be sharing this moment
the same very thimble of time
Isn’t it wild that we each hold an ocean
yet fail to fathom other tides
A child with hands in the soil
wakes without question and grows
truth is a hope to hold onto
and where it blooms we will go
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CREDITS
Written and directed by Thomas Hudson
Produced by Luke Kellett, Marie-Elle Vivaldi, and Laura Smith
Director of Photography: Harrison Gilbert
1st A.C/Gaffer: David Fulham
2nd A.C: Robert Preston
Key Grip: Luke Kellett
Costume Design: Jason Young and Laura Smith
Make-up artist: Amber Travers
Wardrobe Assistant: Benji Crocker
Emily’s Stylist: Leith Groves
Editor/Colourist: Thomas Hudson
Behind the scenes filming - Erling Grønhaug
Production Company: Headjam https://www.headjam.com.au/
Filmed in Newcastle, NSW.
Starring:
Aila Japrakas
Alannah Spurling
Amira Mueller
Anjali Kana
Arden Saunders Wilcox
Ariana Campise
Ava Pritchard
Cleo McNeill
Hannah Watts
Imogen Wilton
Keeley Moon
Keira Spoljaric
Khalia McWilliams
Leila Jo Smith
Lilly Kime
Lily-Rose Kiely
Marina Chamberlain
Mikayla Suffell
Phoebe Ulph
Riti Rahman
Savannah Dorsett
Sunny Topic
Xanthe Tashjian
Yalondha Gundy
and
Emily Barker
This film was made possible by the generous support of the WA Department of Local Government, Sport and Cultural Industries @DLGSCarts
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Wild to be Sharing This Moment was recorded at The Wool Hall
Engineered by Josh Best-Shaw
Produced by Luke Potashnick
Mixed by Luke Potashnick
Mastered by Dick Beetham @ 360 Mastering
Vocals, Acoustic guitar - Emily Barker
Drums - Tom Visser
Bass - Tim Harries
Guitar, Percussion and Synths - Luke Potashnick
Synths and Keys - Richard Causon
Backing vocals - Lukas Drinkwater
Violin - Rebekah Allan
Cello - Laura Anstee
Viola - Rachel Robson
String Arrangement - Tim Harries
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Huge thanks to Tori Styles at White Rose Media for scrolling through 50s archival footage to create a highly symbolic, dreamlike sequence of strange images to accompany the song.
Vocals - Emily Barker
Drums - Tom Visser
Bass - Tim Harries
Guitar, Percussion and Synths - Luke Potashnick
Synths and Keys - Richard Causon
Violin - Rebekah Allan
Cello - Miriam Wakeling
Viola - Emma Shepherd
String Arrangement - Tim Harries
Engineered by Josh Best-Shaw
Produced by Luke Potashnick
Mixed by Luke Potashnick
Mastered by Dick Beetham @ 360 Mastering
Recorded at The Wool Hall
This project has been assisted by the Australian Government through Creative Australia, its principal arts investment and advisory body
=========================================
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emilybarker.com/sonogram
SONOGRAM
I woke up and forgot the myths
That bind our past to this
That lead us blindly
To circle in slow motion
Time is my decaying note
Once sung, once left your throat
No other offering
Worth more than this gift
One foot behind the other, never looking back
Echoes on a sonogram
Smarter than we hope we think
Bring bodies close to the brink
Wear different costumes
Tell the same old stories
Helpless in the wake of time
Vaulting from earth to sky
We’re cells and water
Like every living thing
One foot behind the other, never looking back
Echoes on a sonogram
I woke up and forgot the myths
That bind our past to this
That lead us blindly
To circle in slow motion
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The original version of this song is found on the album "A Dark Murmuration of Words", out now - emilybarker.com/a-dark-murmuration-of-words
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When I moved up to Perth from Bridgetown at 17, I immersed myself in the music scene. I went to gigs as often as I could afford, with various new friends from university. I was performing as a duo at the time with my best friend Andrea Beatty, called—inventively— ‘Emily & Andrea’. We opened for various Perth bands including Sleepy Jackson, becoming friends with Luke and Jesse Steele who we’d met some years before when they’d played at Bridgetown Blues Festival. They often had parties at their family home which we’d go to - we’d play songs and talk about bands we were into. 'You Am I' were never out of the conversation for long and their album Hourly Daily was in my VW Beetle car stereo for weeks on end.
Listening to 'You Am I' with Lukas in our hotel room, I’m immediately transported back to my late teens. I had a feeling Lukas would like them given the Beatles-y sensibilities. I played him a bunch of their songs and when he heard ‘Mr. Milk’ he immediately picked up the guitar and started working out the chords. The lyrics are witty and surreal and there’s plenty of innuendo, such is the rogue charm and intelligence of Tim Rogers and his songs.
We added all sorts of things to the recording: acoustic guitar, double bass, lots of harmonies, a bass drum fashioned from fist thumps on an empty double bass case, shaker and hand claps. It was a really fun one to record. I’m looking forward to a long car journey and re-listening to ‘You Am I’ and ‘Tim Rogers & The Twin Set’ albums.
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Emily Barker's new album "A Dark Murmuration of Words" is out now - https://smarturl.it/eb-words
"an album of spare, striking beauty" Mojo ★★★★
"irresistibly catchy...an album replete with nooks and crannies, light and shade" The Australian ★★★★★
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We knew we were going to do a Nick Cave cover but the difficult question was which one to choose?
An obvious choice might have been to do ‘Where the Wild Roses Grow’, but we weren’t sure we could do something different or interesting enough. We brainstormed how we might cover ‘Red Right Hand’ and even worked out a key for, and started rehearsing ‘The Mercy Seat’ but the outstanding version by Johnny Cash kept ringing in our ears and everything we tried felt inferior. We trawled Nick’s extensive catalogue and landed upon ‘Push the Sky Away’ – an album, and song, we both adore. We recorded it on a day when the weather outside our window was overcast and we were both feeling particularly claustrophobic and flat. It was around day 5 of our quarantine. It felt like a mantra for the day – to just keep on keeping on, to know it would pass. We buried ourselves in our work and it definitely helped. It’s such a simple and small song in many ways, but it contains multitudes, and can be read in many ways.
Lukas starts us off with a beautifully haunting acoustic part, based on a version he’d recorded years ago with his UK duo ‘Jacob & Drinkwater’, and we built the track from there. We retained the sparseness and droney soundscape of the original version, albeit using different instruments.
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Emily Barker's album "A Dark Murmuration of Words" is out now - https://smarturl.it/eb-words
"an album of spare, striking beauty" Mojo ★★★★
"irresistibly catchy...an album replete with nooks and crannies, light and shade" The Australian ★★★★★
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youtube.com/watch?v=KSs4AxfTDsI
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Listen to the album here: emilybarker.com/room822
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‘Frogstomp’ was a huge album in Australia, but also made waves beyond home turf. I was 14 when it came out, Lukas was just 10 (he’ll be happy I point out our age difference here). My best friend, Andrea, was a grunge girl back in those days and had a huge celeb crush on Daniel Johns - we listened to the album a lot as teenagers, moshing about our bedrooms with posters of Johns on her walls. On the other side of the world, Lukas discovered the record a few years later when he was 13 years old. At this time in his life, he and his family were living in a homeless hostel in Cornwall, UK. He was skating and listening to angry music like Silverchair and Nirvana as a means of escape. When we first talked about doing this covers album, it was the first Aussie band he suggested. We listened to the record together the day after our arrival at The Westin Hotel in Perth for our two week quarantine. It was the first song we recorded and it felt good to perform it after a long haul flight – the musical equivalent of running around a park. It brought back a lot of memories for us both: good and not so good. We really pumped out the vocals – apologies to our quarantine neighbours.
Credits:
King - Lukas Drinkwater
Queen - Emily Barker
King's servant - Timon Barker-Rose
Queen's servant - Jeeko Barker-Rose
Camera operator - Buckeley Barker-Rose
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Emily Barker's new album "A Dark Murmuration of Words" is out now - https://smarturl.it/eb-words
"an album of spare, striking beauty" Mojo ★★★★
"irresistibly catchy...an album replete with nooks and crannies, light and shade" The Australian ★★★★★
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We first heard about Stella Donnelly when Lukas and I were wandering around Fremantle, Western Australia a few years ago and went into a record shop. We got chatting to the retailer and we asked if he could recommend anything brilliant and new. He immediately picked up a copy of Stella’s EP ‘Thrush Metal’ which was on the counter and started waxing lyrical. We bought it on the spot and listened to loads on that particular visit to WA.
The following year, we had the pleasure of sharing a stage with Stella at Billy Bragg’s ‘Songwriters in the round’, at Glastonbury Festival. When she performed this song, I looked out into the crowd – there were so many people weeping. One woman was a complete mess. She sang every word with tears pouring down her face. It was an intensely powerful and emotional moment. Stella does not mince her words when speaking on the subject of abuse. By way of making our recording different from the original, I came up with a piano part and Lukas added some bowed double bass.
=========================================
Emily Barker's new album "A Dark Murmuration of Words" is out now - https://smarturl.it/eb-words
"an album of spare, striking beauty" Mojo ★★★★
"irresistibly catchy...an album replete with nooks and crannies, light and shade" The Australian ★★★★★
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Like most Australians, I’m a fan of Paul Kelly. I think of him as the Bob Dylan of Australia: a brilliant storyteller who never shies away from tackling the pertinent and sensitive issues of our times. He’s consistently uplifted burgeoning Australian songwriters such as a young Archie Roach back in the 80s and, more recently, Jess Hitchcock. In ‘Sleep, Australia, Sleep’ – released as a standalone single in 2020 – Kelly attacks the complacency held by corporations, government, and people in positions of power, with their stuck and endangering attitudes towards the climate crisis. The song is also an elegy to our precious native animals and plants: Australia has one of the highest rates of extinction in the entire world.
When it came to recording our version, I began by playing and singing it on acoustic guitar. In this stripped-back style, we realised just how devastatingly sad the lyrics are – something which is perhaps a little hidden in Kelly’s sardonic delivery and the waltzy, more uptempo production of the original. We initially intended to add double bass and lots of harmonies but realised this stark, unadorned version delivered the message with clarity.
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Emily Barker's new album "A Dark Murmuration of Words" is out now - https://smarturl.it/eb-words
"an album of spare, striking beauty" Mojo ★★★★
"irresistibly catchy...an album replete with nooks and crannies, light and shade" The Australian ★★★★★
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=========================================
The new album "A Dark Murmuration of Words" is out now - https://smarturl.it/eb-words
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DINOSAUR BONES
On the 27th October, 1949, two sisters married two brothers in Rotterdam, The Netherlands. One of those pairs was Reiner and Toos, my grandparents, or Ray and Cath as they were known in Australia when they emigrated to Perth in 1952. 'The Double Wedding' was filmed and years later when my nanna passed away, my grandpa grieved by watching the wedding repeatedly. He showed it to me, my siblings, and to dad and mum (their daughter), offering a commentary of who was who frame by frame and cleverly, Mum captured this commentary on her dictaphone. Later when updating the format from VCR to DVD, she overlaid the audio recording.
Twenty years on, I found the DVD and felt it was time for another upgrade given the advances in technology - it is now safely stored in the cloud and on various hard drives, and now also as snippets of their special day accompanying my new single, Dinosaur Bones, in a video created by filmmaker Tori Styles.
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I know so little that anything
You might tell me would be a revelation. – W.S. Merwin (Sire)
The past is as mysterious as the future: we never really know what happened there. – Alison Croggon (Navigatio)
When my parents downsized and moved from my childhood home – a small farm by the Blackwood river – into town, there were boxes and old suitcases of mine that accompanied them. On my next visit to Bridgetown I found them stored in a wardrobe awaiting my attention (mum and dad were hoping I might downsize my possessions too). One of the suitcases once belonged to my grandpa – it was brown with faint stripes and the clasps had gone rusty. In it were childhood love letters and trinkets, diaries, CDs, tapes, notebooks and photographs. I even found my first ever journal – a Christmas present from my parents when I was 8 years old. I’m still keeping journals; I could probably fill an entire wardrobe with them if I shipped them from the UK back to Australia (sorry mum and dad).
As I was sifting through the souvenirs of my early life, it made me think about the footprints we leave behind as we make our way through life... how much of ourselves we share through stories passed on to younger generations, and what remains of us after we’re gone. It made me reflect on my grandparents and parents and how much I don’t know – just snippets from stories – memories that fragment the more I try to remember. Isn’t it interesting too, how we add to those fragments over time, how we flesh them out? Like finding dinosaur bones, then draw the muscles, sketch the skin, add the meaning.
Dinosaur Bones was the first song we recorded during the making of A Dark Murmuration of Words back in November 2019 at Studiowz in Pembrokeshire, Wales. It features the fine musicianship of Lukas Drinkwater (bass), Pete Roe (keys), Rob Pemberton (drums and synth), Misha Law (viola) and Emily Hall (violin). The riff that appears in the verses was taken from a writing session with my dear friend Ted Barnes many years ago which – somewhat appropriately for the song – I found when sifting through a batch of old recordings. I fleshed out the music and added these words…
Dinosaur Bones
(Emily Barker, Ted Barnes)
Organise these memories into hand-me-down cases
Generations worn, a rusted clasp, the lining’s torn
I was thinking of my father and about dinosaur bones
And how we create the story with the fragments that we’re thrown
Sifting through these letters, come alive in callow words
Sorting into boxes what to keep and what to burn
I was thinking of my mother and the pieces she let go
And how we adopt a story until it becomes our own
All the ways we print ourselves in sedimentary stone
Draw the muscles, sketch the skin, add the meaning
Turning pages down a street where time is standing still
Searching through old photographs for emptiness to fill
I was thinking of my grandparents and a past I wish I’d known
And how we alter the story, with each telling that gets told
All the ways we print ourselves in sedimentary stone
Draw the muscles, sketch the skin, add the meaning,
add the meaning
Rob Pemberton - drums, percussion, synth
Pete Roe - Wurlitzer electric piano
Lukas Drinkwater - bass, electric guitar
Misha Law - viola
Emily Hall - violin
Emily Barker - vocals, acoustic guitar
Produced by Greg Freeman
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The new album "A Dark Murmuration of Words" is out now - https://smarturl.it/eb-words
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'Bound For Home' was written with my friend, Frank Turner, on a day I was feeling particularly homesick. Frank is a huge Clive James fan and he read me James’s stunning poem ‘Leçons De Ténèbres’. I learned that day that Clive, based in the UK for decades, had become too ill to make the journey back to Australia. His memories of growing up in the suburbs of Sydney became the muse for so much of his work. He was as fascinated with how we remember, as much as with the memories themselves. As Frank and I worked on the song, it emerged that a conversation was occurring between Clive and I. I was thinking about my childhood home, asking my tidal question of whether or not it was time to return, and reflecting on Clive’s lack of choice on the matter.
As well as Frank lending his voice to our song with some beautiful harmonies, the song also features some great guitar playing (Nashville-tuning) and bowed double bass by Lukas Drinkwater.
=========================================
The new album "A Dark Murmuration of Words" is out now - emilybarker.com/words
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The new album "A Dark Murmuration of Words" is out now - https://smarturl.it/eb-words
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Emily Barker - guitar and vocals
Frank Turner - guitar and vocals
Lukas Drinkwater - bass
The Carducci Strings (arranged by Joe Duddell)
The single 'Bound For Home' (written by Emily Barker and Frank Turner) is out now:
https://smarturl.it/eb-bound
=========================================
The new album "A Dark Murmuration of Words" is out now - https://smarturl.it/eb-words
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As well as Frank lending his voice to our song with some beautiful harmonies, the song also features some great guitar playing (Nashville-tuning) and bowed double bass by Lukas Drinkwater.
==== LYRICS =====
Bound For Home
By Emily Barker and Frank Turner
Someone told me lately time is killing you
Me I’m killing time till I find something to make me follow through
On the decisions and revisions of a life lived in the margins
Like notations of a plan I’m working on
Homeward bound, you won’t be homeward bound anymore
Bound for home, I should be bound for home but I’m not sure
Where does that leave me? Arguing with unreliable memories
You always sound so sure when you recall how it used to be
All the things you left behind, the perfect pictures in your mind
Now you no longer get to see if they’re still true
Homeward bound, you won’t be homeward bound anymore
Bound for home, I should be bound for home but I’m not sure
If I dig deep down through the cold, cold ground
I would find myself back in my hometown
Singing farewell songs as the sun goes down
And reckon all the wrongs back into rhyme
Lessons gifted to us all by vanished time
Homeward bound, though you’re not homeward bound anymore
Bound for home, I am bound for home I’m pretty sure
Bound for home, turning bound for home to make amends
Bound for home, we’re all bound for home in the end
=========================================
The new album "A Dark Murmuration of Words" is out now - https://smarturl.it/eb-words
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#clivejames #poetry #frankturner #emilybarker
=========================================
Emily Barker's new album "A Dark Murmuration of Words" is out now - https://smarturl.it/eb-words
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Excerpts from the film "The Art of Flying" by Jan van IJken used by kind permission - find out more about the film and Jan's other work here:
https://www.janvanijken.com
=========================================
The new album "A Dark Murmuration of Words" is out now - https://smarturl.it/eb-words
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Excerpts from the film "The Art of Flying" by Jan van IJken used by kind permission - find out more about the film and Jan's other work here:
janvanijken.com
=========================================
The new album "A Dark Murmuration of Words" is out now - https://smarturl.it/eb-words
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Filmed and recorded by Northern Cowboy Films
Mixed by Lukas Drinkwater
Original studio version is from the album "A Dark Murmuration of Words", out now - https://smarturl.it/eb-words
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Find out more about Our Gorongosa (and buy their coffee) here: ourgorongosa.co.uk
Colonna Coffee - colonnacoffee.com
The Green Belt Movement - http://www.greenbeltmovement.org
Filmed and edited by Tom Jacob
Thanks
Maxwell Colonna-Dashwood, Beth Williams and all at Colonna Coffee roastery
Emily Kiloh and Matthew Jordan @ Our Gorongosa
Lisa Merton and Claire Roth @ The Green Belt Movement
Emily Barker's new album "A Dark Murmuration of Words" is out now - https://smarturl.it/eb-words
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I wrote ‘Machine’ after watching director Ava DuVernay’s powerful documentary 13th. There are many other inspirations for the song, but this film in particular exposes the insidious methods used by those in positions of power to subvert historical narratives to their own advantage. Oftentimes the persistence isn’t even conscious – hence the lyric “This machine runs on its own” – but as the events of this year have demonstrated, we can all play a part by recognising historical and ongoing injustice and calling it out wherever we see it.
Sing along with me to this lyric video :)
Hope you're keeping well.
Emily
❤️
#lyricvideo #machine #oppression #adarkmurmurationofwords
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Most non-Indigenous Australians, at some point in their lives, come to realise that they've been raised on stolen land; choosing whether or not to acknowledge this is another thing altogether. For me, the moment came when I chose 'Indigenous Australian Studies' as part of my Bachelor of Arts degree. The six-month course, taught by Indigenous Australian academics, opened my eyes to the ongoing injustice and deeply-embedded racism that prevails in law, in land rights, and in Australian society at large. It shouldn't have taken me going to University to find out the truth of how Australia was colonised, but the sad fact of it was that during my childhood education, this was not a topic taught in schools.
Over the years, I’ve often explored the topic of 'home' in my writing, and in songs like 'Ghost Narrative', 'Spadeful of Ground' and 'Everywhen', I acknowledged that the place that am honoured to call my home previously belonged to a nation of people who were forcibly removed from the land through violence, abduction and eugenics, with the intent purpose of eradicating them and their culture altogether. Despite everything the government at the time threw at them (and continues to), Indigenous nations have survived and continue to fight for their right to remain and preserve some of the world's most ancient cultures.
When I was on tour in the United States in 2016/17, I recognised similarities between Australian colonial history and that of America. I saw "statues in the park" that celebrate slave owners, much like those erected in parks around Australia to celebrate the wealthy landowners responsible for executing Indigenous peoples in order to clear the land for farming and industry.
I wrote ‘Machine’ after watching director Ava DuVernay’s powerful documentary 13th. There are many other inspirations for the song, but this film in particular exposes the insidious methods used by those in positions of power to subvert historical narratives to their own advantage. Oftentimes the persistence isn’t even conscious – hence the lyric “This machine runs on its own” – but as the events of this year have demonstrated, we can all play a part by recognising historical and ongoing injustice and calling it out wherever we see it.
When it came to creating a video for ‘Machine’, I wanted to reflect the universality of this oppression and acknowledge that it is the same system of governance, economics and philosophy that oppresses not only the marginalised in our society, but also our earth and its precious ecosystems. I talked to filmmaker, Tori Styles at length about these issues and the origin of the song and, as I hope you can tell from the resulting music video, she absolutely got it and has done a brilliant job of relaying the message of the "machine" at work and the movement to "cut the brakes, grab the wheel", which continues to grow in strength and momentum.
Video created from archive footage by Tori Styles
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If you missed the broadcast, you have until Sunday 22nd November to get a ticket and watch it here: https://www.rootslive.online/watch-again/emily-barker
It was such a special event - thank you so much to everyone who "attended".
Emily
#livestream #adarkmurmurationofwords #emilybarker
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It's TONIGHT!! Sunday 15th November 2020.
We go live at 8pm GMT and cannot wait to play for you.
See you there!
Emily
❤️
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I've been listening to Neil Young's 'Homegrown' online and finally got around to getting it on vinyl. I purchased my copy from a store I've not visited before, but one I've heard a lot of great things about; Tallbird Records in Chesterfield. I had a lovely chat to the shop owner, Maria, and we agreed that once we're through this pandemic, an in-store would be fun to do. The shop is open during lockdown #2 in the UK so you can order online. Keep supporting the indies folks!
tallbirdrecords.co.uk
My husband, Lukas, picked up this bag of Ethiopian Yirgacheffe when he was in Falmouth, Cornwall getting a takeaway coffee from a great cafe there called Beacon. Campbell & Syme is a London-based roastery with responsible sustainability and ethical practises and this roast is really yummy!
campbellandsyme.co.uk
beaconcoffee.co.uk
#loverecordstores
#independentcoffee
Have a lovely week!
Emily x
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In preparation, I went down to the venue to check out the piano they're kindly allowing us to use on the night..
Please join me online for the show - I'll have the full band with me, including strings, and it'll all be filmed with multiple cameras and streamed on Roots Live.
Tickets and details here: https://www.rootslive.online/liveevents/emily-barker-live-stream
Emily x
Filmed by Northern Cowboy Films
#livestream #live #adarkmurmurationofwords
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This song wrote itself. One of those rare occasions that writers live for when words and music come pouring out and it’s a scramble to catch them as they do. I can liken it to seeing something in your peripheral vision – when you look at it directly, it disappears.
Reading back through the lyrics after having scrawled them down in about half an hour, it became very clear to me what I was writing about and it sounds pompous to say, but it feels irreverent to the spirit of creativity to share much more about it. Suffice to say, I was subconsciously thinking about the interconnectedness of life and of historical repetitions - same stories, different clothes – wondering if we will ever learn from our mistakes.
#sonogram #lyrics #adarkmurmurationofwords #zoomout #historyonearth #humanbeings #life
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Whenever I'm in Nashville, I always visit Grimey's. Despite records not being the easiest thing to travel with, I can never resist getting at least one from great record stores I come across on tour. The shop regularly hosts in-stores and I've seen Billy Bragg play there during Americana Festival a few years back. I found this Bobbie Gentry and Glen Campbell record on the sale rack on one of my visits (can you see the price sticker in the top right hand corner?), and it's a beauty. I really enjoy their version of John Hartford's 'Gentle on my mind' song, and the production is so elaborate with strings and horns and the bathroom sink on almost every track. Thank you Grimey's!
grimeys.com
When I first moved to the UK in 2000, it was really hard to find a cafe that served a decent coffee, even in London! Monmouth in Covent Garden was pretty much the only place back then, so I went whenever I could. Ahead of the third wave coffee movement, Monmouth have been sourcing ethical beans for small hold farmers from across the globe for decades now. This Yirgacheffe is so good and is farmed by Alemayehu Daniel Miju whose grandfather started the family coffee farm in 1946. Tasting notes are "dried pineapple and honey with watermelon acidity and medium body – light roast". So good!
monmouthcoffee.co.uk
Enjoy your day!
Emily x
#loverecordstores
#independentcoffee
Order the new album "A Dark Murmuration of Words" now - https://smarturl.it/eb-words
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How to play 'Strange Weather' on guitar.
#strangeweather #guitartutorial
Chords:
Verse:
B, C#m, E, B
B, C#m, E, B, F#
Chorus:
F#, E, B
F#, E, B
Happy playing!
Emily
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A mother sings to her unborn child... she sings of a world that is not in the state she hoped it would be upon her child’s arrival, but that she and her partner will do all they can to nurture and care for their child in these times of strange weather and struggle brought about by climate change.
One line in the song – "The peace of wild things” – is borrowed from a book of poetry with the same title by Wendell Berry in which he celebrates the power, beauty and grounding abilities of our natural world. I often have moments of nostalgia for those times as a child when the Blackwood River, a forest, the ocean, a mountain, gave me a sense of peace and perspective and I feel such sadness for the children who may not be able to enjoy this primal feeling.
The song asks for the forgiveness of future generations for the ignorance and excess that has steered humanity for far too long and hopes that, for their sake, we may learn to right our wrongs, to change for the better.
#StrangeWeather #lyrics #adarkmurmurationofwords #lyricvideo #ClimateChange #future #climatecrisis #environment #children #futuregenerations
The new album "A Dark Murmuration of Words" is out now - https://smarturl.it/eb-words
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I am a huge fan of West Australian author Tim Winton. This is not the first song I have written after reading one of his novels – my song ‘Disappear’ was written after reading his novel Dirt Music and included on my Despite the Snow album.
‘Ordinary’ was written after reading Breath. Like many of Winton’s novels, Breath is set in rural, coastal Western Australia and depicts the melancholy, ennui and apathy that bubbles under the surface of small-town life – especially prevalent in teenagers. The story follows the friendship of two such teenage boys as they transition to adulthood, connected by their passion for surfing. The way in which Winton describes the West Australian coastline ignites my own childhood memories: wandering a pearl white shore, looking out at an imposing sea with that primal feeling of being put in your place by the magnitude of the ocean. It explores heroism on a grand scale (surfing giant waves in Indonesia) versus the beauty of the day-to-day in which the ordinary is celebrated (smaller, safer, long peeler waves).
Reading this novel in the context of our climate crisis, it feels like a metaphor; a reminder to explore and cherish the small mysteries and beauties hidden in plain sight on our own doorsteps.
#ordinary #lyrics #adarkmurmurationofwords #lyricvideo
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#howtoplay #guitartutorial #ordinary
Chords:
Intro:
Bm, E/G#, A, G
Bm, E/G#, A, G
Verse part a)
Bm, E/G#, A, G
Bm, E/G#, A, G
Verse part b)
Em, F#7, Bm, Bm/A, E/G#, G, A
Ahhs:
Bm, A, G
Bm, A, G
Bm, A, G
F#7, Bm
Turn around in final verse part b)
Em, F#7, Bm, Bm/A, E/G#, G, A, Bm, B7
Em, F#7, Bm, Bm/A, E/G#, G, A, Bm
New album "A Dark Murmuration of Words" out now - https://smarturl.it/eb-words
#guitartutorial #ordinary #howtoplay
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On my first trip to Nashville, TN, I visited @OfficialTMR (Third Man Records) having heard so much about it. It's super stylish and has some great old recording paraphernalia such as a recording booth in which I cut a cover of 'I'm So Lonesome I Could Cry' by Hank Williams. There's also record shop there that houses all their own releases and I was drawn to this one by Loretta, who I've always been a fan of, but just look at that cover - how could I not go for it! The production by Jack White is grungy and cool and Loretta sounds her dynamite, passionate, potent self, regardless of the fact she was in her 80's when she recorded this - what a legend!
thirdmanrecords.com
I've not tried 'Kiss the Hippo' before but this roast from El Salvador is so good! The company are really ethical (but of course) and these beans were grown by Thelma de Gutierrez who comes from a long line of producers. This 'honey' process involves removing the skin of the coffee cherry but keeping the fruit on the bean then leaving it to dry in the sun. Flavours are honeysuckle, raspberries and blueberries. Yum!
kissthehippo.com
Enjoy your day!
Emily x
#loverecordstores
#independentcoffee
The new album "A Dark Murmuration of Words" is out now - https://smarturl.it/eb-words
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We are losing species at an alarming rate. I just got back from Australia where nearly half a billion animals died in the devastating forest fires. Many of the birds I grew up with in the South West of Australia like the Red-Tailed Black Cockatoo – Ngoolyark in Noongar language – are now on the endangered list. It is heart-wrenchingly sad – a complex grief that comes entangled with a huge dose of guilt.
I wrote this as a breakup song, but not about two parting lovers – it’s actually about my romance with our earth and all her species. It’s a plea for her, and them, to stay with me, to not let me go – and a promise to do all I can to make the relationship work.
An excerpt from Wendell Berry’s poem ‘The Peace of Wild Things’:
When despair for the world grows in me
and I wake in the night at the least sound
in fear of what my life and my children’s lives may be,
I go and lie down where the wood drake
rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
#anymoregoodbyes #lyrics #adarkmurmurationofwords #lyricvideo
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Chords:
Riff over G, Dm, F
Verse:
G, Dm, Bb, F, Am
G, Dm, Bb, F, G
Chorus:
F, C, C, G
F, C, G
F, C, C, G
F, C, G
Second chorus into bridge:
F, C, C, G
F, C, G
F, C, C, G
F, C, G
F, C, Am, Bb
Bridge:
Eb, Bb, C, G
Eb, Bb, C, Am, G
#guitartutorial #anymoregoodbyes
The new album "A Dark Murmuration of Words" it out now - https://smarturl.it/eb-words
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Chords:
Verse:
D, G, Bm, A
D, G, Em, A, F#7, Gmaj7
Chorus:
Bm, G, Em, F#m, A
Bm, G, Em, F#m, A
D, G, Em, F#m, A
Bm, G, Em, F#m, A
Bm, A
Instrumental:
D, G, Em, A
D, G, Em, A
Bridge:
C#dim, A, D, G
C#dim, F#, Bm, A, G, Em
#banjo #banjotutorial #howtoplay #whenstarscannotbefound
"A Dark Murmuration of Words" is out now - https://smarturl.it/eb-words
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I grew up in a place where if you looked up at the night sky, you could see stars between stars between stars. I remember being overwhelmed by the feeling of how I was just a tiny dot in time and space. Yet somehow it seemed to make sense. It was also, simply, breathtakingly beautiful.
We are made out of the same stuff as stars: carbon, hydrogen, nitrogen, oxygen, phosphorus and sulphur. Perhaps this partially explains why the feeling of connection to everything, to everyone, comes when we look up at a starry sky.
Touring as a musician, travelling from one city to the next, night after night, it is easy to feel disoriented, disconnected. I remember one particular night in Los Angeles yearning to see the stars in order to feel less alone and more connected to my family and close friends, and to my past as a country girl in Western Australia. But this was LA, with no stars to be seen. Even so, I felt somehow comforted by knowing they were there, albeit veiled behind a curtain of light pollution and smog. I thought of my four year old niece and imagined her as a young woman travelling like myself, feeling homesick for our first landscape by the Blackwood River and for her family. In many ways, this song is a letter to her. But it is also for me: a reminder of connection to those gone before us, to the present and the future; and to the sobering insignificance of the individual in light of the magnificent, recondite whole.
#whenstarscannotbefound #lyrics #adarkmurmurationofwords #lyricvideo #stars
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All her work is stunning and you can see more of it here: angemullenbryan.com
Emily
❤️
#artwork #painting #albumcover
The new album "A Dark Murmuration of Words" is out now - https://smarturl.it/eb-words
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Chords:
Riff
D major
Verse
Bm chord with melody (D, D, C#, B, A, B)
then Em, A, D, G, C, F#7
Chorus
G, D, G, D, G, D, Em A
G, D F6, Em, Gm
Bridge
Gm, D
Gm, D
Gm, C, F, C/E, Dm, Em, A
#geography #howtoplay #guitartutorial
"A Dark Murmuration of Words" is out now - https://smarturl.it/eb-words
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Truck Music Store is in Oxford, UK on the corner of the bustling Cowley Road. I've played their numerous times and it has vibes - very good ones!
I ordered this record from them. It's 'The Dirt and The Stars' by my dear friend and touring companion, Mary Chapin Carpenter. I honestly believe this is the best record she has yet made - and she has made plenty of brilliant albums! The songs, the sound, the soulful lyrics. It's just divine so do take a listen.
truckmusicstore.co.uk
Lukas, my husband, tried this coffee at a cafe in Cheltenham recently and jumped online to order some beans. He doesn't drink caffeinated coffee and I'm quite partial to a good decaf myself, so this is a wonderful find. Also, ethically and environmentally, Red Bank come out on top. It's so important we look at what we buy and who from, it's where we hold some power!
redbankcoffee.com
Enjoy your day!
Emily x
#loverecordstores
#independentcoffee
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“The longer I have stayed in England, the more numerous and powerful my memories of Sydney have grown.” Clive James.
A few years ago, my parents sold our family home and moved from the riverside block into town to make an easier life for themselves. Although the move made sense for where they were up to in their lives, it was not a decision that was made lightly given how long we’d spent being just a few steps away from toes in the water of the Blackwood River.
There are so many memories held in that land: the shade-giving eucalypts we’d seen grow over the years; the cleared path through the bush to our private swimming spot; the saplings planted on the river banks; the pets buried in the garden; my grandmother’s ashes scattered beneath the Japanese maple. I knew I would miss it dearly but on returning to Bridgetown and my parents’ new home, I realised that mostly it was the people that I depended on for affirming my sense of self and place in the world.
My foundation of memories rooted to place runs deep, supporting an unyielding and complex love that continues to serve as muse for me as I write words and melodies of adoration and longing from far away.
#geography #lyrics #adarkmurmurationofwords #lyricvideo
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Our non-alcoholic beverage of choice is kindly provided by realkombucha.co.uk
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Also, testing by sharing a Toerag secret with you...
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“Whatever it is, if it’s affecting the sparrows, is it doing us any good? I think of the miner’s canary.” Dr Denis Summers-Smith
There are sparrows in the eaves above my bedroom window in Stroud, Gloucestershire. The window has a view above our tiny terrace garden and stretches out over one of the five valleys. In the mornings I enjoy sitting in the window bench seat, watching the sparrows dart from the eaves above me to the seed balls below. They are a common bird in this old part of town where the walls are made of Cotswold stone and the roofs of slate tiles – allowing for plenty of nesting places unlike newer, more sealed-up builds.
The song title came from some words I saw on an environmental campaign poster. It called to mind an old folk song by Pete Seeger ‘Where Have all the Flowers Gone?’ but also got me wondering if, despite the abundance of sparrows in my own town, their numbers were actually diminishing. I looked into it and found that over the last few decades the sparrow has gone from being one of the world’s most common and widespread birds to being Red Listed as a species of high conservation concern – in the UK alone, numbers in rural areas have halved since the 1970s, whilst in towns and cities they have declined by 60%.
My thoughts returned to the sparrows outside my window - how sad it would be to look out and not see and hear their vibrant movement and chatter. I hope that day never comes.
'Where Have The Sparrows Gone?' is set in an apocalyptic future London, where sparrows were once as common as pigeons, and follows a mother and daughter as they flee the capital, now devoid of sparrows and the trees that were once their home.
#wherehavethesparrowsgone #lyrics #adarkmurmurationofwords #DiversityLoss #speciesloss #environment #interdependency #climatecrisis #sparrows #lyricsvideo
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