• Home
  • About
  • Music
  • Contact
  • Falling A Records
  • Miniatures 2020
  • Falling A shop
  • Archive
Barry Lamb
BL

the insane picnic hello goodbye

17/4/2010

0 Comments

 
Picture

the insane picnic hello goodbye

HELLO
Peter and I had worked together tirelessly in Frenzid Melon from winter 1977 to Spring 1981. The band was our creation and although we went through a whole load of local musicians we were constantly the creative force behind it. Many of our diy cassette releases were recorded as a duo with friends dropping in on occasional tracks. Our live performances we usually managed as three or four piece unit but the constant flow of musicians in and out of the band was proving tiresome. In the Spring of '81 we were back to a two piece and were just about spent. We decided to call it a day and go our separate ways. To this day it's never been easy to separate Ashby & Lamb as a musical partnership and the split lasted from April until September. However, when we reconvened we knew that we needed to form a band that was not centered around us but had at least one more great creative force in it. Owen Turley worked in Pete's brothers record store and had bought the most recent Frenzid Melon album, loved the experimental nature of it and was looking to get out of local heavy rock band Hiroshima. The chemistry at the first rehearsal was amazing as we ploughed through a few Frenzid Melon songs and some songs that myself and Pete had been working on at the time of the split but Owen added such a new fresh dimension and along with Pete and myself was another multi instrumentalist. We invited Lloyd Saich a much respected local drummer to a full rehearsal in a hall to see if we could get a good live sound and the session was really amazing. Sadly Lloyd left the band before we went into the recording studio for the first time but undeterred Pete and Owen shared the drumming responsibilities and that day we recorded "Chaos Control" and "the heartbreak party" both of which sounded so fresh and exciting to us that they ended up on our debut e.p. Later we recruited Chris Chisnall on the drums for live performances. Chris had previously drummed on occasions for Frenzid Melon and was the regular drummer for Spasmodic Caress. We had several really great years together. Every time we played it felt fresh and exciting and slightly unpredictable. Every time we went into the recording studio the songs were deliberately under developed to capture the chemistry and spontaniety and we received consistently great reviews and a good amount of radio exposure.

GOODBYE
It was May 1989. We hadn't played together for a while and for the first time we found ourselves without Tony Smith who had been our producer and sound engineer since the beginning. We went into a new studio with Mike Cheal at the controls. Mike had been the guitarist in Hiroshima the heavy rock band that Owen had left to join us several years earlier. We also decided to try out a new bass player in David White and have Owen focus on drumming. We recorded a 9 minute heavy rock epic which was a poor attempt at being Led Zeppelin and such a long way from what the insane picnic had set out to be. Although the track had some inspired moments and lyrically it had the poetic trademark, it very clearly was not us. We left the studio happy enough with what we had achieved though it's hard to be objective when you have just finished creating something. Within a few days there were some rumblings from Owen that he was not happy with the track at all and a strange discontent started to set in.​

The weird thing was that there was no formal split or announcements or anything we just stopped calling each other to arrange anything. It was the last time the three of us were in a room together. Since that time I had Owen over to my studio in Braintree a few times and we recorded a few tracks and myself and Peter picked up where we left off in 2001 when invited to record a song for a Martin Newell tribute album. We chose "The world strikes one" and that marked the beginning of a new era of working together which has seen us work with Jasun Martz (Frank Zappa, Michael Jackson), Keith Levene (PiL), Hilda Garman, Tor Cesay (Mongrel), Wavis O'Shave and countless others. I've occasionally thought of trying to pull Owen in and seeing if we can reignite the insane picnic chemistry but it seems we have all moved a long way musically and it's hard to imagine recording again without Tony Smith at the controls. Hilda Garman recorded a really great version of "in the summer rain"  ( http://soundcloud.com/barry-lamb/peter-ashby-hilda-garman ) with myself on wind synth and Peter on piano...and I guess that captured a little of the insane picnic re imagined. Myself and Pete have talked about re recording "the awkward cage" as we were never happy with the mix on the album. "Chaos Control" and "the heartbreak party" have both been sampled by Tor Cesay.
0 Comments

Your comment will be posted after it is approved.


Leave a Reply.

    Picture

    Archive

    These pages represent my best attempt at a musical journal, travelogue, archive record of my musical landscape and everything I have been involved in over the years. It features celebrated projects to undeveloped ideas, sketchpad moments, memories and general stuff that has been part of my creative endeavours and the Falling A Records story. I am attempting to place things in chronological order though as time passes and I trawl the crates in my loft, I am discovering that my record keeping has been quite vague at times. Please feel free to interact and correct where necessary. The page also serves as the archive page for the website and is where we post our various announcements etc.,
    It's very much a work in progress. 

    "a work of art is never finished, it is merely abandoned" 

    Archives

    March 2023
    February 2023
    January 2023
    December 2022
    November 2022
    October 2022
    September 2022
    August 2022
    July 2022
    June 2022
    May 2022
    April 2022
    March 2022
    February 2022
    January 2022
    December 2021
    November 2021
    October 2021
    September 2021
    August 2021
    July 2021
    June 2021
    April 2021
    March 2021
    February 2021
    January 2021
    December 2020
    November 2020
    October 2020
    September 2020
    August 2020
    July 2020
    June 2020
    May 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    January 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    May 2017
    December 2016
    June 2016
    April 2016
    January 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014
    October 2014
    June 2014
    April 2014
    January 2014
    September 2013
    June 2013
    February 2012
    October 2011
    September 2011
    March 2011
    April 2010
    March 2010
    February 2010
    June 2009
    April 2009
    April 2008
    November 2007
    July 2007
    May 2007
    January 2006
    July 2004
    May 2004
    April 2004
    March 2004
    February 2004
    May 1983
    December 1982
    August 1982
    June 1980
    October 1978
    August 1978
    December 1977
    November 1974
    December 1969
    October 1961
    March 1959

    Categories

    All
    Archive
    Cassette Culture
    Catalogue
    Clacton Years
    Cloud Quartet
    Definitive Moments In The Musical Landscape Of A Noise Architect
    Dynamite Vision Years
    Falling A Archive
    Influences
    Jazz
    Musical
    Music Press
    Rock Against Racism
    Social Media
    Stone Premonitions
    Synth Pop
    The Insane Picnic

    RSS Feed

Proudly powered by Weebly