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Well summer seems to have gone by way too fast for me, as you get older that really does seem to be the case. I remember summers when I was a little boy being absolutely endless. Spent a lot of time this year shouting at and bossing musicians, strange bunch of people but as long as they deliver the goods and raise our spirits who gives a fuck. Farmer Phil’s Festival was great fun but hard work as usual.  All the bands and artists were sweethearts to a man/woman  – not one of them gave me any trouble. Thanks for that one and all.
I had a great gig at The Big Splash Festival in Newport on a very windy stage outside the Arts Centre right next to the river. I took my guitar out of its case and the case got blown right across the stage ! We’re talking windy here ! I was wearing a very nice shirt for the occasion too which nobody saw because I had to keep my coat on.I enjoyed the gig and was very well looked after by the crew and the audience were just lovely. A film crew turned up to film some of the gig and I was interviewed after. They’re going to send me a copy and I’ll put it up on here so you can all see it for yourselves.

Still enjoying Open Mic at The Bridges on a monday night. Still having some beautiful ‘moments’. I love it, you just never know what you’re going to get and there’s always a surprise or two. All welcome, come on down. It’s fun !

I’ve been rehearsing with Miles and Erica for my album launch at The Half moon in Putney on thursday – some of you got a preview at the Shared event at the Bridges . Got Tim Parkes on guitar and Mark Davies on percussion and Emma Davies on backing vocals. Sounding  just fabulous, got myself a lovely band, really looking forward to the gig.

Right my darlings, that’s almost all for now, hope to see some of you at forthcoming gigs. Come and say hello and give me a hug. x

Here a couple of links to video of me at the Deershed festival earlier this year.
Thanks a lot to Mark Davies – err no not that one, another one – for looking after me at Deershed and for letting us link to these clips. Both these songs are  from my new album Big World for a Little Man from all good record shops and Amazon – just in case you didn’t know.

Underneath the Cherry Tree
Bury Me Standing

Thanks to Mark Durant for letting us feature his great photos of Ray supporting the Wonderstuff at the Tunbridge Wells’ wonderful Forum in July 2010

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[View with PicLens]

In March this year, Ray, Leo and Lulu spent a few days in a straw bale shed in darkest Kent. The idea was to produce some photos for Ray’s album. This happened, you will have seen some of the results. Something else happened too. We made a film. It is not a music video though of course it is. It was made with honesty, with love, with no budget, without much fore-thought and with a lot of after-thought. We think it is beautiful and sad and truthful. Please watch it in the spirit in which it was made.

Old Man in Young Man’s Shoes

Leo x

Only three weeks ’til the album launch at the Half Moon in Putney. Those nice people at the venue have done a lovely poster and you can buy tickets from here:
Tickets

It’s going to be a great night with special guests and an audience packed with friends old and new.

Do come – you’d be a fool not to.

Sorry my laptop is broken – will be out of action  for three weeks. But you can still come and see me supporting the wonderful Wonderstuff at the Tunbridge Wells Forum on Saturday 30th July. I will still get on here though

Tunbridge Wells Forum

Arrived at The Deershed Festival in Thirsk, North Yorkshire, parked up and walked onto the site and the first thing I see is a 10 foot mermaid ! Cool. For the people that don’t know, I have a thing about mermaids. Anyway, I followed her around for about an hour hoping that she’d fall over and that I could assist her in some way…A good start to my day. ( She never fell by the way, not even a wobble, bloody good on those stilts…Bugger ! )

Had a lovely roast dinner in a big round Yorkshire pudding and off we go for some music. Very nice vibe, no twats, even the drunks were friendly and happy, beautiful hot day. Found some friends of mine, Groanbox, playing in a packed marquee, sounded great, went down well with the audience. They’d played earlier in the family tent and said that with so many kids around they’d had to censor themselves quite extensively….Bloody good job they didn’t offer me that stage then !

I then watched Danny and the Champions of the World on the main stage, great music, saw Danny and the boys at Glastonbury so already a fan. Had a chat with him later, very nice man.

And onwards to my gig…I played on the Buskstop Stage. I was well looked after by the stage crew. Had to censor myself too as it happens. I was singing Moon on a Stick and just getting to the line, some people want to just fuck until they’re sore, when a pretty little 8 year old girl walked by, seemed to like what she was hearing, sat down and gave me the most beautiful smile….I just didn’t have the heart to say fuck in front of her and swapped it for an undiscernable noise instead ! Had a great gig, drove the crowd wild with my slash and burn guitar style. I enjoyed them and they enjoyed me !

Time to go see Miles Hunt and Erica Nockalls play their gig. Their marquee was rammed and some, everyone came to see them. I think they needed a bigger stage. A great gig for them. All in all a very pleasant day. Drove Miles and Erica back to the Bridges pub to pick up their car and crawled into bed at 3:30 am. Cleaning out the car the next day I found an empty champagne bottle in the back seat where Erica sat. Such a rock and roll chick that Erica !

BTW my laptop is poorly at the moment so I won’t be online for a few days but will keep posting here.

Left my home in Wales at 7:30pm. Arrived at Glastonbury Reserved Car Park ( Ahem ) at 10:30pm. Everyone tells me the traffic’s going to be really bad even in the evening. Very few cars on the road, an easy drive in, no hold ups until I pull into the carpark  – and 5 cops jump out give my car a good going over.

Haven’t done drugs since 1972 so I’m a bit pissed off but then I’m always getting pulled, I just seem to have one of those faces.

A great start I’m thinking but this turns out to be the only downer of the festival, well apart from all the drunken chav types who just come to get pissed and shout a lot. Music lovers ? I don’t think so. Oh and the sun, way too hot for a vampire like me, had to do a Spaniard and lay low between the hours of noon and 6pm.

Would like to have seen Seasick Steve but had to give him a miss, shame, us old fellas have to stick together. In fact the only time I saw the main stage was when I was leaving on sunday night, 23 stages at Glastonbury, plenty of fabulous music there, I was perfectly happy with that. Saw my friend Barry Wickens from my old band Immaculate Fools now playing with Steve Harley.Great to catch up. Strange to see him playing with Steve’s band but they played a great set and Barry was just as amazing as I remember. A fine musician.

My gig was on the Tadpole Stage in the Green Futures Field. Great stage, good P. A. and run really well. The soundman for my set, Dean, got my sound just right, big and dirty. I had a great crowd and played my arse off. Thanks to all the crew there and thanks to Simone and Cliff for getting me the gig.

My favourite band at the festival ? 10 Ten Tongue.  Go check their MySpace page on this link: 10 Ton Tongue The guitar player , Bex, is just astonishing, a woman after my own heart, hope one day to play with her. She has a Flamenco thing going on and much more. Love the music, shamanic folk roots kind of thing. They stole my heart, fabulous band. Also really liked Wap Wap Wow, Danny and the Champions of the World and The Penny Black Remedy.

And I bumped into old tour mate Arthur Brown – yes the God of Hellfire himself. Did some shows with Arthur and Little Bob and a few others in France a couple of years back and played guitar onstage for him too. Was good to see him again – a perfect gentleman – but very tall.

I camped in The Green Futures field with my chums Leo and Marianne and to be honest we had everything we needed there. Great stages and bands, good food, lovely people and no fucking litter on the ground. Guess everyone’s Glastonbury is different, mine was just great and I’m already looking forward to next year. I was at one of the first ones in 1971 and my how things have changed, if your looking for echoes of the past head up towards the Green Fields area next year. It’s all there, all you really need.

There are more photos (by Leo of course) – do you want to see them?

so no updates for a few days. If you leave a message I am afraid it won’t appear on here until next week but don’t let that stop you. And if you are at Glasto this weekend you know where to find me. Next week new photos up here and links to album samples should appear. Ray x

Dirty Ray will be performing at this year’s Glastonbury Festival. No, not on the Pyramid Stage – maybe next year – but at the intimate, solar powered Tadpole stage in the Green Futures field. Ray will be playing tracks from his forthcoming album Big World for a Little Man and some old favourites too, on Thursday Afternoon at 4pm. If you are at Glasto do come and say hi.

Ray’s new album ‘Big World for a Little Man’, produced by Miles Hunt of the Wonderstuff, is now mastered and is set for release on on September 16th 2010.

It sounds fantastic and we are all excited about it. Sneak previews of some tracks will be available soon and links will be posted here in the near future. If you leave a comment we can email you as things develop.

Check out the gig list for upcoming dates and details of the album launch in London.

Ray will also be doing a set at Glastonbury on the Tadpole stage in the Green Futures field on the Thursday at 4pm. Hope we see some of you there.

You can pre-order a copy of the album – or by the Shared album – now by clicking here:

Big World order