Folk gets surprise boost on BBC TV

Subject: Folk gets surprise boost on BBC TV
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 16 Oct 08 - 06:54 PM

On BBC Television's One show tonight, Ade Edmondson, ex of "The Young Ones" and "Bottom" revealed that he is not acting at this time, having started his own band.

He explained that his band, "The Bad Shepherds" is a punk/ folk fusion band in the sense that it is punk music played on folk instruments (he plays mandolin, as well as guitar).

He went on to say that he loves folk music, and pointed out that it is a misconception that folk is all about sweaters, beards and pipes. He said he found it stimulating and exciting.

The most surprising apologist for the music we love, but God bless him for making the point in a mainstream program, at peak viewing time.

Dijit

Subject: RE: Folk gets surprise boost on BBC TV
From: GUEST,Silas
Date: 16 Oct 08 - 06:57 PM

Stands in for the late and much lamented ViV Stanshall of Bonzo.

Proper music

Subject: RE: Folk gets surprise boost on BBC TV
From: The Borchester Echo
Date: 16 Oct 08 - 07:02 PM

it is a misconception that folk is all about sweaters, beards and pipes

'Spose his daughter told him that.

Subject: RE: Folk gets surprise boost on BBC TV
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 16 Oct 08 - 07:08 PM

You really need to lay off the acid dops Diane, the bitterness is becoming boring.

Don T

Subject: RE: Folk gets surprise boost on BBC TV
From: skipy
Date: 16 Oct 08 - 07:12 PM

Hell's teeth, I thought it was about sweaters, beards and pipes!
Been getting it wrong for 37 years!
Skipy

Subject: RE: Folk gets surprise boost on BBC TV
From: The Borchester Echo
Date: 16 Oct 08 - 07:15 PM

Ella Edmondson is a well-known performer.
Strange you didn't know that.
Furthermore, her mother Jennifer Saunders - as writer of that sitcom crap about the WI - was instrumental in dragging the kRusby in to do the singing.
Thus it is altogether unsurprising that Dad Ade is leaping onto the bandwagon.

Subject: RE: Folk gets surprise boost on BBC TV
From: bubblyrat
Date: 16 Oct 08 - 07:32 PM

I would hesitate to call a mandolin a "folk" instrument !! If it IS, then it took a hell of a long time to get that way !

Subject: RE: Folk gets surprise boost on BBC TV
From: Folkiedave
Date: 16 Oct 08 - 07:33 PM

And booked at festivals next year all ready.

Now there's a surprise.

She was at Shepley last year.

Jools Holland Show next at a guess.

Subject: RE: Folk gets surprise boost on BBC TV
From: The Borchester Echo
Date: 16 Oct 08 - 07:36 PM

No, but they're jolly good for cutting up carrots.

Subject: RE: Folk gets surprise boost on BBC TV
From: The Borchester Echo
Date: 16 Oct 08 - 07:37 PM

Er . . . that's a mandolin(e) for carrot chopping, not Ms Edmondson.

Subject: RE: Folk gets surprise boost on BBC TV
From: Ruth Archer
Date: 16 Oct 08 - 07:47 PM

I believe the family regularly attend the folk awards. They do like the music.

Subject: RE: Folk gets surprise boost on BBC TV
From: The Borchester Echo
Date: 16 Oct 08 - 07:53 PM

Maybe they like acid drops too . . .

Subject: RE: Folk gets surprise boost on BBC TV
From: The Borchester Echo
Date: 16 Oct 08 - 07:55 PM

Recording idea:

Carrot juice and acid drops, they don't go together

(Apologies to Ms Carthy)

Subject: RE: Folk gets surprise boost on BBC TV
From: GUEST,Fantum
Date: 17 Oct 08 - 03:48 AM

Not bothered about how or why the guy got into folk music just that he did

Very pleased to have another singer / player

Subject: RE: Folk gets surprise boost on BBC TV
From: Will Fly
Date: 17 Oct 08 - 05:03 AM

Who cares how or why. Lots of actors started off as musos - Charlie Higson and Ricky Gervaise are two obvious examples. Which particular bandwagon they jump on, if you want to use that phrase, is up to them and how they want to/are able to make a living. Both ways are pretty precarious at times, so good luck to Edmondson. In the end, the music will tell.

Subject: RE: Folk gets surprise boost on BBC TV
From: quokka
Date: 17 Oct 08 - 09:07 AM

I always had a soft spot for Vyvyen

Subject: RE: Folk gets surprise boost on BBC TV
From: The Borchester Echo
Date: 17 Oct 08 - 10:58 AM

Right. Raise you three liquorice allsorts, a stick of Edinburgh rock and (especially) a large handful of (aniseed) balls in this playground game that lacks any conprehensible rules.

Adrian Edmondson (as well as Jennifer Saunders) has made pots of dosh from writing so it's hardly a case of a struggling minstrel, more of a successful dilettante scriptwriter with time on his hands. What is surprising is not that he's doing what he does but that anyone is surprised that he is. If he didn't support the high-profile activities of his partner and daughter, they wouldn't have a lot to talk about around the breakfast table and probably wouldn't even live in the same house.

(I did hear a buzz that Eliza Carthy's dad is thinking of doing a few floor spots. What a chancer).

Subject: RE: Folk gets surprise boost on BBC TV
From: selby
Date: 17 Oct 08 - 12:02 PM

Actually when Eliza and Nancy where going out together, when they where young girls ,they performed at our club Norma and Martin drove them, played full price on the door and Martin did a floor spot of two songs so there you go its happened already.
Keith

Subject: RE: Folk gets surprise boost on BBC TV
From: Will Fly
Date: 17 Oct 08 - 12:42 PM

Showbiz, in all its forms, is full of children piggybacking in one way or another on the fame or power of the parents. It was just the same at the Beeb 35+ years ago, and it's probably the same now. Nepotism. eh? Sod all I or you can do about it, and "if I had a million dollars, just one million to call my own", I might even indulge in something a little outré myself. But it wouldn't make a ha'porth of difference to whatever musical talent I might have. In the end, if Edmondson senior or junior are any good, then it will show; if not, it will show as well.

Subject: RE: Folk gets surprise boost on BBC TV
From: Tim Leaning
Date: 17 Oct 08 - 06:41 PM

DOnt you think the mainstream veiw of what is "good"
May be slightly biased towards what the next crop of "little angels" can muster in the way of tallent,by the doting parents?

Subject: RE: Folk gets surprise boost on BBC TV
From: Will Fly
Date: 18 Oct 08 - 03:52 AM

There's always that possibility, Tim, whenever you try to define "good", or "popular taste" (the "beauty is in the eye of the beholder" sort of thing). I think there are enough people with a solid critical ear in the particular genre we're talking about to be able to form an opinion as to whether the new brat pack have got musical legs - or whether their parents have, for that matter. :-)

Subject: RE: Folk gets surprise boost on BBC TV
From: Nerd
Date: 18 Oct 08 - 04:55 AM

Edmondson's love of folk music is not "leaping on the bandwagon" because of his daughter. He's been well-known as a folk-rock fan for ages. Over 20 years ago, he was directing videos for the Pogues and 10,000 Maniacs. In fact, Ella credits her dad with getting her interested in folk music, and giving her her first guitar. Seems Ade was the one who taught HER it's not all about sweaters, beards and pipes (though she DOES seem to like sweaters and cardigans well enough).

Ade's current band the Bad Shepherds, by the way, features Maartin Allcock and Troy Donockley, which makes me suspect he's good on that mando. But I haven't heard them, so I can't say for sure.

Subject: RE: Folk gets surprise boost on BBC TV
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 18 Oct 08 - 09:07 AM

BLOODY HELL!! Did nobody READ the first post of this thread?

I don't give a rat's arse, who got whom into folk music.

I just pointed out that folk music had at long last, and quite unexpectedly gleaned some positive comment on the mainstream media.

I am surprised, bearing in mind the paroxysms of screaming outrage we are accustomed to seeing whenever an advertiser sideswipes the genre for a cheap laugh, that there are not thousands of folkies lining up here to praise the worthy Mr. Edmondson for his display of good taste.

Still, nothing has EVER satisfied some on this forum.

Don T.

Subject: RE: Folk gets surprise boost on BBC TV
From: squeezebox-kc
Date: 18 Oct 08 - 09:24 AM

He must be fair to play in with Maartin but he might be doing it just for the hell of playing for pleasure.
Eliza did folk no favours on Jules Holland last night

Subject: RE: Folk gets surprise boost on BBC TV
From: Will Fly
Date: 18 Oct 08 - 09:25 AM

Don - I quite agree - does it matter if the music's good? No.

Subject: RE: Folk gets surprise boost on BBC TV
From: Nerd
Date: 18 Oct 08 - 11:59 AM

Don,

I'm in the US, where we don't have quite the same issues when it comes to folk in the media. We have our own challenges to be sure, but it's a different set.

Also, as you must know by now, threads are conversations, not a sequential set of responses to your original point. I was responding to Diane's suggestion that he was just "leaping on the bandwagon" because of his daughter. I think he's been a supporter for a long time, which, as you say, is a great thing.

So here I am, lining up to praise the worthy Mr. Edmondson!

Subject: RE: Folk gets surprise boost on BBC TV
From: r.padgett
Date: 18 Oct 08 - 12:52 PM

and why not good on him!

Ray

Subject: RE: Folk gets surprise boost on BBC TV
From: The Borchester Echo
Date: 18 Oct 08 - 01:27 PM

It was the fact that anybody was surprised that the former Vyvyan Basterd was playing a carrot slicer in a band that I was alluding to, not that he was merely copying his talented daughter. You need to look at that other 80s sitcom Blackadder and its metallic references to work out the full impact of what any (through apparently not every) fule kno.

[Slopes off bronzily and goldily chewing black bullets and licorice torpedos].

Subject: RE: Folk gets surprise boost on BBC TV
From: Nerd
Date: 18 Oct 08 - 10:38 PM

Diane, you can claim to have been saying whatever you like. Luckily, we have what you actually said right in front of us. To wit: you "'spose his daughter told him" that folk music wasn't all about sweaters, beards and pipes, and you think he's "leaping on the bandwagon" to support the "high profile activities of his partner and daughter."

When what you claimed turns out not be true, of course, you knew it all along. It's the rest of us who are fools for not knowing--even though we're the ones who pointed it out.

That's brilliant, that is!

Subject: RE: Folk gets surprise boost on BBC TV
From: The Borchester Echo
Date: 18 Oct 08 - 11:53 PM

Blackadder: Baldrick, have you no idea what irony is?
Baldrick: Yes, it's like goldy and bronzy only it's made out of iron.

or

Me to Me: Diane, why do you bother to talk to dim Murkans called Steve?
Me back to Me: I've absolutely no idea.

Furthermore, what the fuck's the OP on about, describing Adrian Edmondson as "a surprising apologist for folk music"? An apologist? As in "I'm so sorry I like this music which isn't quite as silly as you seem to think"? Fortunately I'm aware he's no such thing (as others have pointed out, the whole lot of them en famille trotted off to the Folk Awards and Ella's got a packed giglist), though it would be infinitely preferable if high profile references on primetime TV were not to the "good enough for folk" mob but to what our cultural heritage actually comprises and how good the music is when not being slaughtered by them.

[time for a walnut whip and a packet of spangles, methinks . . . ]

Subject: RE: Folk gets surprise boost on BBC TV
From: The Borchester Echo
Date: 19 Oct 08 - 12:51 AM

Oh, and while in pissed-off mode, I notice that someone above, à propos of very little, refers familiarly to Ms Carthy: (Eliza did folk no favours on Jules Holland) by which I assume was meant the extended transmission of Jools in which she was showcasing her self-written songs from Dreams Of Breathing Underwater. I've just watched two very moving and personal renditions on the iPlayer, backed by her very excellent band, which were anything but an attempt to "do folk a favour". How patronising and myopic. It reminds me of when Chris Wood was playing out songs which eventually became Lark Descending a few years ago at a local care in the community drop-in centre (sorry "f*lk club"). A typical GEFF couple (y'know, tie-dies & tankards) stalked out when he failed to produce Andy Cutting from his guitar case, declaring they'd come to hear "English traditional tunes". Perhapd they should have stayed at home and put on their old Vaughan Williams vinyl, just as Ms Carthy oughtn't to be allowed to pick up a tenor guitar.

Subject: RE: Folk gets surprise boost on BBC TV
From: Nerd
Date: 19 Oct 08 - 01:47 AM

Diane,

Convenient how every time your facts are proven wrong, it turns out that you were "being ironic." I don't think anyone here buys it, though, your tortuous attempts to look clever by referencing "Blackadder" notwithstanding.

Funnily enough, you only dig yourself in deeper when you reveal that you don't have a clue what "apologist" means. (Hint: "Apologist" is derived from the Greek root apologia, meaning a speech in defense of something, and came down in English primarily within Christian tradition, in which Paul is the original apologist for the religion. Note that Paul does not apologize for Christianity, but quite the contrary writes passionate letters explaining why Christianity is the best religion out there.)

Thus, Edmondson was quite rightly described as an "apologist for folk music," if what he was doing was explaining why folk music was so good.

Modern English "apologize" has curiously reversed the meaning of "apologia," so that to "apologize" is to acknowledge one's behavior as bad or incorrect, and to ask forgiveness for it.

But then, you knew that, right? You were just "being ironic."

Subject: RE: Folk gets surprise boost on BBC TV
From: The Borchester Echo
Date: 19 Oct 08 - 04:55 AM

"When the world falls apart some things stay in place
Levi Stubbs' tears run down his face". (Billy Bragg)

I've been nicking stuff from Richard Curtis scripts for the past two decades.

Steve Winick has (apparently) just passed his beginners exam in cutting and pasting any old crap from from Wikipedia.

My main point was, however, (sigh) was that Vyvyan on the truly awful on dumbed down One in spouting whatever he did, should surely not have surprised anyone with ears within several hundred miles of the ground.

[Jeez, and I thought WAV was dense . . .]

Subject: RE: Folk gets surprise boost on BBC TV
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 19 Oct 08 - 04:57 AM

Here we go again............

"They Shoot Horses, Don't They?"

Subject: RE: Folk gets surprise boost on BBC TV
From: The Borchester Echo
Date: 19 Oct 08 - 05:03 AM

In that the film is about the odd US tradition of marathon dancing competitions, maybe . . . possibly . . . who knows, or even cares?

Subject: RE: Folk gets surprise boost on BBC TV
From: selby
Date: 19 Oct 08 - 05:20 AM

I notice that someone above, à propos of very little, picking up on what you said Ms Easby
(I did hear a buzz that Eliza Carthy's dad is thinking of doing a few floor spots. What a chancer).

Your words not mine and as this is a forum and things drift I thought I would add to the party a little snippet from my experiances I did not and do not expect to be attacked. when did acid attacks become a prerequesite of been a member of mudcat.

Subject: RE: Folk gets surprise boost on BBC TV
From: GUEST
Date: 19 Oct 08 - 05:33 AM

But you will be attacjed selby
That is primarily what Mudcat is about.

Subject: RE: Folk gets surprise boost on BBC TV
From: The Borchester Echo
Date: 19 Oct 08 - 05:33 AM

¿Qué

Subject: RE: Folk gets surprise boost on BBC TV
From: GUEST
Date: 19 Oct 08 - 05:34 AM

Worse still you could be attacked.

Subject: RE: Folk gets surprise boost on BBC TV
From: The Borchester Echo
Date: 19 Oct 08 - 05:39 AM

[in context}¿Qué

Who attacked the selby person?
I saw Ms Kerr and Ms Carthy when they were quite little too.
But I haven't commented on it though as I thought we were talking about la famille Edmondson (which was singularly uninteresting anyway). . .

Subject: RE: Folk gets surprise boost on BBC TV
From: The Borchester Echo
Date: 19 Oct 08 - 05:46 AM

. . . but I did comment on what somebody called "squeezeboxke" said about Ms Carthy "doing folk no favours" on Jools. Are you admitting to be one and the same person?

Subject: RE: Folk gets surprise boost on BBC TV
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 19 Oct 08 - 07:19 AM

"In that the film is about the odd US tradition of marathon dancing competitions, maybe . . . possibly . . . who knows, or even cares?"

Well done Di, you made the connection. Those competitions went on and on and on and on and on, with the majority of those involved dropping out through sheer mind-numbing fatigue, until everyone was totally f**ked and no-one remembered or cared what they were there for anyway.

Subject: RE: Folk gets surprise boost on BBC TV
From: Silas
Date: 19 Oct 08 - 08:04 AM

So nice to have Diane involved in the discussions - she always adds something new to the topic.

Subject: RE: Folk gets surprise boost on BBC TV
From: The Borchester Echo
Date: 19 Oct 08 - 09:10 AM

Indeed I could add something new to some topics. It's why I get paid to write columns or research programmes. Mudcat, however, is not "the meeja". In it lurks an amoebic but pervasive cabal of those unable or incapable of sticking to a topic and who spout anything that floats into their heads, regardless of what has been said before, or the actual context. These have a tendency to accuse someone else of having a go at them when it is actually someone entirely different (or no-one at all). Then there is another that cherrypicks the odd phrase out of context in order to construct some obscure and wholly irrelevant point which exists only in the machinations of the ramshackle windmill that lives in their heads.

There again, there are the out-and-out non-topics:

Celeb talks on talk show about new band he's got with f*lky (yeuk) tendencies. Somebody's surprised. What did you expect him to be talking about? He's always on about this. Duuuuh.

It really adds value to threads dedicated to the eradication of WAV. Racist twat tries to use music to further vile, white supremacist ideology. The purpose is to stop him, and others like him Plain and simple, even if it does take close on a thousand posts.

Subject: RE: Folk gets surprise boost on BBC TV
From: Joe Offer
Date: 19 Oct 08 - 10:26 AM

Back off, Diane. Talk about the topic of discussion, or don't talk at all.
-Joe Offer-

Subject: RE: Folk gets surprise boost on BBC TV
From: The Borchester Echo
Date: 19 Oct 08 - 11:01 AM

Fair enough.
WAV is to be discussed only in his own monocultural thread. Though others seem to be managing perfectly well there on their own.

However, 'twas not me who introduced extraneous sweets, patronising comments on a completely different artist on another telly show, a crap US 70s film, spurious semantics copied from Wiki as a cover-up for failing to detect metal, particularly iron. Nor a series of accusations directed at me arising from wholly misunderstood and distorted (either real deliberately contrived) skewing of what I had said in this non-topic which lacks any cogent point. In this respect, I was speaking to topic inasmuch as was possible, viz: stating that what the artist in question said was no surprise whatsoever as he is known to play things and, together with his family, has a long-standing stake in what some describe as "f*lk".

Subject: RE: Folk gets surprise boost on BBC TV
From: Nerd
Date: 19 Oct 08 - 02:00 PM

Diane,

It's okay not to know something. But when you are compelled to accuse other people of "spurious semantics" just because you didn't know something, it's actually quite sad. "Apologetics" is a branch of Christian rhetoric well known to anyone who follows the ongoing controversies about how much and where Christianity should be part of public discourse. An apologist is not someone who apologizes. It's really that simple.

For the record, my characterization of "apologist" was not in fact copied from Wikipedia. If you visit Wikipedia, which I just did, you will see that my phrasing has almost nothing in common with theirs.

Nor was my post "spurious semantics." An "apologist" is not someone who apologizes, any more than a rape victim is someone who experience rapture. Just because two words share a root does not mean they have the same meaning.

So, to clarify that we are indeed addressing the thread's topic, it appears that Don felt Adrian Edmondson was a welcome apologist for folk music on the BBC. And he was using the word correctly, despite Diane's objections.

Furthermore, Ade Edmondson has been a folk supporter for years, and has even helped to influence his daughter to become a performer. Well done!

Subject: RE: Folk gets surprise boost on BBC TV
From: The Borchester Echo
Date: 19 Oct 08 - 06:49 PM

Just wondering if Joe Offer's returning for an encore, to encourage born-again Nerdy-Stevie to back off (or indeed to fuck off), taking the equally ferrous/ferric-challenged Don Wizziethingy, the multi-identity Eliza knocker and the appalling monocultural WAV, with him.

Then we can all re-enact entire episodes of Blackadder and, to keep it entirely on-topic, I know a Flemish band that has the Blackadder theme in its repertoire. At a pinch, they could probably do The Young Ones too, but who would seriously want them to?

[Munching marshmallows and licorice comfits and thinking about opening a packet of hob-nobs or half-coated dark chocolate digestives].

Subject: RE: Folk gets surprise boost on BBC TV
From: Nerd
Date: 19 Oct 08 - 07:17 PM

Born again? Um, in case anyone cares, I'm a Jew. (Or at least, as Jonathan Miller said, "I'm Jew-ISH.")

I'm aware of Christian rhetorical traditions because I'm over-educated, and one of my degrees was on medieval literature.

Diane, everyone here loves you and would miss you if you ever left.

Subject: RE: Folk gets surprise boost on BBC TV
From: The Borchester Echo
Date: 20 Oct 08 - 06:10 AM

This thread's about a high-profile English celeb sticking an occasional toe a little way into something that's occasionally (and temporarily) just a bit fashionable in popland. Something like Sting or Stephen Fry - that sort of thing. Not even tangentially important, in the scale of things.

Nerdy Stevie's been on Mudcat for a whole two years longer than I have, so we've really got to be a bit deferential, especially considering all those exams he's totted up. Good grief, he must be WAV or at least closely related. How many out of 10 did you get for forklift driving, Stevie?

I joined Mudcat five or so years ago in order to speak out for a young performer that the usual GEFFs were putting the boot into, an activity I consider a lot more worthwhile than the current thread which is about nothing at all, really (barring the confectionery industry). However, look where Jim Moray is now . . . I checked on Stevie's first post and jeez, he's threatening to buy up the Leader/Trailer catalogue when he wins the lottery. May the various deities protect us from that. Isn't it bad enough that the shambolic goblin of Harrogate has the rights to this glorious, hidden music. Imagine them locked up in the Nerdy Polytechnic Library, wherever it is Over There, instead. Shouldn't, mustn't be allowed.