Hardsparrow - ProfilesArchive

About Me

Following his critically-acclaimed appearance as a singing fish, in a musical production at Stoke Damerel School at the dawn of the 1980's, Hardsparrow seemed destined for a glittering career in Show Business. But, tragically, the pressure of public expectations instead forced him to retreat into a terrifying dream-world from which he has never fully emerged. With this in mind, it was perhaps inevitable that, when he finally made his official return to public performance in Winter 2005, it would be a critical and commercial disaster. The marine references were still there, but the trademark sequined cap and foam-filled tail were gone, replaced instead by a stream of inane songs, apparently written by himself, without any of the professional help other modern pop artists might sensibly employ.
Shielded from the truth by a close circle of concerned peers, he has continued to "perform" musical concerts, notorious in the cultural fringes for their excruciating pathos, and has even been offered the chance to release some of his confused cries-for-help on an imaginary Scottish micro-label, complete with convoluted and improbable back-story, set up solely to appease his delusional and violent fantasies.

My Interests

Music:

Member Since: 8/28/2005
Influences: Beach Boys to Bjork, Black Dog to Bob Log, Carter Family to Kevin "Bloody" Wilson, Poets Of Rhythm to Pentangle, Faith No More to Fence Collective, Smog to Vashti Bunyan, Ramones to Drexciya, Boredoms to Banhart, ISB to KLF, AFX to AMT, Leo Kottke to Kool Keith, Papa M to Mama Cass, Sun Ra to sun set...
Sounds Like: "In its latter stages, it saw .. a chap called Hardsparrow drunkenly slur a lengthy, crumbling song about crab fishing, by which point it was definitely time for bed." THE SCOTSMAN
Record Label: Fence / Sweet Lion
Type of Label: None

My Blog

Tram-a-lam-a-ding-dong

The next sparrer effort, Meerschaum Tram, is coming together nicely, in my head at least. But next week I will be retreating to a house in the wilderness (Parkstone), to spend 6 or 7 days recording wh...
Posted by Hardsparrow on Thu, 26 Jun 2008 06:22:00 PST

Business Plan 2008

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Posted by Hardsparrow on Wed, 09 Jan 2008 06:38:00 PST

Sea Mountain Songs

So, I was asked, about a year ago, to cobble together a half-hour of music for Fence's Picket fence series. Cut to last week, and with a monumental effort of will, and more than one pack of Best-in Bo...
Posted by Hardsparrow on Tue, 02 Oct 2007 04:33:00 PST

OLO Podcast

At 2006's Homegame festival I asked the Olo boys if I could do them a mix. "Yeah, go on then," one of them said. So I rushed home and bashed one out. Then I kept it on my computer for a year, but now ...
Posted by Hardsparrow on Thu, 24 May 2007 10:49:00 PST

Bournemouth

So.. I've been rejected by Brighton University, but I'm not too gutted because Bournemouth's Arts Institute is next on my hit-list and the music scene down here right now is fantastic. A recent Solid ...
Posted by Hardsparrow on Fri, 11 May 2007 04:27:00 PST

Sweet Lion CDRs

LOOK AT ME! I DID THIS! LOOK!! Oj! What A Sorry Life.. SLDC01/01.5* Summer 2005 1. Classic beard show 2. Lighthearted 3. I drew skeletons 4. You took the top bunk 5. Cremyll ferry 6. Song of the nitr...
Posted by Hardsparrow on Wed, 02 May 2007 12:14:00 PST

Don't Fudge With The Fence Made

That's the title of the new Fence sampler, available on February 26th from yer better independent stores. Barely the price of two over-priced sandwiches for an albums worth of audio joy, min...
Posted by Hardsparrow on Tue, 20 Feb 2007 07:09:00 PST

Swedish Song

I recently decided, rather foolishly, to try and write a song in Swedish for the End Of The Road festival. A canny decision as it turned out, as almost half the people there seemed to be Swe...
Posted by Hardsparrow on Fri, 13 Oct 2006 11:05:00 PST

Pussy Guitar

Well, we all get ideas for concept albums don't we, and then you start watching some old cowboy film on BBC 2 and before you know it it's lunchtime and you've forgotten the whole rotten idea. Well, I ...
Posted by Hardsparrow on Tue, 18 Jul 2006 11:28:00 PST

The Kong

I was living in London until recently, where a few years back I knocked dull heads with my friend Mungo and we formed a band. A Guitar Monkey was enlisted, the Obvious Drummer was approached and ...
Posted by Hardsparrow on Tue, 18 Jul 2006 11:16:00 PST