Lionheart Radio plays "The Way It Was"...

Many thanks to Chris McGranaghan for playing “The Way It Was” (from the original vinyl album of the same name) on his Lionheart Radio show last evening.

Much obliged, Chris!

Register for the "Live in Lichfield" ballot!

The “register for the ballot” at Fruits de Mer Records for the new Beau, lathe-cut, “Live in Lichfield” EP is now open! It’ll be available on 15^th September.
 
UK or overseas, email fruitsdemer7@hotmail.com to get your name in the hat! 

Good luck!

Stick It In Your Ear webzine reviews "Palace Of Light"...

 A truly wonderful review of the latest Beau “Palace Of Light” album has just been published in the Stick It In Your Ear webzine! Many thanks to Brian Hinton!

********

BEAU

"Palace Of Light"

Cherry Red BEAUPOL 1 - DL-only - (49:58)

..by Brian Hinton

Beau, aka Trevor Midgley, or briefly John Trevor was hand picked back in 1969 by John Peel for the now legendary Dandelion label, alongside other unique talents, Bridgett St John, Clifford T Ward and Kevin Coyne. It is Coyne with whom Beau’s later work most chimes, songs of anger and bitter humour. And of all of these troubadours from the post Dylan/Donovan musical revolution, Beau is surely the most prolific. This is his nineteenth download-only album released by Cherry Red. It is a true cottage industry, just Beau and his 12 string, homely recording studios and a seemingly endless supply of things to say. I went back to Beau’s first and its a fascinating contrast — the same mastery of 12 string, almost a one man orchestra, a mastery of storytelling with a twist and social comment, but the voice is now starker, more of a Northern timbre — Beau hails from Leeds, where his first local radio broadcast was with Jake Thackray and a budgie called Puck. Indeed there is humour here as well as a heavy dose of irony. Beau rails against the world of identity culture and celebrity culture like an updated Thackray, minus the pluminess and affectation.

 

Things kick off with ‘I Plagiarise Beethoven’ in which Beau imagines himself a superstar, whose classical appropriations have gone unnoticed (with little tweaks of musical quotations). It is a shame that Beau does not gig more, this would go down a storm. ‘Twenty-Twenty Vision’ is a blast against social media, and the inherent fascism in woke orthodoxy. Again the 12 string is a musical counterpoint. Masterly. “Sceptic tanks” indeed. These are lyrics which really deserve to be printed out. ‘Glimpse of Venus’ is so multi-layered that the listener can hardly keep up with the wordplay — | think of Alan Clayson and his similar fantasies of an alternative show biz sensation. ‘Green Hill’ makes climbing a hill a metaphor for lost hopes. ‘Cuckoo Land’ presents Beau at his most bitterly sarcastic, and his perfect diction merely makes each point sharper. ‘Opportunity Knocks’ revisits Hughie Green, though it opens with Machiavelli not the winking Canadian. Again the twelve string dances in counterpoint.

 

Beau says that an early influence was Tom Paxton. There is the same underlying compassion, but a sharp point made all the same. Humour leavens anger. Even if the next song is about a public hanging. For saying one word too many. ‘A Target On Your Back’ is so speedily sung that the listener can hardly keep up. But every word clear as a bell. I have a picture in my head of Beau as an updated Greek cynic, railing at the modern world from a dustbin. Relentless. So it is no surprise that this is followed by ‘Cultural Appropriation Blues’ which tells the story of a posh blues singer from Stoke Poges, rhyming chatter and Henley Regatta.

 

‘Epigram’ is the portrait of a man needing tranquillisers to keep going. ‘Lost For A Cliche’ is jaunty confession of a man obsessed with getting just the right form of words. Which turns out to be a hack journalist seeking out exactly the tritest cliche he can. ‘The Worshipful Company Of New April Fools’— now there’s a title — opens “We’re living in truly Onwellian times” and doesn’t let up. Blithely happy, this album is not. Give us a glimpse of hope, Beau. Even though you are undoubtedly right in your diagnosis of cultural malaise! Three to go. ‘Ballad Of The Rowdy Knave’ is about the new fascism. Masquerading as populism. ‘Celebrity Memorabilia’ imagines Beau’s cast offs coming under the hammer, “consomme stains from Watford Gap". Even Adele gets a mention! ‘The Song’ is the most wistful thing here, sung with passion, about music that can “bring a quiver” to the heart. A song about the power of memories and love. It’s an anthem. Beau has gathered a much deserved cult following. A man of clear sight in a country of the blind. The more I imbibe this album and then turn on the news, the more Beau’s lyrics hold true, and come to haunt me. I just hope that he cheers up now and then. And John Peel will be listening up in heaven, and thinking “the boy done well”.

 

Brian Hinton

 

"Beau - Live in Lichfield" - live video now online...

 Good news!
 
“Where Is Your Gun, My Son?”, the live video promoting the upcoming “Live in Lichfield” EP from Fruits de Mer Records is now online and linked from FdM’s order page!
 
Enjoy...

Harmonic Distortion reviews "Palace Of Light"...

A great review of the “Palace Of Light” album from Duncan Fletcher at Harmonic Distortion! 

Many (belated) thanks, Duncan!

***

Beau - Palace Of Light

 

Consistently inspired singer songwriter returns with a satirical 15-song set. Modern life may well be rubbish but at least we have Beau to survey it with gentle humour and poetic barbs.

 

I’ve always admired artists that are in it for the long haul. There are certain songwriters who stick to their principles and stylistic choices, riding out the changes in fashion, sensibilities and taste that affect the wider musical world. Beau, AKA Trevor Midgley is one of these artists. His latest album is his nineteenth for Cherry Red Records and confirms his status as one of the sharpest satirical songwriters this country has produced. He won’t be appearing at Radio One’s Big Weekend, neither will he grace the Pyramid stage at Glastonbury this year. But at 79 years of age Beau still has the drive and talent that was evident on his eponymous 1969 debut album (which was the first release on John Peel’s Dandelion label don’t ya know!)

 

Palace Of Light is, like Beau’s previous albums, a simply recorded affair - just one voice and one guitar (a vintage 1968 Harmony 12-string no less!) It’s a contemporary look at modern life and its strange political and cultural climate. The accompanying sense of dissatisfaction and occasional bafflement is best encapsulated in songs such as ‘Twenty-Twenty Vision’ and ‘Cuckoo Land’. Serious subject matter for sure but Beau lays into it all with delicate humour. Similarly smile-raising is opening track ‘I Plagiarise Beethoven’ where we get an insight into Beau’s wide-ranging melodic influences. Other subjects/targets include cultural appropriation, social media, cancel culture, Brexit, identity politics, society’s obsession with celebrity, rigid adherence to ideology and more. Also worth looking out for are references to Adele, along with one to Paul McCartney’s sheepdog Martha on ‘Celebrity Memorabilia’.

 

He’s a pretty decent guitar player too, perhaps no surprise given that he’s spent a good 60 years at folk music’s coal face. You can take a listen to Palace Of Light via the Spotify player below. It’s a good place to start before working your way through his extensive and highly-recommended back catalogue.

 

http://beausrecordings.blogspot.com/ 

http://www.trevormidgley.com/

BIG News - a live Beau release...

BIG NEWS JUST BEEN ANOUNCED!!

A new Beau release - "Live in Lichfield" - has just been announced by Fruits de Mer Records.

Much more to come – stay tuned…

"Palace Of Light" on the climb...

I see “Palace Of Light” is climbing the Amazon Folk Chart again this morning!

C’mon, “Palace Of Light”!!!

Let It Rock reviews "Palace Of Light"...

“… an array of fifteen pieces which offer a serious cerebral lash of critical whip and may cause a faint-hearted audience to suffer whiplash.”

 
Excellent considered review of the new “Palace Of Light” set from the Let It Rock site in Canada! Many thanks, Dmitry!

*****

BEAU – Palace Of Light

Cherry Red 2025

Protecting one perfect place where words and notes and sentiment combines, English singer-songwriter launches an offensive on cultural narrative.

Arguably, the only reason Trevor Midgley has never gone for a concept album is that he’s interested in various ways the ways of the world get screwed up, even though social commentary and historical excursion are recurrent subjects on most of the veteran’s records, opinions on different aspects of entertainment appear on his platters less frequently. Still, it’s too fertile a stratum of our existence, and Beau’s too vested in this process, to not warrant the artist’s specific focus on what’s going on there, behind the scenes and in full frontal view of public. Cue “Palace Of Light”: an array of fifteen pieces which offer a serious cerebral lash of critical whip and may cause a faint-hearted audience to suffer whiplash.

Beau may somewhat dim a melodic layer of his diatribes to make the lyrics hit harder, but the fierce ringing of Trevor’s twelve-string guitar and high-pitched vocals engage the listener just as effectively as balladry demonstrated by the Leeds troubadour on this tuneful cycle’s finale, simply listed as “The Song” and sounding as triumphantly as a musician’s manifesto should. It’s not an oath to preserve “the beauty that surrounds us every day” – we humans are merely more than a mole on the body of eternity – and it’s not a call to arms, yet it’s an emotionally charged summary of the album’s topics which span quite a few themes rooted in the same societal soil. However, whether we deal with purloining of predecessors’ works as exposed in the half-hilarious “I Plagiarise Beethoven” where quotes from the titular composer appear to amuse the aural spectator, blind ignorance of masses as outlined in the harsh “Twenty-Twenty Vision” where Midgley’s anger is as apparent as his approval is in “A Target On Your Back” where the opposite values get defended, or vanity of reliving past glories as highlighted in “Glimpse Of Venus” where his humorous stanzas rule the game, there’s no doom or gloom on display. And no reproach, either, as “The Joke” stresses rather sarcastically.

Nevertheless, the civil reveries of such folk-informed numbers as the ruminative “Green Hill” – the source of the platter’s title – and the convivial “Cuckoo Land” prove to be false, while “Cultural Appropriation Blues” feels funny and unsparing, as do “Celebrity Memorabilia” that entertains the divergent meanings of the word “anorak” and “Lost For A Cliché” which waltzes around deplorable linguistic compromises in the world of media. Of course, a couple of politics-lambasting cuts make an appearance here as well – wrapped, as is Trevor Midgley’s wont, in spirited sweetness – but in any case, “Palace Of Light” might be one of the most difficult Beau albums. And one of his most thought-provoking works.

***4/5 

Alternative Roots plays "I Plagiarise Beethoven"...

Many thanks to Mike Davies for playing “I Plagiarise Beethoven” from the new “Palace Of Light” set on his Alternative Roots show for Brum Radio this lunchtime.

The full show’s now up on Mixcloud for one and all to hear! 

Thanks again, Mike – greatly appreciated!

"Palace Of Light" lyrics now synchronised on musixmatch...

Many thanks to Vincas Stepankevicius for synchronising the lyrics for the new “Palace Of Light” album on musixmatch.com. 

Greatly appreciated, Vincas!

 

"Palace Of Light" - the lyrics...

The lyrics from the new “Palace Of Light” are now available online, together with notes about the backgrounds to all the songs. 

If you’re a guitar or keyboard player and happen to need the chords for a particular tune, do feel free to message me individually.

Enjoy!

"Palace Of Light" - RELEASE DAY!

It’s out, folks! My brand new 2025 album, “Palace Of Light” hit the online stores at midnight last night!
 
(The album’s title is a quote from “Green Hill”, a song about altruistic individuals with vested interests who are only too pleased to convince the susceptible how life’s greener on the other side.)
 
“Palace Of Light” is my nineteenth release for Cherry Red Records and has been inspired by a whole bunch of themes and attitudes that pervade – and often pervert! – life in the 2020s.
 
And of course, once again my 1968 Harmony 12-string guitar is in there doing the heavy lifting!
 
The album’s available for download from all the Amazons, iTunes etc. and is also streaming on Spotify, Deezer, YouTube, Soundcloud and all your favourite services – click here for Cherry Red’s Smartlink.
 
Please do feel free to check out “Palace Of Light” and to rate and review the set. Responses make such a big difference.
 
(Speaking of Spotify BTW, their 12StringBeau playlist has been updated with all the new songs – now 305 in total!)
 
I really hope you enjoy “Palace Of Light” – it’s been a fun one to make.
 
Thanks as always for your support. It’s much appreciated!

Folking.com reviews "Palace Of Light"...

 ‘“A song will sometimes strike a chord when everything aligns/One perfect place where words and notes and sentiment combines”. Those are the songs Beau makes.’
 
Many thanks indeed to Mike Davies for this stellar review for Folking.com of my upcoming “Palace Of Light” album! 

Much appreciated, Mike!

***

BEAU – Palace Of Light (Cherry Red BEAUPOL1)

 

With near thirty albums to his name, it’s fair to say that as long as there’s self-important self-interested arseholes, social iniquities, political buffoons and popular discontent in the world, there’ll always be fuel and a place for another from Beau’s witty, sardonic, ironic and provocative pen. Musically, the tunes may not greatly depart from a basic melody, but you can always guarantee the words and the subject matter are fresh and inventive.

 

We’re used to hearing of contemporary musicians being accused of ripping off other artists, but Palace Of Light opens with the scurrying strum ‘I Plagiarise Beethoven’, an amusingly tart reminder that it’s been going on for centuries (“not the odd note here and there/But line on glorious line”) encapsulated in its catchy chorus “I plagiarise Beethoven/And lean on J.S.Bach/I’ve stolen from Vivaldi/And knocked them out the park/I’ve pirated Debussy/And lifted from Ravel/And so far no one’s noticed/As far as I can tell”. See if you can spot the way he uses the opening notes to Beethoven’s 5^th.

 

That’s followed by ‘Twenty-Twenty Vision’, an observation on how the distortion of reality by social media eventually becomes accepted as the norm (“The few who fearlessly alight upon a different point of view/Are vilified, their reputations roundly pummelled black and blue/By legions of the paranoid”) while, nothing to do with the Northampton alt-rock band, ‘Glimpse Of Venus’ charts the comeback album launch gig of fictional female punk-metal rocker Venus Flytrap and her aged backing band The Suiciders (“the drummer,always manic, now approaching seventy-five; the breathing apparatus that was keeping him alive/Was perilously wedged between his tom toms and his snare”).

 

Continuing on, the fingerpicked Black-referencing ‘Green Hill’ takes a suitably cynical view of those who sell you the idea of greener pastures to boost their own vested interests and all hopes of a New Jerusalem dashed, a similar theme extending into the nimbly picked clouds of ‘Cuckoo Land’ (“I am, you see, a devotee of blatant, narcissistic motifs/Of wishful thoughts, and litanies of self-delusory beliefs/My country is, I can confirm and with much confidence declare/The envy of the universe and everybody else out there”), with a swipe about colonialism’s cuckoos coming home to roost.

 

The recent rapid turnover of Conservative party leaders affords the inspiration for ‘Opportunity Knocks’ and those keeping an eye on the prize (“One has to be somewhat adept/At hiding ambition; except/When one has, one contends/Been persuaded by friends/One reluctantly has to accept”) while cancel culture and political correctness comes under the hammer with ‘The Joke’ (“A solitary complainant claimed the man had gone too far…custodians of conscience automatically proclaim/A victim list disciples must demolish and defame”) as the hangman prepares to string up the comedian, giving rise to the wincing word play “we have no wish to see the arty choke”.

 

Without dissecting all of the album’s 15 tracks, suffice to say each of them skewers its chosen topic, ranging from a homage to those who stand up for what is as opposed to what a minority would have them be (‘A Target On Your Back’), the self-explanatory ‘Cultural Appropriation Blues’ which, referencing Janis Joplin, tells of fictional Stoke Poges blues singer Chiquenena Basquet who met the Devil “at the crossroads on the A4130” and wrote the celebrated titular number, to seeking validation and acceptance on social media (‘Epigram’), the way the media distort reality through trite euphemistic language (“Lost For A Cliché”), and Orwellian attacks on free speech (‘The Worshipful Company of New April Fools’).

 

Palace Of Light ends with three music related songs, the role of the protest singer in the ‘Ballad Of The Rowdy Knave’ where a dodgy politician complains “my career is reduced to a song”, the marketing of pop culture (‘Celebrity Memorabilia’) and, in ‘The Song’, its power to keep ideas and memories alive and touch our souls (“I know we’ll never comprehend, or even come to grips/Why certain kinds of music bring a quiver to the lips…A song will sometimes strike a chord when everything aligns/One perfect place where words and note and sentiment combines”). Those are the songs Beau makes.

 

Mike Davies

 

First review of "Palace Of Light"...

Many thanks to John Eliot for his generous thoughts on my new “Palace Of Light” album (available a week today) and on my work in general. Much appreciated, John!

*** 

Beau – Palace of Light 

Cherry Red Records

Format CD Download and streaming on all platforms

Just a year ago I reviewed the album, Confessions of a Saboteur and here I am again, new music from Beau, Palace of Light for release on CD and all the usual streaming platforms April 25^th.

I mentioned in the previous review how I came across Beau for the first time in 1972. The album Creation issued on the John Peel label Dandelion. I collect vinyl records and just a few weeks ago in the vinyl shop in Cardiff, (CARDIFF RECORD EXCHANGE Whitchurch Road), a superb shop, and there was a copy of Creation from 1972, at £60. Made me wish I’d bought two copies!

There is a lot to say for musicians who made music in the seventies, and earlier, and are still making great records 50+ years later. Two examples, though there are others, but Bob Dylan and The Rolling Stones come to mind. They are as relevant today as they were earlier in their careers.

This applies to Beau as well. I listen to Creation often, just as I will his new one, Palace of Light. In common on both, Beau plays the same 12 string guitar from 1968. And what a guitarist he is. Beau plays 12 string guitar, and I compare him favourably to the late Mississippi John Hurt who was a master of the instrument. The acoustic resonance of the 12 string, giving depth, sound and echo matched perfectly Beau’s performance of the songs which in themselves lyrically are quite perfect for the sound.

There is no other accompaniment and no other is needed. This is a very brave decision from Beau. It would be tempting to put into the mix even a stand up bass, and sparse drum but even such little would add nothing.

Beau is a poet. Rather like Paul Simon’s lyrics are as poetry, Beau is. Lyrics can read as very different from poetry. Even Bob Dylan’s lyrics, for me, do not stand alone as poetry. Not Beau, his words are poetry.

Particularly for lovers of the folk idiom, Palace of Light is a must for their collection. However, those who really appreciate music and words of quality, this is music from one the greats from the seventies to the present day, a part of quality musical history that should be heard.

Roots & Branches (Australia) plays "Glimpse Of Venus"...

Many thanks to Michael Hunter in Australia for including “Glimpse Of Venus” from the upcoming “Palace Of Light” set on his Roots & Branches show last night. 

Cheers again, Michael – much appreciated!