Beacons Of The Wilderness

by Ben McElroy

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TheSlowMusicMovement After two LPs & a single for TSMM most of you will be familiar with the stylistically meandering, folk rooted musings of Ben McElroy. Well after his previous neoclassical foray he's back in the folk fold, & this time he's got something to say - adding some live honed vocals & straighter compositions to his more familiar alt-folk instrumentals.

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The original test pressings of the record- they were all fine. Apparently white labels can sound better than mass presses- but you'd need to have keen ears tbh!

I can sign/scribble/doodle anything you like..

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Full Digital Discography

18

releases

Get all 18 Ben McElroy releases available on Bandcamp and save 20%.

Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality downloads of With A Stick In His Hand/ The Widow Tree, Where Were You in ‘72? / The Laziest Of Rivers, Beacons Of The Wilderness, Where We Don't Go, Everything Was Different Yesterday, Ever So Gently, How I Learnt To Disengage from The Pack, The Common From The Goose, and 10 more. , and , .

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1.	Beacons of The Wilderness 06:00	buy track
2.	We Wandered through The Memory 04:46	buy track
3.	Bleating 05:24	buy track
4.	Where We Don't Go 04:36	buy track
5.	They Started Falling Like Rain 04:30	buy track
6.	A Law Unto Herself 03:58	buy track
7.	Hitherto Cadaver - Seeds 05:36	buy track
8.	Stinkhorn 03:35	buy track
9.	Beacons of the Wilderness (Instrumental) 05:52	buy track
10.	We Wandered Through the Memory (Instrumental) 04:05	buy track
11.	Where We Don't Go (Instrumental) 04:36	buy track
12.	They Started Falling Like rain (Instrumental) 04:29	buy track
13.	Hitherto Cadaver (Instrumental) 02:54	buy track
14.	Seeds (Instrumental) 02:38	buy track
15.	Stinkhorn (Instrumental) 03:24	buy track

about

'An evocatively curated and wonderfully weird album' -
**** Billy Rough, Songlines Magazine

'Experimental lo-fi folk music at it's very best.' -
Bassey Easton, LeftLion Magazine

'I'm sure some people will love it.'
*** Ian Croft, R&R Magazine

This album was conceived in a slightly different manner to previous albums as it was written to be performable live... either using Ableton loops or good, old fashioned pen, paper and guitar... there's also a lot more of my vocals on this one, and because of this it feels right to explain a bit about what the songs are about...

Beacons Of The Wilderness is about the feeling that something has been lost, but it’s a hazy feeling and hard to truly comprehend, something passed down?

We Wandered Through The Memory is inspired by my work in residential homes but is about all the people whose life was (/is!) so much less than it could have been because of societies prejudices..

Bleating is about sheep and how, though lovely animals, there are far too many of them in the UK.

Where We Don’t Go is me getting old and grumpy.. and about how social media is exacerbating our inability to just enjoy something for what it is without having to somehow capture it for future gain.

The words to They Started Falling Like Rain were originally from the song That Was The Day from my first album Bird-Stone, but I’ve been playing it live in this form so I thought I’d re-record it…

It’s about wondering what it would take for the enormity of the climate crisis to actually sink in. Birds falling from the sky seemed a pretty strong symbol, but tbh, it would probably make the headlines for a couple of days before people forgot and went about their days (albeit now birdless), tweeting about something else.

A Lore Unto Herself features a sample from a lovely little documentary by Joshua Dyer called She Who Saved The Stories, telling the tale of Herefordshire folklore collector Ella Mary Leather. The voice is John Simons, current resident of Ella Mary Leathers old house. (the doc also features my music)

Hitherto Cadaver… those of you who have been following my musical journey since the early noughties (maybe 3 people?) may remember earlier song The Young Cadaver… this is the sequel and gives some insight into what happened to our protagonist after he died at the end of the last song. I’m sure some of you were waiting with baited breath for this… you can relax now, it’s a happy ending (of sorts).

Seeds is about Monsanto- as dystopian a company as, I think, one can imagine.

Stinkhorn is about mushrooms, though may also be an allegory for other things.

credits

released September 29, 2023

All songs by Ben McElroy

All instruments by Ben except-

Lizzie Benzie - Backing Vocals on 1, 2 and 4

Chris Smith - Drums on 2 and 7

Tom Manning - Percussion on 4 and 8, Mandolin on 6

Recorded at home, mixed at home and at JT Soar, Nottingham by Rich Collins

Mastered by Ian Hawgood (www.homenormal.com)

Artwork by Andy Peat (www.instagram.com/andypeat_art)

Funded by Help Musicians

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about

Ben McElroy Nottingham, UK

-folk based experiments

-drone based droning

-maker of ‘shivering seabeds of sound’ (The Guardian, no less!)

Recommendations

shows

Sep 28

Centre for Folklore, Myth & Magic

Todmorden, UK

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