Since coming back from the tour I’ve been getting back to what I ike best – tinkering around in the studio. The Brian Eno/Herbie Hancock collaboration is going well; we added some spoken word elements and Arabic percussion, and I’ve been editing and arranging in preparation for further sessions in January. One day at Brian’s studio we got distracted by a clip that I shot in Australia of a Koala scratching its bum. Brian noticed that it looked as if the koala was playing air guitar, so we spent a happy hour putting a soundtrack together and uploading it onto Youtube – here

The tour itself was, as ever, a combination of euphoria (amazing places, good friends, music) and bullshit (politics, hanging around, gruelling travel). On the last night of the tour Guy Pratt and I decided to go out and buy the cheapest guitars we could find, play them on the last song and then trash them onstage. In Cash Converters the shop assistant eyed us mockingly and asked, “Starting a band are we?” to which Guy replied, “No – finishing one”. The depraved act itself was incredibly cathartic, fun and symbolic in a personal way. Although for a few hideous moments it looked like the guitar wasn’t going to break.

I’ve had a couple of sessions, for the amazing and up-and-coming Florence And The Machine, and the rather more established Tony Christie. I got to try out my beloved new acquisitions – the Bandura (Ukranian giant zither) and the Guitorgan (demented 60s guitar with an organ built inside of it). The combination of working on great music and at the same time seeming to make people happy is so special, and that is why at times like those I love my job so much.

Lastly I’ve been continuing work on my folk album, The Grape And The Grain, adding the aforementioned new instruments and writing the last few tracks. Having not listened to any of it for a while, I was relieved to find that I liked everything more than I remembered. It’s interesting the way new tracks shed a different light on older ones. Although with the increasing decimation of the album as an art form I doubt the idea of context has as much relevance as it used to.

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