Simon Nicol & Ric Sanders live 2003 CD

[PaulT]

I hope there's some left on Saturday... maybe I should just order online

[Andy]

I did. They arrived very promptly.

[koho (Koen)]

Ric just emailed me to say:

Hi Koen - thanks for getting this all together. I love the CD with me & Si. I think the best live CDs are when you don’t know you’re being recorded! I’ve given it a big plug in the Crop prog. Please send me your phone number so I can say thanks in real time! Love, Ric x

We aim to have available at Cropredy (via Talking Elephant):
200x Simon/Ric
150x Iain/Ad
200x Little Johnny England

Should Talking Elephant sell out by the end of Cropredy, I will definetely still have left here in NL. So no immediate worry there!

[PJayBe]

They're well worth buying.

[PaulT]

I've just ordered the Simon & Ric album

[koho (Koen)]

Tracks popped up on the US WBRS Radio - and presenter/compiler Andy Nagy wrote about it:

Founding member Simon Nicol, singer and guitarist, had had an acoustic duo off and on with original fiddler Dave Swarbrick, and there are several superb recorded testaments to that partnership. Much less known, at least for me it was a revelation, was the duo of Simon with Ric Sanders, who has played with Fairport since Swarb left, and previously had been with The Albion Band and The Soft Machine. Their set makes up the first album of the trilogy. The next is a duo with early Fairport singer Iain Matthews and Dutch singer and guitarist Ad Vanderveen (aka The Iain AdVenture!). And the final act that night was the blistering electric folk rock act Little Johnny England, who also have some direct connections with the band sometimes referred to as The Fairport Confusion! This final album is actually a double cd, covering the entirety of their two set closing performance.
All three cds are absolute treasures, recorded from the soundboard and released with full permission of the artists, who indeed wrote the liner notes for each. If you needed more than just my say-so, we fully demonstrate that, by hearing a pair of songs from each of them, finishing with an extended improvisation on the Gershwin classic “Summertime” preceded by Ralph McTell’s gorgeous ballad “The Hiring Fair.” Simon and Ric in top form, as indeed all involved are.

Just sayin'. As said, available at Cropredy (Talking Elephant) - a 2nd box is sent there this week. But also of course directly available via info@radzrecords.com … it's starting to pop up online here and there, too. I hear it eventually will be at the UK Amazon, too, but, erm, everyone earns least in that case … so rather buy direct be it from Radz Records or (and in the UK this absolutely makes more sense) Talking Elephant.

[koho (Koen)]

There's a fourth Greetings From Grolloo album following the three from last year by Simon Nicol & Ric Sanders, Iain Matthews & Ad Vanderveen and Little Johnny England live in Grolloo, The Netherlands 1 March 2003 - all three albums are highlighted here: https://spiralearth.co.uk/greetings-from-grolloo-simon-nicol-ric-sanders-iain-matthews-ad-vanderveen-little-johnny-england/

Number FOUR is a limited edition (numbered to 100) double CD by Ad Vanderveen & The O'Neils, recorded 18 December 2004, which continues the Grolloo series - but has no Fairport link this time.
Now, folk it ain't. In an ideal world, this should be a classic rock album - but it isn't an ideal world, and it will only appear as this limited edition.
The double album, housed in a fold-out digisleeve in similar artwork (continuing the series idea) to the previous three (Fairport related!) Greetings From Grolloo albums, was released at yesterday's Ad Vanderveen Trio gig at Roots aan de Zaan yesterday (my concert series). The Grolloo concerts (2003-2005) were a kind of embryonic Roots aan de Zaan (2013-and ongoing).

From Ad Vanderveen's sleevenote:
“Although I still live and feel like the best is yet to come, I’m well over the hill in terms of what is considered the typical arc of a lifetime. Reflecting on this I wondered, so where and when did the top happen? Maybe it’s just a long stretch of peaks and valleys that I travel on. But the top? Well, in terms of youthful energy crossing with a certain maturity this may have been at or around the time of this recording that was recently unearthed: Greetings From Grolloo 2004, a Christmas show I played with my long-time garage band The O’Neils.
(…) this captured us in great spirit, acoustic songs were fresh and adapted to a band-setting using a resonator guitar, the electric ones feature some wild improvisation that went beyond anything else we’ve ever done. Partly also due to a fever there was a reckless abandon, and unaware of any recording we let it all out in a unique selection of songs, ranging from intimate and folky to full blast rock’n'roll”.

Unlike the previous Grolloo albums, this 2CD is ONLY available via Radz Records and nowhere else (except a few at forthcoming Ad concerts, for as long as he has some limited stock) because of its very limited run. After the launch yesterday, about 1/3rd of the 100 copies are still available - at 22 Euro apiece plus (no matter how many are bought) 11 Euro postage (within the Netherlands, postage is 4.25).
Due to sometimes bumpy Radz Records (Yahoo-)email, the safer address is rootsaandezaan@gmail.com.
If interested, let me know a PayPal address there.

And the sound quality is fabulous.
As is the music: stellar, bordering on the astounding (I know I am biased, but, damn, were they on fire).
I don't know what they were on just before Christmas 2004, but I was there and I know Ad Vanderveen had a fever.
It made him and his band perform next level, oddly enough. To think he almost cancelled due to being sick. Thank heavens he did not. Ad Vanderveen at his electric best.

But only 35 copies remain as of today …

PS the other three are more generally available: in the UK via Talking Elephant, but also through me at Radz Records. All four Grolloo albums together (2 single CDs, 2 double CDs) cost 70 Euro plus 11 Euro postage (or 4.25 postage within NL).