LOWLAND FOLK AND THE MEDIA #1

The main members of Lowland Folk were - Stewart Brown, his wife Anne, and brother, Ramsay Brown.

They originally started off in the 60's as the Lowland Folk Four when Philip Gore was with them and were a very popular act on the folk circuit. As well as doing the biz live, they also made many recordings and TV appearances. On one occasion, they supplied the soundtrack to a television documentary about Dundee which was broadcast on BBC in 1966 to coincide with the opening of the Tay Road Bridge. In fact, a reminder that you can view the original preview of the programme from the '66 Radio Times, in the January 2009 Retro Archives.

The following year, they released an album called "Eh'll Tell The Boaby", which must be one of the earliest recordings to be sung in a broad Dundee accent.

Forward wind a couple of decades to 1986, and the Lowland Folk are still at it, this time bringing out a single to commemorate the return of the Discovery to Dundee. It was released on Broughty Ferry label, Balaena Records, and was recorded at Inner City Sound studios by Allan McGlone.

It was a bit of a departure from their traditional folk sound, opting instead for a moody Clannad kind of vibe. The session also featured Allan Barty on various stringed instruments and Derek Thomson on keyboards.

(Sorry for the crunchy noises on my vinyl copy by the way!)

Finally, a wee bit of trivia - Stewart Brown was also Editor of DC Thomson magazine, "My Weekly".

INNER CITY SOUND AD - 1982

An ad from 1982 for Inner City Sound recording studios in Dens Street.
It lists the gear on offer for all your recording needs & requirements, and at very competitive rates too!
Needless to say, local acts took advantage of their facilities...all sorts of bands ranging from Lowland Folk to Pigs Are Cute.
The boss at the controls was Mafia man, Allan McGlone.

SKEETS BOLIVER - 1970's

Skeets Boliver formed in Dundee around 1973 when 2 local acts, Hens Teeth and Mort Wriggle & The Panthers, fused together. This line-up consisted of Michael & Chris Marra - Brian McDermott - Stuart Ivins and Angus Foy.
The shot of the band above in 1977 has the addition of Peter McGlone (with the rollie-up).
This image of Skeets appears on the back cover of a single the band released in '77, a song called "Moonlight In Jeopardy". The front of the cover with them leaping up into the air is the one on the video screen below, where you can have a wee blast of the tune.
They did in fact release 2 singles in 1977, the first one was a song that was labelled as "Streethouse Door", but they actually sang "Shithouse Door!" - a track I've seen them play live a couple of times.

On the subject of word based fun - I spotted these 2 misprints above in an Edinburgh gig guide dated September 1977.

The first has the band as STREETS Boliver - their setlist made up of middle-of-the-road tracks I suppose!

The other has their name as SHEETS Boliver - probably an evening of cover versions then!

They've even got 2 different dates for Monday!

Anyway, after that brief interlude - the following year (Sunday 8th January 1978 to be exact) the band even made an appearance on national television. The programme was called " I Can't See The Light" and it had footage of Skeets performing live at Laings, as well as having a wee chat with the guys.

The clipping is from an original TV guide page.
Skeets Boliver eventually split around 79/80 with the musicians going their separate ways - Michael obviously doing his successful solo projects, Peter joining Mafia and Brian later going onto work with Del Amitri.
I'm sure there will be plenty of you ready to enter your own Skeets Boliver trivia into the comments....so enter away!