smokeheads press round up, part whatever

Posted on May 11, 2011 by Doug Johnstone

Another great piece of coverage for Smokeheads appeared at the end of last week in The Press and Journal, in a big feature on the Ullapool Book Festival. There were also mentions in the Ross-shire Journal and The Highland Times – rocking the north of the country big-stylee, it seems.

Oh yeah, fuck, and I never posted about the thing in The Courier, did I? An amazing, in depth interview in the paper as a preview of my event at The DCA the other week. Massive thanks to Jen Cosgrove for being so nice about me and the book.

And there was another review of Smokeheads slipped in under the radar recently, on the What Does John Know blog.

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do-it-yourself brain surgery, now on video

Posted on May 11, 2011 by Doug Johnstone

Aye so, last week I linked to the audio of my performance at Words Per Minute 11, reading a particularly nasty bit of Smokeheads. Now, thanks to those ultra-organised WPMers, there’s video footage of it. Ignore the fact it’s called ‘Wods Per Minute’, I have no idea what a ‘wod’ is. Also, ignore the ironing board references at the start, you won’t get it unless you were there.

Anyhoo, here it is. Don’t watch this while snacking:

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scots whay hae on keep it afloat

Posted on May 11, 2011 by Doug Johnstone

What with all my wanderings around the country over the last few days (huge thanks to the Ullapool Book Festival and the Fence Homegame!) I haven’t had a chance to draw your attention to this little beauty of a review for my EP ‘Keep it Afloat’, courtesy of that fine, fine blog Scots Whay Hae. Cheers to Alistair over there for his kind words, the choicest of which are: ‘Keep it Afloat has an honesty that few of Johnstone’s contemporaries would dare, and it still has you on your feet by the end.’ Yowzer!

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do-it-yourself brain surgery, courtesy of wpm

Posted on May 4, 2011 by Doug Johnstone

OK, so I did a reading recently at the wonderful Words Per Minute alongside writers Katy McAuley, Margaret Callaghan and Amy Burns, and singer songwriter Michael Cassidy. I read the nastiest bit of Smokeheads, involving some DIY brain surgery. You can listen to the whole event over here. Beware, my bit is really pretty fucking nasty.

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scottish music blogs, i thank you

Posted on May 4, 2011 by Doug Johnstone

Just a quick shout out to various Scottish music blogs – my debut solo EP has only been out for a few days and several of these fine folks have given it a mention, so cheers to Aye Tunes, Peenko, Jockrock and Manic Pop Thrills – hope y’all liked the music, and I’ll keep you posted on live dates to come.

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fence homegame

Posted on May 3, 2011 by Doug Johnstone

Well, looks like I’m playing the wonderful, amazing Fence Homegame this weekend. Yay! Bit of a last minute johnny, but I think I’m doing a turn on the Sunday afternoon sometime. Hotfooting it down from Ullapool, where I’m appearing on the Saturday night. I suspect I will be hungover. Ho hum.

If you don’t know about Homegame, where the hell have you been? Click on the pic above to find out all about Fence and their awesome festival. At this year’s do there’s the likes of Josh T Pearson, Slow Club and Jon Hopkins, as well as all the usual Fence regulars.

As a wee appetiser / reminder, here’s a clip of me playing a King Creosote song with the man himself and Vic Galloway on backing vocals – I think this was back in 2007. We fuck about a bit at Homegame, so we do.

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ullapool book festival

Posted on May 2, 2011 by Doug Johnstone

I am absolutely delighted to be appearing at the Ullapool Book Festival this weekend coming, click on the pic to go to their site and check out the fantastic line-up – Denise Mina, Don Paterson, John Burnside, Bernard MacLaverty etc, etc.

I’m appearing on the Saturday night alongside brilliant songwriter and storywriter Aidan Moffat, where we’ll be discussing this, that and the other with Rodge Glass, who’s also a damned fine writer. No doubt we’ll be chatting about The Year of Open Doors, the story collection we all played a wee part in that came out last year. I’ll also be playing some tunes, as will Aidan, I think. Should be a cracking night and a brilliant weekend – if you’ve never been before, Ullapool is a beautiful and relaxing place, and their festival is one of the best book events in the country. See yeh there, eh?

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keep it afloat – new solo ep

Posted on May 1, 2011 by Doug Johnstone

I released my debut solo EP, ‘Keep it Afloat’, today. Oof. You can listen to it over at dougjohnstone.bandcamp.com, where you can also download it for £2 or order a CD copy for £3. You’ll also be able to buy the CD at any live dates as well as from the awesome Avalanche Records in Edinburgh’s Grassmarket.

My band Northern Alliance recently entered an extended period of hibernation and I decided to bash on alone for now, this debut EP being the result. The tunes were written on acoustic guitar but fleshed out to a full-band sound, me playing all the instruments, as well as engineering and producing the EP myself in typically half-baked fashion.

The songs are about parenthood, homesickness, the creative process and having a car crash with Bjork. Compared to Northern Alliance, the music is a smidgen more melodic and a tad less sleepy. There are smatterings of indie, rock, lo-fi, folk and country, but essentially this is what pop music sounds like in my head, for better or worse.

Please have a listen, and lemme know whatcha think, eh?

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fuck the royal wedding at word power

Posted on April 27, 2011 by Doug Johnstone

Friday. Royal fucking wedding. Dreading it. What are you doing? I’m looking after the kids, so probably watching CBeebies, maybe some Star Wars films, playing the Nintendo DS, going to the playpark, maybe eating some fish fingers. Then I’m going here:

That’s right, Word Power, where I’m reading and playing some music, alongside poets Paul Kingsnorth and Anita Govan. Details are here. It’s called The Great Divorce. It’s at Word Power, the country’s leading alternative bookshop. I think we can all safely assume we shall not be bowing and scraping to the monarchy. Join us, it’s free. And fun. And cool. And shit and stuff. Word. Etc.

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dundee literary salon

Posted on April 26, 2011 by Doug Johnstone

Aye so, I’m appearing up in Dundee this week, Thursday 28th April, at one of the excellent Dundee Literary Salons. I’ll be reading from and discussing Smokeheads, amongst other things, and you can read about the event here. It’s at the DCA, free to get in, free wine, and runs from 5pm to 7pm.

I’m not sure exactly how I’m going to fill two hours, there better be lots of good questions. I will be playing a few tunes as well, from my FORTHCOMING EP (which I’m not blogging about just yet, all in good time) – and folks who come along will be able to buy the EP BEFORE IT’S EVEN RELEASED. How about them apples?

Anyway, if you find yourself in the vicinity of the DCA on Thursday, pop along, why dontcha?

If you’re so inclined, there’s a Facebook page for the event here.

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