Bill Wells

SAY Award shortlist announced

Bill Wells & Aidan Moffat, Mogwai and Rustie nominated for inaugural Scottish Album of the Year

17 May 2012

The Scottish Album of the Year (SAY) shortlist has been announced today. After some toothcomb sifting and careful deliberation, the judging panel have whittled down the nominations from a beefy 20 to a lean top 10. Through some hi-tech gadgetry, savvy…

Scottish Album of the Year Award 2012 long list announced

Includes Remember Remember, Rustie and Conquering Animal Sound

12 Apr 2012

The long list of nominations for the inaugaral The Scottish Album of the Year Awards has been announced, after 12 months of organisation and deliberation. The 20 albums chosen cover a wide range of genres and include many well-known bands - from…

Single of the Month: The Son(s) - 'If I Hear You Talk Apostrophes Again'

Django Django, Kate Bush and Lightships also reviewed

28 Mar 2012

TS Eliot got it wrong. April is not the cruellest month. Not where our ear canals are concerned, anyway. April is killing us with its pop kindness. Take ‘Storm’ (●●●●, Because), a sojourn into sun-dappled collage-rock, courtesy of vintage exoticists…

Counterflows Festival introduces some premier experimental and folk acts

27 Mar 2012

Held across Glasgow, London and Berlin, Counterflows is a glorious stramash of experimental songwriting, clamorous avant-rock, and absurdist improv. In bringing Japan’s great Kazuki Tomokawa to Europe, the organisers have pulled off a real coup. A…

The Hot 100 2011: 100-50

The definitive list of Scottish creative talent

16 Dec 2011

100: Gordon Ferris. Kilmarnock crime author makes good. The already packed Scottish crime writing field has finally found a bit of elbow room for another burgeoning talent. Joining the likes of Rankin, Brookmyre, McDermid and co is this Ayrshire-born…

Bill Wells' National Jazz Trio of Scotland to appear at Tracer Trails' Christmas Party

Another engagement for the ubiquitous collaborator and jazzman

9 Dec 2011

The National Jazz Trio of Scotland has never really been a trio. Nor has Bill Wells’ cheekily-monickered combo ever played jazz in the conventional sense. With a first album of original material – the waggishly christened Standards Volume Two…

Bill Wells - Lemondale

One of Wells’ most ambitious and enchanting records to date

15 Nov 2011

(Double Six) You wonder if Bill Wells ever sleeps. The Glasgow indie / avant-jazz catalyst has already made one of the albums of this year in Everything’s Getting Older, his exquisite union with Aidan Moffat – not to mention his forthcoming National…

Aidan Moffat & Bill Wells and Malcolm Middleton are pick of September singles

Jens Lekman, Josh T Pearson and Django Django also among highlights

16 Sep 2011

The humble lyric is oft-overlooked in the quick-fix rush of the singles market. Come hither, then, as we salute the month’s most loquacious quality popsters. No such discourse would be complete without a nod to Swedish indie-bard Jens Lekman, whose…

Lee Konitz, Bill Wells & Aidan Moffat among highlights Glasgow Jazz Festival

Michel Legrand, Zu and Glasgow Improvisers Orchestra also appear

29 Jun 2011

A veteran of Miles Davis’ Birth of Cool sessions, Lee Konitz is one of the Festival’s most prestigious bookings. A key player in the development of cool jazz, the alto saxophonist has become more experimental with age. His playing partner, Polish…

Sounds of the Summer 2011 Spotify Playlist

The best summer listening, as chosen by List music critics

25 May 2011

The List: Sounds of the Summer Playlist 2011 You've bought your sausages, you've scrubbed your charred old BBQ back to shiny, chrome perfection, and you've invited your most lithe and beautiful friends around to your back garden. Everything's in…

Bill Wells and Aidan Moffat - Everything’s Getting Older

A great jazz, folk and spoken word collaboration

25 Apr 2011

(Chemikal Underground) Lovers of a collaboration both – Bill Wells with The Pastels and Isobel Campbell among others, Aidan Moffat with the likes of Mogwai’s Stuart Braithwaite and FOUND – it was really only a matter of time before this pair got it…

Aidan Moffat takes Bill Wells collaboration album Everything’s Getting Older on tour

Falkirk poet and ex Arab Strap member set for Oran Mor show

8 Feb 2011

‘Yeah. I might have personality issues,’ Aidan Moffat deadpans, while sipping on a tea. He’s explaining his knack for writing equally candid lyrics about ‘unemotional, nasty shaggers’, ‘lonely sollipsists’, sixty-year-old women, squaddie-shagging girls…

11 for 2011: The new music from Scotland to watch in 2011

Emeli Sandé, Emma’s Imagination, RM Hubbert and Clouds among those destined for a good year ahead

3 Jan 2011

Emeli Sandé The Aberdeen soul-popper was studying medicine at Glasgow Uni whilst also penning hits for Cheryl Cole, Chipmunk and Tinie Tempah. Her recent solo tour proved she’s no slouch when it comes to performing either – and her gutsy…

The best Christmas gigs in Edinburgh and Glasgow

Burns, Zombie Nation, Ballboy and Broken Records among Christmas party gig highlights

10 Dec 2010

Stars In Their Eyes special/ Song, By Toad’s Christmas party/ Kid Canaveral’s Christmas Baubles/ Death Disco’s XXXmas Party/ Radio Magnetic’s Winter Rave/ Mungo’s Hi-Fi/ Bill Wells’ Black Christmas In a bygone olden, golden era – circa 1995 BC…

Bill Wells and Stefan Schneider - Pianotapes

26 Oct 2010

(Karaoke Kalk) This second collaboration between Falkirk’s answer to Thelonious Monk and one third of German electronicists To Rococo Rot is a languid marriage between top of the range chamber piano sketches and low-end analogue equipment. Recorded…

2010 Le Weekend bows out with Faust, Murcof and Tarwater

Pioneering Stirling experimental music festival also hosts Ben Frost, Bill Wells and John Butcher

6 Oct 2010

Since its inception in 1997, Le Weekend has brought a remarkable range of beautiful and challenging music to Scotland. ‘The idea of an experimental music festival, and also the idea of a festival in Stirling, was quite unique,’ says Alastair Campbell…

Music festivals 2010: Festival profiles

28 May 2010

Big or small, loud or quiet, dry or muddy – we love festivals whatever their size, sound or likelihood to leave you soaking wet. Over the next 20 pages we'll give you the lowdown on every major fest hitting Scotland this summer, and information on a few…

Chemikal Underground in Celtic Connections showcase

20 Jan 2010

Celtic Connections throw another leftfield curve ball with this showcase from Glasgow independent record label Chemikal Underground, and featuring a line-up of quirky indie with a folky bent in the shape of The Phantom Band, The Unwinding Hours, Lord…

Alasdair Roberts, The Low Anthem and Buffy Sainte-Marie set for Celtic Connections

7 Jan 2010

With Alasdair Roberts, The Low Anthem and Buffy Sainte-Marie all featuring, the Celtic Connections festival just keeps going from strength to strength, says Ninian Dunnett

Bill Wells & Maher Shalal Hash Baz - Gok

30 Apr 2009

JAZZ/FOLK Inhabiting the Cartesian co-ordinate that melodically aligns Tokyo with Falkirk, Gok is a sublime anthology of avant-garde lullabies and gentle jazz, from Scots outsider dignitary Bill Wells and Japanese folk-punks Maher Shalal Hash…

Celtic Connections - Follow That!

22 Jan 2009

CELTIC CONNECTIONS The title of this latest round of commissions inspired by the music of the late Martyn Bennett underlines the far-reaching influence of his eclectic, open-minded approach to traditional music (while simultaneously suggesting that…

Burt MacDonald with Lol Coxhill

Edinburgh Jazz and Blues Festival

22 Jul 2008

A reunion with free jazz, lyrical flourishes and popcorn machines. One of Scotland’s most adventurous jazz groups, the Burt MacDonald Quintet are reuniting with Lol Coxhill. A legend of the soprano saxophone, Coxhill has worked with the band on five…

Le Weekend

22 May 2008

JAZZ Tolbooth, Stirling, Fri 23–Sun 25 May With Triptych now but a memory, the eclecticism of Le Weekend is brought into even sharper focus as an important vehicle for music that eludes the attention of more conventional mainstream events. This year’s…

Triptych - Eight Ball

10 Apr 2008

Chris ‘Beans’ Geddes DJ, and one seventh of Belle & Sebastian Candi Staton played Renfrew Ferry and ended a triumphant show by passing the mic into the audience as her band played endless choruses of ‘Young Hearts Run Free’. It gets passed between…

Le Weekend

21 May 2007

EXPERIMENTAL (Picture: Zeena Parkins and Ikue Mori) Experimental music festivals are currently so voluminous as to arguably be considered more over-ground than under. When Le Weekend first set the trend back in 1998, however, the landscape was a…