Andy Curry
Oh the monster in me must be broken.
Long Rambling Biography
"I've been playing instruments since I was 7 years old, starting with ill-fated piano lessons, brief dalliances with drums, and slightly more progressive steps with guitars and synthesizers. I've always sung, even though my primary school teachers would try and persuade me not to during their lessons.
Aged fifteen I took up the bass guitar and joined a rock band, ostensibly to meet girls. It almost worked. At sixteen I played solo for the first time - the most terrifying thing I have ever done. Since then I've been writing songs, playing pubs, clubs, the sides of lorries, stages at festivals and in front of five people in a tiny art gallery.
In 2002 I started the electro-pop band DUST BOWL CENTRAL to some critical respect and some bemusement. We played many gigs, recorded a couple of well-reviewed CDs and were hired by Channel 4 to record a lounge version of 'Je t'aime' only to be pipped to the programme by the Ukele Orchestra of Great Britan. Bloody Ukeleles. Coming over here. Stealing our jobs. We soldiered on. DBC may be quiet at the moment but is still a going concern, in one form or another. http://www.myspace.com/dustbowlcentral
During those days I still played solo - knocking out covers in smoky pub lounges. Following some truly soul-destroying covers gigs in dead-end pubs ("Play Wonderwall or we'll glass you!") I decided to plow with my own material. Whilst this gave me a lovely warm artistic feeling inside, it also noticeably didn't pay any money and dramatically reduced my bookability (Is that a word? It is now.) But the songs were coming on and a few supports with the likes of King Creosote, James Yorkston, Gravenhurst and JimBob from Carter USM made me feel slightly better about myself.
In 2007 I self-released my first solo CD 'Sinking Stars' and promptly put a band together, making the acoustic element more electric and generally beefier. Quiet and sensitive is nice, but noisy and loud is much more fun. Old band-mates and trusted accomplices were coralled - Alexander King, Jim Stafford and Andy Payne - and THE ANDY CURRY BAND was formed. A name change was suggested (by myself) but the chaps, quite astutely, realised I was simply trying to apportion the blame and preferred hiding in the gloom. They'd performed with me before, remember.
*Wealth*
In early 2008 respected theatre director Mark France punted me the idea of writing some songs for his adaptation of 'Wealth' by Aristophenes. It was explained that the traditional Chorus part would be replaced with a busker - the songs intended to reflect upon what had just happened on stage and possibly offer an alternate view. Immediately I began formulating a kind of Billy Bragg / Show tune hybrid concept. The lyrics were work-shopped by the cast and then handed to me to neatly butcher into a song. It was decided that each song would take a different stylistic approach, from blues to rock and from ballad to hymnal - but all containing some link to a central musical theme. Admittedly, on some of the final songs that link is very subtle (read: invisible) but there is a musical theme connecting them all and making the songs not simply a series of tunes played in the same show, but a body of connected pieces. Some of them are also filthy!
Andy lives in York with his long-suffering girlfriend, a fish called Roy (Siegfried died) and a Yukka called George.
I warned you.
