Scottish cult-pop raconteur Aidan Moffat has teamed up with award-winning film-maker Paul Fegan for an exploration, and celebration, of Scotland’s musical and storytelling traditions.
Entitled Where You’re Meant To Be, the project sees the acclaimed Glasgow-based artists tour the length of the country this April and May – encountering locals, gathering tales and collaborating along their way – on a road trip whose footage will provide the cornerstone of a feature documentary.
Where You’re Meant To Be is part of the Glasgow 2014 Commonwealth Games Cultural Programme, and the ensuing film is set to premiere after the close of the Games, in late August.
Their spring tour (details below) will see Moffat debut a new body of work, as inspired by our oral tradition – from folk sagas to drinking songs; from bawdy ballads to bruised laments – and as defined by contemporary Scotland.
Moffat will perform these stories and songs at free concerts in villages, cities and towns, backed by an all-star band comprising The Twilight Sad’s James Graham (vocals), Bdy_Prts’ Jenny Reeve (violin, vocals) and Stevie Jones (double-bass, guitar).
The shows will be loosely based around traditional ceilidh gatherings, with poems recited, tales recounted, songs sung and carousal had.
Along with local musicians and storytellers, the tour will welcome the likes of championship bothy balladeers Geordie Murison and Joe Aitken, folk-punk dissident Wounded Knee and national folk treasure Sheila Stewart, who has been enticed out of retirement to duet with Moffat.
Exploring themes of community, travel, culture and sense of place, Where You’re Meant To Be promises an entertaining, life-affirming, intimate and irreverent tribute to Scotland, its stories, its songs and its people – and it offers a modern, vital take on an oral tradition that has endured for centuries, and which continues to influence our national identity.
Moffat and Fegan’s folkloric pop voyage also pays homage to some of the country’s most resonant spaces – from Glasgow Barrowland to Faslane Peace Camp; from Edinburgh catacombs to Loch Ness.
Aidan Moffat is one of Scotland’s most distinctive musical and literary voices.
A compelling performer, lyricist and storyteller, the former Arab Strap singer won 2012’s Scottish Album of the Year Award for his collaboration with Bill Wells, Everything’s Getting Older.
Paul Fegan‘s debut short documentary, Pouters (2012), won countless awards including Best Documentary (Jury Award) at London Short Film Festival, Best Film (Audience Award) at Hamburg International Short Film Festival and Best Scottish Short Film (Jury Award) at the Glasgow Short Film Festival.
He also directed Moffat and Wells’ promo video for The Copper Top.
2014 Tour Dates (All shows free; tickets available now via www.aidanmoffat.co.uk/wymtb)
19/4 Ness Social Club, Port of Ness (Lewis), 9pm
23/4 Peace Camp, Faslane, 7pm
25/4 Blue Lamp, Aberdeen, 8pm
26/4 Cullerlie Farm Park, Cullerlie, 7.30pm
27/4 The Caves, Edinburgh, 7.30pm
9/5 Village Hall, Drumnadrochit, 7.30pm
10/5 Kilbride Church Yard, Lerags, 7.30pm
17/5 The Barrowlands, Glasgow, 7pm
Photo: Neale Smith
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