The Magic Lantern

Formed above a London post office in 2006, The Magic Lantern have evolved a unique, transporting sound inspired by the directness of folk song, the spirit of jazz and the experimental openness of contemporary chamber music.

New Song - Scant Peace Of Mind

Well,

As we get ready for our last Green Note Residency date on the 25th of April we thought we’d just share with you the lyrics of another new song, hot off the press! It’s called ‘Scant Peace Of Mind’ and there’s every chance that it might get its first performance at the Green Note…

Scant Peace Of Mind

She had a warm heart,
Did my baby.

When fruits weighed down the tree,
Sun burning through their skins,
It was golden, golden, golden,
With laughter on the breeze,
Oh then she had a warm heart,
Did my baby.

Time! Oh time!
It offers scant peace of mind.

Soon a chill clung to the air,
Leaves like russet coloured rain,
Fell red and hazel-brown,
With a harsh wind whipping round,
Oh then she had a hard heart
Did my baby.

Time! Oh time!
It offers scant peace of mind.

Then each branch lay stripped and bare,
Exposed and raw and real,
It was black and white and blue,
And those lonely nights froze clear,
Oh then she had a cold heart,
Did my baby.

Time! Oh time!
It offers scant peace of mind.

One dawn the tree awoke,
Sun-bursting with fresh life,
And all shone green, green, green,
Like we all had heard the joke,
Oh then she had new heart, 
Did my baby.

Time! Oh time!
It offers scant peace of mind.

Wonderful poster by Peter Beatty for the last date of our residency at The Green Note, Wednesday 25 April with The Beguilers!

Wonderful poster by Peter Beatty for the last date of our residency at The Green Note, Wednesday 25 April with The Beguilers!

Hercules - New Song

We promised that we’ve been writing new songs and this is the first one we’ve recorded. We recorded it last night in Fred’s kitchen. Fred played the piano, percussion and cello, Dave played the clarinet and Jamie sung. The lyrics are below. We’ll be playing this one live for the first time at the gig at the Green Note next thursday 15th March. Hope you can make it! 

Hercules

Don’t try so hard
Stay perfectly still
You’re falling to the earth
Nobody knows that i love you

Don’t say a word
Turn off all the lights
And come to bed Hercules
Nobody knows that i love you

The mornings are cold
Put the coffee on
We’ll drown our fears in the bath
Where nobody knows how I loved you

Before you go
Let me cast one more gaze
You know they’ll carve you out of stone
Then no one will know that i loved you
Nobody knows that i love you

Green Note Residency no.2 with Sam Lee!

First of all, a huge thanks to everyone who came down to last week’s fantastic first date of our ‘Winter/Spring’ residency at the Green Note. The gig was a great way to start the year and it was great to play two new songs, ‘A Dream’ and ‘The Birds’ - videos of those two tunes are below courtesy of our great friend Eccy de Jonge who filmed and uploaded them.

We are already getting inpatient for second date which is on the 15 March with one of UK’s most incredible folk singers, Sam Lee. Again, Peter Beatty has done an amazing job with the poster if you look carefully at the two posters you’ll start to see how the series is developing. 

In the meantime, we are arranging some more new songs and will be debuting at least one new song, ‘Hercules’ at next gig. Until then!

TML x

The first gig of the year is finally on the horizon, and what a gig it is! We are very proud to have been invited back to The Green Note in Camden for a three date Winter/Spring Residency. The first ‘Winter’ date of the residency will be Thursday 16 February and we are busily preparing new songs and a few surprises for you! We will be joined on this first date our good friend, singer/songwriter, composer and multi-instrumentalist Shama Rahman who weaves stories, sitar and song seamlessly and combines influences from everywhere she has lived, visited, experienced and loved. Doors are at 7 if you want to come and eat before the concert, music starts at 9pm. Tickets are 6 in advance or 8 on the door. Getting your ticket in advance is strongly recommended (and cheaper!).   Tickets are available at: http://www.wegottickets.com/event/150739 You can hear Shama’s music here: www.myspace.com/shamarahmanThe fantastic poster is by illustrator Peter Beatty (also from great band, Urusen). See more of him here:http://peterbeatty.co.uk/ hope to see you there! TML x

The first gig of the year is finally on the horizon, and what a gig it is! We are very proud to have been invited back to The Green Note in Camden for a three date Winter/Spring Residency.

The first ‘Winter’ date of the residency will be Thursday 16 February and we are busily preparing new songs and a few surprises for you! We will be joined on this first date our good friend, singer/songwriter, composer and multi-instrumentalist Shama Rahman who weaves stories, sitar and song seamlessly and combines influences from everywhere she has lived, visited, experienced and loved.

Doors are at 7 if you want to come and eat before the concert, music starts at 9pm.
Tickets are 6 in advance or 8 on the door. Getting your ticket in advance is strongly recommended (and cheaper!).
 
Tickets are available at:
http://www.wegottickets.com/event/150739

You can hear Shama’s music here:

www.myspace.com/shamarahman

The fantastic poster is by illustrator Peter Beatty (also from great band, Urusen). See more of him here:
http://peterbeatty.co.uk/


hope to see you there!

TML x

Here we are in 2012! What’s going to happen?

So, here we are at the beginning of another new year! You will noticed that we haven’t made that many posts over the last month and have been holding a small radio silence while we gathered ourselves for the year ahead.

So first of all, a massive thank you to everyone who made 2011 such a great year for us. We really can’t do what we do without your support! For us, last year’s biggest milestone was the release of our album which though it took a while to get right, we were so happy with the result due in no small part to hard work of Dave De Rose, Leo Abrahams, Mandy Parnell and Ollie Hammick. So many great things have happened as a result, we’re now really excited about getting back in the studio over the next few months and start work on the next album! 

We finished the year with two wonderful gigs with Laish, first at the Brighton Ballroom and then finally at the most amazing small church, Old St Mary’s in London. Here’s a little video that our friend Eccy made of us playing ‘Karachi’:

We have a lot of exciting things already planned for this year! First of all the fantastic Ellie Rose Rusbrige who many of you will know from Apple Of My Eye, has joined the band and we are very excited to have her amazing voice with us. Gig wise, we’re using January to write and rehearse so our live shows for 2012 start with another lovely residency at the Green Note in London. We’ll be playing one gig a month there in February, March and April and will be joined by Shama Rahman, Sam Lee and a special project by Fred and Ellie of ‘Blake Songs’.

We had a great time playing there last year. We’re obviously going full guns ahead writing the rest of the material for the next album which has been really fun and the Green Note gigs will be a great place to play these ones live for the first time. It looks like we’ll be going into the studio to record a single which is slated for release in June followed by a UK tour. In between we’ll be playing at the Roundhouse for the Camden Crawl as well as doing a few other things that we’ve up our sleeves but that’s all for now! Stay tuned! big love The Magic Lantern x

Documentary ‘A World In A Grain Of Sand’ Released Today!

A World In A Grain Of Sand [720p] from Mr Teackle on Vimeo.

We are very very pleased to announce the release of a music documentary ‘A World In A Grain Of Sand’ by Raffaele Castello aka ‘Mr Teakle’ - about the release of our first album. The film follows us in the months leading up to the release of the album, taking in various gigs, reheasals, some embarrasing photo shoots, and interviews with each of us where we more or less tell Raf what we think of everyone else. For us the film really captures how we were feeling over those months with all the frustrations and excitements and culminates in what was for us, a very emotional night of the album launch.

Raf is a documentary film maker from Italy, currently living in London and we first met him at Woodburner, at Dalston Boys Club back in February where he was shooting the final scenes for another film he was making at the time. We met and spoke that night and later Raf got in touch suggesting the idea of a documentary following an up and coming band trying to make it in London - to our surprise he meant us. With Spinal Tap immediatly coming to mind we could see the potential for calamity but in the spirit of adventure we went for it and it was great fun. Having spent so much time with Raf, he is now an extended member of the band and we can’t say thank him enough for the wonderful film he’s made. We hope you like it! If you do, please share it widely and comment where you can! Also, please check out his blog where you can also see his other films! http://www.mrteackle.me/

Four Concerts, Falling Leaves…


These are exciting times at Magic Lantern HQ! After last weekends two fantastic gigs in Oxford and Devon - massive thanks to Jamie, Chris, Nicky, Wilf, Ruth and Ian (and Fred and Phil for driving!) we are pleased to announce a series of very special full band shows with some of our favorite bands. 

First up is this weekend’s excusion up north to Hebden Bridge in Yorkshire where we’ll be playing in the very old (and possibly freezing cold) St Thomas’s Church with the Pomegranate Ensemble, a classical ensmeble started by Dave’s Dad playing a new work of his, ‘Sarah and Issac’. We’ll then be heading back to play in London for the first time in a while on the 23rd with our first show at Servants Jazz Quarter’s in Dalston, possibly our favorite new venue. We’ll be playing a double bill with Rose Tinted - fronted by Rosie Shura whose voice is one of those special things that seems to be able to suspend time.

The following night, 24th we are delighted to be playing at one of the best folk showcases around, Folk Rising, brainchild of Sam Lee and the inimitable Magpies Nest - joining us on the bill are Apply of My Eye who regular Lanternites will have seen us play with lots of times. In our opinion, they are one of the best folk bands in London and it’s always a huge pleasure to play with them - the gig will be being streamed live on the internet as well, more details to follow! Last but not least, we will be joining Firefly for the last night of their November residency at ‘Cocked-Ale’ at Manero’s Bar on the 29th. Another Magpies Nest love child, ‘Cocked-Ale’ is a new weekly folk night and Manero’s bar is an absolultely tiny, implausibly intimate venue. Firefly are a brilliant band who we love playing with. They create incredible textures using everything from gamelan to strings, piano, voices and percussion. Throughout all of these shows, we hope to be playing two completely new songs we have been working on as well as playing songs from our album. We’d love to see you at one of them!

We will also be making a very special announcment this Friday…..stay tuned!

The Magic Lantern - November Gigs

  • Sunday 13th November - St Thomas’s Church
    Palace House Road, Hebden Bridge, West Yorkshire, HX7  6HF w/ The Pomegranate Ensemble
  • Wednesday 23 November - ‘Piranha Parlour’ at Servants Jazz Quarters
    10a Bradbury Street, Dalston, N16 8JN , London - w/Rose Tinted - £3
  • Thursday 24 November - Folk Rising at Cecil Sharp House 
    2 Regent’s Park Road, NW1 7AY, London w/ Apple of My Eye - £5
  • Tuesday 29 November - ’Cocked-Ale’ at Manero’s Bar
  • 232 Kingsland Road, E2 8AX, London w/ Firefly (as part of their November residency) - FREE

big love

The Magic Lantern (Jamie, Fred, Lucy, Dave and Phil)