Commercially Inviable Records

Last weekend the vast majority of the Commercially Inviable stable of acts took a day-trip down to Somerset.  The reason for the trip was for each of them to record a session for the very lovely Songs from the Shed. World of Fox takes up the tale on his blog

“so, last saturday we all went down to north somerset where we ate sarnies, drank beer, snoozed in a hammock and played a few songs in a shed, captured on a camcorder by a lovely chap called jon. it’s quite a big shed, but even so it was quite a squeeze for gurdan thomas, given that there was five of them, and one was playing a tuba

the shed is an old billet hut and is stuffed full of fascinating detritus. one thing that caught my eye was an old magnetic theatre toy that i had when i was about four!

it was a thoroughly nice day out and some of us popped over to nearby clevedon for a glimpse of the seaside (well, the severn estuary, but close enough for a bunch of brummies). it has a nice pier:

i haven’t seen the finished videos, but i’ve a feeling they’ll be pretty good. jon will be posting them up on his website in the next few weeks, and obviously i’ll keep you posted when they’re up.”

Likewise, we can’t wait to see the results. A big thanks from us at the label to Jon from Songs from the Shed for accomodating 4 acts on the same day. Watch this space for links to the videos!

Commercially Inviable artist Gurdan Thomas is in the running for a slot at The Reeperbahn Festival in Hamburg, Germany and needs your help. Sonicbids are running an online competition in association with main festival sponsor Simple Shoes, and it really is simple: The act that grabs the most online votes via their festival portal will perform at the festival.

Gurdan is currently sitting in 13th spot but rising up the table fast, so please take a moment to head over to the site and show your support. It only takes a moment and you’ll also receive a 20% discount at the Simple Shoes online store for your efforts.

Click HERE to vote 

Thanks!

We’re delighted to announce Gurdan Thomas as the new addition to our small but perfectly formed roster.

Gurdan is a travelling musician, original thinker and totally free spirit who divides his time travelling between the UK and Germany, stopping off to play at places he finds along the way and often assembling a scratch backing band from whoever happens to be around.  You can follow his progress over on Twitter, where he goes by the name @gurdanthomas. 

Having produced 2 self-released albums, ‘Graceful Rabbits’ (2007) and ‘Gnodelly Gnodelly’ (2008), he will be releasing his 3rd album, ‘The Fat Lady Sings’ on Commercially Inviable on 27th September 2010. Two weeks prior to the album release we are also releasing a limited single, “Todd”. Here’s the artwork for both releases….

‘The Fat Lady Sings’was partly recorded in England, in Gurdan’s van, and in the Villa Waldbertha, Munich, but almost all of it was created at the Meier farm in Stockau, Bavaria along with performances from musician / farmers Wastl and Katl Meier (pictured with Gurdan and dog below).  Meanwhile the 3 songs on the “Todd”single were recorded right here in Birmingham over the course of an April weekend spent in Bob Lamb’s Kings Heath studio.  Both releases contain performances from completely different groups of musicians but feautre songs written and performed in Gurdan’s unique style - Think The Bonzo Dog Doo Dah Band meets Gogol Bordello.

By way of preview, here are a couple of tracks….

“Stutter” from The Fat Lady Sings LP

“God is Me” from the Todd single

(If you’re reading this via RSS feed then the music players may not work. You’ll need to visit the site to listen to the songs.)

Welcome to the label, Gurdan!

We’re really pleased to annouce that the wonderful Gurdan Thomas has decided to come aboard the good ship Commerically Inviable. We’ll have more news soon, but in the meantime here’s a sneak preview of the artwork for his forthcoming LP…

(thanks to @adrianburrows for the photo)