This album is one of my all-time favourite records. In fact I'd go so far as to say it's a safe number 2 in such a list (behind In the Aeroplane Over the Sea) and it has been for a good five years now. I'll start at the very beginning.
In 2007 I moved to Cardiff for no reason other than I had no reason why not to. I'd just finished university and had to look for a job somewhere, so I found a house with my friend Hugh and a couple of his friends. I was excited to be living in an interesting city after three years in Lancaster and very keen to start seeing bands more often. Not long after we moved in Hugh suggested going to see Chuck Ragan from Hot Water Music play in Le Pub in Newport. I only had Caution and A Flight and a Crash but enjoyed them, so agreed to it (and for the first time in years I was in debt to Hugh rather than the other way around).
On the 11th of October Hugh and I met up with his friend Jon, Reza, and two others whose names I since forgotten and we all got the train to Newport to see Chuck. The gig was incredible (Hugh claims it was the best concert he'd ever seen, and it's certainly one of my favourites). Gunrack? (a Wayne's World reference) opened up and were excellent (Young Hearts was always a classic) and then Chuck took to the stage. I'd only heard bits of the album briefly on the kitchen hi-fi at this point, so wasn't fully prepared for what happened; he belted out the most heart-felt, brilliant songs and played so passionately and genuinely there can't have been a single person in there not impressed. This was my introduction to the world of acoustic folk/punk and I couldn't have asked for a better way to start.
The Boat was incredible, a song whose meaning I have a lot of time for, but California Burritos was the highlight; about five or six guys near the front all had their arms around each other singing along every word to, what I didn't realise at the time, would become my favourite song. It was quite an incredible few minutes in an already incredible evening. At the end of the show I bought the cd of Feast or Famine, an album I've played more times than I care to imagine. Everything I felt about the live show is captured perfectly on these 12 songs and they've become the bench-mark to which I compare all other acoustic music. I can't recommend it enough. It's What You Will, Between the Lines and Do What You Do are all songs worth mentioning too. I ended up picking up a copy on vinyl at the No Idea Yard Sale because it's nice to have great music on vinyl.
Since most of this has been off-topic (more about that gig than the album itself), I figured it's also worth mentioning where this album has taken me: I spent ages trying to find records that are similar to this and seeing musicians of a similar style. If I hadn't seen Chuck that night I may have never heard music by Austin Lucas, William Elliott Whitmore, Sam, Jimmy and Helen, anyone on the Revival Tour and countless others (not to mention the Daytrotter Sessions). All in all, I'm pretty happy with what this record has led me to.
I used to be in a group on Facebook where each month we'd get paired up at random and make a mixtape for the other person. I put California Burritos on one I made for some girl in America (I've put it on practically every mixtape I've made in the last five years) and she sent me a message back saying how much she loved that song. Hopefully she checked the album out too and got at least somewhere near as much out of it as I did.
Format: 12", 10"x20" insert
Tracks: 12
Cost: £4.96 new
Bought: No Idea Yard Sale
When: 29/10/11
Colour: Marbled grey
Etching: none
mp3s: no
