Chris Woods wrote this for Folk Tales.
50 yards is the latest studio album from British singer songwriter David Hughes, helped out here by Jacqui McShee, Gerry Conway, Matt and Dave Pegg. It’s great for once that I can use the term ‘singer songwriter’ as a description not a criticism. This isn’t an album that sounds like dozens of other albums, nor does every track sound like the previous one, nor does it ooze personal angst and sentimentality. The songs are not short on emotion but the overwhelming mood is one of slightly satirical wry humour and wit. The songs are honest, amusing and understanding comments on life’s pleasures, failures and compromises, the sort we all have to make and can relate to. The title track ’50 yards” is about home in a run down town house, but then the typical English compromise, it’s so convenient to be only 50 yards from other places. “Maldon Girls” looks back at what might have been, but was she a girl or a boat? The battle of the sexes is amusingly represented by “Hold Your Horses Woman” and “Sensitivity.”
The musical style is slightly quirky, with a touch of the unexpected in many of the arrangements and some unusual rhythms and interestingly constructed songs. There is some excellent guitar playing, some very Dylanesque songs, some blues, even the tango which has become legendary in fan circles. I found this was not the easiest album to listen to first time 
round, but appreciation soon grew after a few listens and it’s stayed near the top of the frequently played stack of CDs, the sign of a good album.
The Fairport Tour is a book made up of David Hughes diary entries during the spring of ’98 when he was touring in the UK as the support act with Fairport Convention. Originally the diary was published ‘in real time’ day by day on the internet and the book collects all the entries together and adds a live CD.
This book provides a very amusing and highly readable account of a month on the road with Fairport as seen through the eyes of a friend and fellow performer. Not quite Spinal Tap perhaps, but plenty of backstage detail, humour, pictures and insight. Even if you read the internet version as I did, somehow the book seems more real and satisfying than the electronic page.
At £11.99 the 94 page book would be reasonable value. Add the ‘free’ live CD and the package is outstandingly good value. The 37 minute 10 track CD is all taken from David’s live sets during the tour, mostly solo but Fairport back one track and Ric Sanders another. The CD doesn’t duplicate much material from the 50 yards album and with a little more playing time it would stand as a perfectly acceptable live album in it’s own right. Well worth looking out a copy, and a must have for Fairport fans.
(The Folk Corporation, 1998)
