Well sir, you smashed this challenge - and ended up with a stunning unplugged album. It's made me want to hear some of your established tracks with similar stripped-down arrangements, leading the listener to concentrate on the sheer artistry of your words and astonishingly soulful vocal. Next challenge for you is the 24 hours album. 24 minutes of original music in 24 hours. I believe it originated on alonetone. Off you go.

Glad you didn't bin it! Liking the driving feel - immediately hooky also.

A sweet almost-lullaby - glad this one found a home in your February. So very pretty.

Really love this melody and the breezy feel. Some gorgeous little acoustic guitar runs in there too.

Great song writing - loving the sentiment and your tender vox here. I love it when the FAWM and RPM parameters draw out his kind of track, any more of an arrangement would detract from the message - IMHO.

Woohoo! Logged in and back from Brighton. <3 Can now fave this utter classic.

Hauntingly sad and beautiful

Great tune Andrew. we held back on a few old ideas too. i'm glad you put it out there

Hehehe... there's LOTS of youthful angst is these Songs from the Shoebox... possibly an embarrassing amount... You wait... let's see if I'm brave enough to record the ones from 1978/9!!!

That's rather wonderful ...... a bit of youthful angst ??

You've been a writer / poet for so many years!!! How delightful to put these songs out. I'm glad you found the shoe box.

Another beautiful piece of storytelling through haunting voice and gentle music

You sing these words perfectly … I am just in awe of your story telling

So lyrical

Intrigued … who is this written for? Whoever it is is a lucky person … love this

I saw your comments on my site. Thanks. It sounds like you’ve got this recording process figured out. I’m still learning as I go. Thank God for YouTube. 😎

Another little gem ......

This is kick-ass! You have a great voice and I love your guitar playing. When you have great ingredients like that, you don’t need much more than good material, of which there is plenty here! I am very inspired listening to this. I appreciate you sharing it and I look forward to delving deeper -bjk

Good stuff. I'm always amazed at how versatile you are.

That's a good song. I like the "acoustic demo," but do you also envision this as a rocker (2 guitars, bass, and drums)? I think it'd kill.

Wow! John, Paul, and George with Young/Young/Williams/Rudd backing them... I can't think of a better combination for me to listen to. The chorus is just sublime. And George Martin at the controls... lol (just reached the end). Almost perfect Gary - LOVE IT!!

Sheesh... this is utterly superb guys. Stunning groove, love the guitars, and the lyrics/vox are just perfect.

Don't know the original, but I likes this. Lovely lovely vocal, and I like how the instrumentation builds, complementing the vocal perfectly... And I'm still watching this "no reverb" approach with much interest - I wish I was brave enough to try it (I am trying to cut down though! lol)

An emotional and, I found, disturbing listen. I have to admit, news stories and footage of things like this often tend to pass me by, I seem not to get emotionally involved. I sometimes wonder why this is but I have no proper answer. I do get affected by some news stories, but not usually the big ones like this. My wife has been upset, but I've been left cold again on this one, until now. Listening to this piece has opened it up slightly for me, making it more... I don't know what... Many thanks for making this and posting it.

Consider my maw told :-) Nice one boys.

And a nice one to finish. The whole album is an excellent piece of work.

Big smile on my face listening to this. Superbly recorded vocals and guitars by the way.

I love this one.

Yep, you're right about it being a killer bass-line. The vocals are pretty stand-out as well :-) Initially, I wasn't sure whether your vocal delivery was fitting the songs, but this one showed me why it works so well. It's almost like we've got David Gates singing punk songs here... lol. The contrast really brings out the emotions in the lyrics. If you tried to sound "angrier" we'd actually lose some of the power...

I can kind of see why it hasn't made many friends - it just is what it is... It makes me think of 80s stuff, like Moonlighting, etc :-) BUT... it's a mighty fine listen.

Very beautiful. Fine playing, lovely arrangement.

I'd favourited it after the first line! Luckily the rest of it lived up to it... Groove, over all sound, vocal, backing vox, everything. I love it...

I'd only heard the various live versions, where I was concentrating on the performance etc... on this one I noticed what an excellent song it is as well! Love the dual vocal.

Woo! This is really effective. I don't think I've heard it before, but no matter... I needed two listens one after the other. Love it.

I'm still kinda stunned by this one. Welcome over here! :)

Well I enjoy the noises you make :) I like this one a lot, I'll have to explore your other stuff.

I keep dipping into your stuff (I'm very fond of Gormenghast as well, I've even got some songs knocking around somewhere that are directly inspired by it), but this is the first one I've listened to closely... You guys are growing on me - you've got something that makes me keep coming back, and it's not just Mr Peake! Faved :-)

Superb version. I found the album in my parents' records when I was 14 or 15. This song almost took me down the "Bob Dylan" route, but I managed to avoid it in the end(!) But it's always been one of my favourites. It's a difficult one to do justice to... but you've managed it apparently effortlessly :)

Oh yes, I like this!

I wasn't too sure of this when it started and I read the "about"... But after 5 minutes I found that I was still listening and that I was likely to stay til the end. Well put together. For me, it does what you set out to do. Fascinating and strangely calming, all the way through to the end.