Robert White, guitarist/keyboard player with frazzled psychedelic rock band Levitation from 1989 to 1993 was already writing songs for 'Round The Sun', the first album by The Milk & Honey Band, as early as 1992.
'I was writing a lot of songs that weren't really right for the band by that stage and was looking for somewhere else to go with them. I'd always done fairly complete demos for Levitation and so it seemed a natural progression to sing the songs myself although I never considered myself a singer in the traditional sense, it was just my voice that was carrying them. I got fed up with trying to re-create the essence of a song captured in it's first inception so I thought 'why not try and find a home for the songs as they emerge.''
'I approached Geoff Travis at Rough Trade, to whom we were signed at the time, initially to see if he'd like to do an e.p or something as I only had a handful of tunes I thought were good enough. He said 'why not make an album instead?''
What emerged about a year later in 1994 was the album 'Round The Sun' (Rough Trade R3572). A collection of songs recorded at home on an 8 track reel to reel that Robert had used to demo all the Levitation songs. Singing and playing everything himself gave the record a deeply personal feel.
'I decided to keep it all very basic sounding and close-up.... there's hardly any effects on that whole album other than on 'Light' which made up for it by putting tons of effects on everything!'
Closing the album with the sound of two blackbirds, one outside the window of his flat the other down the end of the street, having a dawn conversation, set the tone for the record. It was a fairly low key release but was very warmly received by critics and public alike.
Robert continued writing and presented Geoff Travis with a new collection of songs in 1996. Although keen, Rough Trade weren't in a position to put out the record so he began looking for a new home.
'So I made up some tapes and started to send them to people.'
One of these found it's way to Caroline Elleray and Ian Ramage at BMG publishing who loved the songs and signed Robert in 1997.
'The money enabled me to build a proper studio in my house and that was all I'd ever really wanted. We began looking for a new label and had a lot of meetings with people who loved the songs but then felt a bit short changed when they realised that there was no band, it was all me on those recordings.'
So then began the task of turning what was essentially a studio project into a real band and after a lot of auditioning and rehearsing The Milk & Honey Band began showcasing for major labels.
'It was horrible' recalls Robert 'everyone we met at all these big labels had their own idea of what it should sound like and how it should be presented. I got carried along with the ebb and flow of it and before I knew it I was the backing singer in my own band! I really lost my way around this time and knew I had to put on the brakes.'
'I pissed a lot of people off by deciding to revert back to what I knew I did best - write songs in my own space and time and record them.'
All this time Robert had been stockpiling songs and what emerged in 2000 was an album entitled 'Boy From The Moon' (MAN 4).
'I wanted to find a label who wanted what I wanted. Guy (Lovelady) at Uglyman Records in Manchester understood this and so we went with him. He just loved music and had a couple of bands on his label - Elbow and I Am Kloot - who seemed to be doing it for all the right reasons - I'd got very fed up with trying to please too many people so this just made sense.'
Being on a defiantly indie label had it's own inherent problems but again the record was very well received by those who got to hear it. A copy of it found it's way to Andy Partridge of XTC who fell in love with it immediately.
'He rang me up and I could barely speak to him. I'd been a massive fan since the early 80's, when my manager told me he'd got in touch I thought he was winding me up.'
Andy asked whether 'Boy From The Moon' was on their own label and might they be interested in doing a licensing deal?
'We were tied into the deal with that record with Uglyman so we couldn't do it but the seed had been planted and I knew I'd found an ally and a friend. The album hadn't done very well and I was on the point of selling my house - literally chucking it all in. Andy convinced me to stay and said he was setting up a new label called ‘Ape’ and did I want to make an album for it? What could I say?'
Reinvigorated, Robert set about recording some new songs and these, together with 3 songs taken from the previous album, were released in 2004 as 'The Secret Life Of The Milk and Honey Band'(APE CD006).
'The response was brilliant - people finally started getting to hear the songs and when they did they really connected.'
'We did a few gigs around this time as a 3 piece (with long time collaborators Richard Yale and Michael Tubb) but we all knew we wanted it to be a proper band so we started looking for people to flesh out the sound. When we found Dan (Burke - keyboards/guitar/backing vocals) it all started falling into place.'
With drummer Chris Parsons as the last piece of the puzzle, finally it all felt right.
'It was so much fun all of a sudden and everything made sense. I'd found the right balance of personalities and they all complimented each other as players too, it's all about the chemistry, I learned that from my days in Levitation. You can't really look for it - it just happens.'
So work began on the follow up to 'Secret Life' in 2006.
'I had more and more songs and I just wanted to record everything - so that's what I did. 2 years of recording later and I had 25 songs mixed and in the bag. It took a while to figure out how to shake them all down. I think there's been about 100 different versions of what this album should be but in the end I knew I wanted a simple 10 song record.'
So 'Dog Eared Moonlight' was born.
'I was also intent that it was a mixture of styles, I always liked that on records by artists I love like The Beatles - look at Revolver or Sgt Pepper's or the White Album - so diverse, loud stuff mixed amongst acoustic - no rules as long as it all flows together, that's all that matters. I think too many records nowadays have one mood that they seek to establish for the whole album - I can't do that, maybe I have too short an attention span. I like dynamic shifts in music and I think this record has that.. and a heap of great tunes too, of course.. that's what really matters most to me.'
October 22nd 2008