1985-87Recording of what was to become the first album, Spirit of the Soup, began in the Spring of 1985. The band had discovered the amazing new 4 track portastudio. Recording on a shoe string! A machine was begged, stolen or borrowed from a friend (nobody can remember which) and the whole album was recorded in a fortnight in Cathy's living room at Old Basing. The album was "released" as a cassette to be sold at gigs and copies were recorded piecemeal on whoever's cassette machine happened to be handy! Understandably, a distinct sound of frying eggs could be heard, and they did not sell in large numbers! By now, the band was starting to gig regularly,
mostly in pubs and folk clubs, but the aim was already to try and get into
some bona fide folk festivals, (actually, any festival would do!)
Demo tapes were sent out right left and centre, a publicity leaflet was
cut and pasted (by hand), and moreover it was decided that it would raise
the band's profile if a video was produced. Of
course, the problem was that nobody had any money. The solution.......let's
make a video out of slides! Luckily help was to hand with this
project in the form of Gram Martin, a friend of Cliff's from Basingstoke
who had already won an award for his audio visual work. One
of Cathy's songs from Spirit of the Soup, Silent Seasons, was chosen
as the most adaptable to this kind of treatment, a story board was designed,
and a cast of twenty or so hapless friends were persuaded that it would
be loads of fun to walk fully clothed into the Solent on a chilly October
morning. The Morrigan played its first folk festival (Sidmouth)
in August 1986. Aspirations of stardom were somewhat punctured by
being asked to provide PA for the whole evening (the house PA had packed
up) then assigned the "tombstone slot" at past midnight, when any self
respecting punter had either drunk themselves into floor-hugging oblivion
or gone to bed. This, all for the princely sum of twenty five pounds.
Ah, those The Morrigan began to get a reputation for having
a very unusual mix of folk and rock which didn't quite fit into any of
the existing pigeon holes. The playing was tight, and Cliff was gaining
a real reputation as a theatrical front man, often reciting poetry as part
of the set. CLICK
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