A telephone interview with Jimmy Darn, leader/drummer/vocalist/songwriter of THE DARN FUNK ORCHESTRA, was the main feature on UK radio station Revival FM’s “Gospel Blues Train” programme ,hosted by Lins Honeyman on Saturday December 17th.
Jimmy talked about how the band initially came together, how he wrote the songs (especially their take on the Psalms) and the various members of the band past and present amongst other things. Link also played lots of Darn Funk tracks.
Starting from approx 22 mins and 15 secs into the programme and continuing to the end of the show (1 hour) it certainly a great showcase for the band and their Plankton Records debut album “Soul Food”
To hear the programme (available until December 24th) – CLICK HERE
The “Soul Food” album is available on all major music download and streaming sites Worldwide, including iTunes and Amazon. The CD version of the album is available from the store on this website – CLICK HERE
A big thank you to Lins and the Revival FM for their support!
Plankton’s very own ECHO performed 2 songs and a specially arrange Christmas medley live in the studio on the Premier Christian Radio Breakfast show today (Monday 12th December).
It was an early start for the band as they were live on the air from Premier’s Central London studio just after 8.00am. At approx 1 hour and 6 mins hosts John Pantry and Rosie Wright play a track from Echo’s “Bought Not Souled” album (available on CD from our website store or from all major music download and streaming sites Worldwide) and then they introduce and interview the band and the girls perform a song from their up-coming second album to a work-in-progress backing track (more news on this in the new year!). Then at approx 1 hour 24 the band perform a Christmas Medley (count the songs!) and then a final live song at approx 1 hour and 35 minutes.
It’s the third year in a row that ECHO have appeared and performed on the breakfast show on the run up to Christmas! Perhaps it’s because the girls can sing so well together so early in the morning crammed together in a radio studio.Whatever the reason, Echo’s visit to Premier has almost home a part of Plankton’s traditional build up to Christmas!
To listen to the programme on catch-up (CLICK HERE)
To order ECHO’s “Bought Not Souled” album on CD (CLICK HERE)
A brand new Christmas compilation album featuring UK Gospel and CCM artists has just been released. It features the beautiful version of “Mary Did You Know” by Plankton Records artists Vivienne Neville and Liz Clarke
Compiled by UK CCM supporters A Step FWD the album is available via Rocket Fuel . Here’s what A Step FWD say in their press release:
“We make a personal appeal for you to support aStepFWD with just £10 today but purchasing the album. Of that £1 goes directly to help tackle the homelessness issue in London and the UK. With your help we aim to sell a minimum of 500 albums.
Please purchase your copy today: https://rocketfuelhq.com/astepfwd
Our Christmas LIVE 2016 event will take place on Sunday, 11th December from 6:30pm GMT. We will be broadcasting LIVE via facebook.com/astepfwdUK in true ‘Band-Aid’ and ‘BBC Live Lounge’ style so be sure to join us online for this fresh format and live performances.
Throughout the event will be a live ‘web-a-thon’ with our Christmas Collection 2016 album (a UK first for Christian & Gospel compilations) that is now available and includes 18 top UK artists from multiple genres including Noel Robinson, Ian Yates, Lurine Cato, LCGC, Guvna B and many more! Our desire is to sell 500 albums at least.
With YOUR help, we can make this happen. Please purchase an album online, gift one to a relative or friend and help us to hit that target. Every sale counts! And don’t forget, for every Christmas Collection album sold £1 will go towards awareness and tackling the growing Homelessness issue in London and the UK.
We would love if you could share, LIKE, RT and plug our social media posts, messages and updates as we have been doing for you via the UK Christian Chart and our website.”
Friday 14th October saw the WORLDWIDE DIGITAL release of our latest single. In conjunction with VJ Media, which is run by our friend Vivienne Neville (a Plankton artist herself) we are pleased to release the debut single from songwriter and performer IAN VENTRESS called “MAMA”, which is a truly joyous Gospel and African flavoured celebration of motherhood, with a slice of rap thrown in for good measure!
Ian’s journey to this point in his musical journey is not your standard story. Based in the north east of England he is a successful businessman but alongside his business activities Ian has always had an interest in writing poetry and this has most recently extended and led him to explore his creative talent in songwriting.
This unplanned and unexpected foray into songwriting brought him into contact with Vivienne Neville, who is of course an experienced songwriter and recording artist. Ian then went into the studio to record with Paul Worthington at Broadwater Studios in Gateshead. Feeling much more comfortable with songwriting than performing ‘out front’ on his own, for this first release from those sessions Ian has drafted in some talented artists and contacts to assist him with the vocal duties. “Mama” features the deep rich tones of the wonderful Lu Ndaka and the song also has a fabulous musical twist with a rap section performed by Consept.
“I’m now working on an album’s worth of material”, Ian informed us recently. “It will be a collection of songs of varying styles and different genres of music and as well as singing myself, as with the Mama single, we are going to be featuring some great talented guest vocalists on some of the tracks too. I’m very excited about the coming months and what they might bring!”
Not many people can describe their first release as ‘Gospel with a rap break and a big helping of African Vibe’. After this great song which so joyously captures what mothers mean to all of us we can’t wait to see what’s coming next from Ian Ventress
The single is available on all leading music download and streaming sites Worldwide. Here are the direct links to the single on the UK and USA site of iTunes and Amazon.
A few months ago we were digging around in places long since visited doing some recording research for our friend (radio presenter and Christian music aficionado) Mike Rimmer and we came across two long deleted releases from the rock band FRESH CLAIM (which is led by Plankton’s founder Simon Law).
One of them, the live album “No Claims Bonus”, a very raw and passionate recording that perfectly captures the atmosphere and emotion of early Fresh Claim gigs, has been the subject of requests for re-issue for a while now, so we decided to give them a dust down and make them available as digital releases on all major music download and streaming sites Worldwide, including iTunes and Amazon.
“It’s great to make these releases available again,” states Plankton partner Keith Dixon. “With these releases it means all of Fresh Claim’s albums (and EPs) are now available again – albeit on digital. The live album was always a favourite of Fresh Claim fans so it’s great news for them. These recording were not full studio recordings as ‘Soapbox’ was a ‘session’ recording – meaning recording the band performing live, but with no audience! We did it this way as we wanted to make a release available at a very cheap price so school kids could buy them after the band played lunch time gigs etc.”
“As the releases were originally only on cassette with quite basis artwork – printing artwork was a whole different world back then! – we’ve had to adapt the artwork too, to fit the digital square box style! And, we’ve made them available at a lower price than the other Fresh Claim releases already available too”
Watch this space for more historic releases being released into the world of digital in the future
If you want to know more about FRESH CLAIM (Click here)
Plankton Records very own THE DARN FUNK ORCHESTRA recently picked up an award at the Praisetek Gospel Music Music Awards for their “services to Gospel Music” following years of live gigs in all types of venues and then earlier this year the long-awaited release of their debut album SOUL FOOD – on Plankton Records of course!
The band were obviously delighted to receive the award and we are delighted for them too!
Find out more about THE DARN FUNK ORCHESTRA on their Facebook page: (CLICK HERE) or visit their artist page on this website: (CLICK HERE)
The album SOUL FOOD is available on all major digital music download and streaming sites Worldwide, including iTunes and Amazon and on CD from this website (CLICK HERE) and, for UK customers only also from Amazon (CLICK HERE)
UK CCM website CrossRhythms has just posted a good review of MATT JR HURLEY’s “Raising Questions” EP.
The reviewer picked up on Matt’s recent history and the writing of the songs and went on to note: “… Hurley skilfully balances the undeniably downbeat feel of the EP with the certainty and steadfastness of God’s love no matter the situation with tracks like “The Promise Of Redemption And Hope” and “My Soul Sings” being cases in point. Hurley’s intricate finger-picking and gentle vocal delivery fit the bill perfectly and, whilst he and producer Gareth Matthews keep things pretty basic in terms of instrumentation, the fuller band feel of the psalm-like “Shout To The Sky” and a synth wash on the previously released single “Pebbles” help add some variety to a promising debut.”
Plankton Records is pleased to announce that it will be working with the NINE BEATS Collective who are making a concept album exploring the ancient wisdom of ‘The Beatitudes’. Artists from UK, Uganda, Denmark & USA are collaborating on songs, instrumentals and spoken word to present ‘NINE BEATS’ as a counter-cultural narrative for our times. Amongst the musicians is the world renowned guitarist Caleb Quaye who has played and recorded with Elton John, Hall & Oates, Mick Jagger and many more. The project is being produced by Tony Bean, founder of MOBO winners 5AM.
“These words speak about another world being possible, another way of being human: in these turbulent times, could they actually offer us steps to a new reality?” asks the collective. “NINE BEATS explores these powerful notions – and presents them back to the culture around us through music and art.”
“The arts and theology and spiritual formation are really great conversation partners because… we’re invited to question the assumptions of the systems that we are part of… they point out that the emperor has no clothes on and then invoke the possibility of newness to come… there’s a longing inside of us for another world, something better than what’s here right now… the Beatitudes invite us in to that possibility and say there is a new way to be human, another world is possible”, said author and speaker Mark Scandrette.
Our good friends at leading UK CCM site LOUDER THAN THE MUSIC have given our latest release, the ‘Raising Questions’ EP by Matt JR Hurley a great review, awarding it 4 out of 5 stars.
In summing up the EP the review stated: “These may not be stadium anthems, but this EP has a glorious reflective feel, perfect for those quieter moments in life when you just want music that will gently sooth you. Matt JR Hurley has put together a handful of songs which are musically well crafted, lyrically thoughtful, and overall, a pleasure to listen to.”
We think this sums up the EP brilliantly. If you want to know about the EP, hear some song excerpts etc (CLICK HERE)
Plankton’s Keith Dixon will be attending and doing a very short presentation about Plankton Records at this exciting 1 day conference event in the heart of London’s West End, which has been organised by aStepFWD/UK Christian Charts. If you are involved with music from any kind of Christian perspective then this may be a great event for you to attend.
Keith will also share briefly about his other ‘ventures’ – Doxmedia (music aggregation) and Dox Music Services (music industry advice and support for songwriters, artists and creatives)
For more information on what other organisation are attending (CLICK HERE)
