Tom Palmer is a British folk musician whom has achieved a small cult following as the result of years of extensive touring.
They’ve entertained 13th Century France, played to Kings and paupers, they even featured in Shakespeare, yet troubadours are very much alive and kicking in the shape of Yorkshireman Tom Palmer, whose experiences of distant shores are brought to life with a powerful new album of songs from the guitar maestro.
Recorded over nine months on the banks of Bewl Water, Kent, Tom’s new album – ‘Kickin Back’ – is the latest milestone in the career of one of the UK’s best-loved songsters, and this time he’s aiming to bring his eclectic brand of musical wizardry to a whole new audience.
Written on the jungle-fringed beaches of Penang and the South China Seas, ‘Kickin Back’ records tales of love, lust, wild nights and crazy experiences found by this travelling minstrel as he roamed through Asia after an intensive nine-month tour of Australia. Singing nightly around beach fires, Tom would find an impromptu audience wherever he went, a true travelling player entertaining the local, smiling people, and building up a rich catalogue of experiences on which to draw for his extraordinary songwriting talent.
It’s a long way from his early days in Pontefract, Yorkshire, where, as a teenager, he first set out to emulate the success of his heroes, Bob Dylan and Eric Burdon. Singing came almost by accident, as he coached friends in the guitar by speaking the words to songs. As chords became bars, became whole songs, so ‘the man who spoke the words’ was decreed the band’s singer, and a whole new career began.
Even then, life as a singer-songwriter came through a typically unconventional route, after he’d seek to augment his income singing in the hotel bar where he worked as a chef. As audiences grew familiar with his dark, deep vocals and masterly guitar so more work as a professional beckoned, from pubs and clubs in and around his native Yorkshire, through building up his own full touring band to playing to thousands at Glastonbury, the Cambridge Folk Festival and Cornwall’s Elephant Fair.
Throughout, Tom has seen himself as carrying on a much-loved tradition of the travelling songster. “In days gone by the old troubadours travelled and took stories from one place to the next,” he says. “That’s how people learned about what was going on. I like to think I’m carrying on that tradition - we’ve got so much to learn from other people, other cultures, and songs are a wonderful way to pass all that on. That’s what gets me excited when I play to an audience. That’s what I love...”
They’ve entertained 13th Century France, played to Kings and paupers, they even featured in Shakespeare, yet troubadours are very much alive and kicking in the shape of Yorkshireman Tom Palmer, whose experiences of distant shores are brought to life with a powerful new album of songs from the guitar maestro.
Recorded over nine months on the banks of Bewl Water, Kent, Tom’s new album – ‘Kickin Back’ – is the latest milestone in the career of one of the UK’s best-loved songsters, and this time he’s aiming to bring his eclectic brand of musical wizardry to a whole new audience.
Written on the jungle-fringed beaches of Penang and the South China Seas, ‘Kickin Back’ records tales of love, lust, wild nights and crazy experiences found by this travelling minstrel as he roamed through Asia after an intensive nine-month tour of Australia. Singing nightly around beach fires, Tom would find an impromptu audience wherever he went, a true travelling player entertaining the local, smiling people, and building up a rich catalogue of experiences on which to draw for his extraordinary songwriting talent.
It’s a long way from his early days in Pontefract, Yorkshire, where, as a teenager, he first set out to emulate the success of his heroes, Bob Dylan and Eric Burdon. Singing came almost by accident, as he coached friends in the guitar by speaking the words to songs. As chords became bars, became whole songs, so ‘the man who spoke the words’ was decreed the band’s singer, and a whole new career began.
Even then, life as a singer-songwriter came through a typically unconventional route, after he’d seek to augment his income singing in the hotel bar where he worked as a chef. As audiences grew familiar with his dark, deep vocals and masterly guitar so more work as a professional beckoned, from pubs and clubs in and around his native Yorkshire, through building up his own full touring band to playing to thousands at Glastonbury, the Cambridge Folk Festival and Cornwall’s Elephant Fair.
Throughout, Tom has seen himself as carrying on a much-loved tradition of the travelling songster. “In days gone by the old troubadours travelled and took stories from one place to the next,” he says. “That’s how people learned about what was going on. I like to think I’m carrying on that tradition - we’ve got so much to learn from other people, other cultures, and songs are a wonderful way to pass all that on. That’s what gets me excited when I play to an audience. That’s what I love...”
Folk Acoustic