News

We're delighted to announce that we've appointed Vin as our new drummer. He's been playing drums since he was six, and has taken in just about every style of music that includes a drum kit.

Vin's first gig will be a private function on 1st August, followed by our first festival gig at FEVA in Knaresborough on 22nd August.

Well, the good news is that Stevie is well on the mend and we are delighted to see him playing again.

Unfortunately, he has decided to move on from Hargreaves, so we are currently looking for a new drummer.  If you are interested, please let us know - any style, any influences.  We want you're musical input as much as your drumming.

Thanks to Stevie for a terrific contribution over the last 18 months.  Sorry to see you go and we wish you luck with your new band and your session work.

We're planning a couple more gigs this coming summer and plan to be more active than we have been, so please keep your eyes peeled.

Well, the good news is that Chris's out patient treatment for his asthma was successful and he's back home and starting to feel better already.

The bad news is that Stevie is very poorly and was hostpialised last week. He's out now though, recovering slowly, but it means he'll be out of action for several weeks.

So in the meantime, we're going to perfect some of the new songs we have floating around, possibly do some acoustic gigs & also work on the release of our next EP. After that, we'll work towards some gigs for the summer, so keep your eyes peeled.

We've just got back from Ireland - first time there for Claire, Stevie, Jay and Ian - where we played a charity ball organised by members of Chris' extended family.

We stayed at the excellent Finnstown Country House Hotel, and saw a little bit of Dublin (and a lot of traffic) on the way from and to the ferry.

This was a brilliant trip, a great experience, and a fantastic honour to be asked to play for such a prestigeous charity event. We had to go on a lot later than planned, but apart from that we loved every minute.

Thanks to Aisa and Sala for invitings us, to all the 'English' crowd for getting up and dancing, and to all the 'Irish' crowd for joining in so willingly.

We'll be posting photos shortly, so keep your eyes peeled!

And remember! We're taking part in the Battle of the Bands at Rehab Bar (Parliament Street, Harrogate) - we're on at 7pm this Sunday (8th March). We'll be playing 4 tracks and up against some local competition - it should prove to be fun, so come & see us!

Well, it's taken a year, but it's done. It's official, it's available for everyone to purchase & listen. Our album 'Sooner But Not Later' is now out.

We'll be playing tracks from the album live at No. 19's (Harrogate, Parliament Street on the 20th of February, starts around 8pm. We'll be selling physical copies of the album all evening too.

So come & join us - lovely venue, good people & some music too!

And remember; we have some samples of the album up on our Releases page for you to listen to. If you like what you hear, please buy it & remember to leave us a review on iTunes!

It's nearing the album launch & almost everything's ready. The album launch is this Monday (2nd February) at 8pm - Brio's Pizza & Continental Bar, Hornbeam Park, Harrogate - free entry!

We'll be playing all the songs from the album, which we'll have on sale all night for £10, along with plenty of covers & acoustic tracks so there's something for practically everyone.

We may** also be the first band in the world to Twitter while doing a gig & album launch - so please follow HargreavesBlues on Twitter if you can't be there on the night!

And if you miss this gig, you'll have another chance to see us at No 19's on the 20th February (Parliament Street, Harrogate) which is slowly becoming our regular gig. We also have the honour of playing The Daffodil and Violet Ball in Ireland for charity, which we're very much looking forward to.

As a thank you freebie, the entire EP will be up on this site, very soon, for you guys to listen to.

P.S. We're still looking for a backing singer, so if you're interested please call Chris on 01423 223 496.

** This entirely depends on how hectic we get, but shall try our best!

With the album being released on the 2nd of February, it'd only be right for us to offer up some album samplers in the mean time! So head on over to the Releases page & check out the music player and enjoy a little bit of the album.

If there's any problems with it, please let us know either via our new Hargreaves Twitter account, or via the contact form.

It's with great disappointment that we have to say Anneka has decided not to become a full-time member of Hargreaves due to other commitments, so we're looking for a new backing singer.

You will need to love harmonizing, and be prepared to commit to rehearse or gig each week.

If you're interested please call Chris on 01423 223 496.

We've finally finished recording our album. 9 hours in the studio saw nice arrangements of new songs 'Hi' and 'Lonely' engineered by Ben McCluskey of Straytown Studios, and two versions of 'Goodbye' engineered by Ian Hardcastle - one version will on the album and the 2nd will be a bonus track on physical copies only.

It was the first time that Anneka Yeadon has sung with us in anger and she's already proving to be a great backing vocalist. Her voice works well with Claire, but she also sounds distinctly different and even the rough mixes sound great as a result.

We hope to have physical copies of the album available before Christmas - no pressure then on Ian to mix them and James to develop the artwork ...

Commercial launch and availablility on-line will be early 2009.

We're going back into the studio on Saturday 15th to record the final two tracks for our album. These are going to be slightly different than some of the others - more of a live performance rather than the more heavily produced work we've done so far.

Ian is going to produce 'Lonely', the song written by James and Claire which has been going down well in our live shows. Ben at Straytown is going to engineer Lonely, and also the Steve Earle song 'Goodbye' which he'll also produce and mix.

That's going to give us 12 album tracks - but for those of you who buy it on CD you'll probably also get a couple of bonus tracks in the form of remixes.

We're still hoping to have the physical CD completed by Christmas, but you'll have to wait a few months before we can launch the download version.

Hargreaves is delighted to announce a change in our line-up.

For a while we've been looking for a backing singer to replace Alie who has had to quit for personal and health reasons. We are therefore delighted to announce that Anneka Yeadon will be joining us for our next two gigs with a view to becoming a full-time fixture.

Anneka has a background and qualifications in performing arts, particularly musical theatre which gives her a great background to providing the extra depth and colour that a second voice provides to our music, particularly the new material written by Claire and Chris for the album.

Come along and meet Anneka at The Old White Swan in York on the 21st November where she'll be performing on several of our songs (providing she can master the art of the Shakey Egg).

Did you know that you can ...

Download our EP from Straytown Studios:
http://straytown.dloadshop.com/shop.asp?artistid=14

Four fabulous tracks for the princely sum of £2.99, beautifully produced by Ian Hardcastle of Shotgun Universe productions and sounding (to quote the Harrogate Advertiser's Graham Chalmers) "as natural as honey on buttered toast."