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LILAC TIME

The Lilac Time

Return To Us

    “Return To Us” is the new album by The Lilac Time, the country folk band fronted by Stephen Duffy. The collection is their tenth so far and Stephen’s twentieth long-player in a career that has spanned four decades.

    Coming off the back of five-star rave reviews for the reissue of Stephen’s album I Love My Friends, Return To Us was recorded by the three-piece of Nick Duffy, Claire Duffy and Stephen who have been the core of The Lilac Time since 1999.

    The nine-track album was recorded in Stephen and Claire’s home and covers topics as diverse as The D-Day Landings (March To The Docks), auditory processing disorder and the difficulties in recognising and interpreting sounds (King Kopetsky), Italian Neorealism (A River That Runs Both Ways), life before the Internet (The Simple Things), not getting dragged back to a fictitious golden age (Return To Us), a Christmas song of sorts (The Needles) and needing ‘reassurance because the world went stupid’ ((I’m) A Believer).

    Stephen Duffy: “This our first release on a major label since 1990. After a calamitous time with RCA around the recently reissued I Love My Friends album I never considered it an option. But then after our last performance at Port Eliot in 2017, we were approached by BMG’s senior scout who suggested we send our new record to them after some time we did and here it is”.

    TRACK LISTING

    SIDE A
    1. (I'm) A Believer
    2. March To The Docks
    3. The Hills Of Cinnamon
    4. The Needles

    SIDE B:
    5. Return To Us
    6. The Bridge & Down
    7. The River Runs Both Ways
    8. The Simple Things
    9. King Kopetsky

    The Lilac Time

    Prussian Blue EP

      To celebrate their first album in years "No Sad Songs", The Lilac Time is releasing another special record this year: Prussian Blue EP

      The 12" will feature a beautiful new mix of the album song "Prussian Blue" as well as three live recordings of songs that became really special during their career.

      The EP is strictly limited to 500 copies.

      Lilac Time

      No Sad Songs

        A prose-poem, which Stephen Duffy composed especially for the release of the new and ninth album by his band The Lilac Time, contains the lines: "I was a flower child, now I'm a flower man."

        It took a long time before one became the other. When viewed from space, Stephen Duffy's path may well appear labyrinthine, filled with loopholes and trapdoors. Yet a sober perspective reveals path of a musician and poet who is independent in the very best sense of the word.

        Nevertheless: A lot has happened since the young boy kept his Praktica camera trained on street scenes in the Birmingham of the Cold War. Back in 1979, an 18-year-old Stephen Duffy was founding member of Duran Duran. Yet he did not board the train to superstardom. The visionary instinct of the young artist had other intentions. He might have had Bob Dylan, Nick Drake and The Incredible String Band in mind, but he himself was not allergic to success. He quickly understood that a songwriter with an acoustic guitar had little access to the merry-go-round of the charts in the early eighties. Instead, he emerged as Stephen "Tintin" Duffy, trading his guitar for a synthesizer and making chic, clever and sparkling POP music in capital letters. The young man with the melancholy expression even landed two international hits with Kiss Me and Icing on the Cake. But before the record company was able to put their plan into action and turn Duffy into the next Rick Astley, he took flight. He mothballed his pop persona and founded a band with his brother: The Lilac Time.

        On their debut in 1987, they made what Stephen had long dreamed of: Flower Music. The single Return to Yesterday conjured visions of Simon & Garfunkel. In an era of slapping basses and smacking snares, the instrumentation was exceptional: mainly acoustic, with guitars, banjos, fiddles and accordions, all beautifully arranged by Nick Duffy, who was also responsible for composing the instrumental pieces on the record.

        Keep in mind that the New Acoustic Movement, which brought forth bands like Belle And Sebastian and The Kings Of Convenience, was still more than ten years away. Often in diametrical contrast with this melancholy folk pop were Stephen Duffy's lyrics, with descriptions of suburban tristesse placed seamlessly alongside biting commentary on the issues of the times and courageous reports of the singer's moments of excess and aventures amoureuses.


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