Nick Garrie

The Nightmare of J B Stanislas [2010]

ER-1148 Double-CD Digipak

Everyone who is irrevocably hooked on music knows that, hidden in the archives of some record labels, there are unique and incomparable gems that have remained unjustly hidden over the years, due in large part to the strange whims of the industry and its destiny. Elefant Records is proud to definitively recover one of these albums, maybe one of the most important yet to be discovered. After giving the necessary recognition to Nick Garrie with that “49 Arlington Gardens” which he released two years ago with Duglas T. Stewart (BMX BANDITS), Ally Kerr, Norman Blake (TEENAGE FANCLUB), and a full entourage of huge and renowned Scottish musicians, the time has come to focus the spotlight on his legendary work. And the thing is, “The Nightmare of J B Stanislas” is a missing link in music history, a cursed album that oozes inspiration from all sides, a mix of the intensity of Tim Buckley with the psychedelic touch of THE LEFT BANK, inimitable and inexplicable.

The story begins with a young Garrie who in 1969 is called by the French label DiscAZ (also home to artists such as Brigitte Bardot and Michael Polnareff), to record a debut album, after they heard some demo tracks that impressed them tremendously. Eddie Vartan (Sylvie Vartan’s brother, and an important representative of the French rock scene) is put in charge of production, for which he seeks the help of a 56-musician orchestra to fill the album with arrangements and melodic lines – and album that its composer had brought acoustic and bare. The result is the “The Nightmare of J B Stanislas” in which the seriousness of Garrie’s melodies, his abstract stories flooded with a Saint Tropez breeze, create a strange chemical reaction with Vartan’s orchestrations, and give way to this incredibly addictive work, an authentic canon of beauty, of imagination, of extravagant arrangements full of fantasy. The end of this exciting dream comes when, few short days after the disc goes on sale, the head of DiscAZ, Lucien Morisse, commits suicide, leaving the album orphaned, with no promotion or plan, which resulted in very few copies every getting sold.

All of this is just cause for this definitive edition, which includes the original album, those demos that so impressed the people at DiscAZ, his first single, some recordings done in Portugal in 2002, and above all, “The Cuts”, the recuperation of some of the compositions from that era that were never recorded, and that are now recorded by Garrie himself accompanied by the Scottish crew from “49 Arlington Gardens”. And to all of this we have to add the detailed and deluxe edition of an incredible 44-page book in which Garrie tells the story of his own life, and with it, the story of an album that will never again be called cursed. This work is what has won over people like Gary Olson (LADYBUG TRANSISTOR), Francis McDonald (NICE MAN, TEENAGE FANCLUB), Guille Milkyway (LA CASA AZUL) and our beloved Tracyanne Campbell (CAMERA OBSCURA), and now it’s time it gets its what it deserves, and this incredible edition is the first step.

CD1 THE NIGHTMARE OF J.B. STANISLAS - 1. The nightmare of J.B. Stanislas 2. Can I stay with you 3. Bungles tours 4. David’s prayer 5. Ink pot eyes 6. The wanderer 7. Stephanie city 8. Little bird 9. Deeper tones of blue 10. Queen of queens 11. Wheel of fortune 12. Evening
CD2 THE CUTS - 1. Seashore 2. Josefina 3. St. Tropez whore 4. Three old men 5. Que sera, sera (Whatever will be, will be)
LOST AND FOUND - 6. Summer nights 7. Wine and roses 8. Love in my eyes 9. Queen of spades [First single 1968] 10. Close your eyes [First single 1968] 11. Cambridge town [demo 1968] 12. Stone and silk [demo 1968] 13. Bungles tours [demo 1968] 14. Deeper tones of blue [demo 1968] 15. Little bird [demo 1968] 16. Stanislas [demo 1968] 17. Evening [demo 1968]

49 Arlington Gardens [2009]

ER-1140 CD Digipak / LP

“49 Arlington Gardens” is the album that musical history uses to pay its dues to Nick Garrie. There are many reasons for it to be so. The marvelous recording sessions in Scotland, sponsored by Ally Kerr and that included such great names as Norman Blake (TEENAGE FANCLUB), Francis McDonald (NICE MAN, TEENAGE FANCLUB, BMX BANDITS), Duglas T. Stewart (BMX BANDITS) producing, and Duncan Cameron (DELGADOS, TRAVIS, TRASHCAN SINATRAS) as sound engineer, with the still less famous DOGHOUSE ROSES, Spain’s Sandra Belda Martínez (CALIFORNIA SNOW STORY, SUPERÉTÉ), Rachel Allison, Iona McDonald and many other musicians from the Scottish indie pop scene. An astonishing collection of great compositions, with gems like “Twilight,” “Le pont Mirabeau,” “When Evening Comes” and “When the Child in You,” and a deeply romantic song like “Lovers,” written with Francis Lai (responsible for such historic soundtracks as “A Man and A Woman” and “Love Story”). The fact that “The Nightmare of J.B. Stanislas,” the cursed disc released in 1969 that barely saw the light of day and that today has become a collector’s item, is receiving this small moment of glory that it was robbed of by chance when it was first released.. And above all, a singer-songwriter, Nick Garrie, with a precious voice full of solemnity and a classic pop feeling, in the best sense of the word, enjoying a moment of brilliant inspiration.
It’s one of those discs that sees the light of day thanks to the support of a new generation of musicians, admirers of the British singer-songwriter. It’s an honest, intimate, elegant, precocious disc that maintains a marvelous balance between arrangements and melodies. Just under thirty minutes of dreamy compositions, of pop and tight folk that deals humbly and candidly with human nature with the surprising element of juvenile fantasy that is “The Clockmaker".

There´s a limited edition of this album for vinyl lovers.

Twilight [2008]

ER-265 Single 7"

Its big news for Elefant to have the privilege to discover an underground composer and witness and participate in his musical rebirth. Nick Garrie debuted with “The Nightmare of JB Stanislas”, a psychedelic folk album published in 1969 and produced by Eddie Vartan (Sylvie Vartan’s brother) but remained in the warehouse of the label, DiscAZ after the owner committed suicide immediately following the release of the album. Despite the fact that the copies of this magical album were scarce and the high price for collectors (more than 1,200 euros), it was admired throughout various decades. Leonard Cohen himself personally praised Nick on their joint tour in Spain in the eighties, announcing that he would have loved to have composed some of the songs of the album. He took part in luxurious collaborations, such as those in infamous soundtracks, along with Francis Lai (Oscar winner for “Love Story” and in charge of “Un homme et a femme”, “Vivir por Vivir”, “Bilitis”, “Dark Eyes” and “Emmanuelle”).
The scarce musical activity of this British composer is seen today thanks to the participation of the well known Scottish pop scene: Duglas T. Stewart (BMX BANDITS), Norman Blake (TEENAGE FANCLUB), Ally Kerr (his true guardian angel) and the entourage of musicians who have rendered their services to record the next album, “49 Arlington Gardens”, including Francis Lai, who authors, along with Nick, one of the most romantic moments of the album. For now, the single “Twilight” is a magnificent appetizer designed in a special limited edition vinyl, clearly demonstrating the preciousness which reigns in the melodies of this composer. Today he is recognized more than ever, along with the names of Donovan and Nick Drake. In January of 2009, his long awaited album will be released.

Limited edition

Yo, también [Me too] [2009]

ER-1147 CD Digipak

“Yo, También” [Me too] is the full length film debut of Álvaro Pastor and Antonio Naharro and it is one of the projects we have been involved in this past year with “Elefant Music Supervision”, a project that has been taking shape over time and that has the singular goal of helping and collaborating on audiovisual projects of all types, and to give musical supervision from Elefant that would help the creators’ find the perfect music for their work. Álvaro and Antonio’s recent visit to the San Sebastian Film Festival was a total success, two Silver Conches, for Best Actor for Pablo Pineda and for Best Actress for Lola Dueñas. Lola Dueñas (a renowned and prestigious actress, winner of a Goya for her role in Alejandro Amenábar’s movie “Mar Adentro” (The Sea Inside) and nominated for Pedro Almodóvar’s “Volver”), recently stated in an interview, “When I finish a movie, I forget about it, but I’d never experienced before putting on the music from the soundtrack, like this time”. The music plays such an important role in the movie and the musical selection turned out to be so varied and enriching. Guille Milkyway (LA CASA AZUL) was responsible for creating small musical brushstrokes especially for the movie. The soundtrack is atypical with simple, bare pieces, based on emotionally charged piano melodies that can just as easily express the greatest happiness as they can sink into the deepest sadness and frustration. Guille was also in charge of the movie’s theme song, a 70s style rumba, “Yo, También”, somewhere along the lines of the first recordings by LAS GRECAS or LOS AMAYA, but with that magical touch that our great master’s compositions are full of. There is a lot of music in the movie, as much music as there are characters and situations. Quiet moments, sweet, quotidian, romantic, sad, exciting, fun, crazy, partying, totally out of control… there is music to fit every moment and all together it makes a perfect soundtrack for understanding the movie. Guille’s rumba and MANZANITA’s “Te amaré” give that Spanish touch to the movie, which takes place mostly in Sevilla, but the soundtrack also has the delicate songs of Wales’ THE SCHOOL, the magnetism of CAMERA OBSCURA, the Italian romanticism of GIORGIO TUMA and FITNESS FOREVER, the delicacy of BMX BANDITS, the timeless folk-pop of Nick Garrie and RÓZSÄK and the strength and rhythm of LA CASA AZUL, SOUVENIR, BEEF, and THE GENTLE PEOPLE, among others.