The Wild Swans - About

their single. But, nothing daunted, they all piled into a van again and drove down to London. They did only manage 3 tracks for that session and but as two of them were No Bleeding and Enchanted nobody thought of complaining and this was one of the first batch of Peel sessions to be chosen for release by Strange Fruit - an accolade if ever there was one.

The world should‚ve been at their feet. It probably was only, of course, being the Wild Swans, their feet weren't where the world might've expected to find them (i.e. on the ground), so the world just said "oh well, nobody here...." went off and found someone else to adore. And then, as mysteriously as they'd appeared, they were gone. Nobody really knew how or why. They just weren't there any more.

Then, with no more warning than the first time, they were back again. In 1985 interest was revived by the Peel session EP and, fortuitously, all three original members were between groups so they got back together again, recorded the really rather wonderful Janice Long session which opens CD2 of this album, featuring 2 versions of songs which ended up on the first Sire album, Northern England and Now And Forever, one - Crowning Glory - which later mutated into that album's Whirlpool Heart and one otherwise unrecorded (and excellent) song, Holy Spear, plus a series of demos which landed them a contract with Sire Records. Ged somehow drifted off, in a way which will surprise nobody who knows the man leaving Paul and Jem, plus bass player Joe Fearon (the Wild Swans Mk II stuck to one bass player, well, one presumes there simply weren't any more left after Mark I). Broken Home comes from these pre-Sire demos. The Mark II band made 2 excellent albums for Sire before calling it a day in the late 80s.

These days Ged Quinn is a very fine painter with a fast-growing reputation in the art world, Jem Kelly is still recording with the Lotus Eaters and Paul Simpson has released 3 albums (the last being the truly stupendous Mind Lagoons)