Thursday, June 11, 2026

Welcome to Crispycat Recordings....

WELCOME TO CRISPYCAT RECORDINGS

We issue the solo and collaborative work of musician, abstract artist and podcaster 
DAVID REILLY aka CLOUDLAND BLUE QUARTET (CBQ)
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This section is the Cloudland Blue Diary
 The diary comprises over twenty-one years of daily entries, from Sunday 5 March 2005 to Wednesday 10 June 2026
(Please scroll down for the latest posts)
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SITE DIRECTORY

To go to another section of the site, click on an icon below

ABOUT    MUSIC    PODCASTS    ART    RECOMENDED LISTENING
                    
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CRISPYCAT RECORDINGS ON BANDCAMP

To go to the Bandcamp discographies of these Crispycat related artists, click on an icon.

                    

Crispycat Recordings released the first 25 Cloudland Blue Quartet albums (recorded between 1996 and 2012) to Bandcamp in 2013.

A further 8 LPs were released between 2013 and 2019.

Then, with the advent of lockdown, David spent much more time on new Cloudland Blue Quartet works, with the result that, since May 2020, new music has been released almost every month, with almost 100 further new releases having been issued in the last five years.

The current 9 strong pipeline (see below) will take matters to the end of 2026, beyond the 30th anniversary of Cloudland Blue Quartet's debut recordings, pushing the total CBQ releases available on Bandcamp to 140.

Meanwhile, retrospective releases by David's groups Creek, Crazy Wisdom and Capital Models have also been being issued by Crispycat Recordings and these are set to continue, with around 50 planned over the next 18 months or so...

In 2025, Crazy Wisdom and Capital Models also released new recordings, with seven new EPs from Crazy Wisdom and their remastered back catalogue, which you can find here; and, from Capital Models, two new studio LPs, a live LP and an update to their all encompassing "Repertoire" virtual box set, all of which, along with original recordings from 1980 and reunion tapes from 2011, can be found here...
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NEWS

LATEST ALBUM FROM CBQ


On 5 June, Cloudland Blue Quartet released "Dark" 43rd in The Soundscapes Series, recorded in August 2025. Deemed "orchestral ambient", elements of this work were first aired at the performances in 2025 of the Live Suite, "Keepsake"...

As always from Crispycat Recordings, this release is entirely Free to Stream or Name Your Price (including zero) to Download (with 5 hours of bonuses!)

A 51 minute Orchestral Ambient album, with added darkness, recorded in August 2025 (released June 2026), presented as a virtual 5CD set, w/ 5 versions of the work

Main LP: "Dark" (50:57) short version of the 2nd mix, with the addition of the final closing piece, incl an excerpt from a Stanley Kubrick interview from 1966

Bonuses for Downloaders:
"Dark" (Extended Version) (79:18) 2nd mix of the LP

"Arcane" ("Dark" Initial Mix) (73:11) 1st mix, incl ambience & Short Wave Radio but no Kubrick

"Kubrick" (75:10) 3rd mix, w/multiple edits of Kubrick to the fore

"Kubrick II" (78:31) 4th mix pushing Kubrick to the background emphasising the music

The 4th mix was considered to be the LP until, after 3 days of listening across all 4 alt mixes, it was decided to return to the 2nd, which excluded the Short Wave Radio, to create more succinct versions of the longer tracks and to exclude the Kubrick interview, apart from one short excerpt, which forms the main content of the final track of the finalised LP 
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NEXT NEW RELEASE

On Friday, 3 July, 2026, Cloudland Blue Quartet will release "Music for Guitar and String Quartet in 18 Movements", the 44th in The Soundscapes Series, recorded in November 2025. It sounds like someone playing a 21st Century guitar (with distortion and looping involved) over some cleaned up but still slightly distressed, found string quartet recordings from the early 20th Century...

But that's not what it is...

It is, though, 57 minutes of music, in six parts (Movements 1-6, 7-9, 10, 11-13, 14-16 and 17 & 18)


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UPCOMING LIVE PERFORMANCES

            

There are no live performances planned at present...

Performances will include solo appearances, as Cloudland Blue Quartet, presenting sets of either songs or soundscapes, and group performances, with the current line up of David's 1980 new wave band, Capital Models 

At present there are no plans for his electronic improvisational quartet, Creek, to play live and nothing in the calendar for Cloudland Blue Quartet, Capital Models or vocal/electronic trio, Crazy Wisdom...
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CURRENT CLOUDLAND BLUE QUARTET RELEASE SCHEDULE

   

Friday, 3 July, 2026Music for Guitar and String Quartet in 18 Movements (44th in The Soundscapes Series) (Recorded November 2025)
Friday, 7 August, 2026: Across the Landscape (45th in The Soundscapes Series) (Recorded October 2025)
Friday, 4 September, 2026: Broken (19th in The Songs Series) (Recorded November 2025)
Friday, 2 October, 2026: Elevation (46th in The Soundscapes Series) (Recorded November 2025)

   

Friday, 6 November, 2026Swan Songs (6th in the GLAM! Covers Series) (Recorded December 2025)
Friday, 5 December, 2026: Disquietmusik X (10th in The Disquietmusik Frippertronics Guitar Series) (to be recorded November 2026)
NEW! Thursday, 24 December 2026: Twentytwentysix: The Originals (a collection of tracks from releases issued throughout 2026) (to be compiled December 2026)
NEW! Thursday, 31 December 2026 : Twentytwentysix (a collection of rarities recorded during 2026, many receiving their first official release) (to be compiled December 2026)

(All artwork, releases and release dates subject to change)
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LATEST PODCAST

Since 2014, David has produced over 750 editions of the "Cloudland Blue Eclectic Selection", his weekly podcast on Mixcloud, reflecting his esoteric taste in music and encouraging listeners to broaden their musical horizons.

Click on the pic below to go to Mixcloud 


Unfortunately, with only the most recent 10 able to be made available, each new podcast replaces the one from 10 weeks before.  

To obtain an MP3 download link for any currently unavailable Cloudland Blue Quartet Eclectic Selection, simply e-mail your request to crispycat@hotmail.com.  

The latest edition was published on 7 June 2026.  Volume 23 features tracks from these recordings...


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NEW COLLABORATIONS

David has commenced work on new collaborational projects with Edward SparkBlue Sun Chasing and Duke Gray of Oddsfiche.  No prospective release dates are yet known

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NEW CRAZY WISDOM

Following the reactivation of Crazy Wisdom in 2024 and the release of several EPs and the back catalogue last year, Crazy Wisdom are planning new music for 2026 and the start of this project is imminent


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CREEK REISSUES

The re-issuing on Bandcamp of Creek's long-deleted back catalogue is set to recommence in the Summer of 2026

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DIARY UPDATES

Note that, in the diary, 150 days, across 6 periods in 4 of the 21 years are, currently, "picture only":-

2016: 15-17 October (3 Days)
2021: 8-21 May (14 Days)
2022: 18 April - 10 May & 6 July - 5 September (85 Days)
2023: 1 - 15 October & 18 October - 19 November (48 Days)

It is always the intention to update "picture only" days with the relevant text but doing so is, of course, subject to opportunity (and, indeed, memory!)

Wednesday, June 10, 2026

The long red piano scenario and how not to buy CDs...

Playlist


Large playlist today as, well, I listened to two old/new podcasts while out and about...


The out and aboutness started at 9:30...

Out and down the hill...




...and on to the bus to that Glasgow...


The weather looked ominous...



...and, as we arrived, the heavens opened...




...distorting views from the bus...



It was set to last for an hour - and I had not packed my umbrella...


Ooofft...


Accordingly, £5 from the possible CD budget was spent on this...


...which protected me on my walk to Love Music...


...where a few things of interest were noted but none purchased - a strange scenario for me indeed...


Back home, later, I failed to find these two...



...and this one was rejected...




Another "failure to find"...



Out and the rain had stopped...

£5 down the pan?



Nope - as I approached the bridge at Central Station, it started to pour again...


Into Missing at Midday...


And more things noted but, once again, nothing partaken of...


The first two of this pile plus the "Undiscovered World" comp were also not found later...


All of these those above not noted as being unable to be found, were indeed all found later on...

Lietava was rejected...









After an hour leafing through hundreds of CDs, I left empty handed...


Grabbed some lunch...


...noted the fire destruction...


...and, with the rain on yet again, made my way for the bus home...



A 26 secured immediately I alighted the Glasgow bus at the foot of the hill...

Another downpour as I descended from the Terminus 10 minutes later - £5 well spent...



Home after 5 hours and 33 minutes away...


Coffee had been prepped by the Exec Producer...


...and we enjoyed the first 3 episodes of Season 4 of "Homeland"...

Then, to the machines to find most of the stuff which had looked "interesting" in the Weedge...


As noted below, 16 items found and a second by one of the bands also downloaded...

You might think that a bit strange but, had I bought the CDs, I would have done exactly the same thing and saved the MP3s to my hard drives and, most likely, only have ever accessed the music from those MP3s - occasionally, if ever, actually playing the CDs, which would be filed away (in the old days, they would have spent a couple of months on the shelf in the living room - no longer an option)...

Such is the way these days...

This evening, post a tasty prawn pasta tea, at 7, Ian Sclater and Marianna Paphiti arrived to spend 2 hours recording piano pieces for three of Ian's songs...


It went well, but there will be much editing involved before the three tracks will be ready...


Ended the day with another two of "Homeland" pre bed around 11:30...

Highlight of the Day: Not buying any CDs, even though it was hard to do...

Today's New Music: