Look out! It’s Duke Special

COLERAINE’S Peter Wilson (aka Duke Special) returned to the studios where he recorded his first EP to make one of his finest albums yet. 2015’s ‘Look Out Machines!’ is in Duke’s words, “almost like a little launching pad.”
‘Look Out Machines!’ saw Duke Special come full circle after more than a decade of spreading his tendrils across multiple genres and musical projects. It was recorded in Echo Zoo studios in the UK seaside town of Eastbourne with producers and old friends Dave Izumi and Phil Wilkinson.
“I recorded my first EP there, and a song on my second EP is called ‘Regarding the Moonlight in Eastbourne’, so since the inception of Duke Special I’ve been in Eastbourne on and off,” he explains.
After several albums of isolation and concentration on a specific subject, ‘Look Out Machines!’ saw Duke Special collaborate with well known and as-yet-unknown songwriters. Boo Hewerdine (The Bible, Eddi Reader) and Iain Archer (Snow Patrol) are just two that contributed to the album.
“I was deliberately throwing the net really wide and writing with as many people as I can, to just throw yourself into this blind date and say ‘OK, we’ve got three hours and we’ve gotta come up with something’. I love the trauma of that.”
Duke Special has experienced an incredibly diverse career from his introduction with ‘Adventures in Gramophone’ to recent musical projects based on the photography of Strand, Stielglitz and Steichen (‘Under the Dark Cloth’). He has written a concept album based on a Paul Auster novel (‘The Silent World of Hector Mann’), collaborated with Clannad and even has the time for a sideline in DJing by establishing his Gramophone Club which he brought to Limerick previously.
Music is Wilson’s vocation. He doesn’t wait for record labels or hit records to vindicate his art. He is an artist who loves “going into different territories and finding things that work for me.”
And with that sense of artistic freedom he has produced a most accessible album in ‘Look Out Machines!’ which has appeared on many end of years’ critical lists.
Duke Special will play Dolan’s on Saturday January 16. He stated that he is interested in exploring old sheet music to discover forgotten gems and is looking forward to meeting his fans on his tour who can advise him on where to get old sheet music in the city.
Support for the show comes from She Makes War (aka multi-instrumentalist Laura Kidd)
Kidd writes and produces her own music and is regularly dubbed ‘the DIY Queen’ for her use of the Internet to engage with her loyal fanbase playing regular online gigs for listeners around the globe.
She has toured extensively on bass and vocals for artists including Tricky, Viv Albertine, Lil’ Chris and Alex Parks.