1 May 2004

You can dance round your maypoles in celebration, because the long awaited (31 years!) fifth album by Help Yourself will be released later this month.

Malcolm is utterly delighted with the packaging, which includes some recoloured pics, a potted history of the album from Phil McMullen, and a note from Malcolm himself.

Once again, kudos to Hux for their sterling efforts.

8 March 2004

Er... Happy New Year.

Perhaps not a huge shock, but the release date for the fifth Helps album has been put back - it's now expected at the end of May. May 2004, that is. Keep an eye on the Hux website for more news.

10 December 2003

It's all been a bit quiet recently... so here are a few snippets.

The major news is that the long awaited Helps fifth album is going to be released by Hux. Release date should be around January/February 2004. Malcolm still has to check the CD masters, and get the artwork finalised, but as revealed here a couple of years back, the original Rick Griffin cover will be used. If you haven't seen it, it's still available in all its glory in the archive. It's yet to be confirmed, but the album will probably be called Five.

Richard's hand is now back to normal (whatever that is) and the Green Ray will be appearing at the Plough in Wood Street, Walthamstow on Friday 12 December.

Malcolm himself is spending a lot of time working with Zeus Jones.

Finally, contrary to what you might have heard elsewhere, Malcolm will not, alas, be appering at the Patti on December 20.

9 July 2003

On Monday July 14, Malcolm will be at the Enterprise, helping out The Green Ray and doing a few of his own songs. In fact, he's just finished a new song... which just might get a premiere. Meanwhile, Richard Treece's hand continues to get better, and Richard Booth continues to stand in.

2 June 2003

Malcolm thoroughly enjoyed his brief appearance at the Enterprise last month, and as Richard Treece continues to nurse a poorly hand, Malc will be back again on Monday June 16. A bit more notice this time!

Regarding the unreleased Helps material, Malcolm has decided some of the vocals need tweaking. More news as it happens.

14 May 2003

Apologies for the short notice about this... but Malcolm will be playing a few accoustic songs live at the Enterprise (address below) on Monday 19 May. Not a full solo date as such, it's partly down to the Green Ray's activities being curtailed, which in turn is due to Richard Treece being under doctor's orders to rest his hand.

Malcolm played at a friend's birthday party recently, and is very much looking forward to playing to a wider audience.

5 April 2003

Still no date for Malcolm's London gig.

However, you can catch the Green Ray, featuring former Helps Richard Treece and Ken Whaley along with Simons Burgin and Haspeck, at the Enterprise at 2 Haverstock Hill at Chalk Farm on the 14^th and 28^th of April. If all goes well, this could become a regular thing. Incidentally, this is pretty much opposite the Roundhouse.

Meanwhile, Malcolm is doing some mixing of the Help Yourself material recorded last year.

26 January 2003

No definite news yet on Malcolm's proposed London gig, but discussions are ongoing to come up with a suitable date.

Malcolm was very pleased with the reviews of Lost and Found which were recently published in Mojo and Classic Rock.

In passing... you may have heard that Northdown Publishing are collaborating with Pete Feenstra on a book about Roger Chapman. Malcolm was delighted to hear this and fondly recalls playing a few gigs with Family back in the seventies.

3 November 2002

A third mp3 snippet from Lost and Found has been added to the archive section, where you will also find information on how to get hold of a copy yourself.

13 October 2002

Another mp3 excerpt from Lost and Found has found its way into the archive.

And in the now section is a smattering of information about the recording of Aliens.

26 September 2002

Plans to unleash Malcolm's unreleased 1976 album, Lost and Found are progressing, and it should be available on Hux in the next few months. As promised last time, you can now download an mp3 excerpt of one of the tracks - it's in the archive area. It's worth noting this is from a non-remastered version, so the commercial release will sound even better.

Davy Charles' other commitments mean he now won't be able to contribute to the Helps' fifth album - plan B is now being considered, which might mean Simon Whaley contributing.

Malcolm has recently bought a new Takomine guitar, and is very happy with it. So much so, it has even got him contemplating performing live again.

20 August 2002

Check out the Now section, where you can download an mp3 of Joined at the Hip, a previously unreleased track from Aliens; this track is being exclusively released throught the website.

The Help Yourself long awaited fifth album now just needs Davy Charles' drums adding.

Malcolm recorded a solo album back in the seventies which never saw the light of day - but there are now plans for it to be released. Over the next few months, the website will be making excerpts available for download as mp3 files.

15 June 2002

Three more additions to the archive this month.

Malcolm, Richard and Ken have completed their recordings for the fifth Help Yourself album; it just remains for Davy Charles to add his contributions. The band hope to include a Richard Treece song, Brave New Girl.

The CD Aliens can now be purchased online from cdbaby - there are also Realaudio samples and further info to be found here.

10 April 2002

Apologies to anyone who has been unable to access the site recently; Wrenchboy has been kicking the appropriate parties, and told them to be more careful in future.

Meanwhile, another six items can be found in the archive.

18 February 2002

As promised, a few more items have been posted in the archive section. More to come.

Also of interest this month is the release of Richard Treece's solo album, Dream Arena East. A collection of instrumental guitar pieces recorded on a fairly primitive four track, it is of a distinctly spacey nature... as a sample, here is a 636K mp3 version of the short opening track, Carnipreamble. If you want to buy the CD, email the omnipotent Michael Heatley for details.

The Helps had their fourth Saturday reunion session recently, and now have three new songs which they would like to add to the existing archive fifth album material. The songs are all in the spirit of the Help Yourself sound and the band are all delighted with the outcome so far. The song titles are The Rock, Romance in a Tin, (a Help Yourself version of a song that was on the '76' unreleased Morley recordings) and a song penned by Ken Whaley and sung by him, titled Alley Cat.

19 January 2002

This site has been relaunched. It has been given a totally new look, with direct input from Malcolm himself. Most of the material which was on the previous site has been enhanced and is still here, and further new material has been added, primarily in the archive section. This section will be regularly updated with further items, many rare or not previously published.

Because of the nature of this material, some of the graphics are larger than usual, so take longer to download. Please be patient!

In the pipeline is a section with lyrics and images from Aliens and also a section about the Studio.

Other news...

Malcolm is currently producing singer Zeus Jones and in the next month is combining with Envoy's Hope Grant to produce a dance track for Jeena Kumari.

Richard Treece plans to have some recordings available this year for general release. Look out for further updates on this.

Any site related issues should be directed to the webmaster.