Fence Records may have passed your conscious due to the consistently pleasing output from James Yorkston over the last number of years (well worth checking out if you haven’t). Anyhow, I’ve been lucky enough over the last few years to come across various of the Fence family over the last few years, often at festivals under the guise of The Fence Collective.

The guys behind Fence are Kenny Anderson and Johnny Lynch, aka King Creosote and Pictish Trail. KC has been more prolific, and more commercially successful over the last number of years, whilst the engaging Pictish Trail has released a number of singles, but only two albums, the most recent of which is an oddity, consisting of 50 songs, each of which is 30 seconds long. Leaving this aside, the 2008 ‘Secret Soundz vol. I’ is a little gem of an album, and would risk falling into the ‘Lost music’ series, sadly. I think it’s lovely, and that he has a beautifully delicate style, which deserves more attention.

This is a live version of a song from ‘Secret Soundz’, which has a surprisingly lush and full sound on the record:

Pictish Trail plays in support of Lone Pigeon, the stage name of Gordon Anderson, ex- of The Beta Band and The Aliens, in Bush Hall on April 20th, and is supporting KT Tunstall on tour at the moment.

I’d also encourage you to have a look at the Fence website, I really like what they do as a label, and am always pleased to support them where possible. I like the look of their festival too…

http://www.fencerecords.com/