Something always struck me as off with Andy. I'm a fastidious reader of liner notes and I noticed that Andy's credits all but disappeared over time. Made me wonder exactly what his role was. Couple that with the live shows that we have. Andy is almost never featured on camera and it's almost like they avoid him. I have tried on several viewings to see what he is doing and a lot of times he just seems to be sitting back there doing nothing or tuning an acoustic guitar.
I, frankly, am not surprised by the revelation. Even as a newbie, the situation seemed off to me with Andy.
As for co-writing, I think Greg is acutely aware of what he has with Rikard and NDV. I expect they will step it up even more with David gone.
I wouldn’t say his departure was so much of a shock, as he did seem to take on a much reduced role once the band started bringing in more talent. What surprised me was how acrimonious it apparently got, and for some time before he left, starting with tension between him and Greg about going to Real World to record Stone & Steel. He thought it was too much of a financial extravagance. Then the King’s Place show, Greg felt like Andy left him to do all the work making arrangements for the show (they were basically the only two partners in the org at that point).
Andy’s role even back before Longdon seemed to be more about production and engineering their recordings, which were largely home made with Aubrey doing the vocals and mixes at his studios. He stopped contributing bass on The Difference Machine, and after that it seems like he would just get the odd parts on record. But he did a lot of the production legwork, coordinating everyone’s remote recordings, curating parts, and putting together the songs with Rob Aubrey. For a long time it was really just him and Greg running things before Longdon came along.
Live, he was essentially just rounding out all of the extra little keyboard and guitar parts that Danny and Rikard's couldn’t cover themselves. But he wasn’t really a “player” and since BBT was not a touring venture for many years, I don’t think he was ever really comfortable with taking the band beyond a studio project. I think that was kind of the main wedge between him and Greg. After the Stone & Steel experiment, everyone was excited about the prospect of being able to perform live, but on the way home afterward Andy basically told Greg he thought playing live wasn’t a good idea, and that really chafed Greg.
It does sound like with some time past, they have mended things a bit, but I don’t think they were on very good terms at all when he left or for some time afterward.
Topic: Big Big Train v. "The Likes Of Us" OUT NOW; European Tour Sept/Oct 2024! (Read 111277 times)