Put on your dancing shoes and take a deep, deep breath.  Dancing Boots, the debut album from all-guns-blazing Brown Boots Boogie Band is poised to set the nation a-jigging, a-polkering and a-reeling.

Release Date:  3^rd October 2025

Label: Self release

Formats: CD / Digital

A FORTUIOUS MEETING

It was at the 2017 Shrewsbury Folk Festival when fiddler Martin Clarke and melodeonist Will Allen first hooked up.  The pair realized that they shared a good acreage of common ground and decided to pool their musical resources.  They played their first gig together at the Man of Kent pub in Rochester, later that same year.  Brown Boots were up and running.

The duo have released two albums – First Steps (2020) and Striding Out (2023) – both of which feature the duo’s heady brand of fluent, exhilarating, folk-dance-based tunes.  It’s the type of music that attracts the obvious question from satisfied customers left wanting more: “Do you play Ceilidhs, too?”

And that’s where Brown Boots Boogie Band enter the picture.  By augmenting their lineup with Will Chamberlin (keyboards) and Paul Quarry (drums), the Brown Boots Boys were able to answer that particular question with an emphatic “YES!”

THE MELODY IS FRONT AND CENTRE

Believing that a great ceilidh tune has danceability in its DNA, Brown Boots Boogie Band put melody front and centre and build a groove from there.  The result, preserved here for posterity, is a set of reels, jigs, hornpipes, polkas and waltzes which, whether they’re traditional and familiar, or new and fresh, are played with a precision, an energy and a sheer joie-de-vivre that’s guaranteed to set even the most frigid listener’s feet a-tapping.  In full flow, Brown Boots Boogie Band perform with all the presence of Bellowhead, using just a fraction of the firepower!

It’s Childgrove/Jer the Rigger – an old English country dance tune, coupled with an Irish polka – that gets Dancing Boots underway.  Paul’s vibrant, confident, drumbeat sets – and keeps up – the hell-for-leather pace, before Will A’s melodeon takes the lead.  It’s fluent, it’s fun, and, as a bonus, most listeners will know the tunes.

PRECISION

The bright, sparkly Lemmie Brazil No.1/Old Man’s Dance – a couple of hornpipes – are just the job to keep the ceilidh jumping.  Martin’s fiddle leads on the former, to a crisp, roll-filled drumbeat from Paul.  Will A takes the spotlight for the sleazier Old Man’s Dance and, to ensure the sleazy element isn’t missed by anyone, Lily the cat and Will’s Uncle Keith’s dustbin lid both make a guest appearance to round off the tunes.

‘Precision’ is a term that arises repeatedly in relation to the music of Brown Boots Boogie Band, and it’s the term that came to mind as I listened to J.B.Milne/Old Grey Cat, a set of reels that are performed at a breathless pace.  Fiddle and melodeon switch and switch back as the terrain gets rougher on the approach to the frantic climax of Old Grey Cat. 

ALL GUNS BLAZING

So far, Brown Boots Boogie Band have been steadfastly mining the traditions of these islands for their material and inspiration but things take a change for the jig set Onions/The Antiboscis, a pair of tunes written, respectively, by Martin and Will A.  There’s a warm Irish feel to Onions, with Martin fiddling along to a tight drumbeat on a tune that I’d far rather listen to than attempt to fit in any dance steps…  Will takes over for The Antiboscis and, although the join is scarcely noticeable, the rising energy level is invigourating, as the band finish the tune with all guns blazing.

Martin first introduced his waltz tune, The Brown Boot, to Will A whilst the duo were recording their 2020 debut album.  The tune has matured along with the band and it’s now recognized as a bona-fide dancefloor filler, a melodic waltz with piano, fiddle and melodeon all playing important roles, and all kept in order, as always, by Paul’s solid – yet never overplayed – drums.

BRIGHT, BREEZY AND EXHILARATING

And Martin can also claim responsibility for introducing La Danse de Chez Nous, a 32-bar jig, to the band.  It’s another bright and breezy tune, with an interesting stop/start rhythm, courtesy of Will C and Paul. 

But it’s the repertoire of Chinwrde Morris and the playing of Ed Johnson that the band have to thank for Woodland Revels – part one of the set of reels, Woodland Revels/Pat the Budgie.  It’s a dramatic tune and I can’t begin to imagine the energy levels that would be required to keep in step with it – and the ragtime enhancements are just wonderful!  Pat the Budgie was composed by Canadian fiddler Graham Townsend during the early 1960s and the band still don’t know whether the tune’s title is the budgie’s name, or an instruction…  Whatever the titular inspiration, it’s an exciting, exhilarating tune, peppered with lively percussion.

A ‘TIP OF THE HAT’ TO JIMMY SHAND

Paul provides a wonderful military-styled drum intro to The Perfect Cure/Cleveland Park – a pair of jigs – and, what’s more, he keeps up that rhythm throughout the set.  Cleveland Park was written by Ivan Drever of Wolfstone and it is, perhaps, the album’s most dramatic tune, with softer, sinister passages merging into a vibrant, in-your-face climax.

Petronella, the first part of closing couplet, Petronella/La Sansonette, is another tune that will be familiar to many listeners.  It’s included here, partly as a ‘tip of the hat’ to Jimmy Shand, an enduring influence to Martin and Will A.  It’s a happy tune and the contrast with La Sansonette, a gritty schottische, is stark – but it’s a combination that works very well.

AND A RESOLUTION…

Dancing Boots is an excellent album and it’s made me resolve to catch a live performance of Brown Boots Boogie Band whenever I get the opportunity.  And, as if to consolidate that resolution, the band have added a short play-out, a short burst of Ontario fiddler Jack Hayes’ Lemonville Jig, recorded live at a Hampshire ceilidh.  These guys deserve further investigation…

Watch the – unaugmented – Brown Boots duo perform Winster Gallop, one of many traditional dance tunes in their repertoire, below:

Brown Boots online: Official Website / Facebook / Instagram / Bandcamp / Bandcamp (Brown Boots Boogie Band)

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