16th August 2025
This is a strange and special little art project – the sort of thing Bill Drummond excels in and it’s brought out the best (or second-best) in a clump of Northern Irish artists.
Bill Drummond owns The Curfew Tower in Cushendall, Northern Ireland. It’s 200 year old tower, in town and he organises artists in residence to undertake projects of varying lengths. It’s a great idea and Tony Wright has been helped with a whole heap of artistic licence, to create a fascinating project with other musicians. See, there is a model of The Ghost Of Elvis in the tower, which is a puppet, and Tony built up a project around Mr Presley. He invited a clutch of artists to write the “second-best song they’d ever written” and recorded the demos in the ‘dungeon’ of the tower itself (actually the downstairs room). They make up the second half of the album and some, like Duke Special’s offering are a delight in themselves. The songs then had a polished studio recording in Belfast, backed by the soulful sounds of The Goldtips. Arborist, Duke Special, Tanya Mellotte and Miss Paula Flynn. Plus of course Tony Wright (aka VerseChorusVerse) and the aforementioned The Goldtips).
Rather specially, there are 1000 copies of the album pressed and they can only be bought from the butchers on the main street of Cushendall.
The opening theme is a lovely soul tune. The next, ‘40 Hours To Memphis’, a big ballad from VerseChorusVerse. Paula Flynn doesn’t believe Elvis is dead in a swinging wish that the legend was living life large and having fun in Hades. The Gold Tips live on bread and tears while remembering the big lights. Duke Special turns in a lovely wistful song with his distinctively affecting voice and theatrical turn of phrase. The highlight is Tanya Mellotte reminding us of Elvis’ sole visit to Britain and embroidering the tale to what it should have been. Flying back from National Service in Germany, Elvis changed planes at Prestwick and a 16 year old girl (Annie Murphy) was tipped off by her Mum, jumped on her bike and raced over to wave at The King. She went on to marry an Elvis impersonator and that makes the heart smile. Arborist wraps things up with another ode to Elvis in ‘Are You Still The King’, bending into ‘Are You Lonesome Tonight’ at the end.
The whole is a delightful confection with a handful of excellent songs and a true artistic intention fulfilled.