Band biography
In 2009 Calum MacCrimmon put his pipes to one side and began recording a debut album of original music crossing funk with folk. This project was later to be titled Man’s Ruin. The album was released on Box of Chocolates Records early in 2010 and was met with great positivity from fellow musicians and music lovers on the folk scene. The first Man’s Ruin gig was held in Nice n’ Sleazy (Glasgow) on 24th November of the same year showcasing a much more song-based Man’s Ruin. The band have now delivered 6 funkalicious performances including a live session on BBC Radio Scotland’s roots music show, Global Gathering and most recently a performance at Celtic Connections 2011 double-billing with the internationally renowned Jah Wobble and the Nippon Dub Ensemble.
Man’s Ruin comprise 5 of Scotland’s leading cross-genre folk contemporaries; Hamish Napier, Innes Watson, James Lindsay, Scott Donald and Calum MacCrimmon.
James “Bonnie Laddie” Lindsay
21 year old Bass Player James Lindsay comes from Inverurie in the heart of Aberdeenshire. He began playing music in secondary school and quickly got involved with the local music scene as a Bass guitarist and Double Bassist and at the same time gaining an interest in composing and arranging. In 2007 James went onto further study at Strathclyde University in Glasgow to undertake their BA Applied Music Degree. The move provided him the opportunity to get involved with the burgeoning folk, funk and jazz scenes in the city while at the same time studying classical technique at university.
Since then James has built up an impressive roster of achievements as a bass player and arranger including trips to Canada, Europe and all over the UK. As well as this he has become known as a versatile session bass player, equally at home with Folk, Jazz, Rock, Funk and Classical styles. When not playing with Man’s Ruin, James likes to keep himself busy regularly playing with other musical acts including Breabach, Hamish Napier Quintet, Daniel Thorpe Trio, The Shetland Bus and Skalder. He also works as part of the Live Music Now Organisation with the Bill Flemming Jazz Quartet.
Innes Watson
Innes Watson is one of the steadiest ascending artists on the Scottish Music scene today. Projects include Treacherous Orchestra, Rule of Three, Glasgow Guitar Colloquium, Hamish Napier Quintet, Borders Tunesmiths and he’s a past member of the Folk fusion reckoner Croft No. Five. As well as taking a lead position in these projects Innes is one of the most frequently utilised accompanists in Scotland. He has recently worked with the BBC Scotland Young Traditional Musician of the Year finalists, the TMSA Young Trad. Tour, Daniel Thorpe, Maeve MacKinnon, Fiona MacCaskail and Gillian Frame and many many more. This is how his role as Calum MacCrimmon’s wingman came to be, appearing on his solo album and featuring on many other artistes albums over the past 7 years. “The Watsonator” is soon to realise his own debut solo album and will no doubt feature on many more albums to come. An unstoppable force, a legend in the making, it’s a bird, it’s a plane, it’s…Innes Watson.
Innes brings an edgy craziness and a factory warehouse of ideas and technical ability to Man’s Ruin, the greatest band in the world!
Calum MacCrimmon
Calum’s piping career began in Edmonton, Canada at the age of 9. The legacy of his ancestors took stride long before this in Scotland about 500 years ago as duty-bound pipers to the MacLeods of Dunvegan on the Isle of Skye. The pressure and responsibility of such lineage has apparently done nothing to discourage Calum from a musical path.
Following the first 9 years of Calum’s life in Western Canada, he and his family moved to the East coast of Scotland, briefly living with his granny until a house came up on the market just down the road. Calums mother “thought it best to be close to gran if she needed anything done”. After a short spell of ‘settling in’, Calum enlisted with the City of Dundee Novice Juvenile Pipe Band and began individual lessons with Iain Duncan. There was a lot of teacher-swapping and tune-learning done in the 90’s but to cut a long story short, In 2004 Calum graduated with hounours from the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama.
Breabach are a big part of Calum’s performing career. Here is a short description of the band:
Nominated in the Scots Trad Music Awards for ‘Best Up and Coming Artist’ in 2006 and ‘Best Folk Band’ in 2007 and 2008 and 2010, Breabach’s huge sound is dominated by the twin Bagpipes of Calum MacCrimmon and Donal Brown. This uncompromising force is complemented by the extraordinary fiddle playing of Patsy Reid and is further supported by the charismatic yet propulsive guitar playing of Ewan Robertson, named BBC Young Traditional Musician of the Year 2008. More info on the band can be found at www.breabach.com
Calum released his debut solo album of cross-genre celtic funk music in early 2010 entitled ‘Man’s Ruin’, and is now regularly writing/performing with this band as well as Breabach.
Calum composed music for two separate commissions for large ensembles in 2010. ‘Perception’ was written for The Gordon Duncan Experience and aired in late September. ‘Times Change’ is a musical portrayal of time passing and how we respond within those parameters. This piece was performed in November by the internationally renowned Mr McFalls Chamber as part of the Distil Showcase 2010.
Current Bands and Projects: Man’s Ruin, Breabach, The Unusual Suspects, Seudan, RTK9000 and the Knobsquad, Saxon Pop
Albums Calum has performed on: Man’s Ruin (Calum MacCrimmon), The Big Spree (Breabach), The Desperate Battle of the Birds (Breabach), Big Like This (The Unusual Suspects), Super String Theory (Mike Vass), Seudan
Hamish Napier
From Strathspey, Hamish Napier comes from a family steeped in Scottish traditional music. As part of multi award-winning folk band, Back of the Moon, he toured in the US, Canada and throughout Europe. An accomplished singer, whistler, flautist, pianist and composer, Hamish is currently studying jazz in Glasgow. At 28, he has recorded on over a dozen albums, with leading musicians such as Donald Shaw, Martyn Bennett, Duncan Chisholm and Eddi Reader, and has collaborated with many of the UK’s finest folk musicians on national TV & radio.
Scott Donald
?From an early age, Scott Donald has had a passion for both drums and music technology. At age 13 he had his first drum kit and shortly afterwards his trusty Commodore Amiga with sample tracker software ProTracker and Octamed. From then he has always been a pendulum swinging between drum practise and learning computer software. Always playing what he could program and vice versa.
In the early years like many young drummers he played rock and metal, until the days of early 90s Rave, Drum and Bass, and breakbeat, of which he became hooked on playing and programming the modern dance music styles.
He studied at Perth College in the late 90s and played in various bands, including Chapanga, an 11 piece international line up playing acid jazz and jungle. Even then his drum performances were accompanied by extras and fills programmed into his Alesis SR16 drum machine. Shortly after the college years he helped with drum programming on the Capercaillie remix EP Dusk till Dawn, aged 18.
Within the next 5 years, after working in music technology sales, he moved to Guildford to study at ACM, receiving valuable input in his drumkit studies from Mike Sturgis, Pete Riley and Bill Bruford (who he drum-tech’d for with Bill’s Jazz band ‘Earthworks’) Through learning about Bill’s passion for electronic and acoustic hybrid drumkits and programming, he had a clear idea of what the future held for him.
Upon moving back to Scotland in 2003, Scott has taught drums and music technology in Dundee College, Perth College and University of Abertay Dundee as well as with many private students.
He learned the ropes using Steinberg Cubase VST and has been using Cubase up till present day, as well as Reason and more recently Protools.
However with the discovery of Ableton Live, this has completely transformed his outlook on the live performance of drumkit, creating a fusion of live drumkit playing, samples, and live music production while drumming, and the concept of LoopJamming. (where a number of musicians can sample loops of themselves while performing and manipulate the loop playback live through effect chains.) Integrating live dance music production elements as a fusible style.
He is playing in a number of bands both electronic and live setup. 2009 saw the release of the Architeq album ‘Gold and Green’ (Tirk Records) where Scott performed drums for many of the EPs released from the album. As well as Tirks’ Architeq, Scott has been recording the drum tracks for Tirks new signing ‘Molly Wagger’. Other original bands include Scottish Funk Folk Fusion band Man’s Ruin who have appeared on Radio Scotland live and recently played Celtic Connections festival in 2010-2011.
In his home town of Dundee he is a drummer with several very successful function bands including Funkin Idiots (live jazz funk) and Miami Vince (tribute to Yacht Rock)
In 2008 Scott was in Brazil for one month under the wing of Ronnie Goodman who was doing a sabatical. While there, he was fortunate enough to receive lessons in samba and percussion with Mestres Memeu and Gilmario of Olodum (Brazil’s main Samba band who have played with Paul Simon and Michael Jackson). As well as several percussion lessons from Joel Souza Santos, one of the percussionist from the world famous bale folclorico da bahia.
