Scarlet's Well were a British pop band formed in 1998 by Bid of

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, after the latter band amicably split for the second time. They originally started as a studio project, the first four albums featuring a total of ten lead vocalists, including Bid (the only male voice), Zarif and Alice Healey, the latter being the only member other than Bid who has appeared on all albums. A live band was formed at the beginning of 2004, with the help of Dickon Edwards, who appeared as lead guitarist at the first gig. Since then, they have been through various line-up changes with the last listed below. Using a wide range of instruments on the albums ("rock", folk and orchestral), the music has been variously described as "gypsy folk to English psychedelic rock", "hybrid English pop and Baroque music", "a rich, lush and densely layered confection", and "sprightly guitar pop". Conceptually "an ongoing and open-ended musical", set partly in a fictitious village in

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called Mousseron ("a sickly village situated somewhere east of the Azores, and only slightly north of the Styx", many of the songs are "richly-textured, well-spun yarns driven by a cast of colourful eccentrics", yet "the songs still function as pop in the sweetest sense". Though most of the material was written by Bid, collaborators have included

Alex Kapranos Alexander Paul Kapranos (born 20 March 1972) is a Scottish musician. He is the lead singer and lead guitarist of Scottish rock band Franz Ferdinand. He has also been a part of the supergroups FFS and BNQT. Early life Alexander Paul Kapranos ...

("The Spell" on the "Strange Letters" album) and

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("Maybe", though this song only appeared on his "Worried Noodles" album); past and present members of the band have also contributed, with some lyrics made of poems by

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, and

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. A few of the songs are supposed to have been material never completed by

("Miss Twinkle's Been on Holiday Again", "Why Do Spirits Haunt Ruby Auburn?", "My Little Doll", "Piepentube"), and "Walking with the Beast" (from "Dante's Casino") was re-recorded for "The Dream Spider of the Laughing Horse". All the studio albums have been released by the Spanish label Siesta Records, in the digipak format with a 16-page colour booklet, "lavishly illustrated" with "exquisite artwork which fits in perfectly with the gothic fantasy"Subba Cultcha - Black Tulip Wings review
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Album discography

*''Strange Letters'' (1999) *''The Isle of the Blue Flowers'' (2000) *''Alice in the Underworld'' (2002) *''The Dream Spider of the Laughing Horse'' (2004) *''Unreal'' (live and studio, with musicians from other bands) (2006) *''Black Tulip Wings'' (2006) *''Gatekeeper'' (2008) *''Unreal II'' (live and studio, with musicians from other bands, Red Velvet Records) (2010) *''Society of Figurines'' (2010)

Members

*Bid – guitar/vocals (

) *Alice Healey – vocals *Jennifer Denitto – drums/vocals ( Linus, The Low Edges) *

Peter Momtchiloff Peter Momtchiloff (born 10 March 1962) is a British guitarist and bassist. He was educated at Winchester College and Worcester College, Oxford. His musical career began in 1978 playing bass guitar in Winchester band The Big Figure. At Oxford ...

– guitar (

Talulah Gosh Talulah Gosh were an English guitar-pop group from Oxford, and one of the leading bands of the indiepop movement, taking their name from the headline of an NME interview with Clare Grogan. They supposedly formed in 1986 when Amelia Fletcher ...

, Heavenly, Would-be-goods) * Helena Johansson – violin/mandolin *Deb Van Der Geugten – bass (Linus) *Sian Chaffer – keyboards/vocals Previous members included Martin White (The Mystery Fax Machine Orchestra, solo music & comedy), Dickon Edwards (

Orlando Orlando commonly refers to: * Orlando, Florida, a city in the United States Orlando may also refer to: People * Orlando (given name), a masculine name, includes a list of people with the name * Orlando (surname), includes a list of people wit ...

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and Fosca), Kate Dornan ( Fosca and The Mystery Fax Machine Orchestra), Toby Robinson and Zarif.

References

External links

* http://www.scarletswell.co.uk – the band's official website * http://www.myspace.com/scarletswell – the band's page on MySpace * http://www.siesta.es/ – Siesta Records, the band's record label {{DEFAULTSORT:Scarlets Well British pop music groups Musical groups established in 1998