THIS week’s column celebrates my recent tour of Wales: the music, the football, the beer, the wonderfully diverse venues and the gloriously unique language with its infamous frontal mutations. Surprised there isn’t a Welsh language band called Frontal Mutations to be honest – although Treigladau Blaen would be a bit difficult for a 6 music DJ.
 
Started in Swansea last Wednesday week at Hippos, a lovely grassroots venue and a friendly crowd including my former melodeon player and roadie Lynne Leleu and talented local songwriter Tracey Curtis. The next day I made a visit to the legendary Tangled Parrot record store nearby for a coffee and chat with owner Matt, extolling the virtues of brilliant young Welsh language alt-popsters Tai Haf Heb Drigolyn (Unoccupied Summer Houses) whom I seem to have discovered before virtually anyone else despite living on the Sussex coast. The wonders of the internet.  
 
Then to CWRW, Welsh for beer, the indie venue in Carmarthen, for some very good beer indeed and a fun evening with my uproarious support Tractorbator from Machynlleth, angular noise pop fronted by a demented guitarist dressed as a vicar. CWRW is the home patch of all-female indie sensations Adwaith (Welsh for Reaction) and the following day was Welsh Language Music Day, so they turned up for a BBC-sponsored lunchtime gig launching their third album Solas and it was lovely to meet them – but I couldn’t hang around for the gig because it was time for the long (by Welsh standards) drive to Denbigh in north Wales for that evening’s show at Theatr Twm y’r Nant. 
 
DIY takes many forms. It can be a bunch of punks putting on a gig in a half derelict building — or it can be amazing octogenarians Gaynor and Gwyneth, actress and councillor respectively, organising a return gig for me in their local volunteer-run amateur theatre. They normally only serve wine, so the first thing was a trip to Aldi with Gwyneth to get some beer in for the punks (and swell the theatre coffers) and then what I call a sieve show, which is one at a community venue where loads of people turn up, some already aware of me, some not, but wanting to support their local theatre, and a minority are (politely) discomfited by my performance and leave at half time. The majority, however, were so wonderful that I did my long poem about my mum’s dementia, which doesn’t happen very often, and total respect to the organisers for once more getting out of their comfort zone. 
 
The next day was Saturday and I was playing in Rhayader which gave me the opportunity to take in my first ever Cymru Premier football match en route – perennial champions The New Saints v Penybont in Oswestry, England. 300 fans, a very one sided 4-0 win for the hosts and the best soup I have ever had at a football match. TNS should be nicknamed The Soup Dragons. The show in the evening was lovely, a packed and appreciative audience in The Lost Arc, a lovely community venue in mid-Wales with another support from the formidable Tractorbator. 
 
And then to my final date of the tour at the Cellar in Cardigan, home town of my late friend Dave Datblygu, genius songwriter and inspiration to two generations of the Welsh language low-fi scene: here I am paying my respects at his grave. Will and Simon from Tai Haf Heb Drigolyn came to the gig and it was lovely to meet them for the first time: less than a third of my age, united by a love of language and music. 
 
Next weekend I’m in the West Country – Ashburton, Falmouth, St Austell and Corfe Castle. Hope to see some of you there!

For further info please visit https://www.facebook.com/attilathestockbroker and/or https://attilathestockbroker.bandcamp.com/merch