And they're off!

Last Saturday was a day of sighs of relief. Said the Maiden's latest EP, Of Maids and Mariners, has been some time in the making. There's been days of studio recording of two of the tracks, a long evening of live recording of the other two tracks at Redbourn Folk Club, a photo shoot, a music video made, all of the engineering of the live tracks by Steve, getting the CD artwork done... It seems to have been ages. But now, it's all come together, and on Saturday we sent off the finished tracks and the artwork to Testa Rossa for the production of the CDs themselves. They should be finished within ten days. The release date is Sunday, 20th January. Later than hoped because of a few technical problems along the way.

Some of the tracks have already been featured on the radio, and there are videos on YouTube - "The Soldier and the Maid", their official music video, and their amazing version of Dolly Parton's "Joleen", performed on the main stage at the opening of the Bristol Folk Festival back in May, after winning the prestigious Isambard Folk Award.

Now we wait, with not a little excitement, for the arrival of boxes and boxes of CDs, and the dispatch of the many pre-orders they've had, and the launch event in January at Empire Records in St Albans.