"My album The Violence is a concept album about the Essex Witch Trials in 1645 during the English Civil Wars. It has 20 songs on it.

One reason it is so long is that I found it very hard to find a song to end the album. At one point it ended with King Charles 1 execution, another time it was all the people of England trampling ‘Desire Lines’ out to the coast.

It took me three attempts to find the resting place of Matthew Hopkins, the self proclaimed Witch Finder General. The ruins of St Mary’s church are clearly marked on the ordinance survey map but on three trips I couldn’t locate it. I wondered whether the smallest ruins even odd bricks were sometimes marked on maps and I would never find them amongst the grass on the heath.

Driving through North Essex one day my wife persuaded me to try one more time. She looked over the wall and there was the forlorn pile of stones that used to be St Mary’s church. Growing out of the stones was a twisted old tree that appeared to be smiling.

It’s worth visiting the geography of the places where you are sitting stories. You never know what detail they might throw up.

I had my last song; Matthew Hopkins lying, dead in the ground, waiting to fly to heaven, his remains feeding a tree that laughs down at him."

Darren Hayman

Darren Hayman And The Long Parliament - The Laughing Tree

Singer-Songwriter Dave Burn is a pioneer of UK alt-country whose music takes elements of Brit folk artists such as Richard Thompson and American singer-songwriters from Tim Rose to Tom Petty, then blends them with the sound of classic London indie bands and UK Americana, topped off with literary, twisting lyrics examining both life’s biggest questions and it’s most fascinating ordinary moments.

Darren Hayman And The Long Parliament - The Laughing Tree

Fortuna POP!