The official Canucks hockey podcast for the Vancouver Courier.

Straw Bear formed slowly over a number of years, like sedimentary rock or a bad habit.

They took their name from the Whittlesey Straw Bear festival, the first event in the pagan calendar (available at all good newsagents).

Ian and Chris began recording in their native Cambridgeshire, before Tom, Pas and Cate were sucked into their swirling musical eddy.

But just as they had a full complement, the same violent forces of nature that brought them together rent them asunder and each found themselves flung to different parts of south-east England.

This hasn’t stopped them working on their second album. Black Bank is named after the Fenland road in which the album was recorded.

Straw Bear are immensely proud of the 12 songs that make up the record. Produced with the unwavering support of Chris Taylor of The Bays at his Blue Barn Studio, Black Bank is a more complex, nuanced album than their first.

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