A dark version of Waltzing Matilda from the experimental album, Tree Of Keys. Soundscapes, sound poems, tone poems, ekphrastic music; however you want to describe the music on the album, it is, of all things, creative, imaginative, eclectic.

Many of the works on Tree of Keys were created to a theme for ArtsLab, an arts radio programme for RedShift Radio, which was produced and presented by Mark. Throughout 2017, each episode consisted wholly of new material which was created and sent into the programme each week by a small band of dedicated artists and listeners. This format demanded forty minutes or so of new work each week, and became a spark for creativity that exploded into all sorts of interesting directions.

Tree Of Keys

The Darker Matilda

A track from Burn Of God. Over two years in development, Burn Of God is a progressive concept album on the theme of religion, a depiction of a night of anxiety, an examining of the eternal questions of meaning and existence. This album continued the evolution of my music work from instrumental to vocal orientated, progressive music.

The project began as a series of solo piano works which aimed to depict a specific mood of darkness and emptiness, something like an Erik Satie nocturne. The music grew into a story with links to Ingmar Bergman's film Through a Glass Darkly. It was then that I knew I wanted to make a snapshot of religious belief as a unit, to explore the theme in a complete way.

Recorded and released in March 2020, parts of the album were re-recorded in 2022 for a new CD re-master edition.

Burn Of God

Confession

Great Grandfather's Song from the concept album Burn Of God.

The project began as a series of solo piano works which aimed to depict a specific mood of darkness and emptiness, something like an Erik Satie nocturne. The music grew into a story with links to Ingmar Bergman's film Through a Glass Darkly. It was then that Mark knew he wanted to make a snapshot of religious belief as a unit, to explore the theme in a complete way.
The project began as a series of solo piano works which aimed to depict a specific mood of darkness and emptiness, something like an Erik Satie nocturne. The music grew into a story with links to Ingmar Bergman's film Through a Glass Darkly. It was then that Mark knew he wanted to make a snapshot of religious belief as a unit, to explore the theme in a complete way.

Great Grandfather's Song

An energy-packed song from the album The Dusty Mirror.

The Dusty Mirror is an album of songs suffused with a surrealistic imagination. The album is approximately in three parts. The energy of the first two tracks breaks into a hint of something different with The Escape Angels, which, like The Fingers of Evil was written as a visual-stream of consciousness, a journey of image to image to image, with an instantaneous linkage between the image, emotion, and sound which relates these tracks to my instrumental albums. Despite being a collection of separate songs, the album is treated as a whole, a unity, not a collection of single tracks.

Fear of the Thing Itself, a track about the artist Richard Dadd, is related by murder to Norman Bates, and the four tracks of this section were written in 2011, 2011, 2014, and 2009 respectively.

The Dusty Mirror

Since You Kicked Me Out

A track from The Dusty Mirror, an album of songs suffused with a surrealistic imagination.

Except For The Hatred

Nick Drake is a track from the Mark Sheeky album The Myth Of Sisyphus. Fostered in the extraordinary year of struggle that was 2020, the album began as an idea about working on something with care and attention in obscurity. Though not as bleak as Camus' philosophy, or directly inspired by it, there is a nod to the work, a comment on the affirmation of life vs. death, too. The tracks are unified musically and thematically, telling a story in images. We move between a windswept hilltop and bleak interiors as we roll our rock along the eternal journey.

The Myth Of Sisyphus

Nick Drake

A track from the album Nightfood, an album of two halves which continues to explore structures and unity in contemporary music. The first four tracks, The Nightfood Sonata, is a surrealist rock tale of broken love. There are elements of progressive rock; with guitar, piano, synthesizer, and other effects to create something different.

Nightfood

The Dream Of Wasps

A track from the second half of the album, Nightfood. The Neon Sonata consists of three up-beat electro-pop tunes, ending with a dance-trance composition from the 1990s: the theme to the Amiga game Burnout.

Plastic Superman

A track from Secret Electric Sorcery, an album which contains a mix of new-wave electronic with rock guitars, piano and vocals.

Secret Electric Sorcery

Out Of Date

A track from the album Remembrance Service For Those Who Died Homeless Postponed.

Remembrance Service

We Liked Him He Had Something To Say

Happy duet sung by the Shaw Sisters - Maggie and Rachael - about travelling in Europe and beyond.
Composed by Maggie Shaw and recorded at the Arena Studio, Crewe in 2019 as a Eurovision competition entry but barred from submission by the change of BBC rules in October 2019 preventing members of the public from sending in entries.

Lets Drive - The Shaw Sisters

Maggie Shaw

Related tracks