Tim Keegan & The Personals

Tim Keegan comes to the Folklore Rooms in January to play a rare full band set, performing songs from his forthcoming album, Vide Grenier (out later in the year) along with favourites from his solo and Departure Lounge catalogues.

The Personals: Ginny Clee, Jimmy Count, Simon Edwards, Ben Nicholls and Bernd Rest.

Tim is an acclaimed singer and songwriter, probably best known as front man of turn-of-the-century Bella Union and BBC 6 Music darlings, Departure Lounge, who reunited in 2019 for UK shows to celebrate the 20th anniversary of their debut and ended up recording an album of brand new material in four days.

Transmeridian came out on Violette Records in March 2021, 18 years after their previous long player, Too Late To Die Young. The single, Australia, featured special guest Peter Buck from R.E.M. on Rickenbacker 12-string guitar. A brand new DL album is scheduled for release in 2024.

During a career spanning three decades, alongside his own musical projects, Tim has been a regular accompanist of Robyn Hitchcock (appearing on several albums and in Jonathan Demme's Storefront Hitchcock film) and has worked with many others including John Paul Jones of Led Zeppelin, Kid Loco (appearing on three albums including 2019’s The Rare Birds), Josh Rouse, Emilie Simon, Tahiti 80 and The Blue Aeroplanes, while living variously in the UK, Nashville and Paris. Paul Heaton has called him “one of the best songwriters we’ve got”.

Four of Tim’s songs from the 1990s featured in the 2021 film, The Space Between, directed by Rachel Winter and starring Kelsey Grammer. That same year, Tim’s friend and mentor, Pat Fish (aka the Jazz Butcher) died suddenly and Tim subsequently performed at a brace of tribute concerts in London and Northampton, singing Pat’s songs alongside a band made up of his Jazz Butcher bandmates past and present.

The third Tim Keegan solo album Vide Grenier comes out in 2024, following on from The Long Game (2015) and Foreign Domestic (2007).

Tim lives in Worthing, on the south coast of England, where he fronts a long-running live music residency at local seafront hostelry, The Beach House.

"Casebook studies in flawless songwriting" (NME)

“A voice somewhere between Lou Reed and Edwyn Collins - made to sing of love and truth" (les Inrockuptibles)

“The emphasis here is on quality songwriting – think vintage Lloyd Cole or The Go-Betweens in their quieter moments" (Q)

“One of the UK's most exquisite songwriters" (Magic Revue Pop Moderne)