As an original member of Canadian band Barenaked Ladies, keyboardist Andy Creeggan amicably left the world of the Ladies behind after their second record. The musician went on to further his education and eventually returned to making music, embarking on a colourful solo career that has to date produced three records on his own in addition to a handful of records with his brother Jim under the name The Brothers Creeggan. Creeggan’s most recent solo effort, Andiwork III, was released this past October and sees him dabble with “lots of beats, loops, jazzy bits and organ fantasia.”
Andy Creeggan will be performing at Café Aberdeen tonight with Montreal musician Mike Evin. Show time is set for 8 p.m.
If he chose to, Creeggan could now actually boast being a Metro Moncton resident, having relocated to the Hub City from Sherbrooke, Quebec this past August.
Of course he does no such thing, but not because he is ashamed of being a resident of our fine city, he simply seems too humble to boast about anything.
He does admit to longing for the bigger city music life from time to time, saying that living in Toronto, Montreal and Sherbrooke was a treat.
“Sherbrooke is the same size as Moncton but its proximity to Montreal meant that you got lots of fun stuff from there too,” Creeggan says. “All that being said though, I am a bit of a hermit, being a papa of young ones, so it really doesn’t make that much of a difference to me. I am excited to see what Moncton has to offer in both the French and English music scenes.”
Recorded in his former home studio in Sherbrooke from 2008 until last year, Andiwork III marks Creeggan’s first record in more than six years.
He attributes the lengthy delay between records to some usual culprits that other musicians face: children, teaching and sports; specifically, ultimate frisbee.
“Sports is an obsession of mine and ultimate frisbee ate up a good deal of my time from 2004 to 2010,” he says.
Thankfully, ultimate frisbee didn’t consume all aspects of Creeggan’s life over the past six years. During that time, he managed to squeeze in a number of musical projects, having composed pieces for the CBC Orchestra while also having done some arrangement work for his former band.
The future looks equally bright for Creeggan with more Barenaked Ladies orchestration on the horizon in addition to composing a piece for percussion and clarinet.
Andy is also looking forward to an upcoming project with Mike Evin that will see the duo perform accompanied by a string quartet.
Though no firm plans are in place, he expects that he and his brother Jim will eventually get around to making another Brothers Creeggan record.
He just expects that their aspirations of making a new record may have to wait until their respective kids are a little more grown up.
“I think that Jim and I will eventually get to making another record for sure.”
Article published in January 21, 2011 edition of the Times & Transcript