On to the third volume of songs resulting from Darren Hayman’s Thankful Villages project. The ninth village in this volume is Herbrandston, Pembrokeshire.

I took my best friend John Jervis to spend Christmas with me in Herbrandston. John is a tower of strength but the gentlest of men. His present to me was a book about a dog on a train and a cup with ‘Jazz’ written on it. I bought him Planet of the Apes comics.

Herbrandston is on the south westerly tip of Wales and surrounded by refineries’ industry and abandoned forts. There is one pub called the Taberna Inn which is also the local shop and the post office. Peter the landlord loves trains and leaves updated and hand corrected timetables on each table.

I recorded the mass on Christmas Eve and you can here them singing here. We met Colin that night who told the opening story.

Rebecca gave me a book of Welsh Hymns which had ‘All Through the Night’ in it and on which this is based.

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Thankful Villages Vols. 1 & 2 are out now on Rivertones. You can buy physical copies here, or listen on Spotify. Thankful Villages Volume 3 is also now available here.