AFTER a single show at Port Elizabeth’s Uptown Theatres last night, singer/songwriter Faryll Purkiss, originally from Umhlanga Rocks but now a resident of The Mother City and a major player on its many stages, moves on to Grahamstown tonight for a show at Slipstream after which he will be heading for East London and a gig at Muso’s tomorrow night.

Purkiss has after many months in the studio, released his latest album Fruitbats and Crows, the follow up to his 2006 self-titled album.

“For the last year I’ve pretty much just been doing the new album so I haven’t been travelling for the last year cause I’ve just been in the studio,” he said. “In June and July I’ll be heading back to Europe, so it’s been quite cool being home for such a long time – but I am looking forward to getting back on the road again.”

Purkiss said Eastern Cape audiences could expect something quite different to the usual acoustic guitar and vocal type singer-songwriter show.

“The music has taken a different direction now. I’m not just standing up there playing a guitar anymore. I’m using a lot of different aspects as far as peddles and stuff go and I’m using a loop station as well so I’m really trying to experiment a lot and do weird things like record samples (which are then looped back and used live in the song) while I’m up there playing and just doing it on the fly ... so every show is different.”

This new direction can be heard strongly on the new album.

“I had just finished a month tour of Australia,” Purkiss explains.

“I had one day off – in Perth – just before I flew back home and was cruising through the city with my ipod on shuffle. I have a lot of songs on my ipod and two bands just kept popping up – a band called The Fruit Bats and a band called Old Crow Medicine Show. I went back to my hotel and just wrote a song about that little mission I’d just had in Perth.”

That song didn’t make it onto the album, but Purkiss loved the imagery of the title and decided to use it to name the album anyway.

Purkiss said he was thrilled to be back in the Eastern Cape. “It’s been two-and-a-half years since I last played in the Eastern Cape. I was touring with an Australian guy called Bob Evans and we passed through PE and East London. That was my first time ever playing in the Eastern Cape and it was really incredible. I didn’t know if anyone would really come to the shows cause I’d never been there before but it was so cool ... and the crowds were amazing they really were warm and very welcoming.”