This week’s Friday song, the first in the series, is a song we penned three or four days ago straight after receiving a private email from a Twitter follower of The Portraits on https://twitter.com/the_portraits Normally, we will be tagging the people who’ve inspired the songs, but in this first instance the person who emailed us told us they’d rather remain unidentified as the subject matter refers to a difficult period in their recent life. “Final Act” is about a difficult breakup of a relationship in which past events, “ghosts” as described in the email we received, overshadow the present, and in which inhibition prevents the repair of the situation. Strength doesn’t always been being able to deal with everything by oneself – sometimes it is the strongest people that know they must ask for support from others.

"Daybreak" is inspired by someone who wrote to us with his perceptions of Facebook and how people you haven't seen for decades suddenly ask to be your friend, even if you rarely spoke to them during schooldays. Often people try to make their lives sound as interesting as possible, and take carefully angled shots to hide their blemishes. It is a strange game, but we all reach a stage where we play it! When we, Jeremy and Lorraine, wrote this song we included an age-reference in our own existence: that of leading a mad teenage life with our music when some think we should behave more sensibly and settle down. Pah...

The third in The Portraits’ weekly “Friday Song” series has just been released on their Facebook www.facebook.com/theportraitsmusic A brand new song every single week based on ideas and inspiration sent in by you! "Glastonbury Song" was written on Wednesday afternoon this week and was inspired by Ian Chambers of the amazing UK Sounds radio http://uksounds.com/ - Ian has always been a great support to The Portraits, and he wrote us an email to suggest we capture in song what he called the “Glasto panic” – the madness leading up to our appearance at Glastonbury Festival in 2011. In fact, it’s the tale of the whole experience from finding out we were playing, and screaming out the window (!) and then rapidly amassing a new group, to pushing the van through the mud to get there, and feeling really at home once there. It is not the same lovely “Glastonbury Song” by the Waterboys which just happens to be one of Jeremy’s favourite songs ever. But it follows something of a similar theme – feeling your heart has found its home in such beautiful surroundings. We hope you enjoy the song, and we look forward to receiving your input towards the next song in the series. The songs are inspired by ideas, pictures, suggestions sent to us by you. They can be originals for which you send us stories, bits of poetry -- anything from your own lives, or covers you would like to hear us do in Portraits-style. We will tag you in the videos and publicity if you've been the inspiration for the current week's song! Meanwhile, “Glastonbury Song” along with last week’s Friday Song "Daybreak" and the previous week's song "Final Act", the very first in the Friday Song series, can be downloaded right now from our main site http://www.theportraitsmusic.com/ - click on Friday Song towards the top of the page. The song can be downloaded for free, or you have the option of choosing a price -- and all proceeds from sales of the Friday Songs will go to The Burma Campaign (http://www.burmacampaign.org.uk/) who campaign for human rights and democracy in Burma, a cause close to our hearts. JEREMY MILLINGTON THE PORTRAITS http://www.theportraitsmusic.com/ — with Jeremy Millington and Lorraine Reilly Millington.

The fourth in The Portraits’ weekly “Friday Song” series has just been released on their Facebook www.facebook.com/theportraitsmusic A brand new song every single week based on ideas and inspiration sent in by you! With the Portraits’ commitment to release a new song each and every week during 2012, there were bound to be unexpected hitches – and this week was witness to the first such stumbling block. Lorraine, one half of the song writing team at the heart of the Portraits who are spearheading the Friday Song project, has been down all week with the worst flu she’s had in years. So this week’s song, “Song For A New Soul” marks the launching of Jeremy’s solo career, with Jeremy having multitracked himself performing three vocal lines, piano and guitar. And whilst doing so, he wishes Lorraine a big “Get Well Soon”. The new track was written on Thursday after the planned song which would have featured Lorraine’s vocals was quickly diverted to next Friday’s edition – but next week’s song will be all the more special for the wait! Jeremy asks for forgiveness for a moment of musical sentimentality. “Song For A New Soul” is a tribute to his little boy Euan, now nearly 3 years old – a much delayed homage after the large number of songs he wrote in dedication to his first born Ciara (5), notably “Precious Red” from The Portraits’ Timescape album in 2008. We hope you enjoy the song, and we look forward to receiving your input towards the next songs in the series. The songs are inspired by ideas, pictures, suggestions sent to us by you. They can be originals for which you send us stories, bits of poetry -- anything from your own lives, or covers you would like to hear us do in Portraits-style. We will tag you in the videos and publicity if you've been the inspiration for the current week's song! Meanwhile, “Song For A New Soul” along with last week’s “Glastonbury Song”, and not to forget "Daybreak" and "Final Act" from the first two Fridays of 2012, can be downloaded right now from our main site http://www.theportraitsmusic.com/ - click on Friday Song towards the top of the page. The songs can be downloaded for free, or you have the option of choosing a price -- and all proceeds from sales of the Friday Songs will go to The Burma Campaign (http://www.burmacampaign.org.uk/) who campaign for human rights and democracy in Burma, a cause close to our hearts. JEREMY MILLINGTON THE PORTRAITS http://www.theportraitsmusic.com/ — with Jeremy Millington

Andy Ropek was a legendary London music promoter who truly cared for musicians, was passionate about sound, and who gave a stage to those who wouldn’t otherwise have a chance to be heard. Andy died very suddenly of cancer just before Christmas 2011. On Saturday, 4th February 2012, The Portraits will join a host of other talented acts, including renowned singer songwriter Benny Gallagher (of 1970s Gallagher and Lyle fame) to play a tribute concert to Andy at The Blackheath Halls in SE London. It seemed totally fitting therefore that Song 5 in The Portraits’ weekly Friday Song series should be a tribute to Andy and to the massive help his and Phil Dearing’s joint Icarus Club venture has given to hundreds of musicians since its 2004 inception. This is a light-hearted, affectionate tribute to a great guy, a jolly singalong tune, at once the story of trying to get the attention of major labels and failing because you’re always a little “too young, too old, too hard, too soft, too breakaway, too done before” – as per the lyrics – and a description of just how incredible it is to find a musical home in the shape of a listening audience as provided without fail by the Icarus Club, which incidentally will live on – it is being relaunched on 8th February in Greenwich, London: http://www.facebook.com/theportraitsmusic#!/events/176259892480890/ For the first time, Lorraine and Jeremy are joined by their other band members on a Friday Song, which they’re over the moon about. Vincent Imbert is on violin and French hand-claps (totally distinct from non-French ones) and Shemi Jones, normally the player of a cello and an Irish bodhran drum, turns his hand to a little guitar – and does rather a powerful job of it, I expect you’ll agree. Uniquely, this week’s song will be sold not to raise funds for the Burma Campaign as per the other songs in the series, but for Greenwich and Bexley Hospice which cared for Andy at the end of his life. And double uniquely, a CD single version will be available exclusively at the Concert For Andy on 4th February 2012. The disk will be an enhanced CD containing the audio version plus the song’s video in MPEG2 quality and much additional material. This is the fifth in The Portraits’ weekly “Friday Song” series, released first on their Facebook www.facebook.com/theportraitsmusic A brand new song every single week based on ideas and inspiration sent in by you! We hope you enjoy the song, and we look forward to receiving your input towards the next songs in the series. The songs are inspired by ideas, pictures, suggestions sent to us by you. They can be originals for which you send us stories, bits of poetry -- anything from your own lives, or covers you would like to hear us do in Portraits-style. We will tag you in the videos and publicity if you've been the inspiration for the current week's song! So “Trilby Song”, last week’s song “Song For A New Soul” and the first three in the series, “Glastonbury Song”, "Daybreak" and "Final Act" can be downloaded right now from our main site http://www.theportraitsmusic.com/ - click on Friday Song towards the top of the page. The songs can be downloaded for free, or you have the option of choosing a price -- and all proceeds from sales of the Friday Songs will go to The Burma Campaign (http://www.burmacampaign.org.uk/) who campaign for human rights and democracy in Burma, a cause close to our hearts. JEREMY MILLINGTON THE PORTRAITS http://www.theportraitsmusic.com/ — with Jeremy Millington

Released two hours later than planned due to technical hitches in Cape Town, South Africa, from where we're lucky enough to be uploading, here is song number 6 in our Friday Song series. Inspired by The Portraits' twitter friend ChalumeauMusic who sent through a photograph of the Northern Lights taken by Bjørn Jørgensen at www.arcticphoto.no and asked us to interpret it in our music! Hope you feel we've done it some justice, CM! And massive thanks to Bjørn for kindly agreeing to let us use his images!

This is song 7 in our totally manic Friday Song series, in which we release a brand new song each and every Friday evening throughout 2012 that we've written during the week in question, inspired by ideas sent in by you, the public. The latest in the series, Golden Square, was inspired by an idea sent in by a fellow resident of our adopted home city of London, who asked to remain nameless. The person in question told of their dreams to escape the madness of London to somewhere beautiful, after a break-up caused largely by the hectic pace of the city. We adore London, actually, but agree it is cool to be elsewhere at times, and we feel slightly fraudulent singing such a song from somewhere that is indeed beautiful - Cape Town - where we are currently writing, recording, tweaking our album, gaining inspiration, and when there is a spare 5 minutes, resting.

Inspired by a suggestion for a song made by a member of the audience at The Portraits duo concert in Cape Town last week, Cape Blues, the 8th in the band’s ambitious “write, record and release a brand new song each week in 2012” project, is a snapshot of the beautiful city of Cape Town where songwriters Lorraine and Jeremy still are at the current time of writing. There is a revived debate going on in South Africa about who owns the rights to this stunning country, and there are many sides to the argument, some of which draw into question perceived and accepted notions of natives vs. colonials. This week’s song places the final decision in the hands of the incredible scenery that makes up the Cape – it after all has been here longer than all of us, and as the lyrics state “blood and tears, a thousand years, still no man can decide”. CAPE TOWN 24th February 2012

The ninth in The Portraits’ weekly “Friday Song” series has just been released on their Facebook www.facebook.com/theportraitsmusic A brand new song every single week based on ideas and inspiration sent in by you! Safely back in London after their Cape Town trip, Lorraine and Jeremy have created a live recording and then overdubbed extra vocals for their 9th Friday Song, Cover Our Eyes. The song is inspired by the divide in levels of poverty that still exist in South Africa, and in many other parts of the continent, as reflected by Jeremy in lyrics written while watching the flight plan interactive maps on South African Airways’ in flight entertainment system. While enclosed in a tin tube crossing above West Africa, Jeremy compares the daily trials we westerners feel we go through with the true hardship 30,000 feet below, and reminds us that so many of us close our eyes to the poverty that our lifestyles and relative wealth actually perpetuate in other dark corners of the world. We hope you enjoy the song, and we look forward to receiving your input towards the next song in the series. The songs are inspired by ideas, pictures, suggestions sent to us by you. They can be originals for which you send us stories, bits of poetry -- anything from your own lives, or covers you would like to hear us do in Portraits-style. We will tag you in the videos and publicity if you've been the inspiration for the current week's song! Meanwhile, this song, along with all the previous songs, can be downloaded right now from our main site http://www.theportraitsmusic.com/ - click on Friday Song towards the top of the page. The song can be downloaded for free, or you have the option of choosing a price -- and all proceeds from sales of the Friday Songs will go to The Burma Campaign (http://www.burmacampaign.org.uk/) who campaign for human rights and democracy in Burma, a cause close to our hearts. JEREMY MILLINGTON THE PORTRAITS http://www.theportraitsmusic.com/ — with Jeremy Millington and Lorraine Reilly Millington.

The first entirely instrumental track in The Portraits' Friday Song series, Sandor is a tribute to Sándor Fehér, the violinist who died on board the Costa Concordia earlier this year whilst protecting his beloved violin. Having put the welfare of distressed children before his own safety, Sándor returned to his cabin to place his instrument in a protected place and was last seen heading for a lifeboat. This tribute to him features Vincent Imbert on violin. This is the tenth in The Portraits’ weekly “Friday Song” series, released first on their Facebook www.facebook.com/theportraitsmusic A brand new song every single week based on ideas and inspiration sent in by you! We hope you enjoy the song, and we look forward to receiving your input towards the next songs in the series. The songs are inspired by ideas, pictures, suggestions sent to us by you. They can be originals for which you send us stories, bits of poetry -- anything from your own lives, or covers you would like to hear us do in Portraits-style. We will tag you in the videos and publicity if you've been the inspiration for the current week's song! All the songs in the series can be downloaded right now from our main site http://www.theportraitsmusic.com/ - click on Friday Song towards the top of the page. The songs can be downloaded for free, or you have the option of choosing a price -- and all proceeds from sales of the Friday Songs will go to The Burma Campaign (http://www.burmacampaign.org.uk/) who campaign for human rights and democracy in Burma, a cause close to our hearts. JEREMY MILLINGTON THE PORTRAITS http://www.theportraitsmusic.com/ — with Jeremy Millington

Validation is the eleventh song in The Portraits’ Friday Song series – a brand new song each and every Friday night throughout 2012 and released first on www.facebook.com/theportraitsmusic. Tonight we bring you the first taster of the band’s new album, due in June 2012. This is a raw, acoustic version of the song before any effects or EQing, with the full band involved: Lorraine on vocals and guitar, Jeremy on piano and vocals, Shemi on cello and Vincent on violin. Validation is all about the music industry as experienced by the hundreds of talented acts who trudge around London’s music venues on a weekly basis desperate to find an audience. It is an up and down lifestyle with as many disappointments and doubts as moments of joy and positivity. But a musician that is truly passionate about what they do cannot live without their art so they take the rough with the smooth. And hope that someone listens. Our Friday Song series is based on ideas and inspiration sent in by you! We hope you enjoy the song, and we look forward to receiving your input towards the next songs in the series. The songs are inspired by ideas, pictures, suggestions sent to us by you. They can be originals for which you send us stories, bits of poetry -- anything from your own lives, or covers you would like to hear us do in Portraits-style. We will tag you in the videos and publicity if you've been the inspiration for the current week's song! All the songs in the series can be downloaded right now from our main site http://www.theportraitsmusic.com/ - click on Friday Song towards the top of the page. The songs can be downloaded for free, or you have the option of choosing a price -- and all proceeds from sales of the Friday Songs will go to The Burma Campaign (http://www.burmacampaign.org.uk/) who campaign for human rights and democracy in Burma, a cause close to our hearts. JEREMY MILLINGTON THE PORTRAITS http://www.theportraitsmusic.com/ — with Jeremy Millington

The latest Friday Song is about a group of Burmese artists forbidden in 2010 from ever again carrying out their art as a punishment for a crime so insignificant that you wouldn't believe it possible. The song and video tell the full story. Thanks to the person who sent in this fascinating idea, who wishes to remain nameless. Our Friday Song series is based on ideas and inspiration sent in by you! We hope you enjoy the song, and we look forward to receiving your input towards the next songs in the series. The songs are inspired by ideas, pictures, suggestions sent to us by you. They can be originals for which you send us stories, bits of poetry -- anything from your own lives, or covers you would like to hear us do in Portraits-style. We will tag you in the videos and publicity if you've been the inspiration for the current week's song!

Colourless is song 13 in our Friday Song Series, and marks the quarter-way point in our self-challenge to write and release a brand new song each and every week throughout 2012. Thanks to David Smart of East London for his suggestion for this song. David had recently seen the film Crash, and it rang very true with his own feelings – that we all judge by appearance, however hard we try not to. You can have the most open character and yet it is impossible not to make value or cultural judgements based on the perceptions of our eyes, the information they feed to our brains, and the way our brains then need to categorise and pigeonhole the information they have delivered to them. The strength we have to develop as we mature as individuals is not to respond to these instantaneous perceptions. On the one hand, wouldn’t it be great to rewire nature, as the song says, to free ourselves of these constraints. On the other, wouldn’t that mean that we’d reduce the world to a monotone in our minds, and view everything exactly the same way? Who wants a world that’s colourless? Our Friday Song series is based on ideas and inspiration sent in by you! We hope you enjoy the song, and we look forward to receiving your input towards the next songs in the series. The songs are inspired by ideas, pictures, suggestions sent to us by you. They can be originals for which you send us stories, bits of poetry -- anything from your own lives, or covers you would like to hear us do in Portraits-style. We will tag you in the videos and publicity if you've been the inspiration for the current week's song! All the songs in the series can be downloaded right now from our main site http://www.theportraitsmusic.com/ - click on Friday Song towards the top of the page. The songs can be downloaded for free, or you have the option of choosing a price -- and all proceeds from sales of the Friday Songs will go to The Burma Campaign (http://www.burmacampaign.org.uk/) who campaign for human rights and democracy in Burma, a cause close to our hearts. JEREMY MILLINGTON THE PORTRAITS http://www.theportraitsmusic.com/

The person who inspired this week's song, Daydreaming, has sworn us to secrecy about the fact they are the inspiration for it. Suffice it to say it is based on a situation in their own life which they described to us in detail and which is causing them much heartache. Our Friday Song series is based on ideas and inspiration sent in by you! We hope you enjoy the song, and we look forward to receiving your input towards the next songs in the series. The songs are inspired by ideas, pictures, suggestions sent to us by you. They can be originals for which you send us stories, bits of poetry -- anything from your own lives, or covers you would like to hear us do in Portraits-style. We will tag you in the videos and publicity if you've been the inspiration for the current week's song! All the songs in the series can be downloaded right now from our main site http://www.theportraitsmusic.com/ - click on Friday Song towards the top of the page. The songs can be downloaded for free, or you have the option of choosing a price -- and all proceeds from sales of the Friday Songs will go to The Burma Campaign (http://www.burmacampaign.org.uk/) who campaign for human rights and democracy in Burma, a cause close to our hearts.

Generations, song 15 in our Friday Song series, was inspired by Jade Healey from Manchester who wrote to us about family and about how it can be hard to break out of the mould of your family's "done thing", which has implications for your prospects in life and could be argued to perpetuate the class structures we're all supposedly trying to shake off in the UK. A really interesting song subject, Jade - thanks! Our Friday Song series is based on ideas and inspiration sent in by you! We hope you enjoy the song, and we look forward to receiving your input towards the next songs in the series. The songs are inspired by ideas, pictures, suggestions sent to us by you. They can be originals for which you send us stories, bits of poetry -- anything from your own lives, or covers you would like to hear us do in Portraits-style. We will tag you in the videos and publicity if you've been the inspiration for the current week's song! All the songs in the series can be downloaded right now from our main site http://www.theportraitsmusic.com/ - click on Friday Song towards the top of the page. The songs can be downloaded for free, or you have the option of choosing a price -- and all proceeds from sales of the Friday Songs will go to The Burma Campaign (http://www.burmacampaign.org.uk/) who campaign for human rights and democracy in Burma, a cause close to our hearts. JEREMY MILLINGTON THE PORTRAITS http://www.theportraitsmusic.com/

ECOEUREMENT is song 16 in our Friday Song series, and it isn't a song at all - it is a Moby-influenced instrumental featuring a snippet of cello by the great Shemi Jones. It was inspired by one of several really vibrant pieces of computer art sent to us by the amazing Sarah Wenger - thanks Sarah! Really enjoyed your work, and you never know - it might feature again before this Friday Song series is done. Our Friday Song series is based on ideas and inspiration sent in by you! We hope you enjoy the song, and we look forward to receiving your input towards the next songs in the series. The songs are inspired by ideas, pictures, suggestions sent to us by you. They can be originals for which you send us stories, bits of poetry -- anything from your own lives, or covers you would like to hear us do in Portraits-style. We will tag you in the videos and publicity if you've been the inspiration for the current week's song! All the songs in the series can be downloaded right now from our main site http://www.theportraitsmusic.com/ - click on Friday Song towards the top of the page. The songs can be downloaded for free, or you have the option of choosing a price -- and all proceeds from sales of the Friday Songs will go to The Burma Campaign (http://www.burmacampaign.org.uk/) who campaign for human rights and democracy in Burma, a cause close to our hearts. JEREMY MILLINGTON THE PORTRAITS http://www.theportraitsmusic.com/

NOSTALGIA Friday song no 17 27th April write-up Since we started the Friday Song project, where we are writing, arranging, recording, producing and releasing on our FB wall a brand new Portraits song each and every Friday throughout 2012, all based on ideas sent in by all you good people out there, we've found the whole experience to be a really interesting learning curve. This week sees the release of song 17, Nostalgia, meaning we are more or less a third of the way through the challenge. We've really enjoyed producing each and every song, and we're really pleased with the results each time, but on 4 or 5 occasions we've really felt that we had something very special to unleash on the public. This week is one of those weeks. Written on Wednesday in response to an email we received from Jane Howell from Sunderland (thanks so much Jane), the song portrays a fantasy trip back by Jane to visit her teenage self twenty years ago. In it she tells her younger alter ego what has happened in her life over the last two decades, and asks if she (now) is where she (back then) would hope to be. She also recognises that her paranoid younger self couldn't cope with criticism of any kind, but that her older and wiser version yearns to help her find her way and lose the hang-ups that prevented her getting further in life. Really interesting idea, Jane - hope you feel we've done it justice in some way. The recording features our fantastic string men Shemi (cello) and Vincent (violin), guitar by Jeremy and vocals by Lorraine and Jeremy. We hope you enjoy the song, and we look forward to receiving your input towards the next songs in the series. The songs are inspired by ideas, pictures, suggestions sent to us by you. They can be originals for which you send us stories, bits of poetry -- anything from your own lives, or covers you would like to hear us do in Portraits-style. We will tag you in the videos and publicity if you've been the inspiration for the current week's song! All the songs in the series can be downloaded right now from our main site http://www.theportraitsmusic.com/ - click on Friday Song towards the top of the page. The songs can be downloaded for free, or you have the option of choosing a price -- and all proceeds from sales of the Friday Songs will go to The Burma Campaign (http://www.burmacampaign.org.uk/) who campaign for human rights and democracy in Burma, a cause close to our hearts. JEREMY MILLINGTON THE PORTRAITS http://www.theportraitsmusic.com/

HAPPY EVER AFTERS is song 18 in our Friday Song series, written in response to a request for a love song to accompany a vampire film being made in Scotland right this minute. Thanks to John Adamson in Edinburgh for the inspiration - look forward to seeing what you make of it! The Friday songs are all written in response to inspiration sent in by you, our brilliant supporters! We hope you enjoy the song, and we look forward to receiving your input towards the next songs in the series. The songs are inspired by ideas, pictures, suggestions sent to us by you. They can be originals for which you send us stories, bits of poetry -- anything from your own lives, or covers you would like to hear us do in Portraits-style. We will tag you in the videos and publicity if you've been the inspiration for the current week's song! All the songs in the series can be downloaded right now from our main site http://www.theportraitsmusic.com/ - click on Friday Song towards the top of the page. The songs can be downloaded for free, or you have the option of choosing a price -- and all proceeds from sales of the Friday Songs will go to The Burma Campaign (http://www.burmacampaign.org.uk/) who campaign for human rights and democracy in Burma, a cause close to our hearts.

Mr Drone is song 19 in our Friday Song series, where we write and release a brand new song each and every week throughout 2012 based on ideas sent in by you! This week's song was inspired by an idea sent in by John Fowles - thanks John - who lives in South East London and wanted us to write something about surveillance culture and petty policing in London. As it happens, Lorraine and I did have personal experience in this area, two days after moving to London. We'd decided to tackle London on bikes, which is one of the reelected mayor's areas of pride! He has invested a great deal in the free bikes you now see around the capital, but has forgotten that there is an almost total lack of infrastructure to make this activity realistic or safe. On the day in question, we came up against a true android of a community support officer. We had undertaken our first, and as it turned out, last, cross-capital cycling expedition. After discovering that cycle paths barely exist, and where they do, they are blocked by parked cars, invaded by buses and trucks, and frankly lethal. But none of this mattered an ounce to the ironically monikered "Community Support Officer" who approached us after we escaped on our bikes onto a nearby pavement when we were seconds from being flattened once and for all by traffic. No amount of explanation appealed to this gentleman's better nature, and now, this song is something of a tribute to jobsworths, particularly those in the role of supposedly supporting the community and keeping us all safe. Actually, that day, we felt like easy targets for a quick refill of the exchequer's coffers. We hope you enjoy the song, and we look forward to receiving your input towards the next songs in the series. The songs are inspired by ideas, pictures, suggestions sent to us by you. They can be originals for which you send us stories, bits of poetry -- anything from your own lives, or covers you would like to hear us do in Portraits-style. We will tag you in the videos and publicity if you've been the inspiration for the current week's song! All the songs in the series can be downloaded right now from our main site http://www.theportraitsmusic.com/ - click on Friday Song towards the top of the page. The songs can be downloaded for free, or you have the option of choosing a price -- and all proceeds from sales of the Friday Songs will go to The Burma Campaign (http://www.burmacampaign.org.uk/) who campaign for human rights and democracy in Burma, a cause close to our hearts. JEREMY MILLINGTON May 11th 2012