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• Beautiful & Deranged-Limited Edition

  Compact Disc (CD) + Digital Album

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  ***100% of all sales from Aylie's music will go to his children***
  
  Limited amount of original recording left in Physical CD format.
  
  Produced by Bob Hamilton & Aylie Sparkes in 2003
  
  (Nominated for Western Canadian Music Awards "Blues Album of the Year" in 2004)
  
  Introducing: Aylie Sparkes All Guitars (Jezebel, Brown Bess, Brigitte), Lapsteel, Dobro, and Ghost Banjo
  
  With Paul Stephens Bass, Fretless Bass, Backup Vocals
  & Marc Paradis Drums and Percussion
  
  With Special Guests: Jay Burr Valve Trombone Tracks 5 & 7
  Annie Avery Piano Track 7
  Roger Gillies Nuked Wurlitzer Track 5
  Bob Hamilton Backup Vocals Track 4
  
  All songs SOCAN except 9, 12
  
  Reviews/Words
  
  Yukon Legislature (Honorable Steve Cardiff)
  Mr. Cardiff: I rise on behalf of the Legislature today to pay tribute to a great Yukon musician, Aylie Sparkes, who is also known as Peter Thiessen.
  
  Our thoughts are with Aylie’s family today: his partner Tanya Groundwater, his daughter Teka Rae, and his son Oliver Bean as they try to cope with the loss of their partner and their father.
  
  Aylie passed away on Sunday, May 8, after a battle with cancer in his 38th year. It has been said, Mr. Speaker, that music washes away the dust of everyday life. Aylie’s guitar will no longer help us to wash away the dust of our lives with his powerful and passionate style.
  
  Aylie arrived in the Yukon from Nelson, B.C. about four years ago in true blues fashion on an eighth of a tank of gasoline and about $5 in his pocket. He immediately made a big impression here in Whitehorse in the local music scene and around the territory. He described that group of people, the musicians, as a real tight-knit community — and they are — and he fit right into that community and became part of the community and was well accepted and welcome in all the music circles.
  
  He was described by his peers as a great talent, a kind soul, and a person who contributed to the music community and to the community as a whole.
  
  In 2004, he was nominated for outstanding blues recording at the Western Canadian Music Awards for his Beautiful and Deranged live album.
  
  During his illness, Aylie showed great courage. He continued to play regularly in many venues, including several sets just this past year at the Frostbite Music Festival. Aylie once said, “With show business, the only excuse for not going on is either you’re dead or passed out or in jail.” While I didn’t know Aylie personally, I did have the great opportunity to listen to his music, as many people in the Yukon did. He played with passion.
  
  I had the opportunity to see him at many venues, whether it was at Frostbite Music Festival, the Red Onion Saloon in Skagway, or any of the other venues here in the Yukon. It was always a joy to watch Aylie play because he played with such joy. You could see it in his face, you could hear it in the words, and you could hear it in the comments he made between songs. There was always that sense of camaraderie with the other musicians. He was a real part of the group, and he enjoyed having those people there with him.
  
  While Aylie was only here in the Yukon for a short period of time, he made a great impact here in the Yukon on the music scene and in our community, and we’re all going to miss him.
  
  Donations to assist the family can be made at Steve’s Music Shop.
  
  We’ll miss you, Aylie, and thank you
  
  Rock in the Blues CD'S, Canada
  
  "Manitoban guitarist (lap steel, dobro, etc.) Aylie Sparkes embarked on a journey to Whitehorse, Yukon, two years ago, where he became an instant success, playing more than 250 shows in his first year there!
  
  I first heard of Aylie through a series of website links that originally began with a musical acquaintance from Brussels, Belgium (The Flying Snowman) and detoured through a global incident in Vietnam (The Kim Foundation), which led me to the CBC’s 2003 ArtsCanada (artscanada.cbc.ca/artscanada.jsp) True North Concert held in Oujé-Bougoumou, Québec. While listening to the various sound clips of the concert, the songs that caught my ear were the opening and closing tracks of this CD – “Hellhounds”, a hell-raising slide guitar opus about Jesus and The Devil, and the dobro instrumental “Gypsy’s Lament”, whose beautifully mournful strains resounded in my ears long after the song was finished.
  
  Although Aylie is equally influenced by such diverse artists as Hendrix, Muddy Waters, Elmore James and Earl Scruggs, I also heard influences by Bob Dylan (“Klondike Beauty Queen”), who, of course, was Hendrix’s mentor), Robert Johnson (“Shadow of Doubt” and “Dawson City”) and Rory Gallagher.
  
  Apparently attuned to the “call of the wild”, Aylie mentions in his concert introduction that he prefers being in a place “where there are more moose than people”. The intense ferocity of his own musical character is reflected best in “Hellhounds”, “Yummy Mama” (aptly described by Aylie as a kick in the kryptonite) and “High Heeled Sneakers”, which simultaneously reminded me of Chuck Berry’s “Memphis, Tennessee”, but with a Johnny Winter-like growling vocal tone.
  
  Not to be limited by a Blues or Rock beat, he incorporates elements of funk (“Livin’ My Life”, showcasing Paul Stephens on bass, Marc Paradis on drums, Jay Burr on valve trombone and Roger Gillies on “nuked Wurlitzer”), reggae (“Wing and a Prayer”), dixieland (“Long Distance Love”, featuring Annie Avery on honky-tonk piano and Jay Burr) on trombone
  
  The mystical “Joanne’s Reel” emulates Ry Cooder’s signature sound, while his country roots get a nod on “Klondike Beauty Queen”. The country-blues classic “I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry” (Hank Williams) cries out for harmony vocals, in its simplicity. It’s missing Hank’s prominent vocal twang, and the delicious slide guitar reminded me of the late Dave Conant of Seattle.
  
  Beautiful and Deranged, expertly co-produced (and mixed and mastered) by Bob Hamilton and Aylie Sparkes at Old Crow Recording in Whitehorse, will capture your heart immediately and have you wanting to hear more and more from this outstanding Canadian troubadour! My thanks go out to Kristina Mercs, Aylie’s manager and the CD’s executive producer, for passing on this musical treasure to Ontario!"
  
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