John McCaffrey, aka part timer, needs no heralded introduction at this point, at least in our neck of the woods.  That being said we cannot help but dust off our trumpets every time his name comes up.

In the fledgling stages of his musical days, McCaffrey describes moving from Accrington, in the north of England, to Australia. It was there that he’d been previously involved in making music with good friend Jonny Russell, aka thendof, under the name clickits. Since Russell had always been the more tech-savvy of the two, McCaffrey needed to start developing some familiarity with the computer as a way of constructing tunes upon arriving in Australia.

Perversely enough, this entailed McCaffrey buying his first ever guitar. The subsequent combination of learning to play the guitar and learning how to use a computer as a sequencer gave rise to a fairly lo-fi sound that seemed to deserve the name part timer.  For a gent that allows such organic prettiness and jagged digital disruptions to coexist so peacefully in the same space, he maintains the utmost humility towards his music, even subconsciously avoiding giving capitalization to his part timer namesake. McCaffrey has been fortunate to have some very supportive friends in England at moteer and in Japan at flau, who have encouraged him along the way in releasing several albums.

Whichever, genre binding words we choose to describe McCaffrey’s music, a few things still hold true.  There is a solid comfort found in the warm and uplifting core of his music, one that stands the test of time.  Maybe the material reminisces on the sounds of decaying tapes from long forgotten folk inhabitance, but spend an hour or four listening to full breathe of Part Timer’s collection and you’ll agree there is a timelessness and sheer beauty to his records that will surely keep the dust off them for many years to come.

Part Timer’s album Real to Reel is available on CD or in MP3, FLAC, and WAV formats on our barter page.