Making Waves

Celtic rockers Tide Lines kick off 2023 by topping the bill at Final Fling, a new addition to Edinburgh’s Hogmanay. Frontman Robert Robertson talks to Fiona Shepherd about the excitement of getting back to live gigs, headlining an all-Scottish New Year’s Day knees-up and the quirks of recording on an island

Robert Robertson is not big on New Year resolutions (or none that he will admit to anyway) but for the first time in almost three years, he can look back with thanks and forward with optimism. ‘2022 has been absolutely brilliant, back to what life should be like as a full-time musician, writing and recording and gigging,’ he says. ‘It’s really exciting to be starting a new year with a real plan of what’s about to happen, unlike the last couple where it’s still been going into the unknown a wee bit.’

His band Tide Lines will hit 2023 running by headlining Final Fling, a new New Year’s Day concert in Princes Street Gardens to round off Edinburgh’s Hogmanay celebrations. Their stirring Celtic rock is set to blow cobwebs away alongside fellow flingers Elephant Sessions and Hamish Hawk, in a reflection of the band members’ usual Highland New Year where first footing on January 1st is traditionally a bigger deal than Hogmanay partying.

‘You would relax and toast the New Year but Hogmanay was never a particularly wild night,’ says Robertson. ‘Even as a wee kid, we’d be out visiting or folks would come to visit the house and I would always give a song. Music has always been a massive part of our New Year celebrations.’

Since picking up accordion as his first instrument, Robertson’s Hogmanay has taken a professional turn, involving ceilidh gigs in his native Fort William and larger shows when he started university in Glasgow. There, he formed Tide Lines in 2016 with fellow Highland expats (guitarist Alasdair Turner, keyboard player Ross Wilson and drummer Fergus Munro).

The quartet quickly carved a niche as a next-generation Runrig with emotional Celtic anthems such as ‘Far Side Of The World’ and ‘The Young And The Restless’, custom-ready to rock festivals and arenas. However, in 2022 the quartet went back to their rural roots on their Town Hall tour of Scotland, playing smaller venues in more remote communities as a sort of post-lockdown reset.

The group also spent much of the year recording their forthcoming third album back on Wilson’s native Mull. An Ocean Full Of Islands, due for release in February, is so titled after the view from their studio which they set up in an old Baptist church in the Atlantic-facing Bunessan Bay.

‘It’s a stunning location,’ says Robertson. ‘You can’t help but be influenced by the elements and conditions, and also the local community, many of whom are Ross’ family. You’re halfway through recording a vocal take and there will be a knock on the door and it will be somebody popping in for a cup of tea or asking if they can borrow your ladders. So you get this really bizarre recording experience, which would just never happen in a studio in Glasgow or Edinburgh where logistics and finances would be a big part of the decisions. Up there, we’re not under any particular time constraints.’

Lines play Final Fling, Princes Street Gardens, Edinburgh, Sunday 1 January; An Ocean Full Of Islands is released on Tide Lines Music, Friday 24 February.