ZERO HOUR proudly announces the release of JOHN WESLEY HARDING's "TRAD ARR JONES", his second release for the label, on FEBRUARY 23, 1999. The album of traditional folk music features 11 songs originally arranged and performed by folk music legend Nic Jones from his five solo releases. "TRAD ARR JONES" recalls the days when one artist paid homage to another by recording a collection of their material, rather than one track for a compilation.

NIC JONES was one of the UK Folk Revival's most accomplished interpreters, much loved for his fiddle and guitar playing. Jones first solo album "Ballads and Songs" (1970), quickly established his reputation. His career blossomed throughout the '70s with his own records in addition to his performances on the recordings of others, including Richard Thompson and June Tabor. In February 1982, however, Jones' career was cut short by a car accident that kept him hospitalized for six months. His last release before the accident, "Penguin Eggs" (1980), was Melody Maker's "Folk Music Album Of The Year". Jones has not performed publicly since the accident and copies of his recordings are nearly impossible to find.

JOHN WESLEY HARDING was born in Hastings, England in 1965. A self-taught musician who picked up chords while listening to Loudon Wainwright III, John Prine and Bob Dylan records, Wes started playing his own music while working on his Ph.D in cultural studies at Cambridge University. In 1988 he hit the road opening for Hothouse Flowers and John Hiatt throughout Europe. Wes came to the attention of London's Demon Records who released a live album of original songs for his debut, "It Happened One Night" (Demon 1988/Rhino 1991). He arrived in the U.S. on the heels of his American debut release, "Here Comes The Groom" (Sire Records/ 1990), "the first great album of the 1990s" (Los Angeles Times). Since that time, Wes has cemented his reputation as one of "the best singer-songwriters of his generation", consistently stretching the boundaries of folk music while preserving it's better traditions.

Wes first heard Jones when a friend recommended the album "Penguin Eggs". He began to perform some of Jones' songs in concert. "Nic Jones' performances totally opened up the world of traditional folk music to me." After many hours on tour spent listening to Jones' albums, Wes came up with the idea for an album that would feature Jones' arrangements, with Wes' guitar and one other instrument (long-time associate Robert Lloyd playing mandolin, pump organ, accordian, etc.) splitting these beautiful arrangements between them. Though Nic Jones' arrangements have been recorded by others in the past, most notably Bob Dylan, "TRAD ARR JONES" is the first to acknowledge that the songs were recorded in arrangements by him, true to the drama and spirit of the originals.