Make That A Take was founded after a house party show in the Old Mill Buildings in Ayth back in 2006. We put on our first show at the Girl Guide Hut for our friend’s party when our band Kaizer played there in 1990something. The Alyth folk music scene, including legends such as Wedge, Dirk Van Den Berg, the Stewart family and Gain’s uncle Graham took us under their wing and showed us the way when they figured out that we were serious about this music caper. Janey MacFarlane taught me how to sing during school assembly at Alyth Primary School. Myself and Gain are from there, Kevin from Broken Stories still lives there. There are deep personal connections to the town and we are absolutely devastated at what has happened as a result of the floods on Friday, the worst in town history.

The dude talking in that video is our friend Andrew Pollock. He learned to play guitar upstairs in the original Cowpunk HQ when we were kids and we’ve been friends our whole lives. He and his family have lost everything and, unfortunately, his story is by no means unique. Alyth has lost over 100 years of history and it’s against all probability that nobody was seriously injured. This is a very real disaster and it’s on our doorstep. The very least we can do is try to contribute positively to the relief effort.

There is a Flood Relief Fund being set up by Alyth Community Council and Alyth Parish Church. We aim to help raise money to donate to the relief effort. There is an emergency relief centre at Alyth Town Hall and they are in need of donations of basic care packages; needing everything from clothing and bedding to non-perishable foodstuffs and toiletries. Breathing Space are offering counseling for those affected by events, the community continues to rally round to support one another. We’d like to offer what we can to help, even if it helps just one person.

As such, any and all money from sales/donations of digital releases from our Bandcamp page will be donated to this fund to help support those most in need. All of our releases will be part of this drive. We have 60+ releases available, many of which are already available for free/pay-what-you-want download. If you’ve ever thought about grabbing something and chucking in a couple of quid, we’d suggest that now is the time to do so. Please give generously if you can.

The Alyth Youth Partnership are organising a fundraising benefit show that we’re going to be helping out with next month. Full details will emerge in the next few weeks.

This is a real life disaster and one that hits close to him. We’d appreciate your support in this endeavour.

Thank you,

Derrick