Richard F. Jackson vs JacksorJacksor vs Albatross Archive
I've been releasing music since 2008, and my 'artist' name has changed quite a bit since then:
2008: Richard Jackson
2009 - 2015: Albatross Archive
2016 - 2020: Richard Jackson
2021 - 2024: JacksorJacksor
2025 - present: Richard F. Jackson
For the sake of record keeping, let's talk a little about each of these projects:
2008: Richard Jackson
The first EP - Just Stay Calm - and first shows (where I was playing A LOT of open mics and the occasional festival). Very much a solo project, the recording of Just Stay Calm was a wild affair that I really hadn't appreciated at the time. We had a string quartet, saxes, rhythm section, all recording separate parts in RWCMD's studio with producer Gruffydd Johnston (who's patience knew no limits). A few of the players from that session enjoyed the music so much that they wanted to perform it live, which led to...2009 - 2015: Albatross Archive
The longest and most significant project I've been involved with, Albatross Archive morphed from starting as guitar, bass, sax and djembe to ending as piano, drums and animation. Band highlight being winning 2014's The Big Gig, supporting Charlotte Church on her first run as an indie artist, and playing a lot all along a vibrant Womanby Street. We almost got an album finished, but I couldn't quite get the material over the line, so sadly that LP only lives on as demos on a hard drive.2016 - 2020: Richard Jackson
After the band comes the solo project once more. Around this time I was taking being a media composer much more seriously, so ended up working on some digital orchestral stuff that I'm VERY proud of - the EP 'Absolutes' and LP 'ZEPHYR' (a literally A-Z) are filled with some of the favourite sounds I've ever made.2021 - 2024: JacksorJacksor
After a period of personal and professional upheaval I wanted a creative change. Initially, JacksorJacksor was going to be a far more abstract electronic project, more Musique concrète and austere, but that never really materialised. I made one lockdown EP - 'woodlands' - and then decided to enlist other musicians to come and record with me, culminating in a 10-piece band recording the EP GoodChaos in one day at Musicbox (thank you Ed Truckell for putting up with this idea). This multi-instrumental chamber-pop sound was great, but became increasingly difficult to book (i.e. everyone has busy schedules). I found myself naturally gravitating towards making recordings instead of performing, leading to the written-and-recorded-in-a-week EP 'every machine will eat you', and the 'written-and-recorded-in-a-year' EP 'SAM' (I love timeboxing).2025 - present: Richard F. Jackson
After much soul-searching I decided to return to using my own name, and intend to do so for the foreseeable future. The 'F.' has made an appearance due to the number of other Richard Jackson's I've been confused with over the years, so if I was going to make one more name change then I wanted one with a little more uniqueness musically!
So here you are - a journey of names, and why you'll find lots of JacksorJacksor artifacts that I haven't got around to changing yet.
Hi, I'm Richard F. Jackson, and I make music.