Welcome to Trailer’s Barn

Trailer Star is the alter ego of myself (Shaun Belcher) erstwhile poet, painter, photographer and vinyl collector. Trailer Star went to heaven and was born in 2000 following a particularly galling break-up and when my own musical efforts were getting scant attention.

From the get go Trailer has had a late great career that puts mine to shame and pretty soon in 2003 he had a tribute album dedicated to him featuring a member of Lambchop, Claudia Scott, Bob Cheevers, Terry Calrke, Jim Roll. etc etc and resulted in Moon Over The Downs (see link to original websites below).

This all came out of a minor career as a music journalist of no note (ok maybe a few flat ones) which spawned the first U.K. based americana webzine (see below). I have it on the highest authority (Loose CEO) that I got there first swiftly overtaken by Americana UK.

https://trailerstar.bandcamp.com/

So 25 years on from Trailer’s birth/death Trailer Star Records still semi-exists to proffer Trailer’s back catalogue (more comebacks from grave than Bowie) and a few selected friends and collaborators.
I hope you find Trailer/My obsessions amusing….

TRAILER STAR RECORDS on BANDCAMP

The Tstar Archive

Below links to a range of previous websites preserved as they were designed from 1999 -2004

Pre Trailer and Flyinshoes 1981 – 1999

I started writing songs in the early 1980s influenced by Orange Juice, The Byrds and the Velvets and my friend Pete Astor and his various bands from The Loft through the Weather Prophets to The Holy Road and beyond. Some of this really old material is logged on the web somewhere probably on a soundcloud account..ah here it is Horseshoe Tapes on Soundcloud. Then in 1991 I joined up with a bunch of then Oxford based ne’r do wells to form Alex/The High Priests who produced a lot of noise and one single designed by the lad that did Stereolab’s sleeves see above. That was best thing about it.

Between 1999-2004 I ran an online Americana Webzine called Flyinshoes after Townes Van Zandt album the entire archive HERE: https://www.trailerstar.co.uk/archive/fsr/

SHAUN BELCHER ON BANDCAMP THE ARCHIVES 1991-2000

SOUDCLOUD

BANDCAMP TRAILER STAR

THE TRAILER STAR STORY…

Born in a thunderstorm somewhere in the middle of the Thames Valley sometime before the ‘50s ended and the ‘60s started swinging ‘Trailer Star’ also known as the ‘Legendary Thames Valley Cowboy’ is a fictional character created by myself, Shaun Belcher, artist, poet and sometime musician.
From the mid-80s, when I painted record sleeves for Creation records and started obsessing over American songwriters like Townes Van Zandt, Guy Clark and Peter Case and Bluesmen like Mississippi John Hurt and Lightning Hopkins, I have written songs…literally thousands of them….

These ended up on a series of cassette only releases with titles like ‘Last Farmer of Rattledown Row’ and ‘Black River’ from the mid-80s through to ‘90s. Finally a limited edition ‘Floodplain Demos’ CD was released in 2001, which is where the Trailer Star character first appeared. From 1999 until 2004 I edited and designed the online songwriting webzine ‘Flyin’ Shoes Review’ named after the Townes Van Zandt album of the same name which concentrated on solo artists in the folk, Blues and Americana vein.

After a few years playing live in the early 1990s with The High Priests (a messy three piece garage Blues band like an early White Stripes) I realised that others would sing some of these songs better than me and after showing some artistes my archive of songs the charity CD ‘Moon Over The Downs‘ resulted. Fifteen Americana (US and UK) acts created a tribute to the ‘star that never was’. These included Deanna Varagona of Lambchop, Jim Roll, Bob Cheevers, Terry Clarke and Ronny Elliott with interpretations that ranged across folk, Blues and country.

I had cut my fictional ‘Trailer Star’s’ career abruptly short when his pick-up truck left a blind bend one frosty night on the downs near his trailer but I could not let the story end there and his ghost continues to play…

Trailer Star lives in his ‘late great’ form and I continue to release his collected works on the internet through the official Trailer Star archives at various sites.
Trailer Star is also the fictional host of ‘Trailer Star Radio’ an Americana podcast which comes out irregularly and can be downloaded from all good streamers and some not so good.. etc.
https://tapeheaven.substack.com/p/tstar-radio-no1

The old Flyinshoes Podcast HERE: https://www.mixcloud.com/trailerstar

Maybe one day Trailer will feature in his own novel/film but for now thanks for listening

Shaun Belcher a.k.a. Trailer Star