''Princess Alice and the Broken Arrow'' is the 14th studio album by the English rock band Magnum. The album was released by SPV in Germany on 23 March 2007, in the rest of Europe on 26 March 2007 and in the USA on 3 April 2007. The album title refers to the Princess Alice orphanage near Birmingham, with which

Tony Clarkin Tony Clarkin (born Anthony Michael Clarkin, 24 November 1946) is an English musician and record producer, best known as the guitarist of the rock band Magnum. He has been the sole songwriter throughout Magnum's history, writing all of the mat ...

has close personal ties.Magnum
/ref> The album is the first new studio album with

Rodney Matthews Rodney Matthews (born 6 July 1945) is a British illustrator and conceptual designer of fantasy and science-fiction. Career Trained at the West of England College of Art, Matthews worked in advertising for Plastic Dog Graphics before turning ...

' artwork since 1992, and the only one to feature

Jimmy Copley James Frank Copley (29 December 1953 – 13 May 2017) was an English rock drummer. Copley was largely a session musician and worked with Jeff Beck, Graham Parker, Upp, Paul Young, Magnum, Roger Glover, Ian Gillan and Glenn Hughes of Deep Pu ...

on drums. The album entered the UK Album Charts at No. 70, the first time Magnum had charted in the UK since 1994. It also reached No. 4 on the BBC Rock Album Charts and No. 60 in Germany, the band's biggest market outside of the UK along with Scandinavia.

Track listing

Singles

Like Brothers We Stand digital (2008) # "Like Brothers We Stand"

adio edit Adio may refer to: Business *Adio (company), the former skateboard footwear and apparel company Music Songs * "Adio" (song), a song by Montenegrin recording artist Knez that represented Montenegro at the Eurovision Song Contest 2015 *"Adio", a 19 ...

– 3:31 # "Your Lies"

P version P, or p, is the sixteenth letter of the Latin alphabet, used in the modern English alphabet, the alphabets of other western European languages and others worldwide. Its name in English is ''pee'' (pronounced ), plural ''pees''. History The ...

– 4:32

Cover sleeve

The cover art was designed by

"Tony had got this idea of Princess Alice in his head; the name came from the Princess Alice orphanage in Birmingham... although the Alice on the cover, our Princess Alice if you like, is a fictitious character. And it just seemed right to ask Rodney if he would be interested in doing a painting for the front cover instead of using computer graphics which we have used a lot in the recent past. Tony wanted the sly fox in the artwork and Princess Alice breaking the arrow over her head and this was something that had to be done by an artist... so the only man for the job was Rodney Matthews. We went down to his house in Wales and Tony sat down with him and went through his ideas for the cover and Rodney came back to us with this wonderful pencil drawing which knocked us over; it was brilliant in black and white so we knew it would look amazing in colour. Of course with Rodney he was a known quantity for us from '' Storyteller's Night'' and those other great covers and so he was the obvious choice. It reminds me a lot of '' Storyteller's Night'' and it shouts Magnum at you; I don’t think anybody else would have a cover like that really."Bob Catley – Magnum Interview
/ref> —
Bob Catley Robert Adrian Catley is an English singer and musician, best known by his stage name as Bob Catley. He is the lead singer of the British rock band Magnum. He is also a solo artist. Biography Early years (1947–1972) Born in Aldershot on ...
, 2007 "The little story there is that Princess Alice is doing a deal with the fox; breaking an arrow over her head is her making peace with the fox which is part of the lyrics in "Like Brothers We Stand". And this song is to do with the Native American Indians making peace with the White Man so that they ended up being shoved into reservations instead of having all of that country to themselves. "The Flood" from ''
Sleepwalking Sleepwalking, also known as somnambulism or noctambulism, is a phenomenon of combined sleep and wakefulness. It is classified as a sleep disorder belonging to the parasomnia family. It occurs during slow wave stage of sleep, in a state of low ...
'' was basically the same subject matter. And then the kids in the background stuck in the cages are all looking sorry for themselves and the Princess is trying to get the kids back as part of her deal. And she also kicked off a song called "You’ll Never Sleep" which closes the album that was also part of the very loose Princess Alice concept." —
Bob Catley Robert Adrian Catley is an English singer and musician, best known by his stage name as Bob Catley. He is the lead singer of the British rock band Magnum. He is also a solo artist. Biography Early years (1947–1972) Born in Aldershot on ...
, 2007 "Princess Alice is a fictional character. Her name came from an orphanage in Birmingham, called the Princess Alice Orphanage. It was in
Harborne Harborne is an area of south-west Birmingham, England. It is one of the most affluent areas of the Midlands, southwest from Birmingham Birmingham ( ) is a city and metropolitan borough in the metropolitan county of West Midlands in ...
, in Birmingham, many years ago; it's not there anymore. Tony was researching this before we started putting anything down for the album. He wanted to get his facts right, for personal reasons. And the name, Princess Alice kept going around his head, and it helped him put ideas for a song called "You'll Never Sleep", which is the last track on the album. So that kicked off the whole writing process, really. And the fox... Tony always wanted to get the evil sly fox into the artwork somewhere, and now he's got his chance. There's a little story on the front basically, how she is breaking an arrow over her head, which is a peace symbol, obviously. She's trying to do a deal with the fox, to get the little children back, that he has kidnapped and put them in cages in the back; you can see them and they’re very forlorn and sad."Bravewords.com > Features
/ref> —
Bob Catley Robert Adrian Catley is an English singer and musician, best known by his stage name as Bob Catley. He is the lead singer of the British rock band Magnum. He is also a solo artist. Biography Early years (1947–1972) Born in Aldershot on ...
, 2007 "Rodney came to the studio and let himself be inspired by us and the album title. He started with some small sketches, eventually producing this beautiful painting." —
Bob Catley Robert Adrian Catley is an English singer and musician, best known by his stage name as Bob Catley. He is the lead singer of the British rock band Magnum. He is also a solo artist. Biography Early years (1947–1972) Born in Aldershot on ...
, 2007

Personnel

*Tony Clarkin – guitar *Bob Catley – vocals *Al Barrow – bass guitar *Mark Stanway – keyboards *Jimmy Copley – drums Additional musicians * Jim Lea — violin (on "You'll Never Sleep")

Production

*Produced and written by Tony Clarkin *Mixed by Tony Clarkin & Mark V. Stuart *Recorded at M2, Mad Hat Studio by Mark V. Stuart *Assisted by Sheena Sear *Mastered by Ian Cooper at Metropolis, London *Cover artwork by

*Other artwork by

Al Barrow Al Barrow (born 1968, in Wolverhampton, England) is an English bassist best known as the former member of the hard rock band Magnum. Barrow joined Magnum in 2001 after he was a member of Hard Rain, a group formed by Magnum members, Bob Catl ...

, Generic Designs *Publishing – Colin Newman at Maxwood Music Ltd

Princess Alice and the Broken Arrow tour

*4 May – Lagerhalle, Osnabrueck *5 May – Columbia Club, Berlin *7 May – Spectrum, Augsburg *8 May – Z7, Pratteln *10 May – Colos-saal, Aschaffenburg *11 May –

Capitol A capitol, named after the Capitoline Hill in Rome, is usually a legislative building where a legislature meets and makes laws for its respective political entity. Specific capitols include: * United States Capitol in Washington, D.C. * Numerous ...

, Hanover *12 May – Zeche, Bochum *13 May – Kantine, Köln *14 May – Biebob, Vosselaar *15 May – Le Trabendo, Paris *17 May – Garage, Glasgow *18 May – Carling Academy, Newcastle *19 May – Rock City, Nottingham *20 May – The Academy, Bristol *22 May – The Waterfront, Norwich *23 May – The Academy 2, Manchester *24 May – Wulfrun Hall, Wolverhampton *25 May – Rio's, Leeds *26 May – Mean Fiddler, London

Charts

References

External links

www.magnumonline.co.uk
— Official Magnum site

— at rodneymatthews.com {{DEFAULTSORT:Princess Alice And The Broken Arrow 2007 albums Magnum (band) albums Albums produced by Tony Clarkin SPV/Steamhammer albums Albums with cover art by Rodney Matthews