Lisbon-Toronto-London-Stockholm

For the recording of The Betrayal of the Self, Neil Leyton was very fortunate to have the backing of five very talented Swedish musicians assembled by Laurent Gaston (ex-Highschool Hellcats). Leyton dubbed the quintet "The Ghosts" and at shortly thereafter two of the planned members of the Ghosts (Jeppe "Gyp Casino" and Micke "Rip" Borg) backed out of the project due to other commitments; so Laurent managed to replace Jeppe with Revolution Riot's drummer, Tommie; and a co-worker recommended a guitarist friend that had just moved to Stockholm from the small northern Swedish village of Harnosand. By an absolutely freaky twist of fate, that guitarist's nickname was also Ghost: Micke the Ghost.

Following a series of dates where Neil Leyton supported Diamond Dogs in Sweden in the spring of '05, Leyton's Canadian recording plans for his third album did not go according to plan, and at Lauren Gaston's suggestion, the entire album recording process was relocated to Stockholm at Micke Borg's Acetone studio.

Micke Ghost began rehearsing the material for the Betrayal of the Self sessions based on the roughts that Leyton had previously recorded in Canada. A multi-instrumentalist and an excellent singer in his own right, Micke Ghost really got behind Leyton's material, and the recording sessions went extremely smoothly - even yielding an improvised jam of Swedish gubba, "Flying Machine Blues" - an alternate take on "I just can't take another smile", for those keepin' track of such details.

Leyton and the Ghosts invited some friends from Diamond Dogs to guest on the album; and Micke "Rip" Borg, who was also working with Nicke Andersson from the Hellacopters and the Backyard Babies' Dregen on a cover song project, got them to track a double solo on "Hyperventilating"; and rising star Maria Pettersson sang back-ups and played the Harmonica.

L to R, above: Tommie, Jan, Neil, Ola, Laurent, Micke (photo by Bjorn Olofsson); left: Micke the Ghost.

Below: Tommie, Jan, Ola, Laurent Gaston, Micke the Ghost, Neil Leyton. Photos by Bjorn Olofsson.