TALL tales and creepy accounts are gathered up in Tales From New Inn, by Owen Staton.

The storyteller will launch his new CD collection tomorrow at the Gough Constitutional Club in Ystradgynlais.

The release features early 19th-century folktales which Owen has unearthed over the years.

He said: "They are stories from the Afan and Swansea valleys, lots of 18th Century folk tales with a spooky or a magical edge."

He trawls old books and community records to find a germ of a tale, before polishing, embellishing and dramatising the story, to present it to an audience, he says.

"Often when you tell a story parts of it will be familiar to people, or they will have a distant memory of a version of it.

"And stories travel in an incredible way. Someone can tell a story in South Wales and I can hear the same story in South America, with different names."

And even in this high-tech age, tales still hold their lustre, he insists.

"We can dip in and out of films and books now because everything is available, but to sit people down in a circle and to tell them a fascinating story is a very powerful thing."

It starts at 7.30pm.