65daysofstatic

Headliner: 65daysofstatic
Venue: Rescue Rooms Nottingham
Date: 24 Sep 2013
Support: The Physics House Band, Sleepmakeswaves

Tonight it was 65daysofstatic now what do you describe them as Post Rock, Instrumental, math rock or just simply a post rock industrial math rock band.  What ever genre it is some of these bands like explosions in the sky, mogwai etc are massively underrated creating some immense soundscapes with amazing highs and lows in the same song epic stuff.

I don't mind an early curfew on a week night at my age but the one down point to this is that after finishing work, grabbing something to eat and driving over to Nottingham it's often the case that you miss the first support band, arriving at the venue at 19.45 the first band of the night The Physics House Band had been and gone and I missed all their set.

Next up was a band called sleepmakeswaves an Australian post rock band, the first thing that struck me was the bass played with his bald head and big ginger beard looked like the bloke from the guess who game!

Anyway their set was epic and almost destroyed me, dream like soundscapes intertwined with chaos mind blowing stuff, music that sucks you and transports you to another place WOW!

Next up 65daysofstaic I have seen these a few times before but this was the first actual club show and the last time was in a museum! see tramlines post.

Anyway they came on and did what they do best and played for about 80mins before they had to finish up and let the students in.

Most people get put off my instrumental music or post rock music but once you give in it's such a rewarding experience especially live

Walking back to the car you could tell it was student night as we walked past about 4 Romans dressed in togas, a few men in drag and a man dressed as a penguin.... made me look the weird one in my traditional outfit of jeans and a check shirt.

The Front Bottoms

Headliner: The Front Bottoms
Venue: Bodega Social Club Nottingham
Date: 20 Sep 2013
Support: Shankland, Alsion Weiss

So its been a while but plenty of gigs coming up in the next few months but it was of to see The Front Bottoms at the Bodega in Nottingham.

First up tonight was Shankland playing solo acoustic music I have seen him before at one of my least favourite venues The Maze where he seems to be "local" in the league of gentlemen sense. He's ok but not brilliant.

Next up Alison Weiss an artist from New York again playing solo with a guitar I liked her the music and it was backed up with some nice interaction and stories, not totally my style of music and would I go searching out here music in the future? probably not but I enjoyed her set.

The Headliner for the night was The Front Bottoms from New Jersey touring their latest album Talon of the Hawk which I really enjoyed and was in fact their fourth album.

I'm not really sure how you can describe The Front bottoms part Blink 182, part Pavement, part like nothing else. Quirky indie pop punk I guess.

I was really impressed with the crowd they new all the words and were singing along and having a really good time a little bit of crowd surfing and all that.

The Front Bottoms blasted through an hour long set with no time for an encore at the end of the set the crowd were desperate for one more song but alas due to the venue wanting to take the money off a load of drunk students for a Friday night club night the sound man became the most hated man in the venue by denying this request.

Chris Murray The Maze

Headliner: Chris Murray

Venue: The Maze Nottingham

Date: 16 August 2013

Support acts: Nadia Latoya, stuck in 2nd, Ashmore, project o'kane

So another gig this time Chris Murray, a legend in the ska scene and probably the best in the business when it comes acoustic ska to get you bouncing.

This gig was at the maze in Nottingham a venue I have been to a few times in the past. My main gripe infact a rather large one with this venue is that it seems to be a pretty much closed community for bands performing there.

I get the point and the idea that a large proportion of them are all friends and know each other pretty well and that by having a dedicated number of followers/fans/gig goers etc that they are able to put on these sort of shows by guaranteeing a number of heads through the door. BUT and it's a big BUT it seems to me that if you aren't a friend of the family you don't seem to be given much of a chance or an audience.

When one of the family is onstage they all appear, start jumping around, dancing, singing along etc but as soon as they finish they all vanish and some of the support bands seem to perform in front of nobody. Infact in my opinion the two best bands on the support bill last night played in front of an almost empty venue.

Anyway enough moaning and onto the gig.

First up Nadia Latoya 

Big voice, a mixture of soul and reggae made a good impression on me and a great way to start the night.

Next up one of the family bands stuck in 2nd they were ok but not as good as the family made out.

Next up Ashmore, obviously by now the family had done a runner.  Ashmore is an 18 year old musician from Nottingham together with his mate Motomouf beatboxing, what else can you say but wow, this lad is onto something and with the beats laid down by motomouf they were ace especially the version of redemption song at the end of the set which was awesome.  Best artists on the supporting bill tonight and will probably be bigger than anyone else on the bill eventually.

Next up project o'kane led by Liam O'kane big fish small pond springs to mind not a fan but they love him down here even at the end as a supporting band they left instruments, cases, setlists all over the stage that Chris Murray had to move himself, oh and he sounds a little like Miss Piggy when singing.

Chris Murray was next, I have been a fan of Chris Murray for over 10 years since I got hold of a copy of the 4 track adventures of venice shoreline Chris, and have seen him multiple times.  I love music that is raw, uncomplicated, no need for efffects and Chris Murray does this amazingly well.

Playing a set of mainly requests asked before and during the gig he was great however when the headliner doesn't come on till midnight half the crowd are to drunk to notice and the audience dwindles.  having so many artists on the bill and not starting till 9pm leaves it to late for the headliners to take the stage in my opinion.

I am sure they love what they do here and it's great that as a collective people can get together put on and promote their own shows and have a good time etc, I'm not knocking that at all, it's just I wish they would give more time to other artists all seems a bit local.

Mogwai live Zidane a 21st century portrait

Headliner: Mogwai

Venue: Barbican centre london

Date: 26/07/2013

Mogwai don't play live that often so when the chance arises you have to make to effort so it was off to London to see them.

When I first tried to get tickets it said sold out and I was massively disappointed after randomly trying a few days later it appeared some amazing seats were back on sale, so they were quickly booked and plans were made.

A few years ago a film was made about the legendary Zidane it basically focused on him for an entire game and the makers asked mogwai to provide the soundtrack.

The film is effectively a silent movie with mogwai creating a soundtrack to bring the film to life.  The idea of this event was that mogwai would play the soundtrack live, while the film was projected onto a giant screen.

After arriving at the barbican an immense maze of doors, stairs, corridors, weird toilets etc and £2.15 for a bottle of coke! It was time to take our seats.

Our seats were amazing! Row k right in the centre!

Words can't really do this experience justice the film was ace but mogwai were amazing the point during half time in the match was just stunning.

I have not been to a gig before where nobody moved, the crowd were motionless for close to 2hrs completely blown away by the experience.

The way the tension and emotion that was built up towards the climax of the film when Zidane got sent off was.... Well WOW!

After the film had finished mogwai came back on for an encore and finished the night with a sonic assault, so calm, yet intense and beautiful.

I really need to see mogwai again!

Tramlines festival - sheffield various

Tramlines festival

Sheffield (various venues)

Date: 21/07/2013

So this was my 2nd tramlines festival and I was looking forward to seeing some old and new favourites. Similar to dottodot it's loads of different bands playing in various venues throughout the city.

We arrived early, but sadly not early enough to catch kagoule who opened up the second stage at the O2 academy. Last time I went to the academy was to see the legendary jello Biafra!

After arriving we paid to get our wristbands and went to check out what was on and then we started to wander around sheffield to see what we could find.

First of all we headed to the millennium gallery where 65daysofstatic had an instillation, basically it was a set up of a video screen showing google maps, but with a soundtrack played on 16 different speakers. They were gonna play live in the evening so this was put in the diary.

We decided to check out the main stage just as Theme Park were starting, they were terrible, bland indie pop music so not for my taste so we moved on.

After wandering around sheffield we ended up in the Harley never been here before nice little venue, and it has a piece of art by mr penfold on the side. Checked out a band whose name I can't remember  and decided to head back to the academy as some bands we wanted to see where on shortly.

On the way back I spotted this piece of art by the legend that is phlegm a local sheffield artist!

I love phlegms work and the characters that appear in all his pieces. Like this one just off brick lane in London that I snapped last year.

Anyway I digress.....

These sort of festivals to me are about finding new bands that you may not of heard of before, and the first of these were called The Wytches!

After googling them I read an article form the guardian that described them as tapping into the dark side of psychedelia and painting it black! So these were in my to watch list.

  

I really enjoyed their set it was obvious they were I influenced by the grunge scene and but I love that style of music and I was impressed with them musically.

After checking out The Wytches we went upstairs to see another band whose name I can't remember but they played a zeppelin esq blues rock music, they were ok but obviously not that memorable.

Looking at the posters on the wall it was like being transported back to 1993 with upcoming gigs from shed7, happy Mondays, the wonder stuff, PWEI and Jesus jones!

It was back  downstairs and into the main room to check out one of the must see bands wet nuns! I'm a sucker for a 2piece rock band no frills, no messing just straight up rock n roll.

Wet Nuns were awesome and I spent most of the next day listening to them

Massive riffs a plenty.

After milling around for a bit it was time for rolo tomassi!  I have seen these must be 5or6 times now and they never disappoint. The first time singer Eva Spence walks on stage and starts to sing always makes me smile!

They make a right racket but are always entertaining!

After rolo tomassi Dog is Dead were the headliners, but after the disappointment of seeing the lead singer wearing a black flag t-shirt last year and then sound well the exact opposite, I wasn't in a hurry to see them because they are what some might describe as well a bit shit.

While taking part in the mass evacuation after rolo tomassi from the O2 I must have heard 6-7 people agreeing with this fact and the general consensus being that dog is dead are in fact shit.

So after leaving the O2 it was back to the millenium gallery to see 65daysofstatic perform sleepwalk city and wow it was amazing 30 minutes of amazing swirling soundscapes to images projected onto video screens.

This was an amazing experience that is hard to describe but the video screens and sound through 16speakers was an amazing audio visual experience.

You couldn't really follow that so it was time to call it a day.

Until next year!

Tim Barry / Sam Russo

Headliner: Tim Barry
Venue: Firebug Leicester
Date: 30 June 2013
Other Artists: Flav Giorgni /  Sam Russo

I've been waiting for this gig for along time, in fact it turns out I was the first person to buy tickets! Tim Barry is one of my favourite song writers at the minute, while we have totally different lives, it seems like half the time he's writing songs about me.

First up tonight was an artist from Leicester or so it seemed.... called Flav Giorgini.

Never heard of him before and just assumed he was some bloke from Leicester turns out in another life he played in a pop punk band called Squirtgun in the US who had releases on Lookout records and even more amazing they had a song on the Kevin Smith classic Mallrats!!  in fact it played over the opening credits.  Seems he decided to ditch pop punk and get a Phd in Molecular genetics and works at Leicester University, crazy.

Next up Sam Russo.

Feel a bit guilty here because I can't really remember much about Sam Russo except I really enjoyed his set and his stories.

Next up Tim Barry, As I've already said I'm a massive fan of Tim and I wasn't disappointed, such an amazing song writer.  He played loads of songs from his new album mixed in with classics like Dog Bumped.

Moment of the evening for me was Tim's passion for the situation in Richmond VA in relation to his song Prosser's Gabriel, although I loved the lyrical content of the song I didn't have a real understanding of the entire story and since seeing Tim sing and talk about it I have bought a book to find out more about the story.

I love it when musicians get involved with and communicate with the crowd and especially when they ditch the stage and play in the crowd.

This is real music for me, not standing at the back of a massive stadium watching a screen because you can't see the band.  Give me a small room above a pub with a musician singing songs that actually mean something to him every day of the week.

I can't wait till Tim comes back

Deerhoof

Headliner: Deerhoof

Venue: Bodega Social Club Nottingham 

Date: 26 June 2013

Support: Dusty Bible

So it's been a while, this was the first gig since Dot to Dot but I guess that's the way it goes sometimes.

First up tonight was Dusty Bible a crazy Canadian fellow playing Beefheart style blues music, not so much a group, but more bass and drums back up for some crazy guitar work.

I'm not sure if they had much song structure or just finished the songs when the guitarist was bored.

Saying that.... I really enjoyed their set.

Next up Deerhoof, The last time I saw these was at Alexandra palace on the same bill as Dinosaur Jr and The Flaming Lips.  You don't need to be a genius to work out how epic that was!

Anyway Deerhoof are mental none of their songs make any sense... BUT at the same time make total sense.

I really enjoyed their set including the classic Panda, which I was annoying work colleagues with by singing all the next day at work.