Brum Notes Magazine - March 2014

1March 2014

www.brumnotes.com free

March 2014

music and lifestyle for the west midlands

PLUS: Juice / Is I Cinema / Capital SunAnd your guide to March’s best albums, art, gigs and club nights

INSIDE:

Franz Ferdinand MetronomyWe Are Scientists Also: We look ahead to Flatpack Festival and Frontiers Festival

RIDING HIGH

2 Brum Notes Magazine

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10.30pm-3.30am • £4 advOVER 18S ONLY - PROOF OF AGE REQUIRED

Mon 3rd Mar • £20 advMe First and the Gimme Gimmes+ Old Man Markley + Dead Frequency

Tues 4th Mar • £16.50 advRescheduled • original tickets valid

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Sat 8th Mar Bombay Bicycle Club+ Rae Morris

Sat 8th Mar • £11 advAngel Haze

Sun 9th Mar All Time Low+ Tonight Alive + Only Rivals

Sun 9th Mar • £16 adv6.30pm - 11pm

The English Beatft. original vocalist Dave Wakeling + very special guest Roddy Radiation + Tempting Rosie + The Bluebeat Arkestra

Thurs 13th Mar • £16.50 advThe Selecter35 Years of The Selecter

Fri 14th Mar • £12.50 adv6pm -10pm

God Is An Astronaut

Tues 18th Mar OneRepublic

Thurs 20th Mar Kodaline + James Bay

Fri 21st Mar • £22.50 adv6pm -10pm

Franz Ferdinand

Sat 22nd Mar • £23 advThe Stranglers40th Anniversary Tour + Nine Below Zero

Mon 24th Mar • £20 advMoved from The Institute, Birmingham • Original Tickets Still Valid

Daughtry

Tues 25th Mar • £21.60 advNME Tour 2014 with Austin, Texasft. Interpol + Temples + Royal Blood + Circa Waves

Thurs 27th Mar • £18.50 advAzealia Banks

Fri 28th Mar 6pm - 10pm

Five Finger Death Punch+ Upon A Burning Body + Pop Evil

Sat 29th Mar • £10 adv6pm - 10pm

Heaven’s Basement

Fri 4th Apr • £12.50 adv6pm - 10pm

Emblem3

Mon 7th Apr • £14 advHalestorm

Thurs 10th Apr • £11 advMemphis May Fire+ The Word Alive + Cytota

Sat 12th Apr • £20 advMatt Cardle

Weds 16th Apr • £20 adv6.30pm - 10pm • Rescheduled - original tickets valid

Within Temptation

Fri 18th Apr • £12 adv6pm - 10pm

The Summer Set

Sat 19th Apr • £8.50 adv5.30pm - 11pm

Ones To Watch ft. Fortunes + special guests

Tues 22nd Apr • £11.50 advUncle Acid and The Deadbeats

Thurs 24th Apr • £10 advBlood Red Shoes + DZ Deathrays + Slaves

Fri 25th Apr • £11 adv6.30pm - 10pm

The Smyths Celebrating 30 years since the release of The Smiths debut album, performing ‘The Smiths’ in full

Sat 26th Apr • £12 advBrody Dalle

Mon 28th Apr • £12.50 advVIP tickets £24.50 advPatent Pending & People On Vacation

Tues 29th Apr • £16.50 advClutch

Mon 5th May • £17.50 advAndrew Strong

Sat 10th May • £19.50 advEmbrace

Sat 17th May • £18.50 advRescheduled from 14th Nov 2013Original tickets valid

Professor Green

Sat 17th May • £5 adv6.30pm - 10.30pm

We Are Saviours

Sat 31st May • £27.50 advGraham Parker and The Rumour

Sun 15th June • £8 adv / £15 VIPAndy Jordan

Thurs 26th June • £15 advHeaven & Earth+ M.ILL.ION

Mon 7th July • £28.50 advExtreme

Sun 20th July • £13 adv6.30pm - 10pm

Ultimate Genesis

Mon 21st July • £12.50 adv6.30pm - 10pm

Onslaught

Tues 23rd Sept • £15 advPrimal Fear

Sat 27th Sept • £12 adv8pm - 1am • over 18s only

Quadrophenia Club NightBig Screen Film Show with DJ Drew Stansall (The Specials) plus The Atlantics (playing the movie hits) + The Coopers + The Birmingham Club A Go Go DJ’s

Sat 25th Oct • £15 advWeekend ticket £25 adv1pm -11pm

UK B-Boy Championships Knock-Out Jam

Sun 26th Oct • £15 advWeekend ticket £25 adv3pm -11pm

UK B-Boy Championships World Final

Thurs 30th Oct • £19.50 advJohn Newman

Fri 7th Nov • £16.50 adv5.30pm -10pm

Asking Alexandria

Fri 5th Dec • £15 adv6.30pm -10pm

Graham BonnetCatch the Rainbow Tour

Fri 12th Dec • £11.50 adv6.30pm -10pm

The Doors Alive

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Sun 2nd Mar • £12.50 adv Hats Off To Led Zeppelin

Tues 14th Mar • £7 adv Cypher16 & 61 Inch+ Adust + Fliesch+ The Reaper + A Mouth Full of Matches + Last Vendetta

Weds 5th Mar • £12.50 adv Mike PetersDeclaration Tour 2014Performing ‘Declaration’ in full

Thurs 6th Mar • £9 adv Brother and Bones + Midnight Bonfires

Fri 14th Mar • £5 adv 6pm - 10pm

Salopia + Dan Beckett + Spooky Wagons + Daniel Kirk + Mikey Marks

Sat 15th Mar • £6 adv 6.30pm - 10.30pm

Radio Charmers + Robert Craig Oulton + Static Irony + Ellie Dowen

Thurs 20th Mar • £10 adv Monster Truck & Scorpion Child

Sat 22nd Mar • £7 adv Rescheduled • original tickets valid

Natives

Sun 23rd Mar • £5 adv 6.30pm - 10.30pm

Octane OK + Bentley Park

Sat 29th Mar • £5 adv 6.45pm - 11pm

Valous + Balls Deep + Urgize + Ashes To Fall + De-Fault

Thurs 10th Apr • £7 adv The Last Carnival+ Redshift + The Colliers+ Room Service

Fri 11th Apr • £10 adv 6.30pm - 10pm

Novana (Nirvana Tribute) 20 years of In Utero, performing Album in full + A Poetic Yesterday

Sat 12th Apr • £10 adv Rescheduled • original tickets valid

Sex Pistols Experience+ Tommy Gun

Mon 21st Apr • £9 adv Sick Puppies + The Feud

Sun 27th Apr • £12 adv Norma Jean + Life Ruiner + Night Verses + Branson Hollis

Fri 2nd May • £10 adv 6.30pm - 10pm

Kazabian(Kasabian Tribute)

Tues 6th May • £8 adv Bad Rabbits

Tues 13th May • £10 adv Martin Stephenson & The Daintees+ Helen McCookerybook

Fri 23rd May 6pm - 10pm

The Upload Tour 3ft. Emma Blackery, BriBry & Dave Giles

Thurs 29th May • £9 adv The Riptide Movement

Sat 31st May • £10 adv Metallica Reloaded

Tues 9th Sept • £10 adv Pearl Jem (Pearl Jam Tribute)

Fri 19th Sept • £10 adv 6.30pm - 10pm

Definitely Mightbe (Oasis Tribute) 20 Year Celebration, Performing Definitely Maybe in Full

Fri 17th Oct • £10 adv 6.30pm - 10pm

The ModfathersThe UK’s Number 1 Tribute to Paul Weller & The Jam

Sat 8th Nov • £10 adv Antarctic Monkeys

PRESENTS

TICKETS AVAILABLE AT KIL IL IVE.COM

3March 2014

PRESENTS

TICKETS AVAILABLE AT KIL IL IVE.COM


5March 2014

CONTENTS

Regulars

News 6-7

Fresh Talent 10-11

Style 28-29

Food & Drink 30-31

Live Reviews 32-34

Album Reviews 36-37

Hotlist: Gigs 38

Hotlist: Club Nights 39

Hotlist: Arts & Culture 40

What’s On Guide 43-46

Music and Features

Behind the Scenes: Juice video shoot 8-9

Frontiers Festival 14-15

Flatpack Festival 16-17

Franz Ferdinand 20-21

We Are Scientists 22-23

Metronomy 24-25

Bombay Bicycle Club 26-27

All content © Brum Notes Magazine. Views expressed are those of the author, not necessarily Brum Notes Magazine.

While all care has been taken to ensure the accuracy of content, Brum Notes Magazine will not be held liable for any

errors or losses claimed to have been incurred by any errors. Advertising terms and conditions available on request.

Foals live at the O2 Academy. Read the review on P32. Photo by Andy Hughes

Brum Notes Magazine Unit 12 The Bond 180-182 Fazeley Street BirminghamB5 [email protected] 0121 224 7363 Advertising0121 224 7363 [email protected]! 0121 224 7364

Editor: Chris MoriartyContributorsWords: David Vincent, Daron Billings, Dan Cooper-Gavin, Ed Ling, Ben Calvert, Jonathan Pritchard, Andy Roberts, Ivy PhotiouNew Music Editor: Amy Sumner Arts Editor: Dan Cooper-GavinFood & Drink Editor: Daron BillingsPictures: Andy Hughes, Wayne Fox, Jonathan Morgan, Jane Williams, Chloe MylesCover photo: Andy HughesStyle editor: Jade [email protected] Design: Adam Williams, Andy Aitken

ConnectTwitter: @BrumNotesMagFacebook: www.facebook.com/BrumNotesMagazineOnline: www.brumnotes.com


pSyCh STarS TEmplES addEd TO bill fOr luNar fESTivalPsychedelic newcomers Temples are the latest act to be announced for this year’s Lunar Festival. The Kettering outfit, whose acclaimed debut album Sun Structures hit number seven in the album charts on its release, will perform on the main stage on Saturday, June 7, before headliner Donovan. Lunar Festival runs from June 6 to 8 at Umberslade Estate near Solihull. Also on the bill are British Sea Power, The Polyphonic Spree, Pram, Tim Burgess, Toy, Wide Eyed, Goodnight Lenin, Victories at Sea and more, along with club nights from Sensateria and Magic Garden. Temples are also live at The Institute, Birmingham, on March 4 and the O2 Academy on March 25.

mOSElEy fOlk TO CuraTE NEw pOp-up villagE aT ST paTriCk’S paradE A new pop-up ‘village’ will add an extra musical edge to this year’s St Patrick’s celebrations in Birmingham. The annual St Patrick’s Day Parade will take over the Digbeth area of the city on Sunday, March 16. And this year will see the unveiling of The Emerald Village, a new entertainment area inside The Custard Factory.

Music will be curated by Moseley Folk Festival, with the best in Irish and local folk music performed in the Emerald Village Garden in the Zellig car park, including a set from The Old Dance School.

The Emerald Village, which will be open from midday to 6pm and be free to enter, will also feature an indoor market from Sutton Vintage Fairs and drinks tents run by The Old Crown, plus buskers, Irish food and more. There will also be an alcohol-free family zone hosting a variety of activities, including a drum workshop from Drum Together Brum and kids’ football activities from Footy Bugs.

The main St Patrick’s Parade runs from midday to 4pm on March 16 (one day before the saint’s day itself), following the usual route from Camp Hill, along Digbeth High Street and up towards the Bullring. This year’s parade will have a theme of Irish Myths and Legends, with an Irish dragon leading the procession of floats, vehicles, community groups, pipers and drummers and more.

For details visit www.theemeraldvillage.co.uk or www.stpatricksbirmingham.com.

radiO CONTEST TO COmplETE liNE-up Bands in Birmingham are invited to apply for the chance to open up a special Amazing Radio gig taking place at the Mac. Jacky P & Amazing Radio Presents… is on April 4, with performances from Sylvia, The American Pi-lot and The Little Deaths. One more band is wanted to complete the line-up, with entries being played on the radio show to a panel of judges on March 26, and the winner being announced on air. To enter, email tracks to [email protected]. Tickets for the April 4 gig are £7 from www.macarts.co.uk.

ThE all amEriCaN rEjECTS TO hEadliNE wOlvErhampON’S Slam duNk fESTival Slam Dunk Festival will return to Wolverhampton in May, with The All American Rejects unveiled as the headline act. The one-day festival brings together the best in pop-punk, ska, alt-rock and more, and will take over the Civic Hall and surrounding area on bank holiday Monday, May 26. As well as All American Rejects making their only UK performances of the year, the line-up also include the likes of Letlive, The Ghost Inside, Goldfinger, I Killed the Prom Queen and Canterbury, plus many more. The action takes place across seven indoor and outdoor stages and will be the festival’s biggest instalment yet, after selling out on its debut in Wolverhampton last year.

Tickets cost £35 or £39 including the after party, plus booking fees, and are available now from www.wolvescivic.co.uk.

fEmalE arTS COllECTivE lauNChES A brand new Birmingham-based collective celebrating women in the arts, music and the creative industries launches its first event this month. Alto, billed as a Creative Female Collective, will take over Cherry Reds in John Bright Street in the city centre on Sunday, March 23, from 3pm with a vast array of art and photography exhibitions, film screenings plus live performances from musicians and spoken word artists. To find out more and for the full line-up visit www.facebook.com/alto-communityuk or follow @altocommunityuk .P

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7March 2014

SwaNS TO hEadliNE iNTimaTE EdiTiON Of SupErSONiCSwans, Matmos and Wolf Eyes will headline the next instalment of Supersonic Festival, which returns to Birmingham in May.

Supersonic Festival Ltd Edtn will be a more intimate offering than recent festivals, taking place at its original home of The Custard Factory in Digbeth from May 30 to 31.

The experimental music and arts festival, which first launched back in 2003, took a year off in 2013 while founders Capsule curated the opening season at the new Library of Birmingham.

But demand for the 2014 event is expected to be higher than ever, with just 400 weekend tickets available. Confirmed acts include Swans, Matmos, Wolf Eyes, Ex Easter Island Head, Sleaford Mods, Agathe Max, Basic House and Jenny Hval, with more to be announced. There will also be a presentation and workshop from sonic explorers If Wet as well as Bill Drummond’s The 25 Paintings exhibition.

Tickets for the event are priced at £45 for a weekend pass and are on sale now from www.theticketsellers.co.uk.

Swans

10Th birThday CElEbraTiONS fOr ThE raiNbOwAdventurous clubbing complex The Rainbow in Digbeth celebrates its 10th birthday in style next month with a weekend of street and warehouse parties.

The full line-up is being kept under wraps for now but expect some of the most exciting names in dance music, alongside a strong line-up of local talent on the decks performing across the weekend of April 19 and 20.

Acts already revealed include Adam Shelton, Alex Arnout, Bastian, Jordan Lott and Knicker Bocker Corey. Some of Birmingham’s most respected house, underground and alternative clubbing brands are also joining forces for the huge weekend, including Bigger Than Barry, Below, Dolce Vita, FACE, Seedy Sonics, Shadow City and many more.

Celebrations will take places across all the spaces that make up The Rainbow Venues, including a daytime street and warehouse party on Sunday, April 20.

Tickets start from £10. For more details and line-up announcements see www.facebook.com/therainbowvenues.


“We shot it at local all-girl run arts collec-tive STRYX in Digbeth, opposite the famous ColdRice HQ. The shoots consisted of smoke, lights, a toy prism lens, oil lamps, friends and drinks. We shot the video for a grand total of £50 and edited it ourselves with close friend Mike Smith.

“The idea for the video came from those psychedelic warehouse parties in the 60s that would go on for 12 hours. We wanted something to hit you in the face...hard.

“The song can only ever be what you think it’s about in your own head...we’re not saying a word.”

Sugar is streaming on YouTube now at www.youtube.com/btownjuice1.

The first track to see sunlight from local Brit-guitar act Juice, Sugar was a Valentine’s Day gift to the world, uploaded to YouTube where it notched up over 2,000 views in its first week. Guitarist Tom Holloway tells us about the hazily psychedelic video.

Photos by Andy Hughes

9March 2014

“We shot it at local all-girl run arts collec-tive STRYX in Digbeth, opposite the famous ColdRice HQ. The shoots consisted of smoke, lights, a toy prism lens, oil lamps, friends and drinks. We shot the video for a grand total of £50 and edited it ourselves with close friend Mike Smith.

“The idea for the video came from those psychedelic warehouse parties in the 60s that would go on for 12 hours. We wanted something to hit you in the face...hard.

“The song can only ever be what you think it’s about in your own head...we’re not saying a word.”

Sugar is streaming on YouTube now at www.youtube.com/btownjuice1.

The first track to see sunlight from local Brit-guitar act Juice, Sugar was a Valentine’s Day gift to the world, uploaded to YouTube where it notched up over 2,000 views in its first week. Guitarist Tom Holloway tells us about the hazily psychedelic video.

Photos by Andy Hughes


facebook.com/capitalsun

“Our album [debut record Mr Nobody which is set for release later this year] was record-ed semi-live with Grammy-nominated pro-ducer Chris Tsangarides – bass, drums and a few acoustic guitar tracks, all live with no click track,” explains vocalist and guitarist Glen Boden, getting us up to speed on his band Capital Sun.

“We wanted the album to have that live feel and Chris nailed that sound for us. I sup-pose when we play those tracks at a show we take more musical risks, because if we stuck to the recorded version note for note, we wouldn’t enjoy it and if we didn’t enjoy it, we would be really boring to watch...which we’re not,” he explains. “I started writing acoustic songs and go-ing out and gigging at open mic nights. I asked my friend Andy Smith if he wanted to join me, then as my songwriting got bet-ter, I thought of putting a band together for a bigger sound. I asked family friend (who I also went to college with) Luke Weston if he wanted to play bass, and we auditioned Chris Taylor for drums, as recommended by my uncle. It didn’t take us long to gel both as a band and as friends after we discussed our personal musical influences.”

Their formation in late 2013 seems a long time ago now considering what they’ve

achieved in between, including support slots with both The View and The Enemy. “We got our debut album Mr Nobody all finished at the end of last year and we are now getting all the final bits like al-bum art and promotion tied up and ready for release.” Capturing a late 70s Brit-rock style and combining with modern indie rock hooks, the band namecheck Supertramp, The Beatles, Fleetwood Mac and Neil Young as influences whilst describing them-selves as “Crosby Stills and Nash and Led Zeppelin’s illegitimate child”. “Luke and I both love harmonies,” con-tinues Glen, “we have been playing mu-sic together for over 12 years so we can read each other like a Roald Dahl. The harmonies come very naturally, and it’s something people seem to like about us.” A flurry of recent live shows culminates with a free show at The Loft in Moseley on March 28. “Expect excitement,” says Glen, “we’ve never played at The Loft before and we have a new song called Hands Off Time, so we’ll be playing that!”

Capital Sun are live at The Loft, Moseley, on March 28. Entry is free.

yOuTh maNWide AwakeA five-and-a-half minute progression of a song which slows to a stand around the two minute mark before driving to its ma-levolent crescendo. Perfect 80s American punk but with the trio’s post-punk menace stamped all over it.www.youthmanband.com

blaCk dOllar billSStolenSlice of dirty garage blues from the rock’n’roll quartet, who combine BRMC with The Vines to create their catchiest yet – fast paced and sleazy in all the right quantities.soundcloud.com/blackdollarbills

viCTOrPorkSix minutes of deliciously distorted heavy grunge noise which mounts to what we’re fairly sure the end of the world sounds like. Ascribe your own meaning to the title. soundcloud.com/victorband

jump ThE SharkThere’s Always OneCarefree and youthful fun from female-front-ed Wolverhampton four-piece, with an aver-age age of just 17. Jubilant vocals, indie-pop guitars – it’s a catchy little thing indeed. soundcloud.com/jumptheshark-1

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Capital Sun

Words by Amy Sumner

11March 2014

ONES TO waTChaNimaWith influences from Smash-ing Pumpkins to Placebo, ANi-MA are an abrasive punk rock force to be reckoned with. But with a psychology-inspired name they’re a contemplative lot too. Energetic, concentrated rock. Watch them: March 7, The Wagon & Horses, Digbeth

OhbOyJust four months old, the XFM-championed Northampton four-piece are set to release their debut EP this month. Special-ising in short blasts of indie pop noise, a flurry of upcoming shows accompany the release.Watch them: March 25, The Actress & Bishop

ThE ÁNdalESBorn out of admiration for Ser-gio Leone, Love and Pixies, Cov-entry quintet The Ándales craft hook-laden guitar music. A no-table bass funk underlies Chile-an rhythm and is carried off with a swagger. Watch them: March 5, The Coal Vaults, Coventry

wOmENBass-less rock and punk trio cit-ing influences as “nothing with the word ‘core’ on the end of it”. Heavily dynamic EP Sleepin’ Blues is available now and their live show has a reputation for be-ing fearsomely frenetic.Watch them: March 6, The Bull’s Head, Moseley

is i Cinemafacebook.com/is.i.cinema.band

“Playing fewer gigs has been a bit of a bless-ing for the brand of the group,” says lead singer Dom Fletcher of Is I Cinema’s choice selection of live performances over the past couple of years. “We’re seen as old timers offering a rare treat now.” Like putting on your best party dress or when your mum gets out her good plates. Formed in 2007, Is I Cinema put in the hours on the local circuit to establish themselves on a level where bagging shows with various flavours of the month was a happy reoccurrence. Their word of mouth reputation for an enter-taining live repertoire began to bubble away. Professing to have taken their name from a droll exchange which took place between Dom and a Tube-traveller (‘what you looking at bruv? Is I Cinema?’) and with a stalwart penchant for performing live readings from whatever book happens to be lining their pockets at the time (past hits include The Observer’s Book of Freshwater Fish and the Westlife biography – “it’s performance and it’s meant to be fun and entertaining. People say the readings undermine the in-telligence of the music, but it’s important to have a sense of irony”), Is I Cinema have the side-story sorted. Musically, they tempt comparisons to post-OK Computer Radio-head with dashings of experimental fusion and prog rock and an exacting balance be-tween mellow and its contrast. Apocrypha’s hostile progression, which begins with beau-tifully picked guitars and develops into ex-tended synth-backed menace, is genuinely disconcerting; The Unnamed is softer, drip-ping in its beautifully harmonic lament whilst the driving guitar/drums combination of Te-starossa sits somewhere in between with its reinforced moniker ‘Deliver us from the

weekend, I’ve had my fill of leisure’.

“The longer we go on, the more vital I’m be-ginning to think our sound is getting,” says Dom. “I used to be really worried that we didn’t seem to have a guiding aesthetic, but now I see that as a major blessing, especial-ly with so many bands sounding like carbon copies of some vaguely remembered past. If you think we are pretentious, you’d be sur-prised at the heavy bits. If you think we’re shoegaze, you’d be surprised by the me-lodic clarity. If you think it’s all about tunes, we’ve brought two drum kits – we’re full of contradiction.” Is I Cinema like to poke more than a little fun. In terms of the future though, well, there is one! “I’ve been drawing up plans for a new EP,” Dom explains, “more fully realised and, hopefully, more home produced [than 2010 EP, You Are Physics]. It’s in its infancy, but there are a number of songs that haven’t been set in stone yet that I’d like us to get out there. I want to create something that’s

consistent and that we really feel owner-ship over.”

It’s a hard slog, creating something that justly represents both your interests and your ca-pabilities, let alone one which accurately em-bodies a period of over four years together. There’s something rather final-feeling about a record – it’s just that, a record of crea-tive output embodying a particular period in time. The transient moment of the live show is something a little easier to address how-ever, and they’ll be doing that at The Bull’s Head on March 6. A final thought to finish? “Always vote in elections, even if you spoil your ballot pa-per. There’s nothing cool about being absti-nent. Gove has to be stopped at any cost.” Is I Cinema have your back.

Is I Cinema headline the Brum Notes March Issue Launch Party at The Bull’s Head, Moseley, on March 6. Entry is £3.


Give It All Tour

Thursday 13th March 2014

Luke CONCANNON (Nizlopi) JIMMY DAVIS

Tickets - www.hareandhoundskingsheath.co.uk

BIRMINGHAM

HARE & HOUNDSKINGS HEATH

“Two major influences on me” Ed SheeranA night of soul fired Folk, Hip-Hop, Reggae, Spoken Word& Soul. Two of the MIdlands finest artists bring music that speaks to the hunger in the world for meaning, community

and joy. Music with passion, heart & fire!

13March 2014


For two weeks this month and next – with a third week to follow in June – the Frontiers Festival presents a scintillating programme of leading-edge music and art, with Birmingham Conserva-toire and Third Ear combining to showcase the swashbuckling titans of the Big Apple’s experi-mental scene.

Among the many highlights, electronic pioneer Pauline Oliveros is in town, performing a live tele-matic improvisation with collaborators across the Atlantic, as well as leading a Deep Listening Medi-tation at the Ikon Gallery. There’ll also be a 24-hour Thelonious Monk marathon, a new piece for 1,000 vocalists by David Lang, a big-band improv take on Elliott Sharp’s graphical score Foliage, and the fi rst ever fully-realised performance of Robert Ashley’s 1972 work String Quartet Describing The Motions Of Large Real Bodies, in which live sounds from the Elysian Quartet will be processed in real time by 42 laptop artists.

Alongside the aural delights will be SCORE, an exhibition at the Library of Birmingham exploring the visual representation of music, displaying a range of creative notation systems.

We spoke to Frontiers’ curator, Third Ear’s Ed McKeon, to fi nd out more.

It could be said that Birmingham and New York make for unlikely bedfellows – do you see similarities between the cities?

You’d be surprised. Many people have been drawn to Birmingham because it has a history of free

thinking and nonconformist living. It’s one reason so many migrants have settled here and fi nd a home that isn’t “home”. When you look into the radical arts scenes in New York, very few of the artists were native to the city.

There are also musical connections. Henry Cow’s drummer Chris Cutler, who played an impor-tant role in New York from the late 70s, is the uncle of Joe Cutler, the Conservatoire’s Head of Composition. There’s a reason why the composi-tion department here is probably the most radical and open-minded in the UK. And Rhys Chatham, whose A Secret Rose for 100 guitars we’ll be presenting at the Town Hall in June, references Tony Iommi’s guitar playing and detuned technique as an important infl uence on the direction he took with his Guitar Trio that shook up no wave and alternative rock from the mid-to-late 70s.

Perhaps Alexis de Tocqueville, the French politi-cal theorist and historian who fi rst observed the US in the 19th century, might still be right in his assessment of Birmingham as “intelligent, but in the American way”.

How diffi cult was it to entice everybody to come and perform in Birmingham?

It wasn’t particularly hard. Having partners like the Library of Birmingham, Ikon, Flatpack and others on board certainly helps – after all, not many cities would have the courage and foresight to create the library that we now have.

Some of the featured works are quite high-concept – tell us more about, for example, the Robert Ashley piece with 42 laptop artists.

Robert Ashley has been ahead of his time, it’s as simple as that. The crazy thing is, though, that it’s not at all arcane. If anything, it’s profoundly human – his music has always been about the experience of it, as much about the social situa-tion as the sounds involved. It’s no different with the piece with 42 laptop artists. What counts is how the networks of players are not singly in control, but create a kind of community in which the sound changes through collective awareness and cooperation. No solo heroics!

The string players have possibly the most radical score ever written for quartet – they have to bow at high pressure, as slowly as possible, aiming for about one bow every ten minutes. That’s about 1/30th of the ‘usual’ slowest bow speed. When we usually hear a violin, we might be attracted

by the smooth violin sound, but what we completely miss are the harmonics and resonances of the instrument itself that go into making the sound. And here, we’re invited to listen to these, just as the laptop artists have to.

Is it fair to say that, with a lot of the works, the concept and methodology are just as important as the sonic end product? Is this what makes the SCORE exhibition such a good fi t for the festival?

Music is simply socially-embodied sound. In that sense, the sonic end product is absolutely an expression of the concept, methodology and culture that go into making it.

I’m so happy with this exhibition. Musical notation as we’ve come to know it attempts to represent sound. But if you accept the idea that sound is, peculiarly, only part of our experience of it – for example, a G above middle C played by an electric guitar in a club is simply not the same as the same G played in a concert hall – then you begin to real-ise how little information notation contains. That opens up the fi eld to other ways of imagining music, using imagery, poetry, text, colour, shape and structure. In particular, this way of making music invites musicians to really think about the music and let it get under their skin. After all, as long as musicians simply play what conventional notation tells them, there’s little obligation on them to think about what the sound is doing, or what they’re really doing.

Is it fair to consider Frontiers a niche festival? Was there an attempt to appeal to a relatively broad audience, or is it intended for the already-initiated?

One of my fi rst musical loves was Blondie, and at the same time I’ve found myself drawn to music that seems ‘out there’. Over time, what I’ve come to appreciate is how intimately connected ‘out there’ is to the ‘mainstream’, whatever that may be. It didn’t surprise me when Debbie Harry worked with Elliott Sharp, for example.

I hope there is some-thing in the festival for most people, and that, given a little patience and respect, you might fi nd that some-thing which seems ‘out there’ is actually much closer to home, and much more of an expe-rience, than you might think. And that means taking risks. But then if you want to live a little, you have to take a few…

Frontiers begins on March 22. Visit www.frontiersmusic.org for details.

This month marks the beginning of a mind-expanding musical journey,

with Birmingham taken over by the avant-garde sounds of downtown

New York. Dan Cooper-Gavin looks ahead to the Frontiers Festival.

Transatlanticism

Robert Ashley

Elysian Quartet

Rhys Chatham

Elliott Sharp Crimson Grail

Carl Stone

Oliveros

15March 2014

For two weeks this month and next – with a third week to follow in June – the Frontiers Festival presents a scintillating programme of leading-edge music and art, with Birmingham Conserva-toire and Third Ear combining to showcase the swashbuckling titans of the Big Apple’s experi-mental scene.

Among the many highlights, electronic pioneer Pauline Oliveros is in town, performing a live tele-matic improvisation with collaborators across the Atlantic, as well as leading a Deep Listening Medi-tation at the Ikon Gallery. There’ll also be a 24-hour Thelonious Monk marathon, a new piece for 1,000 vocalists by David Lang, a big-band improv take on Elliott Sharp’s graphical score Foliage, and the fi rst ever fully-realised performance of Robert Ashley’s 1972 work String Quartet Describing The Motions Of Large Real Bodies, in which live sounds from the Elysian Quartet will be processed in real time by 42 laptop artists.

Alongside the aural delights will be SCORE, an exhibition at the Library of Birmingham exploring the visual representation of music, displaying a range of creative notation systems.

We spoke to Frontiers’ curator, Third Ear’s Ed McKeon, to fi nd out more.

It could be said that Birmingham and New York make for unlikely bedfellows – do you see similarities between the cities?

You’d be surprised. Many people have been drawn to Birmingham because it has a history of free

thinking and nonconformist living. It’s one reason so many migrants have settled here and fi nd a home that isn’t “home”. When you look into the radical arts scenes in New York, very few of the artists were native to the city.

There are also musical connections. Henry Cow’s drummer Chris Cutler, who played an impor-tant role in New York from the late 70s, is the uncle of Joe Cutler, the Conservatoire’s Head of Composition. There’s a reason why the composi-tion department here is probably the most radical and open-minded in the UK. And Rhys Chatham, whose A Secret Rose for 100 guitars we’ll be presenting at the Town Hall in June, references Tony Iommi’s guitar playing and detuned technique as an important infl uence on the direction he took with his Guitar Trio that shook up no wave and alternative rock from the mid-to-late 70s.

Perhaps Alexis de Tocqueville, the French politi-cal theorist and historian who fi rst observed the US in the 19th century, might still be right in his assessment of Birmingham as “intelligent, but in the American way”.

How diffi cult was it to entice everybody to come and perform in Birmingham?

It wasn’t particularly hard. Having partners like the Library of Birmingham, Ikon, Flatpack and others on board certainly helps – after all, not many cities would have the courage and foresight to create the library that we now have.

Some of the featured works are quite high-concept – tell us more about, for example, the Robert Ashley piece with 42 laptop artists.

Robert Ashley has been ahead of his time, it’s as simple as that. The crazy thing is, though, that it’s not at all arcane. If anything, it’s profoundly human – his music has always been about the experience of it, as much about the social situa-tion as the sounds involved. It’s no different with the piece with 42 laptop artists. What counts is how the networks of players are not singly in control, but create a kind of community in which the sound changes through collective awareness and cooperation. No solo heroics!

The string players have possibly the most radical score ever written for quartet – they have to bow at high pressure, as slowly as possible, aiming for about one bow every ten minutes. That’s about 1/30th of the ‘usual’ slowest bow speed. When we usually hear a violin, we might be attracted

by the smooth violin sound, but what we completely miss are the harmonics and resonances of the instrument itself that go into making the sound. And here, we’re invited to listen to these, just as the laptop artists have to.

Is it fair to say that, with a lot of the works, the concept and methodology are just as important as the sonic end product? Is this what makes the SCORE exhibition such a good fi t for the festival?

Music is simply socially-embodied sound. In that sense, the sonic end product is absolutely an expression of the concept, methodology and culture that go into making it.

I’m so happy with this exhibition. Musical notation as we’ve come to know it attempts to represent sound. But if you accept the idea that sound is, peculiarly, only part of our experience of it – for example, a G above middle C played by an electric guitar in a club is simply not the same as the same G played in a concert hall – then you begin to real-ise how little information notation contains. That opens up the fi eld to other ways of imagining music, using imagery, poetry, text, colour, shape and structure. In particular, this way of making music invites musicians to really think about the music and let it get under their skin. After all, as long as musicians simply play what conventional notation tells them, there’s little obligation on them to think about what the sound is doing, or what they’re really doing.

Is it fair to consider Frontiers a niche festival? Was there an attempt to appeal to a relatively broad audience, or is it intended for the already-initiated?

One of my fi rst musical loves was Blondie, and at the same time I’ve found myself drawn to music that seems ‘out there’. Over time, what I’ve come to appreciate is how intimately connected ‘out there’ is to the ‘mainstream’, whatever that may be. It didn’t surprise me when Debbie Harry worked with Elliott Sharp, for example.

I hope there is some-thing in the festival for most people, and that, given a little patience and respect, you might fi nd that some-thing which seems ‘out there’ is actually much closer to home, and much more of an expe-rience, than you might think. And that means taking risks. But then if you want to live a little, you have to take a few…

Frontiers begins on March 22. Visit www.frontiersmusic.org for details.

This month marks the beginning of a mind-expanding musical journey,

with Birmingham taken over by the avant-garde sounds of downtown

New York. Dan Cooper-Gavin looks ahead to the Frontiers Festival.

Transatlanticism

Robert Ashley

Elysian Quartet

Rhys Chatham

Elliott Sharp Crimson Grail

Carl Stone

Oliveros


It’s that time again – the peerless Flatpack Film Festival returns for an eighth year, showering Birmingham with an abundance of off-kilter cinematic gems for 11 days and nights. Dan Cooper-Gavin picks out the highlights.

Adventures in Film

arts & culture

They Took Us to the Sea

DVD Bang

This World Made ItselfPhono Cinema Theatre

Silent Running

This World Made Itself This World Made Itself

Flatpack Film Festival runs from March 20–30. For full details, visit www.flatpackfestival.org.uk.

Prepare to have your mind opened and your imagination set ablaze, as 2014’s Flat-pack Film Festival is bursting at the seams with forgotten classics, global oddities, live performances, animation for all ages, and so much more besides. Here’s what we’ve circled with our highlighter pen…

March 20This year’s festival opens with events across the city centre, including Fleapit Cinema in the Great Western Arcade, where you pick the films of your choice via your smartphone, a Street Photography documentary and exhibition at 6/8 Kafé, and a dinner-and-film night at Opus on Cornwall Street, with a seasonal market meal followed by Clark Gable in 1934’s It Happened One Night – the first film to win all five major Oscars. There’s also the enchanting delights of the Victorian Magic Lantern Show at Winter-bourne House and Garden, while BIAD hosts Now You See It, Now You Don’t, featuring the mind-melting music-video work of Jared Raab.

March 21Yorks Bakery Café is the venue for the annual Video Jukebox, showcasing the most inven-tive music promos of the past 12 months. From there, it’s a quick jog over to the Elec-tric Cinema for The Punk Singer, Sini Anderson’s documentary about riot grrrl icon Kathleen Hanna. Afterwards, Cherry Reds on John Bright Street will be spinning tunes from Hanna’s various projects. Meanwhile, the Birmingham and Midland Institute hosts

The Sound Of Mind, a revelatory combina-tion of film, animation, readings and live foley from The Cabinet of Living Cinema.

March 22Start the day at the Ikon with Water-Mirror Of Granada, an improbable, ahead-of-its-time audio-visual trip from Franco-era Spain, before heading to 6/8 Kafé for an afternoon of light painting, with Slow Light rounding up a range of long-exposure experiments, before Japanese duo Tochka lead a Light Painting Workshop. The Old Joint Stock has a triple bill of Charlie Chaplin shorts in Chaplin: A Century On Screen, while the evening’s highlights include The Last Laugh, FW Murnau’s landmark silent film, showing at Hotel du Vin, and The Strange Colour Of Your Body’s Tears at the Electric Cinema, a visceral cinematic rollercoaster from Belgium.

March 23The Electric Cinema welcomes Saint Etienne’s Bob Stanley to present a Pop Double-Bill, two films about near-forgotten teen sensations – the young Paul Anka and the Jimmy Osmond-alike Darren Burn. Mean-while, the Barber Institute has Phono-Ciné-ma-Théâtre, extraordinary short films that wowed visitors to the 1900 Paris Exposition and which have lain in obscurity ever since. Later, Birmingham Cathedral hosts one of the festival’s marquee attractions, a screen-ing of the restored Murnau classic Nosfer-atu, with live accompaniment provided by members of Pram and Misty’s Big Adventure.

March 24Today marks the opening of DVDBANG at the Custard Factory. An import from the streets of South Korea, it’s a booth big enough for eight people at a time – lying within is a choice of over 30 Korean films, plus all manner of local snacks and drinks to guzzle on.

March 25It’s a fine day to check out Swipeside, Flat-pack’s brand new strand, which takes place at Birmingham City University’s new Park-side building. Today’s Swipeside highlight is Pärnography, a selection of striking shorts from the Estonian cartoonist and director Priit Pärn, followed by a talk from the man himself. Meanwhile, the Library of Birming-ham screens Baal, a rarely-seen early 80s TV drama starring David Bowie.

March 26The Electric Cinema hosts Evolutionary Road, the annual round-up of animation from across the globe, while Ort hosts The Magic Cinema, a celebration of DIY filmmaking in which local practitioners are invited to present their work.

March 27Another festival highlight arrives in the form of This World Made Itself at the Library of Birmingham – Miwa Matreyek’s take on the history of the earth, as realised through animation, shadow puppetry and music from Flying Lotus. Meanwhile, the Custard Factory is the place to be for an intriguing

double bill of local interest. Year Zero: Black Country explores the arrival of migrants into Sandwell in the 1960s, while Some Day I’ll Find You is a fascinating tale concerning mysterious sketchings of Mario Lanza found in pubs across the region.

March 28There’s plenty from the wonderful New York director Bill Morrison in this year’s programme, including his moving film The Miners’ Hymns, charting the decline of the industry in the north-east of England. Else-where, the atrium at Millennium Point will be transformed into the set of early-70s sci-fi flick Silent Running, with the screen-ing of said film preceded by a re-edit of Peter Fonda’s contemporary time-travel movie Idaho Transfer, complete with live soundtrack. Meanwhile, the Custard Facto-ry hosts a mind-bending evening of video essays in Smoke And Mirrors, followed by a fascinating look at the USSR’s electronic age in Elektro Moskva, while the recently-revived cult psychedelic night Sensateria features a performance from Swedish band The Orange Revival.

March 29In the afternoon, stop by the Mac for 70s children’s oddity Hugo The Hippo, before calling into the Custard Factory for Sidewalk Poetry, a selection of pieces from experi-mental filmmaker Henry Hills. Later, the Elec-tric Cinema has Mirage Men, examining the American intelligence services’ relation-ship with UFO conspiracy theories, while the

Flatpack Palais hosts Solipsism Cinema, an optical feedback performance from Stephen Cornford. Bill Morrison will be at the Mac to introduce a screening of The Great Flood, his film compiling archive footage of the Mississippi bursting its banks in 1927. Viva VHS presents two obscure horror flicks from the video-rental era at the Custard Facto-ry Theatre, while Channel 4’s experimental shorts series Random Acts pitches up at the Flatpack Kavarna for a party, with DJs playing alongside the films.

March 30Handsworth poet Roy Fisher is the subject of the documentary Birmingham’s What I Think With at the Mac, while the Custard Factory Theatre hosts the latest Post Avant-garde Animation from Austria. The Flatpack Palais has Occupy Music, a documenta-ry about Brazil’s revolutionary indie music scene, followed by More Canals Than Venice, a film chockfull of fascinating facts about Brum. And at the Electric Cinema, there’s the final Bill Morrison screening – his debut film Decasia, in which the main feature is the decaying celluloid itself – before Lost And Refound pays tribute to Morrison’s assemblage of archive footage by round-ing up the irreverent work of other splicers.

17March 2014

It’s that time again – the peerless Flatpack Film Festival returns for an eighth year, showering Birmingham with an abundance of off-kilter cinematic gems for 11 days and nights. Dan Cooper-Gavin picks out the highlights.

Adventures in Film

arts & culture

They Took Us to the Sea

DVD Bang

This World Made ItselfPhono Cinema Theatre

Silent Running

This World Made Itself This World Made Itself

Flatpack Film Festival runs from March 20–30. For full details, visit www.flatpackfestival.org.uk.

Prepare to have your mind opened and your imagination set ablaze, as 2014’s Flat-pack Film Festival is bursting at the seams with forgotten classics, global oddities, live performances, animation for all ages, and so much more besides. Here’s what we’ve circled with our highlighter pen…

March 20This year’s festival opens with events across the city centre, including Fleapit Cinema in the Great Western Arcade, where you pick the films of your choice via your smartphone, a Street Photography documentary and exhibition at 6/8 Kafé, and a dinner-and-film night at Opus on Cornwall Street, with a seasonal market meal followed by Clark Gable in 1934’s It Happened One Night – the first film to win all five major Oscars. There’s also the enchanting delights of the Victorian Magic Lantern Show at Winter-bourne House and Garden, while BIAD hosts Now You See It, Now You Don’t, featuring the mind-melting music-video work of Jared Raab.

March 21Yorks Bakery Café is the venue for the annual Video Jukebox, showcasing the most inven-tive music promos of the past 12 months. From there, it’s a quick jog over to the Elec-tric Cinema for The Punk Singer, Sini Anderson’s documentary about riot grrrl icon Kathleen Hanna. Afterwards, Cherry Reds on John Bright Street will be spinning tunes from Hanna’s various projects. Meanwhile, the Birmingham and Midland Institute hosts

The Sound Of Mind, a revelatory combina-tion of film, animation, readings and live foley from The Cabinet of Living Cinema.

March 22Start the day at the Ikon with Water-Mirror Of Granada, an improbable, ahead-of-its-time audio-visual trip from Franco-era Spain, before heading to 6/8 Kafé for an afternoon of light painting, with Slow Light rounding up a range of long-exposure experiments, before Japanese duo Tochka lead a Light Painting Workshop. The Old Joint Stock has a triple bill of Charlie Chaplin shorts in Chaplin: A Century On Screen, while the evening’s highlights include The Last Laugh, FW Murnau’s landmark silent film, showing at Hotel du Vin, and The Strange Colour Of Your Body’s Tears at the Electric Cinema, a visceral cinematic rollercoaster from Belgium.

March 23The Electric Cinema welcomes Saint Etienne’s Bob Stanley to present a Pop Double-Bill, two films about near-forgotten teen sensations – the young Paul Anka and the Jimmy Osmond-alike Darren Burn. Mean-while, the Barber Institute has Phono-Ciné-ma-Théâtre, extraordinary short films that wowed visitors to the 1900 Paris Exposition and which have lain in obscurity ever since. Later, Birmingham Cathedral hosts one of the festival’s marquee attractions, a screen-ing of the restored Murnau classic Nosfer-atu, with live accompaniment provided by members of Pram and Misty’s Big Adventure.

March 24Today marks the opening of DVDBANG at the Custard Factory. An import from the streets of South Korea, it’s a booth big enough for eight people at a time – lying within is a choice of over 30 Korean films, plus all manner of local snacks and drinks to guzzle on.

March 25It’s a fine day to check out Swipeside, Flat-pack’s brand new strand, which takes place at Birmingham City University’s new Park-side building. Today’s Swipeside highlight is Pärnography, a selection of striking shorts from the Estonian cartoonist and director Priit Pärn, followed by a talk from the man himself. Meanwhile, the Library of Birming-ham screens Baal, a rarely-seen early 80s TV drama starring David Bowie.

March 26The Electric Cinema hosts Evolutionary Road, the annual round-up of animation from across the globe, while Ort hosts The Magic Cinema, a celebration of DIY filmmaking in which local practitioners are invited to present their work.

March 27Another festival highlight arrives in the form of This World Made Itself at the Library of Birmingham – Miwa Matreyek’s take on the history of the earth, as realised through animation, shadow puppetry and music from Flying Lotus. Meanwhile, the Custard Factory is the place to be for an intriguing

double bill of local interest. Year Zero: Black Country explores the arrival of migrants into Sandwell in the 1960s, while Some Day I’ll Find You is a fascinating tale concerning mysterious sketchings of Mario Lanza found in pubs across the region.

March 28There’s plenty from the wonderful New York director Bill Morrison in this year’s programme, including his moving film The Miners’ Hymns, charting the decline of the industry in the north-east of England. Else-where, the atrium at Millennium Point will be transformed into the set of early-70s sci-fi flick Silent Running, with the screen-ing of said film preceded by a re-edit of Peter Fonda’s contemporary time-travel movie Idaho Transfer, complete with live soundtrack. Meanwhile, the Custard Facto-ry hosts a mind-bending evening of video essays in Smoke And Mirrors, followed by a fascinating look at the USSR’s electronic age in Elektro Moskva, while the recently-revived cult psychedelic night Sensateria features a performance from Swedish band The Orange Revival.

March 29In the afternoon, stop by the Mac for 70s children’s oddity Hugo The Hippo, before calling into the Custard Factory for Sidewalk Poetry, a selection of pieces from experi-mental filmmaker Henry Hills. Later, the Elec-tric Cinema has Mirage Men, examining the American intelligence services’ relation-ship with UFO conspiracy theories, while the

Flatpack Palais hosts Solipsism Cinema, an optical feedback performance from Stephen Cornford. Bill Morrison will be at the Mac to introduce a screening of The Great Flood, his film compiling archive footage of the Mississippi bursting its banks in 1927. Viva VHS presents two obscure horror flicks from the video-rental era at the Custard Facto-ry Theatre, while Channel 4’s experimental shorts series Random Acts pitches up at the Flatpack Kavarna for a party, with DJs playing alongside the films.

March 30Handsworth poet Roy Fisher is the subject of the documentary Birmingham’s What I Think With at the Mac, while the Custard Factory Theatre hosts the latest Post Avant-garde Animation from Austria. The Flatpack Palais has Occupy Music, a documenta-ry about Brazil’s revolutionary indie music scene, followed by More Canals Than Venice, a film chockfull of fascinating facts about Brum. And at the Electric Cinema, there’s the final Bill Morrison screening – his debut film Decasia, in which the main feature is the decaying celluloid itself – before Lost And Refound pays tribute to Morrison’s assemblage of archive footage by round-ing up the irreverent work of other splicers.


For more about gigs and tickets visit www.brightside-music.co.uk

or see us on Facebook or follow on Twitter @Bright_Side_

Spiers & Boden - Farewell Tour18th March

Wulfrun Hall, WolverhamptonMartyn Joseph

10th MayRowney Green Village Hall, Birmingham

Boo Hewerdine14th May

Slade Rooms, WolverhamptonRodney Branigan & Tim Snider

15th MayHare and Hounds, Kings Heath

The Riptide Movement29th May

Academy3, Birmingham

Bright Side Music 2014 Season

19March 2014


With 2014 marking the centenary of the outbreak of World War I, Franz Ferdinand – who took their name from the archduke whose assassination was the spark for the global conflict – found them-selves with an unexpected invitation. And it was one they were quick to decline. “We were asked by members of Archduke Franz Ferdinand’s extended family, his distant ances-tors, if we’d like to play in Sarajevo on the anni-versary of his death which…” cries band drummer Paul Thomson, “…is the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard! Especially the way the world is now, you’d be asking for it! “We’d be going out there with targets on our t-shirts,” he laughs, still horrified by the invite. The ill-advised and questionable call to play a concert to mark the centenary of the war coincides with the return of Franz Ferdinand as a well-oiled fighting force. A decade on from their self-titled debut and lauded indie dancefloor anthem Take Me Out, Thomson, frontman Alex Kapranos, bass-ist Bob Hardy and guitarist Nick McCarthy are back with Right Thoughts, Right Words, Right Action, an upbeat, jaunty, critic-pleasing collection that finds the band recharged after 2009’s Tonight. “We toured the album for 18 months,” says Thom-son of the four-and-a-half year gap between Tonight and Right Thoughts. “After being that close for so long, you just need a break from each other, to go back and deal with normal life. And then there’s the process of getting back togeth-er again.” That process was measured, with the band keen to avoid repeating Tonight’s chequered gesta-tion – cancelled sessions, various producers and so on. “We started to hang out socially first, and then we started playing each other things we’d written, so it came about gradually. Eventually there was the four of us in the same room together, and we’d identified all the pitfalls of the previous record: we didn’t want to spend hours in the recording studio with this record, we wanted to do it quick. So we did three or four songs in a weekend, then the next weekend did three or four more, and we could go away and look at them. All the songs had their different strengths, and we could cherry pick the ones we wanted.” Previous albums saw the Glasgow quartet dip into a catalogue of unrecorded songs penned over a period of time. “Even the third record, Tonight, we pulled in songs that were written from before the first album to record – Can’t Stop Feeling was written for the first record, but not used,” Thomson says. But Right Thoughts was a blank slate.

“Was it daunting having a blank slate?” Thomson ponders. “Not really, no. I really liked having the freedom to do what we wanted, that year zero approach to songwriting, it can be liberating. It was like the way the first record came about, it was like being a new band again rather than the touring monster that we’d become.” Reviews of the album, which was recorded at band studios in Scotland and London, and also in Scandinavia, have praised the band’s back-to-basics approach, a response which Thomson is initially unsure about. “Back to basics…what do they mean by that? I don’t know. But I guess we kept it to the point. The songs are succinct, we work within the structure of the classic pop song – but we’ve always done that, that’s the format we’ve tried to work with, the three-minute song. “What did they expect? Fifteen minute prog’ drones?” he laughs. “Umm…we have been known to jam endlessly…so think yourself lucky the songs are just three minutes.” While there’s clearly a certain economy and consistency to Right Thoughts, Thomson admits stranger, more challenging and different sound-ing tracks were recorded during sessions but held back. “The way you hear the album, there’s a coher-ence that comes about when you pull together the tracks. They were pulled from 20 very differ-ent songs. When we came to decide what to [choose] we decided on a succinct tracklisting, and we jettisoned the weirder songs. “I guess they were stylistically weird,” he says of the rejected tunes. “People have said Right Thoughts is a guitar record that sounds a lot like our first one, but that was not planned. We had a different method for different songs, different tempos…those songs will come out in some form, I’m sure, maybe this year. They’re great songs that we want people to hear.” With a strong visual identity, previous Franz releas-es have been influenced by early 20th century Russian artists, such as Alexander Rodchenko, and (with Tonight) New York crime photogra-pher Weegee. For Right Thoughts the vibe is more 50s/60s film credits and legendary graphic designer Saul Bass. “That wasn’t the plan, but I guess the sleeve before was a high resolution photo and we wanted to move away from that, we wanted something hand-made, put together by hand. A few people have mentioned Saul Bass, but that wasn’t what I was thinking about. I just sat there with a scalpel, coffee fuelled…”

In these days of instantly downloadable fonts and Photoshop, it seems a rather lengthy process. But Thomson loved the old school approach. “It was fine, you’re just focussed on the task at hand. I had a way of doing it, listening to records, on my own, cutting out the text – it was a zen-like approach. I didn’t want the sleeve to look ‘Photoshopped’. It takes time, but it was ultimately rewarding.” Though there are already plans to begin working on their fifth album in the late summer/autumn, the foreseeable future is Franz Ferdinand: Tour-ing Monster. “That’s how it goes. You spend ages making a record and then tour it for two years. That’s the way it works for bands nowadays, as record compa-nies don’t get the same returns as they used to, in this age of renting music rather than buying it, so the returns are lower.” However, Thomson admits he’s looking forward-ing to getting back out on the road. “I quite enjoy touring,” he says. “We just did a tour of Asia in late November/December, and that was really good. We did Taiwan, Hong Kong, South Korea…and the audiences were super appreciative when we got there. My return luggage had doubled in size with all the gifts from fans, which was really sweet. The way they react to music, they’re excitable audiences, and the food is amazing. I love to do gigs out there.” Gifts from fans? Sounds intriguing. “I don’t follow other bands so I don’t know if only we get fan art, but we get TONS of it, drawings of us, a lot done in this Manga/anime style so we all look like 15-year-old boys,” Thomson laughs. “I don’t know why the fans infantilise us, do we put ourselves over like cartoons? I guess we are four distinct characters, so they must be disap-pointed when they see us in real life, these four middle-aged men… “People fill entire sketch books, they’re amazing, and I keep them all, every one. Some of the work that goes into them…fabric embroidered badges! Fans must have spent weeks doing some of this stuff, and then they give it to us. They’ve spent so long on them, put so much into them, I feel an obligation to keep them.” Sounds like the ‘right’ thing to do.

Franz Ferdinand are live at the O2 Academy Birmingham on March 21.

Scottish art-rock heroes Franz Ferdinand are back in action and back to basics. “What did they expect? Fifteen minute prog drones?” asks drummer Paul Thomson. David Vincent listens in.

21March 2014

With 2014 marking the centenary of the outbreak of World War I, Franz Ferdinand – who took their name from the archduke whose assassination was the spark for the global conflict – found them-selves with an unexpected invitation. And it was one they were quick to decline. “We were asked by members of Archduke Franz Ferdinand’s extended family, his distant ances-tors, if we’d like to play in Sarajevo on the anni-versary of his death which…” cries band drummer Paul Thomson, “…is the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard! Especially the way the world is now, you’d be asking for it! “We’d be going out there with targets on our t-shirts,” he laughs, still horrified by the invite. The ill-advised and questionable call to play a concert to mark the centenary of the war coincides with the return of Franz Ferdinand as a well-oiled fighting force. A decade on from their self-titled debut and lauded indie dancefloor anthem Take Me Out, Thomson, frontman Alex Kapranos, bass-ist Bob Hardy and guitarist Nick McCarthy are back with Right Thoughts, Right Words, Right Action, an upbeat, jaunty, critic-pleasing collection that finds the band recharged after 2009’s Tonight. “We toured the album for 18 months,” says Thom-son of the four-and-a-half year gap between Tonight and Right Thoughts. “After being that close for so long, you just need a break from each other, to go back and deal with normal life. And then there’s the process of getting back togeth-er again.” That process was measured, with the band keen to avoid repeating Tonight’s chequered gesta-tion – cancelled sessions, various producers and so on. “We started to hang out socially first, and then we started playing each other things we’d written, so it came about gradually. Eventually there was the four of us in the same room together, and we’d identified all the pitfalls of the previous record: we didn’t want to spend hours in the recording studio with this record, we wanted to do it quick. So we did three or four songs in a weekend, then the next weekend did three or four more, and we could go away and look at them. All the songs had their different strengths, and we could cherry pick the ones we wanted.” Previous albums saw the Glasgow quartet dip into a catalogue of unrecorded songs penned over a period of time. “Even the third record, Tonight, we pulled in songs that were written from before the first album to record – Can’t Stop Feeling was written for the first record, but not used,” Thomson says. But Right Thoughts was a blank slate.

“Was it daunting having a blank slate?” Thomson ponders. “Not really, no. I really liked having the freedom to do what we wanted, that year zero approach to songwriting, it can be liberating. It was like the way the first record came about, it was like being a new band again rather than the touring monster that we’d become.” Reviews of the album, which was recorded at band studios in Scotland and London, and also in Scandinavia, have praised the band’s back-to-basics approach, a response which Thomson is initially unsure about. “Back to basics…what do they mean by that? I don’t know. But I guess we kept it to the point. The songs are succinct, we work within the structure of the classic pop song – but we’ve always done that, that’s the format we’ve tried to work with, the three-minute song. “What did they expect? Fifteen minute prog’ drones?” he laughs. “Umm…we have been known to jam endlessly…so think yourself lucky the songs are just three minutes.” While there’s clearly a certain economy and consistency to Right Thoughts, Thomson admits stranger, more challenging and different sound-ing tracks were recorded during sessions but held back. “The way you hear the album, there’s a coher-ence that comes about when you pull together the tracks. They were pulled from 20 very differ-ent songs. When we came to decide what to [choose] we decided on a succinct tracklisting, and we jettisoned the weirder songs. “I guess they were stylistically weird,” he says of the rejected tunes. “People have said Right Thoughts is a guitar record that sounds a lot like our first one, but that was not planned. We had a different method for different songs, different tempos…those songs will come out in some form, I’m sure, maybe this year. They’re great songs that we want people to hear.” With a strong visual identity, previous Franz releas-es have been influenced by early 20th century Russian artists, such as Alexander Rodchenko, and (with Tonight) New York crime photogra-pher Weegee. For Right Thoughts the vibe is more 50s/60s film credits and legendary graphic designer Saul Bass. “That wasn’t the plan, but I guess the sleeve before was a high resolution photo and we wanted to move away from that, we wanted something hand-made, put together by hand. A few people have mentioned Saul Bass, but that wasn’t what I was thinking about. I just sat there with a scalpel, coffee fuelled…”

In these days of instantly downloadable fonts and Photoshop, it seems a rather lengthy process. But Thomson loved the old school approach. “It was fine, you’re just focussed on the task at hand. I had a way of doing it, listening to records, on my own, cutting out the text – it was a zen-like approach. I didn’t want the sleeve to look ‘Photoshopped’. It takes time, but it was ultimately rewarding.” Though there are already plans to begin working on their fifth album in the late summer/autumn, the foreseeable future is Franz Ferdinand: Tour-ing Monster. “That’s how it goes. You spend ages making a record and then tour it for two years. That’s the way it works for bands nowadays, as record compa-nies don’t get the same returns as they used to, in this age of renting music rather than buying it, so the returns are lower.” However, Thomson admits he’s looking forward-ing to getting back out on the road. “I quite enjoy touring,” he says. “We just did a tour of Asia in late November/December, and that was really good. We did Taiwan, Hong Kong, South Korea…and the audiences were super appreciative when we got there. My return luggage had doubled in size with all the gifts from fans, which was really sweet. The way they react to music, they’re excitable audiences, and the food is amazing. I love to do gigs out there.” Gifts from fans? Sounds intriguing. “I don’t follow other bands so I don’t know if only we get fan art, but we get TONS of it, drawings of us, a lot done in this Manga/anime style so we all look like 15-year-old boys,” Thomson laughs. “I don’t know why the fans infantilise us, do we put ourselves over like cartoons? I guess we are four distinct characters, so they must be disap-pointed when they see us in real life, these four middle-aged men… “People fill entire sketch books, they’re amazing, and I keep them all, every one. Some of the work that goes into them…fabric embroidered badges! Fans must have spent weeks doing some of this stuff, and then they give it to us. They’ve spent so long on them, put so much into them, I feel an obligation to keep them.” Sounds like the ‘right’ thing to do.

Franz Ferdinand are live at the O2 Academy Birmingham on March 21.

Scottish art-rock heroes Franz Ferdinand are back in action and back to basics. “What did they expect? Fifteen minute prog drones?” asks drummer Paul Thomson. David Vincent listens in.


Crickey! Time fl ies. We Are Scientists’ sing-er and guitarist Keith Murray is reminiscing about the band’s fi rst UK tour, waaaaaay back in the spring of 2005: Tony Blair was PM, Prince Harry wore a Nazi uniform for kicks, Christopher Eccleston rebooted Doctor Who, the Ricoh Arena opened in Cov, and Editors were the hottest new act in the country. “Editors were the headlining act on our very fi rst tour in the UK, so in some ways we’re more dramatically bonded to them than to any other act,” Keith recalls. “They showed us the ropes, held our hands and lent us their spare amplifi ers when the powerful British current fried our own. “Editors were pretty fiercely proud of Birmingham, and constantly demanded that, upon our fi rst visit, that we simply had to indulge in a Brummie curry. Over and over, it

was all about Brummie curries for them. We got a recommendation on a good restaurant from Russell, their bass player, and ended up walking about 45 minutes from the venue to get the meal. It was entirely worth it.” Over the subsequent nine years, Keith and fellow Scientist co-founder Chris Cain (bass) have joined the NME tour (with Arctic Monkeys, Mystery Jets and Maximo Park), played with Kings Of Leon, posed with kittens, had an MTV series, and released a consistently pleasing run of singles and albums shaped by such infl u-ences as Bowie, Eno-era Roxy Music, and Fleetwood Mac. Always ones to surprise, last year’s Business Casual EP saw them reimagine Berlin’s Take My Breath Away, adding some sweet slide guitar sounds to the theme from 80s fl yboy classic Top Gun.

“I think that the original idea came because I was absently strumming an acoustic guitar, when I realised that the chords coinciden-tally coincided with those of Take My Breath Away,” explains Keith. “It seemed pretty funny to us to perform an earnest, countri-fi ed version of the song.” Does that mean WAS are big fans of Maver-ick, Goose and Iceman? “Of course!” Keith cries, recognising the lead characters’ nicknames. “As children of the 80s, we’re huge fans of Top Gun, but, for my money, Tom Cruise is bested in the Male Lead In A Naval Pilot-centric Action Film category by Josh Lucas, whose turn in Stealth is noth-ing short of underrated genius.” Sadly, there’s no other unexpected juicy cover versions in the current WAS reper-toire, making Take My Breath Away a one-off.

“We’re not really huge fans of cover songs, to be honest,” Keith reveals. “For us, songwriting is the best part of being in a band, so covering someone else’s songs just seems like we’re depriv-ing ourselves of one of our favorite, hard-earned rights.” The EP has paved the way for the duo’s delayed fourth offi cial album, TV En Français. “We did tour for about two years, and actually completed the recording of TV En Français in January, 2013,” says Keith, adding that the arrival of new management, the look for a new label, and their desire to complete the record “without any outside input or interference” added to delays. “Unfortunately, the search, negotiations, and general administra-tive work that had to be done to those ends meant that the album had to wait a full year before it was released. We killed the time in the interim by releasing our Something About You/Let Me Win 7ins and our Business Casual EP – both of which were written and recorded after the completion of TV En Français. The music business can be funny, that way.” Refl ecting on his own highlights from the new(ish) full length album, Keith continues: “My favorites change every day, to be honest, but because we’re currently traveling Europe to promote the Make It Easy single, which is out on the same day as the album [March 3], I’ve really been reminded about how much I loved that song when I initially wrote it. “We did a demo of the song in Brooklyn several months before we started recording the album proper, and I remember walk-ing away from those sessions feeling unusually confi dent in that song. I’m normally a pretty self-deprecating character, so my satisfaction with that song in particular stands as something of an anomaly.” Another key track is Dumb Luck, which is accompanied by one of the goriest (and funniest) promo vids you’re ever likely to see. “That was our goal, yeah,” Keith confi rms of their desire to make the goriest ever promo. “We’re longtime fans of movies like Evil Dead and the Final Destination series, so the video was just our excuse to make a short fi lm of that ilk. “Unfortunately, it didn’t occur to us that the incredibly gory nature of the video meant that most television channels wouldn’t be able to play it at all. Oh well. I still love it.” Back on the drum stool (and adding vocals and keyboards) for the album is none other than Andy Burrows, the multi-instru-mentalist, soundtrack writer, solo artist and Tom ‘Editors’ Smith cohort, who sharpened his talents with Razorlight before joining We Are Scientists (WAS) for fourth album Barbara. So will Mr Burrows be joining them on tour? “He is, unfortunately, not joining us on the UK dates, no. Although Andy is offi cially part of the Brotherhood of Scientists, he’s got a songwriting career of his own to look after. Sadly, it means he can’t make it out on our pretty extensive touring schedule, but he’s got an invitation to play with us any time he likes...”

We Are Scientists are live at The Institute, Birmingham, on March 15. New album TV En Français is out on March 3.

We Are Scientists fi rst burst onto the scene nearly a decade ago as cheeky young indie-rock upstarts. Renowned for their on-stage wit and with the sharp tunes to match, they’re back with a fourth album and a full UK tour. Frontman Keith Murray talks curries and Tom Cruise with David Vincent.

Science and Progress

23March 2014

Crickey! Time fl ies. We Are Scientists’ sing-er and guitarist Keith Murray is reminiscing about the band’s fi rst UK tour, waaaaaay back in the spring of 2005: Tony Blair was PM, Prince Harry wore a Nazi uniform for kicks, Christopher Eccleston rebooted Doctor Who, the Ricoh Arena opened in Cov, and Editors were the hottest new act in the country. “Editors were the headlining act on our very fi rst tour in the UK, so in some ways we’re more dramatically bonded to them than to any other act,” Keith recalls. “They showed us the ropes, held our hands and lent us their spare amplifi ers when the powerful British current fried our own. “Editors were pretty fiercely proud of Birmingham, and constantly demanded that, upon our fi rst visit, that we simply had to indulge in a Brummie curry. Over and over, it

was all about Brummie curries for them. We got a recommendation on a good restaurant from Russell, their bass player, and ended up walking about 45 minutes from the venue to get the meal. It was entirely worth it.” Over the subsequent nine years, Keith and fellow Scientist co-founder Chris Cain (bass) have joined the NME tour (with Arctic Monkeys, Mystery Jets and Maximo Park), played with Kings Of Leon, posed with kittens, had an MTV series, and released a consistently pleasing run of singles and albums shaped by such infl u-ences as Bowie, Eno-era Roxy Music, and Fleetwood Mac. Always ones to surprise, last year’s Business Casual EP saw them reimagine Berlin’s Take My Breath Away, adding some sweet slide guitar sounds to the theme from 80s fl yboy classic Top Gun.

“I think that the original idea came because I was absently strumming an acoustic guitar, when I realised that the chords coinciden-tally coincided with those of Take My Breath Away,” explains Keith. “It seemed pretty funny to us to perform an earnest, countri-fi ed version of the song.” Does that mean WAS are big fans of Maver-ick, Goose and Iceman? “Of course!” Keith cries, recognising the lead characters’ nicknames. “As children of the 80s, we’re huge fans of Top Gun, but, for my money, Tom Cruise is bested in the Male Lead In A Naval Pilot-centric Action Film category by Josh Lucas, whose turn in Stealth is noth-ing short of underrated genius.” Sadly, there’s no other unexpected juicy cover versions in the current WAS reper-toire, making Take My Breath Away a one-off.

“We’re not really huge fans of cover songs, to be honest,” Keith reveals. “For us, songwriting is the best part of being in a band, so covering someone else’s songs just seems like we’re depriv-ing ourselves of one of our favorite, hard-earned rights.” The EP has paved the way for the duo’s delayed fourth offi cial album, TV En Français. “We did tour for about two years, and actually completed the recording of TV En Français in January, 2013,” says Keith, adding that the arrival of new management, the look for a new label, and their desire to complete the record “without any outside input or interference” added to delays. “Unfortunately, the search, negotiations, and general administra-tive work that had to be done to those ends meant that the album had to wait a full year before it was released. We killed the time in the interim by releasing our Something About You/Let Me Win 7ins and our Business Casual EP – both of which were written and recorded after the completion of TV En Français. The music business can be funny, that way.” Refl ecting on his own highlights from the new(ish) full length album, Keith continues: “My favorites change every day, to be honest, but because we’re currently traveling Europe to promote the Make It Easy single, which is out on the same day as the album [March 3], I’ve really been reminded about how much I loved that song when I initially wrote it. “We did a demo of the song in Brooklyn several months before we started recording the album proper, and I remember walk-ing away from those sessions feeling unusually confi dent in that song. I’m normally a pretty self-deprecating character, so my satisfaction with that song in particular stands as something of an anomaly.” Another key track is Dumb Luck, which is accompanied by one of the goriest (and funniest) promo vids you’re ever likely to see. “That was our goal, yeah,” Keith confi rms of their desire to make the goriest ever promo. “We’re longtime fans of movies like Evil Dead and the Final Destination series, so the video was just our excuse to make a short fi lm of that ilk. “Unfortunately, it didn’t occur to us that the incredibly gory nature of the video meant that most television channels wouldn’t be able to play it at all. Oh well. I still love it.” Back on the drum stool (and adding vocals and keyboards) for the album is none other than Andy Burrows, the multi-instru-mentalist, soundtrack writer, solo artist and Tom ‘Editors’ Smith cohort, who sharpened his talents with Razorlight before joining We Are Scientists (WAS) for fourth album Barbara. So will Mr Burrows be joining them on tour? “He is, unfortunately, not joining us on the UK dates, no. Although Andy is offi cially part of the Brotherhood of Scientists, he’s got a songwriting career of his own to look after. Sadly, it means he can’t make it out on our pretty extensive touring schedule, but he’s got an invitation to play with us any time he likes...”

We Are Scientists are live at The Institute, Birmingham, on March 15. New album TV En Français is out on March 3.

We Are Scientists fi rst burst onto the scene nearly a decade ago as cheeky young indie-rock upstarts. Renowned for their on-stage wit and with the sharp tunes to match, they’re back with a fourth album and a full UK tour. Frontman Keith Murray talks curries and Tom Cruise with David Vincent.

Science and Progress

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“After the last record and talking about it in terms of a concept, I kind of didn’t want to do that again,” says Joseph Mount, discuss-ing the band’s forthcoming fourth album, Love Letters. “So there is a bit of a feel, it’s about distance and communicating at a distance, but there’s nothing much more to the name than that Love Letters is quite a nice title and nicely summarises some of the songs and feelings on the album.”

That “last record” in question was the band’s third, 2011’s gold-selling, Mercury-nominated The English Riviera, which was set around reimagining the place where the Metronomy main man grew up, Totnes in Devon. Released on infl uential French label Because Music, the artwork paid homage to Surrey-born graphic designer John Gorham who had created the iconic palm tree motif to promote the South Devon coastline in 1982, and the sounds within the grooves explored a sun-drenched narrative delivered in a quintessentially English channel (no pun intended), set against sounds with an altogether wider feel. It, in itself, was a work of art.

Fundamentally the brainchild of Mount, Metronomy the concept was born in 1999 in Devon. Relocating to Brighton and joined for live performances by bassist Gabriel Stebbing and Oscar Cash on keys, they accrued modest success through their fi rst two records before Stebbing moved to Liverpool with his girl-friend (“It’s all very amicable and he’s assured me he doesn’t think he’s fl eeing a sinking ship,” Joe wrote on the band’s Myspace page at the time). The band’s current guise with Anna Prior on drums and Olugbenga Adele-kan on bass took shape surrounding the third record. Having built a name for creat-ing forward-thinking electronic music which follows no blueprint, the back catalogue is awash with intriguing and voyeuristic instru-mentals, moments of stripped bare taciturn beauty and electronic pop explorations which venture into disco so catchy it’s no wonder their forthcoming tour calls into some of the biggest venues they’ve ever played. Putting it bluntly, in a time where it’s nigh on impossible to create anything even vaguely unique-sound-ing, Metronomy have continued to evolve and currently stand almost alone in their impres-sive singularity.

The band released I’m Aquarius, the first single from Love Letters and a slinky lament to incompatibility, via The Night Sky App in which fans were invited to hold their phones up to the Aquarius constellation to download it. Dismissed by some as a tad pretentious, it was still a novel exploration of the technology of the release.

“I didn’t want the release to happen in any particular way,” explains Joe, “but when we knew that I’m Aquarius was going to be the fi rst single, the label asked us what we thought about releasing it on this app where people had to fi nd it in the sky. I thought it was funny and when else are you going to be able to do that kind of thing? When is anyone else going to be able to do that kind of thing – surely we’ve exhausted the only opportunity? I didn’t really think much about it but people see it in the wider context of how bands are releasing music these days. Really I just thought it was a funny idea. If you’re cynical, you see it as a slightly desperate way to get people interest-ed in what you’re doing, but if you’re not, it’s just a bit of fun.”

Love Letters was recorded at Liam Watson’s analogue Toe Rag studio. Celebrated for their digital explorations, it was an interesting move for a band like Metronomy. “It wasn’t because I don’t like digital things or anything like that,” Joe says, “but I had a deadline – my girlfriend was expecting our fi rst child. The problem with doing stuff digitally is that you can muck around with it forever and I really needed the opposite of that – I needed to be focussed and to fi nish the record. If you record in an analogue way, you have to be very prepared and make sure that when it comes to record-ing the four minutes of the song, you know exactly what’s going on. It was more to make me write stuff a bit differently than for any other reason.”

The title single from the record is an Abba disco stomp. It also has a wonderful accompanying video for which the band worked with French fi lm director, producer and video maker Michel Gondry. Responsible for iconic music videos including Daft Punk’s Around the World, The White Stripes’ Fell in Love With a Girl and multi-ple Bjork masterpieces, it was fi lmed in a single take (of which they did about 12) and sees the

band once again dabbling with impressively creative visuals.

Ostensibly, Metronomy always have been and are today, fundamentally, Joseph Mount. Irre-spective of whatever it says on paper, the rest of the band do not give interviews and play on less than 10 per cent of the new record – Metronomy is Joseph Mount’s futuristic and maverick machine. That said, keyboardist Oscar Cash is Mount’s long term musical collaborator and each player has contributed more this time around than last. “I started playing in bands and I love bands. I love the idea of it and I love what they are,” Joe said in a recent interview with NME and, live, they’ve all become pretty integral to the Metronomy aesthetic.

The release of the Love Letters album is accom-panied by a European tour, a “greatest hits kind of thing” during which the band will also be modulating their live performance. Throughout their various infancies and even alongside The English Riviera, the band performed adorned with electronics and fl ashing LED lights. Never ones to stand still, this time around they’re experimenting more with live instrumentation and leaving the illuminations on their bedside tables. “We have a new stage set, we’re trying to make it a bit more...” Joe begins. “At Christ-mas there were a lot of programmes on about the Royal Variety Performance and I really like those kind of set ups where it looks a bit like TV, so I think we’re going to try and be a bit classic!”

And so what’s in store in Birmingham?

“I’ve been to Birmingham a few times but – I’ve never had a night out there because every time I’ve been recently it’s been playing gigs. We’ve always had fun though, because all those venues that we’ve played have been around the Digbeth area. I’ve walked to the Bullring and I went to meet my cousin in The Irish Centre. I always enjoy the gigs in Birming-ham but the one thing I’m missing is a proper Birmingham experience...”

Any offers anyone?

Metronomy are live at The Institute, Birming-ham, on March 21. New album Love Letters is out on March 10.

Electro adventurers Metronomy have a shiny new record to show off and head out on their biggest tour to date this month. Frontman Joseph Mount tells Amy Sumner why it’ll be a bit like the Royal Variety Performance. digital love

25March 2014

“After the last record and talking about it in terms of a concept, I kind of didn’t want to do that again,” says Joseph Mount, discuss-ing the band’s forthcoming fourth album, Love Letters. “So there is a bit of a feel, it’s about distance and communicating at a distance, but there’s nothing much more to the name than that Love Letters is quite a nice title and nicely summarises some of the songs and feelings on the album.”

That “last record” in question was the band’s third, 2011’s gold-selling, Mercury-nominated The English Riviera, which was set around reimagining the place where the Metronomy main man grew up, Totnes in Devon. Released on infl uential French label Because Music, the artwork paid homage to Surrey-born graphic designer John Gorham who had created the iconic palm tree motif to promote the South Devon coastline in 1982, and the sounds within the grooves explored a sun-drenched narrative delivered in a quintessentially English channel (no pun intended), set against sounds with an altogether wider feel. It, in itself, was a work of art.

Fundamentally the brainchild of Mount, Metronomy the concept was born in 1999 in Devon. Relocating to Brighton and joined for live performances by bassist Gabriel Stebbing and Oscar Cash on keys, they accrued modest success through their fi rst two records before Stebbing moved to Liverpool with his girl-friend (“It’s all very amicable and he’s assured me he doesn’t think he’s fl eeing a sinking ship,” Joe wrote on the band’s Myspace page at the time). The band’s current guise with Anna Prior on drums and Olugbenga Adele-kan on bass took shape surrounding the third record. Having built a name for creat-ing forward-thinking electronic music which follows no blueprint, the back catalogue is awash with intriguing and voyeuristic instru-mentals, moments of stripped bare taciturn beauty and electronic pop explorations which venture into disco so catchy it’s no wonder their forthcoming tour calls into some of the biggest venues they’ve ever played. Putting it bluntly, in a time where it’s nigh on impossible to create anything even vaguely unique-sound-ing, Metronomy have continued to evolve and currently stand almost alone in their impres-sive singularity.

The band released I’m Aquarius, the first single from Love Letters and a slinky lament to incompatibility, via The Night Sky App in which fans were invited to hold their phones up to the Aquarius constellation to download it. Dismissed by some as a tad pretentious, it was still a novel exploration of the technology of the release.

“I didn’t want the release to happen in any particular way,” explains Joe, “but when we knew that I’m Aquarius was going to be the fi rst single, the label asked us what we thought about releasing it on this app where people had to fi nd it in the sky. I thought it was funny and when else are you going to be able to do that kind of thing? When is anyone else going to be able to do that kind of thing – surely we’ve exhausted the only opportunity? I didn’t really think much about it but people see it in the wider context of how bands are releasing music these days. Really I just thought it was a funny idea. If you’re cynical, you see it as a slightly desperate way to get people interest-ed in what you’re doing, but if you’re not, it’s just a bit of fun.”

Love Letters was recorded at Liam Watson’s analogue Toe Rag studio. Celebrated for their digital explorations, it was an interesting move for a band like Metronomy. “It wasn’t because I don’t like digital things or anything like that,” Joe says, “but I had a deadline – my girlfriend was expecting our fi rst child. The problem with doing stuff digitally is that you can muck around with it forever and I really needed the opposite of that – I needed to be focussed and to fi nish the record. If you record in an analogue way, you have to be very prepared and make sure that when it comes to record-ing the four minutes of the song, you know exactly what’s going on. It was more to make me write stuff a bit differently than for any other reason.”

The title single from the record is an Abba disco stomp. It also has a wonderful accompanying video for which the band worked with French fi lm director, producer and video maker Michel Gondry. Responsible for iconic music videos including Daft Punk’s Around the World, The White Stripes’ Fell in Love With a Girl and multi-ple Bjork masterpieces, it was fi lmed in a single take (of which they did about 12) and sees the

band once again dabbling with impressively creative visuals.

Ostensibly, Metronomy always have been and are today, fundamentally, Joseph Mount. Irre-spective of whatever it says on paper, the rest of the band do not give interviews and play on less than 10 per cent of the new record – Metronomy is Joseph Mount’s futuristic and maverick machine. That said, keyboardist Oscar Cash is Mount’s long term musical collaborator and each player has contributed more this time around than last. “I started playing in bands and I love bands. I love the idea of it and I love what they are,” Joe said in a recent interview with NME and, live, they’ve all become pretty integral to the Metronomy aesthetic.

The release of the Love Letters album is accom-panied by a European tour, a “greatest hits kind of thing” during which the band will also be modulating their live performance. Throughout their various infancies and even alongside The English Riviera, the band performed adorned with electronics and fl ashing LED lights. Never ones to stand still, this time around they’re experimenting more with live instrumentation and leaving the illuminations on their bedside tables. “We have a new stage set, we’re trying to make it a bit more...” Joe begins. “At Christ-mas there were a lot of programmes on about the Royal Variety Performance and I really like those kind of set ups where it looks a bit like TV, so I think we’re going to try and be a bit classic!”

And so what’s in store in Birmingham?

“I’ve been to Birmingham a few times but – I’ve never had a night out there because every time I’ve been recently it’s been playing gigs. We’ve always had fun though, because all those venues that we’ve played have been around the Digbeth area. I’ve walked to the Bullring and I went to meet my cousin in The Irish Centre. I always enjoy the gigs in Birming-ham but the one thing I’m missing is a proper Birmingham experience...”

Any offers anyone?

Metronomy are live at The Institute, Birming-ham, on March 21. New album Love Letters is out on March 10.

Electro adventurers Metronomy have a shiny new record to show off and head out on their biggest tour to date this month. Frontman Joseph Mount tells Amy Sumner why it’ll be a bit like the Royal Variety Performance. digital love


Jacks sees the album as musically unlike prede-cessors I Had The Blues But I Shook Them Loose, and top 10 releases Flaws and A Different Kind Of Fix. It needed, not to be the equal of earlier releas-es, but to be better. Therefore, new approaches needed to be embraced – hence the world music and electronic infl uences – and quality control needed to be stricter. “We probably had 20 ideas, just snippets, melo-dies and samples. Before, we’d have done 10 tracks and they would have all gone on the album, but the bar was set so high [this time]. We were so aware of the position we were in and the impor-tance of this record.

“What was really difficult was maintaining perspective,” Jack reckons. “So I’m happy how streamlined the album is, not just how the songs are structurally, but how the songs are so succinct. When you’re doing it all yourselves, it’s easy to get carried away, so you have to be careful, look at how you edit it.”

The best example of the Club’s newfound sense of experimentation and confi dence is the album’s six-minute title track. “The song I’m the most proud of is the fi nal one – So Long, See You Tomorrow. That’s something we’ve never done before, that song takes you on a journey. It’s not verse, chorus, verse, chorus, ends, it’s almost impressionistic. I’m really happy with how that has turned out.” Material for the collection was initially started by Jack while travelling. “I was very wary of coming off the back of the last tour and just going straight into the studio in London,” he continues. “That’s been done before. I have to add something new to make it interesting, there has to be some-thing new in the mix to make it interesting,” he says of his sojourns through India, Turkey, Japan and Europe. “Having no experiences [of travel-ling in those countries and regions] made me feel instantly energised, and that energy makes you feel creative. “When you listen to these songs you can tell the person was feeling positive as travelling makes me feel positive.” The sounds of those foreign locations clearly seep into the songs – hence the tabla sound heard on recent single Luna. “A number of the songs have an Indian infl uence,” Jack says. “I like to go record shopping when I travel, it’s a fun thing to do. In India I was trying to incorporate these sounds I’d found on records into songs as an experiment. I thought the guys [in the band] would laugh at it. But if you get past the stereotype [of Bollywood music], it’s impos-sible not to like it, it’s so infectious.” Armed with laptop and six-string, his trips were not without incident. “There was one fantastic rain storm in Turkey,” he recalls. “I was feeling very self-conscious about the noise I was making – I was in a house with a family – so I went out for a walk with my guitar and found this rural house. It was in a state of ruin, but very atmospheric. Suddenly, the heavens explod-ed and there was this insane rain storm. “I thought the family I was staying with would start to worry about me going off, so I hitchhiked back. I got into this car soaking wet with a guitar and there was this dad with two kids in the back, and the look they gave me was priceless! They looked at me like I was an alien,” he laughs.

The album also sees the band – guitarist Jamie MacColl, drummer Suren de Saram and bassist Ed Nash – reunite with Warwickshire lass Lucy Rose, who they fi rst worked with for the acoustic-based album, Flaws. Though she’s now joined by a new collaborator, Rae Morris. “Lucy sings on It’s Alright Now, Carry Me, Home By Now and Eyes Off You, and Come To, and Rae Morris is on Overdone, Luna and the last track,” Jack reports. “It’s a lovely tool to have these two singers – it depends on which one suits [the song] best which one we go to. “Lucy, the fi rst time we sang together, you could hear our individual voices actually forming a new instrument. She’s our go-to girl when I need that variation in texture. “It all started with Flaws,” Jack expands, “which is where I really got into folk music – the harmonies are so powerful. I’m one of those people who’s always singing different harmonies to things. “Sometimes I go really overboard with the harmo-nies and Jamie says, ‘take one off…’,” he chuckles. After two top 10’ers, Bombay Bicycle Club saw So Long, See You Tomorrow as the album that could potentially push the band into a different league. “Of course, all our records have been important to us, but three records in, this is the moment where things happen or they don’t, so we were so hard on ourselves, the guys had to be really criti-cal of the songs. Some songs would have made it onto the last record, but this time it was ‘no…we won’t let you in!’ “I think it’s our catchiest album, the melodies are really memorable, but are people going to listen to what’s around the melodies instead? I don’t know. I want to make pop music and new music, wheth-er this hinders that…” Jacks wonders, leaving the sentence hanging. But at the end of the day, while a chart-topper is a great thing, Jack confesses he measures success slightly differently. “For me it’s about the travel aspect rather than the sales – whether we get to travel to places we haven’t been before.” Sounds like it’s time to get out that atlas and tick off a few more exotic countries.

Bombay Bicycle Club are live at the O2 Academy, Birmingham, on March 8. So Long, See You Tomorrow is out now.

With a number one album under their collective belt and a sell-out tour ahead, it’s fair to say that Bombay Bicycle Club have ridden their way into the hearts of the nation. David Vincent talks to frontman Jack Steadman about their journey to success.

LIFE IN THE FAST LANE

It’s been a while coming, but Bombay Bicycle Club are fi nally celebrating their fi rst UK number one album after So Long, See You Tomorrow crashed into the top spot on its week of release, outsell-ing nearest rival Aviccii’s True by more than 6,000 copies. Frontman Jack Steadman is, understanda-bly, chuffed. Having released three albums in three years, it’s been a two-and-a-half-year wait for long-player number four, which the North London quartet opted to produce themselves. “It’s certainly very exciting,” he cries. “I’ve never been so excited about a release before, but I’ve also never been so involved before. There’s so much at stake with this album, because of the nature of how we produced it. And that’s partly

why it took so long, we were incredibly hard on ourselves. If we thought something wasn’t work-ing [we said] let’s scrap it and start again. We got through a couple of producers, it just wasn’t working for us, so we said, ‘let’s take the plunge and do it ourselves’.” Taking over production duties himself was not as surprising a move as some people might think though, as Jack explains. “Some people will prob-ably look at the back of the album sleeve and see ‘Produced by Jack Steadman’ and think ‘Wow! That seems sudden!’ But I’ve been producing music since I was 13-14, which is 10 years ago now. I’ve always written music on computers, I enjoy getting involved with crafting sounds, the

technical side. I love it. That’s how I make music, it’s very much on a laptop, and I think you can very much hear it on this record as it’s very loop based. “I have a set way of doing things, which is why I wasn’t satisfi ed with what we’d been doing with other producers,” he continues. “My set-up in my studio is very humble by comparison to other studios. But when you’re working with someone else you have to put things into words. When the producer asks, ‘what do you want the drums to sound like?’, what do you say? I have an idea, but how do you put that into words? When you do it yourself, the sound can take shape as you go along, you don’t have to explain what you can hear or want to hear.”

“ There’s so much at stake with this album, because of the nature of how we produced it.”

27March 2014

Jacks sees the album as musically unlike prede-cessors I Had The Blues But I Shook Them Loose, and top 10 releases Flaws and A Different Kind Of Fix. It needed, not to be the equal of earlier releas-es, but to be better. Therefore, new approaches needed to be embraced – hence the world music and electronic infl uences – and quality control needed to be stricter. “We probably had 20 ideas, just snippets, melo-dies and samples. Before, we’d have done 10 tracks and they would have all gone on the album, but the bar was set so high [this time]. We were so aware of the position we were in and the impor-tance of this record.

“What was really difficult was maintaining perspective,” Jack reckons. “So I’m happy how streamlined the album is, not just how the songs are structurally, but how the songs are so succinct. When you’re doing it all yourselves, it’s easy to get carried away, so you have to be careful, look at how you edit it.”

The best example of the Club’s newfound sense of experimentation and confi dence is the album’s six-minute title track. “The song I’m the most proud of is the fi nal one – So Long, See You Tomorrow. That’s something we’ve never done before, that song takes you on a journey. It’s not verse, chorus, verse, chorus, ends, it’s almost impressionistic. I’m really happy with how that has turned out.” Material for the collection was initially started by Jack while travelling. “I was very wary of coming off the back of the last tour and just going straight into the studio in London,” he continues. “That’s been done before. I have to add something new to make it interesting, there has to be some-thing new in the mix to make it interesting,” he says of his sojourns through India, Turkey, Japan and Europe. “Having no experiences [of travel-ling in those countries and regions] made me feel instantly energised, and that energy makes you feel creative. “When you listen to these songs you can tell the person was feeling positive as travelling makes me feel positive.” The sounds of those foreign locations clearly seep into the songs – hence the tabla sound heard on recent single Luna. “A number of the songs have an Indian infl uence,” Jack says. “I like to go record shopping when I travel, it’s a fun thing to do. In India I was trying to incorporate these sounds I’d found on records into songs as an experiment. I thought the guys [in the band] would laugh at it. But if you get past the stereotype [of Bollywood music], it’s impos-sible not to like it, it’s so infectious.” Armed with laptop and six-string, his trips were not without incident. “There was one fantastic rain storm in Turkey,” he recalls. “I was feeling very self-conscious about the noise I was making – I was in a house with a family – so I went out for a walk with my guitar and found this rural house. It was in a state of ruin, but very atmospheric. Suddenly, the heavens explod-ed and there was this insane rain storm. “I thought the family I was staying with would start to worry about me going off, so I hitchhiked back. I got into this car soaking wet with a guitar and there was this dad with two kids in the back, and the look they gave me was priceless! They looked at me like I was an alien,” he laughs.

The album also sees the band – guitarist Jamie MacColl, drummer Suren de Saram and bassist Ed Nash – reunite with Warwickshire lass Lucy Rose, who they fi rst worked with for the acoustic-based album, Flaws. Though she’s now joined by a new collaborator, Rae Morris. “Lucy sings on It’s Alright Now, Carry Me, Home By Now and Eyes Off You, and Come To, and Rae Morris is on Overdone, Luna and the last track,” Jack reports. “It’s a lovely tool to have these two singers – it depends on which one suits [the song] best which one we go to. “Lucy, the fi rst time we sang together, you could hear our individual voices actually forming a new instrument. She’s our go-to girl when I need that variation in texture. “It all started with Flaws,” Jack expands, “which is where I really got into folk music – the harmonies are so powerful. I’m one of those people who’s always singing different harmonies to things. “Sometimes I go really overboard with the harmo-nies and Jamie says, ‘take one off…’,” he chuckles. After two top 10’ers, Bombay Bicycle Club saw So Long, See You Tomorrow as the album that could potentially push the band into a different league. “Of course, all our records have been important to us, but three records in, this is the moment where things happen or they don’t, so we were so hard on ourselves, the guys had to be really criti-cal of the songs. Some songs would have made it onto the last record, but this time it was ‘no…we won’t let you in!’ “I think it’s our catchiest album, the melodies are really memorable, but are people going to listen to what’s around the melodies instead? I don’t know. I want to make pop music and new music, wheth-er this hinders that…” Jacks wonders, leaving the sentence hanging. But at the end of the day, while a chart-topper is a great thing, Jack confesses he measures success slightly differently. “For me it’s about the travel aspect rather than the sales – whether we get to travel to places we haven’t been before.” Sounds like it’s time to get out that atlas and tick off a few more exotic countries.

Bombay Bicycle Club are live at the O2 Academy, Birmingham, on March 8. So Long, See You Tomorrow is out now.

With a number one album under their collective belt and a sell-out tour ahead, it’s fair to say that Bombay Bicycle Club have ridden their way into the hearts of the nation. David Vincent talks to frontman Jack Steadman about their journey to success.

LIFE IN THE FAST LANE

It’s been a while coming, but Bombay Bicycle Club are fi nally celebrating their fi rst UK number one album after So Long, See You Tomorrow crashed into the top spot on its week of release, outsell-ing nearest rival Aviccii’s True by more than 6,000 copies. Frontman Jack Steadman is, understanda-bly, chuffed. Having released three albums in three years, it’s been a two-and-a-half-year wait for long-player number four, which the North London quartet opted to produce themselves. “It’s certainly very exciting,” he cries. “I’ve never been so excited about a release before, but I’ve also never been so involved before. There’s so much at stake with this album, because of the nature of how we produced it. And that’s partly

why it took so long, we were incredibly hard on ourselves. If we thought something wasn’t work-ing [we said] let’s scrap it and start again. We got through a couple of producers, it just wasn’t working for us, so we said, ‘let’s take the plunge and do it ourselves’.” Taking over production duties himself was not as surprising a move as some people might think though, as Jack explains. “Some people will prob-ably look at the back of the album sleeve and see ‘Produced by Jack Steadman’ and think ‘Wow! That seems sudden!’ But I’ve been producing music since I was 13-14, which is 10 years ago now. I’ve always written music on computers, I enjoy getting involved with crafting sounds, the

technical side. I love it. That’s how I make music, it’s very much on a laptop, and I think you can very much hear it on this record as it’s very loop based. “I have a set way of doing things, which is why I wasn’t satisfi ed with what we’d been doing with other producers,” he continues. “My set-up in my studio is very humble by comparison to other studios. But when you’re working with someone else you have to put things into words. When the producer asks, ‘what do you want the drums to sound like?’, what do you say? I have an idea, but how do you put that into words? When you do it yourself, the sound can take shape as you go along, you don’t have to explain what you can hear or want to hear.”

“ There’s so much at stake with this album, because of the nature of how we produced it.”


EDITOR'S PICKSSTylE

NEW IN

FOR HER

DOROTHY PERKINS£24.00

BURTON£31.50

NEW LOOK£14.99

THEKOOPLES

£140.00

WAREHOUSE£26

FOR HIM

URBAN OUTFITTERS

£85.00

H&M£34.99

TOPSHOP£25.00

MANGO£24.99

TOPMAN£65.00URBAN

OUTFITTERS£75.00

ASOS£12.00

29March 2014

EDITOR'S PICKSbirmingham street styleCHARLES, 24, STUDENT Charles is wearing a pink pair of Nike ‘Flyknit’ trainers, Levi jeans and an oversized black fleece jacket from Selfridges. His style icon is South Korean rapper G Dragon, and his favourite re-tailer in Birmingham is Autograph.

JAKE, 21, HAIRDRESSERJake is wearing an All Saints leather jacket, a blue polka dot shirt from Junco with black jeans and brogues from Primark. Jake’s style icon is Wol-verhampton’s own Ricki Hall, and his favourite retailer is All Saints.

MONICA, 23, STUDENTMonica is wearing an oversized fur jacket and monochrome patterned trousers from COS and her black jumper is from Reiss. Her style icon is Alexa Chung and her favourite retailer in Birming-ham is Selfridges.

ELIZA, 22, MODEL AND CHARITY WORKEREliza is wearing a pair of tan Dunlop trainers, a delicate floral Topshop jumpsuit and a tan vintage fur coat. Her style icon is Paloma Faith and her favourite retailer in Birmingham is COW.

YOUDI, 23, STUDENTYoudi is wearing a pair of Nike Air Force trainers, a Kooples blazer jacket, COS trousers and a pair of striped monochrome American Apparel socks. Her style icon is Cara Delevingne and her favour-ite retailer is Selfridges.

GEORGE, 20, SALES ASSISTANTGeorge is wearing a pair of Nike Cortez train-ers, vintage Levi jeans and a plain black Russell jumper. His style icon is Kanye West and his fa-vourite retailer in Birmingham is Foot Asylum.

photography by Chloe Myles


balcony brasserie Selfridges, 4th Floor, Bullring B5 4BP0121 600 6869

Another new outlet from Searcys (who’ve done a fi ne job of revitalising The REP’s dining expe-rience recently...highly recommended) this time perched at the top of WAGs’ favourite Selfridg-es. There’s something unmistakably glam and cool about Selfridges, from its bulbous hubcap-clad exterior through to the slightly scary looking dudes who DJ in the men’s clothing department on Saturdays and just strolling through the place makes you feel at least 17 per cent more affl uent (even if you ain’t). Happily, the prices of most of the dishes on offer at the Balcony Brasserie won’t send you hurtling back to Wetherspoons in a cold sweat, with main courses from a modest (by Selfridges standards at least) £8.Perched up on the fourth fl oor you’re away from the throng but still part of the buzzy atmosphere of the Bullring. A cool mural adds a little extra hipness to the place and there’s a feeling of space that some city eateries lack. Suitably chilled, we started

off with a shared Charcuterie platter, delicious little cuts of chorizo, salami, ham and Rosette de Lyon (a cured French sausage) served with fresh crusty bread, capons and intensely fl avoured sunblushed tomatoes. As you’d expect here the ingredients are fi rst rate and whilst it’s not the world’s most complicated dish by any means, the balance of fl avours between the cuts of meat and piquant accompaniments were well considered.For mains, the line-caught monkfi sh, lemongrass and quinoa green curry was a rave for the taste-buds, fresh and fragrant with a decent punch of

heat. The Lake District cheeseburger was also a superior specimen. Serving it on a brioche bun with caramelised onions added a little extra sweet-ness, whilst the fresh red onion and lettuce provid-ed a fresh crunch. The cheese topped burger was small but perfectly formed, clearly hand crafted and cooked to perfection. Loved the dinky little bottles of ketchup, mayo and mustard too.If you still need a reason to make it up here pay attention...ORDER THE SNICKERBOCKER-GLORY. Is this the best pudding in Birmingham? Could be. A deconstructed Snickers bar sundae, it’s a chocoholic’s wet dream. The Oreo Cookie Cheesecake came a credible second but frankly you’d be nuts to order anything else...unless you’re anaphylactic of course, in which case it’s prob-ably best avoided.Ideal for a cool date or a pre, mid or post-shop break, Balcony Brasserie is an unexpected oasis of calm right in the heart of shopping central.. Daron Billings

A small, independent café-bar with friendly staff, Cherry Reds is located on York Road, off the bustling Kings Heath High Street. Upon enter-ing this little oasis, you are greeted at the door with a smile and a folky-kitsch display of tempting cupcakes. The menu is small yet perfectly formed. There are maverick touches to modern, homely food that cater to the tastes of fl esh-eaters, vege-tarians and vegans alike. Cherry Reds specialises in strong US and Euro-pean bottled craft beers that are guaranteed to open your eyes and tastesbuds to a plethora of

fl avours beyond the usual pub-standard lagers. There’s always a local ale on hand-pull too. The cocktails (2-4-1 from 4pm-7pm) are original and alcohol-fuelled, like ‘Jamaica-Me-Crazy’: a shot of premium Kraken rum, a shot of Appleton rum, then topped up with ginger beer and lime. With retro décor and intimate dimensions, it invites the informal feeling of being in a house rather than in a public place. It’s a relaxing place to be. The unique ambiance is that your friend is having an open house and that you and those in the know are always very welcome. Ben Calvert

bar WATCH: chErry reds Kings HeathYork Road, Kings Heath, Birmingham B14 7RZ cherryreds.com

Cuisine: British(ish)

Price: Around £25pp for three courses

Service:

Atmosphere:

Food:

Overall:

31March 2014

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Oxford’s favourite mathletes rocked up at the O2 Academy ready to cause havoc and left a little to be desired. There is no doubt-ing the talent that Foals have. Their ability to mix funky riffs and melodic, moody tunes has made them one of the best bands in the country at the moment. But on a cold Tues-day night in the Second City, they seemed a little stale.All the songs were there, Prelude set up Hummer perfectly but a lot of the tunes, such as Blue Blood and Olympic Airways were strung out a little too long. At one point it was clear that the audience were starting to get restless and the chatter of the crowd could be heard over the brooding, some-times haunting music.Frontman Yannis Philippakis promised the crowd they were going to be savage but once again, their penchant for extending songs and showing off their skills took hold, and had good parts of the crowd losing concentration. However, Foals are arguably the kings of the crescendo and for all the build up, as always, there is something quite epic at the end. Spanish Sahara itself has a beautiful crescendo which picked the crowd up, while Red Socks Pugie and Inhaler had much of the crowd bouncing, even if it was to get in on one of Yannis’ many forays into his baying fans.It was back to basics with the encore. The

tuneful, chanting French Open was a per-fect set-up for Two Steps Twice, which they gleefully smashed down the middle of the court. Yannis was on his travels once again, this time up to the balcony where he threat-ened to jump before he was brought down by a steward to boos of the crowd, but after what seemed like an age, the beat dropped, Yannis screamed and all was well with the world once again.Maybe some of the crowd were a little im-patient or had wanted to hear more of their favourite songs rather than long, drawn out solos, but on a frosty night – Foals still blew more hot than cold.Jonathan Pritchard

RX BANDITSHare & Hounds, Kings Heath04/02/14

RX Bandits have been around for a while, emerging from the same late-90s ska in-cubator as Reel Big Fish and Less Than Jake, this tour being a 10-year celebra-tion of their signature album, 2003’s The Resignation. And the place was packed. First, though: Layers…did what Layers do. Frontman Lance was a fireball of energy and lungs, and the boys alongside shredded and bridged like pros. This band so need to be smashing the tent stages at some festivals

this summer. Then: Astpai. Representing for Austria. Tight and thrashy, Ramones-esque, skinny-leg garage punk. There’s a world of awesome punk happening in Europe right now. This being a good example. And final-ly: RX Bandits. Not ska-punk, but definitely ska, these are the band Vampire Weekend think they are. Featuring some spectacular musicianship, they also defy lazy classifica-tion. Sometimes mellow as hell, sometimes harder end of the spectrum alt-rock, some-times straight-up white boy reggae...there was a definite Police/Sting thing going on, Matt Embree’s honeyed vocals not least. Their sound was commercial, almost (but not) MOR – set closer Only for the Night being a radio-friendly pearler. I suspect the reason this band haven’t got massive is a combination of unfavourable industry trends and that they appear to have sincere princi-ples. They also have a beast for a drummer. That guy hit his kit like it was a man that had just run over his cat. Nice. Ed Ling

TOyThe Rainbow, Birmingham21/02/2014 Touring with The Twang has been extreme-ly beneficial for The Grafham Water Sailing Club. A year ago today (okay, a year minus

livE

FOALSO2 Academy, Birmingham11/02/14

Photo by Andy Hughes

33March 2014

a day), they played their second ever show at the same venue supporting now-defunct North East quintet, The Chapman Family. Since then they’ve noticeably tightened their (incidentally bass-tastic) set, refining their live instrumentals and transitioning fluidly between their songs. As a band they’re mov-ing more, they’ve finally turned up those vo-cals, and they’re evidently more comfortable with enjoying themselves. As ever, Feelin’ Blue and the wonderfully and jubilantly ex-tended 90° are highlights and they close on the superb The Butcher of Barcelona. Tour support The Proper Ornaments follow. The ‘other band’ of Veronica Falls’ James Hoare, it’s lo-fi 60s guitar pop which flits from The Byrds to The Free Design, from whom they took their name. It’s a good choice of sup-port for Toy who probably share many of the same reference points, but it isn’t massively interesting and by contrast, Toy are more in-teresting than ever before. Now able to pick from their two full length al-bums (2012’s eponymous debut and 2013’s follow up, Join the Dots), they begin with the intricately crafted majesty of Conductor and Colours Running Out. It’s a 13-song set which carries their pop moniker Endlessly in the centre and which traverses mechanical motorik and krautrock until Join the Dots at the close. The sound is a little off, making it difficult to pick out the individual instru-mentation which has obviously been pored over, however, it’s more coherent than ever before and overall it’s a performance their obvious influences Syd Barrett and Neu! wouldn’t have much contention with. The Horrors were right to shout about this lot.Amy Sumner

THE ORWELLSHare & Hounds, Kings Heath20/02/14

The Orwells kicked off their sold out UK tour in the second city at the Hare & Hounds. Boy did they hit it hard, likening it to two stags

in rutting sea-son, opener Oth-er Voices started a riot right there and then. Lead singer Mario Cuomo lead from the front, literally embrac-ing the crowd at every possi-ble opportunity. The motion and wave after wave of crowdsurfer came over when

the band broke into the second track Right-eous One, and indeed Mario epitomises some of the greatest frontmen – a young Iggy Pop combined with the swagger of Mick Jagger, this lad has charisma by the bucketload. Dirty Sheets took the pit to an-other level with people hurling themselves at the barrier, and eventually when the band got to Mallrats, Mario had torn off his vest flinging it into the gaggle of baying young girls at the front. ‘Godlike’ could be the only description of his next move with water and wine decanted into his adorning followers’ mouths. He called out ‘the Geezers’ from the back of the room and pointed out they like to call them “old f*****s back at home – we came to rock n roll.” They end with an encore of I Wanna Be Your Dog by The Stooges. If this band steamroller in and out of your town, you’d be a fool to miss them.Andy Hughes

SPEEDy ORTIzHare & Hounds, Kings Heath13/02/14

Tonight we’ve not only Speedy Ortiz and Joanna Gruesome in the building, but there’s also Birmingham’s Sunshine Frisbee Laser-beam on the decks and Burning Alms open-ing up. The latter are pretty shambolic, playing a forward-bounding frenetic set includ-ing recent single So Unreal. Singer John Biggs makes way for drummer Tom Whit-field to address the audience on the mic before furiously hurtling into Mata-dors. Cardiff’s Joan-na Gruesome are next. Within their walls, they’re part MBV and part The Wedding Present,

delivered with the indie pop of Allo Darlin’ and channelled effusively through lead sing-er Alanna McArdle. Standout track is their opener, Madison. They’re as energetic as they push through the crowd to get to the front as Speedy Ortiz take to the stage – there’s a lot of mutual band love in the room. Ostensibly the project of Sadie Dupuis who writes frank, forthright and youthfully depres-sive lyrics nowhere more beautifully crafted than on the band’s July debut full-length, Major Arcana, the Massachusetts outfit play a short set of their American college rock. It’s Sonic Youth and Deerhunter and it’s the superbly articulated struggles of youth. To-wards the end of the set, noir slow-burner No Below (‘True I once said I was better off just being dead / But I didn’t know you yet’) is a highlight. Throughout the show there are a few ‘technical difficulties’ (snapped strings precede prolonged periods of slightly un-comfortable chat and Sadie’s guitar amp is a trooper towards the end), but these bands encompass a kickass independence and a fuck you attitude so it’s pretty perfect really.Amy Sumner

TOM ODELLCivic Hall, Wolverhampton09/02/14

Tom Odell strolled onto stage at the Civic Hall to the screams of young girls but the 23-year-old showed maturity beyond his years during his enjoyable set.In what was a surprisingly upbeat, some-times raucous show, Odell laid out the tal-ent that won him the BRIT Critics Choice Award last year for all to see. While banging out tunes on his trusty piano like it was the easiest thing in the world, his voice was what really hit the spot – his vocal abilities are giv-en chance to really shine on the live stage.Kicking off with Long Way Down and Hold Me, he set the scene straight from the off. But even with the drone in the background it was that stunning voice of his that rose

The OrwellsPhoto by Andy Hughes

ToyPhoto by Wayne Fox


above the din to impress the crowd.Songs such as Grow Old With Me and Sense took on a new shimmer as his pure, unadulter-ated talent was thrust into the ears of the ador-ing crowd. After throwing in a few new songs that he has been writ-ing with his band in New York, and

having banter with the crowd, Odell had set everything up perfectly for the killer fi-nal song.Somewhat predictably that was Another Love. The song is so much better than eve-rything else in his armoury that it almost took the shine of how good the rest of the gig was. The crowd seemed somewhat be-mused as to how he could follow it up for his encore but he once again turned up the volume for a piano-thrashing, guitar-riffing finale.The five-song encore, which included a cov-er of Etta James’ I Just Want To Make Love To You, seemed more like a giant Jools Hol-land jam. Impressive as it was, the sheer beauty of Another Love lingered in the back-ground and a number of the crowd started to filter out as he played less well known songs such as Cruel and Parties.Take nothing away from Odell though, he could have just played his album as it was, but has obviously made an effort to make his live shows more interesting – and he has done it to aplomb.Jonathan Pritchard Photo by Jane Williams

CATE LE BONHare & Hounds, Kings Heath18/02/14

Cate Le Bon makes an arresting sight on stage, eyeliner, cheekbones and jutting jolts; idiosyncratic movements that match her haunting vocal and accompanying gothic instrumentation, which at times veers wildly into beautifully crafted psych and at oth-ers sits wistfully beneath her, stripped back, beautiful. Le Bon is joined on stage tonight not only by the exquisitely talented and de-liciously jumpsuited Stephen Black (AKA Sweet Baboo) on bass, but also by boy-friend, exacting guitar-picker H Hawkline. Even sharing the spotlight with such talent, she commands it – this is her thing. The

current UK jaunt sees the Gruff Rhys-cham-pioned songstress spoiled by her own abili-ties in picking a set from her three full-length records, 2009’s Me Oh My, 2012’s Cyrk and 2013’s Mug Museum. The latter naturally predominates the performance allowing the room a glimpse inside its perfectly balanced components; soft and straying from it, tight-ly measured and deliciously wandering, and the contemplations concerning her mortally maternal role (‘I know well this space I fill, I know the drill…I hold the baton’) aside the record’s quirky preoccupation with death. Dazzlingly sleepy-eyed I Can’t Help You and the beautiful folk mooch of Are You With Me Now drip with Le Bon’s exacting intonations, yet the oddball twists and turns of Wild and Sisters, offset by menacingly gothic keys, are just as alluring. Cate Le Bon is more of-ten than not paralleled to Nico. It isn’t hard to deduce why and from the second she walks on stage until the second she steps off it, she is completely and overwhelmingly captivating. A writer, a performer, an artist - in short she’s an inspiration.Amy Sumner Photo by Jonathan Morgan

DRENGEHare & Hounds, Kings Heath19/02/14

As pretentious as their name, Kagoule are thoroughly uninspiring and look about as in-vested in their own set as the room’s mut-ed reaction to it. TRAAMS are a different kettle of fish. Taking the krautrock meets post-punk aesthetic of Parquet Courts, dis-torting it, extending it, and sheening some of it with a Buzzcocks layer of pop, they’re rife with conflictions yet simultaneously per-fectly balanced. ‘I don’t even know your num-ber and you don’t even know my name’, roars lead vocalist Stu Hopkins on Flow-ers – here’s a band capitalising on the op-portunities afforded them. They’re a great support for Drenge, the duo from Castle-ton in Derbyshire, from where their raucous garage punk is the vehicle out. A mirror of the stage, the crowd tonight is young and full of sprite, there’s a circle pit and a crowd surfer within the first two songs. The Love-less brothers’ set is made up of material from their eponymous 2013 debut, scurges of sludgy noise and grunge riffs. Musically their best moments are Bloodsports and Nothing, although there are also some beau-tifully crafted lyrics lurking within Backwa-ters (‘I’ve never seen blood and milk mixed so divine...I’ve never seen such beauty so maligned’) and the mournful lament of Let’s Pretend, and the playful interaction between the two (if not the crowd) is a pleasure as they dare one another to take a breath. Af-ter such an impressive slot from TRAAMS, you do mourn the bass and the boys could do with a couple more tunes. It’s still ear-ly days though and with such a dedicated fanbase already built up, there is plenty of time for that.Amy Sumner

OPEN EVENTSSat 8th March11am-2pmWeds 2nd April5-7pm68 Heath Mill LaneDigbethBirmingham, B9 4AR

birmingham

UPCOMING OPEN EVENTS

the music college

BOOK NOW!www.accesstomusic.ac.uk0800 28 18 42 (landlines)0330 123 3153 (mobiles)

Free tuition for 16-18sNo GCSE entry requirementsCourses carry full UCAS points

Graded ‘Good’ by Ofsted April 2013

Courses for Sept 2014Introduction to MusicMusic PerformanceMusic Technology:> Music Production> Sound EngineeringMusic BusinessArtist DevelopmentMusic Teacher

DrengePhoto by Andy Hughes

Tom Odell

Cate Le Bon

35March 2014

OPEN EVENTSSat 8th March11am-2pmWeds 2nd April5-7pm68 Heath Mill LaneDigbethBirmingham, B9 4AR

birmingham

UPCOMING OPEN EVENTS

the music college

BOOK NOW!www.accesstomusic.ac.uk0800 28 18 42 (landlines)0330 123 3153 (mobiles)

Free tuition for 16-18sNo GCSE entry requirementsCourses carry full UCAS points

Graded ‘Good’ by Ofsted April 2013

Courses for Sept 2014Introduction to MusicMusic PerformanceMusic Technology:> Music Production> Sound EngineeringMusic BusinessArtist DevelopmentMusic Teacher


EagullsEagullsOut March 3 (Partisan)

You probably won’t impress many of your mates if you go around telling them you’ve been listening to ‘the Eagulls’. But they’ll soon get over the obvious pronunciation issues, all will be fi ne. Because, the Leeds-based band are set to tear up bedrooms aplenty once their album gets into the mainstream.Despite being from ‘oop norf’ the band actually shout 00s New York. Or should that be scream? The album is packed with thumping drums and

versatile riffs, while all the time maintaining a level of tuneful soul that gets in deeper than actual music. There is something you can’t quite put your fi nger on. Opener Nerve Endings sounds like a loud din and not much else on fi rst listen, but after a few you realise it’s got real verve to it.The swagger continues through Hollow Visions and into Yellow Eyes, with snippets of Parquet Courts and The Strokes dripping into view.This album gets under your skin and while you may think you have been listening to it in the back-ground, you’ll fi nd that you know all the words when you listen again. And you’ll be singing it as you walk around, without even knowing it.Possessed and Opaque provide the sort of

one-word chorus that gets you bouncing around your car/shower/bedroom/wherever. It’s the sort of album that restores faith in music.There is aggression, attitude, noise, swearing, shouting, grit, determination, and catchy tunes.The fi nal track is called Soulless Youth. And it’s hard to think of a better way of describing the sound of this band than that.Jon Pritchard

Johnny Foreigneryou Can Do Better Out March 10 (Alco-pop! Records)

The lazy journalist inside me was hoping for a mediocre offering from Johnny Foreigner so that this review could neatly close with a fatally hilarious play on the title about the band needing to do better – or some-thing equally droll. Unfortunately for your corre-spondent there’s no such luck here. The fi rst two seconds of Junior Laidley’s drums on opener Shipping make it apparent that this record doesn’t merely demand your attention, but waggles its big hairy nethers in your face, forcing you to submit to its abrasive majesty. Long-time artwork collaborator Lewes Herri-ot joins the ranks for this album, his guitar tying knots with Alexei Berrow’s, tangling like dog-fighting planes bent on wreaking

destruction before embracing in longing clinches of melancholic arpeggios. Countless more clunky metaphors could be used to describe how the agitated duets of Berrow and Kelly Southern wrap around and then bounce off each other fantastically in Le Schwing while guitars collide behind them, but the band deserve a better standard of review for this exhilarating effort.Andy Roberts

Architects Lost Forever, Lost TogetherOut March 10 (Epitaph)

With fi ve albums down, nearly 10 years of touring the globe behind them, and just about every permutation of the hard-core/mathcore/metalcore sound model run and tested, Architects’ sixth full-length studio release

has been eagerly awaited. And on balance, these vegan Brightonians do not disappoint. A seething mass of apocalyptic slamming, cleverly pulsating guitar work, scream-a-rama vocals, blastbeats and the occasional burst of harmonic bridging – Lost Forever, Lost Together is as dark and punishing as you like. And has some interesting things to say. In amongst the slamming – and slamming is perhaps the defi ning quality of this, so much so it’s almost like listening to the industrial printing press of the Norse Gods – there’s also febrile millenarianism cutting through proceedings. A somehow “Elizabethan-era alchemist ranting in tongues about the end of the world” aesthetic. Check out the album artwork and some of the lyri-cal turns of phrase (Naysayer, The Devil is Near) and you’ll see what we mean. This all helps to lift this clear above their peers like Issues and Honour Crest, who, pokey as they are, are a little light on individuality and emotional content. Genuinely raging post-metalcore. Veritably fi lled with passionate intensity. Ed Ling

albumreviews

MetronomyLove LettersOut March 10 (Because Music)

Metronomy’s exquisite appeal has always lain in the ability of Joseph Mount and co to continu-ally metamorphose. Steadfastly refusing to stick to any one blueprint, they’ve handcrafted progres-sive and well-respected records comprising blippy and layered instrumentals, catchy disco pop hooks and heck, even a concept album. Love Letters is a step backwards. Perpetually fond of easing into their records, on opening track The Upsetter, Mount mourns ‘And back out on The Riviera it got so cold at night’, warning that what’s to come on the follow-up to 2011’s jubilant The English Rivi-era is going to involve a little less glitz. Love Letters’ title track is its fi nest moment – preceded by an instrumental lullaby, drummer Anna Prior’s vocals burst forth reinforcing that some of their best-sounding songs are aided by the fairer voice (ditto following track, Month of Sundays, plus TER’s Everything Goes My Way, which featured Veronica Falls’ Roxanne Clifford). However, Boy Racers and Call Me (which falter into one another disjointedly) hark right back to their fi rst record which, at times, became too wrapped up in its drum machines and synths. The Most Immaculate Haircut (purveying to be about Connan Mockasin) doesn’t go anywhere fresh (and failing that, even catchy), and closer Never Wanted, as far as one can make out, is just a list of bathroom items. Whether it’s because the band were working to a deadline (the arrival of Mount’s fi rst child), a lull in creativity or just that the Toe Rag analogue studios in which it was recorded didn’t suit their sound after all, the offering falls a little slow and a little fl at. Which is not to say that it’s a bad record – measured against anybody else, you could get along with it fairly easily. However they’ve shot themselves in the foot with their past output to the point that, armed with the knowledge of just what this band is capable of, Love Letters is a disappointing blow. Amy Sumner

MØNo Mythologies to FollowOut March 10 (Chess Club / RCA Victor)

Bikini Daze left count-less critics and pop lovers giddy with excitement of what was yet to come from the deserving talent in Denmark’s MØ. Since the energetic strut of Pilgrim and catchy brass hooks of Diplo-collabo-rated XXX 8 graced our ears last year, No Mythol-ogies to Follow couldn’t have come too soon. As predicted, it doesn’t disappoint, making the eager

anticipation surrounding it totally justifi able.Captivating from the beginning, opener Fire Rides is grasping from its fi rst pulse of booming drums, all while MØ’s distinct, sultry vocals whirl perfectly amongst the glitchy guitars and spacey electronic melodies. The eerie, party-dynamic ambience of Waste of Time is followed by bitter-sweet love song Dust is Gone, a stunningly lulling and elegant play underpinned by heart-wrenching vocals and vaporous instrumentation. It refl ects the dreamy, 50s-like vocals of Lana Del Rey, reminding us that MØ can break your heart as well as free it on the dance fl oor. The mixture of style in No Mytholo-gies to Follow is a demonstration of MØ’s dissim-ilar strands of identity, tied together to create an explosion both dynamic yet subtly sublime. It jumps from pulsating pop, to icy electro, to soul-ful high-note heartbreak with breathtaking effort-lessness, setting the Danish talent remotely apart from other pop contemporaries and ending with a piece of art that is very nearly close to perfection.Ivy Photiou

Withered HandNew GodsOut March 10 (FortunaPOP!)

Edinburgh troubadour Dan Willson has been steadily nurturing a dedicated horde of followers, drawn in by his lo-fi charm and songs that are laugh-out-loud funny and unbearably melancholy – often at the same time. As an indicator of his ascending star, second album New Gods features appearances from a who’s who of Scottish indie, and sees Willson recording in a ‘proper studio’ for the fi rst time. But rather than being Willson’s crowning glory, the album smooths out the rough edges that made Withered Hand so appealing in the fi rst place. New Gods is still a solid record – Willson’s distinctive high-pitched voice remains as beguiling as ever, and his melodies still offer plenty of raw emotion. Of the more rabble-rous-ing numbers, the new recording of Heart Heart is pleasingly frantic, and the jangly Black Tambourine more than serviceable, but the pick of the bunch is King Of Hollywood, the irresistible recounting of a night out in Los Angeles with King Creosote. Yet it’s the album’s more introspective tracks that highlight the regression to the mean. The moody California is uncharacteristically ponderous, while the defanged radio-friendliness of Fall Apart is only recognisable as a Withered Hand song thanks to those unmistakable vocals. Criminally, the trade-mark anarchic sense of humour is almost entirely absent throughout. On King Of Hollywood, Will-son sings, ‘I fell asleep watching a buzz band.../Please let me be misunderstood’. But that spirit of otherness runs in direct opposition to the rest of New Gods, the sound of a gifted eccentric toning down for a wider audience. Dan Cooper-Gavin

SuperfoodMAM EPOut March 3 (Infectious)

‘You always get away with words, you always sing the same,’ accuses Dom Ganderton on Bubbles – “a discordant, vile, beautiful mess about people not having anything important to say but saying something for the sake of it”. For those who have followed Superfood’s ascent from the start, MAM EP comprises three out of four songs the band has already released – a tad disap-pointing. In a wider context though, it’s solid stuff. Superfood are early Pavement, Britpop at its most astute and American college rock – their calcu-lated appeal is that right now they’re making the music to accompany the look so many try so hard to pull off. They’re clever. They’re also talented in a way that transcends ephemeral scenes. TV sounds like it begins in the corridor with the lockers in some US high school while it docu-ments that modern life is rubbish (‘How am I to dream without the TV on?’). And as the tumbling, off-kilter guitars in Bubbles trickle into Melting and subsequently new track, Houses on the Plain (Oasis, Supergrass, but ultimately, uniquely, Superfood), they’re dallying deliciously with pop. On this record Superfood are tapping up those Britpop glory days and they’re having bounding, star-jumping fun while they’re at it. Unheard mate-rial it may not be brimming with but there’s an album for that yet. AS

Hoopla BlueMother EPOut March 22 (FOMA)

The beauty of music lies more often than not within the beauty of its creators. Hoopla Blue are a band remarkably aware of the importance of interaction and of the immediacy of relationship. Their debut EP begins with the haunting vocal echoes of lead singer Adam Tomes accompanied by Thomas Hewson before bounding forward into chiming guitars which carry through to Oranges, a track on which Tom takes up the vocal leadership. These songs are dripping in folklore, whispers and hints of stories that compel you to immerse your-self inside them entirely. Rituals is a restive multi-layered refrain dripping in intrigue (‘Send for my lovers when I’m not around’), which builds beau-tifully to Seams, the record’s gemstone. Mother displays Hoopla Blue as completely entrancingly as they appear live – the work is a glorious study of the intricacies of instrumental interplay and the accomplishments of the voice as further to this instrumentation. AS

37March 2014

EagullsEagullsOut March 3 (Partisan)

You probably won’t impress many of your mates if you go around telling them you’ve been listening to ‘the Eagulls’. But they’ll soon get over the obvious pronunciation issues, all will be fi ne. Because, the Leeds-based band are set to tear up bedrooms aplenty once their album gets into the mainstream.Despite being from ‘oop norf’ the band actually shout 00s New York. Or should that be scream? The album is packed with thumping drums and

versatile riffs, while all the time maintaining a level of tuneful soul that gets in deeper than actual music. There is something you can’t quite put your fi nger on. Opener Nerve Endings sounds like a loud din and not much else on fi rst listen, but after a few you realise it’s got real verve to it.The swagger continues through Hollow Visions and into Yellow Eyes, with snippets of Parquet Courts and The Strokes dripping into view.This album gets under your skin and while you may think you have been listening to it in the back-ground, you’ll fi nd that you know all the words when you listen again. And you’ll be singing it as you walk around, without even knowing it.Possessed and Opaque provide the sort of

one-word chorus that gets you bouncing around your car/shower/bedroom/wherever. It’s the sort of album that restores faith in music.There is aggression, attitude, noise, swearing, shouting, grit, determination, and catchy tunes.The fi nal track is called Soulless Youth. And it’s hard to think of a better way of describing the sound of this band than that.Jon Pritchard

Johnny Foreigneryou Can Do Better Out March 10 (Alco-pop! Records)

The lazy journalist inside me was hoping for a mediocre offering from Johnny Foreigner so that this review could neatly close with a fatally hilarious play on the title about the band needing to do better – or some-thing equally droll. Unfortunately for your corre-spondent there’s no such luck here. The fi rst two seconds of Junior Laidley’s drums on opener Shipping make it apparent that this record doesn’t merely demand your attention, but waggles its big hairy nethers in your face, forcing you to submit to its abrasive majesty. Long-time artwork collaborator Lewes Herri-ot joins the ranks for this album, his guitar tying knots with Alexei Berrow’s, tangling like dog-fighting planes bent on wreaking

destruction before embracing in longing clinches of melancholic arpeggios. Countless more clunky metaphors could be used to describe how the agitated duets of Berrow and Kelly Southern wrap around and then bounce off each other fantastically in Le Schwing while guitars collide behind them, but the band deserve a better standard of review for this exhilarating effort.Andy Roberts

Architects Lost Forever, Lost TogetherOut March 10 (Epitaph)

With fi ve albums down, nearly 10 years of touring the globe behind them, and just about every permutation of the hard-core/mathcore/metalcore sound model run and tested, Architects’ sixth full-length studio release

has been eagerly awaited. And on balance, these vegan Brightonians do not disappoint. A seething mass of apocalyptic slamming, cleverly pulsating guitar work, scream-a-rama vocals, blastbeats and the occasional burst of harmonic bridging – Lost Forever, Lost Together is as dark and punishing as you like. And has some interesting things to say. In amongst the slamming – and slamming is perhaps the defi ning quality of this, so much so it’s almost like listening to the industrial printing press of the Norse Gods – there’s also febrile millenarianism cutting through proceedings. A somehow “Elizabethan-era alchemist ranting in tongues about the end of the world” aesthetic. Check out the album artwork and some of the lyri-cal turns of phrase (Naysayer, The Devil is Near) and you’ll see what we mean. This all helps to lift this clear above their peers like Issues and Honour Crest, who, pokey as they are, are a little light on individuality and emotional content. Genuinely raging post-metalcore. Veritably fi lled with passionate intensity. Ed Ling

albumreviews

MetronomyLove LettersOut March 10 (Because Music)

Metronomy’s exquisite appeal has always lain in the ability of Joseph Mount and co to continu-ally metamorphose. Steadfastly refusing to stick to any one blueprint, they’ve handcrafted progres-sive and well-respected records comprising blippy and layered instrumentals, catchy disco pop hooks and heck, even a concept album. Love Letters is a step backwards. Perpetually fond of easing into their records, on opening track The Upsetter, Mount mourns ‘And back out on The Riviera it got so cold at night’, warning that what’s to come on the follow-up to 2011’s jubilant The English Rivi-era is going to involve a little less glitz. Love Letters’ title track is its fi nest moment – preceded by an instrumental lullaby, drummer Anna Prior’s vocals burst forth reinforcing that some of their best-sounding songs are aided by the fairer voice (ditto following track, Month of Sundays, plus TER’s Everything Goes My Way, which featured Veronica Falls’ Roxanne Clifford). However, Boy Racers and Call Me (which falter into one another disjointedly) hark right back to their fi rst record which, at times, became too wrapped up in its drum machines and synths. The Most Immaculate Haircut (purveying to be about Connan Mockasin) doesn’t go anywhere fresh (and failing that, even catchy), and closer Never Wanted, as far as one can make out, is just a list of bathroom items. Whether it’s because the band were working to a deadline (the arrival of Mount’s fi rst child), a lull in creativity or just that the Toe Rag analogue studios in which it was recorded didn’t suit their sound after all, the offering falls a little slow and a little fl at. Which is not to say that it’s a bad record – measured against anybody else, you could get along with it fairly easily. However they’ve shot themselves in the foot with their past output to the point that, armed with the knowledge of just what this band is capable of, Love Letters is a disappointing blow. Amy Sumner

MØNo Mythologies to FollowOut March 10 (Chess Club / RCA Victor)

Bikini Daze left count-less critics and pop lovers giddy with excitement of what was yet to come from the deserving talent in Denmark’s MØ. Since the energetic strut of Pilgrim and catchy brass hooks of Diplo-collabo-rated XXX 8 graced our ears last year, No Mythol-ogies to Follow couldn’t have come too soon. As predicted, it doesn’t disappoint, making the eager

anticipation surrounding it totally justifi able.Captivating from the beginning, opener Fire Rides is grasping from its fi rst pulse of booming drums, all while MØ’s distinct, sultry vocals whirl perfectly amongst the glitchy guitars and spacey electronic melodies. The eerie, party-dynamic ambience of Waste of Time is followed by bitter-sweet love song Dust is Gone, a stunningly lulling and elegant play underpinned by heart-wrenching vocals and vaporous instrumentation. It refl ects the dreamy, 50s-like vocals of Lana Del Rey, reminding us that MØ can break your heart as well as free it on the dance fl oor. The mixture of style in No Mytholo-gies to Follow is a demonstration of MØ’s dissim-ilar strands of identity, tied together to create an explosion both dynamic yet subtly sublime. It jumps from pulsating pop, to icy electro, to soul-ful high-note heartbreak with breathtaking effort-lessness, setting the Danish talent remotely apart from other pop contemporaries and ending with a piece of art that is very nearly close to perfection.Ivy Photiou

Withered HandNew GodsOut March 10 (FortunaPOP!)

Edinburgh troubadour Dan Willson has been steadily nurturing a dedicated horde of followers, drawn in by his lo-fi charm and songs that are laugh-out-loud funny and unbearably melancholy – often at the same time. As an indicator of his ascending star, second album New Gods features appearances from a who’s who of Scottish indie, and sees Willson recording in a ‘proper studio’ for the fi rst time. But rather than being Willson’s crowning glory, the album smooths out the rough edges that made Withered Hand so appealing in the fi rst place. New Gods is still a solid record – Willson’s distinctive high-pitched voice remains as beguiling as ever, and his melodies still offer plenty of raw emotion. Of the more rabble-rous-ing numbers, the new recording of Heart Heart is pleasingly frantic, and the jangly Black Tambourine more than serviceable, but the pick of the bunch is King Of Hollywood, the irresistible recounting of a night out in Los Angeles with King Creosote. Yet it’s the album’s more introspective tracks that highlight the regression to the mean. The moody California is uncharacteristically ponderous, while the defanged radio-friendliness of Fall Apart is only recognisable as a Withered Hand song thanks to those unmistakable vocals. Criminally, the trade-mark anarchic sense of humour is almost entirely absent throughout. On King Of Hollywood, Will-son sings, ‘I fell asleep watching a buzz band.../Please let me be misunderstood’. But that spirit of otherness runs in direct opposition to the rest of New Gods, the sound of a gifted eccentric toning down for a wider audience. Dan Cooper-Gavin

SuperfoodMAM EPOut March 3 (Infectious)

‘You always get away with words, you always sing the same,’ accuses Dom Ganderton on Bubbles – “a discordant, vile, beautiful mess about people not having anything important to say but saying something for the sake of it”. For those who have followed Superfood’s ascent from the start, MAM EP comprises three out of four songs the band has already released – a tad disap-pointing. In a wider context though, it’s solid stuff. Superfood are early Pavement, Britpop at its most astute and American college rock – their calcu-lated appeal is that right now they’re making the music to accompany the look so many try so hard to pull off. They’re clever. They’re also talented in a way that transcends ephemeral scenes. TV sounds like it begins in the corridor with the lockers in some US high school while it docu-ments that modern life is rubbish (‘How am I to dream without the TV on?’). And as the tumbling, off-kilter guitars in Bubbles trickle into Melting and subsequently new track, Houses on the Plain (Oasis, Supergrass, but ultimately, uniquely, Superfood), they’re dallying deliciously with pop. On this record Superfood are tapping up those Britpop glory days and they’re having bounding, star-jumping fun while they’re at it. Unheard mate-rial it may not be brimming with but there’s an album for that yet. AS

Hoopla BlueMother EPOut March 22 (FOMA)

The beauty of music lies more often than not within the beauty of its creators. Hoopla Blue are a band remarkably aware of the importance of interaction and of the immediacy of relationship. Their debut EP begins with the haunting vocal echoes of lead singer Adam Tomes accompanied by Thomas Hewson before bounding forward into chiming guitars which carry through to Oranges, a track on which Tom takes up the vocal leadership. These songs are dripping in folklore, whispers and hints of stories that compel you to immerse your-self inside them entirely. Rituals is a restive multi-layered refrain dripping in intrigue (‘Send for my lovers when I’m not around’), which builds beau-tifully to Seams, the record’s gemstone. Mother displays Hoopla Blue as completely entrancingly as they appear live – the work is a glorious study of the intricacies of instrumental interplay and the accomplishments of the voice as further to this instrumentation. AS


Nick MulveyGlee Club, March 3 Former hang-player in the Mercury-nominated modern jazz act Portico Quartet, Nick Mulvey’s debut solo album was released last May. Having moved to Cuba to study music before returning to the UK to study Ethnomusicology, Mulvey’s knowledge and interest in African music informs his own output. Catch him in this intimate setting. EagullsHare & Hounds, March 4 “To all beach bands sucking each others’ dicks and rubbing the press’ clits. I am going to cut

your hair clean off,” begins Eagulls’ open letter to their peers via their blog. It’s longer, angrier and ruder than that, we thought we’d exercise some caution. So Eagulls got attitude. Having support-ed the likes of Parquet Courts and Merchandise, and themselves playing ramshackle thrash punk noise, see for yourselves whether they have the accompanying tunes. NME Awards Tour 2014 ft Interpol, Temples, Royal Blood, Circa WavesO2 Academy, March 25 Debuting new material amongst classic tracks, New York post-punk rockers Interpol headline this year’s NME Awards Tour. On main support, Kettering psych four-piece Temples present songs from their debut number 7-charting album, Sun Structures, whilst Brighton garage rock duo Royal Blood and Liverpool’s Circa Waves open up. Vari-ety is the spice of life. Temple SongsThe Sunflower Lounge, March 27 “We’re a pop group,” declare the Manchester band on their Facebook page. Never ones to argue,

lo-fi Beach Boys and 60s infl uences mingle with superfi cial hints of Supergrass to present some-thing pretty tasty indeed. Make them feel welcome on March 27. Saint RaymondThe Institute, March 27 Like Bastille before him, 18-year-old Notting-ham-born Callum Burrows blurs the boundaries between solo artist and band. Synth-driven in its majority and with evident Police, Tears for Fears and Simple Minds infl uence, it also encapsulates a wonderful pop appeal. His Young Blood soared into the charts at number three – catch him while he’s still playing rooms this size. Bipolar SunshineThe Institute, March 30 Bipolar Sunshine is the solo project of Adio Marchant, former vocalist of Manchester six-piece Kid British. Combining honest and heartfelt poet-ic lyrics with upbeat synth-pop, his four track EP Drowning Butterfl ies premiered as Zane Lowe’s Hottest Record in the World in September last year. Adio’s A Dream For Dreamers UK tour prom-ises to be special.

gigs

JungleHare & Hounds, March 20

Producing ‘world music for run down inner cities’ (The Guardian), mysterious London outfi t Jungle only formed at the beginning of 2013 but already the two fantastic videos for tracks The Heat and Platoon (which they co-directed themselves) have notched up an impressive number of views on YouTube. Following the likes of Wu Lyf and MS MR in their faux-anonymity and crafting tribal soul beats with smatterings of 80s hip hop and dance sensibilities, the big reveal is on March 20.

PICK

Interpol

39March 2014

SensateriaGreen Street Warehouse, March 28 Beginning in the back streets of Digbeth in 1984, 60s psych club night Sensateria housed para-chutes, strobes and impressive visuals as well as a mix of classic and obscure retro sounds. Returning to Birmingham last year, the next instal-ment will also feature live performances from Velvet Texas Cannonball and Swedish outfi t, The Orange Revival. HabitHare & Hounds, March 22 Celebrating seven years of Habit nights, there’s a big line-up for the birthday bash, which features sets from James Holroyd (Back to Basics, Bugged Out and Chemical Brothers tour regular), Jack-2Front, Tiger Collective and Jim Ryan. Moschino Hoe, Versace HottieSpotlight, March 1 Think 90s R’n’B, house and soul for this one under the arches at Spotlight. With sets from Stu Bo, Jordan Lott, Busst, Sneeky Fox and Gum Sole, it’s

a battle of the beatmakers and a night not to miss.

LEFTFOOT PRESENTS Mr Scruff & Floating Points,Hare & Hounds, March 14 & 15 A marathon six hour back-to-back DJ session with Mr Scruff and Floating Points brought to you by Leftfoot. There are two nights on offer, each a rare opportunity to catch two legends in their fi eld in

an intimate space. Expect jazz, funk, soul, disco, house and everything in between. Zombie Prom, Silent Noize & Killerwave’s Parade Day PartySpotlight & Next Door, March 16 An after-party for the St Patrick’s Day Parade, the reincarnated Zombie Prom’s cross-venue party takes place from 2pm. With free-fl ow access across Spotlight, Next Door and the Spotlight car park (which houses a three-channel silent disco), there’ll be projections and visuals as well as the usual mix of garage, house, pop, hip-hop and indie alt tunes.

Cirque Du Soul, FACE & SHAD-OW CITY PRESENT GROOVE ARMADA (DJ SET)The Rainbow, March 1 Travelling Moulin Rouge extravaganza Cirque Du Soul calls into Birmingham for a night of colour, magic and dance. Described as a ‘burlesque meets bass’ themed event, expect house, tech-no, hip-hop and disco. Oh, and an appearance from Groove Armada DJs.

club nights

FACE presents Four TetThe Rainbow Warehouse, March 29

An event which has been three years in the making, FACE and Four Tet (AKA Kieran Hebden) curate what promises to be a very special night at The Rainbow Warehouse. Featuring a DJ set from the world-renowned producer and remixologist himself, alongside a carefully selected line-up of special guests to be announced, plus FACE’s resident DJs, this one will be packed to the rafters. Energy drinks at the ready too, as it’s running right through until 6am.

PICK

Mr Scruff


Flatpack Film FestivalVarious venues, March 20-30Flatpack’s eclectic celebration of cinema, now in its eighth year, is fi rmly established as a highlight of Brum’s cultural offering. We’re promised a typi-cally diverse, mind-expanding programme that’s as accessible as it is challenging, with highlights including This World Made Itself, Miwa Matreyek’s immersive mix of shadow puppetry and animation, featuring music from Flying Lotus. There’s also the UK premiere of restored short fi lms originally screened at the Exposition Universelle in Paris in the year 1900.

Frontiers FestivalVarious venues, from March 22Birmingham Conservatoire and Third Ear combine to present outer-limits sounds from downtown New York. Amongst the highlights, the fi rst-ever fully-realised performance of Robert Ashley’s String Quartet Describing The Motions Of Large Real Bodies, in which music from the Elysian Quartet will be processed in real time by 42 laptop artists. Also on the programme, a telematic improvisa-tional piece from the legendary Pauline Oliveros, which will see her collaborate in real time with musicians across the Atlantic.

John Cage – Indeterminacy and The Conspirators Of Pleasure CBSO Centre, March 18A touring show from London’s Usurp art collec-tive featuring performances of two John Cage pieces, each exploring the concepts of chance, listening and humour. Indeterminacy will see comedian Stewart Lee reading 90 one-minute stories, accompanied by pianists Tania Chen and Steve Beresford. The Conspirators Of Pleasure, meanwhile, is an improvisation between the augmented sitar of Poulomi Desai, the modifi ed toys and electron-ics of Simon Underwood and the Persian frame drum of Seth Ayyaz.

BP Portrait Award 2013Wolverhampton Art Gallery, from March 1A last chance to see the fi nalists from the pres-tigious portrait competition. Artists from 77 coun-tries entered, with the 55 best works on display in Wolverhampton through the spring. Included will be Susanne du Toit’s winning portrait Piet-er, an oil painting of her eldest son, as well as the runner-up, The Uncertain Time by Coventry painter John Devane.

The Threepenny OperaThe Rep, from March 27The venue’s Epic Encounters season continues with this anarchic staging of Bertolt Brecht and Kurt Weill’s iconic musical. Victorian London is a deprived, corrupt, lawless place, and the back-drop for the infl uential Mr Peachum’s pursuit of the charismatic criminal Macheath. All of Weill’s famous songs will be present and correct, includ-ing Mack The Knife and Pirate Jenny.

How To Occupy An Oil Rig Mac, March 20Daniel Bye returns to Edgbaston for this engag-ing, thought-provoking and downright funny show about protest and revolution. Bye’s inspirational works boil big ideas down into palatable chunks, fuelled by his conviction that it is within our gift to change the world.

The Believers Warwick Arts Centre, March 11-15The aptly-named Frantic Assembly company bring a marked physicality and vivaciousness to Bryony Lavery’s latest work, a tale of two feuding families thrown together by circumstance. Following the startling successes of their previous collabora-tions, Stockholm and Beautiful Burnout, this one is not to be missed.

arts &culture

Bill Drummond: The 25 Paintings World TourEastside Projects + various venues, from March 13For his remarkable new project, the KLF iconoclast will base himself in a different city around the world for three months of every year from now until 2025. Drummond’s global odyssey begins in Birmingham on March 13 with the construction of a sculpture, 400 Bunch-es Of Daffodils, underneath Spaghetti Junction. For the following three months, Digbeth’s Eastside Projects will be his HQ, exhibiting The 25 Paintings, which will offer updates concerning his ongoing work, alongside videos, maps and photographs – though the real art will be found in Drummond’s activities around the city.

PICK

41March 2014


43March 2014

KEY TO LISTINGS:M = LIVE MUSICCN = CLUB NIGHTC = COMEDYwhaT’S ON

BIRMINGHAM: O2 Academy, Horsefair, Bristol St B1, 0844 4772000; The Institute, High St, Digbeth B5, 0844 2485037; NIA, King Edwards Rd B1, 0121 7804141; LG Arena, NEC, Solihull B40, 0121 7804141; The Flapper, Kingston Row B1, 0121 2362421; The Victoria, John Bright St B1, 0121 6339439; Hare & Hounds, High St, Kings Heath B14, 0121 4442081; The Actress & Bishop, Ludgate Hill B3, 0121 2367426; The Sunflower Lounge, Smallbrook Queensway B5, 0121 6327656; Symphony Hall, Broad St B1, 0121 7803333; Town Hall, Victoria Sq B3, 0121 7803333; Kitchen Garden Cafe, York Road, Kings Heath B14, 0121 4434725; Alexandra Theatre, Station St B1, 0844 8472302; Bull’s Head, St Marys Row, Moseley B13, 0121 2567777; Island Bar, Suffolk St B1, 0121 6325296; The Jam House, St Pauls Sq B3, 0121 2003030; Ort, Moseley Rd, Balsall Heath, B12; The Asylum, Hampton St, Hockley B19, 0121 2331109; The Rainbow, High St, Digbeth B12, 0121 7728174; Adam & Eve, Bradford St, Digbeth B12, 0121 6931500; The Rose Villa Tavern, Warstone Lane, B18, 0121 2367910; The Yardbird, Paradise Place B3, 0121 2122524; The Glee Club, The Arcadian, Hurst St B5, 0871 4720400; MAC, Cannon Hill Park B12, 0121 4463232; Nightingale, Kent St B5, 0121 6221718; Scruffy Murphys, The Priory Queensway B4, 0121 2362035; The Wagon & Horses, Adderley St, Digbeth B9, 0121 7721403; Lab11, Trent St B5, lab11.co.uk; The Moseley Arms, Ravenhurst St B12, 0121 7668467; Air, Heath Mill Lane B9, 0121 7666646; Suki10c, Bordesley Street B5; Gatecrasher, Broad St B15, 0121 633 1520

Want your gig or club

night listed in our monthly guide? Send

details to:

[email protected]

All details correct at time of going to press.

Check with venues before

setting out.

Saturday, Mar 1

M Louise Petit + Rhiannon Mair

Ort Balsall Heath

M Luke Wylde & The Japes

O2 Academy 3 Birmingham

M Mike & The Me-chanics

Symphony Hall Birmingham

M Huskies TALK Birmingham

M A Suitcase Full Of Owls

The Actress & Bishop

Birmingham

M Spirit Bomb The Wagon & Horses

Birmingham

M Acoustic Blues House Party

Artrix Bromsgrove

M Jam Hott Glitch Hop Awards ft Wil-liam Breakspear

Hare & Hounds Kings Heath

M Black Stone Cherry Wulfrun Hall Wolverhampton

CN Tommy Trash Gatecrasher Birmingham

CN MHVH Spotlight Birmingham

CN Drum & Bass Awards 2014

The Institute Birmingham

CN Cirque du Soul ft Groove Armada DJs

The Rainbow Warehouse

Birmingham

CN Liquid Sessions presents BCee + Deeper Connection

The Rooftop Birmingham

CN Shift Unplug Birmingham

CN JuQebox The Rose Villa Tavern

Hockley

CN Bruk Up with Kwai + Lord Byron


CN Hot Wax Bull’s Head Moseley

CN Blast Off The Slade Rooms Wolverhampton

C Marlon Davis The Glee Club Birmingham

C Silky + Kevin Dewsbury

The Slade Rooms Wolverhampton

Sunday, Mar 2

M Ghouls The Flapper Birmingham

M 5 Seconds of Sum-mer


M Voodoo Kings The Roadhouse Birmingham

M Harry J Hudson The Yardbird Birmingham

M János Balázs Jr Town Hall Birmingham

M Geroge Ezra + Soak


M John Lennon Mc-Cullagh


M Josienne Clarke + Ben Walker

Kitchen Garden Cafe

Kings Heath

M Sunplugged ft. 6-5 Specials

The Sun At The Station

Kings Heath

Monday, Mar 3

M Me First & The Gimme Gimmes


M Svart Crown The Flapper Birmingham

M Nick Mulvey The Glee Club Birmingham

M R5 The Institute Birmingham

M Diana Jones Hare & Hounds Kings Heath

M The Carrivick Sisters

Kitchen Garden Cafe

Kings Heath

CN Jam Jah Bull’s Head Moseley

C Comedy Night The Roadhouse Birmingham

Tuesday, Mar 4

M Disclosure O2 Academy Birmingham

M Cypher 16 O2 Academy 3 Birmingham

M Temples The Institute Birmingham

M Fairport Conven-tion

Town Hall Birmingham

M Eagulls Hare & Hounds Kings Heath

M Liam Williams The Slade Rooms Wolverhampton


CN The Game Gatecrasher Birmingham

C Diamond Dallas Page

The Glee Club Birmingham

Wednesday, Mar 5

M Mike Peters O2 Academy 3 Birmingham

M Anais Mitchell The Glee Club Birmingham

M Straight Lines Hare & Hounds Kings Heath

M Michael Chapman Kitchen Garden Cafe

Kings Heath

M Blackberry Smoke Wulfrun Hall Wolverhampton

C The Noise Next Door

Bramall Music Building

Birmingham

Thursday, Mar 6

M Brother & Bones O2 Academy 3 Birmingham

M 10:04s The Flapper Birmingham

M Paradise 9 The Roadhouse Birmingham

M The Brumbox The Shakespeare Birmingham

M Boy Jumps Ship Hare & Hounds Kings Heath

M Get The Blessing Hare & Hounds Kings Heath

M Traditional Song Session

Kitchen Garden Cafe

Kings Heath

M Is I Cinema + Victor + Women + Ghosts of Dead Airplanes DJs

Bull’s Head Moseley

C Andy Robinson The Glee Club Birmingham

C Paul Sinha The Slade Rooms Wolverhampton

Friday, Mar 7

M So Called Enemy O2 Academy 3 Birmingham

M Kevin Figes Octet Symphony Hall Birmingham

M None So Blind The Actress & Bishop

Birmingham

M Thomas J Speight The Glee Club Birmingham

M Sour Scarlet The Rainbow Birmingham

M The Starries The Wagon & Horses

Birmingham

M The Dublin Leg-ends

Town Hall Birmingham

M Velvet Texas Can-nonball


M Freestyle ft Kezia-soul


M Gucci Pimp The Loft Moseley

M Karma Corner Newhampton Arts Centre

Wolverhampton

CN Hivve presents Clive Henry B2B Alex Arnout

NextDoor Birmingham

CN Artful Dodger The Rainbow Courtyard

Birmingham

CN Hospitality The Rainbow Warehouse

Birmingham

CN Goldie Hare & Hounds Kings Heath

CN Blast Off The Civic Wolverhampton

C Dan Nightingale The Glee Club Birmingham

C Joel Dommett The Slade Rooms Wolverhampton

Saturday, Mar 8

M Bombay Bicycle Club

O2 Academy Birmingham

M Hilum The Actress & Bishop

Birmingham

M The Ganders The Sunflower Lounge

Birmingham

M The Hot Heads The Loft Moseley

M The Assist Numa Bar Wolverhampton

CN Cream Tours ft Tall Paul + Matt Darey + Sonique


CN 10.31 ft Hannah Wants


Birmingham

CN Heroes Of House Warehouse Birmingham

CN Seedy Sonics Resi-dent Party


CN Yo! MTV Raps Tribute 2nd An-niversary


CN An Evening With Knicker Bocker Corey (5 Hour Set)


CN Blast Off Closing Party

Civic Hall Wolverhampton

C Dan Nightingale The Glee Club Birmingham

C Ruby Wax Town Hall Birmingham

Sunday, Mar 9

M All Time Low O2 Academy Birmingham

M The English Beat O2 Academy 2 Birmingham

M IDIOM The Flapper Birmingham

M Dar Williams Hare & Hounds Kings Heath

M Carlo Mahalo & The G Strings

Kitchen Garden Cafe

Kings Heath

M Bohemian Jukebox Sunday Social ft Bonfire Radicals + The Railway Social Club + AC Thomas


C Richard Herring The Glee Club Birmingham

C WitTank The Slade Rooms Wolverhampton

Monday, Mar 10

M Chvrches The Institute Birmingham

M Comedy Night The Roadhouse Birmingham

M Camel Town Hall Birmingham


Tuesday, Mar 11

M Rodriguez Symphony Hall Birmingham

M Friday Club The Actress & Bishop

Birmingham

M Breed 77 The Institute Birmingham

M Lissie The Institute Birmingham

M A Suitcase Full Of Owls

The Roadhouse Birmingham

M The Telescreen (ft Frankie Cocozza)


M Lady Maisery Kitchen Garden Cafe

Kings Heath

M Polar The Slade Rooms Wolverhampton

CN Nuvo Masquerade Nuvo Bar Birmingham

C Alun Cochrane The Loft Moseley

Wednesday, Mar 12

M Architects The Institute Birmingham

M The Kate Gee Band Bull’s Head Moseley

C Rich Hall The Glee Club Birmingham

C Laughing Cows Kitchen Garden Cafe

Kings Heath

Thursday, Mar 13

M Holly Thomas Quintet

Bramall Music Building

Birmingham

45March 2014

M God Is An Astro-naut


M The Selecter O2 Academy 2 Birmingham

M Eagles Born Vul-tures


M Salopia O2 Academy 3 Birmingham

M Luke Concannon + Jimmy Davis


M Atlas The Loft Moseley

CN Lucha Libre with DJ T4BLES

Bodega Birmingham

CN Dr Jekyll’s Potion with Missy R

Jekyll & Hyde Birmingham

CN Dr Jekyll’s Potion with Richey Taylor


CN Freestyle Bull’s Head Moseley

C Kerry Godliman The Glee Club Birmingham

C Rob Deering The Glee Club Birmingham


Friday, Mar 14

M Nocturne ft Kather-ine Priddy

Ort Balsall Heath

M Ella Eyre The Institute Birmingham

M Maximo Park The Institute Birmingham

M Cassiopeia The Rainbow Birmingham

M Ghosts of Dead Airplanes

The Victoria Birmingham

M As Elephants Are Hare & Hounds Kings Heath

M Atlas The Loft Moseley

M Slam Cartel The Slade Rooms Wolverhampton

M Miles Kane Wulfrun Hall Wolverhampton

CN Portal launch night NextDoor Birmingham

CN Killjoy + Adjected Deleted

The Rainbow Courtyard

Birmingham

CN Shadow City pre-sents Jackmaster


Birmingham

CN Mr Scruff & Float-ing Points


CN Freestyle Bull’s Head Moseley

Saturday, Mar 15

M Perspex Flesh Muthers Birmingham

M Radio Charmers O2 Academy 3 Birmingham

M She’Koyokh Symphony Hall Birmingham

M Kill The Romantic The Actress & Bishop

Birmingham

M Bona Fide The Institute Birmingham

M Soilwork The Institute Birmingham

M We Are Scientists The Institute Birmingham

M Weatherbird The Sunflower Lounge

Birmingham

M Lovats Hare & Hounds Kings Heath

M The Samuel Rog-ers Band

The Loft Moseley

CN Toolroom Knights Gatecrasher Birmingham

CN FACE Allnighter ft Ellen Allien


Birmingham

CN United Nations Of Dub


Birmingham

CN Trancecoda 3D The Tunnel Club Birmingham

CN Amine Edge + DANCE

The Warehouse Birmingham

CN JuQebox with Funk Fusion

The Rose Villa Tavern

Hockley

CN Mr Scruff & Float-ing Points


CN Uber Social Bull’s Head Moseley


Sunday, Mar 16

M Stu Larsen The Flapper Birmingham

M Beth Morris The Yardbird Birmingham

M Marika Hackman Hare & Hounds Kings Heath

M Martha Tilston & The Scientists

Kitchen Garden Cafe

Kings Heath

M The Coal Porters Kitchen Garden Cafe

Kings Heath

Monday, Mar 17

M OneRepublic O2 Academy Birmingham

M We Caught The Castle

The Flapper Birmingham


C Rob Beckett The Glee Club Birmingham

Tuesday, Mar 18

M Rainbox ft Only Shadows

The Rainbow Birmingham

M Gregory Porter Town Hall Birmingham

M Chelsea Grin The Slade Rooms Wolverhampton

M Spiers & Boden Wulfrun Hall Wolverhampton

Wednesday, Mar 19

M Love/Hate The Slade Rooms Wolverhampton

C John Fothergill The Glee Club Birmingham

C The Midnight Beast The Institute Birmingham

Thursday, Mar 20

M Kodaline O2 Academy Birmingham

M Red Fang The Institute Birmingham

M The Brumbox The Shakespeare Birmingham

M Gabrielle Town Hall Birmingham

M Jungle Hare & Hounds Kings Heath

M The Misers Hare & Hounds Kings Heath

M Secret Eye The Loft Moseley

C Junior Simpson The Glee Club Birmingham

C Hal Cruttenden The Slade Rooms Wolverhampton

Friday, Mar 21

M Pete Yelding Ort Balsall Heath

M Franz Ferdinand O2 Academy Birmingham

M Equanimity The Actress & Bishop

Birmingham

M Banks The Institute Birmingham

M Loveable Rogues The Institute Birmingham

M Metronomy The Institute Birmingham

M GBH The Wagon & Horses

Birmingham

M Forest Hare & Hounds Kings Heath

M Hot Club De Swing Hare & Hounds Kings Heath

M Freestyle ft Dubcherry


M Secret Eye The Loft Moseley

CN Lucha Libre with DJ T4BLES

Bodega Birmingham

CN Dr Jekyll’s Remedy with Steve Jones



CN DR. Jekyll’s Rem-edy with Steve Jones


CN Enter The Dragon Bull’s Head Moseley

C Sarah Millican Symphony Hall Birmingham

C Junior Simpson The Glee Club Birmingham

Saturday, Mar 22

M Abie Budgen + Samantha Lindo

Cafe ORT Balsall Heath

M The Stranglers O2 Academy Birmingham

M Natives O2 Academy 3 Birmingham

M Octane OK O2 Academy 3 Birmingham

M Pretend Best Friend

The Actress & Bishop

Birmingham

M Johnny Foreigner The Flapper Birmingham

M Obscure Pleasures The Flapper Birmingham

M Only Real + EK-KAH

The Sunflower Lounge

Birmingham

M Hoopla Blue The Victoria Birmingham

M Sunplugged ft. Ben Drummond


Kings Heath

M And Also the Trees The Loft Moseley

M Tyketto Wulfrun Hall Wolverhampton

CN Bigger Than Barry present Roy David JR


CN Habit 7th Birthday ft James Holroyd


C Kane Brown The Glee Club Birmingham

C Patrick Monahan The Glee Club Birmingham

Sunday, Mar 23

M Dan Croll The Institute Birmingham

M Heartbreaker The Roadhouse Birmingham

M Ugly Duckling Hare & Hounds Kings Heath

Monday, Mar 24

M Daughtry O2 Academy Birmingham



Tuesday, Mar 25

M NME Awards Tour ft Interpol


M The Double Happy The Actress & Bishop

Birmingham

M Tinie Tempah Civic Hall Wolverhampton

M I Am Giant The Slade Rooms Wolverhampton

C Jonny & The Bap-tists

The Loft Moseley

Wednesday, Mar 26

M Goldfrapp Symphony Hall Birmingham

M The Webb Sisters The Glee Club Birmingham

M The Retrospectives Hare & Hounds Kings Heath

M Emily Macguire Kitchen Garden Cafe

Kings Heath

M Tinie Tempah Civic Hall Wolverhampton

Thursday, Mar 27

M Azealia Banks O2 Academy Birmingham

M Yung Lean The Flapper Birmingham

M Saint Raymond The Institute Birmingham

M Temple Songs The Sunflower Lounge

Birmingham

M Polar Bear Hare & Hounds Kings Heath

M Sleaford Mods Hare & Hounds Kings Heath

C Mostly Comedy ft Masai Graham + Dan Nicholas

Ort Balsall Heath

C Craig Hill The Glee Club Birmingham

C Robin Ince The Glee Club Birmingham

Friday, Mar 28

M Five Finger Death Punch


M Howler The Institute Birmingham

M Katy B The Institute Birmingham

M Framed The Rainbow Birmingham

M Foes Hare & Hounds Kings Heath

M Youngsta Hare & Hounds Kings Heath

M Freestyle ft Kas-tella


M Capital Sun The Loft Moseley

M Miles Hunt & Erica Nockalls

The Slade Rooms Wolverhampton

CN Sensateria Green Street Warehouse

Birmingham



Saturday, Mar 29

M Lily and Meg + Matthew Edwards

Ort Balsall Heath

M Heaven’s Base-ment


M Valous O2 Academy 3 Birmingham

M Against the Wheel The Actress & Bishop

Birmingham

M China Shop Bull The Wagon & Horses

Birmingham

M Freelance Mourn-ers


M Phillip Henry & Hannah Martin

Kitchen Garden Cafe

Kings Heath

M Vic Godard & The Subway Sect

The Loft Moseley

CN Base Defence League

Boxxed Birmingham

CN Jonas Kopp NextDoor Birmingham

CN FACE presents Four Tet


Birmingham

CN Digs & Woosh + DJ Jack + Jock Lee


CN Leftfoot Sessions - Sexy Beck’s Naked Birthday Bash



Sunday, Mar 30

M Bella Diem The Actress & Bishop

Birmingham

M Mc Devvo The Flapper Birmingham

M Bipolar Sunshine The Institute Birmingham

M Sunplugged ft Steady Hands


Kings Heath


Monday, Mar 31

M Dom Kennedy The Institute Birmingham

M Klaxons Hare & Hounds Kings Heath



47March 2014


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Brum Notes Magazine - March 2014