A word from the Editor

Pg 1

Cheltenham’s MND

Pg 2

Cathodes EP Review

PG 2

Glos-Tone-Beret Review

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10 Minute Review

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What’s On Listings

Pg 5-9

Fabio Thomas

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MAG Needs You!

We are always looking for news and reviews for MAG from lovely people like you! Being a non-profit initiative we don’t pay but can get you into gigs and publish your work. Please contact Amelia if you want to contribute any-thing to this fanzine: musicatglos@gmail.com

MAG would like to say a special thank you to the

Popular Music course at The University of Gloucestershire for their contri-bution to the distribution of the fanzine.

A Word From The EditorThe crappy weather isn’t stopping the county’s musical offerings and thank goodness! Chel-tenham’s listings for April are over two pages long showing just how much we have going on before festival season gets into full swing.

Elsewhere in this issue we have an important announcement from regular columnist and Cheltenham’s Music Network Developer. An EP review of local band Cathodes, Dan Gut-teridge’s review of Tone Radio’s mighty French themed all dayer Glos-Tone-Beret. Fabio Thomas reviews Gloucester Guildhall’s ‘Past, Present & Future’ gig of local bands while our 10 Minute Review this month is of Welcome to Marathon’s Rise Records instore gig.

Festival season is nearly upon us and what bet-ter time to take advantage of our local music scene. We are really lucky in Gloucestershire with such a wide variety of festivals there is definitely something going on that appeals to everyone. Look out in coming issues for news and reviews on local music festivals across the county.

Don’t forget it’s Record Store Day Saturday 20th April, get down and support Gloucester-shire’s independent record stores and take advantage of the exclusive records released specially for the day!

Amelia x

Cheltenham’s Music Network Developer

Despite MAG being established as the music listings fanzine for Gloucestershire for some time now (yay!) it’s only this month that I’ve realised that we’re now cycling through the years at pace, with each column I get to write for this wonderful publication acting as my monthly checkpoint for all things good in this county.

Looking at last year, this is about the time I normally say “we’re out of the winter months of less shows and cold weather” and “Spring is soon to kick off with festival season just around the corner.” The truth is that the county has been most prolific in these ‘down times’ of the gigging calendar, with plenty available for all, as ably documented in the listings section of this fanzine...

This realisation is coupled with an unavoidable certainty - that I will cease to be the Music Network Developer in Cheltenham pretty soon. Five years ago when I started this role there was plenty to do, plenty of people to help and plenty of opportunities to develop projects. This is not the case anymore. I’m in the process of putting together an annual report for my bosses and it’s quite obvious that my work is no longer a direct front line effort, but in organising and facilitating larger projects that benefit the hard work and self-sufficiency of this town’s musicians, venues and promoters. Seeing as this effectively puts me in the ugly role of middle-management, the right thing to do would be to hand in my notice. I will always act as an advocate for local music and endeavour to help anyone who asks, but I feel this work no longer demands a title - I’m happy to do it anyway.

I’d say a regular column of a publicly available (and popular) fanzine is probably not the best place to announce this - especially as I’ve not spoken to the bosses yet - but it only seems right to let the people Iwork for know first.

A

Cathodes EP ReviewWords: Andrew Hammond | Picture: Cathodes

I have had the pleasure of seeing Cathodes live only once and can comfortably say that they are one of my favourite bands from the West Midlands. Hailing from Birmingham, the instru-mental four-piece have audibly spent a lot of time in the studio to create an incredibly profes-sional sounding debut EP.

Available for a pay-what-you-want download, Ghosts of People We Should Have Been fea-tures four unique grooving instrumental tracks each of which are entirely captivating through-out their wandering paths.

Writing instrumental music must be an impos-sibly difficult process considering the lack of a vocal melody for listener’s to latch onto. Yet, Cathodes have successfully written intense, mature tracks with a deep musical intricacy that never relents. The final track: I Am The Big I Am, rounds off their debut record perfectly with its tangible hook, and leaves you with a desper-ate urge to hear more.

Cathodes are a fantastic band on record, and they are equally as entertaining live. The band deserve your attention if you’re curious to hear a new promising instrumental rock group. They can be seen at ‘Live Music Scene Turns Six’ in Bristol at The Exchange on 28th April 2013.

Glos-Tone-Beret ReviewWords: Dan Gutteridge | Picture: Tone Radio

I walk into the Frog on Saturday 9th February and the first thing I see is a bearded gentleman balancing two baguettes and two pints in his arms. He’s got a beret rather precariously balanced on his head, some garlic wrapped around his neck and he’s draped in a striped t-shirt. Then the inevitable happens. The pints hit the floor. Cider gushes everywhere. But he stands proudly holding his prized baguettes. On any other day I would have been straight out of the pub, but not today. For today is one of my favourite music all day-ers. Today is Glos-Tone-Beret.

Glos-Tone-Beret is a daylong festival, taking place at The Frog and Fiddle with the goal of raising as much money as possible for the University of Gloucestershire’s student radio station, Tone. Two stages of great local music, everyone donned in French fancy dress and a live radio broadcast happening from the Frog’s loft. What is there not to love?

The boys from local record label ‘Over The Hill’ were hosting the second stage, neatly tucked away in the Green Room. The stage, and the day was kicked off by Nina Condron. A set full of folky originals and unique covers, it was a great way to kick off the stage. She was followed by Jim Wain. Jim was joined by two members of Thrill Collins, who would be playing later, and served up a particular highlight a cover of ‘King of Spain’.

Medik and Atrevido kicked off the Barn stage in fine fashion. Two very different rock bands but both were very finally skilled in what they did. The heavier Medik brought energy, passion and scream. Atrevido were incredibly tight, and had a front man with one of the smoothest voices ever to grace The Frog. Mic D, known by many others as one fifth of KSH and The Going Goods, managed to put me in some kind of trance. His vocals are to put it simply, outstanding. It was the quietest the room was all day as everybody hung on every word that he sang. I then made my way back into The Barn, and was absolutely stunned. We Used To Have Horses were next to the stage. Instead of the band I thought would greet me. It was in fact one man. He played, guitar, bass, keys and the drums all to an incredibly high standard. After he’d finish playing one instrument it would loop round whilst he played the next. This continued whilst he got behind his drums and beat the hell out of them. This all built into one sensational crescendo that simply blew me away.

Metropolis and Terrors followed in the Barn. Two very organised bands that have a great catalogue of catchy, intriguing rock songs. It seemed to be the day of the vocalist as the Terrors front man pulled me in with his unique vocals. Metropolis whose EP I walked home with at the end of the night certainly caught my imagination. One particular song ‘Okay’ was stuck in my head for some time.Aquation played next on the Over The Hill stage. In a music scene where theres so many rock and in-die bands, Aquation offer something new and unique. Alternative, guitar lead RnB which was superbly placed, early in the evening, on the line up.

10 Minute ReviewWelcome To Marathon @ Rise Records, Chelten-ham (17.03.13)

Five minutes before an instore performance starts, it’s hard to tell just who is already in the shop browsing and who is there to actually watch the band. Sure, there are a couple of people with cameras who look ‘in the know’, but mostly, men with beards and girls with tote bags hang around the aisles either chatting politely or stealthily look-ing through the racks for that twelfth Mountain Goats album. As a result, when the band starts playing, most people stop what they are doing and shuffle small dainty steps forward out of po-liteness or curiosity.

Their curiosity is well-placed because Welcome To Marathon are good. They are young and have accents and attract more girls than boys to see them. They sound like Bruce Springsteen and REM before they got boring (ok, Springsteen nev-er got boring). The vocalist is great and the key-board player propels the songs to sound like how Belle & Sebastian used to before they got boring (they did get boring). Between songs, people in the audience pick DVD’s from the racks and ask their mates, “Have you seen this yet?” That wouldn’t happen if they were playing in a pub. Two girls have come from Taunton to see the band. I wonder if they’ll be able to catch the last train home? It is a Sunday after all. There may be a rail replacement service. I suppose Taunton’s only an hour and a half away on the M5. Oh…I guess I’ve got old and boring too. www.10minutereviews.tumblr.com

Thrill Collins brought their fun loving skiffle pop to the Barn and inevitably packed it out. It now seems that if you live in Cheltenham and do not know and love Thrill Collins then you simply don’t belong here. Marle Hill Parade set the sage awesomely well for ‘The Over The Hill Records’ headliner Welcome To Marathon. Marle, still a relatively new band, are certainly ones to keep tabs on.

Marathon packed out The Green Room and al-though they were a drummer down they still brought their A game. Their entire set had the whole crowd singing lyrics back to the band. This was quite a testament to the bands song writing ability and just how big they have become in Cheltenham. Up and Out of Memphis and Balfour served up par-ticular highlights in their set.

KSH and The Going Goods, were next up and sub-headlining on the main stage and showed just why they have become a highly established act. Mic D’s vocals that blew me away earlier returned but this time were accompanied by some tremen-dous beat boxing and intelligent rap. What KSH and The Going Goods have created is something unique, something special, that I haven’t heard in the county or in deed the whole country. They know how to put on a Fun show as well.

Jake Watson and his band capped of the evening. At risk of sounding like a broken record, Jake again brought something totally different to Glos-Tone-Be-ret. He promised a Ho-Down and boy did he deliver. Foot stomping ‘Indie-Swamp’ that had people hug-ging, dancing and shouting at each other, all at the same time. Jakes energy and passion for his songs is something that is infectious and spreads to ev-erybody in attendance. His talented backing band, truly do back up his ability and add something extra to the show. An excellent, more than worthy head-liner.

No band on display at Glos-Tone warranted a bad review. Something that is incredibly rare for a music all dayer. Each act brought their all, played their hearts out and delivered their part in a great day of incredible music. So well done to everybody that played for this, everybody that attended for mak-ing the day so fun and everybody at Tone Radio for once again delivering on a great event.

Cheltenham 01/04/2013 Royal Union Steve Franks 20:00

02/04/2013 Royal Union Steve Franks 20:00 02/04/2013 The Bayshill Kim Cypher Band 20:30

03/04/2013 The Bayshill Gordon Wood 20:30

04/04/2013 The Wheatsheaf Bex & Franks Quartet 20:00 04/04/2013 Zizi Peter Nemesvari 19:00

05/04/2013 The Bayshill Sons of the Delta 21:00 05/04/2013 The Cotswold Coronettes 21:00 05/04/2013 St Paul’s Tavern Emmett Brown 21:00 05/04/2013 United Services Tubby Blues Club 20:00 05/04/2013 The Royal Sweet, Short & Curly 21:00 05/04/2013 2pigs JUDDER! 22:00 06/04/2013 The Daffodil Huw Johnson Trio 12:30 06/04/2013 The Bayshill Toadstool 21:00 06/04/2013 The Cotswold Los Bandidios Del Tempo 21:00 06/04/2013 Subtone The Cuginis 12:00 06/04/2013 The Beaufort Arms Emily J Mew Duo 21:00 06/04/2013 Sound Music Venue Stereo Influence 20:00 06/04/2013 St Paul’s Tavern Rabbit Foot 21:00 06/04/2013 Frog & Fiddle Kick it for Cancer Fest 15:00

07/04/2013 Royal Union Ska Henchman 21:00 07/04/2013 The Exmouth Swing From Paris 14:30 07/04/2013 Royal Union Brunch with Guitar Music 11:30 07/04/2013 Albion House Nobby 14:30

08/04/2013 The Daffodil Kim Cypher Quartet 20:00 08/04/2013 Royal Union Steve Franks 20:00

09/04/2013 Royal Union Steve Franks 20:00

11/04/2013 Zizi Peter Nemesvari 19:00 11/04/2013 The Wheatsheaf Mrs Peel 20:00

12/04/2013 London Inn Last Man Standing 21:00 12/04/2013 The Bayshill Beaujacks 21:00 12/04/2013 The Cotswold Lyrical Lottery 21:00

April GIG LISTINGS

12/04/2013 Reddings Community Centre Swingtime Quartet 20:00 12/04/2013 G’s Crying Parents 20:30

13/04/2013 The Daffodil Huw Johnson 12:30 13/04/2013 The Bayshill Michigan Avenue 21:00 13/04/2013 Sound Music Venue Canary Swing 20:00 13/04/2013 St Paul’s Tavern Beaujacks 21:00 13/04/2013 Pates School Cate Cody 20:00 13/04/2013 2pigs The Noble Experiment 20:00 14/04/2013 Royal Union Groove Front 21:00 14/04/2013 Albion House Nobby 14:30 14/04/2013 The Playhouse John Etheridge 19:45

15/04/2013 Royal Union Steve Franks 20:00 15/04/2013 The Strand Brown Torpedo 20:00

16/04/2013 The Bayshil Bayshill Jam Session 21:00 16/04/2013 The Frog & Fddle Edenfall 19:30 18/04/2013 Zizi Peter Nemesvari 19:00 18/04/2013 The Wheatsheaf Kim Cypher Quartet 20:00

19/04/2013 2pigs Noise Agents 19:30 19/04/2013 The Bayshill To Be Advised 21:00 19/04/2013 London Inn Allstars Dub Band 21:00 19/04/2013 St Paul’s Tavern Steamroller 21:00 19/04/2013 Sound Music Venue Packed Elephant 20:00 19/04/2013 Bacon Theatre Jerry Lee Lewis Story TBC 19/04/2013 Tithe Barn The Jaguars 20:30

20/04/2013 2pigs Slageri 20:00 20/04/2013 The Exmouth Arms Emily J, Peter N, 21:00 Paul Newman 20/04/2013 The Cotswold Funk Bomb 21:00 20/04/2013 The Bayshill To Be Advised 21:00 20/04/2013 Sound Music Venue Emmett Brown & 20:00 Swift Manouver 20/04/2013 St Paul’s Tavern My Design 21:00

21/04/2013 Royal Union Paul Newmans Jazz Mess 21:00 21/04/2013 Parabola Arts Centre Midland Youth Orchestra 19:30

22/04/2013 Royal Union Steve Franks 20:00

April GIG LISTINGS

23/04/2013 Royal Union Steve Franks 20:00

25/04/2013 Zizi Peter Nemesvari 19:00 25/04/2013 The Wheatsheaf Wheatsheaf Jam Night 20:00

26/04/2013 St Paul’s Tavern Thrill Collins 21:00 26/04/2013 The Bayshill To Be Advised 21:00 26/04/2013 London Inn Charlton Kings Blues 21:00

26/04/2013 The Wheatsheaf Galeforce 20:00

27/04/2013 2pigs Lord Misery 20:00 27/04/2013 Beaufort Arms Vicki Swan & Johnny Dyer 20:00 27/04/2013 The Bayshill Boogaloos 21:00 27/04/2013 The Exmouth Arms Life O’Reilly 21:00 27/04/2013 St Paul’s Tavern MEMEME’S 21:00

28/04/2013 Royal Union Brunch with Guitar Music 11:30 28/04/2013 Exmouth Arm Will be a Jazz Band 14:30 28/04/2013 Tithe Barn Stackridge 19:45 29/04/2013 Royal Union Steve Franks 20:00

30/04/2013 Norwood Arms Norwood Jam 20:30 30/04/2013 Royal Union Steve Franks 20:00

Gloucester 04/04/2013 Ridge & Furrow Jam Night 21:00

05/04/2013 Wotton Hall Keep it Cash 19:30

06/04/2013 Old Richeans Club Sax N Axe 21:00

11/04/2013 Guildhall Duke Special 19:30

13/04/2013 Guildhall Dexy’s 19:30

18/04/2013 Blackfriars Martyn Joesph 19:30

19/04/2013 Guildhall Gaz Coombes 19:30

21/04/2013 Guildhall Peace 19:30

April GIG LISTINGS

26/04/2013 Guildhall Dog is Dead 19:30

27/04/2013 Guildhall Kate Nash 19:30 27/04/2013 Ridge & Furrow Zachery Boot 20:00

Stroud 05/04/2013 Sub Rooms Sheelanagig 20:00

06/04/2013 Sub Rooms Stroud Ceilidhs - Bedlam 20:00

10/04/2013 Sub Rooms Fake Thackeray 19:30

11/04/2013 Sub Rooms Peatbog Faeries 19:30 11/04/2013 Stroud Valley Artspace Three Band Retrospective 21:00

18/04/2013 Sub Rooms Flossie Malavialle 19:30

19/04/2013 Sub Rooms Take Fat 19:30

26/04/2013 Sub Rooms Friday Night Live 20:00 26/04/2013 Stroud Brewery Triple Sec 20:00

27/04/2013 Sub Rooms Hélélé 20:00

Tewkesbury 06/04/2013 DD’s Too Rock For Country 21:00

10/04/2013 Theoc House Rod Kelly Trio 20:00

13/04/2013 Croft Farm Otis Mack & The Tubby Bluesters 21:00

24/04/2013 Theoc House JB3 20:00

Birdlip 05/04/2013 Royal George Greg Winters 21:00

19/04/2013 Royal George MI Brown 21:00

26/04/2013 Royal George Damsons Sky Duo 21:00

April GIG LISTINGS

Cinderford

12/04/2013 Miners Hall Dean Austin 21:00

13/04/2013 Miners Hall Hells Bells 21:00

27/04/2013 Miners Hall Too Rock For Country 21:00

Winchcombe 02/04/2013 White Hart Folk Club 20:00

02/04/2013 Corner Cupboard Bluegras Session 21:00

Conderton 05/04/2013 Yew Tree Kim Cypher Quartet 21:00

Open Mic Nights Tuesday St Paul’s Tavern, Cheltenham Tuesday Salisbury Inn, Cheltenham

Wednesday Cross Keys, Gloucester Wednesday Norwood Arms, Cheltenham

Thursday The Strand Bar, Cheltenham Thursday Hogs Head, Cheltenham Thursday The Restoration, Cheltenh am Thursday St Paul’s Tavern, Cheltenham

Friday The Fiery Angel, Cheltenham Friday Royal George Hotel, Cheltenham Friday Gardners Arms, Tewkesbury

Sunday Royal Union, Cheltenham Sunday The Cotswold Inn, Cheltenham

If you want your gig in MAG email us:musicatglos@gmail.com

April GIG LISTINGS

Fabio Thomas on... Gloucestershire College’s

’Past, Present & Future’Many of the area’s young musicians took to the stage for Gloucestershire College’s ‘Past Present & Future’ gig at the Guildhall on March 15th. The free gig aimed to display a range of the college music department’s most talented musicians from the past, the present and the future (funnily enough). The line-up, which ranged from Gloucestershire gigging veter-ans Swift Manouver to a seemingly new collaboration The Year One All Stars, certainly delivered an eclectic mix of the collage’s bands through the ages.

First on were young punk four piece Strange Things Frighten Us. After recently signing to Red Zebra records, big things were expected from this group, who delivered a slick performance. The band’s quintessentially punk / metal sound, seemed inspired by the female lead vocals of Paramore crossed with double bass drum preci-sion of System of a Down.

The Year One All Star’s followed STFU’s opening set and immediately flicked off the distortion pedals opting for a mellower tone. The group played a set of pop covers which seemed a little loosely thrown together. However, considering this is a collaboration of first year musicians, who presumably (considering their name) had been put together for this one off show, they entertained the crowd sufficiently.

Feed the Moose had announced prior to the gig that this would be their final ever performance. The fact seems slightly disappointing now, as they were one of my favourite acts of the evening. Their borderline psychedelic sound, mixed with their long instrumental breaks and ‘jam-band’ vibe made for an enjoyable performance. A highlight was them even slipping into some Pink Floyd at one point.

The Acrylics again picked up the acoustic covers theme, but with a much tighter sound than The First Year All Stars. They again pleased the crowd with a range of covers, before ending the set with a well thought out origi-nal track; delivered with a superb female vocal line.

Regular readers of the column will have heard me rant and rave about Swift Manouver time and time again, and this is no exception. Their set provoked the crowd to finally start loosening up and moving their hips – this was in stark contrast to the circular mosh pit that erupted during Feed the Moose. SM left Stereo Influence with a difficult job – but the synth-pop headliners seemed to engage an adoring crowd, even if they didn’t make them move their skanking feet.

Want to contribute? We like listings, reviews, editorial, previews, pictures, art, cartoons and would like to fill these pages with things you care about. We‘d love to hear about anything to do with live music in the county really and

can help with anything from promoting you here to getting you reviewed, played on student and local radio, putting you in touch with venues, musicians and artists across the county and just about anything else you can think of!

Want to advertise? Put your gig posters in with the MAG for distribution? Ask what our favourite kind of ham is? You can contact Amelia – musicatglos@gmail.com

MAG Editor Amelia Scognamiglio | Cover Design Robbie Pert | Listings Contributor Ollie West | Staff Writers Fabio Thomas, Andrew Hammond, Tom of 10 Minute Reviews & Dan Gutteridge| Thanks to all the people who contributed to issue TWENTY SEVEN of MAG, special thanks (again) goes to Robbie Pert for designing the awesome covers and to Andrew Lansley for continuing to support MAG and everything musical in Gloucestershire| All work remains property of the original owner, used with permission. Reproduction in whole or any part (especially the listings) of this fanzine would be awesome as it’s great to spread the word people, just make sure you credit the fanzine.