Brighton Music Blog : Hello Curxes! How was the gig?

Macaulay Hopwood : Amazing – sweaty, crazy – the usual festival fayre. Really Good.
Roberta Fidora : All powered by cough syrup.
MH : Cough syrup and beer
RF : Isn’t that a Flaming Moe?

BMB : You’re playing twice over the weekend. You’ve just played on the Les Enfants Terribles stage at the Mesmerist. What’s the other one?

MH : We’re also playing at the Black Dove, across town. That’s for Southsea Fest stage.
RF : It sounds slightly sinister, the name – “The BLACK Dove”
MH : Sounds a bit dark, but hopefully it’ll suit our sound.

BMB : What other Brighton bands are you looking forward to seeing at the Great Escape?

MH : There’s a few bands that I really want to see – We managed to catch half of Us Baby Bear Bones who were on just before we were on a different stage. Hopefully we’ll catch them when they play again.
RF: And Chvrches as well (BMB : who Curxes remixed earlier this year)
MH : Hopefully we can get to hang out with them a bit
BMB : Anyone else, or are you just going to drop in and see what you find?
MH : Despite playing, I haven’t actually got a wristband! So it’s a bit limited as to what I can go and see! I’ll go and see as many as I can.

BMB : Your live set up now has three people

RF : That’s Raife from Strangers. Say hello Raife!
Raife : Hello!
MH : Raife is playing drums with us at the moment. I often moonlight playing bass with Strangers, so we’re doing a bit of band swapping.
BMB : When did the decision to beef up the band come about?
RF : When I couldn’t count in time!
MH : We thought it was cool having a drummer onstage. Raife is a really good mate anyway, we have a good time jamming together, so we thought he would be a good addition to the setup.
RF : It adds more to the spectacle…
MH : He’s a good looking chap as well. We never had too many girls come and see us before, but now that Raife’s with us…
RF : Now we have to clear loads of pants off stage after we play!

BMB : You’re starting to be described as “Blitz Pop” in various places. What does that mean for people who haven’t heard you? Where did the name come from?

MH : An obsession with the second world war, and we’re quite poppy, I suppose. It’s noisy, it sounds like the blitz. It seems to fit the music pretty well.
RF : We leave a trail of destruction in our wake!

BMB : Your latest single Further Still was also out earlier this year. What’s coming up next?

MH : We’ve got another release coming out fairly soon, possibly with a single label, but nothing’s been finalised yet. It’s a song called Valkyrie which is what we close our set with at the moment. It seems to go down well – it’s noisy, it’s got a bad-ass trumpet in it. What more could you want!

Cave Painting have a new EP out called Rio, which is packaged just as beautifully as their album was last year. You can buy it for a fiver from Resident or from the Cave Painting website. Here’s the video for the lead track:

Phantom Runners debut single Goddess of War recalls the best of early 90s guitar indie pop. There’s a hint of Stone Roses in the drums, and the guitars sound like The Railway Children or some other Factory band from that era. We hit download before we’d even listened the whole way through:

Next is the video for Battersea, the lead track from AK/DK‘s new single we wrote about recently:

The new Transformer single is out on 31st May, sees them dropping the vowels for three and a half minutes of electro pop:

Luo‘s new single Dissolver is available to download on Soundcloud. We’ve been big fans of his glitchy laid back jazzy electronica since we first saw him at Sea Monsters, and this track is another fine string to his bow:

AK/DK aren’t the only local analogue synth dance band with new material out. DA-10 also have a new EP called The Shape of Space. Redshift is ravey, Respirator is instrumental hip hop with huge bass (and is still available for download over at XLR8R), Anaphase is retro sounding space-rock, I Have to Survive is broken beat house number and closer Out Of Reach Of Earth brings together a lot of the sounds from each of the preceding tracks. There’s a sampler up on soundcloud, which you can hear here:

The new Call Me Jolene EP, May, is a real change of pace and mood to something far more personal and reflective. It was out on the first of may, and sounds a bit like this:

Finally we have Alice Amelia‘s new single Passion. What starts off sounding like a piano ballad transforms into some slick r’n'b. There’s a free download on the soundcloud link below:

This week is Brighton’s biggest week for music. As if there wasn’t enough going on in Brighton with the Festival and the Fringe we also have The Great Escape, when the music industry takes a weekend away from London and decamps to our brilliant city. I won’t go on about how criminally under-represented Brighton bands are in the main festival, because most of the Alternative Escape is made up of local acts, and most of the Alternative Escape is free. Don’t take this as a slur on the value of the Great Escape – with tickets available for less than fifty quid, it’s no wonder that it was sold out weeks ago.

Here’s a some of the Brighton based musicians playing this weekend. I don’t claim that this is an exhaustive list (although if you’re not on this list, it could mean that Brighton Music Blog doesn’t know about you, so get in touch). And being a festival, there’s definitely no promises about stage times! There’s plenty more info over on the Great Escape Website, and on their smartphone app, and it’s worth signing up to the text alerts over the weekend too. And if you can’t make it, we’ll be posting up some of our photos next week (once we’ve recovered!)

Wednesday

At Jubilee Square, there’s Abi Wade at 5pm, and Jennifer Left at 7pm
Latest7 are hosting an event at Latest music bar, obviously – Warsaw Radio are 8.15 – 8.45, Simonne & The Dark Stars are 9 – 9.30, and Nick Williams 9.45 – 10:15
Pull The Plug are at the Mucky Duck, headlined by Luke Sital Singh
Never Been Kissed promotions are at The Hope, with a selection of Brighton and Hastings bands, headlined by Plasticine who are on at 10.45pm

Thursday

Kinnie The Explorer take on a residency on Resonance’s stage – They’re every day at the Brighthelm Centre at 1.30pm
Noisescape is Brighton Noise’s all day event at Moshi Moshi – their line up is: 1pm Cat Fire Radio, 2.25 Monsters Build Mean Robots, 3.50 Black Black Hills, 5.15 Us Baby Bear Bones, 6.40 AK/DK, 8.05 Dark Horses, 9.30 Nordic Giants
Boon Magazine and Two Sisters Records are at Fitzherberts from 7pm : TigerCub 7.15, The New Union 8pm, The Red Lapels 8.45, IC1s 9.30 , Demob Happy 10:15
Spindle Magazine / Les Enfants Terribles are at The Mesmerist – TigerCub are on at 2.30pm, Curxes are at 6.55pm, with The Wytches headlining at 22:15
Fear of Men are on at Latest at 9pm at a night put on by London in Stereo and Fear of Fiction
Southsea Fest are hosting at the Black Dove, and Curxes are playing at 8.50

Friday

Emma Gatrill is playing at the Fountainhead for Neighbourhood’s all day event. No details of what time she’s on, but looking at the line up it’ll be mid-afternoon
The Wytches are on of the first bands on at Republic of Music‘s event at the Shipwrights Yard on Middle Street. They’re on at 12:55
The Line of Best Fit are hosting at the Unitarian Church – Luke Sital Singh is on at 9.45pm
Drowned in Sound at hosting three nights over the weekend. On Friday they’re at Saint Mary’s Church and Martin Rossiter plays at 8pm
Brighton Music Blog favourites IYES are on at the Blind Tiger at 8.30pm
The Wytches are at The Haunt at 9.15pm
Fiddlers Elbow have a few Brighton acts on – Luke Sital Singh is on at 4pm, Nick Williams is at 6pm
Beatcast and Dirty Bingo are at 10 Below (formerly The Jazz Place).  Fear of Mean play at 9.15pm
Alcopop records host twelve hours of music at the Pav Tav. Tall Ships and Jumping Ships are amongst the bands playing
Then if you’re still standing there’s an afterparty at Brighton Electric – From 20pm there’s Dog in the Snow (acoustic), Jacko Hooper (acoustic), Wild Cat Strike, Hundredth Anniversary, Us Baby Bear Bones, AK/DK, Spacenoid, and Physics House Band DJs

Saturday

The St Ann’s Well Gardens Festival is part of this year’s Alternative Escape – their bill includes Mr B The Gentleman Rhymer at 12.30, Jennifer Left at 1.40, Traams at 2.30, and Jake Shillingford playing a My Life Story set at 15:10
The Beautiful Word play Common Tongue‘s event at The Black Dove at 6.20pm
In ther afternoon The Fiddlers Elbow The Move Ons are on at 2pm, and Matt Carpanini is on at 3pm
The Recommender’s have their annual Blog Up Party at The Mesmerist. It’s not just and event for bloggers, there are bands for everyone and IYES play at 15:20
Kins play not one but two shows as part of the main festival on saturday, at the Green Door Store @ 15:30, and at the Brighthelm Centre at 20:30
Milk No Sugar cafe on Trafalgar Street sees Donna Fullman at 2:30, Warsaw Radio at 3:15 and Nick Williams at 4pm
Brighton Promoters Cable Club are at Sticky Mikes – Two Jackals are on at 2:10pm and Written in Waters are on at 3pm
Fools Paradise vs Bad Math is at the Pav Tav , and Tyrannosaurus Dead play at 8pm
The amazing Physics House Band are on at the Concorde 2 at 8.30pm, and then at 9.15 there’s Tall Ships
80s Matchbox B-Line Disaster play at 9.45pm at Coalition
Last, but by no means least there’s an Under The Influence Billy Bragg special at Fitzherberts, and The Bobby McGees play at 10.10pm

As usual, click on the images to view large:

Click on the images to view full size.

First up is The Beautiful Word’s new single Particles. The video’s out now, but the launch party is going to be on 3rd of June. More details as we get them. The song’s a lot more pop and a lot less twee than we’re used to from the Beautiful Word. It’s still unmistakeably them – it wouldn’t be a Beautiful Word track without Emily and Megan’s lovely close harmonies – but this could well be the best thing they’ve done.

We’ve also got the latest upload from Jacko Hooper,  a very smooth, very classy cover of Fly Me To The Moon. He’s got another new track being uploaded soon, but until then, we’re  more than happy with this. Jacko will be playing at the Great Escape Aftershow Party at Brighton Electric, alongside Dog in the Snow, The Hundredth Anniversary, Us Bear Baby Bones, AK/DK and Spacenoid.

Brighton Music Blog favourites IYES have posted a new track online, which shows a new side to the band. Daddy is a seven minute long house number, which is a little bit baggy and a little bit balearic. It’s stripped of the vocals which characterised Lighthouse and Glow, but the one thing it has in common with the previous two tracks, one of the things that strikes you is how good it sounds. There’s something really clever going on with reverb and stereo, but don’t go overthinking about it, just enjoy it. You can hear it online by watching the youtube video above, or you can get a free download to listen whenever you like by signing up to their mailing list.

Dispatches #3 is coming out soon on download and limited cassette, with gorgeous packaging. The main track Battersea is up now as a free download – it’s a crazy lock groove analogue synth driven number which sounds like Stereolab’s ADHD kid brother, which captures a bit of the energy and attitude of their legendary live sets. The full track list of the release is:

Battersea
Punk Music Mass
Jello With Mimi
Battersea [Checked Slice's Corrupt File Mix]
Battersea [Mechacoustic Mix]
Battersea [Man Ray Sky Mix]
Battersea [Champion Fever Mix]

Deliver was recorded at Brighton Electric, and features a lot less beats than those who’ve seen her live might expect, although it feels like it might burst into a huge dancefloor track at any point. The backbone of the track is what sounds like a looped vocal sample, but is actually played live on pads. I’ve compared Anneka to Bjork before, and Deliver is another track worthy of that comparison, sounding like it wouldn’t be out of place amongst some of the more experimental tracks from the Post era. We love it!