We don’t get to write about Anneka nearly enough on the blog, so we were pleased when an email dropped into inbox earlier today telling us about a new track of hers that has been posted.
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!
Following on from all of the tickets selling in the blink of an eye, the gig has been moved to a bigger venue – The gig will now be held at The Dome, and further tickets have been released.
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In a roundabout way, The Levellers are partly responsible for this blog. No, really. They were the first band I saw live who were associated with where I was living. I grew up on the suburbs of London and while there might have been bands who associated themselves with London, seeing them in London would have still been an hour’s journey on public transport.
In the summer of 1993 the band headlined a night at a free festival in Stanmer Park, just a walk over the fields from Sussex Uni where I was studying. Eighteen year old me thought it was very cool that a band who I’d heard on the radio, whose cds my friends from other parts of the country owned, would be playing a free gig in their hometown, my hometown. It would be another eight years before Fatboy Slim did something similar with the first Big Beach Boutique.
Fast forward to 2013 and the band are celebrating their 25th birthday. The Levellers don’t play much in Brighton these days but to commemorate the landmark they’re playing a one off show on Friday 19th July at The Dome St Barts church just off London Road – the closest suitable venue to The Level which was one of the inspirations for their name (We could mention that The Levellers was also the name of a political movement in the Civil War, but we’re Brighton Music Blog, not the Seventeenth Century History blog). Pre-sale tickets sold out when they were announced last week, but more tickets have been released and are available seetickets.com.
May’s a funny months for gigs. One one hand it’s quite possibly the best month in the year – The Great Escape comes to town and there’s so much going on for Brighton Festival and Fringe. But on the other hand there are so many distractions that a lot of bands lay low until there’s a chance that they’ll be heard. So even though this weekend is a Bank Holiday, things are starting to look a little bit thin on the ground.
On Thursday night Rich from Heliopause is putting on a gig at the Hope. His own band and Ingrid Plum act as support from Canadian Ingrid Gatin. Meanwhile, at Sticky Mike’s, BrightonsFinest are putting on Fragile Creatures.
Be Nothing promotions are celebrating their second birthday on Friday night at the Blind Tiger. There are five bands on the bill headlined by Girl Band, with local representation from Tourist and Adolescent.
Our pick for Saturday night is another gig at the Blind Tiger – Brighton’s King Porter Stomp are joining forces with Bristol’s First Degree Burns for what promises to be a fantastic ska / hip hop collaboration.
Well this is an oddity. A new track out of nowhere from Mary Hampton and her gang of players, the Cotillion. Mary is always a treasure, so anything new from her is worth paying attention to.
But this is a strange, dramatic and sometimes haunting, sometimes disturbing musical setting for the epigraph from the opening of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s novel ‘The Great Gatsby’. The lyrics are sung passionately from the dark inards of the singer, whilst the music swirls around in careless abandon in some parts and a cool dispassionate plinkety plonk of Mary’s piano in others.
The words (which are Fitzgerald’s, not Mary’s) in some ways summarise the novel and are worth repeating just for the hell of it
Then wear the gold hat, if that will move her;
If you can bounce high, bounce for her too,
Till she cry “Lover, gold-hatted, high-bouncing lover,
I must have you!”
Is this track in some way related to the forthcoming film of the Great Gatsby? I don’t think so. Was it prompted by it? Hard to tell. Is it trying to cash-in on the movie? I doubt it very much. Is it a precursor to more Mary Hampton music? We hope so, although it left me wanting more tunes and more songs.
One of my favourite young Brighton bands Time for T have a new video out as a precursor to their new EP and it’s really rather wonderful. One of many highlights from their live set, if this song doesn’t convince you that Spring is here and Summer’s on it’s way you may be half-dead. Best to check.
Here’s a new regular feature that I’ve decided to start on the blog. We write a lot of posts about a lot of bands, and quite often a blog post about something we absolutely love can easily drop out of view. On top of that, some things we write about are slow burners, and while we’ll write things up as soon as we hear about them, some tracks can creep into your consciousness weeks later. So here’s my top ten for April, based on my plays according to last.fm (although it seems to miss half my plays, so I reserve the right to use a bit of licence sometimes).
10. Interlocutor – Saturday (demo)
Alex White of Electric Soft Parade and Brakes has played a couple of gigs with his new solo project Interlocutor, despite the new ESP album due any minute now. He’s also quietly put up a couple of demos onto Bandcamp which we rather like.
9. Bat For Lashes – Laura (Vogue session)
A couple of months ago Natasha Khan did an exclusive session for Vogue.com. Two of the tracks from this session were released on 7″ for Record Store Day which was a nice reminder of what a brilliant track Laura is.
8. Pete Fij & Terry Bickers / I don’t give a shit about you
This track originally came out back in October last year so isn’t Pete and Terry’s new single. This track has crept into our top ten after being put up on Soundcloud as a free download.
7. Shrag / Sleeprunning
Officially the last track to be released by Shrag now that they’ve split. Sleeprunning is the b-side to On The Spines of Old Cathedrals, their final single to be taken from Canines.
6. Curxes / Further Still
Curxes put out their fantastic new release Further Still at the end of March as a free download, and then put up the video a few weeks later. We can’t wait to see them playing the Alternative Escape in a few weeks time (Thursday 16th May – Les Enfants Terrible stage / The Mesmerist at 18:55 or Southsea fest stage / The Black Dove at 20:50).
5. IYES / Lighthouse (Capsun remix)
We absolutely adore Lighthouse. It was one of those tracks that appeared from nowhere that was some brilliant and so unexpected. It’s spawned dozens of fawning blog posts saying how great it is but the problem was the only way to listen to it was on Soundcloud. Earlier this month though the track was remixed Capsun, which beefed up the beats and the bass and put up on Soundcloud which meant you could listen wherever you happened to be. IYES play the Alternative Escape on Saturday at the Mesmerist at 15:20
4. Black Black Hills / Red Cabin
Red Cabin, with it’s retro reverb drenched rock and roll and backwards video, was an immediate hit when we heard it a couple of weeks ago. Go download it now! Black Black Hills play Brighton Noise’s stage at the Alternative Escape on Saturday at 15:50.
3. Us Baby Bear Bones / You
You is another track which had been floating around for a while but got put up as a free download this month. You is going to be on UBBB’s debut EP due for release in July
2. Crayola Lectern / Slow Down
Slow Down is one of my favourite tracks from the new Crayola Lectern album The Fall and Rise of… The whole album is fantastic, but this is the track that we’ve played the most.
1. Electric Soft Parade / Brother You Must Walk Alone
From the moment we heard the new Electric Soft Parade single at the end of last month, it was inevitable that it was going to end up as this months most listened to track. Breezy guitar pop at it’s finest, that sounds even better now that the sun’s out.
About a week ago IYES posted up a short video onto youtube, with the cryptic message “01.05.2013” alongside. What could it all mean? I’m guessing it was a date reference, so maybe all will be revealed on Wednesday…
As promised in our most recent post about the Boon Magazine launch, as soon as we’ve heard details of the forthcoming New Union single, we’re letting you know. Better than that we’ve got the video too. Staying Friends is another slice of cool guitar pop, and is released on June 3rd on Two Sisters records, coming out on limited 12″ and download.
Thursday night was the launch of a new magazine for Brighton, promising music, fashion, art and culture. They heard a rumour that we like Brighton and that we like music so they invited us along to the Green Door Store where they had a whole host of local talent playing for them.
The night kicked off early. When the gig was first announced Tiger Cub were second on the bill, but another commitment initially meant them pulling out, and then got rearranged for them to play a short set early on. I missed Tiger Cub though, cos I was having my dinner. I also missed Spit Shake Sisters, and most of Kill Moon, and when I arrived the room was already so rammed out I couldn’t get in and get a decent view.
Demob Happy
Demob Happy were great though – melodic indie rock which sounded fantastic at the Green Door Store, but I bet would sound even better when you’re sitting in a field in the sun at a festival.
The New Union
The New Union were the big draw of the evening, and one of the main reasons why the night was sold out. Every time I see them they seem to get better and better – Their sound is richer, the songs are stronger. They’ve got a few slow songs in their set now which I’m sure will be great when they’re recorded, but they were in danger of losing the crowd a bit when they played them. With their more upbeat indie numbers they had the audience in the palm of their hand and had the room jumping. They ended their set with last year’s single Without You, and what I guess is going to be their new single which is due in the next few weeks. We’ll hopefully be bringing you more details of that very soon.
The first edition of Boon Magazine is out on May Day.
Last November, Martin Rossiter released his debut solo album, The Defenrestration of St Martin, and we loved it, calling it “a thing of magnificent beauty“. The album was a long a time in the making and Martin was out of the spotlight for nearly ten years. His first step back was a concert at the Unitarian Church in New Road last May, which was recorded and has been released today, on sale for a mere six pounds.
The live album is made up of old Gene favourites as well as tracks from The Defenstration of St Martin, all played in the same style as the album with just piano and voice.
Martin will be heading out on tour soon, and plays Brighton on 14th June at Brighton Dome.
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