Brum Notes Magazine - September 2014 by Brum Notes Magazine

September 2014

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www.brumnotes.com music and lifestyle for the west midlands

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Thurs 16th Oct • £18 adv

Justin Furstenfeld Sat 18th Oct • £16 adv

10.30pm-3.30am • £4 adv

OVER 18S ONLY - PROOF OF AGE REQUIRED

Sat 20th Sept • £10 adv

UK Foo Fighters Tues 23rd Sept • £35/£45 adv

Levellers

Fri 28th Nov • £15 adv

Fri 14th Nov • £14 adv

Hollywood Undead

We Are The Ocean Sun 19th Oct • £11.50 adv

Clean Bandit + Years & Years

Thurs 23rd Oct • £13.50 adv / £27 VIP

Rixton

Fri 24th Oct • £20 adv / £35 VIP 6pm - 10pm

Coma

+ special guests Metasoma + ResPublica

6pm -10pm

Against Me! Sat 15th Nov • £19.50 adv

The Kooks

Sat 15th Nov • £11 adv

The Smyths

30th Anniversary of “Hatful of Hollow”

Thurs 20th Nov • £19.50 adv

Courteeners

Fri 21st Nov • £27.50 adv 6pm -10pm

Example + Feed Me

Ms. Lauryn Hill

Sat 25th Oct • £15 adv

Thurs 25th Sept • £9 adv

UK B-Boy Championships

Sat 22nd Nov • £15 adv

Knock-Out Jam

Mad Caddies

Sun 26th Oct • £17.50 adv

Sun 23rd Nov • £24.50 adv

UK B-Boy Championships

Download Freezes Over - King 810 Sat 27th Sept • £20 adv

The Fray

1pm -11pm • Weekend tix £25 adv

+ Captain Jeffery + Brothers of Caedmon

Thurs 2nd Oct • £7 adv 10pm - 3am • NUS over 18s only

The Birmingham Freshers Festival

ft. MK + Miss Dynamite + Majestic

Tues 7th Oct • £20 adv

Black Veil Brides Tues 7th Oct • £13.50 adv

The 8123 UK Tour ft. The Maine

+ special guests Lydia and Nick Santino

Thurs 9th Oct • £13 adv

Alestorm

+ Lagerstein + Redrum + Rainbowdragoneyes

Fri 10th Oct • £14 adv 6pm -10pm

The Lawrence Arms + Sam Russo + Bangers

Mon 13th Oct • £16 adv

The Hold Steady + The So So Glos

Weds 15th Oct • £15 adv

Kid Ink

Mastodon

+ Big Business + Krokodil

Weds 3rd Dec • £12 adv

Electric Six

Thurs 4th Dec • £30 adv

Boyz II Men

Fri 5th Dec • £15 adv 6.30pm -10pm

Graham Bonnet Catch the Rainbow Tour

Sat 6th Dec • £18.50 adv

Rescheduled show • original tickets valid

Professor Green

Counting Crows

Sat 6th Sept • £8 adv

Sun 5th Oct • £7.50 adv

Sat 1st Nov • £13.50 adv

Mon 8th Sept • £17 adv

Weds 8th Oct • £15 adv

- Doubt Tour + Electric Cake Salad + The Second Trip

Fri 10th Oct • £10 adv

World Final

Sat 1st Nov • £34.50 adv

The Urban Voodoo Machine

Sat 29th Nov • £22.50 adv

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Mon 27th Oct • £13 adv

Sun 28th Sept • £13 adv

+ Icon For Hire

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Quadrophenia Club Night

Big Screen Film Show with DJ Drew Stansall (The Specials) + The Atlantics (playing the movie hits) + The Coopers + The Birmingham Club A Go Go DJs

6pm -10pm

The Gaslight Anthem

3pm -11pm • Weekend tix £25 adv

Sat 27th Sept • £12 adv 8pm - 1am • over 18s only

Weds 26th Nov • £14 adv

Sat 18th Oct • £10 adv

Ones To Watch

Blondie

Lily Allen

Delain + Wolf

Weds 22nd Oct • £15 adv

Sat 13th Sept • £39.50 adv

Weds 26th Nov • £32.50 adv

Fri 14th Nov • £22.50 adv

ICW: Ringo’s Despair

ft. Bare John + Hope Street + The Bad Flowers + Duke + Red Light + The Nics + Sour Scarlet + Plastic Factory

Lords Of The Riff Vol.2 ft. Anti-Mortem

Katy B

Sat 6th Sept • £8.50 adv 6.30pm - 11pm

Thurs 13th Nov • £10 adv

Chevelle + Lucy Rose

Klaxons

Mon 3rd Nov • £13 adv

Bakermat

Tues 4th Nov • £12 adv

TesseracT & Animals As Leaders Weds 5th Nov • £37.50 adv

Billy Idol

Thurs 6th Nov • £21.50 adv

Rise Against + Pennywise + Emily’s Army

Fri 7th Nov • £16.50 adv 5.30pm -10pm

Asking Alexandria + The Ghost Inside + Crown The Empire + Secrets

Sat 8th Nov • £19.50 adv

The Wailers

performing the album ‘Legend’

Sun 9th Nov • £14 adv

Sikth

Sat 11th Nov • £22.50 adv

Benjamin Booker Jesus Jones

Tues 9th Sept • £10 adv

Pearl Jem (Pearl Jam Tribute)

Mamas Gun Tues 14th Oct • £8 adv

Ourzone Found Tour 2014

The Big Cheese Tour

ft. As It Is + Like Torches

Sat 13th Sept • £5 adv 6.45pm - 11pm

Beneath The Remains Weds 17th Sept • £8 adv

Weds 15th Oct • £9 adv

ft. Marmozets + Lonely The Brave + Allusondrugs

Fri 17th Oct • £10 adv 6.30pm - 10pm

The Modfathers

Beartooth

The UK’s No. 1 Tribute to Paul Weller & The Jam

Fri 19th Sept • £10 adv

Sat 18th Oct • £10 adv

6.30pm - 10pm

Definitely Mightbe

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

Sat 20th Sept • £6 adv

The Stirs

+ SLTP + Pony and Trap + Brooklyn Lights + Chaucer

Weds 24th Sept • £7 adv

Me vs Hero

MC Trigga’s Birthday Bash

Hats Off To Led Zeppelin

Jamie T

6pm - 10pm

Eliza and the Bear + Lisbon

6.30pm - 10.30pm

Sun 28th Sept • £12.50 adv

Thurs 13th Nov • £19.50 adv

Supersuckers + The Trews

Thurs 11th Sept • FREE tix at www.ourzonemag.com/tours

9pm - 5am • over 18s only

I Am Legend

Kobra And The Lotus

Rescheduled • original tix valid

Danny & The Champions Of The World + Trevor Moss & Hannah Lou + Brokenwitt Rebels

Sun 19th Oct • £10 adv

Knotslip

+ Destroyed Beyond Belief + Our World Below? + Slaughter Horse

Thurs 23rd Oct • £12 adv

Ghetts

Fri 24th Oct • £8 adv 6pm -10pm

Dave Giles

Sat 4th Oct • £13 adv

Fri 31st Oct • £12 adv

Skeletal Family & Salvation

Framing Hanley

6pm - 10pm

16-18 Horsefair, Bristol St, Birmingham, B1 1DB 2

Doors 7.00pm unless stated • Venue box office opening hours: Mon-Fri 12pm-4pm, Sat 11am-4pm • No booking fee on cash transactions

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Wednesday 3 December

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TO U R A N N O U N C E M E N TS & P R I O R I T Y B O O K I N GS • F I N D U S O N

CONTENTS

The famous faces at Snobs Nightclub, which moves to a new home this month after more than 41 years. Read more on P39. Photo by Dave Travis. Brum Notes Magazine Unit 12 The Bond 180-182 Fazeley Street Birmingham B5 5SE info@brumnotes.com 0121 224 7363 Advertising 0121 224 7363 advertising@brumnotes.com Distribution StickupMedia! 0121 224 7364 Editor: Chris Moriarty Contributors Words: Andrew Gutteridge, Becky Rogers, Ben Russell, Dan Cooper-Gavin, Dan Owens, Dave Vincent, Daron Billings, Jack Parker, Tajinder Hayer, Stephen Brolan Assistant Editor: Amy Sumner Arts Editor: Dan Cooper-Gavin Food & Drink Editor: Daron Billings Pictures: Richard Shakespeare, Rob Hadley, Dave Travis, Sam Wood Design: Adam Williams, Andy Aitken Connect Twitter: @BrumNotesMag Facebook: www.facebook.com/ BrumNotesMagazine Online: www.brumnotes.com

Regulars News 6-7 Fresh Talent 12-13 Style 30-31 Food & Drink 32 Live Reviews 34-35 Album Reviews 36-37 What’s On Guide 38-46 Music and Features Competition: Win a Golden Ticket! 9 Behind the Scenes: Death or Glory Records 10-11 Arts & Culture: Ben Norris 14 Arts & Culture: Rudy’s Rare Records 16-17 Famy 20 Benjamin Booker 21 Honeyblood / Fear of Men 22-23 Gruff Rhys 24-25 Alt-J 26-27 Sleepy Sun 28-29 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.

Brum Notes Magazine

September 2014

godskitchen invites you into the next dimension Kids In Glass Houses

news

New festival to transform Digbeth into huge street art gallery this month

More than 100 street artists will descend on Birmingham this month to transform Digbeth into one of the largest outdoor art galleries in the country. The City of Colours festival, taking place at venues and streets in and around The Custard Factory on September 6, will bring together live painting, music, b-boy demos, beatboxing, illustration battles and more. Artists from across the UK will take part, including some of the most respected names on the street art scene, including Inkie, Chu, Andy Council, Dan Kitchener, Gent48 and Lucy McLauchlan. They will be joined by rising stars and new talent from the world of urban art, while a series of workshops covering graffiti, breakdancing, music production and DJing will also give young people and adults alike the chance to hone their own skills. Most of the action will take place around the unique spaces of The Custard Factory, with exhibitions, interactive displays, live performances, art sales and more across the whole site, with an after party taking place at Alfie Bird’s from 9pm to 5am featuring Om Unit and Kenny Ken. Other nearby venues taking part include The Old Crown, Spotlight and The Arena. City of Colours takes place on Saturday, September 6, with live painting and entertainment from 11am, followed by a viewing day on September 7 from 11am-5pm. Visit www.cityofcolours.co.uk for full details.

Dance music superbrand Godskitchen is hoping to take clubbing into the next dimension with the launch of its brand new production concept MEKANIKA. Launching on September 27, it uses state of the art projection mapping, promising a ‘futuristic gate to another dimension’, with animations cascading and morphing into windows looking in on other worlds. MEKANIKA makes its international debut at Godskitchen TXXENTY on Saturday, September 28, with headline appearances from Paul van Dyk, Pure NRG and John 00 Fleming at The Rainbow Textile Factory in Birmingham, before heading out on a worldwide tour. Details at www.godskitchen.com.

b-boy championships to head back to brum

Birmingham will once again welcome some of the finest hip hop and urban dancers when the B-Boy Championships World Finals returns to the city. The two-day event is now in its 19th year but was hosted in the Second City for the first time last year. The 2014 finals take place at the O2 Academy in Birmingham city centre from October 25-26. For ticket details and more info visit www.bboychampionships.com.

In Search of Birmingham’s own 24 hour party people Think you’ve got what it takes to party hard? you know, really party hard? Well, put your clubbing credentials to the test at the 24 Hour Rave Experiment. In a true test of stamina, anyone who makes it from midday on September 20 until the same time the following day will get their £24 ticket money back. And if you don’t make it? Well, that’s all good too because you’ll forfeit your ticket money to Birmingham Children’s Hospital. No napping either, as if you’re caught sleeping at any point that will 6

be the end of the party for you, with your money going to charity too. Ravers will be able to enjoy 10 rooms of music across indoor and outdoor spaces at The Rainbow Venues in Digbeth, with an eclectic mix of underground house, techno, bass, DnB and trance from local and international DJ names. All contenders must be in the venue by midday on September 20. Tickets available from various outlets or find full details at www.facebook.com/24hrRaveExperiment. Brum Notes Magazine

FIERCE FESTIVAL TO CHALLENGE PRECONCEPTIONS OF YOUTH with eclectic celebration of live art Fierce Festival returns to Birmingham next month with a series of projects aimed at shifting perceptions of youth culture and young people. The annual celebration of adventurous art and performance runs from October 2-12 at various venues and will this year explore Birmingham’s status as the youngest city in Europe, with nearly 40 per cent of the population aged under 25. In honour of this fact, several of the events on the programme will attempt to challenge the ideas of what young people can do.

Car Deconstruction by Dina Roncevic (image courtesy of Anti Festival)

Croatian artist Dina Roncevic leads Car Deconstructions at Eastside Projects in Digbeth, in which seven local girls aged 10-12 will learn basic car mechanics, disassembling a car to its nuts and bolts over three days. In Eat the Street, a group of local 12-year-olds will become restaurant critics, inviting you to dine with them whilst they offer up brutally honest opinions on food, service and décor. The project, led by Canadian artist group Mammalian Diving Reflex, aims to dismantle the barriers between age groups, allowing children a chance to take charge and be heard. A 12-hour musical experiment will also see Australian artist Sarah-Jane Norman invited former child prodigy pianists to sightread Rachmaninoff’s Concerto No 3. Other highlights of the programme include two UK premieres presented in association with DanceXchange, Heavens What Have I Done from provocative New York choreographer Gutierrez, and the stereotype-challenging Yellow Towel from Dana Michel. Lebanese artist Tania El Khoury reflects on the Syrian crisis with her interactive sound installation Gardens Speak, two projects take place in the historic Moseley Road Baths, while the unique Council of Community Conveyors will see clipboard-bearing volunteers knocking on 1,500 doors and passing messages between neighbours. The buzzing Festival Hub at The Edge in Digbeth will also be home to a variety of smaller-scale performances and exhibits. Fierce Festival’s infamous club nights will also return, including Algorave, featuring live coding and music at The Edge in Digbeth on October 4, while the Polish Centre will host the Fierce Slow Dance on October 11. Individual show tickets are on sale from September 2, with weekend passes available now. To book tickets or for full programme details visit www.weareﬁerce.org.

lineup announced for all years leaving

Eagulls, Hookworms, Traams, Cheatahs, God Damn, The Voyeurs and more will all take to the stage for this year’s All Years Leaving festival. The two-day live music event takes over the Hare & Hounds in Kings Heath on October 24-25. Curated by This is Tmrw, the festival is now in its second year and will include street food, live art and a pop-up bar in the stables, alongside live acts and late night DJs in the main room. Day tickets cost £13.50, with weekend tickets £25 and available to book now from www.theticketsellers.co.uk.

oxjam VENUES UNVEILED

The OxjamBrum Takeover Festival will return on October 18. Seven venues have now been confirmed for the annual charity fundraiser, with live sets taking place at The Flapper, The Sunflower Lounge, The Oobleck, Talk, 6/8 Kafe and Island Bar, as well as on the floating favourite, Frederick the Canal Barge. Acts performing include Loom, Alex Moir, Haze, Curb and KIN, with the full lineup set to be unveiled in early September. Limited £8 early bird tickets are on sale now at www.wegottickets.com.

Tuesdays to become Bluesdays once again

Blues lovers will be able to get their fix with a brand new weekly blues night launching in Birmingham this month. Big Bear Records will host Nothin’ But the Blues every Tuesday at The Asylum 2 in Hockley, kicking off on September 23 with a live performance from The 58’s Blues Band. The night is inspired by the legendary Henry’s Blueshouse, which took place every Tuesday at The Crown in Station Street in the late 1960s and early 1970s, and provided a platform for bluesinspired artists, including members of Led Zeppelin and Black Sabbath in the bands’ early days. Entry is £5.

birmingham Comedy festival returns next month

Tommy Tiernan September 2014

A rib-tickling lineup of more than 150 international names and rising stars descends on the Second City next month for Birmingham Comedy Festival. The annual city-wide funnyfest returns from October 3-12 and will include a brand new Breaking Talent Award for the first time. Among those taking part in the 10-day festival are leading Irish funnyman Tommy Tiernan (Oct 4, Town Hall), fast-rising James Acaster (Oct 9, The Glee Club), comedian and actor Doc Brown (Oct 11, Town Hall)

and author and stand-up Mark Watson (Oct 4, Mac Birmingham). Cult radio series The Goon Show will be revived at The Old Joint Stock on Oct 3 and 4, while local comics will also be well represented throughout by the likes of Foghorn Improv, Mickey Sharma, Mrs Barbara Nice and Andy Robinson. A special All-Dayer will see 15 acts performing one-hour shows at Cherry Reds and The Victoria from 1pm on Oct 5. For full information and listings see www.bhamcomfest.co.uk. 7

this september SATURDAY 6TH SEPTEMBER

URS F COLO CITY O L TIVA FES ART EET

FRIDAY 5TH/12TH/19TH/26TH SEPTEMBER

STR AND AFTERPARTY

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SATURDAY 20TH SEPTEMBER

JAWS

SATURDAY 13TH SEPTEMBER

& SUPPORT

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WEDNESDAY 24TH SEPTEMBER

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with SUNSHINE FRISBEE SUNDAY 28TH SEPTEMBER

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GET YOUR TICKETS FROM THETICKETSELLERS.CO.UK OR SEETICKETS.COM 8

Brum Notes Magazine

Jungle

WIN: A GOLDEN TICKET TO SEE EVERY GIG AT THE INSTITUTE DURING OCTOBER

Lethal Bizzle

Brum Notes Magazine turns the grand old age of five next month, after first hitting the streets of Birmingham way back in October 2009. And to celebrate we’ve teamed up with one of the city’s finest music venues, The Institute in Digbeth, to give away a special Golden Ticket offering one lucky winner and a friend entry to an entire month of gigs for free. That means you’ll be able to catch some of the hottest acts in the world throughout the whole of October without having to spend a penny on tickets. There are more than 30 shows to choose from next month, including sold out dates from the likes of George Ezra (Oct 25) and Kids in Glass Houses (Oct 20), plus other big name appearances from Ella Eyre (Oct 1), Lethal Bizzle (Oct 7), Buzzcocks (Oct 9), Dry the River (Oct 10), Maverick Sabre (Oct 21), St Vincent (Oct 24), Jungle (Oct 27) and many more. From rising stars, to legendary names covering a wide spectrum of genres, it’s the dream ticket for any music lover – and while maths isn’t our strong point, we can safely say it’s worth hundreds of pounds as well.

George Ezra

Kids in Glass Houses

To be in with a chance of winning, simply tell us: What is the name of the debut album by George Ezra? Send your answer with name, age and contact details to competitions@brumnotes.com by September 26. Entrants must be aged 18 or above. Terms and conditions apply. The winner will be notified by email by September 30. The Golden Ticket entitles the winner to entry for two to all live shows at The Institute during October 2014. September 2014

St. Vincent

Ella Eyre

behind the scenes

Photos by Rob Hadley

Sticking two fingers up to the worldwide decline of record stores, Steve Hadley first opened the doors to Death or Glory Records in Redditch in January this year. Initially a record shop, the project escalated into a music hub creating its own compilations of local music, hosting band forums and workshops and gaining the support of some real local legends. Next on the list is beginning their own record label. We chat to the man behind it all to find out more. “My background was in the care sector working in various support and managerial roles,” explains Steve of his past experience. “I worked with children with autism and adults with learning difficulties, homeless projects, drug and alcohol rehab projects and with a children’s home, all over a 10-year period. But it was always my aim to run my own business of some kind and I began to develop the idea of bringing a music hub to Redditch. I wanted a place that covered everything from selling records to releasing music. The original idea came from wanting to combine my experience with my passion for music – I read [Patti Smith memoir] Just Kids and loved the romance of the scene that they developed. I wanted that for Redditch, a shop, and a scene to be proud of. “Finding the right location and premises was difficult, I found a few that were right but too expensive or cheap but in the wrong location. In the end I had to go into the Kingfisher Shopping Centre, which wasn’t ideal as the setup costs were vast and location-wise it wasn’t really where we wanted to be. But it was a starting point, so 12 months 10

Brum Notes Magazine

on from the initial idea, at least we were open. We’ve just located to a new shop, still in Redditch but in the Church Green area of the centre. It’s picturesque and makes a nice change to seeing Poundland every day. Really it’s the property we wanted originally and it will give us the chance to grow – we now can be a venue, a shop, have a home for the record label, and a base for the management company. We’ve also put in a recording studio and have Layers’ Elliot Vaughan based here. “In terms of the store, the records we stock range from new releases to pre-loved classics. Ordering is a team effort – everyone gets a say, including our work experience team. We also sell local bands’ records commission-free, the idea being that we support them and they buy their music through us...though some have yet to realise that.” A few months ago, after Redditch was named the least musical place in the UK in a study carried out by researchers from Goldsmiths, the University of London and BBC Lab UK, Death or Glory hit back, publishing their own compilation September 2014

album featuring some of the town’s finest talent. Shortly after that Duran Duran’s John Taylor circulated his own mixtape of Redditch musicians with a tracklisting fairly indebted to the Death or Glory version. “It came about when his cousin came into the shop,” explains Steve of the relationship. He said ‘John would love this, I’ll get him to call you’. I didn’t expect anything to come from it but John attended our last band forum. Having him support what we are doing has been brilliant – he’ll phone up or drop us an email just to check how things are going.” And next on the cards? Death or Glory Records the record label has just whirred into action with its first signing, Byron Hare, who have just finished their debut EP. It looks like an exciting autumn ahead.

Visit Death or Glory Records at 3 Church Green West, Redditch, Worcestershire (approx 30 mins from Birmingham), or find out more at www.facebook.com/ DeathorGloryRecords or on Twitter @DorG_Records. 11

Words by Amy Sumner

SHAAKE

Photo by Chris Lever

“You can’t push for creativity, it either happens or it doesn’t,” says guitarist James Watton, as he and his bandmates mull it over. “But once an idea is conceived, you kind of know if you should pursue it or not.” The band are sat in the studio tweaking their live set ahead of their support slot with Melbourne singer songwriter Gossling at the end of the month. Formed in Redditch about a year ago after varying musical projects between them, they recorded their first track, Shake, decided they particularly liked that word, and added that all-important extra vowel to cement their band name. Currently the band have only two demos available online, Long Way Down and Demons, but within those bluesy guitar riffs lie soulful jazz vocals. Incorporating their individual musical backgrounds and tastes, the band are ensuring they tie together seamlessly. “As a collective we love artists like Joan Armatrading and Fleetwood Mac and their life stories are

facebook.com/weareshaake as much of an influence as the music. Individually, I love Jimmy Page and the truth and rawness in Jack White’s music. Our drummer Oli [Jefferson] loves the technicalities of artists such as Tower Of Power and frontwoman Suzi [Dingle] enjoys the soulful and influential voice of Stevie Wonder and the more contemporary and complex vocals and arrangements from Kimbra and Lalah Hathaway.” So what can we expect from their appearance in Moseley this month? “We’ve written six songs and we want to debut them fully at that gig,” James continues. “We’ll have guitars, drums and microphones to make some good noise and afterwards we’ll be edging towards the release of our debut EP. We’re excited to have something ready to present to the rest of the world before the end of the year.” Shaake are live at the Hare & Hounds in Kings Heath on September 22, supporting Gossling.

Brum Notes Magazine

MIRRORHALL facebook.com/mirrorhallmusic “It’s rooted in pop history and experimental punk though is heading forwards with a more progressive metropolitan element,” deliberates frontman Jack Solomon Smith about the quartet’s sonic appeal. “Originally, [guitarist] Harry Shaw and I recorded on cassette with a Fostex four-track, mainly because it was cheap and we had no software between us. We never cleaned the tape heads and I’m pretty sure we used the wrong tape out of ignorance or laziness so it sounded pretty cruddy, but also like a portal to 1981, which was cool. We’ve since gone digital and haven’t looked back, but we’re still doing all the recordings ourselves.” Mirrorhall’s foundation stones, Jack and Harry, met at a New Year’s Eve party in 2012, started talking and formed a band there and then – because after all, “if you can get on with someone for two hours and they can play an instrument that you can’t then they should probably be in your band”. They began to record some music and met drummer Jimmy Kirk, playing a few shows as a trio before Hannah Al-Shemmeri joined on keys to complete the setup. “The keyboards

mean that now the sound is more meshed out, more dense. It means we can be more ambitious with how we arrange our songs,” says Jack. Mirrorhall are crafting well-considered art rock, not that the tag much quantifies their sound. Visually they’re urban and brutalist, drawing from their Birmingham home. Aurally they’re a little softer but for the sharp juts and jags of Jack’s vocals which bring to mind flailing elbows and knees in Curtis-esque abandon. It feels kaleidoscopic, but in monochrome. “I make a separation between the artwork I make for the band and the other stuff I do so it’s usually created with a particular song in mind because it’s there to attract people,” explains Jack, who creates posters and cover art to accompany the band’s movements. “But at the same time the artwork can’t over-explain or talk over a song; it just has to ask the right questions and form part of the whole.” On September 3, Mirrorhall release their second EP, a five-track follow-up to Horrorscope which they released last year. “They’re all new songs, all have a twist in them and it’s a good representation of the stuff we’ve been making recently,” says Jack. The EP will be a physical cassette release with most of the tracks also available online. In an increasingly digital world, is the physical format something to be treasured or done away with, and does the internet detract from the specialness of the tangible? “There’s a sentimentality to cassettes,” surmises Jack, “they don’t sound the best but at this point they’re a nicer physical object than CDs and there will be a download code included. The physical release is a tangible representation of where we are at this point in time – for good or bad, we exist somewhere other than the interminable cloud.”

THE PLAYLIST PEACE Lost On Me If it’s their pedal-powered, 1998-style sounds that enamour you then Lost On Me, which keeps with their last single Money and the upcoming second album in its more disco pop approach, isn’t necessarily going to make your end of year list. It probably will get your toe tapping though... Out September 28, streaming now via youtube.com/peacebandforever

modern minds Escape Five boys belting out indie rock at a rate of knots, Modern Minds are beginning to attract attention outside our fair city. Having released Escape last month, they’ve a headline show booked in for October – a good choice to keep an eye on. Available now via iTunes

april Ten Miles High Four minutes of Britpop nostalgia rooted in Oasis and their previous guise as Nuneaton’s Noir. The vocals of Gallagher and the pop construction of Albarn, we await the next instalment to see if they can consolidate the sound as their own. Streaming now via soundcloud.com/ apriltheband

Mirrorhall play The Sunflower Lounge, Birmingham, on September 3.

ONES TO WATCH Luke Wylde & The Japes

Hollow People

Velvet Texas Cannonball

Swoomptheeng

After a summer of festival appearances alongside the likes of Boney M, The Beat and Timmy Mallet, Luke Wylde & The Japes celebrate the release of their new EP of upbeat folk pop rhythms. The Slade Rooms, Wolverhampton, September 13

A summery dose of guitar pop embodies Surf, the debut demo from this Birmingham five-piece. With the promise of further material on the horizon and a Catapult Club show to accompany, we’re enjoying these fledgling murmurings. O2 Academy 3, September 5

Velvet Texas Cannonball have been bubbling away for a number of years but with a recent flurry of activity we’re really pleased to have their retro rock’n’bluespsych back in our eardrums. A band who really come into their own on the live stage. The Oobleck, September 28

We first saw Swoomptheeng back in February and to be honest we didn’t know what to make of them. We still have no idea – it’s hardcore rave played in disguise on computers and gaming devices. A see it to believe it kind of thing... TALK, September 20

September 2014

arts & culture

POETRY IN MOTION Feeling something lacking in his relationship with his father, the poet and playwright Ben Norris set off on a hitchhike to retrace the key steps in his dad’s life, from his current home in Nottingham down to Wembley Stadium, the venue of his beloved Luton Town’s finest hour. As he prepares to bring his one-man show, The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Family, to the Mac in Birmingham, he tells Dan Cooper-Gavin more about his M1 odyssey… Did your dad approve of the project? I started to tell him about it, but his response was perfunctory – which is, I guess, exactly why I wanted to go on the trip. That said, I got the sense that some very private part of him was interested, perhaps even flattered. Hitchhiking seems like an exciting/terrifying way to travel? In theory, yes. In practice, also yes. More exciting than terrifying – although ask me that on the pavement-less slip road to an enormous motorway with 40-tonne trucks hurtling by, I might answer differently. It depends on who picks you up. I met such a wide range of mostly wonderful characters on the trip, extroverted, generous and curious enough to give a dishevelled hitchhiker like me a lift. In your blog, you’re less than enthusiastic about a certain budget hotel chain that you stayed in… 14

Ha ha! So you noticed? It wasn’t that bad. My animosity was fairly arbitrary – when you’re physically and emotionally exhausted, a plastic bag is just as likely to bear the brunt of your frustration as a hotel. I was in the hotel when writing most of the blog posts, and thus it became inseparable from the idea of sweaty, sleep-deprived imprisonment. And UHT milk. What were the best and worst moments of your journey? My favourite experiences were always conversations – my Saturday night pub run and curry with Marcus, my dad’s friend of 42 years, and the two conversations I had in Welwyn Garden City with my dad’s aunt and cousin. No place will ever tell you as much about a person as a single encounter with someone who was there, whose stories make the place and person absolutely come alive. Those are the moments I’m particularly keen to do justice to in the

show. The worst was probably walking for what seemed like an age in the rain in Luton, being soaked over and over again by passing, indifferent cars. Or when a motorcyclist called me a fucking cunt before I’d even properly set off. That was a shame. Do you feel closer to your dad now? I do, because the trip and writing the show allowed me to relive the memories we’ve shared together. It made me want to go home and spend time with him in Nottingham, despite the fact we’d soon run out of things to say to each other. I like to think that if he sees the show – and I hope one day he will – it will help him to understand me, and why relationships are important to me, as much as it’s helped me to understand him.

Ben Norris: The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Family is at Mac Birmingham on September 6. Brum Notes Magazine

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arts & culture

RECORD STORE DAYS Starring at The Rep this month is none other than Lenny Henry, bringing home a stage adaptation of his hit radio comedy Rudy’s Rare Records. Dan Cooper-Gavin speaks to the show’s writer Danny Robins about a project that’s a real labour of love. A reggae record shop in Birmingham is the setting of a fine comedy which has delighted Radio 4 listeners since 2008. Rudy’s Rare Records is the creation of Lenny Henry and the comedian and writer Danny Robins, with Lenny playing the role of Adam, the put-upon son of the shop’s maverick owner. As Danny explains, it’s a show that’s close to their hearts. “Lenny had an idea to do a sitcom set in a Jamaican record shop in Birmingham, revolving around three generations of one family,” he explains. “A producer put him in touch with me and my thenwriting partner Dan Tetsell, and together we

developed the idea into a fleshed-out sitcom. It was an idea I immediately clicked with. “They say the best comedy comes from truth, and the setting and characters were very much drawn on people Lenny had grown up with. Since the very first radio recording, we’ve both felt that something about the combination of characters and setting worked in a way that was special and also hugely significant to both of us. “For Lenny, I know the relationship between Adam and Rudy represents a chance to have a conversation with his own father, an emotionally

closed-off man who he never really talked to in life in any meaningful way. He describes him as the Daily Mirror with arms and legs – he never put down the paper long enough to talk. I too have a difficult relationship with my father, and also find this show a way to explore that particular relationship – comedy as therapy, I guess! Since the birth of my own son, I’ve also found myself becoming increasingly interested in exploring the relationship between Adam and his own son Richie. And then there is the music, of course. Both Lenny and I grew up spending our youths in record shops, buying vinyl and discovering new music.”

Brum Notes Magazine

With Lenny’s recent metamorphosis into a critically-acclaimed theatre actor – earning ecstatic reviews for his Othello and his turn in August Wilson’s 1950s drama Fences – it’s perhaps not surprising that Rudy’s Rare Records should also make the move from broadcast to stage. But the adaptation, a co-production between The Rep and London’s Hackney Empire, required a different approach from Danny. “My normal writing experience is about how to tell a tightly-plotted story full of jokes over half an hour,” he says. “It’s vital in sitcom to have strong characters, but they don’t really go on emotional journeys in the way characters in a play do. In sitcom, plot is king – in a play, often not a lot actually happens in terms of plot. Sometimes, characters simply react to one event that has happened before the play starts, but a huge amount goes on in terms of how they emotionally develop, for good or ill. “It’s stuffed with jokes as the sitcom was, but I know we wouldn’t hold our audience’s attention if we didn’t also send our characters on an emotional journey. It can’t be just jokes – it has to be things that make you laugh, things that make you think, things that make you cry, things that make you want to get up and shake your booty and sing along. We’ve got all that, I hope.” The booty shaking will be expedited by a live band, accompanying the action with songs that would be heard in Rudy’s store. “We wrote a list of songs that we loved and we thought Rudy would want as the soundtrack to his shop,” explains Danny, “and then we found out which ones the music-copyright people would let us use. Thankfully, we got pretty much everything we wanted, and we have some great tunes in the show by the likes of Desmond Dekker, Jimmy Cliff, The Sugarhill Gang, Eddy Grant, Toots & the Maytals. “And we get Lenny rapping too, and Joivan [Wade], who plays Richie – he’s part of this group Mandem On The Wall, who are a YouTube phenomenon and known for their rap parodies.”

“Both Lenny and I grew up spending our youths in record shops, buying vinyl and discovering new music.” As well as his wide range of appearances across BBC TV and radio and his fleeting moment of pop stardom (he was responsible for the sample on DJ Dee Kline’s number 11 hit I Don’t Smoke), Danny’s disparate CV includes collaborations with talents as diverse as Armando Iannucci, Joan Rivers, Ronnie Barker and Basil Brush. It’s clear, though, that he holds special affection for his work with Lenny. “As a comedy writer, it’s a joy to find somebody you click with and can riff off, and Lenny is that,” he says. “We’ve been working together for a long time now, and I think we’re quite attuned to each other. We’re not afraid to wander round a room, spewing out joke ideas at each other, knowing some will be rubbish and some will be good. I think Lenny is very open, approachable, up for new experiences, as his recent work testifies. Not everyone is like that – some people are more cautious and conservative with the kind of work they do and who they work with.” While Rudy’s Rare Records is an examination of the family and a celebration of the music, it’s also a love letter to the record shop. In a neat microcosm of wider trends, the stage show sees Rudy’s family needing to come together to secure the future of the shop in the face of threats from developers. “The setting of a record shop is a place that deeply resonates with both of us,” explains Danny. “The demise of the record shop is clearly very real. Over the last decade, about 60 per cent of them have closed – there’s around 300 left, I believe. I think any pronouncements that they will soon be totally extinct are wrong, though. The last time I

Jeffery Kissoon as Clifton and Joivan Wade as Richie in rehearsals for Rudy’s Rare Records (Photo: Robert Day)

September 2014

Lenny Henry as Adam (Photo: Robert Day)

The cast (Photo: Nobby Clark)

popped into The Diskery in Birmingham, which was one of the inspirations for Rudy’s shop, they said business was booming. “There’s a definite vinyl revival going on. For me, a future without record shops is bleak. Consuming music has become such a solitary pursuit, we browse music blogs for recommendations alone, we click and buy it alone and then we listen to it on our headphones alone. Record shops were and are a place to meet people, talk about music and listen to it together. Bands formed in record shops, lifelong friendships started there. Most of the bands I like came from a recommendation given to me by someone in an independent record store. Amazon and iTunes are doing their best to kill them, but I like to think people’s need to be with other people will win through.” Rudy’s Rare Records is at The Rep, Birmingham, from September 4–20.

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Slow

Burners

After recording it back in the summer of 2012, the debut album by Famy finally sees the light of day this month. They’ll be heading out on the road as well, determined to show why the early excitement they generated was fully justified. They talk to David Vincent. Back in 2011, Famy looked poised to break through. Their debut single, Dogg Dogg, resulted in a slew of well-placed reviews on influential blogs and music sites, and within a year the band were recording their debut album, We Fam Econo, which included the track Donkey. Concluding with the declaration “Famy is here!”, in retrospect it seemed a little premature as it’s only now that the fruits of Famy’s labour are seeing the light of day, with that album finally due out more than two years later. “We recorded the album in the summer of 2012 and we’ve had a lot of management issues, boring kinds of things that just needed loads of time to sort out,” explains Arthur Yates of the album’s much delayed release. “So we’ve been sitting on this record which we really believe in, but we had to sort out all the logistical things first. “It was the most frustrating thing,” he continues. “When you write something, you want to record it straight away and get it out immediately after. “To be honest,” he sighs, “to have that gap, it can be frustrating. But we stand by the record, we completely believe in the record. Things in the music industry just happen at their own speed.” Arthur, brother Bruce and Italian pal Luca Maria Galbiati formed Famy in the south of France. “We all met when we moved out there. Luca moved there from Italy, myself and my brother moved there as our parents wanted to be in the sun and experience a less hectic lifestyle than 20

London. That’s how it all happened, and we met at school.” From the warm air of Europe, the band later relocated to London, and it’s here that the Famy sound – think Glasvegas reverb mashed with indie/folk sunshine – began to solidify. “Our inspiration was coming from where we grew up. Our record, for me, sounds like a rock band in the south of France. There is The Sandpipers in there,” says Arthur, referencing the easy listening 60s combo, “and the Beach Boys – they had that Mediterranean feel. Then we came to London and we discovered rock’n’roll. So it’s a marriage of those two sounds, the south of France and London.” The 1980s DIY punk/hardcore scene has also been an influence, though it’s more about the artistic integrity, work ethic and can-do attitude than the music. “Possibly the biggest important influence for us is the Minutemen, they’re DIY forever. Their idea for punk was great, for them, making a record or making whatever they wanted to make…they did.” Recorded in Gloucestershire by Miti Adhikari (whose CV includes BBC Radio 1, Nirvana and Radiohead), We Fam Econo’s distinctive, echoey sound was a product of the unique choice of recording venue. “We recorded in a church in the English countryside, this very big church that gives the record that cavernous sound that we really like. It suits

our music,” says Arthur. “We tried to make it sound as natural as possible, so we put the bass amp in the bell tower of the church and recorded that.” But does the delay between recording and release affect how the band feel about the album? “The way I see this record is, I see this as a period, a record of the band at that period,” Arthur explains. “It encapsulates the place we were. It’s naïve, it has a lot of beauty to it. It’s a very honest and humble record that we made. It’s very, very pure. We’d just started up the band. I think those are the best parts of being in a band – that time when you’re just creating, not trying to create some kind of product. “Live we try to keep it fresh, but it does have a different sound. Live it’s more raw, there’s more of a punky edge, we like to make our shows more raucous.” For those who haven’t seen the band live, a clue to where they are today musically is the recently recorded new single Friends Home. “That’s naturally the direction we’re going in, it’s where our new stuff is going,” Arthur says about the non-album track. “Our first album gave us a lot of room to explore new avenues. It came very early for us. Our newer stuff is more considered, we’ve had time to look at where we are going and where we want to go. We have a plan.” Famy are live at The Sunflower Lounge, Birmingham, on September 22. Debut album We Fam Econo is released on September 8 through Transgressive. Brum Notes Magazine

OPEN BOOK Things have moved pretty fast for Benjamin Booker. Earning a record deal off the back of a homemade demo, he was soon invited to tour with Jack White and is now revelling in the release of a critically acclaimed debut album. He tells Amy Sumner what has inspired his punky brand of gravel-toned blues. “It’s way, way harder than any job I’ve ever had – musicians can’t screw around and expect to get anywhere anymore,” says Benjamin Booker, as we link up with the New Orleans songwriter for a chat ahead of his Birmingham date at the O2 Academy. He’s had a pretty successful year as they go. Signing with ATO Records (Alabama Shakes, My Morning Jacket) in the USA off the back of one grainy, homemade demo, the blues man has just stepped off tour with Jack White, who handpicked the musician and thus helped catapult him from relative unknown right in front of the eagerly anticipating earholes of 5,000 fans a night. “It was amazing,” Booker enthuses. “At the end I was talking to the band and I said, ‘what the hell are we supposed to do now?’ If this whole thing ended abruptly, I’d be happy just having had that opportunity to tour with Jack and the wonderful musicians and crew he’s surrounded himself with.” He has a pretty feisty reputation though, Jack White…? September 2014

“I pulled from This Bike Is a Pipe Bomb, Ted Hawkins, The Gun Club a bunch of delta blues artists when it came to developing the sound I wanted.” “There were no crazy rockstar moments at all. I read something which described him as ‘the last rockstar’ but he’s a very normal family man who just so happens to shred!” Describing his music as ‘punk-blues’, Booker creates traditional blues rock’n’roll songs with a grittier flourish to boot.

New Orleans called Hurray for the Riff Raff,” explains Ben. “I was looking for an analogue studio and found out that’s who they recorded with. All of the songs mean a lot to me – it was important to me not to make a record with a couple of favourites and then a bunch of filler.”

“I pulled from This Bike Is a Pipe Bomb, Ted Hawkins, The Gun Club, a bunch of delta blues artists when it came to developing the sound I wanted,” he says, inspired by “boredom and a stressful time period that gave me a lot of things to get off my chest.”

And live it’s an ever-expanding entity, having started off with just himself and his guitar. “It’s a three-piece now. Bass has really changed things around and that’s what’s opened up the live show. The band will definitely grow as time goes on – I’m just looking for the right folks.”

Releasing his self-titled debut album last month, Booker worked with analogue producer Andrija Tokic to lock down his sound. “He worked with another band from

Benjamin Booker is live at the O2 Academy 3, Birmingham, on September 6. His self-titled debut album is out now on Rough Trade. 21

Bitter with the Sweet

Peddling grungy pop, laced with both delightful harmonies and lo-fi garage sensibilities, Glaswegian duo Honeyblood are a delicious dichotomy. As they prepare to return to Birmingham as part of their debut headline tour, they tell Amy Sumner why they’re just doing what comes naturally. ‘I will hate you forever / Scumbag sleaze, slimeball grease / You really do disgust me.’ So goes the chorus to Honeyblood’s fan favourite, Super Rat – and the clue’s in the band name with this one. Talk about the term ‘bittersweet’. Formed in Glasgow two years ago, Honeyblood are guitarist Stina Tweeddale and drummer Shona McVicar, who play as a duo embodying the ageold adage that less really can be more. Listening to them play, there are obvious musical touchstones – PJ Harvey, The Breeders and Best Coast, acts the girls themselves refer to as inspiration. It’s garage rock dispatching Joanna Gruesomestyle distaste and it’s beautifully harmonious in its delivery. Upon meeting at Glasgow University, both had already played in bands for a decade. They bonded over Best Coast, started writing songs and in July this year they released their self-titled debut 22

album, recorded in Peter Katis’ (The National, Frightened Rabbit) residential recording studio in Bridgeport, Connecticut. It was a rigorous schedule laying down 13 songs in 10 days, but the results were as promising as their early demos always suggested.

sing some harmonies.” But perhaps that’s the next stage in the process?

“To be truthful I can’t even remember what I envisioned the finished product to be before the album was made,” reflects Stina, “but I think that’s a good thing because the album feels right to me.”

Honeyblood have had a successful year to date playing festivals across Europe and a run of dates in the US. In Birmingham we last saw the pair at the Hare & Hounds, where they played tour support to Melbourne’s Courtney Barnett in May, and they appear to have had a blast doing so across the UK in the process. This month the pair return to the venue to play a deserving headline show of their own – bittersweet symphonies all round.

In a rather pleasing juxtaposition, Mojo described the band as creating sounds “equal parts sweetness and butchery” and with a setup encompassing just the two, it’s a feat that the record never at any point feels lacking – it’s well-balanced and it’s well-judged. “It makes us play differently,” explains Stina, when asked if they mourn the lack of bass. “It’s so comfortable now for us to be just us. I do wish sometimes that we had extra voices to

“That’s the sound that just comes naturally to us,” says Stina, “we just play how we want and we can’t make a noise that’s unnatural.”

Honeyblood are live at the Hare & Hounds, Kings Heath, on September 26. Brum Notes Magazine

No fear Combining wistful, dream pop sounds with introspective lyrics, Brighton art school outfit Fear of Men make for intriguing listening. With a well received debut album out earlier this year and a growing confidence in their live performance, Becky Rogers meets a band with nothing to fear, as they prepare for their biggest headline tour to date.

Debut album Loom’s emotion-filled, personal lyrics have led to many comparisons to a young Morrissey. Indeed, his contrasts of melancholic, harder hitting lyrics with seductive pop melodies are something Fear of Men have tried to learn from when creating their own sound. “I love The Smiths so that’s a really huge compliment to me,” says frontwoman Jess. “What we really respect about [The Smiths] as a band is the way they had a lot of different sounds over their career but it was their kind of incisive, thought-out lyrics which you don’t really get in pop songs. I think that’s a really interesting way to juxtapose.” The Smiths’ experimental approach is mirrored by Fear of Men’s, as is their lack of interest in the ‘proper’ way of doing things. But the addition of some modern technology into the mix, namely some recording equipment borrowed from a friend, opened up the ability for Jess to begin creating their own multi-layered sound. “Before that I’d only been able to have just one person playing the guitar and singing. You can’t get experimental with sounds, you can’t use effects, you can’t layer things up. Then suddenly I had this amazing new toy to play with which I September 2014

spent hours and hours with in my room sampling different things.”

of musical anguish that we’ve been secreting between the three of us.”

The intrigue in disorders and medical conditions, especially androphobia (the fear of men), also brings up another comparison to a young Moz, but also signals her belief that it is now the turn of both the boys and the girls.

The upcoming headline tour follows their threemonth long run of dates supporting The Pains Of Being Pure At Heart across the UK and Europe. And Jess admits she is looking forward to the mini-break before hitting the road again. “As soon as we get off this tour we’re going to get into rehearsals. Mike the drummer, his parents live on a farm so we’re just going to go there for the weekend, play music all day and it’ll be really good to have a rest like that and sleep in the same bed for a few nights in a row.”

“I think it’s a really good time for music in that there are so many more girls in bands than there used to be, and it’s less of a gimmick because I think it’s obviously always positive to have women in bands but for it to be 50/50. It’s really gratifying to see women telling their own stories with music rather than, I guess, maybe like the 90s where there was a bit of cliché of a sexy bassist, but I think it’s kind of the women’s turn to say something new and connect with a different audience on that.” The last record took over a year but just a couple of months later another is already in the works – and is already signalling an evolution in their sound. Having been on tour since March and surrounded by new people, events and places constantly, it has inevitably influenced the way they’ve approached their latest recordings. “I think my perspective on life has probably changed a little bit in the last few months,” Jess explains. “We’re definitely going to push things forward and move forward with the kind

Last time Fear of Men appeared in Birmingham, in support of Best Coast, things ended up pretty weird with the lights cutting out mid-show. But two years later and with their debut album under their belt, things have developed significantly both off stage and on it. “I was really nervous when I was first playing shows,” continues the singer. “Now I feel like I’ve got a bit more strength, but then the songs are sometimes about vulnerable introspective things that I feel needs to come across in our live sets too. We’ll definitely get the chance to play some more songs, extend the set a bit and try some new things out, which will be fun.”

Fear of Men are live at the Bull’s Head, Moseley, on September 30. 23

Photo: Eleanor Hardwick

Formed back in 2011 after guitarist Daniel Falvey heard singer Jess Weiss’ reverb-laden soundtrack at an art exhibition, Fear of Men have since gone on to push the boundaries of music.

PUSHING THE

Super Furry Animals frontman Gruff Rhys has never been afraid to experiment. But his latest solo project sees him ploughing into almost unchartered territory, combining an album, book, film and app to tell the tale of a little-known Welsh explorer. He tells David Vincent why he’s never short of ideas. He’s no stranger to music award lists, but the latest project from Gruff Rhys has seen him nominated not just for the AIM Independent Album Of The Year, but also two literature prizes, the Guardian First Book Award and the Gordon Burn Prize.

Welsh speaking native Americans. Evans’ journey across the Atlantic backed by the Spanish led him beyond the known borders of the United States, and along the Mississippi, with his map later used by the pioneering Lewis and Clark Expedition.

“I’m always surprised and grateful to be nominated for anything. I’m excited that people have just read it and listened to it,” he laughs. “And when people do it amazes me. I’m so surprised. It’s difficult to take it in, you know?”

“John isn’t taught in schools, apart from in his home village [Waunfawr, near Caernarfon] where the kids are forced to do school projects about him. He’s very obscure, only appearing in footnotes of other people’s stories. Crossing through America, he features in Spanish history in a very low level and I suppose this was a chance to make a fuss of him, make him historically relevant,” says Gruff, who heard the stories of Evans’ travels from his family and later found himself traversing a similar route.

The focus of critical attention is the album American Interior and accompanying history book (subtitled The Quixotic Journey of John Evans, His Search for a Lost Tribe and How, Fuelled by Fantasy and (Possibly) Booze, He Accidentally Annexed a Third of North America), alongside an app and documentary film all triggered by a figure from history’s margins. To all but a relative few, John Evans is a forgotten 18th century Welsh explorer who, inspired by the notion that a Welshman beat Christopher Columbus to America by several centuries, set off in search of a mythical tribe of light-skinned, 24

“The more I travelled America as a musician the more I found myself crossing his path, so I booked a tour along the route he took…” But how did that idea spiral into a grand multimedia project, with each component exploring a different element of the story? “The tour came first and then the songs, and the tour itself had

a slideshow where I started to tell this story. And the further into the tour, the more I found out, I had more research, added facts to songs. It became apparently enough for a book. I wanted the songs to be more emotional, based on feelings rather than a compilation of historical facts. Everything went hand in hand, kind of. For me it’s like an album, but you get a load more.” The project reunited Rhys with filmmaker Dylan Goch. They’ve previously collaborated on 2010 film Separado!, which found Gruff heading to Patagonia to trace ancestors who’d emigrated there in Victorian times. “It’s great to do something with him again,” says Gruff. “He’s a great director and editor. We’ve made two films now, so it would be great to do more as it’s always an adventure. He’s very innovative and I’d love to do another film, but he’s just getting over this. He took about a year to edit the film and then started to edit a version for DVD of just songs. So he needs a break.” American Interior isn’t the first time Gruff has delved into biography. His collaborations with Boom Bip as Neon Neon, for example, were Brum Notes Magazine

“This is the most intensive thing I’ve ever been involved in creating.”

triggered by the lives of controversial car maker John DeLorean (2008’s Stainless Style) and publisher Giangiacomo Feltrinelli (last year’s Praxis Makes Perfect), while his next (solo) release is the soundtrack to Set Fire to the Stars. “It’s a feature film about Dylan Thomas’s agent, John Malcolm Brinnin, played by Elijah Wood, and about a week in the life of Dylan Thomas in the 1950s when his American agent was trying to keep him off the sauce.” Directed by Andy Goddard (Downton Abbey) and co-starring Celyn Jones (as Thomas), the cast also includes Steven Mackintosh, Shirley Henderson and Kevin Eldon, and is part of the ongoing celebrations marking the centenary of the Welsh literary giant’s birth. “There’s three songy songs and the others are all instrumentals, but there’s an album worth of material,” continues Gruff. “I’m really happy with it, it’s very orchestral. It’s different again. One of the songs, Set Fire to the Stars, is based on a Dylan Thomas poem [Love In The Asylum], but otherwise they’re all my own lyrics. That was pretty daunting – having to write lyrics about Dylan Thomas!” As to what comes next, the Super Furry Animals co-founder says he’s not short on ideas. “I’ve got lots of ideas, but I suppose I’m just going to enjoy playing American Interior for a while. It took about two years, pretty solid, making the film, getting out touring and making the book and it’s been hectic. This is the most intensive thing I’ve ever been involved in creating. Everything’s finished now. To just enjoy touring and playing the songs to people and not anything much else for a while is what I want to do.” Gruff Rhys is live at The Glee Club, Birmingham, on September 15. September 2014

THE POWER OF THREE

Brum Notes Magazine

Hailed as one of the most inventive bands to emerge from the UK in recent years, Alt-J were catapulted into new realms of expectation following the million-selling success of 2012’s debut album An Awesome Wave. Despite the turbulence of losing a founder member just a few months ago, the now three-piece have embraced the anticipation ahead of the release of their second record This Is All Yours this month. They tell Amy Sumner why they were so determined to do themselves justice. Alt-J drummer Thom Green is sat in his Dalston flat waiting for his broken ankle to heal. Sod’s law. He’s at rehearsal in a few hours, when the band will begin practicing for what’s shaping up to be a pretty important tour to support the release of their second full-length album, This Is All Yours, this autumn. The record pretty much has to be good – to date, the band’s 2012 Mercury-winning debut, An Awesome Wave, has sold over one million copies and is generally regarded among that year’s finest offerings. The dangers of going in strong. But Thom at least doesn’t appear to be overly concerned. “It was difficult but not in the sense that we struggled with it,” he explains of the writing process. “We had some material written but the majority was conceived over a six month period and that was intense and quite stressful at points. To start with we were a bit apprehensive to see how it was going to go because you can’t avoid the fact that we had a successful first album and we wanted to do that justice and follow it up – we didn’t want to be a fluke. But we knew that we weren’t and that we just had to crack on and connect with the music that we were making and luckily we did that quite easily. “In terms of differences there’s a lot more production on this album, more electronics and more programmed drums. It sounds a bit cleaner, a bit more polished. It still sounds like us…I don’t want to say it’s better but I do love this album. It sounds like we’ve refined our sound.” The initial offerings are promising. Left Hand Free (which is available for instant download with the pre-order of the album), is different to prior material, more bluesy and more guitar-focused but instantly as infectious. It’s the ‘big single’ their American label had been hoping for. The record’s first single, Hunger of the Pine, familiarly channels the wonderful vocals of lead singer Joe Newman, which sound like they’re wrapped round with Ivy and Virginia Creeper, entwining with years of deftly cryptic folklore, and builds to an almost cinematic synth crescendo which, teamed with its video (directed by Nabil Elderkin - Kanye West, Frank Ocean, The Black Eyed Peas), doesn’t half leave an impression. It’s promising indeed. It also samples Miley Cyrus… “I was remixing one of her album tracks called 4x4,” explains Thom of the somewhat controversial and fully unexpected match, “so I had the stems whilst we were writing Hunger of the Pine. I was September 2014

playing my remix in the studio and realised that the vocal was in the same key so I chopped that section out and put it over what we were doing at the time, which is pretty much exactly how the track ended up. We sat on it for a while because we weren’t sure if we wanted to be associated with her name but it sounded good and she’s actually a really nice person. She’s been kind of a friend, I’ve spoken to her more and more – she’s really hard working and we have a lot of respect for her so it would have been silly not to use it. The more I think about it, it’s kind of nice because it’s so random and so different – there are not a lot of bands who could do it…Though I’ve been getting tonnes of people on Twitter following me and asking me to speak to her for them.”

“You can’t avoid the fact that we had a successful first album and we wanted to do that justice and follow it up – we didn’t want to be a fluke.” Earlier in the year, Alt-J made the transition from a four-piece to a trio when their founding member Gwil Sainsbury amicably bowed out, citing disagreements with the touring lifestyle. It seemed a concerning development for the fans on the outside looking in. But the remaining members were determined to come out of it stronger than ever. “It brought us closer as a three-piece because we realised that we had to stick together and just crack on with it really,” says Thom. “Gwil leaving was a bit of a shock but it gave a bit more space to the music and the writing process because it felt like there was less to get confused about. We’ll have a session musician to play Gwil’s parts live because a lot of the tracks are quite layered and we physically can’t play everything. But we actually saw him last night – he’s fine and he’s doing really well. It just wasn’t for him when it came down to it – touring wasn’t what he enjoyed, so he made the right decision.” Alt-J’s appeal lies not only in the intricacies and complexities of their music, but in the stories, the cultural references and the allusions which nestle inside it. Half of the pleasure comes from deciphering these codes. An Awesome Wave was an opus referencing everything from Where the Wild

Things Are (Breezeblocks), to cult classic novel Last Exit to Brooklyn (Fitzpleasure), to a love story between two WW2 photographers, Robert Capa and Gerda Taro (Taro). It’s tricksy and elliptical in a way that draws you in rather than turning you off. And by the sounds of it, This Is All Yours will be a present just as exciting. “There’s this track called The Gospel of John Hurt,” explains Thom, “which is about this one particular scene in the film Alien, which Joe has somehow managed to write a whole song about. Nara is about the place in Japan, the deer there are regarded as being sacred and are just allowed to wander around and as people you can’t touch them. That’s kind of a nice way of saying that people should be left alone and allowed to do what they want to do with their lives. Joe’s very good at storytelling and interpreting things in his own weird way. There are the lines from Alfred de Musset’s poem L’espoir en Dieu at the end of Hunger of the Pine too. Admittedly there’s a couple of tracks which have no meaning at all… they’re just lyrics that sound good together.” In a recent interview, The Guardian pointed out that Alt-J had really managed to embody that holy grail of success – fame without the celebrity. It’s true that it was only a year or so ago that Alt-J started allowing interviews and press shots were even less forthcoming. The band still don’t appear in their videos and we’re probably pretty safe in the assumption that they’ll never ‘do a Nicki Minaj’ in their artwork… “We don’t want to be famous unless we really have to be,” concludes Thom. “We understand that it’s good for people to know what we look like because it gives some kind of emotional attachment and context to the music – people like to know who they’re listening to and we understand that but we’re not in our music videos or the album covers because we just find that unnecessary.” Which, when you think about it, is really an unusually pristine way of looking at things. And therein lies Alt-J’s appeal – in fusing those novelly traditional elements with the forward-thinking sounds they’ve primed us with, it’s no wonder they’ve been such a success story.

Alt-J are live at the Wolverhampton Civic Hall on September 22. Their new album, This Is All Yours, is out on the same date on Infectious. Turn to P36 to read our verdict on the record. 27

SUNSHINE HIT ME

Californian outfit Sleepy Sun combine the visceral haze of psychedelia with the fuzzy riffage of 1970s-inspired rock. Both blissful and powerful in equal measure, it’s an engaging combination. Frontman Bret Constantino tells Amy Sumner how they try to capture their “magical energy”. “As a kid I was a huge fan of comedians like Dana Carvey and Jim Carrey who, through imitation, taught me how to use the muscles in my throat and face,” explains frontman Bret Constantino, name-checking somewhat surprising influences that helped him on his way to creating music. “That was the beginning of learning to manipulate sound and tone with my voice.” Formed predominantly at UC Santa Cruz with garage rock origins in their initial guise as Mania, Sleepy Sun progressed into psychedelia around 2007, releasing four albums since that point. Fused 28

together by a love of classic rock groups including Neil Young & Crazy Horse, Black Sabbath and Pink Floyd, individually tastes and inspirations are fairly diverse within the band, ranging from Black Flag to Badalamenti. “I think the diversity is reflected in our music more and more with each record we produce, identifies Bret. “Personally, [writer] Henry Miller is always someone I return to. He describes interaction with the muse and offers insight into the creative perspective by abstracting the process. He discusses the muse without deluding the

mystique, and even though he doesn’t speak about writing music, his work is musical.” In January this year the quintet released their fourth album Maui Tears, a relatively prolific output compared to many of their contemporaries in this day and age. “The finished product never manifests in the way you initially envisioned,” says Bret, “but I think we came close this time. A lot of that should be credited to the producer we worked with, Tim Green. He has an exceptional talent capturing the songs Brum Notes Magazine

in a way that preserves their live feel, or their most organic form in its most honest state, which is at times imperfect and dissonant. To me, these are the qualities of records that outlast trend and popularity.” Maui Tears received some really wonderful praise, and justly – it’s a beautifully crafted piece of work. With the recent revival and rejuvenation of the psych rock genre, it manages to hold its footing in an increasingly busy market place. But after 10 years, four albums and a heck of a lot of touring, is it tricky to keep up the momentum? “For me, it’s the musical dynamic between the five of us,” says Bret. “Every so often, there’s a magical energy that whirls about the room. When we collectively tune in to such moments, this makes it all worth it to me.” If you’re wondering what this all sounds like live, Sleepy Sun’s band bio identifies an ‘onstage mixture of alchemy and architecture’, which sounds appealingly heady. “I suppose it’s about being immersed in the music,” continues Bret. “The alchemy has to do with what happens when one is completely present in the performance, it’s an escape from reality, the point of action that is effortless and

infinite in its reach. I guess the architecture has to do with the songs as constructs and how each of us contributes pieces to a larger picture. It’s through music that we attempt to create a space or a house in which we can all, audience included, experience a kind of alchemy or shift in consciousness.”

“The alchemy has to do with what happens when one is completely present in the performance.”

On September 28, Sleepy Sun hop over to the UK and play a show at The Oobleck in Birmingham as part of their run of dates. “British audiences seem more attentive and sincere than audiences in Santa Cruz, but perhaps more critical,” Bret observes. But what is his band’s favourite thing about England? “I love how clever the English are with speech,” says Bret. “If you spend too much time in America, you become aware of the downfall of the English language. Visiting the UK, I’m reminded of the vitality of the English language and how eloquence is not a lost vernacular. That and clotted cream.” Sleepy Sun are live at The Oobleck, Birmingham, on September 28 with support from Asteroid No 4, Grand Union, The Exploding Sound Machine, Velvet Texas Cannonball and Schnauser.

SEPTEMBER AT THE ROADHOUSE

The Roadhouse Birmingham, Wharfside Leisure Complex, Lifford Lane, Stirchley, Birmingham, B30 3DZ 0121 246 2273 // www.theroadhousebirmingham.com

THU 4th Main Room: METAL NIGHT Ft: CØNSTANTINE + ARMONIGHT + CAPTAIN HORIZON + VALOUS Live Lounge: ACOUSTIC OPEN MIC w/ TIM WALKERDINE FRI 5th SOUL JUNCTION: 9 piece soul band playing classic Motown, Stax and Northern Soul w/ spt from LISA MORRALL SAT 6th STRAIGHTEN OUT: A TRIBUTE TO THE STRANGLERS SUN 7th SO CALLED STUDIOS BATTLE OF THE BANDS: GRAND FINAL w/ finalists HIGHTOWER + KILLGLASS + ARAMANTUS TUE 9th VENGEANCE PROMOTIONS In Association with Angry Badger Records Present: KODIAK JACK w/ special guests GUERILLA MONSOON and HAMMERJACK THU 11th Main Room: DURAN – The Tribute w/ spt from CITIZEN-X | Live Lounge: ACOUSTIC OPEN MIC with IAN BEVAN SAT 13th THE UK’s BEST AC/DC TRIBUTE + HELLS BELLS SUN 14th CASH – Johnny Cash Tribute (special acoustic performance) w/ spt from retro girl group THE GLAMOPHONES THU 18th Main Room: MRP & SOUND SHARE Present: BLAST BEAT - An exclusive Hip-Hop night Ft: JIMMIE BLACK + DANNY B + JOSH ‘SMIIFFY’ + MERKAGE + SWIFTY + SOL MORGAN Live Lounge: ACOUSTIC OPEN MIC with COREY YOUNG th FRI 19 JILTED GENERATION – The World’s only full live tribute band to the Prodigy. Spt from ELECTRIC CAKE SALAD SAT 20th HI-ON-MAIDEN w/ spt from ACELDAMA SUN 21st ROADHOUSE Presents: ACOUSTIC ALL-DAYER (3pm Doors) Ft: FRANKIE LORENZO + AIDAN BYRNE + ROSIE SAMARAS + TAYLOR LOUISE + HOSTILE HEART AND THE COYOTE + CRAIG LENNON + MESCH + MR. APOLLO + DOVEHEART + VICTORIA CROSS + ALAN MASON + PAOLA + SAMUEL PENNANT MON 22nd Main Room: THE ROADHOUSE OPEN MIC NIGHT w/ special guests LET THERE BE LIGHT Live Lounge: COMEDY NIGHT Hosted by Hannah Silvester THU 25th Main Room: KING KRAB | Live Lounge: ACOUSTIC OPEN MIC w/ HELEN JONES FRI 26th THE BORN AGAIN BEATLES SAT 27th GUNS VS ROSES - UK GUNS N ROSES TRIBUTE BAND EXPERIENCE w/ spt from SALVATION SUN 28th ROXX TO RUIN – HARD ROCK ALL-DAYER (3pm Doors) Hosted by Birmingham’s own DJ Yentonian! Ft: SLASH UK + WILDSIDE RIOT + STOP STOP + SILENT JACK + FALLEN MAFIA + HANGFIRE + ENDLESS MILE + THE VIGIL + TIGERPUNCH + WYLDE ORCHID + ANGER RISING + SECTION NINETEEN + INBETWEENSEAS + OUT OF LUCK + THE CARSON EXPERIENCE

LIVE LOUNGE OPEN MIC COMEDY ACOUSTIC OPEN MIC EVERY MONDAY WITH EVERY THURSDAY HANNAH SILVESTER

MAIN GIG ROOM OPEN MIC EVERY MONDAY WITH BEN DALBY

All listings are correct at time of print, however, they are subject to change at any time so please check website or call the Roadhouse Team before you travel. Please note: We are strictly 18+ on Friday & Saturday Nights

September 2014

FOR HER

style

On Trend: AUTUMN Style Picks £20

new Look navy and red check wrap

£70

warehouSe culotte jumpsuit

£35

FOR HIM

river iSLand grey croc quilted duffle bag

aSoS ballet flats

topShop feather hem dress

Burtonwode loungewear

river iSLand camouflage hooded jacket

£250

£140

£80

Zara leather coat

£22

£13

new Look bright blue sweater

£239

£79

Zara shoes with pointed toes

£65

Superdry retro sherpa gilet

£40

Lord dotte pocket square

Brum Notes Hayer Magazine By Tajinder

STREET STYLE BIRMINGHAM

This month’s Street Style was shot at Glug Birmingham in August. The next Glug event takes place on November 20. www.glugevents.com

style

aLyS Beider, 26, Manager at Cherry redS, kingS heath shirt: homemade (courtney barnett) jeans: american apparel coat: harborne charity shop shoes: Zara fave shop: pdsa kings heath

Bethany thoMpSon, 22, iLLuStrator, BethanyiLLuStration.Co.uk jacket: mum’s unwanted m&s top: white stuff style icon: Zoe deschanel

Fran Stone, 29, BLogger, FaLLFordiy.CoM top: h&m jeans: new look style icon: alexa chung

toM BradBury, 20, retaiL aSSiStant, provide top: provide jeans: h&m style icon: the hundreds fave shop: johnny cupcakes

thoMaS huSSey, 21, graphiC deSign Student top: river island jeans: hollister shoes: nike fave shop: river island

Steve Bond, 33, graphiC deSigner/ iLLuStrator, BeLLetragedie.CoM shirt: johnny cupcakes jeans: topman fave shop: johnny cupcakes

September PHOTOS2014 BY Sam Wood

eastzeast 197 Broad Street, Birmingham B15 1AY 0121 643 4808 www.eastzeast.com

If there’s something Birmingham’s already blessed with plenty of it’s Indian restaurants and, with the famous Balti Triangle barely a Seekh Kebab’s throw away, perhaps it takes a brave soul to open a new one – especially on Broad Street which has certainly seen its fair share of restaurants come and go over the years. EastZEast already has five seemingly very successful venues in the north west though so they must know what they’re doing. This is their first foray down ‘south’ and from the moment you step through the doors you can clearly tell they’ve spent a rupee or two fitting the place out. Dazzling white walls and crystal chandeliers greet you and it feels a little more like a palace than a curry house. In fact less karahi, more Liberace you could say. The menu’s pretty extensive too so allow a good few minutes to plough through it all, although fans of the cuisine will be pretty familiar with many of the offerings. For starters we went for the old favourite Seekh Kebab and one of the many veggie options, Aloo Tikka. The kebab was suitably deli-seekh; juicy, well spiced and retaining a

Cuisine:

Punjabi

Price:

£25 for three courses

Service: Atmosphere: Food: Overall:

decent meaty texture whilst the Aloo Tikka was a moist parcel of potatoey loveliness with just enough heat. That pretty much set the template for the mains, good food, well flavoured and cooked with just that little more sophistication than usual. The Chicken Tikka Masala, whilst distinctly lacking the deep (and let’s face it sometimes slightly gory and suspicious looking) red hue of some examples, was sweet, mild and creamy. The Lamb Sookah Bhuna packed a decent punch and the meat itself had clearly been cooked long and slooooooooow as it genuinely melted in the mouth, dissolving in a saliva erupting burst of heat and spicy flavour. Highly recommended. In the interests of research

we tried a couple more veggie dishes too, a deliciously smooth and creamy Tarka Daal and a chunky Aloo Gobi Mutter that delivered the kind of flavours and textures rarely found in a dish that doesn’t contain various bits of animal. The rice was fine, perhaps a little clumpy (this was opening night and more of a buffet set up so allowances can be made), but the naan was spot on, thinner than some but sufficiently robust to mop up the sauces without feeling that you were eating an entire king size dough-vet. No doubt the Halva we shared for pudding contained more calories than the average human should consume in a month but it was worth it. In terms of taste, think a slightly lighter treacle pudding with some plump raisins chucked in for good measure and a little more textural variety. Indian puddings can sometimes be tooth-rottingly sweet but this one was just right. Price-wise you’re obviously paying a little bit of a premium for the opulence, location and that little extra sophistication in the cooking but if bling’s your thing EastZEast is hard to beat. Daron Billings

diary: birmingham independent food fair September 13, Millennium Point

The bustling independent food and drink scene in Birmingham will be celebrated in true gastronomic style this month. The Birmingham Independent Food Fair takes place at Millennium Point on September 13, serving up live cooking demos, samples galore and plenty of dishes to take home. There will be more than 40 independent food and drink businesses available to explore on the day, including high end restaurants, specialist 32

Website: www.bhamindfoodfair.co.uk

delis, street food vendors, expert coffee shops and bespoke bakeries, while drinks including specialist spirits, cocktails and ales will be on offer from the likes of sponsors Langley’s Gin and Purity Brewing Company, plus Birmingham’s popular Bitters ‘n’ Twisted bars. Tickets for the event, organised by food guide Dine Birmingham, are £7.50 adv and available through www.bhamindfoodfair.co.uk. Brum Notes Magazine

AS IT IS OUR 5TH BIRTHDAY, WE’RE GIVING THE SUN ON THE HILL A NEW LOOK AND HAVING A BIT OF A PARTY

STARTS AT 6PM WITH SOME SPECIAL GUEST DJs TILL LATE

An evening of musical talent spanning a breadth of genres hosted by the one and only ‘H’! Every sunday at the sun on the hill from 4pm! Free entry!

sunday 7th september for a massive kings heath street festival. we’ll have a brothers cider bar and live bands! free entry from 11am - 8pm!

An eclectic mix of handpicked musicians & poets create the foundation for this cross platform, intimate event. at the station every sunday from 6pm. free in!

COME AND CHECK OUT OUR NEW FOOD MENUS FROM 5TH OF SEPTEMBER, INCLUDING BRUNCH AND MONTHLY SPECIALS AT THE STATION!

PRESENTS... IS BROUGHT TO YOU BY steady hands HERE ON FRIDAY 26TH! EXPECT LIVE MUSIC, VISUALS, SPECIAL GUESTS AND DJ’S UNTIL LATE!

sunonthehill.co.uk - @sunonthehill - facebook.com - the sun on the hill

sunatthestation.co.uk - @sunatthestation - facebook.com - the sun at the station September 2014

power-ska style. The sound is full, clean and robust, with sax, trombone and trumpet weaving through the rhythm section. The brass isn’t just for show, the tone is exceptional, Martin Lundfall (trumpet/vocals) smacks of Chet Baker in ska form. Vocals come from Adam, Bobo and/or Martin with all three pitching in to produce ‘ska-monies’ that immediately have people dancing. New singles Life on the Run and the Dixieland inspired Average Guy showcase why OHF have already played some of Sweden’s biggest festivals. With that almost mystical, music camaraderie resonating from band to audience, Original High Five sign off with an all-Swedish encore and a seven-man “SKÅL!” It’s a toast the joyous crowd are only too happy to return. Will Pace

live

the garden The Sunflower Lounge, Birmingham 15/08/14

It seems that two-pieces are everywhere nowadays – Royal Blood, Sleaford Mods and our own local favourites God Damn to name just three. However, there is one more duo you should certainly be paying attention to, The Garden. These twins from Orange County, California, are hitting catwalks for Yves Saint Laurent and making lo-fi neo-punk with just a drum kit and a vintage Hofner bass guitar. From their music to their look and attitudes this is one band that you can’t help but fall in love with. Tonight, following the release of three singles at once, the twins bring The VadaVerse to Birmingham’s Sunflower Lounge. From the start it’s clear that they aren’t content just standing there playing their songs and expecting the audience to enjoy it. Constantly in motion, the infectious energy gets the crowd thrashing in songs like The Apple, Open Abyss, What We Are and Crystal Clear. Fletcher leaping out from behind the drumkit pulling shapes draws laughter from the crowd as Wyatt starts up another grimey bassline that is the signature of this band. The surprise of the night comes when they put down their instruments and

put on an iPod –what happens next is truly spectacular. Breaking away from their neo-punk sounds, they begin the ‘electronic’ part of the set, more closely related to their solo projects Enjoy (Wyatt) and Puzzle (Fletcher) than to the music they put out as The Garden – although the mood remains just as dark. With beats reminiscent of Death Grips reverberating around the room, the crowd absolutely going crazy and as the duo jumping from speaker stacks, it’s clear that this band is truly something special. As they return to their ‘normal’ positions behind their instruments to wrap up their set, the energy in the room is at fever pitch and no one is left standing still through songs like I’m A Woman and their party anthem We Be Grindin’. The Garden are a band just as involved in the energy as the audience is, it feels like a genuine performance and the passion that these twins have is obvious. Not bad for a couple of models from California. Matthew Burdon | Photo by Sam Wood

Original High Five Hare & Hounds, Kings Heath 14/08/14

Original High Five Photo by Will Pace

How many Swedes does it take to form a ska band? Seven apparently, as Original High Five pile onto the stage at the Hare & Hounds. The crowd is underwhelming in number yet high in spirit, but OHF are by no means put off, colouring the room with their first track Forget. Imagine a blessed union between Hot 8 Brass Band and Millencolin and you’d be close; OHF ooze charisma and come across as more of a brotherhood than a band. A buoyant mixture of reggae and energetic punk-rock form the foundation of their

Electric Swing Circus The Botanical Gardens, Edgbaston 28/07/14

As the sun sets over the idyllic gardens, Electric Swing Circus take to the Victorian bandstand as a large crowd gathers on the main lawn. With no hint of the rigours of their recent touring, they leap into their twohour set with zeal. Through synths, Rashad Gregory conjures forth the brass and string ghosts of the roaring 20s swing era for his bandmates to flesh out with dub, gypsy jazz, ska, electro and whatever else they see fit. Foot-tapping quickly becomes full-blown jiving as pockets of the audience erupt into dance, the band setting the tone with some moves of their own. Professional musicians to the last, ESC punctuate the set with heavier dub numbers such as I’m OK while maintaining their high-octane start. Frontwomen Laura Louise and Bridget Walsh between them seem to have mastered the entire sound spectrum, guitarist Tom Hyland finds Django in his strings, while bassist Patrick Wreford and, as Tom describes him, the “ninja drumming octopus” Chandra Walker champion the rhythms. Shifting through the gears, ESC throw in the ska-laden new offering That Skat, before closing with their new anthem Valentine. “This only works if you all go bananas,”exclaims Tom and the audience obliges. How could they not? Electric Swing Circus are simply irresistible. Will Pace | Photo by Sam Wood

Brum Notes Magazine

Mostly Jazz, Funk & Soul Festival Moseley Park, Moseley 11-13/07/14

With two genuine legends, Mostly Jazz, Funk & Soul well and truly cemented its reputation as one of the best events of its kind in Europe. Here are just some of the highlights... Day One Sons of Kemet made an early pitch for act of the weekend with an intoxicating mix of jazz, West Indian rhythms and bowel rumbling tuba, paving the way for Kraak & Smaak. As names go it might not be the best but this Dutch collective were every bit as addictive, fusing 90s style Euro house and disco beats with fabulously funky basslines. Ever wondered what would happen if you kidnapped Prince and made him smoke ‘erb for six months? You’re not alone. Radio Riddler clearly also pondered this question late one fuggy night and, oddly enough, it works. It’s great festival fare and their reggae-fied versions of everything from Let’s Go Crazy to When Doves Cry were ‘spliffing’. Omar’s band may have been detained at a border somewhere but you can’t keep a good Souleyman down and he treated the early evening crowd to the truly unique sound of Syrian rave, perfect for A-ravian nights. Canadian six-piece Soul Jazz Orchestra closed the second stage in fine style with their mix of Latin and Afro grooves before day one climaxed with Fun Lovin’ Criminals’ fan friendly, hits heavy set. Huey was in fine motherfuckin’ form. From the laid back groove of King Of New York through to the band’s unofficial anthem, Smoke ‘Em If You Got ‘Em, and on to the biggies Scooby Snacks, Barry White and Fun Lovin’ Criminal itself, it was a timely reminder (20 years or so after they formed) that FLC have some pretty awesome tunes under their belts. Day Two Host Craig Charles celebrated his 50th birthday by seeing son Jack blow the place apart as vocalist for Lack of Afro with Recipe For Love, a soul crate digger’s wet dream. As the sun beat down the next few acts took it in turns to try to out-sweat each other. Myron and E were up first, an old school vocal duo

Ibibio Sound Machine

September 2014

in the style of Sam and Dave, then King Khan & The Shrines went balls out with an irresistibly nuts mix of psychedelic soul, R’n’B and garage punk. Can he kick it? Yes he Khan. It takes some act to follow that but Cody Chesnutt nailed it. Channelling the spirit of Marvin Gaye but with his own unique feel this dude could well be the most soulful man on planet earth right now. “It’s taken me 50 years to have the best birthday evvvvaaahhhhh!” yelled Craig Charles before introducing the next band. Ibibio Sound Machine didn’t let the side down. Their mix of West African highlife, tribal rhythms, synths, funky jazzy brass and anything else they want to chuck into the mix got more people up and shaking their ass than anyone else. Then it was the turn of Miss Mavis Staples. Still in fine voice a mere 64 years into her career she had us in the palm of her hand from opening number Come Go With Me. Freedom Highway and I Like the Things About Me may be separated by the decades but they’re united by the same sense of pride that saw her play a part in changing the world during the civil rights movement. How many other artists can lay such a claim? After a stunningly soulful cover of The Weight she left us with an equally sublime I’ll Take You There. She sure did... Day Three London Afrobeat Collective blew away the hangovers before The Heliocentrics left planet earth altogether – imagine Paloma Faith fronting an acid funk band. Reed Bass flew the Birmingham flag with some neat jazz fusion and great solos, including one from the drummer perhaps mindful of who was up next. Ginger Baker may have spent much of the last 50 years or so playing hide and seek with the grim reaper but he’s still here. Remarkably he seems to come back to life behind a drum kit, playing with the intuitive ease of man born with sticks in his hands. His current band, Ginger Baker’s Jazz Confusion, has a distinctly Afrocentric vibe, a passion that no doubt dates back

Kraak & Smaak

to his jams with Fela Kuti, and this set fused the two genres perfectly. “I need a piss,” he said suddenly halfway through and wandered off, returning a few moments later to continue the show. Given that he was once voted the musician least likely to survive the 60s it’s easy to forgive such ‘foibles’. Courtney Pine’s hugely entertaining set won over pretty much everyone in the place. Seemingly capable of playing any tune ever written on his sax he’s the kind of dude that could motivate a corpse to get up and dance. Young Pilgrims kept the party going with brass fuelled mayhem paving the way for Earth, Wind and...hang on...that ain’t Earth, Wind & Fire. Nope, sadly their vocalist had lost his voice but help was at hand courtesy of The Family Stone. If you were looking to compile the ultimate party album it’s a safe bet that they’d be several Family Stone tracks on there and this evening they played them all, from Sing a Simple Song right through to spellchecker’s nightmare Thank You (Falettinme Be Mice Elf Agin). This current lineup features three of the original members with Alex Davis doing a fine job of filling Sly’s boots and together they delivered the hands in the air climax that this year’s Mostly Jazz, Funk & Soul deserved, I Want To Take You Higher inducing the kind of crowd euphoria that normally takes illegal substances to achieve. Daron Billings Photos by Richard Shakespeare

Fun Lovin’ Criminals 35

album reviews

ALT-J This is All yours Out September 22 (Infectious)

It depends what you want from this record as to how much you’re going to enjoy it – it isn’t Mercury-winning debut, An Awesome Wave. Twoand-a-half minutes of instrumental intercepted by harmonious tonsil-work initiates a slow start, each of the opening three tracks drawing out the introduction of drums a little longer than strictly necessary, a placid theme that honestly recurs throughout. It’s decidedly more mellow than its predecessor.

Dark Horses Hail Lucid State Out now (Last Gang Records)

Hail Lucid State is the second album from Brighton’s Dark Horses and, as the title suggests, signifies a sense of triumphant arrival. Their 2012 debut, Black Music, was a brooding lo-fi affair that showed signs of promise but couldn’t seem to pull through the fug of its own making. Their second sees the band surface from the murk with vital signs intact. Employing the production skills again of Richard Fearless (Death In Vegas), whose influence can be heard throughout, the album combines krautrock rhythms, snarling guitars and Swedish singer Lisa Elle’s vocals, morphing through Karen O cool-cut breathiness to Siouxsie 36

That said, it’s characteristically woven through with that intricate puzzle of intrigue which made Alt-J so fascinating to begin with, a web of allusions, references and, at times, just plain weirdness. Every Other Freckle, for instance, is a genre-melding confusion of eroticism: ‘I want to turn you inside out and lick you like a crisp packet’, entices singer Joe Newman before the song melts into some kind of medieval court ditty. It couldn’t be accused of being pop, that’s for sure, but it is unnervingly erotic – it’s the pissing on each other of the music world. Probably. Anyway, it marks a turning point of sorts as the more classic rock swing of Left Hand Free stands to attention. The album’s gemstone is Hunger Of

Sioux post-punk shrill. Album opener Live On Hunger perfectly demonstrates this, a track that is hatched from Yeah Yeah Yeah’s Mosquito and transforms into a swirling, psych drama. Desire harks back to the gloaming of Black Music while Saturn Returns has glistening 80s style synths that pierce through the gloom, illuminating Elle’s vocals as she sings of ‘blinking into twilight’. On Transistor we feel the presence of The Subways’ Rock & Roll Queen with the chill of Joy Division, and on Wise Blood we have the closest the album gets to a Death In Vegas track. The defining track of the album is The Bravest, with lyrics taken from the writings of Marianne Faithfull’s mother Eva, spoken amidst a Savages style, post-punk wasteground. Beneath it all, the overriding influence of The Velvet Underground runs deep in their DNA. With their second album, Dark Horses have emerged as a safe bet to go further. Andrew Gutteridge

The Pine, ironic considering that’s the one that features Miley Cyrus, but undeniably it’s a perfect mesh of synth, vocal melody and a kind of brooding ambience. And then it all slows down again. As an album, it’s a stroll, but with an inquisitive mind for the duration you should find your common ground. And it sure couldn’t be accused of copyism. Amy Sumner

Jaws Be Slowly Out September 15 (Rattlepop)

Despite their debut album sporting the title Be Slowly, Jaws haven’t taken their own advice and have been touring and releasing music in the fast lane ever since the band were brought into fruition in 2012 by lead singer Connor Schofield. After the sugar-rush of the Milkshake EP, it’s clear whilst listening to the full length follow-up that they were keen to produce a collection of songs that communicated more feelings than that of just pure elation. Moody opener Time is just one of the parts of the album on which the band’s sound veers closer towards a more brooding ebb and build. Other tracks like Filth and Home flow in a similarly Brum Notes Magazine

more sinister vein. Fans of the four-piece’s more hopelessly romantic highs will find solace in Swim and Sunset State, two bright and buoyant blasts that permeate the album. It’s testament to Jaws’ close relationship with their followers that the album includes fan-favourites Gold and Surround You, both sure-fire ways to whip up the crowds that go to see them live. Early demo Cameron is also given a rehash and now acts as a showcase to the playful yet powerful drumming of Eddy Geach. The inclusion of stronger songs from the band’s previous output, however, doesn’t outshine the rest of the album as the two singles Be Slowly and Think Too Much Feel Too Little perfectly encapsulate the pop sensibilities in their songwriting and are easily two of the band’s best. Each song is made to sound as big as it possibly can, with every note allowed to echo and reverberate. Subtle details are also quietly noticeable with the odd accentuated sigh here and a dreamy ‘ooh’ there. That’s what Jaws do best, ever so slightly understating gargantuan pop songs that in the hands of another band would sound a lot different. This is pop music for shy people and they’ll find a home in Be Slowly. Pre-existing fans of the band will adore this album. Will it convert new listeners to the Jaws cause? Slowly but surely. Jack Parker

KONGOS Lunatic Out September 22 (Epic Records)

Family bands are a curious breed. Whether it’s the telepathic symmetry of The Cribs or the psychotic rivalry of the Gallaghers, the results often attain a certain cohesion. In these instances, the adage ‘You can choose your friends but…’ goes out the window, and family is forged into harmony, in spite of sibling rivalry. Or else. In the case of Kongos – brothers Jesse, Johnny, Daniel and Dylan – the dynamic is a curious one. While their Kwaito-tinged musical ensemble is comprehensive, their contrast of personalities makes them utterly compelling. With each brother writing individually, the divergence of styles and influences is quadrophenic. While opener I’m Only Joking sees Jesse’s fusion of Fleetwood Mac’s Tusk exploded by Arcade Fire-works, Johnny’s single Come With Me Now sees Beck rhapsodising over a raucous, Slade-like chorus. Guitarist Daniel chips in with Kids These Days – a truncated set-to of guitar and accordion egged on by a bloodthirsty Kasabian. From this, a segue into the mountain-bound celtic ethereality of As We Are draws you back into a ballad that somehow incorporates reggae. Dylan, meanwhile, gives us the Paul Simon-meets-Supergrass earthiness of Sex On The Radio, and the Keane-like September 2014

haunting ballad of Travelling On. But for all their differences, album closer This Time I Won’t Forget draws everything together, a Pink Floyd-like hymn to the will of the human spirit that understands that heart is where the home is. Sibling rivalry has never sounded so good. Stephen Brolan

Dry the River Alarms in the Heart Out now (Trangressive)

On debut record Shallow Bed, Dry the River came on like the bunk buddies of Mumford & Sons. Five more anguish-stained and brooding gentlemen obsessed with bombast, rag-tag peddlers of a neo-folk noise at its most pompous and overblown. It’s no surprise then that their follow-up is every bit as grandiose. Throughout the album, frontman Peter Liddle remains Stuart Murdoch-soft in delivery. His is the tender call of a choirboy that soars on each song’s pseudo-orchestral wings, veering from maudlin to triumphant as he navigates every key change and recalling the ghosts of broken pasts, perished pilgrims and doomed moths with wideeyed innocence and a well-hewn cynicism. Yet, as distinctive an atmosphere as Alarms in the Heart sets forth, it sounds, for the most part, overcooked and over-produced, with even its heaviest songs (Hidden Hand, Everlasting Light) failing to stop its shtick from becoming wearisome. Opting for a dramatic style over any real substance, Dry the River’s modern re-imagining of folk lacks the grisly heart that made the original genre so powerful and, as a result, brands Alarms in the Heart nothing but a vessel with its sights set firmly on the middle of the road. Dan Owens

IONS Wake up Out now (Smokin’ Records)

Ever get the feeling that smoking copious amounts of the green stuff isn’t quite your drug of choice? Ions present a tricky quandary in that respect. Their album Wake Up, released on Smokin’ Records, gives an instant sense of herbal enlightenment as opener Strawman kicks in. An amalgam of Pearl Jam-meets-Soundgarden hollering sets one’s nerves on edge, but not possibly in the way intended. There is an early 90s naiveté on display in the opening chimes of the song, before a surprisingly interesting middle section kicks in, and halfway through you’re appreciating the guitar vs drum riffage assaulting your ears. The slow burn of Bullet Cluster and its dual vocal

adds some drama to the early point of the record, but overlong instrumental patterns at times lend themselves to a feeling of overblown rock. The Universe offers some nice Minus the Bearstyle guitar workout action, while Grave in Wait offers a beautiful picked intro, leading into John Carpenter-style synth noises and a chorus reminiscent of Disarm by The Smashing Pumpkins. Wake Up is a victim of its own constant midtempo, however. It’s only by The Separation that any kind of up-tempo appears and that is only for the 16-beat intro and chorus sections. There is some excellent musicianship flowing throughout the record, take the dual guitar lead on The Event Horizon, but there seems an over reliance on the fast bit = twiddly, half-time bit = heavy formulae. That is not to say all is lost. This is definitely a midpaced album, and if you like a good toke whilst debating the best way to sync up the Wizard of Oz with Dark Side of the Moon, you may well have found your aural soul mate. Mix up the tempos next time and I reckon an interestingly ace slab of tunes could be yours, Ions. Katie Duffy

Stubblemelt Gypaetus Barbatus Out now

Fancy taking a trip down the rabbit hole? Not with Alice though, but with experimental alt-rockers Stubblemelt. There are not many bands that can transport you so easily to an entirely different headspace, especially after listening to just one song. But Brum-based Stubblemelt do exactly that with the album Gypaetus Barbatus (the bearded vulture, for anyone who was wondering). Right from the get-go you can tell this is going to be something a bit different, a bit skewed. And after that, completely bonkers. The band, who have been kicking around for a few years, have managed to create something that sounds like Freddie Mercury being chased by Muse’s Matt Bellamy around The Crystal Maze, while presenter Richard O’Brien looks on bemused. The entire album, full of ambitious, grandiose synth-led songs and over-the-top vocals, would not be out of place as the score to a theatre show – probably involving gun-toting space cowboys riding unicorns and winged ligers. ‘Theatrical’ would be a nice way of describing the album. Gypaetus Barbatus, while over-the-top and at times a bit too much, earns major brownie points for being so different to anything else out there on the local scene at the moment. The band themselves describe their songs as “a joyous apogee for our ears”. However, life is not always about the culmination of something, it’s about the journey that takes you there and the build up. This really does need to be heard to be appreciated. Ben Russell 37

gigs

Ms Lauryn Hill

PICK

O2 Academy, September 23 Playing a set of UK dates which sees her perform on British soil for only the second time in five years, the Fugees soulstress ventures to Birmingham’s O2 Academy for a rare solo set. Having released two studio albums with her former group (1994’s Blunted On Reality and 1996’s The Score) as well as her own Billboard-topping The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill in 1998, expect a mixture of material from the flighty fusionista.

Vance Joy

The Institute, September 28 Melbourne singer-songwriter Vance Joy releases his debut full-length record, Dream Your Life Away, this month and tours the UK in support of it. Perhaps best known for his Riptide single, the artist first cut his teeth performing at open mic nights in Melbourne, feeding himself on a diet of The Pogues and Paul Kelly. He plays The Library at The Institute with support from Ezra Vine.

Mazes

Bull’s Head, September 24 Following on from their second album, the sample and loop-laden Ores & Minerals released in February, and a short run of dates with Stephen Malkmus & The Jicks, Manchester’s Mazes return with mini album Better Ghosts and a run of UK shows. With a fresh and expansive catalogue of sounds referencing Velvet Underground and, indeed, Pavement, Mazes are hotly-tipped by the music press right now – now’s your chance to find out why.

Talons

The Flapper, September 13 Supporting the release of their recent full-length New Topographics, Hereford sextet Talons re-emerge from their four-year absence with gusto. Crafting post-rock and instrumental sounds 38

into an energetic, visceral and raw experience, Talons are a band best served live.

Jesus Jones

Chicks Dig Jerks club night, ft Sunshine Frisbee Laserbeam The Oobleck, September 27

O2 Academy, September 8 Alt dance act Jesus Jones celebrate over 25 years and six albums together with their Doubt tour this Autumn, which sees them play the number one album in full for the first time ever. With the original lineup and a number of other hits up their sleeves, this will be an intimate show for the Real Real Real and Right Here, Right Now creators.

Darlia

The Institute, September 22 Blackpool rock revival trio Darlia have been touted as ‘the best new guitar band in the UK’ so many times that by now it’s probably old news to them. Referencing the grunge rock of Nirvana and the New Wave sounds of S*M*A*S*H and These Animal Men, they’ve now released two EPs, last October’s debut Knock Knock and its follow-up, April’s Candyman, both produced by Cam Blackwood (George Ezra, Florence and The Machine). Darlia

The Chicks Dig Jerks club night makes a welcome return in its new home nestled within The Custard Factory, delivering a killer live lineup boasting some of the finest slacker rock, lo-fi and alt guitar heroes that Birmingham has to offer. The everexcellent Sunshine Frisbee Laserbeam head up proceedings, joined by the feedback-drenched Burning Alms and the swirling sonic adventurers Hoopla Blue. Doors open at 10pm for a real party vibe and Chicks Dig Jerks resident DJs will keep the spirit going until the early hours too.

JJM Club Night with Modern Minds + Regale + Juice JJM Studios, Walsall, September 27

Quality live music is back on the bill in Walsall thanks to JJM Studios, which launches a brand new monthly club night in September. Modern Minds bring their polished brand of soaring guitar anthems, alongside the shimmering indie of Walsall five-piece Regale, and the swirling, swaggering Brit-rock of Birmingham outfit Juice. Plus, the party doesn’t end there, you can also enjoy two rooms of DJs, with indie and alternative in one room and progressive, techno and deep house in t’other. Saddle up, the party starts here... Brum Notes Magazine

Photo by Dave Travis

club nights

Send us your #SnobsMemories to @BrumNotesMag

lazy sunday moving party (aka closing night)

PICK

Snobs, September 21

The final hurrah in its original venue for the iconic indie hotspot and Birmingham’s longest standing nightclub, before it moves to its new home at the former Vudu Club on the corner of Smallbrook Queensway and Hurst Street. The near-legendary underground nightspot has spent more than 41 years in its current location, which will soon make way for a new hotel development. Fear not, however, you won’t be without it for long as the new Snobs opens its doors on September 24, and they’re even taking some of the decor with them.

Cirque Du Soul

The Portal Presents Santé

After their last event featuring Groove Armada, Cirque Du Soul bring the Big Top back to Lower Trinity Street for another dose of magic. A travelling collective of energy, colour and dance, each city bags its own headliner to go alongside visuals, long tails and corsets, top hats and canes, glitter, sequins and feathers, as well as an eclectic selection of DJs. All aboard!

After August’s event was forced to close its doors at midnight due to a phenomenal turnout, the next Portal installment is set to be just as busy as it welcomes Avotre’s Santé to its decks. With support from David Glass and Smak Pony amongst others, the party continues until 5am so bring your best party legs.

The 24 Hour Rave Experiment

Hare & Hounds, September 26

The Arena, September 27

The Rainbow, September 20

The rules: everyone must be at the venue at 12 noon on Saturday until 12 noon on Sunday; anyone caught sleeping will be ejected from the venue; ticket money will be refunded to you if you complete the challenge and donated to charity if not. Challenge accepted.

NextDoor, September 12

DJ Yoda

From hip hop beginnings, DJ Yoda has evolved over a 10-year career, using his turntable skills and diverse influences to make unashamed party music. Championed by Q Magazine as ‘one of the 10 DJs to see before you die’, you can make sure you do that by catching him at the Hare &

Hounds this month, with support from DJ Mylz and Ben Dunn.

Godskitchen Presents TXXENTY The Rainbow, September 27

The first in the series of TXXENTY shows kicks off in Birmingham on Saturday September 27 utilising brand new venue, The Rainbow Textile Factory. With acts including Paul van Dyk, the debut European set from Pure NRG and live sets from Solarstone & Giuseppe Ottaviani and John 00 Fleming amongst others, it’s a killer lineup. And it will all be complemented by the world exclusive launch of a brand new visual production concept from Gatecrasher, known as MEKANIKA, promising a window to another world. Are you ready to get intergalactic?

30 Years of House with Marshall Jefferson & Maurice Fulton Hare & Hounds, September 27

Celebrating 30 years of house music across two rooms at the Hare & Hounds, Trax’s Marshall Jefferson and Maurice Fulton play alongside the likes of Jock Lee, Lee Fisher and Leftfoot residents Adam Regan and Matthew Beck. One not to be missed for any house fans worth their salt. September 2014

DJ Yoda 39

arts & culture

Not I/Footfalls/Rockaby The Rep, September 16-20

PICK

The Royal Court’s hugely acclaimed triple bill of short Samuel Beckett pieces arrives in Birmingham, delivering an impossibly intense and exhilarating hour of theatre. All three works are performed by Irish actress Lisa Dwan, who was mentored by Beckett’s own protégée Billie Whitelaw. In Not I, all that is visible is a mouth delivering a stream of consciousness at breakneck speed, obliquely reflecting on a difficult life. Meanwhile, Footfalls follows a ragged woman’s vigil outside her dying mother’s room, while Rockaby explores the loneliness of the prematurely-aged protagonist, dressed in an evening gown, sitting on a rocking chair that apparently rocks itself. Not to be missed.

Broken Ensemble: War Damaged Musical Instruments (brass section)

Eastside Projects, from September 20 A hugely exciting new work from 2010 Turner Prizewinning sound artist Susan Philipsz. With Eastside’s building dating back to the time of World War I, Philipsz’ site-specific piece fills the gallery with the sounds of brass instruments damaged during the Great War. Also new at Eastside this month is Old Hill Uprising, featuring paintings of cartoonish melancholy from Sandwell-based Polish artist Rafal Zar.

Lee Bul

Ikon, from September 10 Ikon’s fine track record for bringing towering global talent to Brindleyplace continues with this, the first UK solo show from South Korea’s Lee Bul. Many of her intricate, intelligent constructions critique the utopian ideals of progress, none more so than the sculpture After Bruno Taut (Devotion To Drift) – a specially-commissioned chandelier-like sculpture with over-elaborate adornments suggesting the unsustainability of relentless growth.

Yinka Shonibare MBE Ikon, from September 10

Five Under Garments And Much More, a 1995 40

installation by the British-Nigerian artist, represents the 1990s in the latest instalment of the Ikon Icons series, which is revisiting the gallery’s proud five-decade history. Shonibare’s characteristically vivid array of supersized corsetry represents the artist’s subversion of traditional social norms.

Marcia Farquhar: Larger Than Life Grand Union, from September 6

The beginning of a two-month run in the Digbeth gallery for the irreverent London-based performer, photographer and painter, who specialises in the conceptual and the unpredictable. As such, precise details are thin on the ground, though we do know that Farquhar will be in residence for a weekend in October, and there’ll be a dollmaking workshop in November to mark the Day of the Dead.

Kanaval

Ort Gallery, from September 10 A photographic show from Leah Gordon documenting Mardi Gras celebrations in Haiti. Captured by Gordon’s Rolleicord camera are wild performances chronicling the nation’s mythology, history and current affairs, with the pictures accompanied by oral accounts of voodoo rituals and personal experiences. A small part of the show will attempt

to draw parallels between Haitian Kanaval and Ort’s local Balsall Heath Carnival.

Rudy’s Rare Records The Rep, September 4-20

Lenny Henry returns to Birmingham with a stage adaptation of his hit Radio 4 comedy, charting the intergenerational relationships of a Brummie family running a reggae record shop. With the threat of developers looming, the family need to put their differences aside to save the shop’s future. A live band provides the soundtrack, featuring songs by Desmond Dekker, Bob Marley and Jimmy Cliff.

Ben Norris: The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Family Mac Birmingham, September 6

The poet, playwright and actor Ben Norris felt somewhat distant from his father – so he planned out a whistle-stop tour of the key places in his dad’s life, dropping in on his friends and family members and ending up at Wembley Stadium, home to his beloved Luton Town’s 1988 Littlewoods Cup victory. In this work-in-progress, Norris recounts his adventure. Get more weekly arts tips and keep up with the best of what’s on across the West Midlands at www.brumnotes.com. Brum Notes Magazine

“the most enterprising black comedy promoters in the country” (The Guardian)

A BRAND NEW COMEDY SEASON HOSTED BY

JOHN SIMMIT DJs TC CONNECTION

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SEPTEMBER SLAM

USA SPECIAL

WINTER WARMER

CHRISTMAS SPECIAL

WIL E ROBO (USA)

KAT (HOST)

STEPHEN K AMOS BBC TV’s Live at The Apollo

P Diddy’s Bad Boys of Comedy

JEFFERSON & WHITFIELD

MTV Bass

The return of the silky smooth duo

TONY HENDRIKS

Ms Brutal

SEAN G (USA)

JAMIE HOWARD

Winner of USA’s student comedian of the year

Not sarcastic really

MAUREEN YOUNGER The Scary lady

FUNMBI

AKAASH SINGH (USA)

Award-winning newcomer

THANYIA MOORE

Leader of the Indian invasion

One to watch

SMASH

Birmingham’s new comedy hope

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September 2014

WHAT’S ON

KEY TO LISTINGS: M = LIVE MUSIC CN = CLUB NIGHT C = COMEDY

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; The Oobleck, The Custard Factory B9, 0121 270 6665; Suki10c, Bordesley Street B5; Gatecrasher, Broad St B15, 0121 633 1520

Monday, Sep 1

M CN

The Ghost of a Saber Tooth Tiger Jam Jah Freddie Gibbs

Jessy Lanza

Last of the Summer Wits Wednesday, Sep 3

M M M M

Delray Rockets Mirrorhall Roland Gift Jules Rendell

CN Impact with Dubcherry Thursday, Sep 4

Kings Heath

Lisa Stansfield

Moseley

The Temple @ The Institute Hare & Hounds Kitchen Garden Cafe

Birmingham

M M

Winston’s Big Brother Vieon

The Adam & Eve The Sunflower Lounge Hare & Hounds Kitchen Garden Cafe Bull’s Head

Birmingham

Kings Heath

Birmingham Kings Heath Kings Heath Moseley

The Rainbow

Birmingham

St Paul and the Broken Bones

Birmingham

Andrew Combs Trio

The Temple @ The Institute Hare & Hounds Hare & Hounds The Roadhouse The Glee Club The Victoria

Constantine

Comedy Carousel ft Andy Robinson Manilla Road Comedy

All details correct at time of going to press. Check with venues before setting out.

Kings Heath Kings Heath Stirchley Birmingham Birmingham

Symphony Hall The Actress & Bishop The Rainbow

Birmingham

The Sunflower Lounge Wagon & Horses

Birmingham

Hare & Hounds Gatecrasher

Kings Heath

Lab11

Birmingham

NextDoor

Birmingham

Rooftop

Birmingham

The Adam & Eve The Rainbow

Birmingham

The Rainbow Warehouse Hare & Hounds Bull’s Head

Birmingham

The Drum

Aston

The Glee Club

Birmingham

XVII + A Born Disaster Renny Jackson

The Slade Rooms Ort

Wolverhampton

Ones To Watch ft The Ella Arts

O2 Academy 2

Birmingham

Plastic Factory Brum Punx Picnic ft Johnny Kowalski & The Sexy Weirdos Cloudbusting

CN Supersonic Vague CN Dub-Rehab CN Alexkid & Archie Hamilton Dirty Disco

CN CN Kaleidoscope CN Resonance 3rd CN

Burn the Empire

The Delegates

Kings Heath

M M

info@ brumnotes.com

Friday, Sep 5 Hare & Hounds Bull’s Head

Tuesday, Sep 2

Want your gig or club night listed in our monthly guide? Send details to:

Birthday Hysteria

CN Simian Mobile Disco CN C C

(DJ Set) M O D O with Steffan Taylor September Slam! Charlie Baker

Birmingham Birmingham

Birmingham

Kings Heath Moseley

Saturday, Sep 6

M M M

Balsall Heath

Brum Notes Magazine

Benjamin Booker

The Oldest House

Steve Ajao & The Blues Giants Brum Punx Picnic ft Police Bastard Moschino Hoe, Versace Hottie Absolutely Gorgeous

M CN CN

CN The Afterparty CN City of Colours Afterparty FACE

CN CN MOAN Recordings CN CN CN

Showcase Heroes of House

O2 Academy 3 The Actress & Bishop The Adam & Eve Wagon & Horses Spotlight

Birmingham

Patrick Duff

Birmingham

Comedy Carousel ft Andy Robinson Friday, Sep 12

Silver

M M

Dutch Cousin

Sticky Warehouse The Adam & Eve The Oobleck

Birmingham

Coasts

M M

Incognito

Birmingham Birmingham

The Rainbow

Birmingham

The Rainbow

Birmingham

Warehouse Club Bruk Up with Garth Hare & Boogie Bwoy & Bruce Hounds Q Circles present Ed Hare & Rush Hounds Hot Wax Bull’s Head

CN Charlie Baker C

Birmingham

Dick Venom & The Terrorstones Brum Punx Picnic ft Inner Terrestrials Grey Wolf

Rough Works

Jesus Jones

Red Bird Sky

CN Gatecrasher Mondays Jam Jah

CN Lee Mack C

Rob Heron & The Tea Pad Orchestra Kodiak Jack

Lee Mack

Comedy Night

Lee Mack

Laughing Cows

As It Is

Tony Bennett

September 2014

Birmingham

Hare & Hounds Bodega

Kings Heath

NextDoor

Birmingham

Suki10c

Birmingham

The Adam & Eve Bull’s Head

Birmingham

Symphony Hall The Glee Club

Birmingham

Blondie

O2 Academy

Birmingham

Beneath The Remains The Mighty Young

Birmingham

Ruts DC

Santé Psykout

CN Cache with Niall

Moseley

Wolfe Lee Mack

Andy Robinson

The Glee Club

Birmingham

The Adam & Eve Wagon & Horses Kitchen Garden Cafe The Glee Club

Birmingham

Birmingham Birmingham

Birmingham

Moseley

Birmingham

Saturday, Sep 13

Birmingham

M M

Kings Heath

Birmingham

M M M

Talons + IO + Enquiry

O2 Academy 3 The Adam & Eve The Flapper

Beorma

The Oobleck

Birmingham

CYTOTA

Birmingham

Kings Heath

Dangerous Girls Reunited Playlounge

The Temple @ The Institute Hare & Hounds Hare & Hounds The Slade Rooms The Adam & Eve The Oobleck The Rainbow

Birmingham

Wagon & Horses Bull’s Head

Birmingham

The Glee Club Civic Hall

Birmingham

Bull’s Head

Moseley

The Institute

Birmingham

The Glee Club

Birmingham

O2 Academy 3 Kitchen Garden Cafe Gatecrasher

Birmingham

Bull’s Head

Moseley

Symphony Hall

Birmingham

Kitchen Garden Cafe The Roadhouse Symphony Hall The Rose Villa Tavern

Kings Heath

Symphony Hall Kitchen Garden Cafe

Birmingham

O2 Academy 3 Symphony Hall

Birmingham

Stirchley Birmingham Birmingham

Kings Heath

Birmingham

Luke Wylde & The Japes The Afterparty

CN Back Door Betty CN FACE presents Xone CN

Select Party Revolution Disco

CN An Evening with C

Knicker Bocker Corey Andy Robinson

Tom Stade: Decisions Decisions Sunday, Sep 14

Bohemian Jukebox Sunday Social with Dutch Cousin, Gyspyfingers, Pomander. The Freshers Launch Pad Milton Jones: The Best of Milton Jones

Thursday, Sep 11

The Sunflower Lounge The Temple @ The Institute Town Hall

Sweet Lilly

Kings Heath

Wednesday, Sep 10

Birmingham

CN CN Kaleidoscope

Tuesday, Sep 9

The Actress & Bishop The Rainbow

Kings Heath

Monday, Sep 8

Kings Heath

CN Lucha Libre CN The Portal presents

Sunday, Sep 7

Hare & Hounds The Glee Club

CN C

Birmingham Birmingham

Kings Heath Kings Heath Wolverhampton Birmingham Birmingham

Moseley

Wolverhampton

Brum Notes Magazine

Monday, Sep 15

Rusty G’s + Vault of Eagles Jaws

The Flapper

Birmingham

The Oobleck

Birmingham

The Moons

Hare & Hounds Apres

Kings Heath

NextDoor

Birmingham

The Adam & Eve The Rainbow Venues Bull’s Head

Birmingham

The Glee Club

Birmingham

M M

The Saturdays

NIA

Birmingham

Gruff Rhys: American Interior Tuesday, Sep 16

The Glee Club

Birmingham

M M

The Magic Numbers

The Library @ The Institute Hare & Hounds Kitchen Garden Cafe Gatecrasher

Birmingham

CN Only After Dark CN Soul Steppers 20th

The Glee Club

Martin Stephenson

Kris Drever & Eamonn Coyne Supa Fresh

CN The Axis of Awesome C

Kings Heath

CN The 24 Hour Rave

Birmingham Birmingham

CN Holly Walsh C

O2 Academy 3 The Glee Club

Birmingham

The Adam & Eve The Glee Club The Sunflower Lounge The Slade Rooms

Birmingham

The Roadhouse The Glee Club The Wulfrun Hall

Stirchley

The Actress & Bishop The Adam & Eve The Rainbow

Birmingham

The Temple @ The Institute Hare & Hounds Snobs

Birmingham

M M

Kings Heath

Sharon Corr

Birmingham

The Dunwells

The Adam & Eve Hare & Hounds

Birmingham

The Misers

Bull’s Head

Moseley

Mac

Birmingham

The Glee Club The Wulfrun Hall

Experiment Enter The Dragon

Beartooth

Ani DiFranco

Thursday, Sep 18

999

Jonny Cole

Syd Arthur

An Acoustic Evening with Andy Cairns (Therapy?) Blast Beat Hip Hop Night Andy Robinson

CN C C

John Bishop: Work in Progress Friday, Sep 19

Beau Trap

The Wreck Kings

M M

Second City Fire

The Burning Hell

MOTHER

CN Click Friday Moving CN

Party Kaleidoscope

CN Hot Club De Swing with The Electric Swing Circus Blackbox

CN Hardeep Singh Kohli C Holly Walsh C C

Chas n Dave

Birmingham Birmingham Wolverhampton

The Stirs

Hightower

Dave McPherson (InMe)

September 2014

O2 Academy 3 The Actress & Bishop The Adam & Eve

CN CN

The Adam & Eve Chris Cleverly Kitchen Garden Cafe Acoustic All-Dayer ft The Frankie Lorenzo Roadhouse Naughty Horse Fresh- Gatecrasher ers Welcome Party Lazy Sunday Moving Snobs Party Zoo Disco The Institute The Webb

CN CN Jazzifunk presents

Moseley

Birmingham

Moseley

The Roadhouse

Stirchley

Ms Lauryn Hill

O2 Academy

Birmingham

The 58’s Blues Band

The Asylum 2 The Glee Club Hare & Hounds Hare & Hounds

Birmingham

Ort

Balsall Heath

O2 Academy 3 The Glee Club The Oobleck

Birmingham

Bull’s Head

Moseley

NEW Snobs

Birmingham

O2 Academy 2

Birmingham

Wolverhampton

Lisbee Stainton

Alt-J M CN Jam Jah Comedy Night C

Kings Heath Kings Heath Wolverhampton

Tuesday, Sep 23

Kings Heath

Birmingham Kings Heath Kings Heath

Wednesday, Sep 24

M M

Woo + Ruane Maurice Me vs Hero

Birmingham

The Pierces

Wolverhampton

Lust for Youth M Mazes M CN Big Wednesday

Birmingham

Bull’s Head

Gossling + Shaake

Birmingham

Stirchley

The Library @ The Institute Hare & Hounds Kitchen Garden Cafe Civic Hall

Birmingham

Kings Heath

Darlia

Birmingham

Hare & Hounds

Bubblin Monday, Sep 22

Saturday, Sep 20

Birmingham

Sunday, Sep 21

Wednesday, Sep 17

Party The Afterparty

Birmingham

Opening Night Thursday, Sep 25

KING 810

Birmingham Birmingham

WATSKY

The Jacarandas

The Foreign Exchange Woman’s Hour

M M CN CN C

Anathema: Satellites Over Europe 2014 F*ck My Life It’s Freshers Drum’n’Bounce 2nd Birthday Bash Comedy Carousel ft Andy Robinson Friday, Sep 26

The Library @ The Institute The Sunflower Lounge Hare & Hounds Hare & Hounds The Slade Rooms The Institute

Birmingham

CN Jungle Showdown

PST Rooftop

Birmingham

CN CN The Afterparty

Suki10c

Birmingham Birmingham

Kings Heath

CN Chicks Dig Jerks ft

The Adam & Eve The Oobleck

Birmingham

Bull’s Head

Moseley

The Glee Club

Birmingham

The Rainbow Arena The Rainbow Textile Factory Wagon & Horses Warehouse Club Hare & Hounds Bull’s Head

Moseley

The Glee Club

Birmingham

Kings Heath Wolverhampton

2014 Raise2Raise

CN Godskitchen TXXENTY

Birmingham

CN Shards of Ordinance CN CN

M M

James Taylor

LG Arena

Birmingham

The Little Liam Band

Birmingham

Exit Calm + Victories at Sea + Mutes New At Ten

The Adam & Eve The Flapper

Birmingham

The Rainbow

Birmingham

The Temple @ The Institute Hare & Hounds Bodega

Birmingham

Suki10c

Birmingham

The Adam & Eve Wagon & Horses Hare & Hounds Mac

Birmingham

M M M

Kings Heath

Sunday, Sep 28

Vance Joy Sleepy Sun Michael Nesmith

Town Hall

Birmingham

M M M

Delilah

Kings Heath

Vin Garbutt

Birmingham

The Glee Club

Birmingham

Roxx to Ruin Hard Rock All-Dayer Toseland

Black Seas

Ort

Balsall Heath

The Fray

O2 Academy

Birmingham

Among the Echoes

The Actress & Bishop The Adam & Eve The Flapper

Birmingham

Hare & Hounds Kitchen Garden Cafe The Roadhouse The Slade Rooms The Glee Club Hare & Hounds

The Library @ The Institute The Sunflower Lounge The Temple @ The Institute The Slade Rooms The Drum

Birmingham

Boxxed

Birmingham

Club PST

Birmingham

O2 Academy 2

Birmingham

Festival ft MK9 Jam Hott Presents DJ Yoda Danny Bhoy Joe Bor

The Ramonas

M M

Ben Marwood

DZ Deathrays

Dragonforce

Grant Nicholas

Steve Craddock

CN Champion MCs &

Lovers Rock Singers Roll Call Boxxed Fresh

CN CN Alexander Nut CN Quadrophenia Club Night

Birmingham

Honeyblood

Kings Heath Birmingham

Saturday, Sep 27

M M M

Birmingham

O2 Academy 2 The Adam & Eve The Library @ The Institute The Oobleck

CN Shards of Ordinance

C C

Festival ft JK Flesh The Summers End Payback Party 30 Years Of House with Marshall Jefferson + Maurice Fulton For The Love with Paul Boots Joe Bor

Birmingham

The Urban Voodoo Machine The Lurkers

Joel Gion

CN Lucha Libre CN Fall Off Your Turkey CN Kaleidoscope

Sunshine Frisbee Laserbeam (live) Cirque Du Soul

Birmingham Birmingham

Birmingham Birmingham Wolverhampton Aston

C C

Richard Blackwood & Friends Christian Reilly

Birmingham Birmingham Birmingham

Kings Heath Stirchley Wolverhampton Birmingham Kings Heath

Monday, Sep 29

M M

The Horrors

The Institute

Birmingham

Max Jury

Birmingham

July Talk

Andrea Balency & NLF3 The 1975

The Sunflower Lounge The Temple @ The Institute Hare & Hounds Civic Hall Bull’s Head

Moseley

The Rainbow

Birmingham

Hare & Hounds Hare & Hounds Bull’s Head

Kings Heath

M CN Jam Jah

Birmingham Kings Heath Wolverhampton

Tuesday, Sep 30

M M

Keston Cobblers’ Club Jake Isaac

The Phantom Band

Fear of Men

Kings Heath Moseley

Brum Notes Magazine

September 2014

Brum Notes Magazine