The ninth wonder of the unnatural world, extreme tech-metal messiah’s MESHUGGAH have just announced a UK & IRISH leg of their winter tour.
Following the cries of British and Irish metal fans all over the island, MESHUGGAH have announced a lengthy January tour on these shores.
This comes after the previous news that the Swedish tech-metal pioneers will play all over Europe later this year following the imminent release of their anticipated as-yet-untitled new album (expected Autumn 2016.)
Full dates as follows:
12th January – Bristol (UK) O2 Academy
13th January – Birmingham (UK) O2 Institute
14th January – Nottingham (UK) Rock City
15th January – Glasgow (UK) O2 ABC
17th January – Belfast (UK) Limelight
18th January – Dublin (IRL) The Academy
19th January – Manchester (UK) O2 Ritz
20th January – London (UK) O2 Forum
Tickets are on-sale from 10am on Friday 3rd June priced at £22.50 adv. London / £20 adv. Regionally (subject to per-ticket charge plus order processing fee) and are available from www.livenation.co.uk
Transformer is a new series of live music events brought to you by the Victoria Warehouse in Manchester. Its name, chosen in commemoration of Lou Reed whose visionary approach to rock both in the Velvet Underground and on albums like ‘Metal Machine Music’, is reflected in the line-up of the inaugural event on Bank Holiday Sunday 28 May 2017. So far the lineup includes Swans, This Is Not This Heat, The Fall, Royal Trux, Loop, and Mueran Humanos.
Across two rooms of music, a record fair, food stalls, a cinema, and with more live talent and DJs to be announced, Transformer will bring an indoor festival vibe to the expansive Victoria Warehouse, documenting rock music’s most innovative sounds from the past 50 years.
Curated by the in-house team at the iconic Victoria Warehouse – previous host to events for BBC 6 Music, Live Nation and SJM Concerts – the Transformer lineup reads like a response to the question – which existing bands would best headline one of Warhol’s Exploding Plastic Inevitable happenings or Wilson’s Factory Club nights, if either event still existed? James Cohen, owner at the Victoria Warehouse commented:
Swans
New York noise-rock titans, Swans, led by original founder and multi-instrumentalist, Michael Gira, the genre pushing band will bring expansive layers of drone and no wave to the event, hot off the back of their final record ‘The Glowing Man’, released to glowing reviews in summer 2016.
The Fall
Homegrown Manchester post-punk band The Fall, will also star, with front man Mark E Smith leading the band in a lineup that has remained stable since 2007. From citing the Velvet Underground among their musical influences and having a devoted fan in the late John Peel, to releasing an impressive 30 studio albums and playing the original Factory party for Tony Wilson, their set at Transformer is not to be missed.
This Is Not This Heat
In another long-awaited return, London-based avant-rockers, This Heat, perform in Manchester at Transformer for the first time in over 30 years. Now named This Is Not This Heat in respect for original member Gareth Williams who died in 2001, the band reunited in 2016 after 40 years of inactivity, to rapturously received shows at London’s Café Oto; a reception which will no doubt be repeated when they arrive in Manchester.
Loop
From a slightly later period than This Heat, but similarly incubating their sound before reforming in 2013, south London’s Loop also straddle the divide between avant-garde composition and song-form, making the appearance of both bands on the same bill at Transformer a well overdue, must-see event.
Royal Trux
Further adding to the Transformer lineup is Royal Trux from Washington DC. Like LOOP, Royal Trux is indebted to classic garage and psych, at least instrumentally. Vocally, Jennifer Herrema’s voice is akin to Betty Davis, which acts as a counterpoint to Neil Michael Hagerty’s, which lies somewhere between Beefheart and Johnny Thunders. Like all of Transformer’s guests, this is a rare chance to see them live, as the pair have scarcely been in the same room together since 2001.
Mueran Humanos
The line-up released so far for Transformer, is completed by the more recently formed and Berlin-based, Argentinian duo Mueran Humanos. Their music evokes art happenings-slash-gigs in loft spaces in Abraham Beame’s New York, or East London squat parties during Thatcher’s Britain: October Love Songs for Psychick Youth. With elements of psychedelia, garage rock, and minimal synth, their set is assured to bring grit and energy to the Victoria Warehouse.
Earlybird tickets for Transformer are now on sale for the price of £20 + bf from www.skiddle.com/e/12859771. With prices increasing over the coming months, buy now for the best price.
Further lineup announcements are yet to made, as well as more info released about the event’s cinema programme and record fair. Keep an eye on the Facebook page for all the latest news and updates https://www.facebook.com/transformerevents
Event Details
Transformer Events presents:
Swans
The Fall
Royal Trux
This Is Not This Heat
Loop
Mueran Humanos
+ more to be announced.
Venue: Victoria Warehouse, Trafford Wharf Road, Manchester M17 1AB
Date: Bank Holiday Sunday 28 May 2017
Doors: 3pm – 1am
Age: 18+
Tickets: Earlybird Tier 1 – £20 + bf / Tier 2 – £22.50 + bf/ Tier 3 – £25 + bf / Final Tier £27.50 + bf
Available from www.skiddle.com/e/12859771
This concert demonstrated not only how well the orchestra comes together with conductor Nicholas Concannon Hedges, but also the solo skills of several of its members.
The mood for the evening was set by Modest Mussorgsky’s ‘Night on a Bare Mountain’ describing satanic revels. Shivering strings introduce a threatening and vigorous theme on the brass. The music gets livelier until daylight brings peace.
Next came Ralph Vaughan Williams’ tuba concerto in F minor. Soloist Les Neish played with sensitivity, aplomb, and maybe a touch of jazz. The tuba surfed the orchestra in the assertive, jolly first movement, and went on to a cadenza when it played alone. The second movement is typical Vaughan Williams with a serene melody that sounds like a traditional English folk tune. Mood and pace vary in the concluding movement. The audience demanded that Les Neish should return, and he obliged with an encore in which the tuba at times sounded like a didgeridoo and at times seemed to speak.
‘Symphonie Fantastique’ by Hector Berlioz concluded the concert. It tells the story of the composer’s obsession with a woman, and goes on to fantasise a dramatic ending. She, or maybe Berlioz’ idea of her, is represented by a recurring theme, which has a feeling of yearning and despair. The first movement is flowing and amorous. The second begins with a mood of excitement, succeeded by a sunny waltz, but the theme disturbs this cheerful mood. The third movement begins with lovely woodwind solos, echoing each other. Tension builds when the woman appears, and there is thunder towards the end. The fourth movement is the strongest – a sardonic depiction of the composer being marched to his execution for murdering the woman he is obsessed with. There is grim humour here, and a relentless rhythm drives the composer to what sounds like the guillotine. But he is not finished yet. There is a satanic revel in the last movement. Strange creatures seem to celebrate the whole affair, with a raucous ending.
Over recent years, what was once considered a passing trend, has now become a staple of bookstore shelves and giftshops up and down the country. Adult colouring books have been touted as both a stressed buster and a means to reach your inner creative. One of the artists that was credited as helping to kick-start the adult colouring book boom was Barnsley born artist, designer and illustrator Mel Elliott and her much loved brand I Love Mel.
In 2015, The Independent featured her titles amongst the best colouring books for adults and that same year, Business Insider suggested that out of all of the adult colouring book illustrators “perhaps most famous is UK-based artist Mel Elliott, who graduated college in 2007 and began self-publishing grown-up ‘fun books’.”
Indeed, on graduating from the Royal College of Art, Mel began designing fun, printed products such as paper dolls and colouring books under the I Love Mel brand.
She explains, “my work has always been influenced by pop culture, celebrity, fame, glossy magazines and the aesthetic perfection that goes hand in hand with all that stuff. The colouring books and paper dolls were developed when I realised that the things we enjoyed doing as young children, such as cutting out and colouring in, would still be enjoyed by adults, if only the activity books had ‘grown up’ with us.”
Elliott’s book, Colour Me Good: Ryan Gosling, went viral at the height of the actor’s “Hey Girl” meme-phase and always on-trend, she has since published pop culture-inspired colouring books dedicated to Eddie Redmayne, Benedict Cumberbatch, Taylor Swift, iconic album covers, redheaded male celebrities, and ‘girl crushes’. Perhaps her most popular title is The David Bowie Colouring Book, which in the last year has been picked up and republished by Quercus Books.
…Vs David Bowie is an exhibition that deconstructs exactly what a colouring book is. Here, a long roll-call of local artists of varying disciplines, decorate, ink, collage, embroider and digitally manipulate their way through the pages of The David Bowie Colouring Book, while at the same time paying homage to one of the greatest icons of Music, Fashion and Pop Culture and the colourful career that he had.
As well as Mel Elliott, …Vs David Bowie features the work of Lynne Barker, Mark Evans, Fabric Lenny, Gallons of Ink, Roseanna Hanson, Rachel Hufton, Hannah Elizabeth Jones, Julie Newton, Painty Face, AW Parker, Gemma Raynor, Caroline Reed, Lisa V Robinson, Samantha Stewart, Jamie Walman and Louise Wright.
Exhibition curator Jason White said, “I am so pleased to be able to pay homage to the wonderful David Bowie and in doing so, championing so many brilliant artists from our area; many of which have neither exhibited in the last two years or not at all.”
This exhibition was possible only with the kind permission of Mel Elliott and Quercus Books, and the support of Barnsley’s Vinyl Underground Records.
…Vs David Bowie opens on The Panorama at The Civic on 11 February and closed 8 April 2017.
Admission is free.
For more information and to book visit www.barnsleycivic.co.uk or call the Box Office on 01226 327000.
Inspired by the extraordinary sound of vortex rings travelling through the atmosphere at supersonic speed, ‘Speaking Tubes’ is a gleaming steel circle of large air-ducting tubes and giant cones which spill out a chorus of sound into special, interactive listening zones. Vortex is a contemporary music piece to be performed within the Speaking Tubes installation, which was created in collaboration with composer Yannis Kyriakides, saxophonist John Butcher, physicist Jem Stansfield and the University of Huddersfield School of Computing and Engineering. Musicians and audience members alike move around and interact with the sound installation, themselves becoming the live performance.
Yannis Kyriakides commented, “Vortex is a project that has been developed over a number of years with IOU that has taken the form of an installation and performance. The essence of the piece is to put the audience in an immersive situation at the heart of a sonic vortex and explore the various effects of sound movement through the extraordinary installation created by IOU. The fact that the audience has to find their own position inside the listening space amongst the musicians gives the piece an intimate as well as exhilarating power. The collaboration with IOU, local musicians and in the forthcoming version with renown saxophonist John Butcher promises to be a memorable experience.”
Amsterdam-based composer Yannis Kyriakides has written over a hundred compositions and regularly works with visual artists, choreographers and film makers. His work has been featured at leading contemporary music festivals such as Aldeburgh Music Festival, Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival and the Venice Biennale. Vortex will feature IOU’s volunteer musicians as well as, for the first time, tenor and soprano saxophonist John Butcher, who is known for his exploration of feedback and extreme acoustics.
The installation is only around for the short time of two days so make sure you pop in to see it and tickets for the Vortex performances can be purchased online, over the phone or in person at The Civic.
Speaking Tubes is at The Civic on Friday 25 and Saturday 26 November between 10am and 4pm. Admission is FREE.
Vortex is at The Civic on Friday 25 and Saturday 26 November at 7.30pm. Tickets are £8 full price and £5 concessions.
For more information and to book visit www.barnsleycivic.co.uk or call the Box Office on 01226 327000.
Teased earlier this year with the slick intimacy of Completely, Alpines’ album ‘Another River’ pares down the sound of their 2014 debut ‘Oasis’. This new effort is not so much the sound of a duo finding their feet, as it is an utterly standout performance from a couple of intrepid sonic experimenters subtly refining their craft.
Their futurist brand of production renders Catherine Pockson’s R&B melodies into dazzling soundscapes, each thrumming with a life of its own. The album is preceded by the release of ‘Heaven’, an anthem with towering vocal harmonies and a sly bass groove.
Alpines UK Tour Dates 2017
Feb 14th – Birmingham, Hare & Hounds
Feb 15th – Leeds, Headrow House
Feb 16th – Glasgow, King Tuts
Feb 17th – Manchester, Soup Kitchen
Feb 20th – Bristol, The Louisana
Feb 21st – Oxford, The Cellar
Feb 22nd – Brighton, The Prince Albert
Recorded and Produced at Sheffield’s 2Fly Studio with Alan Smyth, (Arctic Monkeys, Pulp, Richard Hawley), ‘Wrong Kind Of People’ harkens back to the band’s early style, channelling a rawness in its main riff and infusing the track with a heavy dose of grunge.
The B Side is ‘Animals Don’t Go To Heaven’, a haunting ballad about “the instinctive fear of death and the beyond.”
I Set The Sea On Fire are an experience. Sounding like a cross between Indie, Grunge, and good old dirty Funk, I Set The Sea On Fire are one of a kind. After a summer of sell out shows and festivals up and down the country, I Set The Sea On Fire have just returned from South Korea, having played Zandari Festa in Seoul to packed out venues.
With all sights set on similar opportunities next year, I Set The Sea On Fire have plans for a European Tour in 2017 and more showcases around the world. Championed by BBC Introducing since their launch in 2011, I Set The Sea On Fire have received acclaim from audiences and critics up and down the UK and are garnering heavy interest from overseas as far as Japan.
The info
I Set The Sea On Fire are
Billy Washington (vocals, guitar)
Pete Jenkins (bass, vocals)
Meg Washington (flute, vocals)
Matt Price (trumpet)
Josh Knight (drums)
‘Dream Darling’ is the sublime new album from The Slow Show, out 25th November on Haldern Pop Recordings. The first single from the album is ‘Ordinary Lives’, available to stream & download now on iTunes and Spotify.
‘Dream Darling’ is an album that any adult who’s lived a little can identify with; there is a hard-won optimism in its 10 graceful songs. This is music made by five men who, as singer Rob Goodwin explains, have “gone through the typical life-changing experiences that men in their late thirties and forties experience”. Whether that’s the romantic regret of the Tindersticks-inflected drama of ‘Breaks Today’ or overcoming loss in the album’s towering centrepiece ‘Ordinary Lives’, this is music to live in.
There are few bands who are aware of how potent a weapon silence can be in their music. As their name implies, The Slow Show have both a magisterial beauty to their sparse songs and the confidence to let their spellbinding four-minute stories find their mark. Rarely since The Blue Nile has a band created such a powerful, fully realised world from what initially appears such a minimal framework.
Having gone on tour in Germany and Switzerland almost immediately after the band formed in 2010, The Slow Show are a major cult concern and festival regulars in mainland Europe, where they’re signed to Haldern Pop Recordings, the label formed by the team behind the successful festival. At home, their music has been championed by DJs at BBC 6 Music and Radio 2 ever since their debut EP, 2012’s ‘Brother’.
After taking four years to assemble, last years debut album ‘White Water’ was a more aggressive, angry affair, topped off by Goodwin’s mordant baritone vocals. It’s a startling rumble that bears comparison to Leonard Cohen and Mark Lanegan but, on ‘Dream Darling’, Goodwin has honed his vocal range to become a compelling storyteller. He’s a singer who’s now able to narrate the jilted-at-the-altar heartbreak of ‘Last Man Standing’ or ‘Hurts’ tale of a man offering redemption to a sex worker with the necessary levels of wit and pathos, as well as convincingly crooning into the mic.
‘Dream Darling’ was recorded at a farmhouse in the Lake District and produced by Goodwin and Fred Kindt, The Slow Show’s keyboardist. The band would start at 8am and record until 2am, with the night-time studio sessions partly inspired ‘Dream Darling’s title. “It’s an album written in the dark and worked on late at night. It feels quite a dreamy record. The alliteration is deliberate – I think alliteration is an official theme now for The Slow Show, following the band name and ‘White Water’ for the first album title.”
Having experimented with orchestration on ‘White Water’, they were determined to push the classical influences further this time, recording with a choir in Berlin and letting them carry the vocals in places – most notably the soaring wordless finale ‘Brick’, which is the perfect, tear-jerking climax for the album’s theme of change.
The album’s other key guest is local Manchester singer Kesha Ellis, who sings the devastating duets ‘Hurts’ and ‘Last Man Standing’. “I don’t find traditionally ‘great’ singers so interesting. Kesha doesn’t sing much, but the texture and tone in her voice are beautiful.”
While they’re proud of Manchester’s heritage, musically The Slow Show stand apart, influenced more by Sigur Ros than New Order or The Stone Roses. “But seeing how many great bands come from Manchester makes you realise you can make it, and that’s important,” says Goodwin.
Dream Darling is a record that shows anything is possible too. Any change and upheaval can be overcome. No matter how gentle the beauty of their songs, The Slow Show are a band worth shouting about from the rooftops.
The Slow Show: Rob Goodwin (vocals); Fred Kindt (keyboards); Joel Byrne-McCullough (guitar); James Longden (bass); Chris Hough (drums)
The Slow Show, UK headline tour November 2016:
Nov 25 London, Bush Hall
Nov 26 Bristol, The Louisiana
Nov 27 Ramsgate Music Hall
Nov 28 Leeds, Brudenell Games Room
Nov 29 Manchester, Gorilla
Following a main stage appearance at Kendal Calling and support slots with Cast and Inspiral Carpets, Manchester’s Student Band of 2016 The Chadelics have announced a worldwide release of their new single Love Me Again.
Noise Cannon’s Ben Smith described Love Me Again: “A beautifully melodic and matured side to The Chadelics everyone’s been itching for since the ‘Ryan Said Its OK’ EP. ‘Love Me Again’ sees the powerful northern quartet demonstrate their creative flare with grace and excellence.”
Joe said: “This is definitely a new direction for us and we strongly believe in what we are doing. The new track ‘Love Me Again’ is like a melting pot of everything I’ve been soaking up in terms of songwriting.”
A busy year has seen the four teenagers supporting Cast, Inspiral Carpets and winning the Manchester Student Band Competition which landed them recording time at Blueprint Studios in Manchester and a main stage appearance at Kendal Calling to hundreds of fans. It was a great step up for the Cumbrian rockers who last year stormed the Woodland Stage at KC.
“These are exciting times for us,” said guitarist Robbie Coplen. “The last few weeks have been a bit mad from recording the single one week to supporting Cast the next.”
They recorded the single in two days at Salford’s Blueprint Studio under the expert ear of producer Ian Stewart.
Drummer Zack Smith adds: “Being in the studio was absolutely brilliant and we were working with some great people who have worked with some big names and that was amazing for us.
“It just seems like everything we’ve done this year, we’ve turned it up a notch, doing things we never expected, but you don’t really notice these things and how far you’ve come until you look back on them. We’ve achieved a lot since last summer, but it feels like there’s a lot more to come.”
Love Me Again will be available on iTunes, Spotify and other major platforms, download from 12th Nov.
Love Me Again Tour
Nov 12th: Star & Garter, Manchester (support Girls Girls Girls, Claremonts, Violet Disguise) Single launch party!
Nov 13th: Bar 21, Manchester
Nov 18th: John Paul Jones, Whitehaven
Nov 24th: O’Riley’s, Hull
Dec 3rd: Derby Arms, Barrow
Dec 4th: Zombie Shack, Manchester
The info
Lead vocals + guitar: Joe Mansergh
Bass: Joe Simons
Drums: Zack Smith
Guitar + vocals: Robbie Coplen
Performing tracks from their latest releases ‘Helter Seltzer’ and ‘TV en Français’ as well as a healthy dose from classics stretching right back to their 2005 major label debut ‘With Love and Squalor’, We Are Scientists always guarantee a unique night balancing unrivalled onstage humour and a blistering set of giant pop songs, but don’t just take it from us.
We Are Scientists play the following shows this December:
15 // Moles Club // Bath, UK
16 // The Wardrobe // Leeds, UK
18 // The Venue // Derby, UK
“Anyone who’s seen our live show knows it’s the best. Anyone who hasn’t should take my word for it — why would I lie?” –Keith Murray
We Are Scientists maintain a self-aggrandizing web presence at wearescientists.com, and have accounts with Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, & Youtube under “wearescientists” — their name without the spaces.
Yannis Kyriakides commented, “Vortex is a project that has been developed over a number of years with IOU that has taken the form of an installation and performance. The essence of the piece is to put the audience in an immersive situation at the heart of a sonic vortex and explore the various effects of sound movement through the extraordinary installation created by IOU. The fact that the audience has to find their own position inside the listening space amongst the musicians gives the piece an intimate as well as exhilarating power. The collaboration with IOU, local musicians and in the forthcoming version with renown saxophonist John Butcher promises to be a memorable experience.”
