Formed in 2014, Fabled is the brainchild of saxophonist/clarinettist, Sam Rapley. Following on from the success of their recent EP, the band have been performing extensively across the UK building a loyal fanbase and writing material for their debut album ‘Short Stories’. As the title implies, the album interprets collection of short stories tackling subjects such as life, love, and death told through richly atmospheric and expressive music, which draws from Rapley and his fellow musicians shared love of jazz ensembles, literature, classical musicians, world music, modern composition and indie-folk.

Originally from Manchester and now living in London, Rapley has been quickly solidifying himself as one of the most exciting up and coming musicians and composers in the scene. As well as playing in Fabled, Rapley plays regularly as a sideman with BBC Radio 3 Next Generation artist Misha Mullov-Abbado Group, Troykestra, Maria Chiara Argiro Quintet, Waaju and Ralph Wyld’s Mosaic.

Looking at his recent work it’s easy to see how such a multifarious source of styles and genres have collided on ‘Short Stories’. At times the album calls to mind the likes of Mammal Hands, Gogo Penguin, Polar Bear and Tigran Hamasyan whilst undertones of Debussy, Ravel, Peter Broderick and Lau can also be heard throughout. Tracks such as ‘Old Owls’ capture the raw intensity that can be heard throughout the current London scene. Whilst elsewhere, tracks such as ‘Dove Stone’ and ‘H.G’ are heavily cinematic with mellifluous sax and clarinet lines layered over idiosyncratic guitar and piano parts, which provide percussive and rhythmic qualities whilst also intertwining melodies throughout Rapley’s playing.

There is a sentimental poetry to Fabled’s approach to finding new ways to tell age-old stories through their intimate and heavily textured music. Their redolent instrumentation and vast voicings speak volumes in the absence of words, giving contemplative life to the stories laid out by the band. Albums that manage to merge such a wide variety of styles and exhibit such a multitude of musical landscapes are rare. Fabled have produced a debut which is both accomplished and distinctive, and this is only the very start of their journey.

Fabled is:
Sam Rapley – saxophone / clarinet / compositions
Alex Munk – guitar
Matt Robinson – piano
Conor Chaplin – double bass
Will Glaser – drums

Tour dates:

1st October – Pizza Express Jazz Club, London
9th October – The Flute and Tankard, Cardiff
10th October – The Lescar, Sheffield
12th October – Leeds College of Music, Leeds (workshop)
13th October – Anteros Arts, Norwich
16th October – Band On The Wall, Manchester
25th October – The Future Inns, Bristol
26th October – The Dark Horse, Birmingham
27th October – Zeffirelli’s, Ambleside
11th December – St Ives Jazz Club, St Ives
12th December – Speakeasy, Torquay
13th December – Soundcellar, Poole

Mabel has unveiled new single ‘One Shot’, which is available today via Polydor Records. A UK headline tour has also been confirmed to close out an incredible 2018 for Mabel.

‘One Shot’ is that classic, contemporary call for girl-power from Mabel, blending her now-instantly-identifiable soulful vocals with a warm palette of global sounds. A sun-kissed live favourite over the festival season (and a track which Mabel’s expansive, impassioned young audience has long-since demanded the release of), ‘One Shot’ is – says Mabel – “so important! After ‘Finders Keepers’ and ‘Fine Line’ I wanted to make another up-tempo, playful track that people could dance to. ‘One Shot’ is about playing hard to get and knowing what you want. I do believe that when it comes to relationships that you have to set the bar high and know your worth so that you never settle, and that’s what ‘One Shot’ is about.”

In 2018 Mabel has truly seen her ‘One Shot’ and taken it, blossoming in both her confidence as an artist, and a still-just-22-year-old still finding her place in the world.

Five weeks in the top 10 for platinum-selling breakthrough single ‘Finders Keepers’ led to Mabel’s nomination for her first ever BRIT Award (Critics’ Choice), extensive European dates with Harry Styles, her sold-out headline tour (including London’s Kentish Town Forum) and increasingly-surreal experiences around the world (from a childhood spent in Sweden and Malaga to walking out at Wembley Stadium). Repaying all her early promise in the process, Mabel has emerged as one of the UK’s most positive, candid young musical role models, with songs that frequently explore everything from identity (sexual, racial, personal), the challenges of modern relationships, and working out who you are and what you want.

‘One Shot’ is a further taste of Mabel’s massively-anticipated debut album, which she has worked on around-the-clock all year and follows early body of work ‘Ivy To Roses’. She has since become one of the top 500 streamed artists in the world, which include Top-15-charting collaborations with the likes of Jax Jones (on recent hit ‘Ring Ring’) and Not3s (‘Fine Line’, ‘My Lover’). A project arguably entwined in Mabel’s DNA – from finding her voice in a musical dynasty to enrolling in music college and writing songs in secret – it’s those dual forces of anxiety but quiet self-belief that ultimately have empowered Mabel to move between those worlds of music, fashion, dance, and art. The results always feel quintessentially ‘Mabel’, and in ‘One Shot’ a vital voice in UK youth culture takes her next step towards international pop stardom.

Dates

November 29 || Dublin || Academy
November 30 || Glasgow || Garage
December 2 || Newcastle || University
December 4 || Leeds || Stylus
December 5 || Manchester || O2 Ritz
December 6 || Birmingham || Institute
December 8 || Cardiff || University Great Hall
December 10 || Bristol || Academy
December 11 || Bournemouth || Academy
December 12 || London || Brixton Academy

Tickets: https://www.seetickets.com/tour/mabel

THE TEA STREET BAND have announced details of their new album ‘Frequency’, to be released November 9th on Modern Sky UK.

The band have now announced a run of additional UK shows as follows:

Thu 15 Nov – Liverpool – District
Fri 16 Nov – Liverpool – District (Sold Out)
Sat 17 Nov – Stoke – Sugarmill
Fri 23 Nov – Blackburn – Electric Church Club
Sat 24 Nov – Leeds – The Fox and Newt
Sun 25 Nov – Manchester – Castle Hotel
Fri 30 Nov – Chester – Telfords Warehouse
Sat 01 Dec – London – Slaughtered Lamb

Tickets available here: https://teastreetband.tmstor.es

The first track to be taken from the Tea Street Band’s new album is ‘Feel It’, now available to stream now and as an instant grat with album pre-orders. ‘Frequency’ is the cult Liverpool band’s follow-up to their 2014 self-titled debut, which gained support from tastemakers such as Huw Stephens, John Kennedy, Janice Long, Clint Boon, and Rob Da Bank, and saw The Tea Street Band travel as far as Australia and South Korea on promotional duties.

Listen to ‘Feel It’

The Tea Street Band follow in the tradition of tunefully idiosyncratic Liverpool bands like The Coral, The Lightning Seeds, and Shack, though their blissful Electronica sounds like none of those bands. Rather, The Tea Street Band are closer to artists like Tunng and This Is The Kit, blending instrumentation with synths and beats. Like so many Liverpool artists, at the heart of The Tea Street Band is a keen ear for melody. Driven by propulsive hooks, their songs grab from the get-go, often building to a euphoric rush.

Recorded over a year in Liverpool’s fabled Parr Street Studios with Chris Taylor (Ian Brown, Millburn), ‘Frequency’ is a big leap forward for The Tea Street Band. “The writing process was different than the first album,” says frontman Timo Tierney. “We wrote it together, with all of us having a massive input on each song, the title and the art work (photo By John Johnson, designed by Dom Foster). It’s all of ours. We have all pushed each other musically and that can be heard on songs like ‘Sacré-Coeur’ and ‘Marseille Blues.’”

The Tea Street Band: Timo Tierney (vocals, guitar), Nick Otaegui (bass, vocals), Lee Smith (guitar, synth) and Dom Allen (drums).

The Tea Street Band ‘Frequency’
1. Givin’ It Back
2. Sacré-Coeur
3. Only Love
4. Feel It
5. Coming Up
6. BFYH
7. Marseille Blues
8. Hearts Collide
9. Enter The Void
10. Frequency
11. Taken It All

i/ https://www.instagram.com/teastreetband/
f/ https://www.facebook.com/TeaStreetBand/
t/ https://twitter.com/TeaStreetBand

What of the bands that can’t stop writing? How do you keep up? Like Bob Pollard and R. Stevie Moore before them, it’s something that must just be there, in the blood. Over the last few years, Sunshine Frisbee Laserbeam have been putting out quality material at an alarming rate – 100+ songs, and if it wasn’t for the day jobs, there’d have been far more – whilst never quite fitting in to any one pigeonhole long enough to be branded with a genre. So, where to start? Here. “Blackout Cowboy” is that record. It could as easily be their debut. A fresh slate from which to start from. A band with 100 songs distilling everything that makes them great down to just 8 new songs. Like a record from the 70’s, succinct and compact, total confidence in the material.

Early lo-fi offerings in the form of two EPs, a self-titled album, and a Halloween single secured the then three-piece a regular spot on the Birmingham music scene, as well as frequent invites to towns and cities up and down the country. A couple of increases in headcount (most recently Junior Laidley on keyboards and percussion) and the purple patch writing sessions around “Blackout Cowboy” have allowed the band to move away from the lo-fi aesthetic they once adhered to, and are now able to work the same unique approach to songwriting into an ever expanding range of hooks, riffs and drones that fill any room they play.

Dark lyrical matter permeates throughout the record, as does black humour and the band’s gift for melody. From the power-pop rush of opener “Running From A Ghost”, through to the Malkmus-esque closer of “Mind Control”, there’s both variety and an almost endless slew of good ideas throughout. From the thick guitar tone that brings “All The Way Over The Edge” to life, to the melodic invention across “Blackout Cowboy” and “Meatloaf To The Camera”, there’s no let up across the record. And on “Mrs JR Hartley” the band even channel the neurotic energy of those early Weezer songs, in contrast to that most English of references in the song title.

Some bands hit their stride a few records in, and some bands hit it out of the park entirely: this is Sunshine Frisbee Laserbeam making a strong claim for the latter.

Sunshine Frisbee Laserbeam UK tour dates

02 Nov – The Lanes – Bristol
03 Nov – Sunflower Lounge – Birmingham
04 Nov – The Castle – Manchester
05 Nov – Wharf Chambers – Leeds
08 Nov – TBC – Cambridge
09 Nov – Rough Trade – Nottingham
11 Nov – Old Blue Last, London