| CMU Daily - on the inside Wednesday 23rd August |
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In today's CMU Daily:
- CMU at the Edinburgh Festival
- Safety concerns over Madonna Moscow gig
- McCready withdraws guilty plea
- Sparklehorse to release limited edition singles
- Wilson says no more woaaaaaaaaaahs
- The Cult tour
- Dylan disses, well, all of you
- Rooster offering support slots to new bands
- New Snoop Dog
- Arctic Monkeys on bassist departure, sort of
- Single review: Dot Allison - Beneath The Ivy
- Tiscali confirm Reading webcast line up
- Extra tickets for Snow Patrol T gig
- YouTube launch branded channels service
- Petition launched to save London's Astoria
- New site to encourage fans to support unsigned bands
- Another holiday park fest thing
- Amstell gets Buzzcocks
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CMU AT THE EDINBURGH FESTIVAL>>
So, the grand finale weekend of the Edinburgh Festival is looming, though you'll probably be all too busy doing the Reading / Leeds / Creamfields / Carnival thing to notice. Ah well, here's some music reviews that might just entice you...
Shooglenifty at The Spiegel Garden at Edinburgh Fringe (14, 21, 28 Aug)
The atmosphere at the Shooglenifty gig was better than almost any gig I have been to. In the middle of the Spiegel Garden, the Edinburgh based folk band entertained a crowd of Scots and honorary Scots/Festival-goers with their mixture of traditional folk music and alternative rock. Throughout the gig, the band played high energy folk songs that had everybody dancing to the fiddle, banjo and guitars that comprise the band. Even somebody who has never heard a Shooglenifty song in their life could not fail to enjoy the set. If you are looking for as close to a traditional Scottish night out as possible, then Shooglenifty is not to be missed. I shall be rushing out to buy a copy of their CD as soon as possible. NC
tw rating 5/5
Ray Wilson and Band at L'Attache at Rutland No 1 at Edinburgh Fringe (until 26 Aug)
Who? He was in that early 90's Scottish grunge band Stiltskin, and later performed briefly with Genesis. Stiltskin had that hit 'Inside'. You know - the one that went "Baa Da Da Baa Da Da", etc - that Sky TV used in the early days of the English Premiership. Anyway, Ray Wilson ran through a range of material, most of which was downbeat, soft dad rock played with an electric acoustic guitar to a middle aged audience who nodded their heads in approval. The quality ranged significantly, some of his slow songs uncomfortably highlighting some dodgy lyrics (e.g. "Naked gypsy, lie down next to me"), whilst closers 'Inside' and 'She' at least provided balls to the proceedings with some brooding guitar riffage. Hit and miss. DA
tw rating 3/5
Niki King at Opal Lounge at Edinburgh Fringe (until 26 Aug)
Niki King knows exactly how to perk up an audience. Aside from the fact that she's comfortable performing on home ground, Niki seems to enjoy singing as much as the audience enjoys listening to her, which is a lot. Likewise, Niki is a generous performer who isn't on stage just to flaunt her stunningly soulful and clear voice; rather, she is insistent on audience participation - which really means the audience singing along, dancing and having a good time. Whilst some of the more energetic songs became repetitive at times, there was a good mix of slow, soulful tracks and upbeat, faster ones. Unfortunately for the audience, the gig just wasn't long enough; they clapped and cheered 'encore!' but to no avail. JS
tw rating 4/5
Henry's Hot Music Festival at Henry's Cellar Bar at Edinburgh Fringe (until 31 Aug)
Live performances from 7pm until 10.30pm, then partying until the wee small hours to an eclectic mix of Djs and bands - sounds pretty good - 10 hours for a fiver? Unfortunately on this occasion, the first show had cancelled and we were down to eight and a half hours. But disappointment soon lifted with the production of Flamenco Puro - a combination of flamenco guitar and dance, mesmerising to both the eye and ear. The only slight disturbance in the force was Mark Brown, guitarist, speaking with a broad Scottish accent. The illusion, broken for a second, was re-established through the passion and flair of both performers. Once over, to the bar for refreshments. A veritable pick'n'mix of musical entertainment, if you can last the distance. SR
tw rating 3/5
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SAFETY CONCERNS OVER MADONNA MOSCOW GIG
Problems are mounting for an upcoming Madonna gig in Moscow, though this has nothing to do with objections to that slightly controversial crucifix routine. Rather, safety officials are concerned that the proposed site for the gig - in front of Moscow University - could be dangerous because students are expected to pile into the university buildings around the site to get a glimpse of the concert, and it is feared some may be injured (mainly by falling out of windows). To that end organisers are being urged to find a new site, but with the city's main stadium hosting a football match that night, it isn't clear if a big enough venue will be found in time. Agence France Presse quote the city's security head Nikolai Koulikov as saying: "The question of where the Madonna concert will eventually take place has still not been resolved".
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MCCREADY WITHDRAWS GUILTY PLEA
Country singer Mindy McCready has withdrawn her guilty plea regarding a driving violation last year. I've kind of last track of this story. There was something about McCready being accused of drinking under the influence and without a licence back in May 2005 - she was acquitted of the former but pleaded guilty to the latter, which was a bigger deal than normal because she was already on probation from an earlier charge of fraudulently obtaining drugs from a pharmacy. Anyway, her people now claim that paperwork has come to light which means that McCready was actually licenced at the time of the May 2005 arrest, and as a result they are calling for a retrial. So, now you know.
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SPARKLEHORSE TO RELEASE LIMITED EDITION SINGLES
Sparklehorse will release three limited edition singles on vinyl in the run up to the release of their new album, 'Dreamt For Lightyears In The Belly Of A Mountain'. The singles will be 'Don't Take My Sunshine Away', 'Ghost In The Sky' and 'Knives Of Summertime' and they will be released on 4, 11 and 18 Sep respectively.
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WILSON SAYS NO MORE WOAAAAAAAAAAHS
Chief Kaiser Ricky Wilson has pledged that their upcoming second album will be free of the band's trademark 'woaahs' which, of course, appeared in a few of the songs on 2005's 'Employment', most notably 'I Predict A Riot' and 'Oh My God'. Wilson told NME: "It wasn't deliberate on the last album, it was just when we write songs before we've written the words, me and Nick [Hodgson, drummer] will do demos and just make noises. When there was a bit that we didn't know what noise to make that was the sound we made. To be honest I think the 'woaaahs' partly came from when the rest of the band were doing the build ups before the chorus I just didn't want to stand there looking like a dickhead! I wanted something to do."
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THE CULT TOUR
Newly reformed The Cult are going on a tour that may well take in the following venues on the below stated dates...
18 Sep: Bristol Academy
19 Sep: Southampton Guildhall
20 Sep: Manchester Apollo
22 Sep: London Brixton Academy
23 Sep: Leeds University
24 Sep: Birmingham Academy
26 Sep: Glasgow Academy
27 Sep: Newcastle Academy
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DYLAN DISSES, WELL, ALL OF YOU
Bob Dylan has being doing his bit to big up new and aspiring talent by describing all modern music as "atrocious" and "worth nothing". Asked in an interview with Rolling Stone on the tendency of kids to download music for free, he remarked: "Well, why not? It ain't worth nothing anyway. You listen to these modern records, they're atrocious, they have sound all over them. There's no definition of nothing, no nothing, just like... static. I don't know anybody who's made a record that sounds decent in the past 20 years, really".
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ROOSTER OFFERING SUPPORT SLOTS TO NEW BANDS
Roooooooooster (that's what the kids are calling them) are inviting fans to recommend bands to open up for them on their upcoming 32 date tour. GetAmped will be their main touring support, but they hope to have a third local band to open up each night. Bands interested in putting themselves forward should put a post on Rooster's MySpace - http://www.myspace.com/roosterofficialmusic - including a link to some music, and they may well be picked.
By the way, a release date has now been set for the new Rooster album, 'Circles & Satellites', which will now be out on 2 Oct.
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NEW SNOOP DOG
Talking of Autumn releases, the new Snoop Dog album, 'The Blue Carpet Treatment', will be released on 20 Nov. The new long player includes collaborations with the likes of Stevie Wonder, The Game, Ice Cube, R Kelly, Brandy and MC Eight. The first single release will be 'Vato' featuring B Real from Cypress Hill.
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ARCTIC MONKEYS ON BASSIST DEPARTURE, SORT OF
Here's some random quotes from the Arctic Monkeys regarding the departure of bassist Andy Nicholson from the band earlier this year. They have been nabbed from NME.com, and make no sense to me, but I'm guessing they do make sense if you read the full interview with the band in this week's NME. Alas, I don't have a copy to hand to check.
Alex Turner: "We sorta found ourselves in a situations where we wanted to move forward. It weren't like us wanting to carry on like this as punishment for him wanting to opt out."
Jamie Cooke: "Everyone might say we're wankers and we shit on him, but they don't know. We know, Andy knows and that's all that really matters."
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SINGLE REVIEW: Dot Allison - Beneath The Ivy (Universal Digital)
Dot Allison has never had the fame she deserves - her 90s outfit One Dove were responsible for some awesome lush dubbed-up pop, whilst her two subsequent solo albums mined French pop, electroclash and torch songs to beautiful effect but, like One Dove, were ignored by the public. Since being dropped in 2002, Dot has toured with Massive Attack (who really should have used her voice on one of their albums), before inexplicably hanging round with World's Leading Cretin and general useless junkie tosser Pete Doherty for a while. Still, we won't hold that against her, because this is a welcome comeback and a fine EP indeed. Gone is the lush production; 'Beneath The Ivy' reveals a sparse, pared down sound that lets Dot's songwriting simply speak for itself. The lovely 'Quicksand' has little more than an acoustic guitar and some dreamy glock sounds accompanying the ethereal vocals, recalling the fragile somnambulance of Hope Sandoval and Mazzy Star, but in a slightly less narcotic way. 'Blade Of Words' is even better; a dark, foreboding piece of country that sounds like it has brutal murder on its mind, whilst 'Paper Rose' sits somewhere between the other two tracks. Overall not quite as impressive as some of her previous work, but recommended nonetheless. MS
Release date: 28 Aug
Press contact: Smash Press [all]
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TISCALI CONFIRM READING WEBCAST LINE UP
Those Tiscali people have confirmed that Panic! At The Disco and Belle & Sebastian will be the first acts to be webcast from this weekend's Reading Festival. Both bands will appear on the ISP's Reading microsite - http://www.tiscali.co.uk/reading - sometime on Friday. As previously reported, as well as webcasting sets from the main stage, Tiscali will also present footage of performances from their backstage sessions tent, where Jet, Tapes N Tapes and The Shakes have all just been added to the line up (which already included the likes of Yeah Yeah Yeahs, The Fratellis, Dirty Pretty Things, Four Day Hombre, Sway and The Automatic). As previously mentioned, if you are going to the Reading Festival as a media or important backstage type, you need to get in touch with Dan at The Incubator in order to get into the Tiscali sessions tent - [email protected]
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EXTRA TICKETS FOR SNOW PATROL T GIG
Another 2000 tickets have become available to this weekend's Snow Patrol gig at Edinburgh's Meadowbank Stadium which, I think, is part of the whole T On The Fringe thingy that we've been covering quite a lot of over on the ThreeWeeks website (and it's not an easy thing to cover you know, I think you should all congratulate us for making the effort). 20,000 tickets have already been sold for the show, which takes place this Friday, and the extra tickets are expected to be snapped up quite quickly. Dave Corbet of T On The Fringe promoters DF Concerts told the Scotsman: "We are thrilled that even more fans can enjoy Snow Patrol. The demand for tickets was huge with the gig selling out some time ago. I hope we have made some disappointed fans out there a lot happier."
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YOUTUBE LAUNCH BRANDED CHANNELS SERVICE
YouTube has announced details of a new commercial initiative which will allow brands to launch their own channels on the popular video service for a fee - the video service reckons the ad platform is "the first step toward defining a new advertising model for video entertainment on the internet". The company says that brands who launch their own branded channel will be able to offer "deeper, more brand-centric video experiences", which is great news, because those are my favourite kind of video experiences.
One of YouTube's first clients in this domain is Warner Music who will use a YouTube channel to promote the new album from Paris Hilton. The channel will include an exclusive video introduction from Hilton, plus music videos. Personally I think that if they want to generate lots of traffic they should have one of those 'shoot em up' games where you get to shoot Paris Hilton - but as far as I'm aware that won't be included.
Of course a number of brands have already used YouTube for viral marketing initiatives without actually paying for the privilege (most prominently Smirnoff) so it will be interesting to see if bosses at the site try to stop such guerilla uses of their platform now legit ad packages are available.
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PETITION LAUNCHED TO SAVE LONDON'S ASTORIA
Rumours about the future of the London venue The Astoria have been circulating for a while now, ie that the building is being sold off and converted into shops and offices, and now a petition has been set up to try and stop the redevelopment. I must remember to get in touch with Mean Fiddler to get an official line on this - meantime, here's the petition link.
http://www.petitiononline.com/savethea/
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NEW SITE TO ENCOURAGE FANS TO SUPPORT UNSIGNED BANDS
A company in Holland has launched a new website called SellaBand which aims to help unsigned bands reach their fans and raise funds to enable them to record and release a debut mini-album.
The basic core of the site is similar to other online services supporting unsigned talent - bands can upload tracks, pictures and copy to the SellaBand server and direct their fans to their SellaBand page.
The difference is that fans will be encouraged to support the band by making a $10 donation-come investment. If and when 5000 fans have done so the $50,000 raised will be used to allow the band to record a six track limited edition album, copies of which will be sent to every supporter.
Songs recorded for the album will also be available as free downloads via the band's page on the Sellaband site. While no revenue will be earned from the downloads themselves, advertising will be sold on the site, revenues from which will be split three ways between the band, Sellaband and the fans who supported the recording of the tracks.
Record producer Chris Kimsey, who is involved in the new venture, told reporters: "Music for the people, chosen by the people, supported by the people not some marketing plan to sell us music that we do not want. SellaBand puts value back into the sound of music".
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ANOTHER HOLIDAY PARK FEST THING
Another one of those 'festivals in a holiday camp' things for your diaries. The Long Blondes, The Young Knives and The Subways will all play The Big Reunion Goes To The Movies, which takes place at Butlins in Skegness on 24-26 Nov and 1-3 Dec. The festival will feature a number of movie-style arenas, though I'm not sure if that means they'll be showing films too, and their website wouldn't load on my PC, so I've no way of checking. You can try though - http://thebigreunion.com.
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AMSTELL GETS BUZZCOCKS
Hurrah, this is good news. Well, there's bad news first. Mark Lamarr, who took the last series of Never Mind The Buzzcocks off, is not going to return to the popular music quiz. But the good news is Simon Amstell, one of the guest presenters on the last series, is taking over full time, which should be cool. Commenting on his new job, he told reporters he hoped to beat "the universal, exceptionless rule that when a new host takes over an old show it is a horrible, embarrassing disaster".