Tag: Gigs

Posted on

CD piracy…

So, 1 in 3 CDs sold worldwide is a pirate copy. I wonder how that stacks up against the percentages of money made by record companies vs artists. Are the pirates ripping off the labels more than the labels are ripping off the artists? I suspect not.

From the article –

“Jorgen Larsen, president of music producer Universal Music International, said the livelihood of the artists and music industry workers was at risk if piracy continued to rise.”

I think the livelihood of the artists is put more at risk by signing to Universal than it is from piracy. I very much doubt anyone is bootlegging my CDs. In fact, I’d be slightly flattered if they were. I’m sure there are some CDR copies kicking around, and I hope that they inspire the owners to turn up to gigs. There’s certainly enough MP3 material of mine around to make up a whole CD of extras (moreso if you’re in the street team), but people still buy the CDs, come to the gigs, and everything’s ticking along quite nicely. I’m certainly more scared of one day having a breakdown and accidentally signing a record deal than I am of discovering 100,000 copies of Grace And Gratitude for sale in a Delhi street market – in fact, if they did, I’d probably just go and do a gig there!

Perhaps the markup on CDs is to blaim? If the labels are still trying to charge £16 a CD to music buyers in India/China/Mexico etc, how on earth do they expect them to come up with that kind of money? Maybe they should look at ways of making it more attractive to buy the real thing, rather than just blaiming the pirates for filling a gap in the market. If the record companies weren’t so obviously rapacious in their dealings with artists, and such a rip-off in terms of what they charge the end user, then people might feel more generously disposed towards them. How about if they started to give away 20% of their profits to arts projects in developing countries?

No, instead they blame ‘organised crime’ – I’d be interested to see the evidence for this. It’s quite possible that ‘organised crime’ units are somehow involved, but it’s equally possible that there are a bunch of opportunists who see a gap in the market created by the greed of the majors.

It’s like the Metallica/Napster debacle – I, along with 10 million other people, found it very hard to feel much sympathy for the multi-millionaire Lars Ulrich in his claims that he was being ripped off by Napster. If every single item of Metallica merch was fair trade, if they were pressuring their record company to encourage staff to unionise and putting pressure on for fairer wages around the world, if they implimented a scheme in Metallica PLC where the top paid person could only earn 9 times what the lowest paid person could earn, I’d be feeling a little more generous towards his claims that kids in colleges downloading Metallica albums were destroying his livelihood.

Soundtrack – Ali Farka Toure with Ry Cooder, ‘Talking Timbuktu’ (heard a piece on Radio 4 last night about Ali, and dug out this CD again – fantastic stuff – brings back marvellous memories of sitting at Rick Turner‘s house in Santa Cruz, discovering amazing new music from around the world, and listening to Rick’s remarkable stories.)

Posted on

Edinburgh Fringe Programme now online!!

Got back from a weekend in Berwick On Tweed (more on that later) to find the Edinburgh Fringe programme had been posted out. And it’s also now online for your perusal!!

Obviously, the first place to go is to the entry for my show, where you’ll want to buy tickets for multiple nights for you and your friends.

Then, from blog-world, there’s Richard Herring’s show, from bass-world, there’s guy pratt’s show, from jazz-world, there’s Julie McKee’s show, from RFH Foyer gigs-world, there’s The Big Buzzard Boogie Band show, from last year’s showbiz pals-world, there’s Barry Cryer and Ronnie Golden’s show, from guitar-world, there’s Antonio Forcione’s show and from unmissable gig-world, there’s Spearhead.

So, spread the word, tell your friends and get them to come to the show, and I’ll have flyers for you to download everso soon!

Soundtrack – Prefab Sprout, ‘From Langley Park To Memphis’.

Posted on

Weekend of musical friends

So, Friday was the last commuter jazz gig (or ‘computer jazz’, if you’re the chief exec. of the South Bank) before the big refurb kicks in at the end of Meltdown at the end of June. Peter King was playing, and was marvellous – very fine saxophonist, even if he does play alto (not a big fan of alto, generally – it’s just a tenor sax for kids) – and the aforementioned malapropism-prone chief exec. did a lovely speech about lady jazzshark who as previously mentioned has been booking bands at the RFH since prehistoric days, and will be much missed.

So, naturally, sharky person had a big party afterwards, at a friend’s GORGEOUS flat overlooking the Thames along by Blackfriars bridge. That’s one hell of a view to wake up to each morning, for sure. Much celebration took place, and by all accounts no small about of debauchery, though I left at 10.30, so thankfully missed all that.

Saturday was a fun day – started by meeting up with the wonderful Todd Reynolds – an outstanding violinist, and truly lovely wonderful person. Todd and I have exchanged emails and been reading eachother’s posts to Loopers Delight for years, but hadn’t met, so it was great to put a face to an email address and spend the day filling in the gaps. We went back down to the RFH Foyer for the last Saturday gig before the closure (and therefore JazzShark’s last saturday gig) – many fragile hung over people there from the party the night before (fools… ;o) ) – and a lovely short film about a couple in their 70s who meet at the free gigs in the foyer to dance together.

After that, gave Todd the shortened tourist trip round central London (interesting that my tourist trips never take in Buckingham Palace – maybe my anti-royalist sentiments are spilling over into my appreciation of what’s valuable to see in town. I always take people past Downing Street and along Whitehall (the seat of our sham-democracy) and Trafalgar Square (site of many a kick-ass protest) and down to the South Bank (home of the arts), but ignore any of the Royal nonsense, unless it’s for a quick walk round St James’ Park.

I digress… A fantastic day spent wandering round with Todd, all in. Top bloke, fun day.

Then home, to pick up TSP to head out to Lizzie’s leaving do, only TSP is behind on writing work (TSP is high powered celeb journo, interviewing the great and good about all things healthy), so I leave cinderella at home and head off to the ball on my own.

Lizzie is one of life’s lovely people – a fantastic photographer/photo journalist, and very funny lady. Party was full of lovely people, naturally, with no repeats of Friday night’s debauchery (totally different group of friends here…) So good send off for Lizzie, but crap that she’s moving (only to Bristol, so we’ll still see lots of her, but still…)

Sunday – head off to church, but it’s an ‘away match’ (meaning that a family from outside the church are having a christening – though it turns out they were from the church, I just didn’t know them – major black mark against my name for not having said hi to them!!) anyway – decide to go for fry-up at nice cafe on the Holloway Road was Gawain instead. Gawain is a marvellous producer/programmer/musician who has got heavily into community music education and is doing amazingly well. Very inspiring to talk to, with lots of plans for collaborative stuff.

Then home, domestic stuff, drop mixing desk off at St Luvvies to be used at Soul Space service before heading to Finsbury Park tube to meet up with BJ and Juliet to go to Joe Jackson/Todd Rungren gig at Hammersmith homebrew Apollo or whatever it’s called this week.

The reason BJ and I are at the gig is that the lovely Todd Reynolds who I met up with on Saturday is playing with his amazing string quartet Ethel as opening act and collaborator with Joe and Todd (BJ played with Todd in John Cale’s band in the 90s). Juliet had a ticket anyway, so Todd got her an aftershow pass and we all piled down to the gig together.

Ethel kicked out – wow. Incredible energy and performance, and great gig. They looked great, played great, the music was magic and the audience were captivated.

Then Joe Jackson came on – now I’m quite a fan of Joe’s singles collection (playing at the moment, in an attempt to rescue my memory of his music), but the gig was poor. Very poor. The sound was very compressed, and solo voice and piano versions of his uptempo stuff didn’t, to my ears, work at all. The new material was particularly bad. Some of his piano playing was lovely, but the overall feeling was one of big disappointment.

So a lot was rest on Todd Rungren’s shoulders. And he didn’t rise to the occasion either. The songs all sounded thrown away, I couldn’t remember one snippet of melody at the end of any of them, his guitar sound was possibly the worst I’ve ever heard at a ‘big’ gig, and again I was left contemplating self harm as a more pleasant sensory experience than the assault my ears were currently being subjected to.

Then, all change once again. Ethel come back on, and we’re back to the gig being amazing – a Gilbert and Sullivan tune, a couple each from Joe and Todd and an encore of ‘While My Guitar Gently Weeps’ (after Todd’s solo set I wanted to rename it ‘While My Guitar is Gently put through a wood-chipper’) – I’ve never seen a couple of aging rock stars so outrageously upstaged by a string quartet in my life. If the gig had been 40 minutes of Ethel, followed by 80 minutes of all five of them on stage playing a mixture of hits and misses, it could have been a breathtaking gig. As it was, it was two hours of dire self-indulgent horse-shit topped and tailed by two exquisite but far too short sets.

Ethel were a revelation, and are destined for hugeness. Please go and buy their CD, I guarantee you won’t regret it.

After all-too-brief chat with Todd after the gig, with just enough time to introduce him to Juliet and blag a copy of the Ethel album, it was time to hop on the last tube home.

Soundtrack – Joe Jackson, ‘Stepping Out – The Best Of’.

Posted on

Thoughts on Live 8

It was announced today that there’ll be a huge gig in Hyde Park on July 2nd called Live 8, to highlight the cause of the Make Poverty History campain, and put pressure on the G8 leaders meeting the week after in Gleneagles to make changes to our screwed up economic system that currently favours the rich over the poor, widening the gap between them.

The gig won’t be a fund raiser in the way that Live Aid was, it’s all about awareness and garnering public support for the changes. On the same day, there’ll be gigs in Paris, Rome, Berlin and the US. It’s all happening on the same day as the Protests in Edinburgh in the run-up to the G8 summit.

Which begs the question, why isn’t it happening in Edinburgh? People are already suggesting that up to a quarter of a million people are going to descend on Edinburgh for the weekend. Why host an event in London that could a) dent the attendance in Edinburgh and b) split the media attention? I’m all for gigs big and small that raise awareness of such issues, but the timing could have been better. Even having it on the Sunday would have been better, giving die-hards the change to hot-foot it from Scotland back to London.

Meanwhile, I was asked to play a gig in Edinburgh months ago, which has yet to be confirmed (looks unlikely to happen), and have now been asked to play one in London on July 2nd (sadly not in Hyde Park – I’m sure some solo bass noodling would provide the perfect antedote to overblown rock dinosaurs giving it earnest for hours on end).

As it is, I’ll probably still go to Edinburgh, minus bass gear. I’ve already planned to go to the protests, and on a much more selfish note, can stay on a day or two and see if I can sort out some promo for my Edinburgh show! Having said that, the London show does look fun – it’s organised by Filomena Campus, an improv singer I’ve done things with before, and the last gig we did together featured some fab players – Orphy, Dudley Philips, Roland Sutherland etc.

Hopefully the split in the focus of events on July 2nd won’t confuse people as to the aims, and somehow some kind of miracle will happen in the G8. Given the kinds of people the US have been putting forward for jobs in the UN and World Bank of late, I don’t hold out much hope for them to show any compassion to the poor – clearly making the mega rich even richer is a much higher priority than ending the trade inequity that leaves entire continents languishing in crippling poverty despite them being rich in natural resources.

I’ll stop now, I’m slipping into despair again…

Read the Guardian’s report on the announcement

Posted on

Another fine Darbucka gig

So last night I was back at Darbucka, which, contrary to previous knowledge is no longer underneath India EC1 – they’ve taken over the upstairs part now, and the whole place is Darbucka! How cool is that?

Anyway, ’twas my third gig there, and I love playing there. The atmosphere is fab, the seating very relaxed and the owner, Ahmad is a good friend and supporter of live music.

Last night was extra-specially fun due to my two special guests, BJ Cole and Cleveland Watkiss.

The slightly surreal air that seems to drift around at my gigs began even before the show started, with George Galloway being in the venue when we got there… …sadly, he wasn’t there for an evening of mellow bass noodling, and left not long after we arrived to set up.

First set was just me, doing my thing. It was fun to play a slightly longer set, and get to play a couple of old tunes I haven’t played for a while – Highway One, and No More Us And Them, as well as a couple of new tunes – one slow country-ish thing so far called ‘What Happens When You Listen To Too Much Gillian Welch Late At Night’ (subject to change), and another untitled one, dedicated to Eric Roche a great friend and genius musician, going through a bit of a rough patch. (speaking of Eric, he’s playing at The Troubadour in Earl’s Court tonight, and is unmissably good – please go along and support him, you’ll thank me afterwards.)

Response to both old and new tunes was good, and Cleveland arrived during the last song of the set, so that was good!

Second set began with me on my own doing on tune (No More Us And Them, I think), and then BJ joined me for the next world premier of the evening – it was the first time BJ and I had played anything that was pre-written together. Usually, we just start playing and see where it goes. This time, we did a tune that BJ had joined in on in my soundcheck, a new tune called ‘So Long And Thanks For All The Thumbs’, and he added a huge amount of loveliness to the track! We then followed that with a bleepy, trippy improv, which ended with BJ in fine industrial soundscape mode, wringing all manner of weird and wonderful sounds from his knitting machine. What a fab player!

So I then kicked him off the stage, and brought up guest #2 for world premier #3 – Cleveland Watkiss. This was the first time Cleveland and I had played together on stage – we’ve played together twice before, but both times in my living room. He started us off with a clicky vocal percussion track, which I looped, slightly out of time, and we glitched it into a really really cool percussive soundscape with layers of oohs and aahs, and some dubby vocal samples, just him singing and me tweaking. At one point I was tempted to join in, but it didn’t need it, so I carried on tweaking and he carried on singing, and that was tune #1.

The second tune we did I started it off, funky thing in Am, which built up with layers and layers of fantastic beatbox into a full on clubby dancey thing, wah-wah guitars, clattering drums, dub vocals, all from just he and I. Another big success.

To finish off, I closed the main set with ‘People Get Ready’, then got BJ and Cleveland back for a mellow country ballad improv thing which just topped off the evening perfectly. A resounding success!

Hopefully I’ll be back at Darbucka before too long, I love it there!

if you want to get BJ’s or Cleveland’s CDs, you can get BJ’s here and Cleveland’s here (BJ’s newest album Trouble In Paradise is fantastic, as is Cleveland’s duet with Nikki Yeo)

If you were at the gig, please post your thoughts over in the reviews section of my forum.

Soundtrack – Maxwell, ‘Embrya’; Lewis Taylor, ‘Lewis Taylor’.

Posted on

I'm in a composing frame of mind…

well, I’ve been recording stuff, anyway. After a rather long hiatus, the impetus to record came back with the duo project with Cleveland. We recorded the duo stuff, and I left my bass rig wired up to the computer so I could record some solo bits ‘n’ bobs. So I’ve been recording a couple of tracks a day for the last few days, and some of it’s rather good.

The format is as usual, in that I’m recording the stuff live, largely made up on the spot, but I’m then editing the tracks, and trying to get some kind of structure from the initial version, and then re-learn that to get a nice arrangement together. We’ll see how well it works!

The good thing is that I’ll have a couple of new tunes to premier at the upcoming gigs, which is nice, and will probably throw one of them in the direction of the street team, later this week. If they behave themselves.

Other news – the first of my show sponsors for Edinburgh has confirmed. Working on three more (if anyone reading this fancies sponsoring the show, you can email me for details). If I get all four, it’ll cover the cost of the venue hire, significantly droppping my financial risk!

Have also sorted out accomodation for while we’re there, thanks to hugely generous and lovely friends in Edinburgh. It’s all coming together!

So, life is good. Now I just need to get on with writing some of the teaching stuff that I’ve got to do, for musicdojo.com and BGM. Busy-busy!

Soundtrack – Zakir Hussein, ‘Making Music’; some old MP3s of unreleased stuff of mine; Tommy Sims, ‘Peace and Love’; Ani DiFranco, ‘Little Plastic Castle’; Orphy Robinson, ‘When Tomorrow Comes’.

Posted on

I'm on a charity compilation CD…

Back when the Tsunami happened in December, everyone was running around wondering what they could do to help. We all gave money to the various appeals, so much so that the DEC said it didn’t need any more money after just a few months. It was an astounding response, to be sure. One of the efforts that I was contacted about almost immediately was a compilation CD being assembled by people at BassTechUK – a website/webforum based in Manchester. the guy who runs the site had the idea of putting together a CD of tracks from bassists all over the place, and selling it to raise money for the appeal.

So the charity was chosen – SOS Children – a charity that works with orphans all over the world – and lots of bassists were approached.

The resulting list is pretty impressive – Janek Gwizdala, Jimmy Haslip, the Poogie Bell Band, Steve Jenkins, Mo Foster, Peter Muller, Stevie Williams, Lorenzo Feliciati, David Dyson, Laurence Cottle, Dean Brown and me – we all donated tracks, which are now available on the ‘As One’ CD.

It’s a nice idea, and one I’m glad to be a part of – as a musician, it doesn’t really do much good to turn up in a disaster area and play tunes while there are people who need feeding (after the event, it can be good to have musicians turn up – if you ever get a chance to hear Micheal Franti tell his story of his trip to Iraq, it’s amazing). But we can do what we do – sell music to make money – and then donate that money to the appeal. Every penny of this is going to the charity (to the point where we’ve all agreed to donate our MCPS royalties on the manufacturing when they arrive).

So go on, click on the CD cover and head over to BassTechUK and buy a copy…

Soundtrack – mainly bits of new stuff that I’ve been recording, trying out some new tunes to premier at the upcoming gigs.

Posted on

Two gigs this week (watched) and two days at LGS.

LGS being the London Guitar Show. I was there Friday to meet up with the nice peoples at Bass Guitar Magazine to chat about me writing a column for them, which I now need to sketch out a plan for, and then get writing. Caught up with a few other friends. Went back Saturday to see more friends, and was hoping to check out the Celinder basses which are amazing (Lowell brought one to my workshop in Cupertino , California back in January, and I wanted to see more), but the noise was so loud it was pointless.

However through the din I did get to listen to Laurence Cottle, jamming with guitarist Paul Stacey, and despite the noise and Paul having to play through a bass amp, they made a glorious noise. Fab musicians. Caught up with more friends. It wasn’t a bad show for bass stuff – the Bass Centre had a stand with all manner of bargains on it, EBS, GB Guitars, MarkBass, Celinder, the re-born Trace Elliot, Ashdown, Peavey and a few others were there with plenty of bass toys. It’d be unfair to compare it to NAMM as a) it’s open to the public, and all about selling stuff not launching new products and getting dealers and b) it’s in England.

The two gigs were Nitin Sawhney on Wednesday, and The Bays on Friday.

Nitin’s gig was a bit of a disappointment – the tunes he did with the Asian singers, Nina Bhardwaj and some guy whose name I can’t find online, were amazing. Great vocalists. The other stuff came over like a load of Urban Species mid 90s mellow hip-hop grooves with some OK tunes. Nothing special. Maybe it’s just that I had high expectations. It was enjoyable, just not the mind blowing experience I’d expected. Still, Orphy Robinson came with me, and an evening out with Orphy was enough to make it all worthwhile (and I didn’t pay for the ticket – ’twas a present from Dweez, who couldn’t go due to work commitments – thanks John!)

The other gig.. actually, there were two other gigs, as I went to see Roger Beaujolais play with his sextet in the Foyer of the Festival Hall before going to see The Bays in the Queen Elizabeth Hall. Roger’s band were very fine – London really does have some fantastic jazz players!

The idea behind The Bays is that they play completely improvised club-tastic dance grooves. The feel can change from night to night – sometimes its more house-y, sometimes more Drum ‘n’ Bass-ish. Friday night sounded like Gong remixed by Daft Punk. Top notch. The addition of a third keyboard player and a guy playing synth stuff on guitar was fine, but hardly necessary, as they make enough noise as a quartet. Still, the gig was fab, and I’d recommend the Bays to anyone who can cope with the volume (it was loud!).

Soundtrack – Eric Roche, ‘With These Hands’ (Eric’s had to cancel a few gigs again recently due to being ill, so if you’ve been playing to buy this fantastic record, now would probably be a good time! Head over to Eric’s site to have a listen – he’s one of the finest solo acoustic guitarists I’ve heard, one of the nicest people I know, and an indie artist that you really ought to support by buying his marvellous CDs!)

Posted on

The Man In The Van With A Bass In His Hand

Went to see Mike Watt at the ICA this evening. He’s a bit of a punk legend, particularly in the States, where his first band, The Minutemen, inspired a whole generation of American punk bands in the 80s. In the mid-90s he made his first solo album, on which a who’s who of the American alternative scene paid their respects to Watt – members of Nirvana, The Chili Peppers, Pearl Jam, The Pixies, Black Flag, The Rollins Band, Sonic Youth, Porno For Pyros etc. etc. all appeared on the record with him.

I met Watt a couple of years ago at The Bass Bash in Anaheim during NAMM, where he played a set with Kira, as ‘Dos’ – just two basses and voices – a resolutely low-fi punk set at an evening of fusion twiddling. Great subversive stuff. We also chatted alot that evening, and he revealed himself to be a deep, intellegent musician commited to maintaining his integrity as an artist, and staying true to his original punk ethic – DIY, and don’t take shit from anyone – even when signed to a major label.

Tonight he played all the tracks from his latest album – The SecondMan’s Middle Stand – from start to finish. It is, he says, a ‘sickness opera’ – a song-cycle based on his near-fatal illness, in three sections; hell, purgatory and heaven.

The music is very difficult to describe – very intricately written but playing with a punk abandon, the arrangements stop on a dime, switch time signatures, have unison phrases for all three musicians (the line-up is a trio of organ, bass and drums – not your typical punk lineup!) and then switch to full on dissonant avant garde scariness, and back to more conventional song forms. The dynamic range is huge, from a whisper to ear-splitting rock-out, and at the heart of it all is Watt’s aggressive, adventurous bass playing. All in all, marvellous stuff, impossible to accurately pigeonhole, deeply personal, and definitely music that rewards repeat listening.

He’s on tour in the UK for another week – go and see him if you can, but leave any preconceptions at the door. Do take earplugs though – it gets very loud! I’m so out of practice with ‘rock’ gigs – the volume scared the life out of me til I got my plugs in.

Watt’s tour diary makes for great reading too, though be warned, he speaks his own language, so the Pedrospeak Primer might help!

Soundtrack – Mike Watt, ‘The Secondman’s Middle Stand’; Mike Watt, ‘Contemplating The Engine Room’.

Posted on

Top notch comedy night

Went to a very fine comedy gig last night – organised by James Cary – an exceedingly funny man himself – the gig featured absurdist standup from Milton Jones, comedy performance poetry from Jude Simpson and Paul Kerensa – I don’t think I’ve seen a more consistently funny comedy gig in a long time – no lame warm-up act here. Paul’s style is old school observational stuff and word play, and he does it brilliantly. Jude is all set to be the new Victoria Wood – comedy poetry that’s both hilarious and brilliantly constructed, it’s a joy to hear language (ab)used in such a creative way.

And Milton – one of the funniest people I’ve ever seen. It’s about the fourth time I’ve seen him do his show, and even the repeat gags get funnier every time. I heartily recommend going to see any of them if they are doing standup near you.

It was also one of those gigs where you know half the audience – Jam and Melissa, Evil Harv, Mini Harv, Andy Flan, Darren Greenbelt, the blokes out of Infinite Number Of Monkeys… much fun, and a fine night out.

Soundtrack – Green Day, ‘American Idiot’ (left here by a student, and marvellous it is too – must buy this); more of me and Cleveland.

© 2008 Steve Lawson and developed by Pretentia. | login

Top