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The big gig thread 2015 edition

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    #26
    The big gig thread 2015 edition

    So far looking forward to Macy Gray, Pond and Peace in Dublin. Academy, Whelan's and Whelan's respectively.

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      #27
      The big gig thread 2015 edition

      Well, our tickets for Taylor Swift in Cologne in faraway June have arrived, and at least one member of the family is beyond excited. It's not me, I should stress, but I am looking forward to it in an observational capacity.

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        #28
        The big gig thread 2015 edition

        MsD wrote: Gang of Four at Oslo in Hackney on 28 Feb .. rude not to, really.
        I saw them a couple of years ago at Shepherds Bush and again at the RFH when Massive Attack were hosting the meltdown. I reckon you'll love it.

        I have Calexico and Godspeed You! Black Emperor coming up which will provide the opportunity for some moderate old man rocking.

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          #29
          The big gig thread 2015 edition

          Stupid question, but what is the best way to find out in advance about gigs in London? I picked up a copy of Time Out last week and found it quite unfit for purpose. It seems to have become a listings magazine without any actual listings.

          Comment


            #30
            The big gig thread 2015 edition

            12 Bar Club
            6 January at 02:37 · Edited ·
            As The Late Great Joe Strummer would say....
            'This is a public service announcement !'
            We are pleased to announce, that The 12 Bar Club will be relocating to
            Phibbers at 203 Holloway Road, London N7 8DL.
            Watch this space for news of upcoming events
            These venues are never quite the same outside the centre, but looks like good news.

            Comment


              #31
              The big gig thread 2015 edition

              It's just not the same. I'm not that sentimental, generally, but I will miss the scuzzy old 12 Bar. These places get a patina, the beer vapours, the layers of posters stuck on the walls, the graffiti ... It's organic, and hard to replicate. These places have history.

              Comment


                #32
                The big gig thread 2015 edition

                steveeeeeeeee wrote: Stupid question, but what is the best way to find out in advance about gigs in London? I picked up a copy of Time Out last week and found it quite unfit for purpose. It seems to have become a listings magazine without any actual listings.
                No idea, I get all mine via word of mouth or Facebook, but that's why I end up going mostly to see mates' bands and the same bands 50 times over, apart from the odd serendipitous and random event.

                In the case of the Gang of Four, the barman in my local told me. It's not been promoted very much AFAIK.

                Having been involved in management and promotion - there's just so much competition and fragmentation now, it's hard to get your gig noticed. In one case, the audience comprised the singer's mum, me and two mates, three post punk minor legends, an obsessed fan who'd flown in from the US, and about six others who'd seen the poster.

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                  #33
                  The big gig thread 2015 edition

                  Artist: James Yorkston
                  Venue: Das Bett, Frankfurt
                  Tickets: 13 Euros
                  Support: None, he played two sets, one of traditional songs, one of his own. "Usually we find someone who sings about their cats, but there wasnae anyone like that in Frankfurt at short notice."
                  Drinks: One Büble Hell, three Crušovice Schwarzbiere (bottled - no draft beer at this improvised venue stuck out of town on a street with car rental locations and an Aldi. The name could well be because it might once have functioned as a mattress warehouse.)
                  Audience annoyance: Pretty full (150-200 people) of the older and balder generation (a fair number of Germans have a big thing for Celtic folk music), very few smartphones, quite subdued, but polite and appreciative. The McFan behind me wanted to let everyone know that he too was Scottish, and laughed loudly at everything the singer said in-between songs, as though he was the only one in on the joke, even when nothing at all funny was being said. Though JY was inevitably, Scottishly dry, and kept his stories nice and short.
                  The music: There's not a great range to his voice, but his own songs especially are lyrical, beautiful, sad and folk-edgy all at once. I put him in the hallowed canon of Celtic rainy-day, fucked-up-folk artistes like Jackie Leven and Malcolm Middleton. 9/10.

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                    #34
                    The big gig thread 2015 edition

                    steveeeeeeeee wrote: Stupid question, but what is the best way to find out in advance about gigs in London? I picked up a copy of Time Out last week and found it quite unfit for purpose. It seems to have become a listings magazine without any actual listings.
                    I can't think of a single comprehensive source for info such as NME/MM used to offer. As MsD suggests, information tends to arrive in a piecemeal fashion via email updates from venues, promoters and bands themselves or Facebook. How satisfactory this is depends upon how high your tolerance for sifting through those messages is. I quite like it for the off chance of coming across something interesting I didn't know about, others might find it a bit too spammy or time consuming. Narrowing the list down to some trusted providers can help.

                    imp wrote:
                    The McFan behind me wanted to let everyone know that he too was Scottish, and laughed loudly at everything the singer said in-between songs, as though he was the only one in on the joke, even when nothing at all funny was being said.
                    Interesting you mention this, imp: I've seen JY a couple of times and found a lot of the audience really quite off putting in ostentatiously showing that they 'get it' more than anyone else. To the forced laughter, add theatrical shhh-ing should anyone dare breathe or adjust their position while the great man is doing his thing.

                    Malcolm Middleton is ace but I much prefer him in plugged in mode.

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                      #35
                      The big gig thread 2015 edition

                      I suppose it counts as a 2015 gig, as they were on after midnight at the NYE gig I went to, but if you like your rock music with that garagey edge, then the Ming City Rockers are worth a bit of your time.

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                        #36
                        The big gig thread 2015 edition

                        Off to see...

                        Naked Lunch on Friday

                        Wolfgang Flur on Saturday

                        Vile Electrodes, Mesh and (separately) London Modular Alliance, the following Saturday

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                          #37
                          The big gig thread 2015 edition

                          Artist: Kraftwerk
                          Venue: Paradiso, Amsterdam
                          Tickets: 65.50 euro
                          Support: None
                          Drinks: One Affligem Blond bottled, two Heineken draft (because somebody else went to get beer, and I was stupid enough to not specify which beer I wanted).
                          Audience annoyance: The concert was sold out, and some of the audience members couldn't deal with so many people being there. Some were unreasonably angry with others (in the process disturbing everyone else around them including me) for talking during the concert, even though the volume was ramped up well enough. One muppet was filming an entire song with a smartphone, leaving the flashlight on for the whole time. Less an annoyance and more of a quirk: it was a 3D concert (i.e. accompanied by a 3D animation on a big screen behind the four gentlemen), so the entire crowd wore these weird 3D glasses.
                          The music: Well, you know Kraftwerk. This concert was the fifth in a series of eight consecutive nights at Paradiso. Every night consists of two sets: in the first set they play one particular album entirely, and in the second set they play a greatest hits compilation of the rest. This concert was the Computerwelt one, which was brilliant, since it allowed Kraftwerk to kick off with the heavy beat of Nummern to get the, otherwise possibly pretty static, crowd moving. Particularly pleasing was that they included not just the title track of Radio-Activitaet, but also Aetherwellen (for which they took a serious amount of time, which was nice) and Nachrichten, and that they found space for Elektro-Kardiogramm in the second encore. They didn't play Neonlicht, but I've heard from people that on other nights they occasionally left out Taschenrechner, so I think I had the better deal. 8/10.

                          Comment


                            #38
                            The big gig thread 2015 edition

                            Earth at the Occii, tomorrow.

                            Half-excited.

                            Comment


                              #39
                              The big gig thread 2015 edition

                              evilC wrote:
                              Wolfgang Flur on Saturday
                              I haven't come across him since that Yamo album he did with Mouse On Mars in the late '90s. Hope you report back on what his current thing is like.

                              Comment


                                #40
                                The big gig thread 2015 edition

                                Slug - The Social, 27th Jan
                                Clinic - Half Moon Putney, 31st Jan
                                Interpol - Roundhouse 7th Feb
                                Interpol - 17th Feb That There Forum
                                Krill - 25th February
                                Slug - Lexington April 27th
                                British Sea Power Roundhouse 13th June

                                Some of these are subject to the issuing of pink tickets from Mrs IronSeaPower.

                                Comment


                                  #41
                                  The big gig thread 2015 edition

                                  beak wrote: Earth at the Occii, tomorrow.

                                  Half-excited.
                                  Flaked out.

                                  Comment


                                    #42
                                    The big gig thread 2015 edition

                                    First of the year earlier this week for Funeral for a Friend, ostensibly to accompany the 16 year old Thing One, though I like them as much really and he got into them from my CDs (and its the third time we've seen them together, its an unlikely father-son bonding thing).

                                    There was no issue with age limits (him or me) but on the way in the bouncer looked at us both and said 'he's not going to be drinking is he', and my reply of 'of course not, he has to drive me home cos I am' deservedly fell flat on its arse.

                                    Enjoyment tempered slightly by the set including a lot of the new album - reasonably enough, but it only came out that day. Attendance figures hit somewhat by Slipknot and Korn playing less than a mile away at the same time.

                                    But Thing One got a photo with the lead shouter, who was next to us watching one of the support bands, and couldn't have been more pleasant.

                                    Nothing else for about a month.

                                    Comment


                                      #43
                                      The big gig thread 2015 edition

                                      I would just like to thank small caps for being the first person (finally, after a whole year) to adopt the correct formatting for 'big gig thread' reviews. The rest of you have a long way to go.

                                      Comment


                                        #44
                                        The big gig thread 2015 edition

                                        Saw Ian Dury's old band at a heaving TW Forum last night & the old public loo was bouncing. Only 4 original members now: Jankel, Watt-Roy, Gallagher and Turnbull. They've found a decent enough singer who doesn't pretend to be Dury but retains much of his style and attitude, and belted out the hits from their fantastic back-catalogue in style. You can't help but have a dance and singalong, even if it is quite funny seeing a bunch of old farts in the audience joining in with Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll.

                                        Even the newer tracks were fine, if a bit more in the Chas & Dave mould. Really recommend catching them live if you can before the grim reaper or care home catches up with the remaining originals.

                                        Comment


                                          #45
                                          The big gig thread 2015 edition

                                          I've been down the old 12 Bar today, which is.closed but being Occupied. Back tomorrow for a radio recording with the squatters.

                                          Many big names are getting involved with the Save Our Soho campaign now.

                                          We were going to go to the new 12 Bar tonight to see King Kurt but I couldn't quite muster the energy.

                                          Comment


                                            #46
                                            The big gig thread 2015 edition

                                            Benjm wrote:
                                            Originally posted by evilC
                                            Wolfgang Flur on Saturday
                                            I haven't come across him since that Yamo album he did with Mouse On Mars in the late '90s. Hope you report back on what his current thing is like.
                                            This!

                                            Comment


                                              #47
                                              The big gig thread 2015 edition

                                              Hahahaha

                                              That's fucking ghastly.
                                              It's like the school disco and the headmaster has taken over while the DJ has gone for a piss.

                                              Comment


                                                #48
                                                The big gig thread 2015 edition

                                                Calvert wrote: Hahahaha

                                                That's fucking ghastly.
                                                It's like the school disco and the headmaster has taken over while the DJ has gone for a piss.
                                                Yeah, only the young, the beautiful and the guitar-wielding allowed here!

                                                Comment


                                                  #49
                                                  The big gig thread 2015 edition

                                                  Hey, don't mess with our ageing synth legends, Calvert, or you might find yourself passing on our personal regards to Edgar Froese.

                                                  I'm not 100% convinced by Wolfgang's turn there. I might be biased though having thought that he came across as a bit of a knob in I Was A Robot. Seeing the music performed away from Kraftwerk is interesting as a reminder of how theatrical their presentation is and the illusion they create that it has to be done that way.

                                                  Comment


                                                    #50
                                                    The big gig thread 2015 edition

                                                    steveeeeeeeee wrote: Stupid question, but what is the best way to find out in advance about gigs in London? I picked up a copy of Time Out last week and found it quite unfit for purpose. It seems to have become a listings magazine without any actual listings.
                                                    There's a website called Songkick.com (also an app) which allows you to input a list of bands you like and they'll send alerts and emails when any of them are playing in your city.

                                                    I went from watching 2-3 gigs a year to watching 15-20 gigs a year since signing up with them (and it's free). No I don't work for them.

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