Birmingham: It's Not Shit

Friday Photo By Karen Strunks

Radisson Hotel, Birmingham by Karen Strunks

You don’t have to be posh to see Privilege

The Flatpack Festival draws out another gem with a screening of Privilege —  on 16mm at Ikon Eastside on Sunday 15 March. The film is a 1967 exploration of the power of fame, and has depth and darkness not quite communicated in the poster:

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Steven Shorter is a pop phenomenon, and his management use him to further all sorts of causes. So far so real — but this pop star is from Birmingham. And the film was shot in part in Brum, including at St Andrews. Not to be missed.

There’s parallels here with Slade’s master-work Slade in Flame, but that disappointingly was shot oop north as Dudley’s grit wasn’t quite filmic enough.

Keep Digbeth Friendly

Long preamble to this, but bear with us, it (like all good things do) ends in a song. Here’s what happened:

• Some people decided to do a Birmingham Twitter Festival.
• Craig Friends of the Stars offered the band’s services as cover artistes as a raffle prize.
• Nicky Getgood won that prize.
• Nicky is obsessed with all things Irish and Digbeth.
• So she, rather inevitably, chose a traditional Irish song (her favourite, Black Velvet Band) — but being a Brummie, couldn’t let the opportunity to do something special pass.
• She “butchered the lyrics to reflect the recent Noise Abatement Order problems suffered by The Spotted Dog and The Rainbow“. (Can you pop them online somewhere please, so we can sing along?)
• And then Craig et al recorded up a storm. A folky storm.
• And then Nicky put it online and intends to get copies everywhere for the traditional Birmingham green guinness fest in March.

I’m not a Irish music fan normally, but this version isn’t all fiddles and yelping it’s smooth and ragged in just the right places. I suggest you play it loud, with due consideration for others. And go and check out the band’s other stuff too.

Friends of the Stars – Black Velvet Band

Additional Lyrics by Nicky Getgood
Arrangement by Friends of the Stars
Recorded in Birmingham and Glasgow in Feb 2009 by Friends of the Stars
Anna Russell – Vocals
Campbell Docherty – Bass, Electric Guitar, Backing Vocals
Craig Hamiltion – Vocals, Acoustic Guitar
Piano kindly played by Rich Batsford

Convention on Modern Liberty Event in Brum Sat 28/2

The Convention on Modern Liberty will be holding a half-day satellite event this Saturday, 28th Feb 2009 at Aston University. NO2ID is involved in this major nationwide event. [link]

Shefali by Craig Holmes

For the weather presenter fans amongst you, photos that "can be used for everything from web sites to books" – are we going to see shefali.com or an autobiography? Only time will tell. [link]

Photospace Flash Swap

This is good, but complicated. So take a look at the flyer and read this (copied from editorialgirl):

What? Where? When?

Photographers of all abilities are invited to bring their work along to exhibit at a spontaneous, free event at the Custard Factory on Saturday 21 March. But there’s a twist. Everything exhibited can be offered as a swap.

Whether your photo has been created lovingly in the darkroom, digitally manipulated or just snapped on the run, everyone who brings a print will have the opportunity to swap their work for that of another photographer. It’s a great chance to show your work off to an appreciative audience, as publicly or anonymously as you like – and to pick up some unique, locally produced art for yourself.

How Does It Work?

Simple. For every print you bring to give away, you will be able to take another from the exhibition in return.

To take part, bring your images to the Vaad Gallery in the Custard Factory (next to the Medicine Bar), between 11am and 4pm on Saturday 21 March. Your prints will be exhibited in the Gallery for the whole of Saturday, when you’ll get the chance to meet other photographers and choose a print for yourself. At 5pm we’ll have an official launch – we’ll tell you a bit more about what we’re doing to try and make a Photospace happen; you’ll get a free drink! – and then from 7pm you can take your new piece of artwork home.

If you’re just interested in supporting the idea of a Birmingham Photospace, but don’t want to swap prints, do come along to see the exhibition anyway and show your support.

And if you can’t make it to the Flash Swap, but still want to help, follow the Birmingham Photospace blog and spread the word about a permanent space for photography in Birmingham. If you can help us to find funding, or have any other bright ideas for ways to make it happen, all the better!

Jury Service

Reg Eccles was chosen out of 100 people as a juror at the Birmingham pub bombings trial in the summer of 1975. Here’s an interview, longer than the version that made it to Radio 4’s PM. [link]

It's over for the Rainbow — Joss Stone is playing there

From the Baron: "International soul legend Joss Stone – yes…THE Joss Stone…the 10million album selling Grammy award winning Joss Stone…is playing The Rainbow on Monday 23rd February. This ain't a wind up…it's (as far as I can tell) a low key warm up gig to début tracks from her as yet untitled new album." Tickets still available from TicketWeb her says. [link]

Apostrophe Mountain

#365 – i’ve discovered where birminghames apostrophes have gone, originally uploaded by star-one.

Simon has discovered where Birmingham’s apostrophes have gone.

At the end of the Rainbow there’s a crock of shit

I really like The Rainbow — a pub always slightly further up Digbeth High Street than you think it is. I like it when there are bands I like on, I also like it when it’s quiet. It’s quiet in the day a lot, which musn’t make much dosh and it really makes all its money from being what it is — a fantastic live music venue.

The Rainbow, Deritend on flickr by Albert S. Bite

And that’s the problem it seems. It’s too loud and a (that’s right 1 – reportedly) complaint has been made to Birmingham City Council Environmental Health. But it’s enough to threaten the place with closure. Nicky Digbeth has the full sp.

Look at the picture, does the pub look near to anything that might be affected by any amount of noise? Look at this overhead view:

Uploaded with plasq’s Skitch!

To the rear (north-ish) of the pub, a warehouse run by the pub, to the west, east: mostly closed commercial premises [EDIT seems the car showroom to the east is open - take that recession] (which wouldn’t be open at night when the music was on anyway). To the south; a wide dual carriageway and one of those ’store the junk you’ve acquired’ places [EDIT, that's a bit up the road, there's a furniture shop & other stuff too]. I’ve not got a noise-ometer, but it’s a fair bet that night-time noise doesn’t harm the operations of these things. The nearest residential development is (by estimate) 250 metres away, and is on the other side of some hefty buildings.

Here’s the science bit*: “In a normal three dimensional setting, the intensity of sound waves will be attenuated according to the inverse square of the distance from the source” Which by my calculation (oh alright then I used this website) means that if the bands in the rainbow were at 100dB in the back of the pub (estimated from here), it would at the most (given no walls in the way, and no air dampening) be 46.02dB 250 meters away. The Noise Abatement Society says a library is normally 35 decibels, Traffic at 50km/h: 60-80 decibels. There’s a big road in between the Rainbow and the flats in question.

Doesn’t sound so loud all of a sudden, does it?

Here’s the rational thinking person’s view**: It’s baffling that someone would buy a residence that was sold to them as being in a ‘vibrant city centre location’ and then bitch when they realise the vibrancy doesn’t work 9 to 5 hours!. Birmingham regulars will have seen this depressing tale unfold before in the late 90’s with Jazz/Blues live venue The Fiddle and Bone, unfortunately many letters to MP’s and the press came to nought and now that place now stands like some beer themed Marie Celeste.

So, any lawyers care to help Digbeth retain it’s vibrancy?

*look, this might all be nonsence, I’m guessing and using the web.

**okay it’s Midge, but he’s right.