Posts Tagged ‘ gigbeth ’

Mayday Art Crawl in Digbeth

Or thereabouts; time-wise it's not May Day it's this Friday (the 1st of May) but it is in Digbeth. Three gallery openings on one night, all nicely timed so you can see all of them — and then sod off to the pub. Getgood has the sp:

Gigbeth Feedback

I’ve been mulling over Gigbeth. Here’s the thing, as you can see and read, I enjoyed Gigbeth. I like watching music, having a pint, being out with mates. I can happily tick the Sugar Hill Gang off my list of bands I wanted to see. I’m so glad that Musical Youth are happy and not bitter has-beens. It’s good, in places, but it’s not great. As Ringo Starr might say, I offer this feedback in “peace and love” and hope that the constructive criticism herein is taken in the spirit in which it’s meant (which is to improve the thing, not to knock it):

Gigbeth Links Round-up

So far there’s: Pete Ashton playing with his Thingamigoop video. Photos starting to appear on Flickr — the most recent should be here. Gigbeth tweets. Listen again on Rhubarb Radio site. Complete the survey. Nicky Getgood writes about everything Digbeth, and hence Gigbeth. She’s also found more links… Big Cat Henry on Young Knives & Guillemots Bobbie Gardner on the conference and its party. More if and when we spot them, please add to the comments.

So to Gigbeth on Saturday. The weather outside was frightful, was the line-up delightful? Well there were enough interesting-sounding acts, and seeing more than one band would be an improvement over yesterday. The 4Talent stage started with a bonus half an hour from Pete Ashton and The Thingamigoops, they’ve got one great song — don’t know the name, we’ll call it the one that goes “widdly widdly widdly weeeeep” — and it can sustain 30 minutes. I’m a big fan of the little one, he should go solo. Rich Batsford had the bonus of a crowd bolstered by people arriving to see the (metal, judging by the fans’ appearance) band on downstairs who were locked out of the room (and in a masterpiece of planning all of the blokes’ toilets in the building). He managed to captivate them with nothing more than his piano and good nature, despite the fact that contemplative and mellow probably wasn’t their reason for turning up. Bizarrely, one guy liked Rich enough to be intently taking photos, but not enough to listen — he’d got his iPod on and turned right up. Maybe he’s got a thing for beards. I hated Iain Woods and...

We didn’t get to see much at Gigbeth on Friday, our stupidity was the problem. But stupidity driven by the pace of technological change. We’d got those fancy QR Code tickets sent to Jules’s mobile phone. She then went and bought an iPhone, losing all the texts. We were ready with our boots blacked, then had to spent a good hour finding confirmation emails and printing out the little pictures to take with us. We were cheered up by one of the codes looking like a monkey’s face (or Andrew Marr in a new BBC political journalists version of Planet of the Apes for Children in Need): Then we got there and the guys on the door hadn’t a clue what to do with the QR Codes anyway, but they found our names on a list and were lovely — and agreed that ours did indeed look like a monkey. The Custard Factory area looked pretty deserted when we arrived, so I’m guessing everyone was ensconced watching the Gulliemots, but we really wanted to see the Young Knives so to the Sanctuary we went. We must have arrived at a bad time as there were no bands in any...

And it’s this Friday and Saturday, in Digbeth. It’s difficult to pick out bands or acts without prior knowledge, so we originally did our myspace marathon and tried to pick out a few to see. There are definitely less acts this year (down to a day less of gigs I suppose), unless there are some not listed and linked. All the info available is on the Gigbeth site – you can see the programme spread across the venues, what happened to the outdoor stage at millenium point (or did I dream it)? Worthy of your attention seems to be a free shindig featuring the Destroyers and Musical Youth at South Birmingham College on Saturday night, and also the slightly left-field line-up collated by 4Talent for the Dragon Bar (front bar second floor) of the Sanctury. As well as Brummie krautrock heroes Einstellung (pictured here waiting for the toilet in the Custard Factory) there’s a full set by Rich Batsford performing his Valentine Court album (currently available as a free download from his site) and The Keyboard Choir who sound top. Highlight of that stage should be the caberet electronica stylins of Mr Pete Ashton (second place in last year’s...

Gigbeth 2008 – myspace marathon

Last year before Gigbeth, we did this. “This” consisted of having a quick shuftee at the myspace page of every act that was listed, listening to what we found and “reviewing” the bands based on only that. Quickly — no second goes, no in-depth research. This, we found, means we’ll be honest, without sparing feelings — the only way to judge music. When we saw the bands (those that we managed to hunt out) we weren’t always right, but that isn’t really the point. At the very least it’s a collection of links all in one place, your opinions won’t match ours – go listen for yourself (and tell us what you think…). So, barring falling prey to the photo-sensitive epilepsy that myspace can induce, here we go:

The youth of Saturday 8th October at Millennium Point

I’ve just noticed that the Gigbeth line up/stages times programme is starting to take shape — and points to Musical Youth on the Saturday evening. Yay. Glad that the area covered seems to be more compact this year, and that times are a little less fuzzy – you can start planning now. I also hear that the Ticket Shop at the base of the Rotunda will again be selling tickets, last year this was the place to go to get them without a booking fee.

Gigbeth blog rumblings

Over on the Gigbeth blog they've took a rather harsh line on what I considered to be a quick witisism by Midge Diabolik. He made a quick quip about D:Ream – they got a bit defensive. When you're programming a deliberately diverse music event it's obvious that not everybody will like everything that's on – and catty remarks about bands you find distasteful is probably the mainstay of the British music press. So I'm surprised that they're suprised really. I'm really looking forward to the Young Knives, but find Guillemots boring. I'm excited by the Sugarhill Gang, but non-plussed by the revival of D:Ream. That's how it goes. Btw Gigbeth dudes and dudettes, there's something wrong with your WordPress installation — probably to do with where the site thinks the blog is installed (hence links and pages are up the spout) drop us a line if you'd like a bit of help.

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Posts Tagged ‘ gigbeth ’

Mayday Art Crawl in Digbeth

Gigbeth Feedback

Gigbeth Links Round-up

Thingamigoops can only get better

Sharpening Knives

Gigbeth, it’s some gigs, in Digbeth

Gigbeth 2008 – myspace marathon

The youth of Saturday 8th October at Millennium Point

Gigbeth blog rumblings

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