London here we come!

This Thursday sees us play what is probably our biggest gig to date. We’re playing main support to the staggering Australian singer/songwriter Rory Ellis at the famous Half Moon in Putney.

Rory is a guy I (Phil) have known for a while through my folk connections, and met up with him on his first ever tour over here about 6 years ago – where he played a 30 minute set in-between two acts from a local acoustic guy at the back of a tiny pub in Newbury. Suffice to say the local talent got absolutely blown off the stage by Rory’s sheer power and emotive songwriting – I can’t imagine he was invited back!

He’s since gone on to gain quite a reputation for himself in this country, generally heading over here for the summer months and playing all over the place. He’s a guy who needs to be heard. Without a doubt the finest talent I’ve ever had the pleasure of ‘discovering’ through a CD sent to my house for review. Not only that, an absolutely brilliant bloke, full of stories.

This gig then is big for us in two ways. It is the first of a couple of main artist support slots we’ve got in the next few weeks (the other being nu-folk songstress Lisa Knapp on June 14th), which is a position we were looking to get in to around the time of the album coming out – which is great. The second reason is because of the venue. The Half Moon marks a step up in class for us. A venue synonymous with top quality intimate acoustic performances from the very best artists on the scene, both from the UK and from across the world. Acts like Billy Bragg, Eddi Reader, Show of Hands, Nick Cave, Paul Brady and KT Tunstall have all played there in the last few years – so it’s a bit special to be joining that calibre of act to play on that stage.

These are the sort of venues where we absolutely have to make a good impression on both the promoter (for re-bookings and recommendations) and also the paying punters who will visit here expecting the standard of act to be very high. This is the sort of venue where a band like us, who have been playing everywhere we possibly can over the last year or so need to aspire to headlining one day and its up to us on Thursday to put in a performance worthy of the venue. Hopefully a good reception to that and the album might go some way in making a headline appearance happen somewhere down the line!

So – for anyone wishing to see this momentous occasion, tickets are available by visiting the Half Moon website.

A month to go...

With the launch growing nearer and ticket sales growing larger we're all getting quite excited about getting out tonight to start gigging again. We've had a bit of a quiet few weeks, largely due to my holidaying obsession visiting Cyprus, Dublin and Greece all in the space of 6 weeks – but we're now all in the country and here to stay for a good couple of months at least!

We had our 1st get together as a 5-piece for the first time in aaaages on Tuesday night, which was thoroughly enjoyable! We all got together, had a good old chin wag and ate rum cake before knuckling down to rehearse the set, reminding ourselves of our own material! We also had a bit of a mini jam, hoping to get something new together for you guys to enjoy listening to this Summer.

So – business as usual seems to be the way forward for the foreseeable future. Thanks to all of you who have purchased tickets already, and for those of you who haven't – get booking! It's going to be a cracking night for all included, so make yourself a part of it!

And... for those of you joining us in Godalming this eve – we look forward to seeing you.

The point of no return

On friday we finally took the plunge and, in the first step towards making the album available to all of you lovely people, we uploaded it to ReverbNation so that they can submit it to a number of digital download sites, including iTunes and Amazon mp3.

Yup, that's right - the album is all mixed, mastered and ready to go, and now there's no turning back - what will be the final version is currently working its way around cyberspace in anticipation of the release on the 15th June!

To celebrate, we have decided to make three of the tracks available for you to listen to on Myspace, ReverbNation and last.fm. These are just a taster to whet your appetite, and will only be available until the album is launched, so make the most of it while you can!

A bit of a news update

A quick one to keep you up to date with what we're doing in the near future - we've just been confirmed as playing at the Halfmoon Putney's Unplugged night on 20th July, and in the next few weeks we're playing Susie Clarke's "Living Room Players" night at The Star, Godalming on 14th May, supporting Rory Ellis, again at the Halfmoon Putney on 21st May, Gostrey Meadow Charity Fair in Farnham on the 6th June and supporting Lisa Knapp at The Wilde Theatre, Bracknell on 14th June.

Not forgetting, of course, our Album Launch on the 12th June at Jagz, Ascot, tickets are on sale now, and are flying off the shelves (as it were), so be sure to get yours soon - either from any of us or through our website or Myspace. Tickets are £6, or you can grab yourself a bargain by pre-ordering an album at the same time for just £10 for the two.

Read All About It

Well, everyone has gone on holiday…...again. Emma is in Greece for her bi-monthly sun and alcohol excursion, Ben is in the Caribbean making sure he stays far enough away from the beach so Greenpeace don’t come running and Adrian is camping – at work. He’s just taken over as manager of The Bull in Bracknell but doesn’t have any staff. So it’s 12 hour shifts and then a retreat back to his 2 man pop up situated between the Guinness Extra Cold and the Speciality Ales which I believe this week include Skinners – a nice pint.

So, it’s left to me (Phil) and Gethin to keep things ticking over and it’s album mastering and press blurb this week. Writing a press release about your own band is tougher than you might think. Yeah, it’s easy to write about the band and whole album process but a much harder task to actually make it interesting. It’s one of those things where its interesting to the people involved, but pretty dull to those who aren’t, and are just reading it on a page (similar to this blog at times!). The problem when you write a press release is, if it isn’t full of quotes and a mountain of information you get journalists on the blower asking you questions every 10 minutes – but if it is a well written document with lots of info and quotes, they basically just do a bit of cut and paste and suddenly you’ve just done their job for them!

I’m confident though that the one we’ve put together will mean a bit of ‘creative freedom’ for anyone wishing to do a feature on us, which brings up a whole new problem! Who wants to do a feature on a local band?

Sure, we are getting a few good slots further afield these days and people are legitimately interested in what we are doing and the music we are making, which is great – however, until someone tells us otherwise or we have enough money and supportive bosses (not likely) to actually tour the country, we are still a local band. And who wants to write about them? So far we’ve lined up a further radio slot which is great, but isn’t until August and also a feature in the local rag The Bracknell News, which again we are very happy about – but we’re kind of looking for a bit more……and it isn’t through lack of trying either. You can kind of see their point, but it’s extremely frustrating as these are the people we need to help spread the word.

So this week its all hands on deck with regards getting a few more people to actually write about us, feature us and generally get the name out there. It’ll be a slow process and I don’t think any of us will actually expect to see the album reviewed in the June edition of Mojo or anything – but you have to try and start somewhere….

Its All Getting Complicated.......

We are having worries. No, don't worry, the recent economic strife hasn't run us into ruin, we don't need a government bailout (although I wouldn't complain) and haven't been rendered immobile by Swine Flu. Although, as Phil is spending his time pointing out to me, I'm going on holiday tomorrow and getting rather close to the source of all this. Eeep.

Anyway, we are having worries. What with the album launch coming up, which is the 12th of June at Jagz in Ascot, we are undergoing a pretty major transformation. Before, we ran the simple band business plan of just turning up at rehearsal, turning up at gigs and where possible recording. Now, however, we are undergoing the slightly odd process of turning into what has been a hobby project, don't get us wrong a very serious hobby project, into a business. Signing up with royalty collection companies, figuring out business plans, distribution channels and all the rest of it. It is very confusing.

Still, as per usual, Google, Gethin and Phil have combined to create some triforce of brilliance. Distribution channels are emerging, we have received the mock ups of CDs to go full steam ahead with them, royalty agencies are being joined and insurance is being sorted. It is a rather large learning curve, but as usual we will endure and succeed. We will....

What not to wear?

Some days it seems that what you wear says more about you as a band than anything else. Music? Don't be so silly, it's all about the shirt. Or possibly, as suggested on The Guardian Music Blog, the jeans. If that is the case, then we're a bit screwed to be honest - our band 'uniform' is jeans and black shirts (although Emma gets to wear whatever she wants, as she has more fashion sense than the rest of us combined!). So, unless we can join the ranks of Mötorhead and Status Quo, singled out by the Guardian article as the two bands who wear jeans and "are not s**t", it would appear we're destined to burn forever in music hell...

So, do clothes actually matter? If The Levellers gig that me, Phil and Emma went to on Saturday is anything to go by, people don't really care that much! The crowd, as might be expected, had quite a few beards (ok, technically not clothes), a fair number of scruffy waistcoats, and a LOT of ripped jeans. Nothing particularly out of the ordinary. So how about the bands? Well, first up we had Hobo Jones and The Junkyard Dogs. The only way I can really describe their outfits is some combination of pirates and farmers - a bit odd, but not that out of place, considering the gig... Up next, Pama International. They walk on stage and, shock horror, they're all wearing suits. The audience seem slightly confused. But then they start playing a very tight set of Specials-esque Ska/Dub/Reggae, and no-one really cares - they're all enjoying the music (or at least enjoying the cider anyway). And how about the headline act, The Levellers? Well, needless to say, they were all wearing jeans...

So, for now anyway, we think we're going to stick with our combination of jeans and black shirts - it might be a bit dull, but it seems to have worked for enough bands in the past, and we reckon that our energies are much better directed to entertaining you with our music! And you never know, if you come along to the album launch we might even splash out and wear some brown...